About this story
Mrs. Davis and stern Hester Prime carry you through the funeral while the town debates, in your hearing, what your mother's life proved and where a fatherless child so poor should go. No household has room to keep you for love. At a meeting that treats you as barely present, Hester Prime calls taking you in a duty, not an affection.
How it opens
Winter dawn entered the poorest street in Dexter through thawing snow and soot.
Melissa DavisMargaret is gone, but her little boy slept through the final hour.
Neighbors found reasons to return to living husbands, breakfasts, and washing.
Duty does not disappear because the dead can no longer thank us.
Melissa DavisFreddie, come here; there is something you must understand gently.
Choose
Why will Mother not wake when the room is cold?
I want to wait here until Mother speaks.