Plains Song by Wright Morris

her hair wild, her blouse forever unbuttoned, so vibrantly alive to think of her as dead was unthinkable. At night Cora listened for the snap of the twigs and the drag of her dress as she approached the porch. If Cora lifted Sharon Rose, she would hear Belle cry, “I’ll take her! I’ll take her!” since it was known she resisted Cora. But with Belle gone it seemed to Cora that Sharon Rose made less fuss.
    Nothing would persuade Cora to terrify the little girls with the caged wild animals at a circus, but against her better judgment she went with Orion and Anna Pilic—Emerson scoffed at the thought of it—to the Chautauqua in Nehigh. In the dark of the tent, hung with smoking lanterns, she saw scenes from
Uncle Tom’s Cabin,
Little Eva, to Cora’s great relief, escaping from Simon Legree across the blocks of ice. (She did it on a rope that swung her, like an angel, from one bank of the river to the other.) Anna Pilic was so excited she sometimes put both hands to her eyes. Sharon Rose and Madge observed it all in silence, Sharon’s eyes as bright as candles. Neither slept a wink on the long ride home, the night filled with the creak of the buggy, the clop-clop of the horse.
    For days Cora was distracted with the thought of a world so near, yet so far. The only black woman she had ever set eyes on had been in Omaha, near where they crossed the river. Cora had little desire to see more than she had already seen, or feel more than she had already felt. The crowding of so many people into one great tent had been more disquieting than pleasurable,with the squealing of the boys and girls under the seats like mice in a shaken basket of cobs.
    Anna Pilic was good with the little girls, but her strange speech troubled Cora. When she spoke to them, what was she saying? Sharon Rose often prattled it back. When Anna sang to them, Cora listened, pondering what she heard. Anna’s love of music touched her, and brought to Cora’s mind pleasures she had forgotten. Singing need not be confined to the church, but might be played and enjoyed in the home. The wife of her uncle, in Ohio, owned and played a foot-pedaled pump organ. In the catalogues Cora browsed in, when she had a moment, both pianos and organs were offered for sale that would play by themselves or could be played on the keys in the ordinary manner. She spent weeks wondering just where in the house it should sit. The living room offered a corner, free of windows, where it might sit at an angle facing the listeners. Both Orion and Emerson might be encouraged to spend more time there. Nor did she consult Emerson in this matter, since she would make the purchase with her own egg and butter income. That would help explain why, when it arrived, so little thought had been given as to how to get it into the house. The unused door at the front had to be taken off its hinges, and a ramp built to slide the piano from the wagon. Orion supervised the move, in Emerson’s absence, and was the first to sit on the stool that came with it, and puzzle over the directions. He was mechanically minded, if not musical. Ten player rolls had come with it, in their boxes with the labels, and beforeEmerson had come in from the field and paused at the barn to ponder what he was hearing, Anna Pilic had mastered the art of sitting on the stool seat while pedaling, and reversing the music to the point where it started. The volume proved to be deafening. Cora had left the house to let the breeze cool her flushed face. In the outdoors it was less alarming, and she could give attention to what she was hearing. Where had she heard it before? Her mouth went dry and her eyes filmed over, as they did when listening to hymns. She did not fully grasp what she had done until she saw Emerson transfixed at the barn door, assuring her that for a family limited to girls she had chosen right.
    As he did when bewildered, Emerson stood gazing at the swallow-streaked sky. He liked