realized her mistake, and promised to retrieve it during the week; but the week was full of planning and journeying and talking.
Saturday dawned cool and clear. She had dinner prepared for cooking in the yard: sweet potatoes, hoecake, and buttermilk, and a hog to be barbecued. Everything was ready by eight o’clock in the morning. Emma and two other girl helpers were on the tiptoe of expectancy. Nine o’clock came and no one with it. Ten o’clock came, and eleven. High noon found Zora peering down the highway under her shading hand, but no soul in sight. She tried to think it out: what could have happened? Her people were slow, tardy, but they would not thus forget her and disappoint her without some great cause. She sent the girls home at dusk and then seated herself miserably under the great oak; then at last one half-grown boy hurried by.
“I wanted to come, Miss Zora, but I was afeared. Preacher Jones has been talking everywhere against you. He says that your mother was a voodoo woman and that you don’t believe in God, and the deacons voted that the members mustn’t help you.”
“And do the people believe that?” she asked in consternation.
‚ÄúThey just don‚Äôt know what to say. They don‚Äôt ‚Äôzactly believe it, but they has to ‚Äôlow that you didn‚Äôt say much ‚Äôbout religion when you talked. You ain‚Äôt been near Big Meetin‚Äô‚ÅÝ‚Äîand‚ÅÝ‚Äîand‚ÅÝ‚Äîyou ain‚Äôt saved.‚Äù He hurried on.
Zora leaned her head back wearily, watching the laced black branches where the starlight flickered through‚ÅÝ‚Äîas coldly still and immovable as she had watched them from those gnarled roots all her life‚ÅÝ‚Äîand she murmured bitterly the world-old question of despair: ‚ÄúWhat‚Äôs the use?‚Äù It seemed to her that every breeze and branch was instinct with sympathy, and murmuring, ‚ÄúWhat‚Äôs the use?‚Äù She wondered vaguely why, and as she wondered, she knew.