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noises.
    That afternoon late Thomas Pittman was laid out somewhere in the house. Caroline and Walker decided that his heart burst. Caroline had come upon him she told people lying face down in a cotton row.
    That night Walker and his brother Julius sitting on the back steps smoking and talking decided to bury Thomas Pittman out beyond the kitchen beside the woods.
    Word was taken by Ross to Mr Saunders to please lend two of his slaves to dig the grave at first light. From the back porchthere was clear sight of them the next morning digging beyond the kitchen toward the woods. Their shirts were off and by the time the sun was on them they glistened.
    Thomas Pittman was buried in a pine coffin made by Richard Stott. Richard let them use one he had made for his father who was lingering.

    This is how the graveyard was started one summer.
Then in October, on the second full moon
—
that is, a blue moon
—
as the day died after sunset, but before dark, there gradually appeared the outline of Thomas Pittman rocking in a rocking chair beside his grave. And as he’s been joined by others there in the graveyard beyond where the kitchen once stood, I, on blue moons, have seen and heard
—
still see and hear
—
them all.

BLISS
    At around lunchtime everybody started stopping work. I walked with Aunt Scrap over to the clearing between the graveyard and wisteria vine, where people were spreading blankets and quilts on the ground. Aunt Scrap took me into the edge of the woods and ran her rake softly across the pine straw. “See, you can still see where the cotton rows were.” And there on the ground among the tall pine trees: gentle, undulating rows beneath the thick copper-colored pine straw.
    Now that would have been something to give a report on in school.
    Thatcher walked up. I grabbed his hand, which was rough from the work he’d been doing. Thatcher has very manly hands anyway. He works for Strong Pull Construction, and will eventually become a crane operator. It’s been his lifelong dream.
    Dan Braddock, sitting on the tailgate of Mr. Copeland’s jeep truck, said to Aunt Scrap, who was getting food outof a basket in the truck bed, ‘Ain’t it so, Aunt Scrap?”
    â€œWhat’s that?”
    â€œAbout Hawk. Nigger woman nursing him and a pickaninny at the same time.”
    â€œAunt Ricka, won’t it? Some kin to that Zuba.”
    â€œI don’t remember it,” said Uncle Hawk.
    â€œYou ought to,” said Mr. Copeland. He looked at me. I had just sat down on a blanket. “Hawk was so old before he stopped nursing, Mama told him if he’d just please stop, he could start smoking cigarettes.”
    Everybody laughed.
    â€œWho was Zuba?” I asked Thatcher, who had just sat down beside me.
    â€œNigger man used to live on the place. He got hung with a stretch of wisteria vine for murdering a little girl. That same vine I reckon.”
    I was shocked to my toes.
    Aunt Scrap handed me a ham-and-biscuit.
    It was a joyous and merry occasion. The sun was bright through the lofty pines and we were in the cool shade drinking iced tea and eating lovely picnic food.

NORALEE
    I like the graveyard. You can’t step on the graves, but a dog gets on one and Aunt Scrap hollers.
    Papa asks me if I can remember coming last year and I can. There is a little rock angel on Loretta’s grave. Loretta was my grandma but I never saw her when she was alive. They talk about Loretta and the baby fingers. Then they talk about that rock pile and Meredith carries me down there on his shoulders.
    Mr. Braddock talks about niggers. Mama says not to say nigger but everybody else does except Mama and Bliss.
    Mr. Braddock is fat.
    Then we eat.
    Aunt Scrap has a surprise for me in her pocket. She always does. It’s a piece of candy, but she says I can’t eat it until after lunch. She hollers at Fox. Fox is Meredith’s home dog. He’s black and last time at the