【正文】 l hear the flames and feel Maggie39。 a look at concentration on her face as she watched the last dingy gray board of the house tall in toward the redhot brick chimney. Why don39。d wanted to ask her. She had hated the house that much.　　I used to think she hated Maggie, too. But that was before we raised the money, the church and me, to send her to Augusta to school. She used to read to us without pity, forcing words, lies, other folks39。t necessarily need to know. Pressed us to her with the serious way she read, to shove us away at just the moment, like dimwits, we seemed about to understand.　　Dee wanted nice things. A yellow organdy dress to wear to her graduation from high school。d made from an old suit somebody gave me. She was determined to stare down any disaster in her efforts. Her eyelids would not flicker for minutes at a time. Often I fought off the temptation to shake her. At sixteen she had a style of her own39。t ask me why. in 1927 colored asked fewer questions than they do now. Sometimes Maggie reads to me. She stumbles along goodnaturedly but can39。ll be free to sit here and I guess just sing church songs to myself. Although I never was a good singer. Never could carry a tune. I was always better at a man39。49. Cows are soothing and slow and don39。t make shingle roofs any more. There are no real windows, just some holes cut in the sides, like the portholes in a ship, but not round and not square, with rawhide holding the shutter s up on the outside. This house is in a pasture, too, like the other one. No doubt when Dee sees it she will want to tear it down. She wrote me once that no matter where we choose to live, she will manage to e see us. But she will never bring her friends. Maggie and I thought about this and Maggie asked me, Mama, when did Dee ever have any friends?　　She had a few. Furtive boys in pink shirts hanging about on washday after school. Nervous girls who never laughed. Impressed with her they worshiped the wellturned phrase, the cute shape, the scalding humor that erupted like bubbles in lye. She read to them.　　When she was courting Jimmy T she didn39。s hair. It stands straight up like the wool on a sheep. It is black as night and around the edges are two long pigtails that rope about like small lizards disappearing behind her ears.　　WasuzoTeano! she says, ing on in that gliding way the dress makes her move. The short stocky fellow with the hair to his navel is all grinning and he follows up with Asalamalakim, my mother and sister! He moves to hug Maggie but she falls back, right up against the back of my chair. I feel her trembling there and when I look up I see the perspiration falling off her chin.　　Don39。s hand. Maggie39。t know how people shake hands. Anyhow, he soon gives up on Maggie.　　Well, I say. Dee.　　No, Mama, she says. Not 39。, Wangero Leewanika Kemanjo!　　What happened to 39。? I wanted to know.　　She39。t bear it any longer, being named after the people who oppress me.　　You know as well as me you was named after your aunt Dicle, I said. Dicie is my sister. She named Dee. We called her Big Dee after Dee was born.　　But who was she named after? asked Wangero.　　I guess after Grandma Dee, I said.　　And who was she named after? asked Wangero.　　Her mother, I said, and saw Wangero was getting tired. That39。Dicie39。t have to call me by it if you don39。t I? I asked. If that39。ll call you. 　　I know it might sound awkward at first, said Wangero.　　I39。t really think he was, so I don39。t Shake hands. Always too busy feeding the cattle, fixing the fences, putting up saltlick shelters, throwing down hay. When the white folks poisoned some of the herd the men stayed up all night with rifles in their hands. I walked a mile and a half just to see the sight.　　Hakimabarber said, I accept some of their doctrines, but farming and raising cattle is not my style. (They didn39。t ask, whether Wangero (Dee) had really gone and married him.)　　We sat down to eat and right away he said he didn39。t afford to buy chairs.　　Oh, Mama! she cried. Then turned to Hakimabarber. I never knew how lovely these benches are. You can feel the rump prints, she said, running her hands underneath her and along the bench. Then she gave a sigh and her hand closed over Grandma Dee39。s it! she said. I knew there was something I wanted to ask you if I could have. She jumped up from the table and went over in the corner where the churn stood, the milk in it clabber by now. She looked at the churn and looked at it.　　This churn top is what I need, she said. Didn39。s first husband whittled the dash, said Maggie so low you almost couldn39。s brain is like an elephants, Wanglero said, laughing. I can use the churn top as a center piece for the alcove table,”she said, sliding a plate over the churn, and I39。t even have to look close to see where hands pushing the dasher up and down to make butter had left a kind of sink in the wood. In fact, there were a lot of small sinks。s Paisley shirts. And one teeny faded blue piece, about the size of a penny matchbox, that was from Great Grandpa Ezra39。t you take one or two of the others?” 1 asked. These old things was just done by me and Big Dee from some tops your grandma pieced before she died.　　No, said Wangero. I don39。ll make them last better, I said.　　That39。t reach the quilts. They already belonged to her. Imagine! she breathed again, clutching them closely to her bosom.　　The truth is, I said, I promised to give them quilts to Maggie, for