"Thank you all for coming in this terrible weather. I think it is a measure of Kansas sympathy that everyone here managed to show."

They were told to sing. Dorothy tried to look behind her at the people singing and was turned around. Then they said a prayer. Dorothy had to make sure that Aunty Em heard her say the words. It was one of the worst things Aunty Em had found out when she came, that Dorothy did not know her prayers.

The power and the glory

Forever an never

Hay men.

Dorothy didn't know what they meant.

Then the Preacher spoke.

"This is the saddest of occasions," he said. "The death of a young man in a way that in a less generous community would have precluded Christian interment. It is something that is hard for all of us to face, most especially his parents, who must be wondering how and why they failed him. All of us share that sense of having failed. I knew Wilbur Frederick Jewell as a boy and as a young fellow approaching manhood and knew him to be a well-mannered youth, who gave no outward sign of the worm within. We must all of us, in the privacy of our thoughts, come to our own conclusions about Wilbur. But in this memorial service, we must remember his virtues and pray that they weigh heaviest in the scales of justice when his soul is judged in Heaven. Perhaps the prayers of those who love him and the true love of the Lord Jesus can atone and win forgiveness."

It went on like that. Mrs. Jewell shook so much the pew rattled. Aunty Em clicked with her tongue. Dorothy could feel her aunt go harder and fiercer. There were more songs and another prayer. They all bowed their heads and prayed for the young man's soul. Dorothy didn't know that one, so mumbled, looking sideways to see if Aunty Em was angry. She looked angry, but Dorothy thought perhaps not at her.

Finally it was over. Why did everything have to last so long? Mrs. Jewell was making her way toward the church door, with the speed of clouds on a rainy day. They all had to sit for her. Dorothy's legs wanted to move, and started to twitch, and once again, of course, Aunty Em stilled her.

They waited while other people went out one by one. People shook hands with the Preacher and then spoke to the Jewells, offering a few words as if from a high platform looking down. Or they looked embarrassed, nodding, shaking hands, and then left, ducking for some reason, though the doorway was not low.

Dorothy felt her own secret gift, folded and crisp, inside her mitten.

Aunty Em patted her and then pushed her: now it was time to move. Dorothy swung her legs around and jumped down to the floor. The school students were ahead of them. They were the very last. Dorothy couldn't wait to be gone. The students had little to say. They ducked the most and gathered outside. From somewhere far enough away came the sound of laughter. The Preacher stood next to Bob Jewell, hands clasped.

"A cold day, young man," said Aunty Em to the Preacher. "And an even colder sermon. Perhaps when you are a bit older, you will also learn to be wiser."

The Preacher was not used to being criticized. He looked dumbfounded.

"I simply mean," said Aunty Em, "that it is not your job to increase the grief of the bereaved."

"I'm sorry if I left that impression," he said.

"It is not to me, but to the young man's mother that you should perhaps address a few more kindly words," said Aunty Em. "I may say that it would not have happened in our congregation or with another preacher."

The Preacher chuckled. It was a very nasty chuckle. Dorothy thought: Why is he laughing? He chuckled and shrugged.

Aunty Em took Mary Jewell's hand. She took it and then suddenly seized it hard, a different gesture altogether. Then she moved on.

It was Dorothy's turn. "I've got a present for you, Mrs. Jewell," said Dorothy.

Aunty Em turned. What present?

Mrs. Jewell leaned over, with her great breathy wrinkled weight. Dorothy unfolded the piece of paper from inside her mitten. The present was a drawing. Dorothy passed it up to Mrs. Jewell.

"Thank you, Dorothy," said Mrs. Jewell. "What is it?"

"It's an Indian," said Dorothy. "I only had a pencil so it had to be a Kansas Indian. That's gray. A real Indian would be red."

"That's very nice, Dorothy, now come along," said Aunty Em, advancing.

"That's why he hanged himself," said Dorothy. "He wanted to be an Indian, a real Indian. But he wasn't brave enough."

"Oh-ho!" cried Mrs. Jewell, unsteadily.

"He didn't like it here. He didn't like school or anything. He wanted to get away."

But he was too frightened to leave, and so he felt ashamed. It was shame that made him kill himself. Dorothy could taste the shame and feel the shape it had, but she didn't have the words for it.

"Dorothy!" raged Aunty Em, stepping forward. Dorothy was seized, pulled, hauled away. Mrs. Jewell seemed to sag, waving Dorothy away. The drawing fell to the floor.

"But Uncle Henry said you didn't understand!" said Dorothy. Aunty Em gave her arm a savage tug. Dorothy knew she had done wrong, but she didn't care. It was the truth.

Aunty Em got her to the wagon and bundled her up onto the front seat. "Hurry up, Henry, let's get away." Uncle Henry speeded up somewhat. The mule was untied.

"Dorothy. What am I going to do with you?" Aunty Em's hand covered her face. Her face moved from side to side. "That poor woman."

Dorothy didn't want to hear what she had done wrong. Everything she did was wrong. "It was a present," she murmured.

"It was a present that opened a wound. I told you, Dorothy, not to mention what he did!"

"But I'm the only one who knows."

Knows that there is a nothingness in the wilderness, a great emptiness in the plains and sky, a nothingness that needs to be filled, not only with houses and horses and plows, but with imagination, an inhuman nothingness that could suck you in and kill you.

There was no point talking. How could Dorothy make anyone understand that? She could not explain it; she had no words. She could only endure the incomprehension and the harsh words and the silence.

It was dark by the time they got home. Scarecrows waved in moonlight. Instead of going inside, Dorothy hopped down from the wagon and ran.

She ran up the slopes of the bald hill to where the snowmen were. There were still three of them, in a row, as glossy and hard as marble. They were white-blue in moonlight. They were here and Wilbur was not. When the sun came, they would melt, and nothing Dorothy could do would stop it. They would melt away like memories trickling out of her head. There was very little Dorothy could do about anything at all.