"Does Ginger like church?"

"He should by this time." Mama put her satchel and her Bible and the other book down on the front bench and took off her gloves. I walked on over to the heater.

"I'm shivering, Mama."

"You'll get warm in a little while. Aw, I bet there's not a piece of kindling in this wood box!"

There wasn't, but Mama found some old wadded-up newspapers and a few splinters down in one corner. She piled them into the heater and then started stripping crusty hunks of pine bark from the logs in the box.

"Mama, look! A black grasshopper!"

"Where?"

"There he goes! He just jumped off that bark. Here he is! On the floor! See?" I grabbed at him, but he jumped again.

"Bandershanks, that's not a grasshopper. That's just a cricket!"

"Can I have him?"