I had learned my piece so thoroughly that the order was like turning on a spigot. Four verses, four lines in each, gushed forth.
My father clapped. 'Now for something to eat,' he said.
Immediately after supper my mother and I set out, leaving my father to shave and come later. It was a cold night with a great many bright stars. At the corner we met Luella and her mother. Luella’s mother was carrying over her arm Luella’s spring coat, her everyday one, a dark blue reefer.
'Martha ought to have hers along, too,' said my Aunt Emma. 'If the church should be chilly they’ll catch their death sitting in thin dresses.'
My mother thought it was probable we would. So I was sent back to hunt for my little reefer. It was like Luella’s, dark blue with tarnished gilt anchors on the corners of the sailor collar, and like hers it was second-best and outgrown.
Luella and I parted with our mothers at the door of the Sunday school room.
'Don’t forget to take your reefers when you march in,' admonished my Aunt Emma.
'Must we carry them while we march?' I almost wailed.
My mother came to the rescue. 'Hold them down between you and the little girl you march with. Then no one will see.'
'Yes’m.' I was much relieved.