Chapter I: "Wha' dah Alfie got in 'e han'?"

"It ent nutton," spoke up Din, "yo' is ah 'larmer, dah is wha' yo' is."

"Orright den," replied Mirrie, "oi muss be blin'."

"Like dah is anything de worl' don' know orready."

"Wha' yo' got dey, boy?" murmured April, bent over the washtub, soap suds frosting on her veiny brown arms. She caught up the bulk of her starch-crusted patchwork frock and dried her hands in it.

"Oi tell yo' de boy got somet'ing," Mirrie said, "yo' is such a ownway somebody yo' can't even hear yo' ears ringin'."

"Hey, it muss be a cockroach."

"Or a forty-leg--"

"It ent!"

"Look out deah, boy, yo' gwine stump yo' toe. Bam--tell yo' so! Go help 'e up, Mirrie."

" ... won't stay whe' yo' belong, ni? Why yo' got to be runnin' 'bout de gap like yo' ent got nobody? Like yo' is some sheep who' ent got no muddah or no faddah. Come yah, wha' yo' got in yo' han'? Lemmah see it!"

"Woy, woy, it nearly jook mah fingah!"

"Um is a black pin!" exclaimed Mirrie in terror.

"Wha' yo' get dis pin from, boy?" asked April, paling and pausing, then venomously seizing it.

"_Obeah!_"

"Heaven help mah!"

"Who giv' yo' dis pin, boy?" April insisted. Her brows were wrinkled; she exposed the pin to the sun.

"Open yo' mout', boy," she said, "whe' yo' get dis pin?"

"Miss Diggs giv' it to me, mum," murmured Alfie slowly, afraidly.

"Zink Diggs?"

"Yassum."

"Whelp!"

"Giv' yo' dis pin? Wha' fo'? Wha' she giv' yo' a pin fo'? Hey, boy, tek um back to she."

"Sen' he back wit' um!"

"Wha' she mean, yes?"

"Yo' too stupid," shouted Mirrie, assuming an air of worldly wisdom not wholly unsuited to her. "She is wukkin' obeah fo' yo', dat is wha' is de mattah."

"De bad-minded wretch!" cried April. "Hey, wha' Ah do she, ni? Did Ah tek wey she man? Did Ah break she sugar stick? Did Ah call she teef? Did Ah steal she guamazelli plum f'on she? Hey, Ah can't understan' it, yes. Wha' she wan' fo' giv' me a black pin, fo'?"

April held the ghastly symbol against the ripe Barbados sun. Moving in the shadow of the spreading _dounz_ she stared at it long and hard. Dark April, a lanky, slipshod woman in a half-dry print skirt and old, sprawling, ratty shoes, stood up, amazed at the lurid import. "Ah wondah why she sen' me dis," she pondered, bewildered.

At her side one of the girls shuffled, cracking the dark, crisp dirt under her feet. "Yo' too stupid," she said. "Little as I is I know wha' um mean."

In something of a trance April went to the shed-roof. Cooing pigeons and doves swarmed upon it. Beaten by the rain, dung spattered upon it, ran white and dark blue. Under the shingled edges of the roof bats took refuge. White-spotted canaries sang to the lovely robins poised on the bowing limbs of the _dounz_.

" ... let she alone, sha', g'way."

"Eatin' de po' dog bittie."

"It ent."

"It is."

"Yo' chirrun, behav' unna-self!" April turned, an angry look flooding her dusky face. "Oi gwine beat all yo', yes."

Devil-symbol, _obeah_-symbol--a black pin. "Gwine stick um yah." She bored it into a sunless, rainless spot in the side of the shed-roof. "All yo' ent gwine tetch dis pin, unna understan'? Unna heah wha' Oi say? Nobody ent gwine tetch dis pin! If anybody tetch it, they bess get ready fo' tetch me. Oi tell unna dah f'um now."

"Oi know Oi ent gwine got nutton fo' do wit' it."

"Nor me."

"Nor me needah."

"Da, da, unna bess not, fo' Oi'll wash unna behind de fuss one wha' do."