The Soul of Rose Dede

Excerpt

His progress was slow, for he stopped--his forehead gravely puckered, his finger in his mouth--to listen to the clear whistle of a mocking-bird in the live-oak above his head; he watched the heavy flight of a white night-moth from one jimsonweed trumpet to another; he strayed aside to pick a bit of shining punk from the sloughing bark of a rotten log; he held this in his closed palm as he came at last into the open space where the others were.