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time. Surely you don't want your ears to ring with pain from my efforts."
    "Now, Mrs. Magruder, I can't allow you to be so modest." James Marshall rose to his feet and offered Mama his hand. "Please." He bowed like a true gentleman. Mama's face reddened even more.
    Rachel leapt up and clapped her hands. "Yes, Mama, yes! Please play and sing for us like you used to!"
    Mama glanced at me. "Please, Mama," I begged. "You sing so beautifully."
    Still blushing, Mama allowed us to lead her to the little organ in the parlor. She seated herself and opened one of Mr. Stephen Foster's song books. "What would you like to hear?"
    "Play 'Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair,'" Rachel begged. "It's my very favorite song."
    Mama smiled at her. "That's because you have light brown hair, just like Jeanie."
    Rachel smoothed her braids and darted a coy look at James Marshall. If she'd been ten years older, I'd have thought she was flirting.
    "It's also because you're morbid," I told her crossly. "You just love songs and books where people die." Turning to Mama, I said, "Why can't we have a happy song like 'Oh! Susanna' or 'Camptown Races'?"

    "Jeanie doesn't die," Rachel said, "She floats like a vapor, on the soft summer air."
    "When did you ever see a live person float on the air?" I asked her.
    Mama laid her hand on my arm. "That's enough, Haswell. I'll play 'Jeanie' first, and then you can pick a song."
    As Mama struck the opening chords, Rachel made a little sneaky face at me. I might have made one back, but Mama began to sing. Her voice was so sweet, it brought tears to our eyes, especially at the end when she sang, "'Oh! I sigh for Jeanie with the light brown hair. Floating, like a vapor, on the soft summer air.'"
    "Now 'Camptown Races,'" I said, but James Marshall said I should let Mama pick some pretty songs first. "Play your favorites, ma'am."
    Mama smiled and turned to "Beautiful Dreamer." After that she picked "Come Where My Love Lies Dreaming," "I Would Not Die in Spring Time," and "Old Dog Tray." She finished up with "Hard Times Come Again No More."
Let us pause in life's pleasures and count its many tears

While we all sup sorrow with the poor;

There's a song that will linger forever in our ears;

Oh! Hard Times, come again no more.
    It was a melancholy song, one Papa dismissed as overly sentimental, but the words always struck my heart, especially now when it seemed hard times had come to stay. While Mama sang, Rachel leaned against her; the lamplight touched their hair with gold. It was a perfect picture, one I knew I'd see in my mind's eye all my life.

    By the time we reached the last chorus, we were the saddest folks you ever did see.
'Tis the song, the sigh of the weary;

Hard Times, Hard Times, come again no more.

Many days you have lingered around my cabin door;

Oh! Hard Times, come again no more.
    As the last note faded away, Mama sighed and folded her hands in her lap. Tears sparkled in her eyes.
    James Marshall laid his hand gently on her shoulder. "Perhaps we should hear 'Camptown Races' now," he suggested.
    Mama wiped her eyes with her lacy handkerchief. "Yes," she agreed. "Burton loved that song." She glanced at Papa's tintype on the mantel, showing him in his uniform and beard, and then bent over the keyboard.
    As soon as the song began, we all joined in. Our spirits lifted at once. We sang "Oh! Susanna" next, and then James Marshall himself took over the organ and played a grand medley of lively songs, including "Old Dan Tucker," "Cumberland Gap," and "The Bonnie Blue Flag."
    Suddenly, Rachel flung her arms around him. "Oh, James Marshall," she cried, "stay with us forever. We haven't had so much merriment since Papa's last Christmas at home."
    She turned to Mama and me. "Remember, Haswell? Remember, Mama? Papa was here, and Avery, too, and we were all singing round the organ, just like now."
    James Marshall laughed. "Forever's a long time, Miss Rachel." With that, he launched into "Dixie."
    He hadn't played more than