The hall was filled with white faces turned up to look at her. Every chair was filled and there were two rows of standees at the back of the hall. Kerosene lanterns glowed and flared. The red velvet curtains were pulled back in swoops of cloth and tied with gold ropes.
And she thought: I'm Abagail Freemantle Trotts, I play well and I sing well; I do not know these things because anyone told me.
And so she began to sing "The Old Rugged Cross" into the moveless silence, her fingers picking melody. Then picking up a strum, the slightly stronger melody of "How I Love My Jesus," and then stronger still, "Camp Meeting in Georgia." Now people were swaying back and forth almost in spite of themselves. Some were grinning and tapping their knees.
She sang a medley of Civil War songs: "When Johnny Comes Marching Home," "Marching Through Georgia," and "Goober Peas" (more smiles at that one; many of these men, Grand Army of the Republic veterans, had eaten more than a few goober peas during their time in the service). She finished with "Tenting Tonight on the Old Campground," and as the last chord floated away into a silence that was now thoughtful and sad, she thought: Now if you want to throw your tomatas or whatever, you go on and do it. I played and sang my best, and I was real fine.
When the last chord floated into silence, that silence held for a long, almost enchanted instant, as though the people in those seats and the others standing at the back of the hall had been taken far away, so far they could not find their way back all at once. Then the applause broke and rolled over her in a wave, long and sustained, making her blush, making her feel confused, hot and shivery all over. She saw her mother, weeping openly, and her father, and David, beaming at her.
She had tried to leave the stage then, but cries of "Encore! Encore! " broke out, and so, smiling, she played "Digging My Potatoes." That song was just a tiny bit risky, but Abby guessed that if Gretchen Tilyons could show her ankles in public, then she could sing a song that was the teeniest bit bawdy. She was, after all, a married woman.
Someone's been diggin my potatoes
They've left em in my bin,
And now that someone's gone
And see the trouble I've got in.
There were six more verses like that (some even worse) and she sang every one, and at the last line of each the roar of approval was louder. And later she thought that if she had done anything wrong that night, it was singing that song, which was exactly the kind of song they probably expected to hear a nigger sing.
She finished to another thunderous ovation and fresh cries of "Encore! " She remounted the stage, and when the crowd had quietened, she said: "Thank you all very much. I hope you won't think I am bein forward if I ask to sing just one more song, which I have learned special but never ever expected to sing here. But it is just about the best song I know, on account of what President Lincoln and this country did for me and mine, even before I was born."
They were very quiet now, listening closely. Her family sat stock still, all together near the left aisle, like a spot of blackberry jam on a white handkerchief.
"On account of what happened back in the middle of the States War," she went steadily on, "my family was able to come here and live with the fine neighbors that we have."
Then she played and sang "The Star-Spangled Banner," and everyone stood up and listened, and some of the handkerchiefs came out again, and when she had finished, they applauded fit to raise the roof.
That was the proudest day of her life.
She stirred awake a little after noon and sat up, blinking in the sunlight, an old woman of a hundred and eight. She had slept wrong on her back and it was a pure misery to her. Would be all day, if she knew anything about it.