Free The Devil's Dream by Lee Smith

had them all eating right out of her hand, by acting so sweet. I know acting when I see it. And I was the one that had to go around picking up after her and saying, “Did you eat yer supper, Nonnie?” and “Don’t play in the rain, Nonnie” and such as that.
    For Nonnie was the silliest, mooniest child you ever saw, not one grain of sense in her head! She would of starved to death or killed herself a hundred times if it hadn’t of been for me. She would have killed herself over and over doing the crazy things she done, such as swinging on grapevines and playing with snakes. She never had a thought in the world for what might happen to her.
    And was lazy to boot! If you asked her to churn, she might start out a-churning, then she’d be churning and singing, then she’d just be singing, and wander off singing, and allow the cream to clabber in the churn. Many’s the time she done that, and many’s the slap I give her for it. Oh, I done my duty, rest assured of it, but I just couldn’t get through to her, so it done no good in the end. As a littlun, Nonnie was all the time a-singing. She used to go off down the road by herself to the Bevins sisters’ house and learn songs offen them, and I’d have to fetch her home.
    I could not carry a tune in a bucket myself, and don’t give a damn to. For what good does it do you in the end? What good did it do Nonnie? When she was a girl, her favorite song was that crazy little cuckoo song. And to this day, it reminds me of Nonnie and how silly she was. But Daddy was plumb fooled by her, and when she was little he used to carry her to town on the front of his saddle and then set her up on the counter in the store to sing for folks. Daddy never took me to town on his saddle, I might add. Of course I would not have cared to be displayed thataway nohow, but you ought to treat children equal, I say, and not favor one over the other so.
    Well, in all fairness, I know that Daddy did not favor Nonnie because of Nonnie her ownself. No, he favored Nonnie because she was the spitting image of Mamma. Everybody said so. So it was not Nonnie’s fault, in a way, but she got spoiled rotten all the same. And she was not all that pretty neither, never mind what folks said. She was kind of dreamy and dish-faced if you ask me. Not to mention contrary. Now we all know what a woman’s lot is, but Nonnie wouldn’t have no part of it! We’d be sitting by the fire of a night, for an instance, and I’d be doing piecework on my lap, but Nonnie she’d of flung herself flat down on the floor and be a-staring and a-staring into the fire, and not doing a blessed thing with her hands. When you’d call her it was like she was off in the clouds someplace.
    â€œNonnie,” I said one time, then, “Nonnie,” real loud and sharp. Oh, she looked up then.
    â€œNonnie, what air ye a-looking at, anyway?” I axed her, and do you know what she said? She said she’d seen figures a-dancing, dancing in the flames!
    Of course later I remembered her answer real good, in light of the awful thing that would come to pass, but at the time it just hit me as more of her foolishness.
    And as she got older, she got worser. She started in a-wanting to go to play-parties with the big gals and fellers when she was not but about twelve years old, just ragging Daddy to let her go, and of course he done it finely, for he always let Nonnie do exactly what she pleased.
    â€œZinnia, you go with her and watch out for her,” Daddy told me the first time he let her go, but I would not do it.
    â€œI don’t care to go,” was all I said. Hadn’t Daddy seed that I hadn’t never gone to a play-party myself in all them years? For I am no fool. And I knowed them boys would pass me by, a-stepping Charley, and I refused pint-blank to give them the satisfaction.
    I didn’t care for boys then, and I don’t care for men now. They are