Twenty-dollar Gold Pieces

Lying in the Dust

Sometimes on cold winter nights, Mama could be persuaded to tell the little ones there was fine Southern blood flowing in their veins. She would open the trunk in the corner and unpack her treasures: a tiny nosegay of dried flowers, a piece of lace that once belonged to some distant maiden aunt who died years before, a delicate collar that retained its beauty but no longer was fashionable.

Mama would set all those aside and take out what the little ones thought was the most valuable of all, the ambrotype of their grandfather, taken on his way to defend the South against Northern aggression. … More