"Don't worry, Ma'am.This is an emergency, we'll work out the insurancelater. It's fastest if we just carry your daughter, Melissa,was it?"Two other wo...men were jury-rigging a bolt of cloth into amakeshift stretcher, I'm told. I was getting light-headedfrom blood loss at that point, so the next thing I remember wasbeing laid on a cot in the emergency room.My luck held, as a male nurse bent over me, checking my pupils.I whispered, "Please, get my mother away from here. She's theone who--"The. ..” The doctor’s voice manifested in reality and Owen turned his head away from the light. The doctor grabbed Owen’s chin, turned his face back and shined the light again. He then turned it off. “Owen?”“What’s up, doc?” Owen said, his tongue felt weird.“Good, you’re conscious,” the doctor said. “You lost a lot of blood and we had to operate on your arm. However, good news, I have no reason to doubt you could live a good long time after this.”“Good, I’d made plans for 2056. I wouldn’t want to. Some have been here for as long as there's been a county, since 1776. Ask some white kid's grandpa." But, but, how could they do that?" He spread his arms wide, almost hitting the girl in the next row. She squealed and he apologized."It was the law, Maryland law, right from the start. The State said there had to be schools for black kids, this was after slavery ended, 1864. You know it was illegal to teach a slave how to read, don't you? But it didn't say what kind of schools, or how many, or. His sturdy, well-muscled frame trembling with weakness, his eyes darted across every inch of Persephone. Immovable humility made a compromise with eager obedience; Grasping her left ankle with one hand, he cradled her foot in the other, raising it gently as he bent down to plant a firm kiss in the delicate arch of her foot. An impressed murmur rose from the audience. Persephone smiled. "Good. Keep going." Hades' mind was swimming, and he struggled to control his motions. His hands moved.