The Girls In The Stilt House Quotes
"Anything, it seems to her, might come of this night. And almost anything would be better than what has come before."
"Ada runs her hand along the dogleg crevice. She can just shove her little finger through it, which she does, raising the hairs on her neck again."
"It might have been filled with bricks, the way she bent under it, but mostly it was loss that weighed her down."
"When she was a little girl, she had believed she loved this place, the trees offering themselves as steadfast companions, the wildflowers worthy confidants."
"Her father had once claimed that Ansel broke out of a chain gang up North and was hiding out, he and his pack of half-wild dogs, on that finger of swampland known for water moccasins that hung from the trees when the water was high."
"But then, no. Ansel and her father had too much stacked against each other to play games with pinecones."
"Ada stuffed the rag into her pocket and rushed inside to fry up bacon and cut out biscuits before her father returned from the woods."
"Ada knew her father well enough to know he was biding his time, the same as when he was stalking a deer or hand fishing for catfish."
"Leaving it wriggling in the trap, he had rushed home to find Ada and hustle her back through the woods to give her a lesson in how it was up to him, that fox’s fate."
"A thousand quiet punishments, day in and day out."
"And now, with her grogginess burned away and after having slept for so many hours, it was use the slop jar or make a fast trip to the outhouse."
"I done cleared out the shed. There’s plenty of room for you to sleep out there. You’re more’n welcome to it. Daughter."
"Remembered where she was and quickly rewrapped herself against everything unseen in the dark, dank shed."
"You might could start off thanking the one dragged you out of there."
"As if in warning, he raised his eyebrows the instant before he trilled two high notes."
"Ada saw a star fall in the sky and made a quick wish that any part of this night might be real."
"He traced the curve of Ada’s chin with his finger."
"It’s your life. You get to live it how you want. Just reach out and take it. I’ll help you."
"It’s what he done to my mother, Ada said, when I was a little girl. I learnt that in there."
"There was so much she did not know about taking care of herself."
"If a gator was of a companionable mind, what safer place in the world than on its back?"
"That there were exceptions to Thou shalt not kill, or at least mercy enough to cover this night."
"A baby. It seemed to Ada a word with no dictionary definition, just a blank space she would fill in with whatever truth replaced the baby-doll image she now held."
"Ada felt a new lightness of heart now that she had someone other than her father to work at life with."
"Ain’t never been a man loved a woman no more’n that one."
"I won't be crossing over the Trace anymore until her time comes, unless there's trouble."
"You know, we got that whole room in there going to waste."
"You the one fixing to have to live with that name."
"The problem—one of the problems, as she saw it—was that a person, at least a person in her own circumstances, couldn’t have a respectable dream in a place like this."
"Life was short and she was not about to miss any good thing right in front of her, looking ahead for something that might never be."
"Ain’t but one jackass out there, and he’s driving the wagon."
"It’s what Rainy makes. A man probably makes double that. Maybe more."
"To answer your question—real bad. I want it real bad. For all of us. It’s a chance for a whole life."
"I promised myself, and my father, that I would live on as little as possible, on potatoes and onions, if need be, and send every spare penny back home."
"Was on my feet by suppertime, the day you come."
"Time comes I need help getting on my own two feet, I’ll let you know."
"No swelling and a strong grip. From everything I’m seeing, you going all the way this time."
"I don’t know as I’ve ever seen a dress pretty as that one there."
"He carried a book around with him most everywhere he went."
"My best find was a first-century oil lamp, still in one piece."
"It starts with digging in the creek, and who knows where it goes from there."
"Don’t tell Gertie, but I done got the name picked out."
"The strong thing is picking up and getting on a train for Ohio with nothing but a raggedy old coat and them cardboard shoes of yourn."
"I’d say we’ve got us a whole mess of secrets to keep now."
"I know you are not a stupid girl. Not nearly stupid enough to go mouthing off about things that don’t concern you. Because that…that would be very stupid."
"Nature carrying on, consecrating a new day for those who set their step by such offerings."
"Was her pride worth so much? She asked herself the question and answered it easily. No. Not her pride. But dignity is what raising her hand to Frank would have cost her."
"She stepped behind one of the cedar trees and moved aside a prickly branch so she could keep her eye on Stella Mae while she got herself under control."
"You got the tie vines pulled off the fence in the northwest field, Mr. Morgan?"
"Every ear open, every eye on the path been set before us, every heart reaching for the comfort nothing but Him can give."
"But we would not have you ignorant, brethren, concerning them that fall asleep; that ye sorrow not, even as the rest, who have no hope."
"What we will do here today is throw ourselves at the foot of the cross and cry for mercy."
"Healing so they could look to raising Annis."
"It felt like forgiveness, that touch, and Matilda thought she must have somehow given something away, worn the truth on her face."
"Two dreams going in opposite directions, and Annis sitting at the crossroads."
"It’s been enough time that it ain’t likely to be catching anymore. And me and you look to be in the clear. But you keep a watch on yourself."
"Every baby ought to have something decent to sleep in."
"She was still sleeping in this hallway, still bound to the Trace as if there was something she could do from only here that would grant her some relief from the rage and guilt and grief."
"She belonged to the Trace in the way a child belongs to a callous parent."
"But to really belong somewhere. Matilda had never known that."
"For the first time since the shack fire, she thought she might actually be regaining it."
"That his mouth had filled with blood and his jaw had hung too low, unhinged, the angle wrong."
"Setting loose even this small part of it had freed something inside her, had cleansed her somehow, like the cupping of bad blood."
"Ada sighed. She picked nervously at a fingernail."
"But I never drove the wagon anywhere but up and down the back trail with you. I don’t know if I can do it."
"Matilda had wound it around Ada, tied it at one hip, and all but dragged her out to the wagon that was already hitched and waiting, the sun scarcely up."
"Raining while the sun shines, the devil’s beating his wife."
"The cupboard was filled with jars of fruits and vegetables from the garden, canned ahead of the cooler months."
"She mourned the loss of Matilda more than that of Jesse."
"She would teach Annis other things, things that Ada had yet to learn, things her own mother never had an opportunity to know."
"You ain’t got half a notion what that girl be carrying around with her. What she been carrying around before she ever laid eyes on you. She saved your life. Saved your baby, too. Ain’t that enough?"
"Life is hard. You got a hard row to hoe, I ain’t denying. You find a way, is what you do. It’s what we all got to do."
"I don’t plan on being there too long. I’ve got a job sewing. For Rankin’s Dry Goods. I’m thinking on moving to town, after I save up some."
"She just left recently. The girl. And my father isn’t coming back. I mean, he don’t look to be coming back. It’s just a few months shy of a year he’s been gone."
"It’s important that the young hold hope for this world. Otherwise, we’re every one of us lost."
"For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake."
"The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be proclaimed and denounced."
"A baby named by the wind, Matilda thought. Her mother’s beautiful baby, gone to a better world."