When they withheld their recognition and made plain that they had no clear need of her, when she was unable to find her better self reflected in their eyes, when their hostility was so piercing it threatened to crush and destroy her, then the cluster of women assembled in the yard on a late August afternoon involved in the mundane tasks of hanging clothes, cracking pecans, and tying off buttons collapsed into a faceless them, a threatening crowd, a race without distinct features or characteristics. At such moments, Helen could see only treason en masse, the lines of battle were drawn; she
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