She got up that morning with the firm determination to go on in there and have a good talk with Jody.  But she sat a long time with the walls creeping in on her.  Four walls squeezing her breath out.  Fear lest he depart while she sat trembling upstairs nerved her and she was inside the room before she caught her breath.  She didn’t make the cheerful, casual start that she had thought out.  Something stood like an oxen’s foot on her tongue, and then too, Jody, no Joe, gave her a ferocious look.  A look with all the unthinkable coldness of outer space.  She must talk to a man who was ten immensities away.

He was lying on his side facing the door like he was expecting somebody or something.  A sort of changing look on his face.  Weak-looking but sharp-pointed about the eyes.  Through the thin counterpane she could see what was left of his belly huddled before him on the bed some helpless thing seeking shelter.

The half-washed bedclothes hurt her pride for Jody.  He had always been so clean.
“Whut you doin’ in heah, Janie?”
“Come tuh see ‘bout you and how you wuz makin’ out.”

He gave a deep-growling sound like a hog dying down in the swamp and trying to drive off disturbance.  “Ah come in heah tuh git shet uh you but look lak ‘tain’t doin me no good.  G’wan out.  Ah need tuh rest.”

“Naw, Jody, Ah come in heah tuh talk widja and Ah’m gointuh do it too.  It’s for both of our sakes Ah’m talkin’.”
He gave another ground grumble and eased over on his back.

“Jody, maybe Ah ain’t been sich uh good wife tuh you, but Jody--”
“Dat’s ‘cause you ain’t got de right feelin’ for nobody.  You oughter have some sympathy ‘bout yo’self.  You ain’t no hog.”
“But, Jody, Ah meant tuh be awful nice.”
“Much as Ah done fu yuh.  Holdin’ me up tuh scorn.  No sympathy!”
“Naw, Jody, it wasn’t because Ah didn’t have no sympathy.  Ah had uh lavish uh dat.  Ah just didn’t never git no chance tuh use none of it.  You wouldn’t let me.”
“Dat’s right, blame everything on me.  Ah wouldn’t let you show no feelin’!  When, Janie, dat’s all Ah ever wanted or desired.  Now you come blamin’ me!”
“ ‘Tain’t dat, Jody.  Ah aint here tuh blame nobody.  Ah’m just tryin’ tuh make you know what kinda person Ah is befo’ it’s too late.”
“Too late?” he whispered.
His eyes buckled in a vacant-mouthed terror and she saw the awful surprise in his face and answered it.

“Yeah Jody, don’t keer whut dat multiplied cockroach told yuh tuh git yo’money, you got tuh die, and yuh can’t live.”

A deep sob came out of Jody’s weak frame.  It was like beating a bass drum in a hen- house.  Then it rose high like pulling in a trombone.
“Janie! Janie! don’t tell me Ah got tuh die, and Ah ain’t used tuh thinikin ‘bout it.”

“ ‘Tain’t really no need of you dying, Jody, if you had of—de doctor—but it don’t do no good bringin’ dat up now.  Dat’s just whut Ah wants tuh say, Jody.  You wouldn’t listen.  You done lived wid me for twenty years and you don’t half know me atall.  And you could have but you was so busy worshippin ‘de work of yo’ own hands, and cuffin’ folks around in their minds till you didn’t see uh whole heap uh things yuh could have.”
“Leave heah, Janie.  Don’t come heah--”
“Ah knowed you wasn’t gointuh lissen tuh me.  You changes everything but nothin’ don’t change you—not even death.  But Ah ain’t goin outa here and Ah ain’t gointuh hush.  Naw, you gointuh listen tuh me one time befo’ you die.  Have yo’ way all yo life, trample and mash dwn and then die ruther than let yo’self heah ‘bout it.  Listen, Jody, you ain’t de Jody ah run off down de road wid.  You’se whut’s left after he died.  Ah run off tuh keep house wid you in uh wonderful way.  But you wasn’t satisfied wid me de way Ah was.  Naw!  Mah own mind had tuh be squeezed and crowded out tuh make room for yours in me.”
“Shut up! Ah wish thunder and lightnin’ would kill yuh!”
“Ah know it.  And now you got tuh die tuh find out dat you got tuh pacify somebody besides yo’self if you wants any love and any sympathy in dis world.  You ain’t tried tuh pacify nobody but yo’self.  Too busy listening tuh yo’ own big voice.”
“All dis tearin’ down talk!”  Jody whispered with sweat globules forming all over his face and arms.  “Git outa heah!”
“All dis bowin’ down, all dis obedience under yo’ voice—dat ain’t whut Ah rushed off down de road tuh find out about you.”

A sound of strife in Jody’s throat, but his eyes stared unwillingly into a corner of the room so Janie knew the futile fight was not with her. The icy sword of the square-toed one had cut off his breath and left his hands in a pose of agonizing protest.  Janie gave them peace on his breast, then she studied his dead face for a long time.

“Dis sittin’ in de rulin chair is been hard on Jody,” she muttered out loud.  She was full of pity for the first time in years.  Jody had been hard on her and others, but life had mishandled him too.  Poor Joe!  Maybe if she had known some other way to try, she might have made his face different.  But what that other way could be, she had no idea.  She thought back and forth about what had happened in the making of a voice out of a man.  Then thought about herself.  Years ago, she had told her girl self to wait for her in the looking glass.  It had been a long time since she had remembered.  Perhaps she’d better look.  She went over to the dresser and looked hard at her skin and features.  The young girl was gone, but a handsome woman had taken her place.  She tore off the kerchief from her head and let down her plentiful hair.  The weight, the length, the glory was there.  She took careful stock of herself, starched and ironed her face, forming it into just what people wanted to see, and opened up the window and cried, “Come heah people!  Jody is dead.  Mah husband is gone from me.”