Anne was twenty-two. She wasn’t the oldest of Miss Lil’s girls, but she was the most grown up. She was the only one who wasn’t from around here. She’d seen more of the world than what was squeezed between the bays. She acted the same around everyone, whether white or n***o or Indian. She knew I worked hard for my keep and she often thanked me for cleaning her room after she’d used it. And when you talked to her, she listened. She didn’t look like she was thinking about what else she had to do.
I always thought of her as my big sister though I never had one, so I’m not sure exactly what that’s like. Because of her I got the job with Miss Lil. She’d seen me sweating over a few days’ work I got scraping barnacles off the pier. I guess she was impressed by how hard I worked because she spoke
