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Show in my father's house/ 8 high forehead balanced by a forthright jaw, eyes glimmering with amusement despite the old convention of sober portraits, ears strangely Pan-like. That morning, I noticed a faint, white scar bridging his straight nose. "How did Grandfather get that scar?" I asked Grandmother. "Children should be seen, not heard," she said abruptly, and turned away. Afterward, we headed across the yard, my father told me how my grandfather had been cutting wood with some of the brethren and an axhead flew off its handle and sliced off Grandfather's nose. "It was hanging by a little flap of skin, like that," he said, pinching thumb and forefinger together. Sunday school stories of tarring and feathering of church leaders and of gunshots at the Carthage jail swarmed in my head. "Did they do it on purpose?" "No, dear, it was an accident. When blood spurted from your grandfather's face, the man who owned the axe called to the other brethren. They formed a prayer circle and administered to him. Within seconds, the blood slowed to a trickle, and in a few days, there was only a white scar to show what had happened, Faith is the strongest medicine in the world - next to the priesthood." I squinted up at him. "You mean it just grew together?" My father nodded solemnly. "That cut on your hand that Daddy bandaged yesterday? If you had enough faith, it would be |