Young Jane trails the furious slave-owner and his dogs out into the fields, where she sees all five rise into the air “like climbing a ladder.” The last, “the one who had smiled at my great-grandmama’s mama, Jane…kept treading air with arms like wings. The five serene new arrivals at Ol’ Man Deboreaux’s plantation, just off the boat from Africa, barely speak a word, keep to themselves-and, when the first evening’s meal is over, vanish. The small, enigmatic figures in Daly’s folk-style landscape paintings add to the air of mystery infusing this spare rendition of “The People Could Fly,” retold here in a version handed down from storyteller McGill’s slave-born ancestor.
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