UNSPOKEN

A farm child and a fugitive make an unspoken connection in this suspenseful, wordless Civil War episode.

Drawn in monochrome pencil on rough-textured paper, the broad, full-page and full-spread rural scenes give the encounter a shadowy, atmospheric setting. Going about her chores after watching a detachment of mounted soldiers beneath a Confederate flag trot by, the child is startled and fearful to realize that someone is hiding in a pile of cornstalks in the storehouse. Rather than mention this to the (seemingly) oblivious adults in her extended family or, later, to the hunters who come by with a reward poster, she courageously ventures out by herself, carrying small gifts of food. Never seen beyond a glimpse of an eye amid the leaves, the fugitive at last departs as silently as he (or she) came—leaving a corn doll in return for the girl’s kindness. In a ruminative afterword, Cole reflects on his Virginia family’s own connections to the war and, though silent about the signal quilt he hangs on the farmyard’s fence in the illustrations, explains the significance of the Big Dipper visible in the nighttime sky.

Moving and emotionally charged, the book is capped with a powerful close-up of the child’s face on the rear cover with the legend “What would you do if you had the chance to help a person find freedom?” (Picture book. 7-10)