midnight
After a time the old woman rose and hobbled to a big black chest . Out of it she brought an old bag of cotton seed -- not the white-green seed which Bles had always known , but small , smooth black seeds , which she handled carefully , dipping her hands deep down and letting them drop through her gnarled fingers . And so again they sat and waited and waited , saying no word . Not until the stars of midnight had swung to the zenith did they start down through the swamp . Bles sought to guide the old woman , but he found she knew the way better than he did . Her shadowy figure darting in and out among the trunks till they crossed the tree bridge , moved ever noiselessly ahead . She motioned the boy and girl away to the thicket at the edge , and stood still and black in the midst of the cleared island .