In the fourth week of her residency at 124 Bluestone Road, Beloved clings to Sethe, following her about the kitchen and awaiting her return from work at the restaurant. Like a hungry child, Beloved clamors for Sethe's stories, questioning her about her "diamonds," the crystal earrings that Mrs. Garner gave Sethe as a wedding gift to mark the union that had no proper ceremony or celebration. Sethe describes how she pilfered fabrics to fashion a wedding dress, which she topped off with a wool shawl that "kept [her] from looking like a haint peddling." Following the Saturday honeymoon in the cornfield, Mrs. Garner gave Sethe the earrings and wished the couple happiness.
More questions about Sethe's mother elicit meager facts—that she worked in indigo fields from dawn to nightfall and then slept through Sundays. The demands of her toil gave her only a few weeks in which to bond with her infant daughter, who was then passed on to a wet-nurse so that Ma'am could return to the fields. Once, Ma’am carried Sethe behind the smokehouse and lifted her breast to reveal a circle and cross burned into her flesh so that the child could always identify her mother. After her mother was hanged, Sethe examined her corpse but was unable to locate the symbols on the decaying flesh.
Retelling the vile stories forces Sethe to abandon narrative and move into action. Lifting damp sheets, she begins folding them as she tries to answer Beloved's insistent queries about Ma'am. Sethe can recall only that many slaves were killed along with her mother, and that Nan, a one-armed black governess, took over the role of parent and taught Sethe her mother's native dialect. Pained by the sorrowful "rememory," Sethe longs for the comfort of her mother-in-law, Baby Suggs. To Denver's relief, Sethe shifts her attention from the tense conversation to the imminent arrival of Paul D.
