At the entrance to the Church of the Holy Redeemer, Paul D sips from a liquor bottle and contemplates the crusty exterior that once protected his heart from vulnerability. He relives the demise of Sweet Home, the slave haven that crumbled rapidly after Garner's death. Because Paul D and the other slaves refused to believe Sixo's description of slavery in the outside world, Paul D found the truth the hard way — in the brutal Alfred, Georgia prison camp. The day the male slaves tried to escape from Sweet Home, Sixo was supposed to meet his lover, the Thirty-Mile Woman, and Halle was supposed to bring along his wife and three children. The black female Underground Railroad agent, hidden in the corn, promised to remain a night and half a day and to "rattle" to identify her whereabouts.
Paul D recalls hearing unidentified gunshots that night and seeing Halle inexplicably eat butter from the churn. Sixo joined Paul D and the Thirty-Mile Woman but could not account for the absence of Paul A, Halle, or Halle's family. As schoolteacher, four adults, and some pupils approached the dry creek bed, Sixo pushed his woman out of range. He and Paul D were apprehended. Sixo fought back. Schoolteacher struggled to take him alive but eventually determined that Sixo was of no use to Sweet Home. Schoolteacher lit a fire and roasted Sixo, who was tied at the waist to a tree. Schoolteacher then shot Sixo to quiet his singing to his unborn child, "Seven-O! Seven-O!"
