Mayella testifies next, a reasonably clean nineteen-year- old girl who is obviously terrified. She says that she called Tom Robinson inside the fence that evening and offered him a nickel to break up a dresser for her, and that once he got inside the house he grabbed her and took advantage of her. In Atticus' cross-examination, Mayella reveals that she has seven siblings to care for, a drunken father, and no friends.

Then Atticus examines her testimony and asks why she didn't put up a better fight, why her screams didn't bring the other children running, and--most importantly--how Tom Robinson managed the crime with a useless left hand, torn apart by a cotton gin when he was a boy. Atticus begs her to admit that there was no rape, that her father beat her. She shouts at him and calls the courtroom cowards if they don't convict Tom Robinson, and then bursts into tears refusing to answer any more questions. In the recess that follows, Mr. Underwood notices the children up in the balcony, but Jem tells Scout that the newspaper editor won't tell Atticus-- although he might include it in the social section of the newspaper.

The prosecution rests, and Atticus calls only one wit

These chapters are marked by a mood of mounting mischief. They begin with a reference to the Radley Place, the source of childhood terrors that no longer terrify--"Boo Radley was the least of our fears," Scout comments, in the wake of the trial and Bob Ewell's threats. The Radley Place is part of the past, now, although the narrator still expresses a fond wish to see him someday, and remembers their near-encounters with Boo during summers past. These memories restore Boo Radley to the reader's consciousness, which has been occupied with the trial for most of Book Two, and the restoration provides foreshadowing for Boo's appearance a few chapters later.

She takes Boo--"Mr. Arthur"--down to the porch, and they sit on the swing and listen to Atticus and Heck Tate argue. Heck insists on calling the death an accident, and Atticus, thinking that Jem killed Bob Ewell, does not want his son protected. The sheriff corrects him--Boo killed Ewell, not Jem, and Boo does not need the attention of the neighborhood brought to his door. Tom Robinson died for no reason, Heck says, and now the man responsible is dead: "let the dead bury the dead."

It is very dark on the way to the school, and Cecil Jacobs jumps out and frightens them. Scout and Cecil go together around the crowded school, visiting the "haunted house" (in a 7th grade classroom) and buying homemade candy. The pageant looms, and all the children go backstage. Unfortunately, Scout falls asleep, misses her entrance, and runs onstage at the end, prompting Judge Taylor and many others to burst out laughing. The lady in charge of the pageant accuses Scout of ruining it, and Scout is so ashamed that she and Jem wait backstage until the crowd is gone before they make their way home.

Scout, meanwhile, draws closer to her Aunt. The older woman's refusal to have Walter Cunningham to dinner pulls them apart, but the missionary tea party reveals the better side of Aunt Alexandra. The scene brilliantly portrays the hypocrisy of the Maycomb ladies: "Mrs. Merriweather's large brown eyes always filled up with tears when she considered the oppressed (in Africa)," Scout notes, yet the same woman can complain that "there's nothing more distracting than a sulky darky." In the wake of the tragedy of Tom Robinson's death (which Mr. Underwood's editorial compares to "the senseless slaughter of songbirds," an obvious reference to the novel's title), however, the tea party becomes an opportunity for the Finch women to display moral courage by maintaining a public facade of composure.

Some common words found in the essay are:
Tom Robinson, Aunt Alexandra, Bob Ewell, Miss Maudie, Cecil Jacobs, Bob Ewell's, Jem Scout, Judge Taylorexpels, Robinson Tom, Judge Taylor, tom robinson, aunt alexandra, bob ewell, miss maudie, bob ewell's, kill mockingbird chapters, heck tate, black people, miss gates, kill mockingbird, mockingbird chapters, bob ewell's threats, jem atticus discuss, walter cunningham dinner, trial miss maudie,
Approximate Word count = 4093
Approximate Pages = 16 (250 words per page double spaced)