(1929)

Jason Compson III	The head of the Compson household until his death from alcoholism in 1912. Mr. Compson is the father of Quentin, Caddy, Jason IV, and Benjy, and the husband of Caroline. Mr. Compson is a well-spoken but very cynical and detached man. He subscribes to a philosophy of determinism and fatalism--he believes life is essentially meaningless and that he can do little to change the events that befall his family. Despite his cynicism, however, Mr. Compson maintains notions of gentlemanliness and family honor, which Quentin inherits. Mr. Compson risks the family’s financial well-being in exchange for the potential prestige of Quentin’s Harvard education, and he tells stories that foster Quentin’s nearly fanatical obsession with the family name.
Caroline Compson	The self-pitying and self-absorbed wife of Mr. Compson and mother of the four Compson children. Caroline’s hypochondria preoccupies her and contributes to her inability to care properly for her children. Mrs. Compson’s negligence and disregard contribute directly to the family’s downfall. Constantly lost in a self-absorbed haze of hypochondria and self-pity, Mrs. Compson is absent as a mother figure to her children and has no sense of her children’s needs. She even treats the mentally disabled Benjy cruelly and selfishly. Mrs. Compson foolishly lavishes all of her favor and attention upon Jason, the one child who is incapable of reciprocating her love. Mrs. Compson’s self-absorption includes a neurotic insecurity over her Bascomb family name, the honor of which is undermined by her brother Maury’s adulterous behavior. Caroline ultimately makes the decision to change her youngest son’s name from Maury to Benjamin because of this insecurity about her family’s reputation.
Quentin Compson	The oldest of the Compson children and the narrator of the novel's second chapter. A sensitive and intelligent boy, Quentin is preoccupied with his love for his sister Caddy and his notion of the Compson family's honor. He commits suicide by drowning himself just before the end of his first year at Harvard. A very traditional Southern code of conduct and morality defines order and chaos within Quentin's world, and causes him to idealize nebulous, abstract concepts such as honor, virtue, and feminine purity. His strict belief in this code causes Quentin profound despair when he learns of Caddy's promiscuity. Turning to Mr. Compson for guidance, Quentin feels even worse when he learns that his father does not care about the Southern code or the shame Caddy's conduct has brought on the family. When Quentin finds that his sister and father have disregarded the code that gives order and meaning to his life, he is driven to despondency and eventually suicide. Quentin's focus on ideas over deeds makes him a highly unreliable narrator, as it is often difficult to tell which of the actions he describes have actually occurred and which are mere fantasy.
Candace Compson	The second oldest of the Compson children and the only daughter, Caddy is perhaps the most important figure in the novel, as she represents the object of obsession for all three of her brothers. As a child, Caddy is somewhat headstrong, but very loving and affectionate. She steps in as a mother figure for Quentin and Benjy in place of the self--absorbed Mrs. Compson. Caddy's muddying of her underwear in the stream as a young girl foreshadows her later promiscuity. It also presages and symbolizes the shame that her conduct brings on the Compson family. Caddy does feel some degree of guilt about her promiscuity because she knows it upsets Benjy so much. On the other hand, she does not seem to understand Quentin's despair over her conduct. She rejects the Southern code that has defined her family's history and that preoccupies Quentin's mind. Unlike Quentin, who is unable to escape the tragic world of the Compson household, Caddy manages to get away. Though Caddy is disowned, we sense that this rejection enables her to escape an environment in which she does not really belong.
Jason Compson IV	The second youngest of the Compson children and the narrator of the novel's third chapter. Jason is mean--spirited, petty, and very cynical. Ironically, the loveless Jason is the only one of the Compson children who receives Mrs. Compson's affection. Jason has no capacity to accept, enjoy, or reciprocate this love, and eventually he manipulates it to steal money from Miss Quentin behind Mrs. Compson's back. Jason rejects not only familial love, but romantic love as well. He hates all women fervently and thus cannot date or marry and have children. He steals and hoards money in a strongbox, but not for any particular purpose other than selfishness. Jason's lack of achievement stems primarily from his relentless self--pity. Jason never forgives Caddy for the loss of the job at Herbert's bank, and he is unable to move past this setback to achieve anything worthwhile in his later life. Ironically, Jason becomes the head of the Compson household after his father's death--an indication of the low to which the once--great family has sunk.
Benjy Compson	The youngest of the Compson children and narrator of the novel's first chapter. Born Maury Compson, his name is changed to Benjamin in 1900, when he is discovered to be severely mentally retarded. Benjy is utterly dependent upon Caddy, his only real source of affection. Benjy cannot understand any abstract concepts such as time, cause and effect, or right and wrong--he merely absorbs visual and auditory cues from the world around him. Despite his utter inability to understand or interpret the world, however, Benjy does have an acute sensitivity to order and chaos, and he can immediately sense the presence of anything bad, wrong, or out of place. He is able to sense Quentin's suicide thousands of miles away at Harvard, and senses Caddy's promiscuity and loss of virginity. In light of this ability, Benjy is one of the only characters who truly takes notice of the Compson family's progressing decline. However, his disability renders Benjy unable to formulate any response other than moaning and crying. Benjy's impotence--and the impotence of all the remaining Compson men--is symbolized and embodied by his castration during his teenage years.
Miss Quentin	Caddy's illegitimate daughter, who is raised by the Compsons after Caddy's divorce. A rebellious, promiscuous, and miserably unhappy girl, Miss Quentin eventually steals money from Jason and leaves town with a member of a traveling minstrel show. Miss Quentin is the lone member of the newest generation of the Compson family. Many parallels arise between Miss Quentin and her mother, Caddy, but the two differ in important ways. Miss Quentin repeats Caddy's early sexual awakening and promiscuity, but, unlike Caddy, she does not feel guilty about her actions. Likewise, Miss Quentin grows up in a meaner, more confined world than Caddy does, and is constantly subject to Jason's domineering and cruelty. Not surprisingly, we see that Miss Quentin is not nearly as loving or compassionate as her mother. She is also more worldly and headstrong than Caddy. Yet Miss Quentin's eventual success in recovering her stolen money and escaping the family implies that her worldliness and lack of compunction--very modern values--indeed work to her benefit.
Dilsey	The Compsons' cook, Dilsey is a pious, strong-willed, protective woman who serves as a stabilizing force for the Compson family. She is the only character detached enough from the Compsons' downfall to witness both the beginning and the end of this final chapter of the family history. Interestingly, Dilsey lives her life based on the same set of fundamental values--family, faith, personal honor, and so on--upon which the Compsons' original greatness was built. However, Dilsey does not allow self-absorption to corrupt her values or spirit. She is very patient and selfless--she cooks, cleans, and takes care of the Compson children in Mrs. Compson's absence, while raising her own children and grandchildren at the same time. Dilsey seems to be the only person in the household truly concerned for the Compson children's welfare and character, and she treats all of the children with love and fairness, even Benjy. The last chapter's focus on Dilsey implies a hope for renewal after the tragedies that have occurred. We sense that Dilsey is the new torchbearer of the Compson legacy, and represents the only hope for resurrecting the values of the old South in a pure and uncorrupted form.
Roskus	Dilsey's husband and the Compsons' servant. Roskus suffers from a severe case of rheumatism that eventually kills him.
T.P.	One of Dilsey's sons, T.P. gets drunk with Benjy and fights with Quentin at Caddy's wedding.
Versh	Another of Dilsey's sons and Benjy's keepers.
Frony	Dilsey's daughter. Frony is also Luster's mother and works in the Compsons' kitchen.
Luster	Frony's son and Dilsey's grandson. Luster is a young boy who looks after and entertains Benjy in 1928, despite the fact that he is only half Benjy's age.
The Man with the Red Tie	The mysterious man with whom Miss Quentin allegedly elopes.
Damuddy	The Compson children's grandmother, who dies when they are young.
Uncle Maury Bascomb	Mrs. Compson's brother, who lives off his brother-in-law's money. Benjy is initially named after Uncle Maury, but Benjy's condition and Caroline's insecurity about her family name convince her to change her son's name.
Mr. and Mrs. Patterson	The Compsons' next-door neighbors. Uncle Maury has an affair with Mrs. Patterson until Mr. Patterson intercepts a note Maury has sent to her.
Charlie	One of Caddy's first suitors, whom Benjy catches with Caddy on the swing during the first chapter.
Dalton Ames	A local Jefferson boy who is probably the father of Caddy's child, Miss Quentin.
Shreve MacKenzie	Quentin's roommate at Harvard. A young Canadian man, Shreve reappears in Absalom, Absalom!, one of Faulkner's later novels, which is largely narrated by Shreve and Quentin from their dorm room at Harvard.
Spoade	A Harvard senior from South Carolina. Spoade once mocked Quentin's virginity by calling Shreve Quentin's “husband.”
Gerald Bland	A swaggering student at Harvard. Quentin fights with Gerald because he reminds him of Dalton Ames.
Mrs. Bland	Gerald Bland's boastful, Southern mother.
Deacon	A black man in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to whom Quentin gives his suicide notes.
Julio	The brother of an Italian girl who attaches herself to Quentin as he wanders Cambridge before his suicide.
Sydney Herbert Head	The prosperous banker whom Caddy marries. Herbert later divorces Caddy because of her pregnancy.
Lorraine	Jason's mistress, a prostitute who lives in Memphis.
Earl	The owner of the farm-supply store where Jason works. Earl feels some loyalty toward Mrs. Compson and thus puts up with Jason's surliness.
Reverend Shegog	The pastor who delivers a powerful sermon on Easter Sunday at the local black church in Jefferson.

　　　　　　　I. April 7, 1928 (Benjy's Perspective)
　 　　　 II. June 2, 1910　(Quentin's Perspective)
　　　　　III. April 6, 1928　(Jason's Perspective)
　　　　　IV. April 8, 1928　(Dilsey focus)





　　　　　　　　　　　　April 7, 1928



Through the fence, between the curling flower spaces, I could see them hitting. They
were coming toward where the flag was and I went along the fence. Luster was hunting
in the grass by the flower tree. They took the flag out, and they were hitting. Then
they put the flag back and they went to the table, and he hit and the other hit. Then
they went on, and I went along the fence. Luster came away from the flower tree and we
went along the fence and they stopped and we stopped and I looked through the fence
while Luster was hunting in the grass.

"Here, caddie." He hit. They went away across the pasture. I held to the fence and
watched them going away.

"Listen at you, now." Luster said. "Aint you something, thirty three years old, going
on that way. After I done went all the way to town to buy you that cake. Hush up that
moaning. Aint you going to help me find that quarter so I can go to the show tonight."

They were hitting little, across the pasture. I went back along the fence to where the
flag was. It flapped on the bright grass and the trees.

"Come on." Luster said. "We done looked there. They aint no more coming right now.
Les godown to the branch and find that quarter before them niggers finds it."

It was red, flapping on the pasture. Then there was a bird slanting and tilting on
it. Luster threw.The flag flapped on the bright grass and the trees. I held to the
fence.

"Shut up that moaning." Luster said. "I cant make them come if they aint coming, can
I. If you dont hush up, mammy aint going to have no birthday for you. If you dont hush,
you know what I going to do. I going to eat that cake all up. Eat them candles, too.
Eat all them thirty three candles. Come on, les go down to the branch. I got to find
my quarter. Maybe we can find one of they balls. Here. Here they is. Way over yonder.
See." He came to the fence and pointed his arm. "See them. They aint coming back here
no more. Come on."

We went along the fence and came to the garden fence, where our shadows were. My sha-
dow was higher than Luster's on the fence. We came to the broken place and went through
it.

"Wait a minute." Luster said. "You snagged on that nail again. Cant you never crawl
through here without snagging on that nail."

Caddy uncaught me and we crawled through. Uncle Maury said to not let anybody see us,
so we better stoop over, Caddy said. Stoop over, Benjy. Like this, see. We stooped over
and crossed the garden, where the flowers rasped and rattled against us. The ground
was hard. We climbed thefence, where the pigs were grunting and snuffing. I expect
they're sorry because one of them got killed today, Caddy said. The ground was hard,
churned and knotted.

Keep your hands in your pockets, Caddy said. Or they'll get froze. You dont want your
hands froze on Christmas, do you.

"It's too cold out there." Versh said. "You dont want to go outdoors."

"What is it now." Mother said.

"He want to go out doors." Versh said.

"Let him go." Uncle Maury said.

"It's too cold." Mother said. "He'd better stay in. Benjamin. Stop that, now."

"It wont hurt him." Uncle Maury said.

"You, Benjamin." Mother said. "If vou dont be good, you'll have to go to the kitchen."

"Mammy say keep him out the kitchen today." Versh said. "She say she got all that cook-
ing to get done."

"Let him go, Caroline." Uncle Maury said. "You'll worry yourself sick over him."

"I know it." Mother said. "It's a judgment on me. I sometimes wonder."

"I know, I know." Uncle Maury said. "You must keep your strength up. I'll make you a
toddy."

"It just upsets me that much more." Mother said. "Dont you know it does."

"You'll feel better. " Uncle Maury said. "Wrap him up good, boy, and take him out for
a while."

Uncle Maury went away. Versh went away.

"Please hush." Mother said. "We're trying to get you out as fast as we can. I dont want
you to get sick."

Versh put my overshoes and overcoat on and we took my cap and went out. Uncle Maury was
putting the bottle away in the sideboard in the diningroom.

"Keep him out about half an hour, boy." Uncle Maury said. "Keep him in the yard, now."

"Yes, sir." Versh said. "We dont never let him get off the place."

We went out doors. The sun was cold and bright.

"Where you heading for." Versh said. "You dont think you going to town, does you." We
went through the rattling leaves. The gate was cold. "You better keep them hands in your
pockets." Vershsaid. "You get them froze onto that gate, then what you do. Whyn't you
wait for them in the house." He put my hands into my pockets. I could hear him rattling
in the leaves. I could smell the cold. The gate was cold.

"Here some hickeynuts. Whooey. Git up that tree. Look here at this squirl, Benjy." I
couldn't feel the gate at all, but I could smell the bright cold. "You better put them
hands back in your pockets."

Caddy was walking. Then she was running, her booksatchel swinging and jouncing behind
her.

"Hello, Benjy." Caddy said. She opened the gate and came in and stooped down. Caddy
smelled like leaves. "Did you come to meet me." she said. "Did you come to meet Caddy.
What did you let him get his hands so cold for, Versh." "I told him to keep them in his
pockets." Versh said. "Holding on to that ahun gate."

"Did you come to meet Caddy." she said, rubbing my hands. "What is it. What are you try-
ing to tell Caddy." Caddy smelled like trees and like when she says we were asleep.

What are you moaning about, Luster said. You can watch them again when we get to the
branch. Here. Here's you a jimson weed. He gave me the flower. We went through the fence,
into the lot.

"What is it." Caddy said "What are you trying to tell Caddy. Did they send him out,
Versh."

"Couldn't keep him in." Versh said. "He kept on until they let him go and he come right
straight down here, looking through the gate."

"What is it." Caddy said. "Did you think it would be Christmas when I came home from
school. Is that what you thought. Christmas is the day after tomorrow. Santy Claus,
Benjy. Santy Claus. Come on, let's run to the house and get warm." She took my hand and
we ran through the bright rustling leaves. We ran up the steps and out of the bright
cold, into the dark cold. Uncle Maury was putting the bottle back in the sideboard. He
called Caddy. Caddy said,

"Take him in to the fire, Versh. Go with Versh." she said. "I'll come in a minute."

We went to the fire. Mother said,

"Is he cold, Versh."

"Nome." Versh said.

"Take his overcoat and overshoes off." Mother said. "How many times do I have to tell
you not to bring him into the house with his overshoes on.

"Yessum." Versh said. "Hold still, now." He took my overshoes off and unbuttoned my
coat. Caddy said,

"Wait, Versh. Cant he go out again, Mother. I want him to go with me."

"You'd better leave him here." Uncle Maury said. "He's been out enough today."

"I think you'd both better stay in." Mother said. "It's getting colder, Dilsey says."

"Oh, Mother." Caddy said.

"Nonsense." Uncle Maury said. "She's been in school all day. She needs the fresh air.
Run along, Candace."

"Let him go, Mother." Caddy said. "Please. You know he'll cry."

"Then why did you mention it before him." Mother said. "Why did you come in here. To
give him some excuse to worry me again. You've been out enough today. I think you'd
better sit down here and play with him."

"Let them go, Caroline." Uncle Maury said. "A little cold wont hurt them. Remember,
you've got to keep your strength up."

"I know." Mother said. "Nobody knows how I dread Christmas. Nobody knows. I am not
one of those women who can stand things. I wish for Jason's and the children's sakes
I was stronger."

"You must do the best you can and not let them worry you. " Uncle Maury said. "Run
along. you two. But dont stay out long, now. Your mother will worry."

"Yes, sir." Caddy said. "Come on, Benjy. We're going out doors again." She buttoned
my coat and we went toward the door.

"Are you going to take that baby out without his overshoes." Mother said. "Do you want
to make him sick, with the house full of company."

"I forgot." Caddy said. "I thought he had them on.

We went back. "You must think." Mother said. Hold still now Versh said. He put my over-
shoes on. "Someday I'll be gone, and you'll have to think for him." Now stomp Versh
said. "Come here and kiss Mother, Benjamin."

Caddy took me to Mother's chair and Mother took my face in her hands and then she held
me against her.

"My poor baby." she said. She let me go. "You and Versh take good care of him, honey."

"Yessum." Caddy said. We went out. Caddy said,

"You needn't go, Versh. I'll keep him for a while."

"All right." Versh said. "I aint going out in that cold for no fun." He went on and we
stopped in the hall and Caddy knelt and put her arms around me and her cold bright face
against mine. She smelled like trees.

"You're not a poor baby. Are you. Are you. You've got your Caddy. Haven't you got your
Caddy."

Cant you shut up that moaning and slobbering, Luster said. Aint you shamed of yourself,
making all this racket. We passed the carriage house, where the carriage was. It had a
new wheel.

"Git in, now, and set still until your maw come." Dilsey said. She shoved me into the
carriage.

T.P. held the reins. "Clare I dont see how come Jason wont get a new surrey." Dilsey
said. "This thing going to fall to pieces under you all some day. Look at them wheels."

Mother came out, pulling her veil down. She had some flowers.

"Where's Roskus." she said.

"Roskus cant lift his arms, today." Dilsey said. "T.P. can drive all right."

"I'm afraid to." Mother said. "It seems to me you all could furnish me with a driver
for the carriage once a week. It's little enough I ask, Lord knows."

"You know just as well as me that Roskus got the rheumatism too bad to do more than he
have to, Miss Cahline." Dilsey said. "You come on and get in, now. T.P. can drive you
just as good as Roskus."

"I'm afraid to." Mother said. "With the baby." Dilsey went up the steps. "You calling
that thing a baby." she said. She took Mother's arm. "A man big as T.P. Come on, now,
if you going."

"I'm afraid to." Mother said. They came down the steps and Dilsey helped Mother in.
"Perhaps it'll be the best thing, for all of us." Mother said.

"Aint you shamed, talking that way." Dilsey said. "Dont you know it'll take more than
a eighteen year old nigger to make Queenie run away. She older than him and Benjy put
together. And dont you start no projecking with Queenie, you hear me. T.P. If you dont
drive to suit Miss Cahline, I going to put Roskus on you. He aint too tied up to do
that."

"Yessum." T.P. said.

"I just know something will happen." Mother said. "Stop, Benjamin."

"Give him a flower to hold." Dilsey said. "That what he wanting." She reached her hand
in.

"No, no." Mother said. "You'll have them all scattered."

"You hold them." Dilsey said. "I'll get him one out." She gave me a flower and her hand
went away. "Go on now, fore Quentin see you and have to go too." Dilsey said.

"Where is she." Mother said.

"She down to the house playing with Luster." Dilsey said. "Go on, T.P. Drive that surrey
like Roskus told you, now.

"Yessum." T.P. said. "Hum up, Queenie."

"Quentin." Mother said. "Dont let "

"Course I is." Dilsey said.

The carriage jolted and crunched on the drive. "I'm afraid to go and leave Quentin." Mo-
ther said.

"I'd better not go. T.P." We went through the gate, where it didn't jolt anymore. T.P.
hit Queenie with the whip.

"You, T.P." Mother said.

"Got to get her going." T.P. said. "Keep her wake up till we get back to the barn."

"Turn around." Mother said. "I'm afraid to go and leave Quentin."

"Cant turn here." T.P. said. Then it was broader.

"Cant you turn here." Mother said.

"All right." T.P. said. We began to turn.

"You, T.P." Mother said, clutching me.

"I got to turn around some how." T.P. said. "Whoa, Queenie." We stopped.

"You'll turn us over." Mother said.

"What you want to do, then." T.P. said.

"I'm afraid for you to try to turn around." Mother said.
"Get up, Queenie." T.P. said. We went on.

"I just know Dilsey will let something happen to Quentin while I'm gone." Mother said.
"We must hurry back."

"Hum up,' there." T.P. said. He hit Queenie with the whip.

"You, T.P." Mother said, clutching me. I could hear Queenie's feet and the bright shapes
went smooth and steady on both sides, the shadows of them flowing across Queenie's back.
They went on like the bright tops of wheels. Then those on one side stopped at the tall
white post where the soldier was. But on the other side they went on smooth and steady,
but a little slower.

"What do you want." Jason said. He had his hands in his pockets and a pencil behind his
ear.

"We're going to the cemetery." Mother said.

"All right." Jason said. "I dont aim to stop you, do I. Was that all you wanted with me,
just to tell me that."

"I know you wont come." Mother said. "I'd feel safer if you would."

"Safe from what." Jason said. "Father and Quentin cant hurt you."

Mother put her handkerchief under her veil. "Stop it, Mother." Jason said. "Do you want
to get that damn looney to bawling in the middle of the square. Drive on, T.P."

"Hum up, Queenie." T.P. said.

"It's a judgment on me." Mother said. "But I'll be gone too, soon."

"Here." Jason said.

"Whoa." T.P. said. Jason said,

"Uncle Maury's drawing on you for fifty. What do you want to do about it."

"Why ask me." Mother said. "I dont have any say so. I try not to worry you and Dilsey.
I'll be gone soon, and then you "

"Go on, T.P." Jason said.

"Hum up, Queenie." T.P. said. The shapes flowed on. The ones on thc other side began a-
gain, bright and fast and smooth, like when Caddy says we are going to sleep.

Cry baby, Luster said. Aint you shamed. We went through the barn. The stalls were all
open. You aint got no spotted pony to ride now, Luster said. The floor was dry and dusty.
The roof was falling. The slanting holes were full of spinning yellow. What do you want
to go that way, for. You want to get your head knocked off with one of them balls.

“Keep your hands in your pockets." Caddy said. "Or they'll be froze. You dont want your
hands froze on Christmas, do you."

We went around the barn. The big cow and the little one were standing in the door, and we
could hear Prince and Queenie and Fancy stomping inside the barn. "If it wasn't so cold,
we'd ride Fancy." Caddy said. "But it's too cold to hold on today." Then we could see the
branch, where the smoke was blowing. "That's where they are killing the pig." Caddy said.
"We can come back by there and see them." We went down the hill.

"You want to carry the letter." Caddy said. "You can carry it." She took the letter out
of her pocket and put it in mine. "It's a Christmas present." Caddy said. "Uncle Maury is
going to surprise Mrs Patterson with it. We got to give it to her without letting anybody
see it. Keep your hands in your pockets good, now." We came to the branch.

"It's froze." Caddy said. "Look." She broke the top of the water and held a piece of it a-
gainst my face. "Ice. That means how cold it is." She helped me across and we went up the
hill. "We cant even tell Mother and Father. You know what I think it is. I think it's a
surprise for Mother and Father and Mr Patterson both, because Mr Patterson sent you some
candy. Do you remember when Mr Patterson sent you some candy last summer.

There was a fence. The vine was dry, and the wind rattled in it.

"Only I dont see why Uncle Maury didn't send Versh." Caddy said. "Versh wont tell." Mrs

Patterson was looking out the window. "You wait here." Caddy said. "Wait right here, now.
I'll be back in a minute. Give me the letter." She took the letter out of my pocket. "Keep
your hands in your pockets." She climbed the fence with the letter in her hand and went
through the brown, rattling flowers. Mrs Patterson came to the door and opened it and
stood there.

Mr Patterson was chopping in the green flowers. He stopped chopping and looked at me. Mrs
Patterson came across the garden, running. When I saw her eyes I began to cry. You idiot,
Mrs Patterson said, I told him never to send you alone again. Give it to me. Quick. Mr
Patterson came fast, with the hoe. Mrs Patterson leaned across the fence, reaching her
hand. She was trying to climb the fence. Give it to me, she said, Give it to me. Mr Pat-
terson climbed the fence. He took the letter. Mrs Patterson's dress was caught on the
fence. I saw her eyes again and I ran down the hill.

"They aint nothing over yonder but houses." Luster said. "We going down to the branch."
They were washing down at the branch. One of them was singing. I could smell the clothes
flapping, and the smoke blowing across the branch.

"You stay down here." Luster said. "You aint got no business up yonder. Them folks hit
you, sho."

"What he want to do."

"He dont know what he want to do." Luster said. "He think he want to go up yonder where
they knocking that hall. You sit down here and play with your jimson weed. Look at them
chillen playing in the branch, if you got to look at something. How come you cant behave
yourself like folks." I sat down on the bank, where they were washing, and the smoke
blowing blue.

"Is you all seen anything of a quarter down here." Luster said."What quarter."

"The one I had here this morning." Luster said. "I lost it somewhere. It fell through
this here hole in my pocket. If I dont find it I cant go to the show tonight."

"Where'd you get a quarter, boy. Find it in white folks' pocket while they aint looking."

"Got it at the getting place." Luster said "Plenty more where that one come from. Only I
got to find that one. Is you all found it yet."

"I aint studying no quarter. I got my own business to tend to."

"Come on here." Luster said. "Help me look for it."

"He wouldn't know a quarter if he was to see it, would he.""He can help look just the
same."

Luster said. "You all going to the show tonight."

"Dont talk to me about no show. Time I get done over this here tub I be too tired to lift
my hand to do nothing."

"I bet you be there." Luster said. "I bet you was there last night. I bet you all be
right there when that tent open."

Be enough niggers there without me. Was last night."

"Nigger's money good as white folks, I reckon."

"White folks gives nigger money because know first white man comes along with a band
going to get it all back, so nigger can go to work for some more."

"Aint nobody going make you go to that show."

"Aint yet. Aint thought of it, I reckon."

"What you got against white folks."

"Aint got nothing against them. I goes my way and lets white folks go theirs. I aint stu-
dying that show."

"Got a man in it can play a tune on a saw. Play it like a banjo."

"You go last night." Luster said. "I going tonight If I can find where I lost that quar-
ter."

"You going take him with you, I reckon."

"Me." Luster said. "You reckon I be found anywhere with him, time he start bellering."

"What does you do when he start bellering."

"I whips him." Luster said. He sat down and rolled up his overalls. They played in the
branch.

"You all found any balls yet." Luster said.

"Aint you talking biggity. I bet you better not let your grandmammy hear you talking like
that."

Luster got into the branch, where they were playing. He hunted in the water, along the
bank.

"I had it when we was down here this morning." Luster said.

"Where bouts you lose it."

"Right out this here hole in my pocket." Luster said. They hunted in the branch. Then they
all stood up quick and stopped, then they splashed and fought in the branch. Luster got
it and they squatted in the water, looking up the hill through the bushes.

"Where is they." Luster said.

"Aint in sight yet."

Luster put it in his pocket. They came down the hill.

"Did a hall come down here."

"It ought to be in the water. Didn't any of you boys see it or hear it."

"Aint heard nothing come down here." Luster said. "Heard something hit that tree up yon-
der. Dont know which way it went."

They looked in the branch.

"Hell. Look along the branch. It came down here. I saw it."

They looked along the branch. Then they went back up the hill.

"Have you got that ball." the boy said.

"What I want with it." Luster said. "I aint seen no ball."

The boy got in the water. He went on. He turned and looked at Luster again. He went on
down the branch.

The man said "Caddie" up the hill. The boy got out of the water and went up the hill.

"Now, just listen at you." Luster said. "Hush up."

"What he moaning about now."

"Lawd knows." Luster said. "He just starts like that. He been at it all morning. Cause
it his birthday, I reckon."

"How old he."

"He thirty three." Luster said. "Thirty three this morning."

"You mean, he been three years old thirty years."

"I going by what mammy say." Luster said. "I dont know. We going to have thirty three
candles on a cake, anyway. Little cake. Wont hardly hold them. Hush up. Come on back
here." He came and caught my arm. "You old looney." he said. "You want me to whip you."

"I bet you will."

"I is done it. Hush, now." Luster said. "Aint I told you you cant go up there. They'll
knock your head clean off with one of them balls. Come on, here." He pulled me back.
"Sit down." I sat down and he took off my shoes and rolled up my trousers. "Now, git
in that water and play and see can you stop that slobbering and moaning."

I hushed and got in the water and Roskus came and said to come to supper and Caddy
said,

It's not supper time yet I'm not going.

She was wet. We were playing in the branch and Caddy squatted down and got her dress
wet and Versh said,

"Your mommer going to whip you for getting your dress wet."

"She's not going to do any such thing." Caddy said.

"How do you know." Quentin said.

"That's all right how I know." Caddy said. "How do you know."

"She said she was." Quentin said. "Besides, I'm older than you."

"I'm seven years old." Caddy said. "I guess I know."

"I'm older than that." Quentin said. "I go to school. Dont I, Versh."

"I'm going to school next year." Caddy said. "When it comes. Aint I, Versh."

"You know she whip you when you get your dress wet." Versh said.

"It's not wet." Caddy said. She stood up in the water and looked at her dress. "I'll
take it off." she said. "Then it'll dry."

"I bet you wont." Quentin said.

"I bet I will." Caddy said.

"I bet you better not." Quentin said.

Caddy came to Versh and me and turned her back.

"Unbutton it, Versh." she said.

"Dont you do it, Versh." Quentin said.

"Taint none of my dress." Versh said.

"You unbutton it, Versh." Caddy said. "Or I'll tell Dilsey what you did yesterday."
So Versh unbuttoned it.

"You just take your dress off." Quentin said. Caddy took her dress off and threw it
on the bank. Then she didn't have on anything but her bodice and drawers, and Quen-
tin slapped her and she slipped and fell down in the water. When she got up she began
to splash water on Quentin, and Quentin splashed water on Caddy. Some of it splashed
on Versh and me and Versh picked me up and put me on the bank. He said he was going
to tell on Caddy and Quentin, and then Quentin and Caddy began to splash water at
Versh. He got behind a bush.

"I'm going to tell mammy on you all." Versh said.

Quentin climbed up the bank and tried to catch Versh, but Versh ran away and Quentin
couldn't. When Quentin came back Versh stopped and hollered that he was going to tell.
Caddy told him that if he wouldn't tell, they'd let him come back. So Versh said he
wouldn't, and they let him.

"Now I guess you're satisfied." Quentin said. "We'll both get whipped now."

"I dont care." Caddy said. "I'll run away."

"Yes you will." Quentin said.

"I'll run away and never come back." Caddy said. I began to cry.

Caddy turned around and said "Hush" So I hushed. Then they played in the branch. Ja-
son was playing too. He was by himself further down the branch. Versh came around the
bush and lifted me down into the water again. Caddy was all wet and muddy behind, and
I started to cry and she came and squatted in the water.

"Hush now." she said. "I'm not going to run away." So I hushed. Caddy smelled like
trees in the rain.

What is the matter with you, Luster said. Cant you get done with that moaning and play
in the branch like folks.

Whyn't you take him on home. Didn't they told you not to take him off the place.

He still think they own this pasture, Luster said. Cant nobody see down here from the
house, noways.

We can. And folks dont like to look at a looney. Taint no luck in it.

Roskus came and said to come to supper and Caddy said it wasn't supper time yet.

"Yes tis." Roskus said. "Dilsey say for you all to come on to the house. Bring them
on, Versh." He went up the hill, where the cow was lowing.

"Maybe we'll be dry by the time we get to the house." Quentin said.

"It was all your fault." Caddy said. "I hope we do get whipped." She put her dress on
and Versh buttoned it.

"They wont know you got wet." Versh said. "It dont show on you. Less me and Jason
tells."

"Are you going to tell, Jason." Caddy said.

"Tell on who." Jason said.

"He wont tell." Quentin said. "Will you, Jason."

"I bet he does tell." Caddy said. "He'll tell Damuddy."

"He cant tell her." Quentin said. "She's sick. If we walk slow it'll be too dark for
them to see."

"I dont care whether they see or not." Caddy said. "I'm going to tell, myself. You car-
ry him up the hill, Versh."

"Jason wont tell." Quentin said. "You remember that bow and arrow I made you, Jason."

"It's broke now." Jason said.

"Let him tell." Caddy said. "I dont give a cuss. Carry Maury up the hill, Versh." Versh
squatted and I got on his back.

See you all at the show tonight, Luster said. Come on, here. We got to find that quarter.

"If we go slow, it'll be dark when we get there." Quentin said.

"I'm not going slow." Caddy said. We went up the hill, but Quentin didn't come. He was
down at the branch when we got to where we could smell the pigs. They were grunting and
snuffing in the trough in the corner. Jason came behind us, with his hands in his pockets.
Roskus was milking the cow in the barn door.

The cows came jumping out of the barn.

"Go on." T.P. said. "Holler again. I going to holler myself. Whooey." Quentin kicked T.P.
again. He kicked T.P. into the trough where the pigs ate and T.P. lay there. "Hot dog."
T.P. said. "Didn't he get me then. You see that white man kick me that time. Whooey."

I wasn't crying, but I couldn't stop. I wasn't crying, but the ground wasn't still, and
then I was crying. The ground kept sloping up and the cows ran up the hill. T.P. tried
to get up. He fell down again and the cows ran down the hill. Quentin held my arm and we
went toward the barn. Then the barn wasn't there and we had to wait until it came back.
I didn't see it come back. It came behind us and Quentin set me down in the trough where
the cows ate. I held on to it. It was going away too, and I held to it. The cows ran down
the hill again, across the door. I couldn't stop. Quentin and T.P. came up the hill,
fighting. T.P. was falling down the hill and Quentin dragged him up the hill. Quentin
hit T.P. I couldn't stop.

"Stand up." Quentin said. "You stay right here. Dont you go away until I get back."

"Me and Benjy going back to the wedding." T.P. said. "Whooey."

Quentin hit T.P. again. Then he began to thump T.P. against the wall T.P. was laughing.
Every time Quentin thumped him against the wall he tried to say Whooey, but he couldn't
say it for laughing. I quit crying, but I couldn't stop. T.P. fell on me and the barn
door went away. It went down the hill and T.P. was fighting by himself and he fell down
again. He was still laughing, and I couldn't stop, and I tried to get up and I fell down,
and I couldn't stop. Versh said,

"You sho done it now. I'll declare if you aint. Shut up that yelling."

T.P. was still laughing. He flopped on the door and laughed. "Whooey." he said. "Me and
Benjy going back to the wedding. Sassprilluh." T.P. said.

"Hush." Versh said. "Where you get it."

"Out the cellar." T.P. said. "Whooey."

"Hush up." Versh said. "Where bouts in the cellar."

"Anywhere." T.P. said. He laughed some more. "Moren a hundred boftles lef. Moren a mill-
ion. Look out, nigger, I going to holler."

Quentin said, "Lift him up."

Versh lifted me up.

"Drink this, Benjy." Quentin said. The glass was hot. "Hush, now." Quentin said. "Drink
it."

"Sassprilluh." T.P. said. "Lemme drink it, Mr Quentin."

"You shut your mouth." Versh said. "Mr Quentin wear you out."

"Hold him, Versh." Quentin said.

They held me. It was hot on my chin and on my shirt. "Drink." Quentin said. They held
my head. It was hot inside me, and I began again. I was crying now, and something was
happening inside me and I cried more, and they held me until it stopped happening. Then
I hushed. It was still going around, and then the shapes began. Open the crib, Versh.
They were going slow. Spread those empty sacks on the floor. They were going faster,
almost fast enough. Now. Pick up his feet. They went on, smooth and bright. I could
hear T.P. laughing. I went on with them, up the bright hill.

At the top of the hill Versh put me down. "Come on here, Quentin." he called, looking
back down the hill. Quentin was still standing there by the branch. He was chunking
into the shadows where the branch was.

"Let the old skizzard stay there." Caddy said. She took my hand and we went on past the
barn and through the gate. There was a frog on the brick walk, squatting in the middle
of it. Caddy stepped over it and pulled me on.

"Come on, Maury." she said. It still squatted there until Jason poked at it with his toe.

"He'll make a wart on you." Versh said. The frog hopped away.

"Come on, Maury." Caddy said.

"They got company tonight." Versh said.

"How do you know." Caddy said.

"With all them lights on." Versh said. "Light in every window."

"I reckon we can turn all the lights on without company, if we want to." Caddy said.

"I bet it's company. " Versh said. "You all befter go in the back and slip upstairs."

"I dont care." Caddy said. "I'll walk right in the parlor where they are.

"I bet your pappy whip you if you do." Versh said.

"I dont care." Caddy said. "I'll walk right in the parlor. I'll walk right in the din-
ing room and eat supper."

"Where you sit." Versh said.

"I'd sit in Damuddy's chair." Caddy said. "She eats in bed."

"I'm hungry. " Jason said. He passed us and ran on up the walk. He had his hands in
his pockets and he fell down. Versh went and picked him up.

"If you keep them hands out your pockets, you could stay on your feet." Versh said.
"You cant never get them out in time to catch yourself, fat as you is."

Father was standing by the kitchen steps.

"Where's Quentin." he said.

"He coming up the walk." Versh said. Quentin was coming slow. His shirt was a white
blur. "Oh." Father said. Light fell down the steps, on him.

"Caddy and Quentin threw water on each other. " Jason said.

We waited.

"They did." Father said. Quentin came, and Father said, "You can eat supper in the
kitchen tonight." He stooped and took me up, and the light came tumbling down the
steps on me too, and I could look down at Caddy and Jason and Quentin and Versh. Fa-
ther turned toward the steps. "You must be quiet, though." he said.

"Why must we be quiet, Father." Caddy said. "Have we got company."

"Yes." Father said.

"I told you they was company." Versh said.

"You did not." Caddy said. "I was the one that said there was. I said I would "

"Hush." Father said. They hushed and Father opened the door and we crossed the back
porch and went in to the kitchen. Dilsey was there, and Father put me in the chair
and closed the apron down and pushed it to the table, where supper was. It was stea-
ming up.

"You mind Dilsey, now." Father said. "Dont let them make any more noise than they
can help, Dilsey."

"Yes, sir." Dilsey said. Father went away.

"Remember to mind Dilsey, now." he said behind us. I leaned my face over where the
supper was. It steamed up on my face.

"Let them mind me tonight, Father." Caddy said.

"I wont." Jason said. "I'm going to mind Dilsey."

"You'll have to, if Father says so." Caddy said. "Let them mind me, Father."

"I wont." Jason said. "I wont mind you."

"Hush." Father said. "You all mind Caddy, then. When they are done, bring them up
the back stairs, Dilsey."

"Yes, sir." Dilsey said.

"There." Caddy said. "Now I guess you'll mind me."

"You all hush, now." Dilsey said. "You got to be quiet tonight."

"Why do we have to be quiet tonight." Caddy whispered.

"Never you mind." Dilsey said. "You'll know in the Lawd's own time." She brought my
bowl. The steam from it came and tickled my face. "Come here, Versh." Dilsey said.

"When is the Lawd's own time, Dilsey." Caddy said.

"It's Sunday." Quentin said. "Dont you know anything."

"Shhhhhh." Dilsey said. "Didn't Mr Jason say for you all to be quiet. Eat your sup-
per, now. Here, Versh. Git his spoon." Versh's hand came with the spoon, into the
bowl. The spoon came up to my mouth. The steam tickled into my mouth. Then we quit
eating and we looked at each other and we were quiet, and then we heard it again and
I began to cry.

"What was that." Caddy said. She put her hand on my hand.

"That was Mother." Quentin said. The spoon came up and I ate, then I cried again.

"Hush." Caddy said. But I didn't hush and she came and put her arms around me. Dil-
sey went and closed both the doors and then we couldn't hear it.

"Hush, now." Caddy said. I hushed and ate. Quentin wasn't eating, but Jason was.

"That was Mother." Quentin said. He got up.

"You set right down." Dilsey said. "They got company in there, and you in them mud-
dy clothes. You set down too, Caddy, and get done eating."

"She was crying." Quentin said.

"It was somebody singing." Caddy said. "Wasn't it, Dilsey."

"You all eat your supper, now, like Mr Jason said." Dilsey said. "You'll know in the
Lawd's own time." Caddy went back to her chair.

"I told you it was a party." she said.

Versh said, "He done et all that."

"Bring his bowl here." Dilsey said. The bowl went away.

"Dilsey." Caddy said. "Quentin's not eating his supper. Hasn't he got to mind me."

"Eat your supper, Quentin." Dilsey said. "You all got to get done and get out of my
kitchen."

"I dont want any more supper. Quentin said.

"You've got to eat if I say you have." Caddy said. "Hasn't he, Dilsey." The bowl
steamed up to my face, and Versh's hand dipped the spoon in it and the steam tickled
into my mouth.

"I dont want any more." Quentin said. "How can they have a party when Damuddy's sick."

"They'll have it down stairs." Caddy said. "She can come to the landing and see it.
That's what I'm going to do when I get my nightie on.

"Mother was crying. " Quentin said. "Wasn't she crying, Dilsey."

"Dont you come pestering at me, boy." Dilsey said. "I got to get supper for all them
folks soon as you all get done eating."

After a while even Jason was through eating, and he began to cry.

"Now you got to tune up." Dilsey said.

"He does it every night since Damuddy was sick and he cant sleep with her." Caddy
said. "Cry baby."

"I'm going to tell on you." Jason said.

He was crying. "You've already told." Caddy said. "There's not anything else you can
tell, now."

"You all needs to go to bed." Dilsey said. She came and lifted me down and wiped my
face and hands with a warm cloth. "Versh, can you get them up the back stairs quiet.
You, Jason, shut up that crying."

"It's too early to go to bed now." Caddy said. "We dont ever have to go to bed this
early."

"You is tonight." Dilsey said. "Your paw say for you to come right on up stairs when
you et supper. You heard him."

"He said to mind me. " Caddy said.

"I'm not going to mind you." Jason said.

"You have to." Caddy said. "Come on, now. You have to do like I say.

"Make them be quiet, Versh." Dilsey said. "You all going to be quiet, aint you.

"What do we have to be so quiet for, tonight." Caddy said.

"Your mommer aint feeling well." Dilsey said. "You all go on with Versh, now."

"I told you Mother was crying. " Quentin said. Versh took me up and opened the door
onto the back porch. We went out and Versh closed the door black. I could smell Versh
and feel him. You all be quiet, now. We're not going up stairs yet. Mr Jason said for
you to come right up stairs. He said to mind me. I'm not going to mind you. But he
said for all of us to. Didn't he, Quentin. I could feel Versh's head. I could hear
us. Didn't he, Versh. Yes, that right. Then I say for us to go out doors a while.
Come on. Versh opened the door and we went out.

We went down the steps.

"I expect we'd better go down to Versh's house, so we'll be quiet." Caddy said. Versh
put me down and Caddy took my hand and we went down the brick walk.

"Come on." Caddy said. "That frog's gone. He's hopped way over to the garden, by now.
Maybe we'll see another one." Roskus came with the milk buckets. He went on. Quentin
wasn't coming with us. He was sitting on the kitchen steps. We went down to Versh's
house. I liked to smell Versh's house. There was a fire in it and T.P. squatting in
his shirt tail in front of it, chunking it into a blaze.

Then I got up and T.P. dressed me and we went to the kitchen and ate. Dilsey was sing-
ing and I began to cry and she stopped.

"Keep him away from the house, now." Dilsey said.

"We cant go that way." T.P. said.

We played in the branch.

"We cant go around yonder." T.P. said. "Dont you know mammy say we cant."

Dilsey was singing in the kitchen and I began to cry.

"Hush." T.P. said. "Come on. Les go down to the barn."

Roskus was milking at the barn. He was milking with one hand, and groaning. Some
birds sat on the barn door and watched him. One of them came down and ate with
the cows. I watched Roskus milk while T.P. was feeding Queenie and Prince. The calf
was in the pig pen. It nuzzled at the wire, bawling.

"T.P." Roskus said. T.P. said Sir, in the barn. Fancy held her head over the door, be-
cause T.P. hadn't fed her yet. "Git done there." Roskus said. "You got to do this milk-
ing. I cant use my right hand no more."

T.P. came and milked.

"Whyn't you get the doctor." T.P. said.

"Doctor cant do no good." Roskus said. "Not on this place."

"What wrong with this place." T.P. said.

"Taint no luck on this place." Roskus said. "Turn that calf in if you done."

Taint no luck on this place, Roskus said. The fire rose and fell behind him and Versh,
sliding on his and Versh's face. Dilsey finished putting me to bed. The bed smelled
like T.P. I liked it.

"What you know about it." Dilsey said. "What trance you been in."

"Dont need no trance." Roskus said. "Aint the sign of it laying right there on that bed.
Aint the sign of it been here for folks to see fifteen years now.

"Spose it is." Dilsey said. "It aint hurt none of you and yourn, is it. Versh working
and Frony married off your hands and T.P. getting big enough to take your place when
rheumatism finish getting you."

"They been two, now." Roskus said. "Going to be one more. I seen the sign, and you is
too."

"I heard a squinch owl that night." T.P. said. "Dan wouldn't come and get his supper,
neither. Wouldn't come no closer than the barn. Begun howling right after dark. Versh
heard him."

"Going to be more than one more." Dilsey said. "Show me the man what aint going to die,
bless Jesus."

"Dying aint all." Roskus said.

"I knows what you thinking." Dilsey said. "And they aint going to be no luck in saying
that name, lessen you going to set up with him while he cries."

"They aint no luck on this place." Roskus said. "I seen it at first but when they chang-
ed his name I knowed it."

"Hush your mouth." Dilsey said. She pulled the covers up. It smelled like T.P. "You all
shut up now, till he get to sleep."

"I seen the sign. " Roskus said.

"Sign T.P. got to do all your work for you." Dilsey said. Take him and Quentin down to
the house and let them play with Luster, where Frony can watch them, T.P., and go and
help your paw.

We finished eating. T.P. took Quentin up and we went down to T.P.'s house. Luster was
playing in the dirt. T.P. put Quentin down and she played in the dirt too. Luster had
some spools and he and Quentin fought and Quentin had the spools. Luster cried and
Frony came and gave Luster a tin can to play with, and then I had the spools and Quen-
tin fought me and I cried.

"Hush." Frony said. "Aint you shamed of yourself. Taking a baby's play pretty." She
took the spools from me and gave them back to Quentin.

"Hush, now." Frony said. "Hush, I tell you.

"Hush up." Frony said. "You needs whipping, that's what you needs." She took Luster
and Quentin up. "Come on here." she said. We went to the barn. T.P. was milking the
cow. Roskus was sitting on the box.

"What's the matter with him now." Roskus said.

"You have to keep him down here." Frony said. "He fighting these babies again. Taking
they play things. Stay here with T.P. now, and see can you hush a while."

"Clean that udder good now." Roskus said. "You milked that young cow dry last winter.
If you milk this one dry, they aint going to be no more milk."

Dilsey was singing.

"Not around yonder." T.P. said. "Dont you know mammy say you cant go around there."

They were singing.

"Come on." T.P. said. "Les go play with Quentin and Luster. Come on."

Quentin and Luster were playing in the dirt in front of T.P.'s house. There was a
fire in the house, rising and falling, with Roskus sitting black against it.

"That's three, thank the Lawd." Roskus said. "I told you two years ago. They aint
no luck on this place."

"Whyn't you get out, then." Dilsey said. She was undressing me. "Your bad luck talk
got them Memphis notions into Versh. That ought to satisfy you.

"If that all the bad luck Versh have." Roskus said.

Frony came in.

"You all done." Dilsey said.

"T.P. finishing up." Frony said. "Miss Cabline want you to put Quentin to bed."

"I'm coming just as fast as I can." Dilsey said. "She ought to know by this time I
aint got no wings."

"That's what I tell you." Roskus said. "They aint no luck going be on no place where
one of they own chillen's name aint never spoke."

"Hush." Dilsey said. "Do you want to get him started."

"Raising a child not to know its own mammy's name." Roskus said.

"Dont you bother your head about her." Dilsey said. "I raised all of them and I reck-
on I can raise one more. Hush, now. Let him get to sleep if he will."

"Saying a name." Frony said. "He dont know nobody's name."

"You just say it and see if he dont." Dilsey said. "You say it to him while he sleep-
ing and I bet he hear you.

"He know lot more than folks thinks." Roskus said. "He knowed they time was coming,
like that pointer done. He could tell you when hisn coming, if he could talk. Or
yours. Or mine."

"You take Luster outen that bed, mammy." Frony said. "That boy conjure him."

"Hush your mouth." Dilsey said. "Aint you got no better sense than that. What you
want to listen to Roskus for, anyway. Get in, Benjy."

Dilsey pushed me and I got in the bed, where Luster already was. He was asleep. Dil-
sey took a long piece of wood and laid it between Luster and me. "Stay on your side
now." Dilsey said. "Luster little, and you dont want to hurt him."

You cant go yet, T.P. said. Wait.

We looked around the corner of the house and watched the carriages go away.

"Now." T.P. said. He took Quentin up and we ran down to the corner of the fence and
watched them pass. "There he go." T.P. said. "See that one with the glass in it.
Look at him. He laying in there. See him."

Come on, Luster said, I going to take this here ball down home, where I wont lose it.
Naw, sir,you cant have it. If them men sees you with it, they'll say you stole it.
Hush up, now. You cant have it. What business you got with it. You cant play no ball.

Frony and T.P. were playing in the dirt by the door. T.P. had lightning bugs in a bot-
tle.

"How did you all get back out." Frony said.

"We've got company." Caddy said. "Father said for us to mind me tonight. I expect you
and T.P. will have to mind me too."

"I'm not going to mind you." Jason said. "Frony and T.P. dont have to either.""They
will if I say so." Caddy said. "Maybe I wont say for them to."

"T.P. dont mind nobody." Frony said. "Is they started the funeral yet."

"What's a funeral." Jason said.

"Didn't mammy tell you not to tell them." Versh said.

"Where they moans." Frony said. "They moaned two days on Sis Beulah Clay."

They moaned at Dilsey's house. Dilsey was moaning. When Dilsey moaned Luster said,
Hush, and we hushed, and then I began to cry and Blue howled under the kitchen steps.
Then Dilsey stopped and we stopped.

"Oh." Caddy said. "That's niggers. White folks dont have funerals."

"Mammy said us not to tell them, Frony." Versh said.

"Tell them what." Caddy said.

Dilsey moaned, and when it got to the place I began to cry and Blue howled under the
steps. Luster, Frony said in the window. Take them down to the barn. I cant get no
cooking done with all that racket. That hound too. Get them outen here.

I aint going down there, Luster said. I might meet pappy down there. I seen him last
night, waving his arms in the barn.

"I like to know why not." Frony said. "White folks dies too. Your grandmammy dead as
any nigger can get, I reckon."

"Dogs are dead." Caddy said. "And when Nancy fell in the ditch and Roskus shot her
and the buzzards came and undressed her."

The bones rounded out of the ditch, where the dark vines were in the black ditch, in-
to the moonlight, like some of the shapes had stopped. Then they all stopped and it
was dark, and when I stopped to start again I could hear Mother, and feet walking fast
away, and I could smell it. Then the room came, but my eyes went shut. I didn't stop.
I could smell it. T.P. unpinned the bed clothes.

"Hush." he said. "Shhhhhhhh."

But I could smell it. T.P. pulled me up and he put on my clothes fast.

"Hush, Benjy." he said. "We going down to our house. You want to go down to our house,
where Frony is. Hush. Shhhhh."

He laced my shoes and put my cap on and we went out. There was a light in the hall.
Across the hall we could hear Mother.

"Shhhhhh, Benjy." T.P. said. "We'll be out in a minute." A door opened and I could smell
it more than ever, and a head came out. It wasn't Father. Father was sick there.

"Can you take him out of the house."

"That's where we going." T.P. said. Dilsey came up the stairs.

"Hush." she said. "Hush. Take him down home, T.P. Frony fixing him a bed. You all look
afterhim, now. Hush, Benjy. Go on with T.P."

She went where we could hear Mother.

"Better keep him there." It wasn't Father. He shut the door, but I could still smell it.

We went down stairs. The stairs went down into the dark and T.P. took my hand, and we
went out the door, out of the dark. Dan was sitting in the back yard, howling.

"He smell it." T.P. said. "Is that the way you found it out."

We went down the steps, where our shadows were.

"I forgot your coat." T.P. said. "You ought to had it. But I aint going back."

Dan howled.

"Hush now." T.P. said. Our shadows moved, but Dan's shadow didn't move except to howl
when he did.

"I cant take you down home, bellering like you is." T.P. said. "You was bad enough be-
fore you got that bullfrog voice. Come on."

We went along the brick walk, with our shadows. The pig pen smelled like pigs. The cow
stood in the lot, chewing at us. Dan howled.

"You going to wake the whole town up." T.P. said. "Cant you hush." We saw Fancy, eating
by the branch. The moon shone on the water when we got there.

"Naw, sir." T.P. said. "This too close. We cant stop here. Come on. Now, just look at
you. Got your whole leg wet. Come on, here." Dan howled.

The ditch came up out of the buzzing grass. The bones rounded out of the black vines.

"Now." T.P. said. "Beller your head off if you want to. You got the whole night and a
twenty acre pasture to belIer in."

T.P. lay down in the ditch and I sat down, watching the bones where the buzzards ate
Nancy, flapping black and slow and heavy out of the ditch.

I had it when we was down here before, Luster said. I showed it to you. Didn't you see
it. I took it out of my pocket right here and showed it to you.

"Do you think buzzards are going to undress Damuddy." Caddy said. "You're crazy."

"You're a skizzard." Jason said. He began to cry.

"You're a knobnut." Caddy said. Jason cried. His hands were in his pockets.

"Jason going to be rich man." Versh said. "He holding his money all the time."
Jason cried.

"Now you've got him started." Caddy said. "Hush up, Jason. How can buzzards get in
where Damuddy is. Father wouldn't let them. Would you let a buzzard undress you. Hush
up, now." Jason hushed. "Frony said it was a funeral." he said.

"Well it's not." Caddy said. "It's a party. Frony dont know anything about it. He wants
your lightning bugs, T.P. Let him hold it a while."

T.P. gave me the bottle of lightning bugs.

"I bet if we go around to the parlor window we can see something." Caddy said. "Then
you'll believe me."

"I already knows." Frony said. "I dont need to see.

"You better hush your mouth, Frony." Versh said. "Mammy going whip you."

"What is it." Caddy said.

"I knows what I knows." Frony said.

"Come on." Caddy said. "Let's go around to the front."

We started to go.

"T P. wants his lightning bugs." Frony said.

"Let him hold it a while longer, T.P." Caddy said. "We'll bring it back."

"You all never caught them." Frony said.

"If I say you and T.P. can come too, will you let him hold it." Caddy said.

"Aint nobody said me and T.P. got to mind you." Frony said.

"If I say you dont have to, will you let him hold it." Caddy said. "All right." Frony
said. "Let him hold it, T.P. We going to watch them moaning."

"They aint moaning." Caddy said. "I tell you it's a party. Are they moaning, Versh."

"We aint going to know what they doing, standing here." Versh said.

"Come on." Caddy said. "Frony and T.P. dont have to mind me. But the rest of us do.
You better carry him, Versh. It's getting dark."

Versh took me up and we went on around the kitchen.

When we looked around the corner we could see the lights coming up the drive. T.P.
went back to the cellar door and opened it.

You know what's down there, T.P. said. Soda water. I seen Mr Jason come up with both
hands full of them. Wait here a minute.

T.P. went and looked in the kitchen door. Dilsey said, What are you peeping in here
for. Where's Benjy.

He out here, T.P. said.

Go on and watch him, Dilsey said. Keep him out the house now.

Yessum, T.P. said. Is they started yet.

You go on and keep that boy out of sight, Dilsey said. I got all I can tend to.

A snake crawled out from under the house. Jason said he wasn't afraid of snakes and
Caddy said he was but she wasn't and Versh said they both were and Caddy said to be
quiet, like Father said.

You aint got to start bellering now, T.P. said. You want some this sassprilluh.

It tickled my nose and eyes.

If you aint going to drink it, let me get to it, T.P. said. All right, here tis. We
better get another bottle while aint nobody bothering us. You be quiet, now.

We stopped under the tree by the parlor window. Versh set me down in the wet grass.
It was cold. There were lights in all the windows.

"That's where Damuddy is." Caddy said. "She's sick every day now. When she gets well
we're going to have a picnic."

"I knows what I knows." Frony said.

The trees were buzzing, and the grass.

"The one next to it is where we have the measles." Caddy said. "Where do you and T.P.
have the measles, Frony."

"Has them just wherever we is, I reckon." Frony said.

"They haven't started yet." Caddy said.

They getting ready to start, T.P. said. You stand right here now while I get that box
so we can see in the window. Here, les finish drinking this here sassprilluh. It make
me feel just like a squinch owl inside.

We drank the sassprilluh and T.P. pushed the bottle through the lattice, under the
house, and went away. I could hear them in the parlor and I clawed my hands against
the wall. T.P. dragged the box. He fell down, and he began to laugh. He lay there,
laughing into the grass. He got up and dragged the box under the window, trying not
to laugh.

"I skeered I going to holler." T.P. said. "Git on the box and see is they started."

"They haven't started because the band hasn't come yet." Caddy said.

"They aint going to have no band." Frony said.

"How do you know." Caddy said.

"I knows what I knows." Frony said.

"You dont know anything." Caddy said. She went to the tree. "Push me up, Versh."

"Your paw told you to stay out that tree." Versh said.

"That was a long time ago." Caddy said. "I expect he's forgotten about it. Besides,
he said to mind me tonight. Didn't he didn't he say to mind me tonight."

"I'm not going to mind you." Jason said. "Frony and T.P. are not going to either."

"Push me up, Versh." Caddy said.

"All right." Versh said. "You the one going to get whipped. I aint." He went and push-
ed Caddy up into the tree to the first limb. We watched the muddy bottom of her draw-
ers. Then we couldn't see her. We could hear the tree thrashing.

"Mr Jason said if you break that tree he whip you." Versh said.

"I'm going to tell on her too." Jason said.

The tree quit thrashing. We looked up into the still branches.

"What you seeing." Frony whispered.

I saw them. Then I saw Caddy, with flowers in her hair, and a long veil like shining
wind. Caddy Caddy

"Hush." T.P. said. "They going to hear you. Get down quick." He pulled me. Caddy. I
clawed my hands against the wall Caddy. T.P. pulled me. "Hush." he said. "Hush. Come on
here quick." He pulled me on. Caddy "Hush up, Benjy. You want them to hear you. Come on,
les drink some more sassprilluh, then we can come back if you hush. We better get one
more bottle or we both be hollering. We can say Dan drank it. Mr Quentin always saying
he so smart, we can say he sassprilluh dog, too."

The moonlight came down the cellar stairs. We drank some more sassprilluh.

"You know what I wish." T.P. said. "I wish a bear would walk in that cellar door. You
know what I do. I walk right up to him and spit in he eye. Gimme that bottle to stop my
mouth before I holler."

T.P. fell down. He began to laugh, and the cellar door and the moonlight jumped away and
something hit me.

"Hush up." T.P. said, trying not to laugh. "Lawd, they'll all hear us. Get up." T.P. said.
"Get up, Benjy, quick." He was thrashing about and laughing and I tried to get up. The cell-
ar steps ran up the hill in the moonlight and T.P. fell up the hill, into the moonlight,
and I ran against the fence and T.P. ran behind me saying "Hush up hush up." Then he fell
into the flowers, laughing, and I ran into the box. But when I tried to climb onto it it
jumped away and hit me on the back of the head and my throat made a sound. It made the
sound again and I stopped trying to get up, and it made the sound again and I began to cry.
But my throat kept on making the sound while T.P. was pulling me. It kept on making it and
I couldn't tell if I was crying or not, and T.P. fell down on top of me, laughing, and it
kept on making the sound and Quentin kicked T.P. and Caddy put her arms around me, and her
shining veil, and I couldn't smell trees anymore and I began to cry.

Benjy, Caddy said, Benjy. She put her arms around me again, but I went away. "What is it,
Benjy." she said. "Is it this hat." She took her hat off and came again, and I went away.

"Benjy." she said. "What is it, Benjy. What has Caddy done."

"He dont like that prissy dress." Jason said. "You think you're grown up, dont you. You
think you're better than anybody else, dont you. Prissy."

"You shut your mouth." Caddy said. "You dirty little beast. Benjy."

"Just because you are fourteen, you think you're grown up, dont you."

Jason said. "You think you're something. Dont you."

"Hush, Benjy." Caddy said. "You'll disturb Mother. Hush."

But I didn't hush, and when she went away I followed, and she stopped on the stairs and wait-
ed and I stopped too.

"What is it, Benjy." Caddy said. "Tell Caddy. She'll do it. Try."

"Candace." Mother said.

"Yessum." Caddy said.

"Why are you teasing him." Mother said. "Bring him here."

We went to Mother's room, where she was lying with the sickness on a cloth on her head.

"What is the matter now." Mother said. "Benjamin.

"Benjy." Caddy said. She came again, but I went away.

"You must have done something to him." Mother said. "Why wont you let him alone, so I can
have some peace. Give him the box and please go on and let him alone."

Caddy got the box and set it on the floor and opened it. It was full of stars. When I was
still, they were still. When I moved, they glinted and sparkled. I hushed.

Then I heard Caddy walking and I began again.

"Benjamin." Mother said. "Come here." I went to the door. "You, Benjamin." Mother said.

"What is it now." Father said. "Where are you going."

"Take him downstairs and get someone to watch him, Jason." Mother said. "You know I'm ill,
yet you "

Father shut the door behind us.

"T.P." he said.

"Sir." T.P. said downstairs.

"Benjy's coming down." Father said. "Go with T.P."

I went to the bathroom door. I could hear the water.

"Benjy." T.P. said downstairs.

I could hear the water. I listened to it.

"Benjy." T.P. said downstairs.I listened to the water.

I couldn't hear the water, and Caddy opened the door.

"Why, Benjy." she said. She looked at me and I went and she put her arms around me. "Did
you find Caddy again." she said. "Did you think Caddy had run away." Caddy smelled like
trees.

We went to Caddy's room. She sat down at the mirror. She stopped her hands and looked at
me.

"Why, Benjy. What is it." she said. "You mustn't cry. Caddy's not going away. See here."
she said. She took up the bottle and took the stopper out and held it to my nose. "Sweet.
Smell. Good."

I went away and I didn't hush, and she held the bottle in her hand, looking at me.

"Oh." she said. She put the bottle down and came and put her arms around me. "So that was
it. And you were trying to tell Caddy and you couldn't tell her. You wanted to, but you could-
n't, could you. Of course Caddy wont. Of course Caddy wont. Just wait till I dress."

Caddy dressed and took up the bottle again and we went down to the kitchen.

"Dilsey." Caddy said. "Benjy's got a present for you." She stooped down and pot the bottle
in my hand. "Hold it out to Dilsey, now." Caddy held my hand out and Dilsey took the bot-
tle.

"Well I'll declare." Dilsey said. "If my baby aint give Dilsey a bottle of perfume. Just
look here, Roskus."

Caddy smelled like trees. "We dont like perfume ourselves." Caddy said.

She smelled like trees.

"Come on, now." Dilsey said. "You too big to sleep with folks. You a big boy now. Thirteen
years old. Big enough to sleep by yourself in Uncle Maury's room." Dilsey said.

Uncle Maury was sick. His eye was sick, and his mouth. Versh took his supper up to him
on the tray.

"Maury says he's going to shoot the scoundrel." Father said. "I told him he'd better not
mention it to Patterson before hand." He drank.

"Jason." Mother said.

"Shoot who, Father." Quentin said. "What's Uncle Maury going to shoot him for."

"Because he couldn't take a little joke." Father said.

"Jason." Mother said. "How can you. You'd sit right there and see Maury shot down in
ambush, and laugh."

"Then Maury'd better stay out of ambush." Father said.

"Shoot who, Father." Quentin said. "Who's Uncle Maury going to shoot."

"Nobody." Father said. "I dont own a pistol."

Mother began to cry. "If you begrudge Maury your food, why aren't you man enough to
say so to his face. To ridicule him before the children, behind his back."

"Of course I dont." Father said. "I admire Maury. He is invaluable to my own sense of racial
superiority. I wouldn't swap Maury for a matched team. And do you know why, Quentin."

"No, sir." Quentin said.

"Et ego in arcadia I have forgotten the latin for hay." Father said. "There, there." he said.
"I was just joking." He drank and set the glass down and went and put his hand on Mother's
shoulder.

"It's no joke." Mother said. "My people are every bit as well born as yours. Just because
Maury's health is bad.

"Of course." Father said. "Bad health is the primary reason for all life. Created by disease,
within putrefaction, into decay. Versh."

"Sir." Versh said behind my chair.

"Take the decanter and fill it."

"And tell Dilsey to come and take Benjamin up to bed." Mother said.

"You a big boy." Dilsey said. "Caddy tired sleeping with you. Hush now, so you can go to
sleep." The room went away, but I didn't hush, and the room came back and Dilsey came and sat
on the bed, looking at me.

"Aint you going to be a good boy and hush." Dilsey said. "You aint, is you. See can you wait
a minute, then." She went away. There wasn't anything in the door. Then Caddy was in it.

"Hush." Caddy said. "I'm coming."

I hushed and Dilsey turned back the spread and Caddy got in between the spread and the blanket.
She didn't take off her bathrobe.

"Now." she said. "Here I am." Dilsey came with a blanket and spread it over her and tucked it
around her.

"He be gone in a minute." Dilsey said. "I leave the light on in your room.

"All right." Caddy said. She snuggled her head beside mine on the pillow. "Goodnight, Dilsey."

"Goodnight, honey." Dilsey said. The room went black. Caddy smelled like trees.

We looked up into the tree where she was.

"What she seeing, Versh." Frony whispered.

"Shhhhhhh." Caddy said in the tree. Dilsey said, "You come on here." She came around the cor-
ner of the house. "Whyn't you all go on up stairs, like your paw said, stead of slipping out be-
hind my back. Where's Caddy and Quentin."

"I told her not to climb up that tree." Jason said. "I'm going to tell on her.

"Who in what tree." Dilsey said. She came and looked up into the tree. "Caddy." Dilsey said.
The branches began to shake again.

"You, Satan." Dilsey said. "Come down from there."

"Hush." Caddy said, "Dont you know Father said to be quiet." Her legs came in sight and Dilsey
reached up and lifted her out of the tree.

"Aint you got any better sense than to let them come around here." Dilsey said. "I couldn't do
nothing with her." Versh said.

"What you all doing here." Dilsey said. "Who told you to come up to the house."

"She did." Frony said. "She told us to come."

"Who told you you got to do what she say." Dilsey said. "Get on home, now.' Frony and T.P. went
on. We couldn't see them when they were still going away.

"Out here in the middle of the night." Dilsey said. She took me up and we went to the kitchen.

"Slipping out behind my back." Dilsey said. "When you knowed it's past your bedtime."

"Shhhh, Dilsey." Caddy said. "Dont talk so loud. We've got to be quiet."

"You hush your mouth and get quiet, then." Dilsey said. "Where's Quentin."

"Quentin's mad because we had to mind me tonight." Caddy said. "He's still got T.P.'s bottle
of lightning bugs."

"I reckon T.P. can get along without it." Dilsey said. "You go and find Quentin, Versh. Roskus
say he seen him going towards the barn." Versh went on. We couldn't see him.

"They're not doing anything in there." Caddy said. "Just sitting in chairs and looking."

"They dont need no help from you all to do that." Dilsey said. We went around the kitchen.

Where you want to go now, Luster said. You going back to watch them knocking ball again. We done
looked for it over there. Here. Wait a minute. You wait right here while I go back and get that
ball. I done thought of something.

The kitchen was dark. The trees were black on the sky. Dan came waddling out from under the
steps and chewed my ankle. I went around the kitchen, where the moon was. Dan came scuffling
along, into the moon.

"Benjy." T.P. said in the house.

The flower tree by the parlor window wasn't dark, but the thick trees were. The grass was
buzzing in the moonlight where my shadow walked on the grass.

"You, Benjy." T.P. said in the house. "Where you hiding. You slipping off. I knows it."

Luster came back. Wait, he said. Here. Dont go over there. Miss Quentin and her beau in the
swing yonder. You come on this way. Come back here, Benjy.

It was dark under the trees. Dan wouldn't come. He stayed in the moonlight. Then I could see
the swing and I began to cry.

Come away from there, Benjy, Luster said. You know Miss Quentin going to get mad.

It was two now, and then one in the swing. Caddy came fast, white in the darkness.

"Benjy." she said. "How did you slip out. Where's Versh."

She put her arms around me and I hushed and held to her dress and tried to pull her away.

"Why, Benjy." she said. "What is it. T.P." she called. The one in the swing got up and came,
and I cried and pulled Caddy's dress.

"Benjy." Caddy said. "It's just Charlie. Dont you know Charlie."

"Where's his nigger." Charlie said. "What do they let him run around loose for."

"Hush, Benjy." Caddy said. "Go away, Charlie. He doesn't like you." Charlie went away and I
hushed. I pulled at Caddy's dress.

"Why, Benjy." Caddy said. "Aren't you going to let me stay here and talk to Charlie a while."

"Call that nigger." Charlie said. He came back. I cried louder and pulled at Caddy's dress.

"Go away, Charlie." Caddy said. Charlie came and put his hands on Caddy and I cried more. I
cried loud.

"No, no." Caddy said. "No. No."

"He cant talk." Charlie said. "Caddy."

"Are you crazy." Caddy said. She began to breathe fast. "He can see. Dont. Dont." Caddy fought.
They both breathed fast. "Please. Please." Caddy whispered.

"Send him away." Charlie said.

"I will." Caddy said. "Let me go."

"Will you send him away." Charlie said.

"Yes." Caddy said. "Let me go." Charlie went away. "Hush." Caddy said. "He's gone." I hushed.
I could hear her and feel her chest going.

"I'll have to take him to the house." she said. She took my hand. "I'm coming." she whispered.

"Wait." Charlie said. "Call the nigger."

"No." Caddy said. "I'll come back. Come on, Benjy."

"Caddy." Charlie whispered, loud. We went on. "You better come back. Are you coming back."

Caddy and I were running. "Caddy." Charlie said. We ran out into the moonlight, toward the kit-
chen.

"Caddy." Charlie said.

Caddy and I ran. We ran up the kitchen steps, onto the porch, and Caddy knelt down in the dark
and held me. I could hear her and feel her chest. "I wont." she said. "I wont anymore, ever.
Benjy. Benjy.' Then she was crying, and I cried, and we held each other. "Hush." She said.
"Hush. I wont anymore. So I hushed and Caddy got up and we went into the kitchen and turned
the light on and Caddy took the kitchen soap and washed her mouth at the sink, hard. Caddy
smelled like trees.

I kept a telling you to stay away from there, Luster said. They sat up in the swing, quick.
Quentin had her hands on her hair. He had a red tie.

You old crazy loon, Quentin said. I'm going to tell Dilsey about the way you let him follow
everywhere I go. I'm going to make her whip you good.

"I couldn't stop him." Luster said. "Come on here, Benjy."

"Yes you could." Quentin said. "You didn't try. You were both snooping around after me. Did
Grandmother send you all out here to spy on me." She jumped out of the swing. "If you dont
take him right away this minute and keep him away, I'm going to make Jason whip you."

"I cant do nothing with him." Luster said. "You try it if you think you can."

"Shut your mouth." Quentin said. "Are you going to get him away."

"Ah, let him stay." he said. He had a red tie. The sun was red on it. "Look here, Jack." He
struck a match and put it in his mouth. Then he took the match out of his mouth. It was still
burning. "Want to try it." he said. I went over there. "Open your mouth." he said. I opened
my mouth. Quentin hit the match with her hand and it went away.

"Goddam you." Quentin said. "Do you want to get him started. Dont You know he'll beller all
day. I'm going to tell Dilsey on you." She went away running.

"Here, kid." he said. "Hey. Come on back. I aint going to fool with him."

Quentin ran on to the house. She went around the kitchen.

"You played hell then, Jack." he said. "Aint you."

"He cant tell what you saying." Luster said. "He deef and dumb."

"Is." he said. "How long's he been that way."

"Been that way thirty three years today." Luster said. "Born looney. Is you one of them show
folks."

"Why." he said.

"I dont ricklick seeing you around here before." Luster said.

"Well, what about it." he said.

"Nothing." Luster said. "I going tonight."

He looked at me.

"You aint the one can play a tune on that saw, is you." Luster said.

"It'll cost you a quarter to find that out." he said. He looked at me. "Why dont they lock
him up." he said. "What'd you bring him out here for."

"You aint talking to me." Luster said. "I cant do nothing with him. I just come over here
looking for a quarter I lost so I can go to the show tonight. Look like now I aint going to
get to go." Luster looked on the ground. "You aint got no extra quarter, is you." Luster said.

"No." he said. "I aint."

"I reckon I just have to find that other one, then." Luster said. He put his hand in his pock-
et. "You dont want to buy no golf ball neither, does you." Luster said.

"What kind of ball." he said.

"Golf ball." Luster said. "I dont want but a quarter."

"What for." he said. "What do I want with it."

"I didn't think you did." Luster said. "Come on here, mulehead." He said. "Come on here and
watch them knocking that ball. Here. Here something you can play with along with that jimson
weed."

Luster picked it up and gave it to me. It was bright.

"Where'd you get that." he said. His tie was red in the sun, walking.

"Found it under this here bush." Luster said. "I thought for a minute it was that quarter I
lost." He came and took it.

"Hush." Luster said. "He going to give it back when he done looking at it."

"Agnes Mabel Becky." he said. He looked toward the house.

"Hush." Luster said. "He fixing to give it back."

He gave it to me and I hushed.

"Who come to see her last night." he said.

"I dont know." Luster said. "They comes every night she can climb down that tree. I dont keep
no track of them."

"Damn if one of them didn't leave a track." he said. He looked at the house. Then he went and
lay down in the swing.

"Go away." he said. "Dont bother me."

"Come on here." Luster said. "You done played hell now. Time Miss Quentin get done telling on
you."

We went to the fence and looked through the curling flower spaces. Luster hunted in the grass.

"I had it right here." he said. I saw the flag flapping, and the sun slanting on the broad
grass.

"They'll be some along soon." Luster said. "There some now, but they going away. Come on and
help me look for it."

We went along the fence.

"Hush." Luster said. "How can I make them come over here, if they aint coming. Wait. They'll
be some in a minute. Look yonder. Here they come."

I went along the fence, to the gate, where the girls passed with their booksatchels. "You,
Benjy." Luster said.

"Come back here."

You cant do no good looking through the gate, T.P. said. Miss Caddy done gone long ways away.
Done got married and left you. You cant do no good, holding to the gate and crying. She cant
hear you. What is it he wants, T.P. Mother said. Cant you play with him and keep him quiet.

He want to go down yonder and look through the gate, T.P. said.

Well, he cannot do it, Mother said. It's raining. You will just have to play with him and
keep him quiet. You, Benjamin.

Aint nothing going to quiet him, T.P. said. He think if he down to the gate, Miss Caddy come
back. Nonsense, Mother said.

I could hear them talking. I went out the door and I couldn't hear them, and I went down to
the gate, where the girls passed with their booksatchels. They looked at me, walking fast,
with their heads turned. I tried to say, but they went on, and I went along the fence, try-
ing to say, and they went faster. Then they were running and I came to the corner of the
fence and I couldn't go any further, and I held to the fence, looking after them and try-
ing to say.

"You, Benjy." T.P. said. "What you doing, slipping out. Dont you know Dilsey whip you."

"You cant do no good, moaning and slobbering through the fence." T.P. said. "You done skeer-
ed them chillen. Look at them, walking on the other side of the street."

How did he get out, Father said. Did you leave the gate unlatched when you came in, Jason.

Of course not, Jason said. Dont you know I've got better sense than to do that. Do you think
I wanted anything like this to happen. This family is bad enough, God knows. I could have
told you, all the time. I reckon you'll send him to Jackson, now. If Mr Burgess dont shoot
him first.

Hush, Father said.

I could have told you, all the time, Jason said.

It was open when I touched it, and I held to it in the twilight. I wasn't crying, and I
tried to stop, watching the girls coming along in the twilight. I wasn't crying.

"There he is."

They stopped.

"He cant get out. He wont hurt anybody, anyway. Come on."

"I'm scared to. I'm scared. I'm going to cross the street."

"He cant get out."

I wasn't crying.

"Dont be a fraid cat. Come on."

They came on in the twilight. I wasn't crying, and I held to the gate.

They came slow.

"I'm scared."

"He wont hurt you. I pass here every day. He just runs along the fence."

They came on. I opened the gate and they stopped, turning. I was trying to say, and I
caught her, trying to say, and she screamed and I was trying to say and trying and the
bright shapes began to stop and I tried to get out. I tried to get it off of my face,
but the bright shapes were going again. They were going up the hill to where it fell
away and I tried to cry. But when I breathed in, I couldn't breathe out again to cry,
and I tried to keep from falling off the hill and I fell off the hill into the bright,
whirling shapes.

Here, looney, Luster said. Here come some. Hush your slobbering and moaning, now.

They came to the flag. He took it out and they hit, then he put the flag back.

"Mister." Luster said.

He looked around. "What." he said.

"Want to buy a golf ball." Luster said.

"Let's see it." he said. He came to the fence and Luster reached the ball through.

"Where'd you get it." he said.

"Found it." Luster said.

"I know that." he said. "Where. In somebody's golf bag."

"I found it laying over here in the yard." Luster said. "I'll take a quarter for it."

"What makes you think it's yours." he said.

"I found it." Luster said.

"Then find yourself another one." he said. He put it in his pocket and went away.

"I got to go to that show tonight." Luster said.

"That so. " he said. He went to the table. "Fore caddie." he said. He hit.

"I'll declare." Luster said. "You fusses when you dont see them and you fusses when
you does. Why cant you hush. Dont you reckon folks gets tired of listening to you all
the time. Here. You dropped your jimson weed." He picked it up and gave it back to me.
"You needs a new one. You bout wore that one out." We stood at the fence and watched
them.

"That white man hard to get along with." Luster said. "You see him take my ball."
They went on.

We went on along the fence. We came to the garden and we couldn't go any further. I
held to the fence and looked through the flower spaces. They went away.

"Now you aint got nothing to moan about." Luster said. "Hush up. I the one got some-
thing to moan over, you aint. Here. Whyn't you hold on to that weed. You be bellering
about it next." He gave me the flower. "Where you heading now.

Our shadows were on the grass. They got to the trees before we did. Mine got there
first. Then we got there, and then the shadows were gone. There was a flower in the
bottle. I put the other flower in it.

"Aint you a grown man, now," Luster said. "Playing with two weeds in a bottle. You know
what they going to do with you when Miss Cahline die. They going to send you to Jackson,
where you belong. Mr Jason say so. Where you can hold the bars all day long with the
rest of the looneys and slobber. How you like that."

Luster knocked the flowers over with his hand. "That's what they'll do to you at Jackson
when you starts bellering."

I tried to pick up the flowers. Luster picked them up, and they went away. I began to cry.

"Beller." Luster said. "Beller. You want something to beller about. All right, then. Cad-
dy." he whispered. "Caddy. Beller now. Caddy."

"Luster." Dilsey said from the kitchen.

The flowers came back.

"Hush." Luster said. "Here they is. Look. It's fixed back just like it was at first. Hush,
now."

"You, Luster." Dilsey said.

"Yessum." Luster said. "We coming. You done played hell. Get up." He jerked my arm and I
got up. We went out of the trees. Our shadows were gone.

"Hush." Luster said. "Look at all them folks watching you. Hush up. We went out of the
trees. Our shadows were gone.

"Hush." Luster said. "Look at all them folks watching you. Hush."

"You bring him on here." Dilsey said. She came down the steps.

"What you done to him now." she said.

"Aint done nothing to him." Luster said. "He just started bellering."

"Yes you is." Dilsey said. "You done something to him. Where you been."

"Over yonder under them cedars." Luster said.

"Getting Quentin all riled up." Dilsey said. "Why cant you keep him away from her. Dont
you know she dont like him where she at."

"Got as much time for him as I is." Luster said. "He aint none of my uncle."

"Dont you sass me, nigger boy." Dilsey said.

"I aint done nothing to him." Luster said. "He was playing there, and all of a sudden he
started bellering."

"Is you been projecking with his graveyard." Dilsey said.

"I aint touched his graveyard." Luster said.

"Dont lie to me, boy." Dilsey said. We went up the steps and into the kitchen. Dilsey
opened the firedoor and drew a chair up in front of it and I sat down. I hushed.

What you want to get her started for, Dilsey said. Whyn't you keep him out of there.

He was just looking at the fire, Caddy said. Mother was telling him his new name. We did-
n't mean to get her started.

I knows you didn't, Dilsey said. Him at one end of the house and her at the other. You let
my things alone, now. Dont you touch nothing till I get back.

"Aint you shamed of yourself." Dilsey said. "Teasing him." She set the cake on the table.

"I aint been teasing him." Luster said. "He was playing with that bottle full of dogfennel
and all of a sudden he started up bellering. You heard him."

"You aint done nothing to his flowers." Dilsey said.

"I aint touched his graveyard." Luster said. "What I want with his truck. I was just hunt-
ing for that quarter."

"You lost it, did you." Dilsey said. She lit the candles on the cake. Some of them were lit-
tle ones. Some were big ones cut into little pieces. "I told you to go put it away. Now I
reckon you want me to get you another one from Frony."

"I got to go to that show, Benjy or no Benjy." Luster said. "I aint going to follow him a-
round day and night both."

"You going to do just what he want you to, nigger boy." Dilsey said. "You hear me."

"Aint I always done it." Luster said. "Dont I always does what he wants. Dont I, Benjy."

"Then you keep it up." Dilsey said. "Bringing him in here, bawling and getting her started
too. You all go ahead and eat this cake, now, before Jason come. I dont want him jumping on
me about a cake I bought with my own money. Me baking a cake here, with him counting every
egg that comes into this kitchen. See can you let him alone now, less you dont want to go to
that show tonight."

Dilsey went away.

"You cant blow out no candles." Luster said. "Watch me blow them out." He leaned down and
puffed his face. The candles went away. I began to cry. "Hush." Luster said. "Here. Look at
the fire whiles I cuts this cake."

I could hear the clock, and I could hear Caddy standing behind me, and I could hear the roof.
It's still raining, Caddy said. I hate rain. I hate everything. And then her head came into
my lap and she was crying, holding me, and I began to cry. Then I looked at the fire again
and the bright, smooth shapes went again. I could hear the clock and the roof and Caddy.

I ate some cake. Luster's hand came and took another piece. I could hear him eating. I look-
ed at the fire.

A long piece of wire came across my shoulder. It went to the door, and then the fire went a-
way. I began to cry.

"What you howling for now." Luster said. "Look there." The fire was there. I hushed. "Cant
you set and look at the fire and be quiet like mammy told you." Luster said. "You ought to
be ashamed of yourself. Here. Here's you some more cake."

"What you done to him now." Dilsey said. "Cant you never let him alone."

"I was just trying to get him to hush up and not sturb Miss Cahline." Luster said. "Some-
thing got him started again."

"And I know what that something name." Dilsey said. "I'm going to get Versh to take a stick
to you when he comes home. You just trying yourself. You been doing it all day. Did you take
him down to the branch."

"Nome." Luster said. "We been right here in this yard all day, like you said."

His hand came for another piece of cake. Dilsey hit his hand. "Reach it again, and I chop
it right off with this here butcher knife." Dilsey said. "I bet he aint had one piece of
it."

"Yes he is." Luster said. "He already had twice as much as me. Ask him if he aint."

"Reach hit one more time." Dilsey said. "Just reach it."

That's right, Dilsey said. I reckon it'll be my time to cry next. Reckon Maury going to let
me cry on him a while, too.

His name's Benjy now, Caddy said.

How come it is, Dilsey said. He aint wore out the name he was born with yet, is he.

Benjamin came out of the bible, Caddy said. It's a better name for him than Maury was.

How come it is, Dilsey said.

Mother says it is, Caddy said.

Huh, Dilsey said. Name aint going to help him. Hurt him, neither. Folks dont have no luck,
changing names. My name been Dilsey since fore I could remember and it be Dilsey when
they's long forgot me.

How will they know it's Dilsey, when it's long forgot, Dilsey, Caddy said.

It'll be in the Book, honey, Dilsey said. Writ out.

Can you read it, Caddy said.

Wont have to, Dilsey said. They'll read it for me. All I got to do is say Ise here.

The long wire came across my shoulder, and the fire went away. I began to cry.

Dilsey and Luster fought.

"I seen you." Dilsey said. "Oho, I seen you." She dragged Luster out of the corner, shak-
ing him. "Wasn't nothing bothering him, was they. You just wait till your pappy come home.
I wish I was young like I use to be, I'd tear them years right off your head. I good mind
to lock you up in that cellar and not let you go to that show tonight, I sho is."

"Ow, mammy." Luster said. "Ow, mammy.

I put my hand out to where the fire had been.

"Catch him." Dilsey said. "Catch him back."

My hand jerked back and I put it in my mouth and Dilsey caught me. I could still hear the
clock between my voice. Dilsey reached back and hit Luster on the head. My voice was going
loud every time.

"Get that soda." Dilsey said. She took my hand out of my mouth. My voice went louder then
and my hand tried to go back to my mouth, but Dilsey held it. My voice went loud. She sprin-
kled soda on my hand.

"Look in the pantry and tear a piece off of that rag hanging on the nail." she said. "Hush,
now. You dont want to make your maw sick again, does you. Here, look at the fire. Dilsey make
your hand stop hurting in just a minute. Look at the fire." She opened the fire door. I look-
ed at the fire, but my hand didn't stop and I didn't stop. My hand was trying to go to my
mouth, but Dilsey held it.

She wrapped the cloth around it. Mother said,

"What is it now. Cant I even be sick in peace. Do I have to get up out of bed to come down
to him, with two grown negroes to take care of him."

"He all right now." Dilsey said. "He going to quit. He just burnt his hand a little."

"With two grown negroes, you must bring him into the house, bawling." Mother said. "You got
him started on purpose, because you know I'm sick." She came and stood by me. "Hush." she
said. "Right this minute. Did you give him this cake."

"I bought it." Dilsey said. "It never come out of Jason's pantry. I fixed him some birth-
day."

"Do you want to poison him with that cheap store cake." Mother said. "Is that what you are
trying to do. Am I never to have one minute's peace."

"You go on back up stairs and lay down." Dilsey said. "It'll quit smarting him in a minute
now, and he'll hush. Come on, now."

"And leave him down here for you all to do something else to." Mother said. "How can I lie
there, with him bawling down here. Benjamin. Hush this minute."

"They aint nowhere else to take him." Dilsey said. "We aint got the room we use to have. He
cant stay out in the yard, crying where all the neighbors can see him."

"I know, I know." Mother said. "It's all my fault. I'll be gone soon, and you and Jason will
both get along better." She began to cry.

"You hush that, now." Dilsey said. "You'll get yourself down again. You come on back up
stairs. Luster going to take him to the liberry and play with him till I get his supper
done."

Dilsey and Mother went out.

"Hush up." Luster said. "You hush up. You want me to burn your other hand for you. You aint
hurt. Hush up."

"Here." Dilsey said. "Stop crying, now." She gave me the slipper, and I hushed. "Take him to
the liberry." she said. "And if I hear him again, I going to whip you myself."

We went to the library. Luster turned on the light. The windows went black, and the dark tall
place on the wall came and I went and touched it. It was like a door, only it wasn't a door.

The fire came behind me and I went to the fire and sat on the floor, holding the slipper.
The fire went higher. It went onto the cushion in Mother's chair.

"Hush up." Luster said. "Cant you never get done for a while. Here I done built you a fire,
and you wont even look at it."

Your name is Benjy, Caddy said. Do you hear. Benjy. Benjy.

Dont tell him that, Mother said. Bring him here.

Caddy lifted me under the arms.

Get up, Mau- I mean Benjy, she said.

Dont try to carry him, Mother said. Cant you lead him over here. Is that too much for you
to think of.

I can carry him, Caddy said. "Let me carry him up, Dilsey."

"Go on, Minute." Dilsey said. "You aint big enough to tote a flea. You go on and be quiet,
like Mr Jason said."

There was a light at the top of the stairs. Father was there, in his shirt sleeves. The
way he looked said Hush. Caddy whispered,

"Is Mother sick."

Versh set me down and we went into Mother's room. There was a fire. It was rising and
falling on the walls. There was another fire in the mirror, I could smell the sickness.
It was on a cloth folded on Mother's head. Her hair was on the pillow. The fire didn't
reach it, but it shone on her hand, where her rings were jumping.

"Come and tell Mother goodnight." Caddy said. We went to the bed. The fire went out of
the mirror. Father got up from the bed and lifted me up and Mother put her hand on my
head.

"What time is it." Mother said. Her eyes were closed.

"Ten minutes to seven." Father said. "It's too early for him to go to bed." Mother said.

"He'll wake up at daybreak, and I simply cannot bear another day like today."

"There, there." Father said. He touched Mother's face.

"I know I'm nothing but a burden to you. Mother said. "But I'll be gone soon. Then you
will be rid of my bothering."

"Hush." Father said. "I'll take him downstairs a while." He took me up. "Come on, old
fellow.

Let's go down stairs a while. We'll have to be quiet while Quentin is studying, now.

Caddy went and leaned her face over the bed and Mother's hand came into the firelight.
Herrings jumped on Caddy's back.

Mother's sick, Father said. Dilsey will put you to bed. Where's Quentin.

Versh getting him, Dilsey said.

Father stood and watched us go past. We could hear Mother in her room. Caddy said "Hush."

Jason was still climbing the stairs. He had his hands in his pockets.

"You all must be good tonight." Father said. "And be quiet, so you wont disturb Mother."

"We'll be quiet." Caddy said. "You must be quiet now, Jason." She said. We tiptoed.

We could hear the roof. I could see the fire in the mirror too. Caddy lifted me again.

"Come on, now." she said. "Then you can come back to the fire. Hush, now."

"Candace." Mother said.

"Hush, Benjy." Caddy said. "Mother wants you a minute. Like a good boy. Then you can come
back. Benjy."

Caddy let me down, and I hushed.

"Let him stay here, Mother. When he's through looking at the fire, then you can tell him."

"Candace." Mother said. Caddy stooped and lifted me. We staggered. "Candace." Mother said.

"Hush." Caddy said. "You can still see it. Hush."

"Bring him here." Mother said. "He's too big for you to carry. You must stop trying. You'll
injure your back. All of our women have prided themselves on their carriage. Do you want to
look like a washerwoman."

"He's not too heavy." Caddy said. "I can carry him."

"Well, I dont want him carried, then." Mother said. "A five year old child. No, no. Not in
my lap. Let him stand up."

"If you'll hold him, he'll stop." Caddy said. "Hush." she said. "You can go right back.
Here. Here's your cushion. See."

"Dont, Candace." Mother said.

"Let him look at it and he'll be quiet." Caddy said. "Hold up just a minute while I slip it
out. There, Benjy. Look."

I looked at it and hushed.

"You humor him too much." Mother said. "You and your father both. You dont realise that I
am the one who has to pay for it. Damuddy spoiled Jason that way and it took him two years
to outgrow it, and I am not strong enough to go through the same thing with Benjamin."

"You dont need to bother with him." Caddy said. "I like to take care of him. Dont I. Benjy.

"Candace." Mother said. "I told you not to call him that. It was bad enough when your father
insisted on calling you by that silly nickname, and I will not have him called by one. Nick-
names are vulgar. Only common people use them. Benjamin." she said.

"Look at me." Mother said.

"Benjamin." she said. She took my face in her hands and turned it to hers.

"Benjamin." she said. "Take that cushion away, Candace."

"He'll cry." Caddy said.

"Take that cushion away, like I told you." Mother said. "He must learn to mind."

The cushion went away.

"Hush, Benjy." Caddy said.

"You go over there and sit down." Mother said. "Benjamin." She held my face to hers.

"Stop that." she said. "Stop it."

But I didn't stop and Mother caught me in her arms and began to cry, and I cried. Then the
cushion came back and Caddy held it above Mother's head. She drew Mother back in the chair
and Mother lay crying against the red and yellow cushion.

"Hush, Mother." Caddy said. "You go up stairs and lay down, so you can be sick. I'll go get
Dilsey." She led me to the fire and I looked at the bright, smooth shapes. I could hear the
fire and the roof

Father took me up. He smelled like rain.

"Well, Benjy." he said. "Have you been a good boy today."

Caddy and Jason were fighting in the mirror.

"You, Caddy." Father said.

They fought. Jason began to cry.

"Caddy." Father said. Jason was crying. He wasn't fighting anymore, but we could see Caddy
fighting in the mirror and Father put me down and went into the mirror and fought too. He
lifted Caddy up. She fought. Jason lay on the floor, crying. He had the scissors in his hand.
Father held Caddy.

"He cut up all Benjy's dolls." Caddy said. "I'll slit his gizzle."

"Candace." Father said.

"I will." Caddy said. "I will." She fought. Father held her. She kicked at Jason. He rolled
into the corner, out of the mirror. Father brought Caddy to the fire. They were all out of
the mirror. Only the fire was in it. Like the fire was in a door.

"Stop that." Father said. "Do you want to make Mother sick in her room.

Caddy stopped. "He cut up all the dolls Mau- Benjy and I made." Caddy said. "He did it just
for meanness.

"I didn't." Jason said. He was sitting up, crying. "I didn't know they were his. I just
thought they were some old papers.

"You couldn't help but know." Caddy said. "You did it just-"

"Hush." Father said. "Jason." he said. "I'll make you some more tomorrow." Caddy said.
"We'll make a lot of them. Here, you can look at the cushion, too."

Jason came in.

I kept telling you to hush, Luster said.

What's the matter now, Jason said.

"He just trying hisself." Luster said. "That the way he been going on all day."

"Why dont you let him alone, then." Jason said. "If you cant keep him quiet, you'll have
to take him out to the kitchen. The rest of us cant shut ourselves up in a room like Mother
does."

"Mammy say keep him out the kitchen till she get supper." Luster said.

"Then play with him and keep him quiet." Jason said. "Do I have to work all day and then
come home to a mad house." He opened the paper and read it.

You can look at the fire and the mirror and the cushion too, Caddy said. You wont have to
wait until supper to look at the cushion, now. We could hear the roof. We could hear Jason
too, crying loud beyond the wall.

Dilsey said, "You come, Jason. You letting him alone, is you."

"Yessum." Luster said.

"Where Quentin." Dilsey said. "Supper near bout ready."

"I don't know'm." Luster said. "I aint seen her."

Dilsey went away. "Quentin." she said in the hall. "Quentin. Supper ready."

We could hear the roof. Quentin smelled like rain, too.

What did Jason do, he said.

He cut up all Benjy's dolls, Caddy said.

Mother said to not call him Benjy, Quentin said. He sat on the rug by us. I wish it would-
n't rain, he said. You cant do anything.

You've been in a fight, Caddy said. Haven't you.

It wasn't much, Quentin said.

You can tell it, Caddy said. Father'll see it.

I dont care, Quentin said. I wish it wouldn't rain.

Quentin said, "Didn't Dilsey say supper was ready."

"Yessum." Luster said. Jason looked at Quentin. Then he read the paper again. Quentin
came in. "She say it bout ready." Luster said. Quentin jumped down in Mother's chair.
Luster said,

"Mr Jason."

"What." Jason said.

"Let me have two bits." Luster said.

"What for." Jason said.

"To go to the show tonight." Luster said.

"I thought Dilsey was going to get a quarter from Frony for you." Jason said.

"She did." Luster said. "I lost it. Me and Benjy hunted all day for that quarter. You
can ask him."

"Then borrow one from him." Jason said. "I have to work for mine." He read the paper.
Quentin looked at the fire. The fire was in her eyes and on her mouth. Her mouth was
red.

"I tried to keep him away from there." Luster said.

"Shut your mouth." Quentin said. Jason looked at her.

"What did I tell you I was going to do if I saw you with that show fellow again." he
said. Quentin looked at the fire. "Did you hear me." Jason said.

"I heard you." Quentin said. "Why dont you do it, then."

"Dont you worry." Jason said.

"I'm not." Quentin said. Jason read the paper again.

I could hear the roof Father leaned forward and looked at Quentin.

Hello, he said. Who won.

"Nobody." Quentin said. "They stopped us. Teachers."

"Who was it." Father said. "Will you tell."

"It was all right." Quentin said. "He was as big as me."

"That's good." Father said. "Can you tell what it was about."

"It wasn't anything." Quentin said. "He said he would put a frog in her desk and she
wouldn't dare to whip him."

"Oh." Father said. "She. And then what."

"Yes, sir." Quentin said. "And then I kind of hit him."

We could hear the roof and the fire, and a snuffling outside the door.

"Where was he going to get a frog in November." Father said.

"I dont know, sir." Quentin said.

We could hear them.

"Jason." Father said. We could hear Jason.

"Jason." Father said. "Come in here and stop that."

We could hear the roof and the fire and Jason.

"Stop that, now. " Father said. "Do you want me to whip you again." Father lifted
Jason up into the chair by him. Jason snuffled. We could hear the fire and the roof.
Jason snuffled a little louder.

"One more time." Father said. We could hear the fire and the roof.

Dilsey said, All right. You all can come on to supper.

Versh smelled like rain. He smelled like a dog, too. We could hear the fire and the
roof.

We could hear Caddy walking fast. Father and Mother looked at the door. Caddy passed
it, walking fast. She didn't look. She walked fast.

"Candace." Mother said. Caddy stopped walking.

"Yes, Mother." she said.

"Hush, Caroline." Father said.

"Come here." Mother said.

"Hush, Caroline." Father said. "Let her alone."

Caddy came to the door and stood there, looking at Father and Mother. Her eyes flew
at me, and away. I began to cry. It went loud and I got up. Caddy came in and stood
with her back to the wall, looking at me. I went toward her, crying, and she shrank
against the wall and I saw her eyes and I cried louder and pulled at her dress. She
put her hands out but I pulled at her dress. Her eyes ran.

Versh said, Your name Benjamin now. You know how come your name Benjamin now.
They making a bluegum out of you. Mammy say in old time your granpaw changed nigger's
name, and he turn preacher, and when they look at him, he bluegum too. Didn't use
to be bluegum, neither. And when family woman look him in the eye in the full of the
moon, chile born bluegum. And one evening, when they was about a dozen them bluegum
chillen running around the place, he never come home. Possum hunters found him in
the woods, et clean. And you know who et him. Them bluegum chillen did.

We were in the hall. Caddy was still looking at me. Her hand was against her mouth
and I saw her eyes and I cried. We went up the stairs. She stopped again, against the
wall, looking at me and I cried and she went on and I came on, crying, and she shrank
against the wall, looking at me. She opened the door to her room, but I pulled at her
dress and we went to the bathroom and she stood against the door, looking at me.
Then she put her arm across her face and I pushed at her, crying.

What are you doing to him, Jason said. Why cant you let him alone.

I aint touching him, Luster said. He been doing this way all day long. He needs whip-
ping.

He needs to be sent to Jackson, Quentin said. How can anybody live in a house like
this.

If you dont like it, young lady, you'd better get out, Jason said.

I'm going to, Quentin said. Dont you worry.

Versh said, "You move back some, so I can dry my legs off." He shoved me back a
little. "Dont you start bellering, now. You can still see it. That's all you have to
do. You aint had to be out in the rain like I is. You's born lucky and dont know
it." He lay on his back before the fire.

"You know how come your name Benjamin now." Versh said. "Your mamma too proud for
you.What mammy say."

"You be still there and let me dry my legs off." Versh said. "Or you know what I'll
do. I'll skin your rinktum."

We could hear the fire and the roof and Versh.

Versh got up quick and jerked his legs back. Father said, "All right, Versh."

"I'll feed him tonight." Caddy said. "Sometimes he cries when Versh feeds him."

"Take this tray up." Dilsey said. "And hurry back and feed Benjy."

"Dont you want Caddy to feed you." Caddy said.

Has he got to keep that old dirty slipper on the table, Quentin said. Why dont you
feed him in the kitchen. It's like eating with a pig.

If you dont like the way we eat, you'd better not come to the table, Jason said.

Steam came off of Roskus. He was sitting in front of the stove. The oven door was
open and Roskus had his feet in it. Steam came off the bowl. Caddy put the spoon
into my mouth easy. There was a black spot on the inside of the bowl.

Now, now, Dilsey said. He aint going to bother you no more.

It got down below the mark. Then the bowl was empty. It went away. "He's hungry
tonight."

Caddy said. The bowl came back. I couldn't see the spot. Then I could. "He's star-
ved, tonight." Caddy said. "Look how much he's eaten."

Yes he will, Quentin said. You all send him out to spy on me. I hate this house.
I'm going to run away.

Roskus said, "It going to rain all night."

You've been running a long time, not to've got any further off than mealtime,
Jason said.

See if I dont, Quentin said.

"Then I dont know what I going to do." Dilsey said. "It caught me in the hip so
bad now I cant scarcely move. Climbing them stairs all evening."

Oh, I wouldn't be surprised, Jason said. I wouldn't be surprised at anything
you'd do. Quentin threw her napkin on the table.

Hush your mouth, Jason, Dilsey said. She went and put her arm around Quentin. Sit
down, honey, Dilsey said. He ought to be shamed of hisself throwing what aint your
fault up to you.

"She sulling again, is she." Roskus said.

"Hush your mouth." Dilsey said.

Quentin pushed Dilsey away. She looked at Jason. Her mouth was red. She picked up
her glass of water and swung her arm back, looking at Jason. Dilsey caught her arm.
They fought. The glass broke on the table, and the water ran into the table. Quent-
in was running.

"Mother's sick again." Caddy said.

"Sho she is." Dilsey said. "Weather like this make anybody sick. When you going to
get done eating, boy."

Goddam you, Quentin said. Goddam you. We could hear her running on the stairs. We
went to the library.

Caddy gave me the cushion, and I could look at the cushion and the mirror and the
fire.

"We must be quiet while Quentin's studying." Father said. "What are you doing,
Jason."

"Nothing." Jason said.

"Suppose you come over here to do it, then." Father said.

Jason came out of the corner.

"What are you chewing." Father said.

"Nothing. " Jason said.

"He's chewing paper again." Caddy said.

"Come here, Jason." Father said.

Jason threw into the fire. It hissed, uncurled, turning black. Then it was gray.
Then it was gone. Caddy and Father and Jason were in Mother's chair. Jason's eyes
were puffed shut and his mouth moved, like tasting. Caddy's head was on Father's
shoulder. Her hair was like fire, and little points of fire were in her eyes, and
I went and Father lifted me into the chair too, and Caddy held me. She smelled
like trees.

She smelled like trees. In the corner it was dark, but I could see the window. I
squatted there, holding the slipper. I couldn't see it, but my hands saw it, and I
could hear it getting night, and my hands saw the slipper but I couldn't see myself
but my hands could see the slipper, and I squatted there, hearing it getting dark.

Here you is, Luster said. Look what I got. He showed it to me. You know where I got
it. Miss Quentin give it to me. I knowed they couldn't keep me out. What you doing,
off in here. I thought you done slipped back out doors. Aint you done enough moan-
ing and slobbering today, without hiding off in this here empty room, mumbling and
taking on. Come on here to bed, so I can get up there before it starts. I cant fool
with you all night tonight. Just let them horns toot the first toot and I done gone.

We didn't go to our room.

"This is where we have the measles." Caddy said. "Why do we have to sleep in here
tonight."

"What you care where you sleep." Dilsey said. She shut the door and sat down and be-
gan to undress me. Jason began to cry. "Hush." Dilsey said.

"I want to sleep with Damuddy." Jason said.

"She's sick." Caddy said. "You can sleep with her when she gets well. Cant he, Dil-
sey."

"Hush, now." Dilsey said. Jason hushed.

"Our nighties are here, and everything." Caddy said. "It's like moving."

"And you better get into them." Dilsey said. "You be unbuttoning Jason.

Caddy unbuttoned Jason. He began to cry.

"You want to get whipped." Dilsey said. Jason hushed.

Quentin, Mother said in the hall.

What, Quentin said beyond the wall. We heard Mother lock the door. She looked in our
door and came in and stooped over the bed and kissed me on the forehead.

When you get him to bed, go and ask Dilsey if she objects to my having a hot water
bottle, Mother said. Tell her that if she does, I'll try to get along without it.
Tell her I just want to know.

Yessum, Luster said. Come on. Get your pants off.

Quentin and Versh came in. Quentin had his face turned away. "What are you crying
for." Caddy said.

"Hush." Dilsey said. "You all get undressed, now. You can go on home, Versh."

I got undressed and I looked at myself and I began to cry. Hush, Luster said. Look-
ing for them aint going to do no good. They're gone. You keep on like this, and we
aint going have you no more birthday. He put my gown on. I hushed, and then Luster
stopped, his head toward the window. Then he went to the window and looked out.
He came back and took my arm. Here she come, he said. Be quiet, now. We went to
the window and looked out. It came out of Quentin's window and climbed across into
the tree. We watched the tree shaking. The shaking went down the tree, then it came
out and we watched it go away across the grass. Then we couldn't see it. Come on,
Luster said. There now. Hear them horns. You get in that bed while my foots behaves.

There were two beds. Quentin got in the other one. He turned his face to the wall.
Dilsey put Jason in with him. Caddy took her dress off.

"Just look at your drawers." Dilsey said. "You better be glad your maw aint seen
you."

"I already told on her." Jason said.

"I bound you would." Dilsey said.

"And see what you got by it." Caddy said. "Tattletale."

"What did I get by it." Jason said.

"Whyn't you get your nightie on." Dilsey said. She went and helped Caddy take off
her bodice and drawers. "Just look at you." Dilsey said. She wadded the drawers
and scrubbed Caddy behind with them. "It done soaked clean through onto you." she
said. "But you wont get no bath this night. Here." She put Caddy's nightie on her
and Caddy climbed into the bed and Dilsey went to the door and stood with her
hand on the light. "You all be quiet now, you hear." she said.

"All right." Caddy said. "Mother's not coming in tonight." she said. "So we still
have to mind me."

"Yes." Dilsey said. "Go to sleep, now."

"Mother's sick." Caddy said. "She and Damuddy are both sick."

"Hush." Dilsey said. "You go to sleep."

The room went black, except the door. Then the door went black. Caddy said, "Hush,
Maury" putting her hand on me. So I stayed hushed. We could hear us. We could hear
the dark.

It went away, and Father looked at us. He looked at Quentin and Jason, then he
came and kissed Caddy and put his hand on my head.

"Is Mother very sick." Caddy said.

"No." Father said. "Are you going to take good care of Maury."

"Yes." Caddy said.

Father went to the door and looked at us again. Then the dark came back, and he
stood black in the door, and then the door turned black again. Caddy held me and
I could hear us all, and the darkness, and something I could smell. And then I
could see the windows, where the trees were buzzing. Then the dark began to go
in smooth, bright shapes, like it always does, even when Caddy says that I have
been asleep.




　　　　　　　　　　　　June 2, 1910




When the shadow of the sash appeared on the curtains it was between seven and
eight oclock and then I was in time again, hearing the watch. It was Grandfat-
her's and when Father gave it to me he said I give you the mausoleum of all
hope and desire; it's rather excruciatingly apt that you will use it to gain
the reducto absurdum of all human experience which can fit your individual
needs no better than it fitted his or his father's. I give it to you not that
you may remember time, but that you might forget it now and then for a moment
and not spend all your breath trying to conquer it. Because no battle is ever
won he said. They are not even fought. The field only reveals to man his own
folly and despair, and victory is an illusion of philosophers and fools.

It was propped against the collar box and I lay listening to it. Hearing it,
that is. I dont suppose anybody ever deliberately listens to a watch or a clock.
You dont have to. You can be oblivious to the sound for a long while, then in
a second of ticking it can create in the mind unbroken the long diminishing
parade of time you didn't hear. Like Father said down the long and lonely light-
rays you might see Jesus walking, like. And the good Saint Francis that said
Little Sister Death, that never had a sister.

Through the wall I heard Shreve's bed-springs and then his slippers on the floor
hishing. I got up and went to the dresser and slid my hand along it and touched
the watch and turned it face-down and went back to bed. But the shadow of the
sash was still there and I had learned to tell almost to the minute, so I'd have
to turn my back to it, feeling the eyes animals used to have in the back of their
heads when it was on top, itching. It's always the idle habits you acquire which
you will regret. Father said that. That Christ was not crucified: he was worn a-
way by a minute clicking of little wheels. That had no sister.

And so as soon as I knew I couldn't see it, I began to wonder what time it was.
Father said that constant speculation regarding the position of mechanical hands
on an arbitrary dial which is a symptom of mind-function. Excrement Father said
like sweating. And I saying All right. Wonder. Go on and wonder.

If it had been cloudy I could have looked at the window, thinking what he said
about idle habits. Thinking it would be nice for them down at New London if the
weather held up like this. Why shouldn't it? The month of brides, the voice that
breathed She ran right out of the mirror, out of the banked scent. Roses. Roses.
Mr and Mrs Jason Richmond Compson announce the marriage of. Roses. Not virgins
like dogwood, milkweed. I said I have committed incest, Father I said. Roses.
Cunning and serene. If you attend Harvard one year, but dont see the boat-race,
there should be a refund. Let Jason have it. Give Jason a year at Harvard.

Shreve stood in the door, putting his collar on, his glasses glinting rosily, as
though he had washed them with his face. "You taking a cut this morning?"

"Is it that late?"

He looked at his watch. "Bell in two minutes."

"I didn't know it was that late." He was still looking at the watch, his mouth
shaping. "I'll have to hustle. I cant stand another cut. The dean told me last
week--" He put the watch back into his pocket. Then I quit talking.

"You'd better slip on your pants and run," he said. He went out.

I got up and moved about, listening to him through the wall. He entered the sit-
ting-room, toward the door.

"Aren't you ready yet?"

"Not yet. Run along. I'll make it."

He went out. The door closed. His feet went down the corridor. Then I could hear
the watch again. I quit moving around and went to the window and drew the curtains
aside and watched them running for chapel, the same ones fighting the same heaving
coat-sleeves, the same books and flapping collars flushing past like debris on a
flood, and Spoade. Calling Shreve my husband. Ah let him alone, Shreve said, if
he's got better sense than to chase after the little dirty sluts, whose business.
In the South you are ashamed of being a virgin. Boys. Men. They lie about it. Be-
cause it means less to women, Father said. He said it was men invented virginity
not women. Father said it's like death: only a state in which the others are left
and I said, But to believe it doesn't matter and he said, That's what's so sad a-
bout anything: not only virginity and I said, Why couldn't it have been me and not
her who is unvirgin and he said, That's why that's sad too; nothing is even worth
the changing of it, and Shreve said if he's got better sense than to chase after
the little dirty sluts and I said Did you ever have a sister? Did you? Did you?

Spoade was in the middle of them like a terrapin in a street full of scuttering
dead leaves, his collar about his ears, moving at his customary unhurried walk.
He was from South Carolina, a senior. It was his club's boast that he never ran
for chapel and had never got there on time and had never been absent in four years
and had never made either chapel or first lecture with a shirt on his back and
socks on his feet. About ten oclock he'd come in Thompson's, get two cups of cof-
fee, sit down and take his socks out of his pocket and remove his shoes and put
them on while the coffee cooled. About noon you'd see him with a shirt and collar
on, like anybody else. The others passed him running, but he never increased his
pace at all. After a while the quad was empty.

A sparrow slanted across the sunlight, onto the window ledge, and cocked his head
at me. His eye was round and bright. First he'd watch me with one eye, then flick!
and it would be the other one, his throat pumping faster than any pulse. The hour
began to strike. The sparrow quit swapping eyes and watched me steadily with the
same one until the chimes ceased, as if he were listening too. Then he flicked off
the ledge and was gone.

It was a while before the last stroke ceased vibrating. It stayed in the air, more
felt than heard, for a long time. Like all the bells that ever rang still ringing
in the long dying light-rays and Jesus and Saint Francis talking about his sister.
Because if it were just to hell; if that were all of it. Finished. If things just
finished themselves. Nobody else there but her and me. If we could just have done
something so dreadful that they would have fled hell except us. I have committed
incest I said Father it was I it was not Dalton Ames And when he put Dalton Ames.
Dalton Ames. Dalton Ames. When he put the pistol in my hand I didn't. That's why
I didn't. He would be there and she would and I would. Dalton Ames. Dalton Ames.
Dalton Ames. If we could have just done something so dreadful and Father said
That's sad too people cannot do anything that dreadful they cannot do anything
very dreadful at all they cannot even remember tomorrow what seemed dreadful to-
day and I said, You can shirk all things and he said, Ah can you. And I will look
down and see my murmuring bones and the deep water like wind, like a roof of wind,
and after a long time they cannot distinguish even bones upon the lonely and invi-
olate sand. Until on the Day when He says Rise only the flat-iron would come float-
ing up.It's not when you realise that nothing can help you--religion, pride, any-
thing--it's when you realise that you dont need any aid. Dalton Ames. Dalton Ames.
Dalton Ames. If I could have been his mother lying with open body lifted laughing,
holding his father with my hand refraining, seeing, watching him die before he lived.
One minute she was standing in the door

I went to the dresser and took up the watch, with the face still down. I tapped the
crystal on the corner of the dresser and caught the fragments of glass in my hand
and put them into the ashtray and twisted the hands off and put them in the tray.
The watch ticked on. I turned the face up, the blank dial with little wheels click-
ing and clicking behind it, not knowing any better. Jesus walking on Galilee and
Washington not telling lies. Father brought back a watch-charm from the Saint Louis
Fair to Jason: a tiny opera glass into which you squinted with one eye and saw a
skyscraper, a ferris wheel all spidery, Niagara Falls on a pinhead. There was a red
smear on the dial. When I saw it my thumb began to smart. I put the watch down and
went into Shreve's room and got the iodine and painted the cut. I cleaned the rest
of the glass out of the rim with a towel.

I laid out two suits of underwear, with socks, shirts, collars and ties, and packed
my trunk. I put in everything except my new suit and an old one and two pairs of
shoes and two hats, and my books. I carried the books into the sitting-room and
stacked them on the table, the ones I had brought from home and the ones Father
said it used to be a gentleman was known by his books; nowadays he is known by
the ones he has not returned 　and locked the trunk and addressed it. The quarter
hour sounded. I stopped and listened to it until the chimes ceased.

I bathed and shaved. The water made my finger smart a little, so I painted it again.
I put on my new suit and put my watch on and packed the other suit and the accesso-
ries and my razor and brushes in my hand bag, and folded the trunk key into a sheet
of paper and put it in an envelope and addressed it to Father, and wrote the two
notes and sealed them.

The shadow hadn't quite cleared the stoop. I stopped inside the door, watching the
shadow move. It moved almost perceptibly, creeping back inside the door, driving the
shadow back into the door. Only she was running already when I heard it. In the mir-
ror she was running before I knew what it was. That quick her train caught up over
her arm she ran out of the mirror like a cloud, her veil swirling in long glints her
heels brittle and fast clutching her dress onto her shoulder with the other hand,
running out of the mirror the smells roses roses the voice that breathed o'er Eden.
Then she was across the porch I couldn't hear her heels then in the moonlight like a
cloud, the floating shadow of the veil running across the grass, into the bellowing.
She ran out of her dress, clutching her bridal, running into the bellowing where T.
P. in the dew Whooey Sassprilluh Benjy under the box bellowing. Father had a V-shap-
ed silver cuirass on his running chest

Shreve said, "Well, you didn't…. Is it a wedding or a wake?"

"I couldn't make it," I said.

"Not with all that primping. What's the matter? You think this was Sunday?"

"I reckon the police wont get me for wearing my new suit one time," I said.

"I was thinking about the Square students. They'll think you go to Harvard. Have you
got too proud to at tend classes too?"

"I'm going to eat first." The shadow on the stoop was gone. I stepped into sunlight,
finding my shadow again. I walked down the steps just ahead of it. The half hour went.
Then the chimes ceased and died away.

Deacon wasn't at the postoffice either. I stamped the two envelopes and mailed the one
to Father and put Shreve's in my inside pocket, and then I remembered where I had last
seen the Deacon. It was on Decoration Day, in a G.A.R. uniform, in the middle of the
parade. If you waited long enough on any corner you would see him in whatever parade
came along. The one before was on Columbus' or Garibaldi's or somebody's birthday. He
was in the Street Sweepers' section, in a stovepipe hat, carrying a two inch Italian
flag, smoking a cigar among the brooms and scoops. But the last time was the G.A.R.
one, because Shreve said:

"There now. Just look at what your grandpa did to that poor old nigger."

"Yes," I said. "Now he can spend day after day marching in parades. If it hadn't been
for my grandfather, he'd have to work like whitefolks."

I didn't see him anywhere. But I never knew even a working nigger that you could find
when you wanted him, let alone one that lived off the fat of the land. A car came along.
I went over to town and went to Parker's and had a good breakfast. While I was eating
I heard a clock strike the hour. But then I suppose it takes at least one hour to lose
time in, who has been longer than history getting into the mechanical progression of it.

When I finished breakfast I bought a cigar. The girl said a fifty cent one was the best,
so I took one and lit it and went out to the street. I stood there and took a couple of
puffs, then I held it in my hand and went on toward the corner. I passed a jeweller's
window, but I looked away in time. At the corner two bootblacks caught me, one on either
side, shrill and raucous, like blackbirds. I gave the cigar to one of them, and the oth-
er one a nickel. Then they let me alone. The one with the cigar was trying to sell it to
the other for the nickel.

There was a clock, high up in the sun, and I thought about how, when you dont want to
do a thing, your body will try to trick you into doing it, sort of unawares. I could feel
the muscles in the back of my neck, and then I could hear my watch ticking away in my
pocket and after a while I had all the other sounds shut away, leaving only the watch in
my pocket. I turned back up the street, to the window. He was working at the table be-
hind the window. He was going bald. There was a glass in his eye--a metal tube screwed
into his face. I went in.

The place was full of ticking, like crickets in September grass, and I could hear a big
clock on the wall above his head. He looked up, his eye big and blurred and rushing be-
yond the glass. I took mine out and handed it to him.

"I broke my watch."

He flipped it over in his hand. "I should say you have. You must have stepped on it."

"Yes, sir. I knocked it off the dresser and stepped on it in the dark. It's still run-
ning though."

He pried the back open and squinted into it. "Seems to be all right. I cant tell until
I go over it, though. I'll go into it this afternoon."

"I'll bring it back later," I said. "Would you mind telling me if any of those watches
in the window are right?"

He held my watch on his palm and looked up at me with his blurred rushing eye.

"I made a bet with a fellow," I said. "And I forgot my glasses this morning."

"Why, all right," he said. He laid the watch down and half rose on his stool and look-
ed over the barrier. Then he glanced up at the wall. "It's twen--"

"Dont tell me," I said, "please sir. Just tell me if any of them are right."

He looked at me again. He sat back on the stool and pushed the glass up onto his fore-
head. It left a red circle around his eye and when it was gone his whole face looked
naked. "What're you celebrating today?" he said. "That boat race aint until next week,
is it?"

"No, sir. This is just a private celebration. Birthday. Are any of them right?"

"No. But they haven't been regulated and set yet. If you're thinking of buying one of
them--"

"No, sir. I dont need a watch. We have a clock in our sitting room. I'll have this one
fixed when I do." I reached my hand.

"Better leave it now."

"I'll bring it back later." He gave me the watch. I put it in my pocket. I couldn't
hear it now, above all the others. "I'm much obliged to you. I hope I haven't taken
up your time."

"That's all right. Bring it in when you are ready. And you better put off this cele-
bration until after we win that boat race."

"Yes, sir. I reckon I had."

I went out, shutting the door upon the ticking. I looked back into the window. He was
watching me across the barrier. There were about a dozen watches in the window, a do-
zen different hours and each with the same assertive and contradictory assurance that
mine had, without any hands at all. Contradicting one another. I could hear mine, tick-
ing away inside my pocket, even though nobody could see it, even though it could tell
nothing if anyone could.

And so I told myself to take that one. Because Father said clocks slay time. He said
time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock
stops does time come to life. The hands were extended, slightly off the horizontal at
a faint angle, like a gull tilting into the wind. Holding all I used to be sorry about
like the new moon holding water, niggers say. The jeweller was working again, bent over
his bench, the tube tunnelled into his face. His hair was parted in the center. The
part ran up into the bald spot, like a drained marsh in December.

I saw the hardware store from across the street. I didn't know you bought flat-irons
by the pound. "Maybe you want a tailor's goose," the clerk said. "They weigh ten
pounds." Only they were bigger than I thought. So I got two six-pound little ones,
because they would look like a pair of shoes wrapped up. They felt heavy enough toge-
ther, but I thought again how Father had said about the reducto absurdum of human ex-
perience, thinking how the only opportunity I seemed to have for the application of
Harvard. Maybe by next year; thinking maybe it takes two years in school to learn to
do that properly.

But they felt heavy enough in the air. A car came. I got on. I didn't see the placard
on the front. It was full, mostly prosperous looking people reading newspapers. The
only vacant seat was beside a nigger. He wore a derby and shined shoes and he was hold-
ing a dead cigar stub. I used to think that a Southerner had to be always conscious of
niggers. I thought that Northerners would expect him to. When I first came East I kept
thinking You've got to remember to think of them as colored people not niggers, and if
it hadn't happened that I wasn't thrown with many of them, I'd have wasted a lot of
time and trouble before I learned that the best way to take all people, black or white,
is to take them for what they think they are, then leave them alone. That was when I
realised that a nigger is not a person so much as a form of behavior; a sort of obverse
reflection of the white people he lives among. But I thought at first that I ought to
miss having a lot of them around me because I thought that Northerners thought I did,
but I didn't know that I really had missed Roskus and Dilsey and them until that morn-
ing in Virginia. The train was stopped when I waked and I raised the shade and looked
out. The car was blocking a road crossing, where two white fences came down a hill and
then sprayed outward and downward like part of the skeleton of a horn, and there was a
nigger on a mule in the middle of the stiff ruts, waiting for the train to move. How
long he had been there I didn't know, but he sat straddle of the mule, his head wrapped
in a piece of blanket, as if they had been built there with the fence and the road, or
with the hill, carved out of the hill itself, like a sign put there saying You are home
again. He didn't have a saddle and his feet dangled almost to the ground. The mule look-
ed like a rabbit. I raised the window.

"Hey, Uncle," I said. "Is this the way?"

"Suh?" He looked at me, then he loosened the blanket and lifted it away from his ear.

"Christmas gift!" I said.

"Sho comin, boss. You done caught me, aint you."

"I'll let you off this time." I dragged my pants out of the little hammock and got a quar-
ter out. "But look out next time. I'll be coming back through here two days after New Year,
and look out then." I threw the quarter out the window. "Buy yourself some Santy Claus."

"Yes, suh," he said. He got down and picked up the quarter and rubbed it on his leg. "Than-
ky, young marster. Thanky." Then the train began to move. I leaned out the window, into the
cold air, looking back. He stood there beside the gaunt rabbit of a mule, the two of them
shabby and motionless and unimpatient. The train swung around the curve, the engine puff-
ing with short, heavy blasts, and they passed smoothly from sight that way, with that qua-
lity about them of shabby and timeless patience, of static serenity: that blending of child-
like and ready incompetence and paradoxical reliability that tends and protects them it
loves out of all reason and robs them steadily and evades responsibility and obligations by
means too barefaced to be called subterfuge even and is taken in theft or evasion with only
that frank and spontaneous admiration for the victor which a gentleman feels for anyone who
beats him in a fair contest, and withal a fond and unflagging tolerance for whitefolks' va-
garies like that of a grandparent for unpredictable and troublesome children, which I had
forgotten. And all that day, while the train wound through rushing gaps and along ledges
where movement was only a laboring sound of the exhaust and groaning wheels and the eternal
mountains stood fading into the thick sky, I thought of home, of the bleak station and the
mud and the niggers and country folks thronging slowly about the square, with toy monkeys
and wagons and candy in sacks and roman candles sticking out, and my insides would move
like they used to do in school when the bell rang.

I wouldn't begin counting until the clock struck three. Then I would begin, counting to
sixty and folding down one finger and thinking of the other fourteen fingers waiting to be
folded down, or thirteen or twelve or eight or seven, until all of a sudden I'd realise
silence and the unwinking minds, and I'd say "Ma'am?" "Your name is Quentin, isn't it?"
Miss Laura would say. Then more silence and the cruel unwinking minds and hands jerking
into the silence. "Tell Quentin who discovered the Mississippi River, Henry." "DeSoto."
Then the minds would go away, and after a while I'd be afraid I had gotten behind and I'd
count fast and fold down another finger, then I'd be afraid I was going too fast and I'd
slow up, then I'd get afraid and count fast again. So I never could come out even with the
bell, and the released surging of feet moving already, feeling earth in the scuffed floor,
and the day like a pane of glass struck a light, sharp blow, and my insides would move,
sitting still. Moving sitting still. My bowels moved for thee. One minute she was standing
in the door. Benjy. Bellowing. Benjamin the child of mine old age bellowing. Caddy! Caddy!

I'm going to run away. He began to cry she went and touched him. Hush. I'm not going to.

Hush. He hushed. Dilsey.

He smell what you tell him when he want to. Dont have to listen nor talk.

Can he smell that new name they give him? Can he smell bad luck?

What he want to worry about luck for? Luck cant do him no hurt.

What they change his name for then if aint trying to help his luck?

The car stopped, started, stopped again. Below the window I watched the crowns of people's
heads passing beneath new straw hats not yet unbleached. There were women in the car now,
with market baskets, and men in work-clothes were beginning to outnumber the shined shoes
and collars.

The nigger touched my knee. "Pardon me," he said. I swung my legs out and let him pass.
We were going beside a blank wall, the sound clattering back into the car, at the women
with market baskets on their knees and a man in a stained hat with a pipe stuck in the
band. I could smell water, and in a break in the wall I saw a glint of water and two masts,
and a gull motionless in midair, like on an invisible wire between the masts, and I raised
my hand and through my coat touched the letters I had written. When the car stopped I
got off.

The bridge was open to let a schooner through. She was in tow, the tug nudging along un-
der her quarter, trailing smoke, but the ship herself was like she was moving without
visible means. A man naked to the waist was coiling down a line on the fo'c's'le head.
His body was burned the color of leaf tobacco. Another man in a straw hat without any
crown was at the wheel. The ship went through the bridge, moving under bare poles like
a ghost in broad day, with three gulls hovering above the stern like toys on invisible
wires.

When it closed I crossed to the other side and leaned on the rail above the boathouses.
The float was empty and the doors were closed. Crew just pulled in the late afternoon
now, resting up before. The shadow of the bridge, the tiers of railing, my shadow leaning
flat upon the water, so easily had I tricked it that would not quit me. At least fifty
feet it was, and if I only had something to blot it into the water, holding it until it
was drowned, the shadow of the package like two shoes wrapped up lying on the water. Nig-
gers say a drowned man's shadow was watching for him in the water all the time. It twin-
kled and glinted, like breathing, the float slow like breathing too, and debris half sub-
merged, healing out to the sea and the caverns and the grottoes of the sea. The displace-
ment of water is equal to the something of something. Reducto absurdum of all human ex-
perience, and two six-pound flatirons weigh more than one tailor's goose. What a sinful
waste Dilsey would say. Benjy knew it when Damuddy died. He cried. He smell hit. He smell
hit.

The tug came back downstream, the water shearing in long rolling cylinders, rocking the
float at last with the echo of passage, the float lurching onto the rolling cylinder with
a plopping sound and a long jarring noise as the door rolled back and two men emerged,
carrying a shell. They set it in thewater and a moment later Bland came out, with the
sculls. He wore flannels, a gray jacket and a stiff straw hat. Either he or his mother
had read somewhere that Oxford students pulled in flannels and stiff hats, so early one
March they bought Gerald a one pair shell and in his flannels and stiff hat he went on
the river. The folks at the boathouse threatened to call a policeman, but he went anyway.
His mother came down in a hired auto, in a fur suit like an arctic explorer's, and saw
him off in a twentyfive mile wind and a steady drove of ice floes like dirty sheep. Ever
since then I have believed that God is not only a gentleman and a sport; he is a Kentuck-
ian too. When he sailed away she made a detour and came down to the river again and drove
along parallel with him, the car in low gear. They said you couldn't have told they'd e-
ver seen one another before, like a King and Queen, not even looking at one another, just
moving side by side across Massachusetts on parallel courses like a couple of planets.

He got in and pulled away. He pulled pretty well now. He ought to. They said his mother
tried to make him give rowing up and do something else the rest of his class couldn't or
wouldn't do, but for once he was stubborn. If you could call it stubbornness, sitting in
his attitudes of princely boredom, with his curly yellow hair and his violet eyes and his
eyelashes and his New York clothes, while his mamma was telling us about Gerald's horses
and Gerald's niggers and Gerald's women. Husbands and fathers in Kentucky must have been
awful glad when she carried Gerald off to Cambridge. She had an apartment over in town,
and Gerald had one there too, besides his rooms in college. She approved of Gerald asso-
ciating with me because I at least revealed a blundering sense of noblesse oblige by get-
ting myself born below Mason and Dixon, and a few others whose Geography met the require-
ments (minimum). Forgave, at least. Or condoned. But since she met Spoade coming out of
chapel one He said she couldn't be a lady no lady would be out at that hour of the night
she never had been able to forgive him for having five names, including that of a present
English ducal house. I'm sure she solaced herself by being convinced that some misfit
Maingault or Mortemar had got mixed up with the lodge-keeper's daughter. Which was quite
probable, whether she invented it or not. Spoade was the world's champion sitter-around,
no holds barred and gouging discretionary.

The shell was a speck now, the oars catching the sun in spaced glints, as if the hull
were winking itself along him along. Did you ever have a sister, No but they're all
bitches. Did you ever have a sister? One minute she was. Bitches. Not bitch one minute
she stood in the door Dalton Ames. Dalton Ames. Dalton Shirts. I thought all the time
they were khaki, army issue khaki, until I saw they were of heavy Chinese silk or finest
flannel because they made his face so brown his eyes so blue. Dalton Ames. It just miss-
ed gentility. Theatrical fixture. Just papier-mache, then touch. Oh. Asbestos.
Not quite bronze. But wont see him at the house.

Caddy's a woman too remember. She must do things for women's reasons too.

Why wont you bring him to the house, Caddy? Why must you do like nigger women do in the
pasture the ditches the dark woods hot hidden furious in the dark woods.

And after a while I had been hearing my watch for some time and I could feel the letters
crackle through my coat, against the railing, and I leaned on the railing, watching my
shadow, how I had tricked it. I moved along the rail, but my suit was dark too and I
could wipe my hands, watching my shadow, how I had tricked it. I walked it into the
shadow of the quad. Then I went east.

Harvard my Harvard boy Harvard harvard That pimple-faced infant she met at the field-
meet with colored ribbons. Skulking along the fence trying to whistle her out like a
puppy. Because they couldn't cajole him into the diningroom Mother believed he had some
sort of spell he was going to cast on her when he got her alone. Yet any blackguard He
was lying beside the box under the window bellowing that could drive up in a limousine
with a flower in his buttonhole. Harvard. Quentin this is Herbert. My Harvard boy. Her-
bert will be a big brother has already promised Jason

Hearty, celluloid like a drummer. Face full of teeth white but not smiling. I've heard
of him up there. All teeth but not smiling. You going to drive?

Get in Quentin.

You going to drive.

It's her car aren't you proud of your little sister owns first auto in town Herbert his
present. Louis has been giving her lessons every morning didn't you get my letter Mr and
Mrs Jason Richmond Compson announce the marriage of their daughter Candace to Mr Sydney
Herbert Head on the twenty-fifth of April one thousand nine hundred and ten at Jefferson
Mississippi. At home after the first of August number Something Something Avenue South
Bend Indiana. Shreve said Aren't you even going to open it? Three days. Times. Mr and
Mrs Jason Richmond Compson Young Lochinvar rode out of the west a little too soon, did-
n't he?

I'm from the south. You're funny, aren't you.

O yes I knew it was somewhere in the country.

You're funny, aren't you. You ought to join the circus.

I did. That's how I ruined my eyes watering the elephant's fleas. Three times These cou-
ntry girls. You cant ever tell about them, can you. Well, anyway Byron never had his wish,
thank God. But not hit a man in glasses Aren't you even going to open it? It lay on the
table a candle burning at each corner upon the envelope tied in a soiled pink garter two
artificial flowers. Not hit a man in　glasses.

Country people poor things they never saw an auto before lots of them honk the horn Can-
dace so She wouldn't look at me they'll get out of the way wouldn't look at me 　your fa-
ther wouldn't like it if you were to injure one of them I'll declare your father will simply
have to get an auto now I'm almost sorry you brought it down Herbert I've enjoyed it so
much of course there's the carriage but so often when I'd like to go out Mr Compson has
the darkies doing something it would be worth my head to interrupt he insists that Roskus
is at my call all the time but I know what that means I know how often people make prom-
ises just to satisfy their consciences are you going to treat my little baby girl that
way Herbert but I know you wont Herbert has spoiled us all to death Quentin did I write
you that he is going to take Jason into his bank when Jason finishes high school Jason
will make a splendid banker he is the only one of my children with any practical sense
you can thank me for that he takes after my people the others are all Compson Jason fur-
nished the flour. They made kites on the back porch and sold them for a nickel a piece,
he and the Patterson boy. Jason was treasurer.

There was no nigger in this car, and the hats unbleached as yet flowing past under the
window. Going to Harvard. We have sold Benjy's He lay on the ground under the window,
bellowing. We have sold Benjy's pasture so that Quentin may go to Harvard a brother to
you. Your little brother. You should have a car it's done you no end of good dont you
think so Quentin I call him Quentin at once you see I have heard so much about him from
Candace.

Why shouldn't you I want my boys to be more than friends yes Candace and Quentin more
than friends Father I have committed what a pity you had no brother or sister No sister
no sister had no sister Dont ask Quentin he and Mr Compson both feel a little insulted
when I am strong enough to come down to the table I am going on nerve now I'll pay for
it after it's all over and you have taken my little daughter away from me My little
sister had no. If I could say Mother. Mother

Unless I do what I am tempted to and take you instead I dont think Mr Compson could o-
vertake the car.

Ah Herbert Candace do you hear that She wouldn't look at me soft stubborn jaw-angle
not back-looking You needn't be jealous though it's just an old woman he's flattering a
grown married daughter I cant believe it.

Nonsense you look like a girl you are lots younger than Candace color in your cheeks
like a girl A face reproachful tearful an odor of camphor and of tears a voice weeping
steadily and softly beyond the twilit door the twilight-colored smell of honeysuckle.
Bringing empty trunks down the attic stairs they sounded like coffins French Lick.
Found not death at the salt lick

Hats not unbleached and not hats. In three years I can not wear a hat. I could not.
Was. Will there be hats then since I was not and not Harvard then. Where the best of
thought Father said clings like dead ivy vines upon old dead brick. Not Harvard then.
Not to me, anyway. Again. Sadder than was. Again. Saddest of all. Again.

Spoade had a shirt on; then it must be. When I can see my shadow again if not careful
that I tricked into the water shall tread again upon my impervious shadow. But no sis-
ter. I wouldn't have done it. I wont have my daughter spied on 　I wouldn't have.

How can I control any of them when you have always taught them to have no respect for
me and my wishes I know you look down on my people but is that any reason for teaching
my children my own children I suffered for to have no respect Trampling my shadow's
bones into the concrete with hard heels and then I was hearing the watch, and I touch-
ed the letters through my coat.

I will not have my daughter spied on by you or Quentin or anybody no matter what you
think she has done

At least you agree there is reason for having her watched

I wouldn't have I wouldn't have. I know you wouldn't I didn't mean to speak so sharply
but have no respect for each other for themselves

But why did she The chimes began as I stepped on my shadow, but it was the quarter
hour. The Deacon wasn't in sight anywhere. think I would have could have

She didn't mean that that's the way women do things it's because she loves Caddy

The street lamps would go down the hill then rise toward town I walked upon the belly
of my shadow. I could extend my hand beyond it. feeling Father behind me beyond the
rasping darkness of summer and August the street lamps Father and I protect women from
one another from themselves our women Women are like that they dont acquire knowledge
of people we are for that they are just born with a practical fertility of suspicion
that makes a crop every so often and usually right they have an affinity for evil for
supplying whatever the evil lacks in itself for drawing it about them instinctively as
you do bed-clothing in slumber fertilising the mind for it until the evil has served
its purpose whether it ever existed or no He was coming along between a couple of
freshmen. He hadn't quite recovered from the parade, for he gave me a salute, a very
superior-officerish kind.

"I want to see you a minute," I said, stopping.

"See me? All right. See you again, fellows," he said, stopping and turning back; "glad
to have chatted with you." That was the Deacon, all over. Talk about your natural psy-
chologists. They said he hadn't missed a train at the beginning of school in forty
years, and that he could pick out a Southerner with one glance. He never missed, and
once he had heard you speak, he could name your state. He had a regular uniform he met
trains in, a sort of Uncle Tom's cabin outfit, patches and all.

"Yes, suh. Right dis way, young marster, hyer we is," taking your bags. "Hyer, boy,
come hyer and git dese grips." Whereupon a moving mountain of luggage would edge up,
revealing a white boy of about fifteen, and the Deacon would hang another bag on him
somehow and drive him off. "Now, den, dont you crap hit. Yes, suh, young marster, jes
give de old nigger yo room number, and hit'll be done got cold afar when you arrives."

From then on until he had you completely subjugated he was always in or out of your
room, ubiquitous and garrulous, though his manner gradually moved northward as his ra-
iment improved, until at last when he had bled you until you began to learn better he
was calling you Quentin or whatever, and when you saw him next he'd be wearing a cast-
off Brooks suit and a hat with a Princeton club I forget which band that someone had
given him and which he was pleasantly and unshakably convinced was a part of Abe Lin-
coln's military sash. Someone spread the story years ago, when he first appeared a-
round college from wherever he came from, that he was a graduate of the divinity
school. And when he came to understand what it meant he was so taken with it that he
began to retail the story himself, until at last he must have come to believe he real-
ly had. Anyway he related long pointless anecdotes of his undergraduate days, speaking
familiarly of dead and departed professors by their first names, usually incorrect
ones. But he had been guide mentor and friend to unnumbered crops of innocent and lo-
nely freshmen, and I suppose that with all his petty chicanery and hypocrisy he stank
no higher in heaven's nostrils than any other.

"Haven't seen you in three-four days," he said, staring at me from his still military
aura. "You been sick?"

"No. I've been all right. Working, I reckon. I've seen you, though."

"Yes?"

"In the parade the other day."

"Oh, that. Yes, I was there. I dont care nothing about that sort of thing, you under-
stand, but the boys likes to have me with them, the vet'runs does. Ladies wants all
the old vet'runs to turn out, you know. So I has to oblige them."

"And on that Wop holiday too," I said. "You were obliging the W. C. T. U. then, I
reckon."

"That? I was doing that for my son-in-law. He aims to get a job on the city forces.
Street cleaner.

I tells him all he wants is a broom to sleep on. You saw me, did you?"

"Both times. Yes."

"I mean, in uniform. How'd I look?"

"You looked fine. You looked better than any of them. They ought to make you a gen-
eral,
Deacon."

He touched my arm, lightly, his hand that worn, gentle quality of niggers' hands.
"Listen. This aint for outside talking. I dont mind telling you because you and me's
the same folks, come long and short." He leaned a little to me, speaking rapidly,
his eyes not looking at me. "I've got strings out, right now. Wait till next year.
Just wait. Then see where I'm marching. I wont need to tell you how I'm fixing it;
I say, just wait and see, my boy." He looked at me now and clapped me lightly on the
shoulder and rocked back on his heels, nodding at me. "Yes, sir. I didn't turn Dem-
ocrat three years ago for nothing. My son-in-law on the city; me--Yes, sir. If
just turning Democrat'll make that son of a bitch go to work…. And me: just you
stand on that corner yonder a year from two days ago, and see."

"I hope so. You deserve it, Deacon. And while I think about it--" I took the letter
from my pocket. "Take this around to my room tomorrow and give it to Shreve. He'll
have something for you. But not till tomorrow, mind."

He took the letter and examined it. "It's sealed up."

"Yes. And it's written inside, Not good until tomorrow."

"H'm," he said. He looked at the envelope, his mouth pursed. "Something for me, you
say?"

"Yes. A present I'm making you."

He was looking at me now, the envelope white in his black hand, in the sun. His eyes
were soft and irisless and brown, and suddenly I saw Roskus watching me from behind all
his whitefolks' claptrap of uniforms and politics and Harvard manner, diffident, secret,
inarticulate and sad. "You aint playing a joke on the old nigger, is you?"

"You know I'm not. Did any Southerner ever play a joke on you?"

"You're right. They're fine folks. But you cant live with them."

"Did you ever try?" I said. But Roskus was gone. Once more he was that self he had
long since taught himself to

"I'll confer to your wishes, my boy."

"Not until tomorrow, remember."

"Sure," he said; "understood, my boy. Well--"

"I hope--" I said. He looked down at me, benignant, profound. Suddenly I held out
my hand and we shook, he gravely, from the pompous height of his municipal and mil-
itary dream. "You're a good fellow, Deacon. I hope…. You've helped a lot of young
fellows, here and there."

"I've tried to treat all folks right," he said. "I draw no petty social lines. A
man to me is a man, wherever I find him."

"I hope you'll always find as many friends as you've made."

"Young fellows. I get along with them. They dont forget me, neither," he said, wa-
ving the envelope. He put it into his pocket and buttoned his coat. "Yes, sir," he
said. "I've had good friends."

The chimes began again, the half hour. I stood in the belly of my shadow and
listened to the strokes spaced and tranquil along the sunlight, among the thin,
still little leaves. Spaced and peaceful and serene, with that quality of autumn
always in bells even in the month of brides. Lying on the ground under the window
bellowing He took one look at her and knew. Out of the mouths of babes. The
street lamps The chimes ceased. I went back to the postoffice, treading my sha-
dow into pavement. go down the hill then they rise toward town like lanterns hung
one above another on a wall. Father said because she loves Caddy she loves people
through their shortcomings. Uncle Maury straddling his legs before the fire must re-
move one hand long enough to drink Christmas. Jason ran on, his hands in his pock-
ets fell down and lay there like a trussed fowl until Versh set him up. Whyn't you
keep them hands outen your pockets when you running you could stand up then
Rolling his head in the cradle rolling it flat across the back. Caddy told Jason and
Versh that the reason Uncle Maury didn't work was that he used to roll his head
in the cradle when he was little.

Shreve was coming up the walk, shambling, fatly earnest, his glasses glinting be-
neath the running leaves like little pools.

"I gave Deacon a note for some things. I may not be in this afternoon, so dont you
let him have anything until tomorrow, will you?"

"All right." He looked at me. "Say, what're you doing today, anyhow? All dressed
up and mooning around like the prologue to a suttee. Did you go to Psychology this
morning?"

"I'm not doing anything. Not until tomorrow, now."

"What's that you got there?"

"Nothing. Pair of shoes I had half-soled. Not until tomorrow, you hear?"

"Sure. All right. Oh, by the way, did you get a letter off the table this morning?"

"No."

"It's there. From Semiramis. Chauffeur brought it before ten oclock."

"All right. I'll get it. Wonder what she wants now."

"Another band recital, I guess. Tumpty ta ta Gerald blah. 'A little louder on the
drum, Quentin'. God, I'm glad I'm not a gentleman." He went on, nursing a book, a
little shapeless, fatly intent. The street lamps do you think so because one of
our forefathers was a governor and three were generals and Mother's weren't
.
any live man is better than any dead man but no live or dead man is very much bet-
ter than any other live or dead man Done in Mother's mind though. Finished. Fin-
ished. Then we were all poisoned you are confusing sin and morality women dont do
that your mother is thinking of morality whether it be sin or not has not occurred
to her

Jason I must go away you keep the others I'll take Jason and go where nobody knows
us so he'll have a chance to grow up and forget all this the others dont love me
they have never loved anything with that streak of Compson selfishness and false
pride Jason was the only one my heart went out to without dread

nonsense Jason is all right I was thinking that as soon as you feel better you and
Caddy might go up to French Lick

and leave Jason here with nobody but you and the darkies

she will forget him then all the talk will die away found not death at the salt
licks

maybe I could find a husband for her not death at the salt licks

The car came up and stopped. The bells were still ringing the half hour. I got
on and it went on again, blotting the half hour. No: the three quarters. Then it
would be ten minutes anyway. To leave Harvard your mother's dream for sold Ben-
jy's pasture for

what have I done to have been given children like these Benjamin was punishment
enough and now for her to have no more regard for me her own mother I've suffered
for her dreamed and planned and sacrificed I went down into the valley yet never
since she opened her eyes has she given me one unselfish thought at times I look
at her I wonder if she can be my child except Jason he has never given me one mo-
ment's sorrow since I first held him in my arms I knew then that he was to be my
joy and my salvation I thought that Benjamin was punishment enough for any sins
I have committed I thought he was my punishment for putting aside my pride and
marrying a man who held himself above me I dont complain I loved him above all of
them because of it because my duty though Jason pulling at my heart all the while
but I see now that I have not suffered enough I see now that I must pay for your
sins as well as mine what have you done what sins have your high and mighty peo-
ple visited upon me but you'll take up for them you always have found excuses for
your own blood only Jason can do wrong because he is more Bascomb than Compson
while your own daughter my little daughter my baby girl she is she is no better
than that when I was a girl I was unfortunate I was only a Bascomb I was taught
that there is no halfway ground that a woman is either a lady or not but I never
dreamed when I held her in my arms that any daughter of mine could let herself
dont you know I can look at her eyes and tell you may think she'd tell you but
she doesn't tell things she is secretive you dont know her I know things she's
done that I'd die before I'd have you know that's it go on criticise Jason acc-
use me of setting him to watch her as if it were a crime while your own daughter
can I know you dont love him that you wish to believe faults against him you ne-
ver have yes ridicule him as you always have Maury you cannot hurt me any more
than your children already have and then I'll be gone and Jason with no one to
love him shield him from this I look at him every day dreading to see this Comp-
son blood beginning to show in him at last with his sister slipping out to see
what do you call it then have you ever laid eyes on him will you even let me try
to find out who he is it's not for myself I couldn't bear to see him it's for
your sake to protect you but who can fight against bad blood you wont let me try
we are to sit back with our hands folded while she not only drags your name in
the dirt but corrupts the very air your children breathe Jason you must let me
go away I cannot stand it let me have Jason and you keep the others they're not
my flesh and blood like he is strangers nothing of mine and I am afraid of them
I can take Jason and go where we are not known I'll go down on my knees and pray
for the absolution of my sins that he may escape this curse try to forget that
the others ever were

If that was the three quarters, not over ten minutes now. One car had just left,
and people were already waiting for the next one. I asked, but he didn't know
whether another one would leave before noon or not because you'd think that in-
terurbans. So the first one was another trolley. I got on. You can feel noon. I
wonder if even miners in the bowels of the earth. That's why whistles: because
people that sweat, and if just far enough from sweat you wont hear whistles and
in eight minutes you should be that far from sweat in Boston. Father said a man
is the sum of his misfortunes. One day you'd think misfortune would get tired,
but then time is your misfortune Father said. A gull on an invisible wire at-
tached through space dragged. You carry the symbol of your frustration into e-
ternity. Then the wings are bigger Father said only who can play a harp.

I could hear my watch whenever the car stopped, but not often they were already
eating 　Who would play a 　Eating the business of eating inside of you space too
space and time confused Stomach saying noon brain saying eat oclock All right
I wonder what time it is what of it. People were getting out. The trolley didn't
stop so often now, emptied by eating.

Then it was past. I got off and stood in my shadow and after a while a car came
along and I got on and went back to the interurban station. There was a car rea-
dy to leave, and I found a seat next the window and it started and I watched it
sort of frazzle out into slack tide flats, and then trees. Now and then I saw
the river and I thought how nice it would be for them down at New London if the
weather and Gerald's shell going solemnly up the glinting forenoon and I won-
dered what the old woman would be wanting now, sending me a note before ten o-
clock in the morning. What picture of Gerald I to be one of the Dalton Ames oh
asbestos Quentin has shot background. Something with girls in it. Women do have
always his voice above the gabble voice that breathed an affinity for evil, for
believing that no woman is to be trusted, but that some men are too innocent to
protect themselves. Plain girls. Remote cousins and family friends whom mere ac-
quaintanceship invested with a sort of blood obligation noblesse oblige. And she
sitting there telling us before their faces what a shame it was that Gerald
should have all the family looks because a man didn't need it, was better off
without it but without it a girl was simply lost. Telling us about Gerald's wo-
men in a Quentin has shot Herbert he shot his voice through the floor of Caddy's
room tone of smug approbation. "When he was seventeen I said to him one day
'What a shame that you should have a mouth like that it should be on a girl's
face' and can you imagine the curtains leaning in on the twilight upon the odor
of the apple tree her head against the twilight her arms behind her head kimo-
no-winged the voice that breathed o'er eden clothes upon the bed by the nose
seen above the apple what he said? just seventeen, mind. 'Mother' he said 'it
often is'." And him sitting there in attitudes regal watching two or three of
them through his eyelashes. They gushed like swallows swooping his eyelashes.
Shreve said he always had Are you going to look after Benjy and Father

The less you say about Benjy and Father the better when have you ever consi-
dered them Caddy

Promise

You needn't worry about them you're getting out in good shape

Promise I'm sick you'll have to promise wondered who invented that joke but
then he always had considered Mrs Bland a remarkably preserved woman he said
she was grooming Gerald to seduce a duchess sometime. She called Shreve that
fat Canadian youth twice she arranged a new room-mate for me without consul-
ting me at all, once for me to move out, once for He opened the door in the
twilight. His face looked like a pumpkin pie.

"Well, I'll say a fond farewell. Cruel fate may part us, but I will never love
another. Never."

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about cruel fate in eight yards of apricot silk and more metal
pound for pound than a galley slave and the sole owner and proprietor of the
unchallenged peripatetic john of the late Confederacy." Then he told me how
she had gone to the proctor to have him moved out and how the proctor had
revealed enough low stubbornness to insist on consulting Shreve first. Then
she suggested that he send for Shreve right off and do it, and he wouldn't
do that, so after that she was hardly civil to Shreve. "I make it a point
never to speak harshly of females," Shreve said, "but that woman has got
more ways like a bitch than any lady in these sovereign states and domini-
ons." and now Letter on the table by hand, command orchid scented colored
If she knew I had passed almost beneath the window knowing it there with-
out My dear Madam I have not yet had an opportunity of receiving your com-
munication but I beg in advance to be excused today or yesterday and tomo-
rrow or when As I remember that the next one is to be how Gerald throws his
nigger downstairs and how the nigger plead to be allowed to matriculate in
the divinity school to be near marster marse gerald and How he ran all the
way to the station beside the carriage with tears in his eyes when marse
gerald rid away I will wait until the day for the one about the sawmill
husband came to the kitchen door with a shotgun Gerald went down and bit
the gun in two and handed it back and wiped his hands on a silk handker-
chief threw the handkerchief in the stove I've only heard that one twice

　　shot him through the I saw you come in here so I watched my chance and
came along thought we might get acquainted have a cigar
Thanks I dont smoke
No things must have changed up there since my day mind if I light up
Help yourself
Thanks I've heard a lot I guess your mother wont mind if I put the match
behind the screen will she a lot about you Candace talked about you all
the time up there at the Licks I got pretty jealous I says to myself who
is this Quentin anyway I must see what this animal looks like because I
was hit pretty hard see soon as I saw the little girl I dont mind tell-
ing you it never occurred to me it was her brother she kept talking about
she couldn't have talked about you any more if you'd been the only man
in the world husband wouldn't have been in it you wont change your mind
and have a smoke
I dont smoke
In that case I wont insist even though it is a pretty fair weed cost me
twenty-five bucks a hundred wholesale friend of in Havana yes I guess
there are lots of changes up there I keep promising myself a visit but I
never get around to it been hitting the ball now for ten years I cant get
away from the bank during school fellow's habits change things that seem
important to an undergraduate you know tell me about things up there
I'm not going to tell Father and Mother if that's what you are getting at
Not going to tell not going to oh that that's what you are talking about
is it you understand that I dont give a damn whether you tell or not un-
derstand that a thing like that unfortunate but no police crime I wasn't
the first or the last I was just unlucky you might have been luckier
You lie
Keep your shirt on I'm not trying to make you tell anything you dont want
to meant no offense of course a young fellow like you would consider a
thing of that sort a lot more serious than you will in five years
I dont know but one way to consider cheating I dont think I'm likely to
learn different at Harvard We're better than a play you must have made the
Dramat well you're right no need to tell them we'll let bygones be bygones
eh no reason why you and I should let a little thing like that come be-
tween us I like you Quentin I like your appearance you dont look like
these other hicks I'm glad we're going to hit it off like this I've pro-
mised your mother to do something for Jason but I would like to give you
a hand too Jason would be just as well off here but there's no future in
a hole like this for a young fellow like you
Thanks you'd better stick to Jason he'd suit you better than I would
I'm sorry about that business but a kid like I was then I never had a mo-
ther like yours to teach me the finer points it would just hurt her unn-
ecessarily to know it yes you're right no need to that includes Candace
of course
I said Mother and Father
Look here take a look at me how long do you think you'd last with me
I wont have to last long if you learned to fight up at school too try and
see how long I would You damned little what do you think you're getting at
Try and see
My God the cigar what would your mother say if she found a blister on her
mantel just in time too look here Quentin we're about to do something
we'll both regret I like you liked you as soon as I saw you I says he must
be a damned good fellow whoever he is or Candace wouldn't be so keen
on him listen I've been out in the world now for ten years things dont mat-
ter so much then you'll find that out let's you and I get together on this
thing sons of old Harvard and all I guess I wouldn't know the place now
best place for a young fellow in the world I'm going to send my sons there
give them a better chance than I had wait dont go yet let's discuss this
thing a young man gets these ideas and I'm all for them does him good
while he's in school forms his character good for tradition the school but
when he gets out into the world he'll have to get his the best way he can
because he'll find that everybody else is doing the same thing and be damn-
ed to here let's shake hands and let bygones be bygones for your mother's
sake remember her health come on give me your hand here look at it it's
just out of convent look not a blemish not even been creased yet see here
To hell with your money
No no come on I belong to the family now see I know how it is with a young
fellow he has lots of private affairs it's always pretty hard to get the
old man to stump up for I know haven't I been there and not so long ago ei-
ther but now I'm getting married and all specially up there come on dont be
a fool listen when we get a chance for a real talk I want to tell you about
a little widow over in town
I've heard that too keep your damned money
Call it a loan then just shut your eyes a minute and you'll be fifty
Keep your hands off of me you'd better get that cigar off the mantel
Tell and be damned then see what it gets you if you were not a damned fool
you'd have seen that I've got them too tight for any half-baked Galahad of
a brother your mother's told me about your sort with your head swelled up
come in oh come in dear Quentin and I were just getting acquainted talking
about Harvard did you want me cant stay away from the old man can she
Go out a minute Herbert I want to talk to Quentin
Come in come in let's all have a gabfest and get acquainted I was just
telling Quentin Go on
Herbert go out a while Well all right then I suppose you and bubber do want
to see one another once more eh
You'd better take that cigar off the mantel
Right as usual my boy then I'll toddle along let them order you around
while they can Quentin after day after tomorrow it'll be pretty please to
the old man wont it dear give us a kiss honey
Oh stop that save that for day after tomorrow
I'll want interest then dont let Quentin do anything he cant finish oh by
the way did I tell Quentin the story about the man's parrot and what happen-
ed to it a sad story remind me of that think of it yourself ta-ta see you
in the funnypaper
Well
Well
What are you up to now
Nothing
You're meddling in my business again didn't you get enough of that last sum-
mer
Caddy you've got fever You're sick how are you sick

　　　　I'm just sick. I cant ask.
　　　　Shot his voice through the
　　　　Not that blackguard Caddy

Now and then the river glinted beyond things in sort of swooping glints, a-
cross noon and after. Good after now, though we had passed where he was still
pulling upstream majestical in the face of god gods. Better. Gods. God would
be canaille too in Boston in Massachusetts. Or maybe just not a husband. The
wet oars winking him along in bright winks and female palms. Adulant. Adulant
if not a husband he'd ignore God. That blackguard, Caddy The river glinted a-
way beyond a swooping curve.

　　　　I'm sick you'll have to promise
　　　　Sick how are you sick
　　　　I'm just sick I cant ask anybody yet promise you will

If they need any looking after it's because of you how are you sick Under
the window we could hear the car leaving for the station, the 8:10 train.
To bring back cousins. Heads. Increasing himself head by head but not barbers.
Manicure girls. We had a blood horse once. In the stable yes, but under lea-
ther a cur. Quentin has shot all of their voices through the floor of Caddy's
room

The car stopped. I got off, into the middle of my shadow. A road crossed the
track. There was a wooden marquee with an old man eating something out of a
paper bag, and then the car was out of hearing too. The road went into trees,
where it would be shady, but June foliage in New England not much thicker than
April at home. I could see a smoke stack.I turned my back to it, tramping my
shadow into the dust. There was something terrible in me sometimes at night I
could see it grinning at me I could see it through them grinning at me through
their faces it's gone now and I'm sick

　　　　Caddy
　　　　Dont touch me just promise
　　　　If you're sick you cant
　　　　Yes I can after that it'll be all right it wont matter dont let them send him
　　　　to Jackson promise
　　　　I promise Caddy Caddy
　　　　Dont touch me dont touch me
　　　　What does it look like Caddy
　　　　What
　　　　That that grins at you that thing through them

I could still see the smoke stack. That's where the water would be, healing out
to the sea and the peaceful grottoes. Tumbling peacefully they would, and when
He said Rise only the flat irons. When Versh and I hunted all day we wouldn't
take any lunch, and at twelve oclock I'd get hungry. I'd stay hungry until about
one, then all of a sudden I'd even forget that I wasn't hungry anymore. The
street lamps go down the hill then heard the car go down the hill. The chair-
arm flat cool smooth under my forehead shaping the chair the apple tree lean-
ing on my hair above the eden clothes by the nose seen You've got fever I felt
it yesterday it's like being near a stove.

Dont touch me.

Caddy you cant do it if you are sick. That blackguard.

I've got to marry somebody. Then they told me the bone would have to be broken a-
gain

At last I couldn't see the smoke stack. The road went beside a wall. Trees lea-
ned over the wall, sprayed with sunlight. The stone was cool. Walking near it
you could feel the coolness. Only our country was not like this country. There
was something about just walking through it. A kind of still and violent fecun-
dity that satisfied even bread-hunger like. Flowing around you, not brooding
and nursing every niggard stone. Like it were put to makeshift for enough green
to go around among the trees and even the blue of distance not that rich chima-
era. told me the bone would have to be broken again and inside me it began to
say Ah Ah Ah and I began to sweat. What do I care I know what a broken leg is
all it is it wont be anything I'll just have to stay in the house a little longer
that's all and my jaw-muscles getting numb and my mouth saying Wait Wait
just a minute through the sweat ah ah ah behind my teeth and Father damn that
horse damn that horse. Wait it's my fault. He came along the fence every mor-
ning with a basket toward the kitchen dragging a stick along the fence every
morning I dragged myself to the window cast and all and laid for him with a
piece of coal Dilsey said you goin to ruin yoself aint you got no mo sense
than that not fo days since you bruck hit. Wait I'll get used to it in a min-
ute wait just a minute I'll get

Even sound seemed to fail in this air, like the air was worn out with carrying
sounds so long. A dog's voice carries further than a train, in the darkness a-
nyway. And some people's. Niggers. Louis Hatcher never even used his horn
carrying it and that old lantern. I said, "Louis, when was the last time you
cleaned that lantern?"

"I cleant hit a little while back. You member when all dat flood-watter wash
dem folks away up yonder? I cleans hit dat ve'y day. Old woman and me settin
fo de fire dat night and she say 'Louis, whut you gwine do ef dat flood git
out dis fur?' and I say 'Dat's a fack. I reckon I had better clean dat lantun
up.' So I cleant hit dat night."

"That flood was way up in Pennsylvania," I said. "It couldn't ever have got
down this far."

"Dat's whut you says," Louis said. "Watter kin git des ez high en wet in Jef-
ferson ez hit kin in Pennsylvaney, I reckon. Hit's de folks dat says de high
watter cant git dis fur dat comes floatin out on de ridge-pole, too."

"Did you and Martha get out that night?"

"We done jest dat. I cleans dat lantun and me and her sot de balance of de
night on top o dat knoll back de graveyard. En ef I'd a knowed of aihy one
higher, we'd a been on hit instead."

"And you haven't cleaned that lantern since then."

"Whut I want to clean hit when dey aint no need?"

"You mean, until another flood comes along?"

"Hit kep us outen dat un."

"Oh, come on, Uncle Louis," I said.

"Yes, suh. You do yo way en I do mine. Ef all I got to do to keep outen de
high watter is to clean dis yere lantun, I wont quoil wid no man."

"Unc' Louis wouldn't ketch nothin wid a light he could see by," Versh said.

"I wuz huntin possums in dis country when dey was still drowndin nits in yo
pappy's head wid coal oil, boy," Louis said. "Ketchin um, too."

"Dat's de troof," Versh said. "I reckon Unc' Louis done caught mo possums
than aihy man in dis country."

"Yes, suh," Louis said. "I got plenty light fer possums to see, all right.
I aint heard none o dem complainin. Hush, now. Dar he. Whooey. Hum awn,
dawg." And we'd sit in the dry leaves that whispered a little with the slow
respiration of our waiting and with the slow breathing of the earth and the
windless October, the rank smell of the lantern fouling the brittle air,
listening to the dogs and to the echo of Louis' voice dying away. He never
raised it, yet on a still night we have heard it from our front porch.
When he called the dogs in he sounded just like the horn he carried slung
on his shoulder and never used, but clearer, mellower, as though his voice
were a part of darkness and silence, coiling out of it, coiling into it a-
gain. WhoOoooo. WhoOoooo. WhoOooooooooooooooo. Got to marry somebody

Have there been very many Caddy

I dont know too many will you look after Benjy and Father

You dont know whose it is then does he know

Dont touch me will you look after Benjy and Father

I began to feel the water before I came to the bridge. The bridge was of
gray stone, lichened, dappled with slow moisture where the fungus crept.
Beneath it the water was clear and still in the shadow, whispering and
clucking about the stone in fading swirls of spinning sky. Caddy that

I've got to marry somebody Versh told me about a man who mutilated himself.
He went into the woods and did it with a razor, sitting in a ditch. A bro-
ken razor flinging them backward over his shoulder the same motion complete
the jerked skein of blood backward not looping. But that's not it. It's not
not having them. It's never to have had them then I could say O That That's
Chinese I dont know Chinese. And Father said it's because you are a virgin:
dont you see? Women are never virgins. Purity is a negative state and there-
fore contrary to nature. It's nature is hurting you not Caddy and I said
That's just words and he said So is virginity and I said you dont know. You
cant know and he said Yes. On the instant when we come to realise that tra-
gedy is second-hand.

Where the shadow of the bridge fell I could see down for a long way, but
not as far as the bottom. When you leave a leaf in water a long time after
a while the tissue will be gone and the delicate fibers waving slow as the
motion of sleep. They dont touch one another, no matter how knotted up they
once were, no matter how close they lay once to the bones. And maybe when
He says Rise the eyes will come floating up too, out of the deep quiet and
the sleep, to look on glory. And after a while the flat irons would come
floating up. I hid them under the end of the bridge and went back and lean-
ed on the rail.

I could not see the bottom, but I could see a long way into the motion of
the water before the eye gave out, and then I saw a shadow hanging like a
fat arrow stemming into the current. Mayflies skimmed in and out of the
shadow of the bridge just above the surface. If it could just be a hell
beyond that: the clean flame the two of us more than dead. Then you will
have only me then only me then the two of us amid the pointing and the
horror beyond the clean flame The arrow increased without motion, then
in a quick swirl the trout lipped a fly beneath the surface with that
sort of gigantic delicacy of an elephant picking up a peanut. The fading
vortex drifted away down stream and then I saw the arrow again, nose in-
to the current, wavering delicately to the motion of the water above
which the May flies slanted and poised. Only you and me then amid the
pointing and the horror walled by the clean flame

The trout hung, delicate and motionless among the wavering shadows.
Three boys with fishing poles came onto the bridge and we leaned on the
rail and looked down at the trout. They knew the fish. He was a neigh-
borhood character.

"They've been trying to catch that trout for twenty-five years. There's
a store in Boston offers a twenty-five dollar fishing rod to anybody
that can catch him."

"Why dont you all catch him, then? Wouldn't you like to have a twenty-
five dollar fishing rod?"

"Yes," they said. They leaned on the rail, looking down at the trout."
I sure would," one said.

"I wouldn't take the rod," the second said. "I'd take the money in-
stead."

"Maybe they wouldn't do that," the first said. "I bet he'd make you
take the rod."

"Then I'd sell it."

"You couldn't get twenty-five dollars for it."

"I'd take what I could get, then. I can catch just as many fish with
this pole as I could with a twenty-five dollar one." Then they talked
about what they would do with twenty-five dollars. They all talked at
once, their voices insistent and contradictory and impatient, making of
unreality a possibility, then a probability, then an incontrovertible
fact, as people will when their desires become words.

"I'd buy a horse and wagon," the second said.

"Yes you would," the others said.

"I would. I know where I can buy one for twenty-five dollars. I know
the man."

"Who is it?"

"That's all right who it is. I can buy it for twenty-five dollars."

"Yah," the others said. "He dont know any such thing. He's just talk-
ing."

"Do you think so?" the boy said. They continued to jeer at him, but
he said nothing more. He leaned on the rail, looking down at the trout
which he had already spent, and suddenly the acrimony, the conflict,
was gone from their voices, as if to them too it was as though he had
captured the fish and bought his horse and wagon, they too partaking
of that adult trait of being convinced of anything by an assumption of
silent superiority. I suppose that people, using themselves and each
other so much by words, are at least consistent in attributing wisdom
to a still tongue, and for a while I could feel the other two seeking
swiftly for some means by which to cope with him, to rob him of his
horse and wagon.

"You couldn't get twenty-five dollars for that pole," the first said.
"I bet anything you couldn't."

"He hasn't caught that trout yet," the third said suddenly, then they
both cried:

"Yah, what'd I tell you? What's the man's name? I dare you to tell.
There aint any such man."

"Ah, shut up," the second said. "Look. Here he comes again." They
leaned on the rail, motionless, identical, their poles slanting slen-
derly in the sunlight, also identical. The trout rose without haste,
a shadow in faint wavering increase; again the little vortex faded
slowly downstream. "Gee," the first one murmured.

"We dont try to catch him anymore," he said. "We just watch Boston
folks that come out and try."

"Is he the only fish in this pool?"

"Yes. He ran all the others out. The best place to fish around here
is down at the Eddy."

"No it aint," the second said. "It's better at Bigelow's Mill two to
one." Then they argued for a while about which was the best fishing
and then left off all of a sudden to watch the trout rise again and
the broken swirl of water suck down a little of the sky. I asked how
far it was to the nearest town. They told me.

"But the closest car line is that way," the second said, pointing
back down the road. "Where are you going?"

"Nowhere. Just walking."

"You from the college?"

"Yes. Are there any factories in that town?"

"Factories?" They looked at me.

"No," the second said. "Not there." They looked at my clothes. "You
looking for work?"

"How about Bigelow's Mill?" the third said. "That's a factory."

"Factory my eye. He means a sure enough factory."

"One with a whistle," I said. "I haven't heard any one oclock whistles
yet."

"Oh," the second said. "There's a clock in the unitarial steeple. You
can find out the time from that. Haven't you got a watch on that chain?"

"I broke it this morning." I showed them my watch. They examined it
gravely.

"It's still running," the second said. "What does a watch like that
cost?"

"It was a present," I said. "My father gave it to me when I graduated
from high school."

"Are you a Canadian?" the third said. He had red hair.

"Canadian?"

"He dont talk like them," the second said. "I've heard them talk. He
talks like they do in minstrel
shows."

"Say," the third said. "Aint you afraid he'll hit you?"

"Hit me?"

"You said he talks like a colored man."

"Ah, dry up," the second said. "You can see the steeple when you get
over that hill there."

I thanked them. "I hope you have good luck. Only dont catch that old
fellow down there. He deserves to be let alone."

"Cant anybody catch that fish," the first said. They leaned on the rail,
looking down into the water, the three poles like three slanting threads
of yellow fire in the sun. I walked upon my shadow, tramping it into the
dappled shade of trees again. The road curved, mounting away from the
water. It crossed the hill, then descended winding, carrying the eye,
the mind on ahead beneath a still green tunnel, and the square cupola
above the trees and the round eye of the clock but far enough. I sat
down at the roadside. The grass was ankle deep, myriad. The shadows
on the road were as still as if they had been put there with a stencil,
with slanting pencils of sunlight. But it was only a train, and after
a while it died away beyond the trees, the long sound, and then I could
hear my watch and the train dying away, as though it were running
through another month or another summer somewhere, rushing away under
the poised gull and all things rushing. Except Gerald. He would be sort
of grand too, pulling in lonely state across the noon, rowing himself
right out of noon, up the long bright air like an apotheosis, mounting
into a drowsing infinity where only he and the gull, the one terrifi-
cally motionless, the other in a steady and measured pull and recover
that partook of inertia itself, the world punily beneath their shadows
on the sun. Caddy that blackguard that blackguard Caddy

Their voices came over the hill, and the three slender poles like bal-
anced threads of running fire. They looked at me passing, not slowing.

"Well," I said. "I dont see him."

"We didn't try to catch him," the first said. "You cant catch that
fish."

"There's the clock," the second said, pointing. "You can tell the time
when you get a little closer."

"Yes," I said. "All right." I got up. "You all going to town?"

"We're going to the Eddy for chub," the first said.

"You cant catch anything at the Eddy," the second said.

"I guess you want to go to the mill, with a lot of fellows splashing
and scaring all the fish away."

"You cant catch any fish at the Eddy."

"We wont catch none nowhere if we dont go on," the third said.

"I dont see why you keep on talking about the Eddy," the second said.
"You cant catch anything there."

"You dont have to go," the first said. "You're not tied to me."

"Let's go to the mill and go swimming," the third said.

"I'm going to the Eddy and fish," the first said. "You can do as you
please."

"Say, how long has it been since you heard of anybody catching a fish
at the Eddy?" the second said to the third.

"Let's go to the mill and go swimming," the third said. The cupola
sank slowly beyond the trees, with the round face of the clock far
enough yet. We went on in the dappled shade. We came to an orchard,
pink and white. It was full of bees; already we could hear them.

"Let's go to the mill and go swimming," the third said. A lane turn-
ed off beside the orchard. The third boy slowed and halted. The first
went on, flecks of sunlight slipping along the pole across his shoul-
der and down the back of his shirt. "Come on," the third said. The
second boy stopped too. Why must you marry somebody Caddy

Do you want me to say it do you think that if I say it it wont be

"Let's go up to the mill," he said. "Come on."

The first boy went on. His bare feet made no sound, falling softer
than leaves in the thin dust. In the orchard the bees sounded like
a wind getting up, a sound caught by a spell just under crescendo
and sustained. The lane went along the wall, arched over, shattered
with bloom, dissolving into trees. Sunlight slanted into it, sparse
and eager. Yellow butterflies flickered along the shade like flecks
of sun.

"What do you want to go to the Eddy for?" the second boy said. "You
can fish at the mill if you want to."

"Ah, let him go," the third said. They looked after the first boy.
Sunlight slid patchily across his walking shoulders, glinting along
the pole like yellow ants.

"Kenny," the second said. Say it to Father will you I will am my fa-
thers Progenitive I invented him created I him Say it to him it will
not be for he will say I was not and then you and I since philopro-
genitive

"Ah, come on," the third boy said. "They're already in." They looked
after the first boy. "Yah," they said suddenly, "go on then, mamma's
boy. If he goes swimming he'll get his head wet and then he'll get a
licking." They turned into the lane and went on, the yellow butter-
flies slanting about them along the shade.

it is because there is nothing else I believe there is something else
but there may not be and then I You will find that even injustice is
scarcely worthy of what you believe yourself to be He paid me no at-
tention, his jaw set in profile, his face turned a little away be-
neath his broken hat.

"Why dont you go swimming with them?" I said. that blackguard Caddy

Were you trying to pick a fight with him were you

A liar and a scoundrel Caddy was dropped from his club for cheating
at cards got sent to Coventry caught cheating at midterm exams and
expelled

Well what about it I'm not going to play cards with

"Do you like fishing better than swimming?" I said. The sound of the
bees diminished, sustained yet, as though instead of sinking into
silence, silence merely increased between us, as water rises. The
road curved again and became a street between shady lawns with white
houses. Caddy that blackguard can you think of Benjy and Father and
do it not of me

What else can I think about what else have I thought about The boy
turned from the street. He climbed a picket fence without looking
back and crossed the lawn to a tree and laid the pole down and climb-
ed into the fork of the tree and sat there, his back to the road
and the dappled sun motionless at last upon his white shirt. else
have I thought about I cant even cry I died last year I told you I
had but I didn't know then what I meant I didn't know what I was
saying Some days in late August at home are like this, the air thin
and eager like this, with something in it sad and nostalgic and fam-
iliar. Man the sum of his climatic experiences Father said. Man the
sum of what have you. A problem in impure properties carried tedio-
usly to an unvarying nil: stalemate of dust and desire. but now I
know I'm dead I tell you

Then why must you listen we can go away you and Benjy and me where
nobody knows us where The buggy was drawn by a white horse, his feet
cropping in the thin dust; spidery wheels chattering thin and dry, mov-
ing uphill beneath a rippling shawl of leaves. Elm. No: ellum.
Ellum.

On what on your school money the money they sold the pasture for
so you could go to Harvard dont you see you've got to finish now if
you dont finish he'll have nothing

Sold the pasture His white shirt was motionless in the fork, in the
flickering shade. The wheels were spidery. Beneath the sag of the
buggy the hooves neatly rapid like the motions of a lady doing em-
broidery, diminishing without progress like a figure on a treadmill
being drawn rapidly offstage. The street turned again. I could see
the white cupola, the round stupid assertion of the clock. Sold the
pasture

Father will be dead in a year they say if he doesn't stop drinking
and he wont stop he cant stop since I since last summer and then
they'll send Benjy to Jackson I cant cry I cant even cry one minute
she was standing in the door the next minute he was pulling at her
dress and bellowing his voice hammered back and forth between the
walls in waves and she shrinking against the wall getting smaller
and smaller with her white face her eyes like thumbs dug into it
until he pushed her out of the room his voice hammering back and
forth as though its own momentum would not let it stop as though
there were no place for it in silence bellowing

When you opened the door a bell tinkled, but just once, high and
clear and small in the neat obscurity above the door, as though
it were gauged and tempered to make that single clear small sound
so as not to wear the bell out nor to require the expenditure of
too much silence in restoring it when the door opened upon the
recent warm scent of baking; a little dirty child with eyes like a
toy bear's and two patent-leather pigtails.

"Hello, sister." Her face was like a cup of milk dashed with cof-
fee in the sweet warm emptiness. "Anybody here?"

But she merely watched me until a door opened and the lady came.
Above the counter where the ranks of crisp shapes behind the glass
her neat gray face her hair tight and sparse from her neat gray
skull, spectacles in neat gray rims riding approaching like some-
thing on a wire, like a cash box in a store. She looked like a
librarian. Something among dusty shelves of ordered certitudes
long divorced from reality, desiccating peacefully, as if a breath
of that air which sees injustice done

"Two of these, please, ma'am."

From under the counter she produced a square cut from a newspaper
and laid it on the counter and lifted the two buns out. The little
girl watched them with still and unwinking eyes like two currants
floating motionless in a cup of weak coffee Land of the kike home
of the wop. Watching the bread, the neat gray hands, a broad gold
band on the left forefinger, knuckled there by a blue knuckle.

"Do you do your own baking, ma'am?"

"Sir?" she said. Like that. Sir? Like on the stage. Sir? "Five
cents. Was there anything else?"

"No, ma'am. Not for me. This lady wants something." She was not
tall enough to see over the case, so she went to the end of the
counter and looked at the little girl.

"Did you bring her in here?"

"No, ma'am. She was here when I came."

"You little wretch," she said. She came out around the counter,
but she didn't touch the little girl. "Have you got anything in
your pockets?"

"She hasn't got any pockets," I said. "She wasn't doing anything.
She was just standing here, waiting for you."

"Why didn't the bell ring, then?" She glared at me. She just need-
ed a bunch of switches, a blackboard behind her 2 x 2 e 5. "She'll
hide it under her dress and a body'd never know it. You, child.
How'd you get in here?"

The little girl said nothing. She looked at the woman, then she
gave me a flying black glance and looked at the woman again. "Them
foreigners," the woman said. "How'd she get in without the bell
ringing?"

"She came in when I opened the door," I said. "It rang once for
both of us. She couldn't reach anything from here, anyway. Besides,
I dont think she would. Would you, sister?" The little girl look-
ed at me, secretive, contemplative. "What do you want? bread?"

She extended her fist. It uncurled upon a nickel, moist and dirty,
moist dirt ridged into her flesh. The coin was damp and warm. I
could smell it, faintly metallic.

"Have you got a five cent loaf, please, ma'am?"

From beneath the counter she produced a square cut from a newspap-
er sheet and laid it on the counter and wrapped a loaf into it. I
laid the coin and another one on the counter. "And another one of
those buns, please, ma'am."

She took another bun from the case. "Give me that parcel," she
said. I gave it to her and she unwrapped it and put the third bun
in and wrapped it and took up the coins and found two coppers in
her apron and gave them to me. I handed them to the little girl.
Her fingers closed about them, damp and hot, like worms.

"You going to give her that bun?" the woman said.

"Yessum," I said. "I expect your cooking smells as good to her as
it does to me."

I took up the two packages and gave the bread to the little girl,
the woman all iron-gray behind the counter, watching us with cold
certitude. "You wait a minute," she said. She went to the rear. The
door opened again and closed. The little girl watched me, holding
the bread against her dirty dress.

"What's your name?" I said. She quit looking at me, but she was
still motionless. She didn't even seem to breathe. The woman return-
ed. She had a funny looking thing in her hand. She carried it sort
of like it might have been a dead pet rat.

"Here," she said. The child looked at her. "Take it," the woman
said, jabbing it at the little girl. "It just looks peculiar. I calculate
you wont know the difference when you eat it. Here. I cant stand
here all day." The child took it, still watching her. The woman rub-
bed her hands on her apron. "I got to have that bell fixed," she
said. She went to the door and jerked it open. The little bell tink-
led once, faint and clear and invisible. We moved toward the door
and the woman's peering back.

"Thank you for the cake," I said.

"Them foreigners," she said, staring up into the obscurity where the
bell tinkled. "Take my advice and stay clear of them, young man."

"Yessum," I said. "Come on, sister." We went out. "Thank you, ma'am."

She swung the door to, then jerked it open again, making the bell
give forth its single small note. "Foreigners," she said, peering
up at the bell.

We went on. "Well," I said. "How about some ice cream?" She was eat-
ing the gnarled cake. "Do you like ice cream?" She gave me a black
still look, chewing. "Come on."

We came to the drugstore and had some ice cream. She wouldn't put
the loaf down. "Why not put it down so you can eat better?" I said,
offering to take it. But she held to it, chewing the ice cream like
it was taffy. The bitten cake lay on the table. She ate the ice
cream steadily, then she fell to on the cake again, looking about
at the showcases. I finished mine and we went out.

"Which way do you live?" I said.

A buggy, the one with the white horse it was. Only Doc Peabody is
fat. Three hundred pounds. You ride with him on the uphill side,
holding on. Children. Walking easier than holding uphill. Seen
the doctor yet have you seen Caddy

I dont have to I cant ask now afterward it will be all right it wont
matter

Because women so delicate so mysterious Father said. Delicate equi-
librium of periodical filth between two moons balanced. Moons he
said full and yellow as harvest moons her hips thighs. Outside out-
side of them always but. Yellow. Feet soles with walking like. Then
know that some man that all those mysterious and imperious conceal-
ed. With all that inside of them shapes an outward suavity waiting
for a touch to. Liquid putrefaction like drowned things floating
like pale rubber flabbily filled getting the odor of honeysuckle
all mixed up.

"You'd better take your bread on home, hadn't you?"

She looked at me. She chewed quietly and steadily; at regular inter-
vals a small distension passed smoothly down her throat. I opened my
package and gave her one of the buns. "Goodbye," I said.

I went on. Then I looked back. She was behind me. "Do you live down
this way?" She said nothing. She walked beside me, under my elbow
sort of, eating. We went on. It was quiet, hardly anyone about get-
ting the odor of honeysuckle all mixed She would have told me not
to let me sit there on the steps hearing her door twilight slamming
hearing Benjy still crying Supper she would have to come down then
getting honeysuckle all mixed up in it 　We reached the corner.

"Well, I've got to go down this way," I said. "Goodbye." She stopped
too. She swallowed the last of the cake, then she began on the bun,
watching me across it. "Goodbye," I said. I turned into the street
and went on, but I went to the next corner before I stopped.

"Which way do you live?" I said. "This way?" I pointed down the
street. She just looked at me. "Do you live over that way? I bet
you live close to the station, where the trains are. Dont you?" She
just looked at me, serene and secret and chewing. The street was em-
pty both ways, with quiet lawns and houses neat among the trees, but
no one at all except back there. We turned and went back. Two men sat
in chairs in front of a store.

"Do you all know this little girl? She sort of took up with me and I
cant find where she lives." They quit looking at me and looked at her.

"Must be one of them new Italian families," one said. He wore a rusty
frock coat. "I've seen her before. What's your name, little girl?" She
looked at them blackly for a while, her jaws moving steadily. She
swallowed without ceasing to chew.

"Maybe she cant speak English," the other said.

"They sent her after bread," I said. "She must be able to speak some-
thing."

"What's your pa's name?" the first said. "Pete? Joe? name John huh?"
She took another bite from the bun.

"What must I do with her?" I said. "She just follows me. I've got to
get back to Boston."

"You from the college?"

"Yes, sir. And I've got to get on back."

"You might go up the street and turn her over to Anse. He'll be up at
the livery stable. The marshal."

"I reckon that's what I'll have to do," I said. "I've got to do some-
thing with her. Much obliged. Come on, sister."

We went up the street, on the shady side, where the shadow of the bro-
ken facade blotted slowly across the road. We came to the livery stable.
The marshal wasn't there. A man sitting in a chair tilted in the broad
low door, where a dark cool breeze smelling of ammonia blew among the
ranked stalls, said to look at the postoffice. He didn't know her ei-
ther.

"Them furriners. I cant tell one from another. You might take her across
the tracks where they live, and maybe somebody'll claim her."

We went to the postoffice. It was back down the street. The man in the
frock coat was opening a newspaper.

"Anse just drove out of town," he said. "I guess you'd better go down
past the station and walk past them houses by the river. Somebody
there'll know her."

"I guess I'll have to," I said. "Come on, sister." She pushed the last
piece of the bun into her mouth and swallowed it. "Want another?" I
said. She looked at me, chewing, her eyes black and unwinking and fri-
endly. I took the other two buns out and gave her one and bit into the
other. I asked a man where the station was and he showed me. "Come on,
sister."

We reached the station and crossed the tracks, where the river was. A
bridge crossed it, and a street of jumbled frame houses followed the
river, backed onto it. A shabby street, but with an air heterogeneous
and vivid too. In the center of an untrimmed plot enclosed by a fence
of gaping and broken pickets stood an ancient lopsided surrey and a
weathered house from an upper window of which hung a garment of vivid
pink.

"Does that look like your house?" I said. She looked at me over the bun.
"This one?" I said, pointing. She just chewed, but it seemed to me that
I discerned something affirmative, acquiescent even if it wasn't eager,
in her air. "This one?" I said. "Come on, then." I entered the broken
gate. I looked back at her. "Here?" I said. "This look like your house?"

She nodded her head rapidly, looking at me, gnawing into the damp half-
moon of the bread. We went on. A walk of broken random flags, speared by
fresh coarse blades of grass, led to the broken stoop. There was no move-
ment about the house at all, and the pink garment hanging in no wind from
the upper window. There was a bell pull with a porcelain knob, attached
to about six feet of wire when I stopped pulling and knocked. The little
girl had the crust edgeways in her chewing mouth.

A woman opened the door. She looked at me, then she spoke rapidly to
the little girl in Italian, with a rising inflexion, then a pause, interroga-
tory. She spoke to her again the little girl looking at her across the
end of the crust, pushing it into her mouth with a dirty hand

"She says she lives here." I said. "I met her down town. Is this your
bread?

"No spika," the woman said. She spoke to the little girl again. The lit-
tle girl just looked at her.

"No live here?" I said. I pointed to the girl, then at her, then at the
door. The woman shook her head. She spoke rapidly. She came to the edge
of the porch and pointed down the road, speaking.

I nodded violently too. "You come show?" I said. I took her arm, waving
my other hand toward the road. She spoke swiftly, pointing. "You come
show," I said, trying to lead her down the steps.

"Si, si," she said, holding back, showing me whatever it was. I nodded
again.

"Thanks. Thanks. Thanks." I went down the steps and walked toward the
gate, not running, but pretty fast. I reached the gate and stopped and
looked at her for a while. The crust was gone now, and she looked at me
with her black, friendly stare. The woman stood on the stoop, watching
us.

"Come on, then," I said. "We'll have to find the right one sooner or la-
ter."

She moved along just under my elbow. We went on. The houses all seemed
empty. Not a soul in sight. A sort of breathlessness that empty houses
have. Yet they couldn't all be empty. All the different rooms, if you
could just slice the walls away all of a sudden. Madam, your daughter,
if you please. No. Madam, for God's sake, your daughter. She moved along
just under my elbow, her shiny tight pigtails, and then the last house
played out and the road curved out of sight beyond a wall, following
the river. The woman was emerging from the broken gate, with a shawl
over ner head and clutched under her chary. The road curved on, empty.
I found a coin and gave it to the little girl. A quarter. "Goodbye,
sister," I said. Then I ran.

I ran fast, not looking back. Just before the road curved away I looked
back. She stood in the road, a small figure clasping the loaf of bread
to her filthv little dress, her eyes still and black and unwinking. I ran on

A lane turned from the road. I entered it and after a while I slowed to
a fast walk. The lane went between back premises--unpainted houses with
more of those gay and startling colored garments on lines, a barn broken-
backed, decaying quietly among rank orchard trees, unpruned and weed-chok-
ed, pink and white and murmurous with sunlight and with bees. I looked
back. The entrance to the lane was empty. I slowed still more, my shadow
pacing me, dragging its head through the weeds that hid the fence.

The lane went back to a barred gate, became defunctive in grass, a mere
path scarred quietly into new grass. I climbed the gate into a woodlot and
crossed it and came to another wall and followed that one, my shadow be-
hind me now. There were vines and creepers where at home would be honey-
suckle. Coming and coming especially in the dusk when it rained, getting
honeysuckle all mixed up in it as though it were not enough without that,
not unbearable enough. What did you let him for kiss kiss

I didn't let him I made him watching me getting mad What do you think of
that? Red print of my hand coming up through her face like turning a light
on under your hand her eyes going bright

It's not for kissing I slapped you. Girl's elbows at fifteen Father said
you swallow like you had a fishbone in your throat what's the matter with
you and Caddy across the table not to look at me. It's for letting it be
some darn town squirt I slapped you you will will you now I guess you say
calf rope. My red hand coming up out of her face. What do you think of
that scouring her head into the. Grass sticks criss-crossed into the flesh
tingling scouring her head. Say calf rope say it 　　　　　　

I didn't kiss a dirty girl like Natalie anyway The wall went into shadow,
and then my shadow, I had tricked it again. I had forgot about the river
curving along the road. I climbed the wall. And then she watched me jump
down, holding the loaf against her dress.

I stood in the weeds and we looked at one another for a while.

"Why didn't you tell me you lived out this way, sister?" The loaf was wear-
ing slowly out of the paper; already it needed a new one. "Well, come on
then and show me the house." not a dirty girl like Natalie. It was raining
we could hear it on the roof, sighing through the high sweet emptiness of
the barn.

There? touching her

Not there

There? not raining hard but we couldn't hear anything but the roof and if
it was my blood or her blood

She pushed me down the ladder and ran off and left me Caddy did

Was it there it hurt you when Caddy did ran off was it there [p.154]

Oh She walked just under my elbow, the top of her patent leather head, the
loaf fraying out of the newspaper.

"If you dont get home pretty soon you're going to wear that loaf out. And
then what'll your mamma say?" I bet I can lift you up

You cant I'm too heavy

Did Caddy go away did she go to the house you cant see the barn from our
house did you ever try to see the barn from

It was her fault she pushed me she ran away

I can lift you up see how I can

Oh her blood or my blood Oh We went on in the thin dust, our feet silent
as rubber in the thin dust where pencils of sun slanted in the trees. And
I could feel water again running swift and peaceful in the secret shade.

"You live a long way, dont you. You're mighty smart to go this far to town
by yourself." It's like dancing sitting down did you ever dance sitting
down? We could hear the rain, a rat in the crib, the empty barn vacant
with horses. How do you hold to dance do you hold like this

Oh

I used to hold like this you thought I wasn't strong enough didn't you

Oh Oh Oh Oh

I hold to use like this I mean did you hear what I said I said

oh oh oh oh

The road went on, still and empty, the sun slanting more and more. Her
stiff little Pigtails were bound at the tips with bits of crimson cloth.
A corner of the wrapping flapped a little as she walked, the nose of the
loaf naked. I stopped.

"Look here. Do you live down this road? We haven't passed a house in a
mile, almost."

She looked at me, black and secret and friendly.

"Where do you live, sister? Dont you live back there in town?"

There was a bird somewhere in the woods, beyond the broken and infre-
quent slanting of sunlight.

"Your Papa's going to be worried about you. Dont you reckon you'll get
a whipping for not coming straight home with that bread?"

The bird whistled again, invisible, a sound meaningless and profound,
inflexionless, ceasing as though cut off with the blow of a knife, and
again, and that sense of water swift and peaceful above secret places,
felt, not seen not heard.

"Oh, hell, sister." About half the paper hung limp. "That's not doing
any good now." I tore it off and dropped it beside the road. "Come on.
We'll have to go back to town. We'll go back along the river."

We left the road. Among the moss little pale flowers grew, and the
sense of water mute and unseen. I hold to use like this I mean I use
to hold She stood in the door looking at us her hands on her hips

You pushed me it was your fault it hurt me too

We were dancing sitting down I bet Caddy cant dance sitting down

Stop that stop that

I was just brushing the trash off the back of your dress

You keep your nasty old hands off of me it was your fault you pushed
me down I'm mad at you

I dont care she looked at us stay mad she went away We began to hear
the shouts, the splashings; I saw a brown body gleam for an instant.

Stay mad. My shirt was getting wet and my hair. Across the roof hear-
ing the roof loud now I could see Natalie going through the garden a-
mong the rain. Get wet I hope you catch pneumonia go on home Cowface.
I jumped hard as I could into the hogwallow the mud yellowed up to my
waist stinking I kept on plunging until I fell down and rolled over
in it "Hear them in swimming, sister? I wouldn't mind doing that my-
self." If I had time. When I have time. I could hear my watch. mud
was warmer than the rain it smelled awful. She had her back turned
I went around in front of her. You know what I was doing? She turned
her back I went around in front of her the rain creeping into the
mud flatting her bodice through her dress it smelled horrible. I
was hugging her that's what I was doing. She turned her back I went
around in front of her. I was hugging her I tell you.

I dont give a damn what you were doing

You dont you dont I'll make you I'll make you give a damn. She hit
my hands away I smeared mud on her with the other hand I couldn't
feel the wet smacking of her hand I wiped mud from my legs smeared
it on her wet hard turning body hearing her fingers going into my
face but I couldn't feel it even when the rain began to taste sweet
on my lips

They saw us from the water first, heads and shoulders. They yelled
and one rose squatting and sprang among them. They looked like bea-
vers, the water ripping about their chins, yelling.

"Take that girl away! What did you want to bring a girl here for?
Go on away!"

"She wont hurt you. We just want to watch you for a while."

They squatted in the water. Their heads drew into a clump, watching
us, then they broke and rushed toward us, hurling water with their
hands. We moved quick.

"Look out, boys; she wont hurt you."

"Go on away, Harvard!" It was the second boy, the one that thought
the horse and wagon back there at the bridge. "Splash them, fellows!"

"Let's get out and throw them in," another said. "I aint afraid of
any girl."

" Splash them! Splash them!" They rushed toward us, hurling water.
We moved back. "Go on away!" they yelled. "Go on away!"

We went away. They huddled just under the bank, their slick heads
in a row against the bright water. We went on. "That's not for us,
is it." The sun slanted through to the moss here and there, level-
ler. "Poor kid, you're just a girl." Little flowers grew among the
moss, littler than I had ever seen. "You're just a girl. Poor kid."
There was a path, curving along beside the water. Then the water
was still again, dark and still and swift. "Nothing but a girl. Poor
sister." We lay in the wet grass panting the rain like cold shot on
my back. Do you care now do you do you

My Lord we sure are in a mess get up. Where the rain touched my fore-
head it began to smart my hand came red away streaking off pink in
the rain. Does it hurt

Of course it does what do you reckon

I tried to scratch your eyes out my Lord we sure do stink we better
try to wash it off in the branch "There's town again, sister. You'll
have to go home now. I've got to get back to school. Look how late
it's getting. You'll go home now, wont you?" But she just looked at
me with her black, secret, friendly gaze, the half-naked loaf clutch-
ed to her breast. "It's wet. I thought we jumped back in time." I
took my handkerchief and tried to wipe the loaf, but the crust began
to come off, so I stopped. "We'll just have to let it dry itself.
Hold it like this." She held it like that. It looked kind of like
rats had been eating it now. and the water building and building up
the squatting back the sloughed mud stinking surfaceward pocking the
pattering surface like grease on a hot stove. I told you I'd make you

I dont give a goddam what you do

Then we heard the running and we stopped and looked back and saw him
coming up the path running, the level shadows flicking upon his legs.

"He's in a hurry. We'd--" then I saw another man, an oldish man run-
ning heavily, clutching a stick, and a boy naked from the waist up,
clutching his pants as he ran.

"There's Julio," the little girl said, and then I saw his Italian face
and his eyes as he sprang upon me. We went down. His hands were
jabbing at my face and he was saying something and trying to bite
me, I reckon, and then they hauled him off and held him heaving and
thrashing and yelling and they held his arms and he tried to kick me
until they dragged him back. The little girl was howling, holding
the loaf in both arms. The half naked boy was darting and jumping
up and down, clutching his trousers and someone pulled me up in time
to see another stark naked figure come around the tranquil bend in
the path running and change direction in midstride and leap into the
woods, a couple of garments rigid as boards behind it. Julio still
struggled. The man who had pulled me up said, "Whoa, now. We got
you." He wore a vest but no coat. Upon it was a met shield In his
other hand he clutched a knotted, polished stick.

" You're Anse, aren't you?" I said. "I was looking for you. What's
the matter?"

"I warn you that anything you say will be used aganst you," he said.
"You're under arrest."

"I killa heem," Julio said. He struggled. Two men held him. The
little girl howled steadily, holding the bread. "You steala my see-
ster," Julio said. "Let go, meesters."

"Steal his sister?" I said. "Why, I've been--"

"Shet up," Anse said. "You can tell that to Squire."

"Steal his sister?" I said. Julio broke from the men and sprang at
me again, but the marshal met him and they struggled until the other
two pinioned his arms again. Anse released him, panting.

"You durn furriner," he said. "I've a good mind to take you up too,
for assault and battery." He turned to me again. "Will you come peace-
able, or do I handcuff you?"

"I'll come peaceable," I said. "Anything, just so I can find someone
--do something with-- Stole his sister," I said. "Stole his--"

" I've warned you," Anse said. "He aims to charge you with meditated
criminal assault. Here, you, make that gal shut up that noise."

"Oh," I said. Then I began to laugh. Two more boys with plastered
heads and round eyes came out of the bushes, buttoning shirts that
had already dampened onto their shoulders and arms, and I tried to
stop the laughter, but I couldn't.

"Watch him, Anse, he's crazy, I believe."

"I'll h-have to qu-quit," I said. "It'll stop in a mu-minute. The o-
ther time it said ah ah ah," I said, laughing. "Let me sit down a
while." I sat down, they watching me, and the little girl with her
streaked face and the gnawed looking loaf, and the water swift and
peaceful below the path. After a while the laughter ran out. But my
throat wouldn't quit trying to laugh, like retching after your sto-
mach is empty.

"Whoa, now," Anse said. "Get a grip on yourself."

"Yes," I said, tightening my throat. There was another yellow but-
terfly, like one of the sunflecks had come loose. After a while I
didn't have to hold my throat so tight. I got up. "I'm ready. Which
way?"

We followed the path, the two others watching Julio and the little
girl and the boys somewhere in the rear. The path went along the
river to the bridge. We crossed it and the tracks, people coming to
the doors to look at us and more boys materialising from somewhere
until when we turned into the main street we had quite a procession.
Before the drug store stood an auto, a big one, but I didn't rec-
ognise them until Mrs Bland said,

"Why, Quentin! Quentin Compson!" Then I saw Gerald, and Spoade in
the back seat, sitting on the back of his neck. And Shreve. I didn't
know the two girls.

"Quentin Compson!" Mrs Bland said.

" Good afternoon," I said, raising my hat. "I'm under arrest. I'm
sorry I didn't get your note. Did Shreve tell you?"

"Under arrest?" Shreve said. "Excuse me," he said. He heaved himself
up and climbed over their feet and got out. He had on a pair of my
flannel pants, like a glove. I didn't remember forgetting them. I
didn't remember how many chins Mrs Bland had, either. The prettiest
girl was with Gerald in front, too. They watched me through veils,
with a kind of delicate horror. "Who's under arrest?" Shreve said.
"What's this, mister?"

"Gerald," Mrs Bland said. "Send these people away. You get in this
car, Quentin."

Gerald got out. Spoade hadn't moved.

"What's he done, Cap?" he said. "Robbed a hen house?"

"I warn you," Anse said. "Do you know the prisoner?"

"Know him," Shreve said. "Look here--"

"Then you can come along to the squire's. You're obstructing justice.
Come along." He shook my arm.

"Well, good afternoon," I said. "I'm glad to have seen you all. Sor-
ry I couldn't be with you."

"You, Gerald," Mrs Bland said.

"Look here, constable," Gerald said.

"I warn you you're interfering with an officer of the law," Anse said.
"If you've anything to say, you can come to the squire's and make cog-
nizance of the prisoner." We went on. Quite a procession now, Anse
and I leading. I could hear them telling them what it was, and Spoade
asking questions, and then Julio said something violently in Italian
and I looked back and saw the little girl standing at the curb, look-
ing at me with her friendly, inscrutable regard.

"Git on home," Julio shouted at her. "I beat hell outa you."

We went down the street and turned into a bit of lawn in which, set
back from the street, stood a one storey building of brick trimmed
with white. We went up the rock path to the door, where Anse halted
everyone except us and made them remain outside. We entered, a bare
room smelling of stale tobacco. There was a sheet iron stove in the
center of a wooden frame filled with sand, and a faded map on the
wall and the dingy plat of a township. Behind a scarred littered ta-
ble a man with a fierce roach of iron gray hair peered at us over
steel spectacles.

"Got him, did ye, Anse?" he said.

"Got him, Squire."

He opened a huge dusty book and drew it to him and dipped a foul pen
into an inkwell filled with what looked like coal dust.

"Look here, mister," Shreve said.

"The prisoner's name," the squire said. I told him. He wrote it slow-
ly into the book, the pen scratching with excruciating deliberation.

"Look here, mister," Shreve said. "We know this fellow. We--"

"Order in the court," Anse said.

"Shut up, bud," Spoade said. "Let him do it his way. He's going to
anyhow."

"Age," the squire said. I told him. He wrote that, his mouth moving
as he wrote. "Occupation." I told him. "Harvard student, hey?" he
said. He looked up at me, bowing his neck a little to see over the
spectacles. His eyes were clear and cold, like a goat's. "What are
you up to, coming out here kidnapping children?"

"They're crazy, Squire," Shreve said. "Whoever says this boy's kid-
napping--"

Julio moved violently. "Crazy?" he said. "Dont I catcha heem, eh?
Dont I see weetha my own eyes--"

"You're a liar," Shreve said. "You never--"

"Order, order," Anse said, raising his voice.

"You fellers shet up," the squire said. "If they dont stay quiet,
turn 'em out, Anse." They got quiet. The squire looked at Shreve,
then at Spoade, then at Gerald. "You know this young man?" he said
to Spoade.

"Yes, your honor," Spoade said. "He's just a country boy in school
up there. He dont mean any harm. I think the marshal'll find it's a
mistake. His father's a congregational minister."

"H'm," the squire said. "What was you doing, exactly?" I told him,
he watching me with his cold, pale eyes. "How about it, Anse?"

"Might have been," Anse said. "Them durn furriners."

"I American," Julio said. "I gotta da pape'."

"Where's the gal?"

"He sent her home," Anse said.

"Was she scared or anything?"

"Not till Julio there jumped on the prisoner. They were just walking
along the river path, towards town. Some boys swimming told us which
way they went."

"It's a mistake, Squire," Spoade said. "Children and dogs are always
taking up with him like that. He cant help it."

"H'm," the squire said. He looked out of the window for a while. We
watched him. I could hear Julio scratching himself. The squire looked
back.

"Air you satisfied the gal aint took any hurt, you, there?"

"No hurt now," Julio said sullenly.

"You quit work to hunt for her?"

"Sure I quit. I run. I run like hell. Looka here, looka there, then
man tella me he seen him give her she eat. She go weetha."

"H'm," the squire said. "Well, son, I calculate you owe Julio some-
thing for taking him away from his work."

"Yes, sir," I said. "How much?"

"Dollar, I calculate."

I gave Julio a dollar.

"Well," Spoade said. "If that's all--I reckon he's discharged, your
honor?"

The squire didn't look at him. "How far'd you run him, Anse?"

"Two miles, at least. It was about two hours before we caught him."

"H'm," the squire said. He mused a while. We watched him, his stiff
crest, the spectacles riding low on his nose. The yellow shape of
the window grew slowly across the floor, reached the wall, climbing.
Dust motes whirled and slanted. "Six dollars."

"Six dollars?" Shreve said. "What's that for?"

"Six dollars," the squire said. He looked at Shreve a moment, then
at me again.

"Look here," Shreve said.

"Shut up," Spoade said. "Give it to him, bud, and let's get out of
here. The ladies are waiting for us. You got six dollars?"

"Yes," I said. I gave him six dollars.

"Case dismissed," he said.

"You get a receipt," Shreve said. "You get a signed receipt for that
money."

The squire looked at Shreve mildly. "Case dismissed," he said without
raising his voice.

"I'll be damned--" Shreve said.

"Come on here," Spoade said, taking his arm. "Good afternoon, Judge.
Much obliged." As we passed out the door Julio's voice rose again, vi-
olent, then ceased. Spoade was looking at me, his brown eyes quizzical,
a little cold. "Well, bud, I reckon you'll do your girl chasing in Bos-
ton after this."

"You damned fool," Shreve said. "What the hell do you mean anyway,
straggling off here, fooling with these damn wops?"

"Come on," Spoade said. "They must be getting impatient."

Mrs Bland was talking to them. They were Miss Holmes and Miss Dainger-
field and they quit listening to her and looked at me again with that
delicate and curious horror, their veils turned back upon their little
white noses and their eyes fleeing and mysterious beneath the veils.

"Quentin Compson," Mrs Bland said. "What would your mother say. A young
man naturally gets into scrapes, but to be arrested on foot by a coun-
try policeman. What did they think he'd done, Gerald?"

"Nothing," Gerald said.

"Nonsense. What was it, you, Spoade?"

"He was trying to kidnap that little dirty girl, but they caught him in
time," Spoade said. "Nonsense," Mrs Bland said, but her voice sort of
died away and she stared at me for a moment, and the girls drew their
breaths in with a soft concerted sound. "Fiddlesticks," Mrs Bland said
briskly. "If that isn't just like these ignorant lowclass Yankees. Get
in, Quentin."

Shreve and I sat on two small collapsible seats. Gerald cranked the car
and got in and we started.

"Now, Quentin, you tell me what all this foolishness is about," Mrs
Bland said. I told them, Shreve hunched and furious on his little seat
and Spoade sitting again on the back of his neck beside Miss Dainger-
field.

"And the joke is, all the time Quentin had us all fooled," Spoade said.
"All the time we thought he was the model youth that anybody could trust
a daughter with, until the police showed him up at his nefarious work."

"Hush up, Spoade," Mrs Bland said. We drove down the street and crossed
the bridge and passed the house where the pink garment hung in the win-
dow. "That's what you get for not reading my note. Why didn't you come
and get it? Mr MacKenzie says he told you it was there."

"Yessum. I intended to, but I never went back to the room."

"You'd have let us sit there waiting I dont know how long, if it hadn't
been for Mr MacKenzie. When he said you hadn't come back, that left an
extra place, so we asked him to come. We're very glad to have you any-
way, Mr MacKenzie." Shreve said nothing. His arms were folded and he
glared straight ahead past Gerald's cap. It was a cap for motoring in
England. Mrs Bland said so. We passed that house, and three others, and
another yard where the little girl stood by the gate. She didn't have
the bread now, and her face looked like it had been streaked with coal-
dust. I waved my hand, but she made no reply, only her head turned slow-
ly as the car passed, following us with her unwinking gaze. Then we ran
beside the wall, our shadows running along the wall, and after a while
we passed a piece of torn newspaper lying beside the road and I began
to laugh again. I could feel it in my throat and I looked off into the
trees where the afternoon slanted, thinking of afternoon and of the bird
and the boys in swimming. But still I couldn't stop it and then I knew
that if I tried too hard to stop it I'd be crying and I thought about
how I'd thought about I could not be a virgin, with so many of them
walking along in the shadows and whispering with their soft girlvoices
lingering in the shadowy places and the words coming out and perfume
and eyes you could feel not see, but if it was that simple to do it
wouldn't be anything and if it wasn't anything, what was I and then Mrs
Bland said, "Quentin? Is he sick, Mr MacKenzie?" and then Shreve's fat
hand touched my knee and Spoade began talking and I quit trying to stop
it.

"If that hamper is in his way, Mr MacKenzie, move it over on your side.
I brought a hamper of wine because I think young gentlemen should drink
wine, although my father, Gerald's grandfather " ever do that Have you
ever done that In the gray darkness a little light her hands locked a-
bout

"They do, when they can get it," Spoade said. "Hey, Shreve?" her knees
her face looking at the sky the smell of honeysuckle upon her face and
throat

"Beer, too," Shreve said. His hand touched my knee again. I moved my
knee again. like a thin wash of lilac colored paint talking about him
bringing

"You're not a gentleman," Spoade said. him between us until the shape
of her blurred not with dark

"No. I'm Canadian," Shreve said. talking about him the oar blades wink-
ing him along winking the Cap made for motoring in England and all time
rushing beneath and they two blurred within the other forever more he
had been in the army had killed men

"I adore Canada," Miss Daingerfield said. "I think it's marvellous."

"Did you ever drink perfume?" Spoade said. with one hand he could lift
her to his shoulder and run with her running Running

"No," Shreve said. running the beast with two backs and she blurred in
the winking oars running the swine of Euboeleus running coupled within
how many Caddy

"Neither did I," Spoade said. I dont know too many there was something
terrible in me terrible in me Father I have committed Have you ever done
that We didnt we didnt do that did we do that

"and Gerald's grandfather always picked his own mint before breakfast,
while the dew was still on it. He wouldn't even let old Wilkie touch it
do you remember Gerald but always gathered it himself and made his own
julep. He was as crotchety about his julep as an old maid, measuring
everything by a recipe in his head. There was only one man he ever gave
that recipe to; that was " we did how can you not know it if youll just
wait Ill tell you how it was it was a crime we did a terrible crime it
cannot be hid you think it can but wait Poor Quentin youve never done
that have you and Ill tell you how it was Ill tell Father then itll have
to be because you love Father then well have to go away amid the point-
ing and the horror the clean flame Ill make you say we did Im stronger
than you Ill make you know we did you thought it was them but it was me
listen I fooled you all the time it was me you thought I was in the
house where that damn honeysuckle trying not to think the swing the ce-
dars the secret surges the breathing locked drinking the wild breath the
yes Yes Yes yes 　"never be got to drink wine himself, but he always said
that a hamper what book did you read that in the one where Gerald's row-
ing suit of wine was a necessary part of any gentlemen's picnic basket"
did you love them Caddy did you love them When they touched me I died

one minute she was standing there the next he was yelling and pulling at
her dress they went into the hall and up the stairs yelling and shoving
at her up the stairs to the bathroom door and stopped her back against
the door and her arm across her face yelling and trying to shove her
into the bathroom when she came in to supper T. P. was feeding him he
started again just whimpering at first until she touched him then he
yelled she stood there her eyes like cornered rats then I was running
in the gray darkness it smelled of rain and all flower scents the damp
warm air released and crickets sawing away in the grass pacing me with
a small travelling island of silence Fancy watched me across the fence
blotchy like a quilt on a line I thought damn that nigger he forgot to
feed her again I ran down the hill in that vacuum of crickets like a
breath travelling across a mirror she was lying in the water her head
on the sand spit the water flowing about her hips there was a little
more light in the water her skirt half saturated flopped along her
flanks to the waters motion in heavy ripples going nowhere renewed
themselves of their own movement I stood on the bank I could smell
the honeysuckle on the water gap the air seemed to drizzle with hon-
eysuckle and with the rasping of crickets a substance you could feel
on the flesh
is Benjy still crying
I dont know yes I dont know
poor Benjy
I sat down on the bank the crass was damn a little then I found my
shoes wet
get out of that water are you crazy
but she didnt move her face was a white blur framed out of the blur
of the sand by her hair
get out now
she sat up then she rose her skirt flopped against her draining she
climbed the bank her clothes flopping sat down
why dont you wring it out do you want to catch cold
yes
the water sucked and gurgled across the sand spit and on in the dark
among the willows across the shallow the water rippled like a piece
of cloth holding still a little light as water does
hes crossed all the oceans all around the world
then she talked about him clasping her wet knees her face tilted back
in the gray light the smell of honeysuckle there was a light in mo-
thers room and in Benjys where T. P. was putting him to bed
do you love him
her hand came out I didnt move it fumbled down my arm and she held my
hand flat against her chest her heart thudding
no no
did he make you then he made you do it let him he was stronger than
you and he tomorrow Ill kill him I swear I will father neednt know
until afterward and then you and I nobody need ever know we can take
my school money we can cancel my matriculation Caddy you hate him dont
you dont you
she held my hand against her chest her heart thudding I turned and
caught her arm
Caddy you hate him dont you
she moved my hand up against her throat her heart was hammering there
poor Quentin
her face looked at the sky it was low so low that all smells and sounds
of night seemed to have been crowded down like under a slack tent espe-
cially the honeysuckle it had got into my breathing it was on her face
and throat like paint her blood pounded against my hand I was leaning
on my other arm it began to jerk and jump and I had to pant to get any
air at all out of that thick gray honeysuckle
yes I hate him I would die for him Ive already died for him I die for
him over and over again everytime this goes
when I lifted my hand I could still feel crisscrossed twigs and grass
burning into the palm
poor Quentin
she leaned back on her arms her hands locked about her knees
youve never done that have you
what done what
that what I have what I did
yes yes lots of times with lots of girls
then I was crying her hand touched me again and I was crying against her
damp blouse then she lying on her back looking past my head into the sky
I could see a rim of white under her irises I opened my knife
do you remember the day damuddy died when you sat down in the water in
your drawers
yes
I held the point of the knife at her throat
it wont take but a second just a second then I can do mine I can do mine
then
all right can you do yours by yourself
yes the blades long enough Benjys in bed by now
yes
it wont take but a second Ill try not to hurt
all right
will you close your eyes
no like this youll have to push it harder
touch your hand to it
but she didnt move her eyes were wide open looking past my head at the
sky
Caddy do you remember how Dilsey fussed at you because your drawers were
muddy
dont cry
Im not crying Caddy
push it are you going to
do you want me to
yes push it
touch your hand to it
dont cry poor Quentin
but I couldnt stop she held my head against her damp hard breast I could
hear her heart going firm and slow now not hammering and the water gurgl-
ing among the willows in the dark and waves of honeysuckle coming up the
air my arm and shoulder were twisted under me
what is it what are you doing
her muscles gathered I sat up
its my knife I dropped it
she sat up
what time is it
I dont know
she rose to her feet I fumbled along the ground
Im going let it go
to the house
I could feel her standing there I could smell her damp clothes feeling her
there
its right here somewhere
let it go you can find it tomorrow come on
wait a minute Ill find it
are you afraid to
here it is it was right here all the time
was it come on
I got up and followed we went up the hill the crickets hushing before us
its funny how you can sit down and drop something and have to hunt all a-
round for it
the gray it was gray with dew slanting up into the gray sky then the trees
beyond
damn that honeysuckle I wish it would stop
you used to like it
we crossed the crest and went on toward the trees she walked into me she
gave over a little the ditch was a black scar on the gray grass she walked
into me again she looked at me and gave over we reached the ditch
lets go this way
what for
lets see if you can still see Nancys bones I havent thought
to look in a long time have you
it was matted with vines and briers dark
they were right here you cant tell whether you see them or not can you
stop Quentin
come on
the ditch narrowed closed she turned toward the trees
stop Quentin
Caddy
I got in front of her again
Caddy
stop it
I held her
Im stronger than you
she was motionless hard unyielding but still
I wont fight stop youd better stop
Caddy dont Caddy
it wont do any good dont you know it wont let me go
the honeysuckle drizzled and drizzled I could hear the crickets watching us
in a circle she moved back went around me on toward the trees you go on
back to the house you neednt come
I went on
why dont you go on back to the house
damn that honeysuckle
we reached the fence she crawled through I crawled through when I rose from
stooping he was coming out of the trees into the gray toward us coming to-
ward us tall and flat and still even moving like he was still she went to
him
this is Quentin Im wet Im wet all over you dont have to if you dont want to
their shadows one shadow her head rose it was above his on the sky higher
their two heads
you dont have to if you dont want to
then not two heads the darkness smelled of rain of damp grass and leaves the
gray light drizzling like rain the honeysuckle coming up in damp waves I
could see her face a blur against his shoulder he held her in one arm like
she was no bigger than a child he extended his
hand
glad to know you
we shook hands then we stood there her shadow high against his shadow one
shadow
whatre you going to do Quentin
walk a while I think Ill go through the woods to the road and come back
through town
I turned away going
goodnight
Quentin
I stopped
what do you want
in the woods the tree frogs were going smelling rain in the air they sounded
like toy music boxes that were hard to turn and the honeysuckle
come here
what do you want
come here Quentin
I went back she touched my shoulder leaning down her shadow the blur of her
face leaning down from his high shadow I drew back
look out
you go on home
Im not sleepy Im going to take a walk
wait for me at the branch
Im going for a walk
Ill be there soon wait for me you wait
no Im going through the woods
I didnt look back the tree frogs didnt pay me any mind the gray light like
moss in the trees drizzling but still it wouldnt rain after a while I turned
went back to the edge of the woods as soon as I got there I began to smell
honeysuckle again I could see the lights on the courthouse clock and the
glare of town the square on the sky and the dark willows along the branch
and the light in mothers windows the light still on in Benjys room and I
stooped through the fence and went across the pasture running I ran in the
gray grass among the crickets the honeysuckle getting stronger and stronger
and the smell of water then I could see the water the color of gray honey-
suckle I lay down on the bank with my face close to the ground so I couldnt
smell the honeysuckle I couldnt smell it then and I lay there feeling the
earth going through my clothes listening to the water and after a while I
wasnt breathing so hard and I lay there thinking that if I didnt move my
face I wouldnt have to breathe hard and smell it and then I wasnt thinking
about anything at all she came along the bank and stopped I didnt move
its late you go on home
what
you go on home its late
all right
her clothes rustled I didnt move they stopped rustling
are you going in like I told you
I didnt hear anything
Caddy
yes I will if you want me to I will
I sat up she was sitting on the ground her hands clasped about her knee
go on to the house like I told you
yes Ill do anything you want me to anything yes
she didnt even look at me I caught her shoulder and shook her hard
you shut up
I shook her
you shut up you shut up
yes
she lifted her face then I saw she wasnt even looking at me at all I could
see that white rim
get up
I pulled her she was limp I lifted her to her feet
go on now
was Benjy still crying when you left
go on
we crossed the branch the roof came in sight then the windows upstairs
hes asleep now
I had to stop and fasten the gate she went on in the gray light the smell
of rain and still it wouldnt rain and honeysuckle beginning to come from
the garden fence beginning she went into the shadow I could hear her feet
then
Caddy
I stopped at the steps I couldnt hear her feet
Caddy
I heard her feet then my hand touched her not warm not cool just still her
clothes a little damp
still
do you love him now
not breathing except slow like far away breathing
Caddy do you love him now
I dont know
outside the gray light the shadows of things like dead things in stagnant water
I wish you were dead
do you you coming in now
are you thinking about him now
I dont know
tell me what youre thinking about tell me
stop stop Quentin
you shut up you shut up you hear me you shut up are you going to shut up
all right I will stop well make too much noise
Ill kill you do you hear
lets go out to the swing theyll hear you here
Im not crying do you say Im crying
no hush now well wake Benjy up
you go on into the house go on now
I am dont cry Im bad anyway you cant help it
theres a curse on us its not our fault is it our fault
hush come on and go to bed now
you cant make me theres a curse on us
finally I saw him he was just going into the barbershop he looked out I
went on and waited
Ive been looking for you two or three days
you wanted to see me
Im going to see you
he rolled the cigarette quickly with about two motions he struck the match
with his thumb
we cant talk here suppose I meet you somewhere
Ill come to your room are you at the hotel
no thats not so good you know that bridge over the creek in there back of
yes all right
at one oclock right
yes
I turned away
Im obliged to you
look
I stopped looked back
she all right
he looked like he was made out of bronze his khaki shirt
she need me for anything now
Ill be there at one
she heard me tell T. P. to saddle Prince at one oclock she kept watching
me not eating much she
came too
what are you going to do
nothing cant I go for a ride if I want to
youre going to do something what is it
none of your business whore whore
T. P. had Prince at the side door
I wont want him Im going to walk
I went down the drive and out the gate I turned into the lane then I ran
before I reached the bridge I saw him leaning on the rail the horse was
hitched in the woods he looked over his shoulder then he turned his back
he didnt look up until I came onto the bridge and stopped he had a piece
of bark in his hands breaking pieces from it and dropping them over the
rail into the water
I came to tell you to leave town
he broke a piece of bark deliberately dropped it carefully into the water
watched it float away
I said you must leave town
he looked at me
did she send you to me
I say you must go not my father not anybody I say it
listen save this for a while I want to know if shes all right have they
been bothering her up there
thats something you dont need to trouble yourself about
then I heard myself saying Ill give you until sundown to leave town
he broke a piece of bark and dropped it into the water then he laid the
bark on the rail and rolled a cigarette with those two swift motions spun
the match over the rail
what will you do if I dont leave
Ill kill you dont think that just because I look like a kid to you
the smoke flowed in two jets from his nostrils across his face
how old are you
I began to shake my hands were on the rail I thought if I hid them hed
know why
Ill give you until tonight
listen buddy whets your name Benjys the natural isnt he
Quentin
my mouth said it I didnt say it at all
Quentin
he raked the cigarette ash carefully off against the rail he did it slow-
ly and carefully like sharpening a pencil my hands had quit shaking
listen no good taking it so hard its not your fault kid it would have been
some other fellow
did you ever have a sister did you
no but theyre all bitches
I hit him my open hand beat the impulse to shut it to his face his hand
moved as fast as mine the cigarette went over the rail I swung with the
other hand he caught it too before the cigarette reached the water he held
both my wrists in the same hand his other hand flicked to his armpit under
his coat behind him the sun slanted and a bird singing somewhere beyond
the sun we looked at one another while the bird singing he turned my hands
loose
look here
he took the bark from the rail and dropped it into the water it bobbed up
the current took it floated away his hand lay on the rail holding the pis-
tol loosely we waited
you cant hit it now
no
it floated on it was quite still in the woods I heard the bird again and the
water afterward the pistol came up he didnt aim at all the bark disappeared
then pieces of it floated up spreading he hit two more of them pieces of bark
no bigger than silver dollars
thats enough I guess
he swung the cylinder out and blew into the barrel a thin wisp of smoke dis-
solved he reloaded the three chambers shut the cylinder he handed it to me
butt first
what for I wont try to beat that
youll need it from what you said Im giving you this one because youve seen
what itll do
to hell with your gun
I hit him I was still trying to hit him long after he was holding my wrists
but I still tried then it was like I was looking at him through a piece of
colored glass I could hear my blood and then I could see the sky again and
branches against it and the sun slanting through them and he holding me on
my feet
did you hit me
I couldnt hear
what
yes how do you feel
all right let go
he let me go I leaned against the rail
do you feel all right
let me alone Im all right
can you make it home all right
go on let me alone
youd better not try to walk take my horse
no you go on
you can hang the reins on the pommel and turn him loose hell go back to the
stable
let me alone you go on and let me alone
I leaned on the rail looking at the water I heard him untie the horse and
ride off and after a while I couldnt hear anything but the water and then
the bird again I left the bridge and sat down with my back against a tree
and leaned my head against the tree and shut my eyes a patch of sun came
through and fell across my eyes and I moved a little further around the
tree I heard the bird again and the water and then everything sort of
rolled away and I didnt feel anything at all I felt almost good after
all those days and the nights with honeysuckle coming up out of the dark-
ness into my room where I was trying to sleep even when after a while I
knew that he hadnt hit me that he had lied about that for her sake too
and that I had just passed out like a girl but even that didnt matter a-
nymore and I sat there against the tree with little flecks of sunlight
brushing across my face like yellow leaves on a twig listening to the wa-
ter and not thinking about anything at all even when I heard the horse
coming fast I sat there with my eyes closed and heard its feet bunch
scuttering the hissing sand and feet running and her hard running hands
fool fool are you hurt
I opened my eyes her hands running on my face
I didnt know which way until I heard the pistol I didnt know where I didnt
think he and you running off slipping
I didnt think he would have
she held my face between her hands bumping my head against the tree
stop stop that
I caught her wrists
quit that quit it
I knew he wouldnt I knew he wouldnt
she tried to bump my head against the tree
I told him never to speak to me again I told him
she tried to break her wrists free
let me go
stop it Im stronger than you stop it now
let me go Ive got to catch him and ask his let me go Quentin please let me
go let me go
all at once she quit her wrists went lax
yes I can tell him I can make him believe anytime I can make him
Caddy
she hadnt hitched Prince he was liable to strike out for home if the notion
took him
anytime he will believe me
do you love him Caddy
do I what
she looked at me then everything emptied out of her eyes
and they looked like the eyes in statues blank and unseeing and serene
put your hand against my throat
she took my hand and held it flat against her throat
now say his name
Dalton Ames
I felt the first surge of blood there it surged in strong accelerating beats
say it again
her face looked off into the trees where the sun slanted and where the bird
say it again
Dalton Ames
her blood surged steadily beating and beating against my hand

It kept on running for a long time, but my face felt cold and sort of dead,
and my eye, and the cut place on my finger was smarting again. I could hear
Shreve working the pump, then he came back with the basin and a round blob
of twilight wobbling in it, with a yellow edge like a fading balloon, then my
reflection. I tried to see my face in it.

"Has it stopped?" Shreve said. "Give me the rag." He tried to take it from
my hand.

"Look out," I said. "I can do it. Yes, it's about stopped now." I dipped the
rag again, breaking the balloon. The rag stained the water. "I wish I had a
clean one."

"You need a piece of beefsteak for that eye," Shreve said. "Damn if you wont
have a shiner tomorrow. The son of a bitch," he said.

"Did I hurt him any?" I wrungout the handkerchief and tried to clean the
blood off of my vest.

"You cant get that off," Shreve said. "You'll have to send it to the clean-
er's. Come on, hold it on your eye, why dont you.

"I can get some of it off," I said. But I wasn't doing much good. "What sort
of shape is my collar in?"

"I dont know," Shreve said. "Hold it against your eye. Here."

"Look out," I said. "I can do it. Did I hurt him any?"

"You may have hit him. I may have looked away just then or blinked or some-
thing. He boxed the hell out of you. He boxed you all over the place. What
did you want to fight him with your fists for? You goddam fool. How do you
feel?"

"I feel fine," I said. "I wonder if I can get something to clean my vest."

"Oh, forget your damn clothes. Does your eye hurt?"

"I feel fine," I said. Everything was sort of violet and still, the sky green
paling into gold beyond the gable of the house and a plume of smoke rising
from the chimney without any wind. I heard the pump again. A man was filling
a pail, watching us across his pumping shoulder. A woman crossed the door,
but she didn't look out. I could hear a cow lowing somewhere.

"Come on," Shreve said. "Let your clothes alone and put that rag on your eye.
I'll send your suit out first thing tomorrow."

"All right. I'm sorry I didn't bleed on him a little, at least."

"Son of a bitch," Shreve said. Spoade came out of the house, talking to the
woman I reckon, and crossed the yard. He looked at me with his cold, quizzi-
cal eyes.

"Well, bud," he said, looking at me, "I'll be damned if you dont go to a lot
of trouble to have your fun. Kidnapping, then fighting. What do you do on
your holidays? burn houses?"

"I'm all right," I said. "What did Mrs Bland say?"

"She's giving Gerald hell for bloodying you up. She'll give you hell for let-
ting him, when she sees you. She dont object to the fighting, it's the blood
that annoys her. I think you lost caste with her a little by not holding your
blood better. How do you feel?"

"Sure," Shreve said. "If you cant be a Bland, the next best thing is to commit
adultery with one or get drunk and fight him, as the case may be."

"Quite right," Spoade said. "But I didn't know Quentin was drunk."

"He wasn't," Shreve said. "Do you have to be drunk to want to hit that son of
a bitch?"

"Well, I think I'd have to be pretty drunk to try it, after seeing how Quentin
came out. Where'd he learn to box?"

"He's been going to Mike's every day, over in town," I said.

"He has?" Spoade said. "Did you know that when you hit him?"

"I dont know," I said. "I guess so. Yes."

"Wet it again," Shreve said. "Want some fresh water?"

"This is all right," I said. I dipped the cloth again and held it to my eye.

"Wish I had something to clean my vest." Spoade was still watching me.

"Say," he said. "What did you hit him for? What was it he said?"

"I dont know. I dont know why I did."

"The first I knew was when you jumped up all of a sudden and said, 'Did you
ever have a sister? did you?' and when he said No, you hit him. I noticed you
kept on looking at him, but you didn't seem to be paying any attention to
what anybody was saying until you jumped up and asked him if he had any sis-
ters."

"Ah, he was blowing off as usual," Shreve said, "about his women. You know:
like he does, before girls, so they dont know exactly what he's saying. All
his damn innuendo and lying and a lot of stuff that dont make sense even.
Telling us about some wench that he made a date with to meet at a dance hall
in Atlantic City and stood her up and went to the hotel and went to bed and
how he lay there being sorry for her waiting on the pier for him, without him
there to give her what she wanted. Talking about the body's beauty and the
sorry ends thereof and how tough women have it, without anything else they
can do except lie on their backs. Leda lurking in the bushes, whimpering and
moaning for the swan, see. The son of a bitch. I'd hit him myself. Only I'd
grabbed up her damn hamper of wine and done it if it had been me."

"Oh," Spoade said, "the champion of dames. Bud, you excite not only admira-
tion, but horror." He looked at me, cold and quizzical. "Good God," he said.

"I'm sorry I hit him," I said. "Do I look too bad to go back and get it over
with?"

"Apologies, hell," Shreve said. "Let them go to hell. We're going to town."

"He ought to go back so they'll know he fights like a gentleman," Spoade
said. "Gets licked like one, I mean."

"Like this?" Shreve said. "With his clothes all over blood?"

"Why, all right," Spoade said. "You know best."

"He cant go around in his undershirt," Shreve said. "He's not a senior yet.
Come on, let's go to town."

"You needn't come," I said. "You go on back to the picnic."

"Hell with them," Shreve said. "Come on here."

"What'll I tell them?" Spoade said. "Tell them you and Quentin had a fight
too?"

"Tell them nothing," Shreve said. "Tell her her option expired at sunset.
Come on, Quentin. I'll ask that woman where the nearest interurban--"

"No," I said. "I'm not going back to town."

Shreve stopped, looking at me. Turning his glasses looked like small yel-
low moons.

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm not going back to town yet. You go on back to the picnic. Tell them
I wouldn't come back because my clothes were spoiled."

"Look here," he said. "What are you up to?"

"Nothing. I'm all right. You and Spoade go on back. I'll see you tomor-
row." I went on across the yard, toward the road.

"Do you know where the station is?" Shreve said.

"I'll find it. I'll see you all tomorrow. Tell Mrs Bland I'm sorry I
spoiled her party." They stood watching me. I went around the house. A
rock path went down to the road. Roses grew on both sides of the path.
I went through the gate, onto the road. It dropped downhill, toward the
woods, and I could make out the auto beside the road. I went up the hill.
The light increased as I mounted, and before I reached the top I heard a
car. It sounded far away across the twilight and I stopped and listened
to it. I couldn't make out the auto any longer, but Shreve was standing
in the road before the house, looking up the hill. Behind him the yellow
light lay like a wash of paint on the roof of the house. I lifted my hand
and went on over the hill, listening to the car. Then the house was gone
and I stopped in the green and yellow light and heard the car growing
louder and louder, until just as it began to die away it ceased all to-
gether. I waited until I heard it start again. Then I went on.

As I descended the light dwindled slowly, yet at the same time without
altering its quality, as if I and not light were changing, decreasing,
though even when the road ran into trees you could have read newspaper.
Pretty soon I came to a lane. I turned into it. It was closer and darker
than the road, but when it came out at the trolley stop--another wooden
marquee--the light was still unchanged. After the lane it seemed bright-
er, as though I had walked through night in the lane and come out into
morning again. Pretty soon the car came. I got on it, they turning to
look at my eye, and found a seat on the left side.

The lights were on in the car, so while we ran between trees I couldn't
see anything except my own face and a woman across the aisle with a hat
sitting right on top of her head, with a broken feather in it, but when
we ran out of the trees I could see the twilight again, that quality of
light as if time really had stopped for a while, with the sun hanging
just under the horizon, and then we passed the marquee where the old man
had been eating out of the sack, and the road going on under the twilight,
into twilight and the sense of water peaceful and swift beyond. Then the
car went on, the draft building steadily up in the open door until it was
drawing steadily through the car with the odor of summer and darkness ex-
cept honeysuckle. Honeysuckle was the saddest odor of all, I think. I re-
member lots of them. Wistaria was one. On the rainy days when Mother
wasn't feeling quite bad enough to stay away from the windows we used to
play under it. When Mother stayed in bed Dilsey would put old clothes on
us and let us go out in the rain because she said rain never hurt young
folks. But if Mother was up we always began by playing on the porch until
she said we were making too much noise, then we went out and played under
the wisteria frame.

This was where I saw the river for the last time this morning, about here.
I could feel water beyond the twilight, smell. When it bloomed in the
spring and it rained the smell was everywhere you didn't notice it so
much at other times but when it rained the smell began to come into the
house at twilight either it would rain more at twilight or there was
something in the light itself but it always smelled strongest then until
I would lie in bed thinking when will it stop when will it stop. The
draft in the door smelled of water, a damp steady breath. Sometimes I
could put myself to sleep saying that over and over until after the ho-
neysuckle got all mixed up in it the whole thing came to symbolise night
and unrest I seemed to be lying neither asleep nor awake looking down a
long corridor of gray halflight where all stable things had become sha-
dowy paradoxical all I had done shadows all I had felt suffered taking
visible form antic and perverse mocking without relevance inherent them-
selves with the denial of the significance they should have affirmed
thinking I was I was not who was not as not who.

I could smell the curves of the river beyond the dusk and I saw the last
light supine and tranquil upon tideflats like pieces of broken mirror,
then beyond them lights began in the pale clear air, trembling a little
like butterflies hovering a long way off. Benjamin the child of. How he
used to sit before that mirror. Refuge unfailing in which conflict tem-
pered silenced reconciled. Benjamin the child of mine old age held hos-
tage into Egypt. O Benjamin. Dilsey said it was because Mother was too
proud for him. They come into white people's lives like that in sudden
sharp black trickles that isolate white facts for an instant in unargu-
able truth like under a microscope; the rest of the time just voices
that laugh when you see nothing to laugh at, tears when no reason for
tears. They will bet on the odd or even number of mourners at a funeral.
A brothel full of them in Memphis went into a religious trance ran naked
into the street. It took three policemen to subdue one of them. Yes Je-
sus O good man Jesus O that good man.

The car stopped. I got out, with them looking at my eye. When the trol-
ley came it was full. I stopped on the back platform.

"Seats up front," the conductor said. I looked into the car. There were
no seats on the left side. "I'm not going far," I said. "I'll just stand
here."

We crossed the river. The bridge, that is, arching slow and high into
space, between silence and nothingness where lights--yellow and red and
green--trembled in the clear air, repeating themselves.

"Better go up front and get a seat," the conductor said.

"I get off pretty soon," I said. "A couple of blocks."

I got off before we reached the postoffice. They'd all be sitting around
somewhere by now though, and then I was hearing my watch and I began to
listen for the chimes and I touched Shreve's letter through my coat, the
bitten shadows of the elms flowing upon my hand. And then as I turned into
the quad the chimes did begin and I went on while the notes came up like
ripples on a pool and passed me and went on, saying Quarter to what? All
right. Quarter to what.

Our windows were dark. The entrance was empty. I walked close to the left
wall when I entered, but it was empty: just the stairs curving up into sha-
dows echoes of feet in the sad generations like light dust upon the shad-
ows, my feet waking them like dust, lightly to settle again.

I could see the letter before I turned the light on, propped against a
book on the table so I would see it. Calling him my husband. And then
Spoade said they were going somewhere, would not be back until late, and
Mrs Bland would need another cavalier. But I would have seen him and he
cannot get another car for an hour because after six oclock. I took out
my watch and listened to it clicking away, not knowing it couldn't even
lie. Then I laid it face up on the table and took Mrs Bland's letter and
tore it across and dropped the pieces into the waste basket and took off
my coat, vest, collar, tie and shirt. The tie was spoiled too, but then
niggers. Maybe a pattern of blood he could call that the one Christ was
wearing. I found the gasoline in Shreve's room and spread the vest on
the table, where it would be flat, and opened the gasoline.

the first car in town a girl Girl that's what Jason couldn't bear smell
of gasoline making him sick then got madder than ever because a girl
Girl had no sister but Benjamin Benjamin the child of my sorrowful if
I'd just had a mother so I could say Mother Mother It took a lot of ga-
soline, and then I couldn't tell if it was still the stain or just the
gasoline. It had started the cut to smarting again so when I went to
wash I hung the vest on a chair and lowered the light cord so that the
bulb would be drying the splotch. I washed my face and hands, but even
then I could smell it within the soap stinging, constricting the nos-
trils a little. Then I opened the bag and took the shirt and collar and
tie out and put the bloody ones in and closed the bag, and dressed.
While I was brushing my hair the half hour went. But there was until
the three quarters anyway, except suppose seeing on the rushing dark-
ness only his own face no broken feather unless two of them but not
two like that going to Boston the same night then my face his face for
an instant across the crashing when out of darkness two lighted windows
in rigid fleeing crash gone his face and mine just I see saw did I see not
goodbye the marquee empty of eating the road empty in darkness in
silence the bridge arching into silence darkness sleep the water peaceful
and swift not goodbye

I turned out the light and went into my bedroom, out of the gasoline but
I could still smell it. I stood at the window the curtains moved slow
out of the darkness touching my face like someone breathing asleep, bre-
athing slow into the darkness again, leaving the touch. After they had
gone up stairs Mother lay back in her chair, the camphor handkerchief
to her mouth. Father hadn't moved he still sat beside her holding her
hand the bellowing hammering away like no place for it in silence When
I was little there was a picture in one of our books, a dark place into
which a single weak ray of light came slanting upon two faces lifted out
of the shadow. You know what I'd do if I were King? she never was a
queen or a fairy she was always a king or a giant or a general I'd break
that place open and drag them out and I'd whip them good It was torn
out, jagged out. I was glad. I'd have to turn back to it until the dungeon
was Mother herself she and Father upward into weak light holding hands
and us lost somewhere below even them without even a ray of light. Then
the honeysuckle got into it. As soon as I turned off the light and tried
to go to sleep it would begin to come into the room in waves building
and building up until I would have to pant to get any air at all out of
it until I would have to get up and feel my way like when I was a little
boy hands can see touching in the mind shaping unseen door Door now no-
thing hands can see My nose could see gasoline, the vest on the table,
the door. The corridor was still empty of all the feet in sad generations
seeking water. yet the eyes unseeing clenched like teeth not disbelieving
doubting even the absence of pain shin ankle knee the long invisible flow-
ing of the stair-railing where a misstep in the darkness filled with
sleeping Mother Father Caddy Jason Maury door I am not afraid only Mother
Father Caddy Jason Maury getting so far ahead sleeping I will sleep fast
when I door Door door It was empty too, the pipes, the porcelain, the
stained quiet walls, the throne of contemplation. I had forgotten the
glass, but I could hands can see cooling fingers invisible swan-throat
where less than Moses rod the glass touch tentative not to drumming lean
cool throat drumming cooling the metal the glass full overfull cooling
the glass the fingers flushing sleep leaving the taste of dampened sleep
in the long silence of the throat I returned up the corridor, waking the
lost feet in whispering battalions in the silence, into the gasoline,
the watch telling its furious lie on the dark table. Then the curtains
breathing out of the dark upon my face, leaving the breathing upon my
face. A quarter hour yet. And then I'll not be. The peacefullest words.
Peacefullest words. Non fui. Sum. Fui. Non sum. Somewhere I heard bells
once. Mississippi or Massachusetts. I was. I am not. Massachusetts or
Mississippi. Shreve has a bottle in his trunk. Aren't you even going to open
it Mr and Mrs Jason Richmond Compson announce the Three times. Days.
Aren't you even going to open it marriage of their daughter Candace that
liquor teaches you to confuse the means with the end I am. Drink. I was
not. Let us sell Benjy's pasture so that Quentin may go to Harvard and I
may knock my bones together and together. I will be dead in. Was it one
year Caddy said. Shreve has a bottle in his trunk. Sir I will not need
Shreve's I have sold Benjy's pasture and I can be dead in Harvard Caddy
said in the caverns and the grottoes of the sea tumbling peacefully to
the wavering tides because Harvard is such a fine sound forty acres is
no high price for a fine sound. A fine dead sound we will swap Benjy's
pasture for a fine dead sound. It will last him a long time because he
cannot hear it unless he can smell it as soon as she came in the door
he began to cry I thought all the time it was just one of those town
squirts that Father was always teasing her about until. I didn't notice
him any more than any other stranger drummer or what thought they were
army shirts until all of a sudden I knew he wasn't thinking of me at all
as a Potential source of harm but was thinking of her when he looked at
me was looking at me through her like through a Piece of colored glass
why must you meddle with me dont you know it wont do any good I thought
you'd have left that for Mother and Jason

did Mother set Jason to spy on you I wouldn't have.

Women only use other people's codes of honor it's because she loves Caddy
staying downstairs even when she was sick so Father couldn't kid Uncle
Maury before Jason Father said Uncle Maury was too poor a classicist to
risk the blind immortal boy in person he should have chosen Jason because
Jason would have made only the same kind of blunder Uncle Maury himself
would have made not one to get him a black eye the Patterson boy was
smaller than Jason too they sold the kites for a nickel a piece until the
trouble over finances Jason got a new partner still smaller one small e-
nough anyway because T. P. said Jason still treasurer but Father said why
should Uncle Maury work if he Father could support five or six niggers
that did nothing at all but sit with their feet in the oven he certainly
could board and lodge Uncle Maury now and then and lend him a little mo-
ney who kept his Father's belief in the celestial derivation of his own
species at such a fine heat then Mother would cry and say that Father be-
lieved his people were better than hers that he was ridiculing Uncle Maury
to teach us the same thing she couldn't see that Father was teaching us
that all men are just accumulations dolls stuffed with sawdust swept up
from the trash heaps where all previous dolls had been thrown away the
sawdust flowing from what wound in what side that not for me died not.
It used to be I thought of death as a man something like Grandfather a
friend of his a kind of Private and particular friend like we used to
think of Grandfather's desk not to touch it not even to talk loud in the
room where it was I always thought of them as being together somewhere
all the time waiting for old Colonel Sartoris to come down and sit with
them waiting on a high place beyond cedar trees Colonel Sartoris was on
a still higher place looking out across at something and they were wait-
ing for him to get done looking at it and come down Grandfather wore his
uniform and we could hear the murmur of their voices from beyond the ce-
dars they were always talking and Grandfather was always right

The three quarters began. The first note sounded, measured and tranquil,
serenely peremptory, emptying the unhurried silence for the next one and
that's it if people could only change one another forever that way merge
like a flame swirling up for an instant then blown cleanly out along the
cool eternal dark instead of Iying there trying not to think of the swing
until all cedars came to have that vivid dead smell of perfume that Benjy
hated so. Just by imagining the clump it seemed to me that I could hear
whispers secret surges smell the beating of hot blood under wild unsecret
flesh watching against red eyelids the swine untethered in pairs rushing
coupled into the sea and he we must just stay awake and see evil done
for a little while its not always and i it doesnt have to be even that long
for a man of courage and he do you consider that courage and i yes sir
dont you and he every man is the arbiter of his own virtues whether or
not you consider it courageous is of more importance than the act itself
than any act otherwise you could not be in earnest and i you dont believe
i am serious and he i think you are too serious to give me any cause for
alarm you wouldnt have felt driven to the expedient of telling me you had
committed incest otherwise and i i wasnt lying i wasnt lying and he you
wanted to sublimate a piece of natural human folly into a horror and then
exorcise it with truth and i it was to isolate her out of the loud world
so that it would have to flee us of necessity and then the sound of it
would be as though it had never been and he did you try to make her do it
and i i was afraid to i was afraid she might and then it wouldnt have done
any good but if i could tell you we did it would have been so and then the
others wouldnt be so and then the world would roar away and he and now
this other you are not lying now either but you are still blind to what is in
yourself to that part of general truth the sequence of natural events and
their causes which shadows every mans brow even benjys you are not thinking
of finitude you are contemplating an apotheosis in which a temporary state
of mind will become symmetrical above the flesh and aware both of itself
and of the flesh it will not quite discard you will not even be dead and i
temporary and he you cannot bear to think that someday it will no longer
hurt you like this now were getting at it you seem to regard it merely as
an experience that will whiten your hair overnight so to speak without al-
tering your appearance at all you wont do it under these conditions it will
be a gamble and the strange thing is that man who is conceived by accident
and whose every breath is a fresh cast with dice already loaded against him
will not face that final main which he knows before hand he has assuredly
to face without essaying expedients ranging all the way from violence to
petty chicanery that would not deceive a child until someday in very dis-
gust he risks everything on a single blind turn of a card no man ever does
that under the first fury of despair or remorse or bereavement he does it
only when he has realised that even the despair or remorse or bereavement
is not particularly important to the dark diceman and i temporary and he
it is hard believing to think that a love or a sorrow is a bond purchased
without design and which matures willynilly and is recalled without warning
to be replaced by whatever issue the gods happen to be floating at the time
no you will not do that until you come to believe that even she was not
quite worth despair perhaps and i i will never do that nobody knows what i
know and he i think youd better go on up to cambridge right away you might
go up into maine for a month you can afford it if you are careful it might
be a good thing watching pennies has healed more scars than jesus and i
suppose i realise what you believe i will realise up there next week or
next month and he then you will remember that for you to go to harvard has
been your mothers dream since you were born and no compson has ever disap-
pointed a lady and i temporary it will be better for me for all of us and
he every man is the arbiter of his own virtues but let no man prescribe for
another mans wellbeing and i temporary and he was the saddest word of all
there is nothing else in the world its not despair until time its not even
time until it was

The last note sounded. At last it stopped vibrating and the darkness was
still again. I entered the sitting room and turned on the light. I put my
vest on. The gasoline was faint now, barely noticeable, and in the mirror
the stain didn't show. Not like my eye did, anyway. I put on my coat.
Shreve's letter crackled through the cloth and I took it out and examined
the address, and put it in my side pocket. Then I carried the watch into
Shreve's room and put it in his drawer and went to my room and got a fresh
handkerchief and went to the door and put my hand on the light switch. Then
I remembered I hadn't brushed my teeth, so I had to open the bag again. I
found my toothbrush and got some of Shreve's paste and went out and brushed
my teeth. I squeezed the brush as dry as I could and put it back in the bag
and shut it, and went to the door again. Before I snapped the light out I
looked around to see if there was anything else, then I saw that I had for-
gotten my hat. I'd have to go by the postoffice and I'd be sure to meet some
of them, and they'd think I was a Harvard Square student making like he was
a senior. I had forgotten to brush it too, but Shreve had a brush, so I
didn't have to open the bag any more.




　　　　　　　　　　　　April 6, 1928




Once a bitch always a bitch, what I say. I says you're lucky if her playing
out of school is all that worries you. I says she ought to be down there in
that kitchen right now, instead of up there in her room, gobbing paint on her
face and waiting for six niggers that cant even stand up out of a chair unless
they've got a pan full of bread and meat to balance them, to fix breakfast for
her. And Mother says,

"But to have the school authorities think that I have no control over her,
that I cant--"

"Well," I says. "You cant, can you? You never have tried to do anything with
her," I says. "How do you expect to begin this late, when she's seventeen years
old?"

She thought about that for a while.

"But to have them think that … I didn't even know she had a report card. She
told me last fall that they had quit using them this year. And now for Profes-
sor Junkin to call me on the telephone and tell me if she's absent one more
time, she will have to leave school. How does she do it? Where does she go?
You're down town all day; you ought to see her if she stays on the streets."

"Yes," I says. "If she stayed on the streets. I dont reckon she'd be playing
out of school just to do something she could do in public," I says.

"What do you mean?" she says.

"I dont mean anything," I says. "I just answered your question." Then she begun
to cry again, talking about how her own flesh and blood rose up to curse her.

"You asked me," I says.

"I dont mean you," she says. "You are the only one of them that isn't a reproach
to me."

"Sure," I says. "I never had time to be. I never had time to go to Harvard or
drink myself into the ground. I had to work. But of course if you want me to
follow her around and see what she does, I can quit the store and get a job
where I can work at night. Then I can watch her during the day and you can
use Ben for the night shift."

"I know I'm just a trouble and a burden to you," she says, crying on the pillow.

"I ought to know it," I says. "You've been telling me that for thirty years. Even
Ben ought to know it now. Do you want me to say anything to her about it?"

"Do you think it will do any good?" she says.

"Not if you come down there interfering just when I get started," I says. "If you
want me to control her, just say so and keep your hands off. Everytime I try to,
you come butting in and then she gives both of us the laugh."

"Remember she's your own flesh and blood," she says.

"Sure," I says, "that's just what I'm thinking of--flesh. And a little blood too,
if I had my way. When people act like niggers, no matter who they are the only
thing to do is treat them like a nigger."

"I'm afraid you'll lose your temper with her," she says.

"Well," I says. "You haven't had much luck with your system. You want me to do
anything about it, or not? Say one way or the other; I've got to get on to work."

"I know you have to slave your life away for us," she says. "You know if I had
my way, you'd have an office of your own to go to, and hours that became a Bas-
comb. Because you are a Bascomb, despite your name. I know that if your father
could have foreseen--"

"Well," I says, "I reckon he's entitled to guess wrong now and then, like anybo-
dy else, even a Smith or a Jones." She begun to cry again.

"To hear you speak bitterly of your dead father," she says.

"All right," I says, "all right. Have it your way. But as I haven't got an of-
fice, I'll have to get on to what I have got. Do you want me to say anything to
her?"

"I'm afraid you'll lose your temper with her," she says.

"All right," I says. "I wont say anything, then."

"But something must be done," she says. "To have people think I permit her to
stay out of school and run about the streets, or that I cant prevent her doing
it…. Jason, Jason," she says. "How could you. How could you leave me with these
burdens."

"Now, now," I says. "You'll make yourself sick. Why dont you either lock her up
all day too, or turn her over to me and quit worrying over her?"

"My own flesh and blood," she says, crying. So I says,

"All right. I'll tend to her. Quit crying, now."

"Dont lose your temper," she says. "She's just a child, remember."

"No," I says. "I wont." I went out, closing the door.

"Jason," she says. I didn't answer. I went down the hall. "Jason," she says be-
yond the door. I went on down stairs. There wasn't anybody in the diningroom,
then I heard her in the kitchen. She was trying to make Dilsey let her have an-
other cup of coffee. I went in.

"I reckon that's your school costume, is it?" I says. "Or maybe today's a hol-
iday?"

"Just a half a cup, Dilsey," she says. "Please."

"No, suh," Dilsey says. "I aint gwine do it. You aint got no business wid mo'n
one cup, a seventeen year old gal, let lone whut Miss Cahline say. You go on
and git dressed for school, so you kin ride to town wid Jason. You fixin to be
late again."

"No she's not," I says. "We're going to fix that right now." She looked at me,
the cup in her hand.

She brushed her hair back from her face, her kimono slipping off her shoulder.
"You put that cup down and come in here a minute," I says.

"What for?" she says.

"Come on," I says. "Put that cup in the sink and come in here."

"What you up to now, Jason?" Dilsey says.

"You may think you can run over me like you do your grandmother and everybody
else," I says. "But you'll find out different. I'll give you ten seconds to put that
cup down like I told you."

She quit looking at me. She looked at Dilsey. "What time is it, Dilsey?" she
says. "When it's ten seconds, you whistle. Just a half a cup. Dilsey, pl--"

I grabbed her by the arm. She dropped the cup. It broke on the floor and she
jerked back, looking at me, but I held her arm. Dilsey got up from her chair.

"You, Jason," she says.

"You turn me loose," Quentin says. "I'll slap you."

"You will, will you?" I says. "You will will you?" She slapped at me. I caught
that hand too and held her like a wildcat. "You will, will you?" I says. "You
think you will?"

"You, Jason!" Dilsey says. I dragged her into the diningroom. Her kimono came
unfastened, flapping about her, dam near naked. Dilsey came hobbling along. I
turned and kicked the door shut in her face.

"You keep out of here," I says.

Quentin was leaning against the table, fastening her kimono. I looked at her.

"Now," I says. "I want to know what you mean, playing out of school and tell-
ing your grandmother lies and forging her name on your report and worrying her
sick. What do you mean by it?"

She didn't say anything. She was fastening her kimono up under her chin, pull-
ing it tight around her, looking at me. She hadn't got around to painting her-
self yet and her face looked like she had polished it with a gun rag. I went
and grabbed her wrist. "What do you mean?" I says.

"None of your damn business," she says. "You turn me loose."

Dilsey came in the door. "You, Jason," she says.

"You get out of here, like I told you," I says, not even looking back. "I want
to know where you go when you play out of school," I says. "You keep off the
streets, or I'd see you. Who do you play out with? Are you hiding out in the
woods with one of those dam slick-headed jellybeans? Is that where you go?"

"You--you old goddam!" she says. She fought, but I held her. "You damn old
goddam!" she says. "I'll show you," I says. "You may can scare an old woman
off, but I'll show you who's got hold of you now." I held her with one hand,
then she quit fighting and watched me, her eyes getting wide and black. "What
are you going to do?" she says.

"You wait until I get this belt out and I'll show you," I says, pulling my
belt out. Then Dilsey grabbed my arm.

"Jason," she says. "You, Jason! Aint you shamed of yourself."

"Dilsey," Quentin says. "Dilsey."

"I aint gwine let him," Dilsey says. "Dont you worry, honey." She held to my
arm. Then the belt came out and I jerked loose and flung her away. She stum-
bled into the table. She was so old she couldn't do any more than move hardly.
But that's all right: we need somebody in the kitchen to eat up the grub the
young ones cant tote off. She came hobbling between us, trying to hold me a-
gain. "Hit me, den," she says, "ef nothin else but hittin somebody wont do
you. Hit me," she says.

"You think I wont?" I says.

"I dont put no devilment beyond you," she says. Then I heard Mother on the
stairs. I might have known she wasn't going to keep out of it. I let go. She
stumbled back against the wall, holding her kimono shut.

"All right," I says. "We'll just put this off a while. But dont think you can
run it over me. I'm not an old woman, nor an old half dead nigger, either. You
dam little slut," I says.

"Dilsey," she says. "Dilsey, I want my mother."

Dilsey went to her. "Now, now," she says. "He aint gwine so much as lay his
hand on you while Ise here." Mother came on down the stairs.

"Jason," she says. "Dilsey."

"Now, now," Dilsey says. "I aint gwine let him tech you." She put her hand on
Quentin. She knocked it down.

"You damn old nigger," she says. She ran toward the door.

"Dilsey," Mother says on the stairs. Quentin ran up the stairs, passing her.
"Quentin," Mother says. "You, Quentin." Quentin ran on. I could hear her when
she reached the top, then in the hall. Then the door slammed.

Mother had stopped. Then she came on. "Dilsey," she says.

"All right," Dilsey says. "Ise comin. You go on and git dat car and wait now,"
she says, "so you kin cahy her to school."

"Dont you worry," I says. "I'll take her to school and I'm going to see that
she stays there. I've started this thing, and I'm going through with it."

"Jason," Mother says on the stairs.

"Go on, now," Dilsey says, going toward the door. "You want to git her started
too? Ise comin, Miss Cahline."

I went on out. I could hear them on the steps. "You go on back to bed now,"
Dilsey was saying. "dont you know you aint feeling well enough to git up yet?
Go on back, now. I'm gwine to see she gits to school in time."

I went on out the back to back the car out, then I had to go all the way round
to the front before I found them.

"I thought I told you to put that tire on the back of the car," I says.

"I aint had time," Luster says. "Aint nobody to watch him till mammy git done
in de kitchen."

"Yes," I says. "I feed a whole dam kitchen full of niggers to follow around a-
fter him, but if I want an automobile tire changed, I have to do it myself."

"I aint had nobody to leave him wid," he says. Then he begun moaning and slob-
bering.

"Take him on round to the back," I says. "What the hell makes you want to keep
him around here where people can see him?" I made them go on, before he got
started bellowing good. It's bad enough on Sundays, with that dam field full
of people that haven't got a side show and six niggers to feed, knocking a dam
oversize mothball around. He's going to keep on running up and down that fence
and bellowing every time they come in sight until first thing I know they're
going to begin charging me golf dues, then Mother and Dilsey'll have to get a
couple of china door knobs and a walking stick and work it out, unless I play
at night with a lantern. Then they'd send us all to Jackson, maybe. God knows,
they'd hold Old Home week when that happened.

I went on back to the garage. There was the tire, leaning against the wall,
but be damned if I was going to put it on. I backed out and turned around. She
was standing by the drive. I says, "I know you haven't got any books: I just
want to ask you what you did with them, if it's any of my business. Of course
I haven't got any right to ask," I says. "I'm just the one that paid $11.65
for them last September."

"Mother buys my books," she says. "There's not a cent of your money on me. I'd
starve first."

"Yes?" I says. "You tell your grandmother that and see what she says. You dont
look all the way naked," I says, "even if that stuff on your face does hide more
of you than anything else you've got on."

"Do you think your money or hers either paid for a cent of this?" she says.

"Ask your grandmother," I says. "Ask her what became of those checks. You saw
her burn one of them, as I remember." She wasn't even listening, with her face
all gummed up with paint and her eyes hard as a fice dog's.

"Do you know what I'd do if I thought your money or hers either bought one cent
of this?" she says, putting her hand on her dress.

"What would you do?" I says. "Wear a barrel?"

"I'd tear it right off and throw it into the street," she says. "dont you be-
lieve me?"

"Sure you would," I says. "You do it every time."

"See if I wouldn't," she says. She grabbed the neck of her dress in both hands
and made like she would tear it.

"You tear that dress," I says, "and I'll give you a whipping right here that
you'll remember all your life."

"See if I dont," she says. Then I saw that she really was trying to tear it, to
tear it right off of her.

By the time I got the car stopped and grabbed her hands there was about a dozen
people looking. It made me so mad for a minute it kind of blinded me.

"You do a thing like that again and I'll make you sorry you ever drew breath,"
I says.

"I'm sorry now," she says. She quit, then her eyes turned kind of funny and I
says to myself if you cry here in this car, on the street, I'll whip you. I'll
wear you out. Lucky for her she didn't, so I turned her wrists loose and drove
on. Luckily we were near an alley, where I could turn into the back street and
dodge the square. They were already putting the tent up in Beard's lot. Earl
had already given me the two passes for our show windows. She sat there with
her face turned away, chewing her lip. "I'm sorry now," she says. "I dont see
why I was ever born."

"And I know of at least one other person that dont understand all he knows a-
bout that," I says. I stopped in front of the school house. The bell had rung,
and the last of them were just going in. "You're on time for once, anyway," I
says. "Are you going in there and stay there, or am I coming with you and make
you?" She got out and banged the door. "Remember what I say," I says. "I mean
it. Let me hear one more time that you are slipping up and down back alleys
with one of those dam squirts."

She turned back at that. "I dont slip around," she says. "I dare anybody to
know everything I do."

"And they all know it, too," I says. "Everybody in this town knows what you
are. But I wont have it anymore, you hear? I dont care what you do, myself,"
I says. "But I've got a position in this town, and I'm not going to have any
member of my family going on like a nigger wench. You hear me?"

"I dont care," she says. "I'm bad and I'm going to hell, and I dont care. I'd
rather be in hell than anywhere where you are."

"If I hear one more time that you haven't been to school, you'll wish you were
in hell," I says.

She turned and ran on across the yard. "One more time, remember," I says. She
didn't look back.

I went to the postoffice and got the mail and drove on to the store and parked.
Earl looked at me when I came in. I gave him a chance to say something about
my being late, but he just said,

"Those cultivators have come. You'd better help Uncle Job put them up."

I went on to the back, where old Job was uncrating them, at the rate of about
three bolts to the hour.

"You ought to be working for me," I says. "Every other no-count nigger in town
eats in my kitchen."

"I works to suit de man whut pays me Sat'dy night," he says. "When I does dat,
it dont leave me a whole lot of time to please other folks." He screwed up a
nut. "Aint nobody works much in dis country cep de boll-weevil, noways," he
says.

"You'd better be glad you're not a boll-weevil waiting on those cultivators,"
I says. "You'd work yourself to death before they'd be ready to prevent you."

"Dat's de troof," he says. "Boll-weevil got tough time. Work ev'y day in de
week out in de hot sun, rain er shine. Aint got no front porch to set on en
watch de wattermilyuns growin and Sat'dy dont mean nothin a-tall to him."

"Saturday wouldn't mean nothing to you, either," I says, "if it depended on
me to pay you wages. Get those things out of the crates now and drag them
inside."

I opened her letter first and took the check out. Just like a woman. Six days
late. Yet they try to make men believe that they're capable of conducting a
business. How long would a man that thought the first of the month came on the
sixth last in business. And like as not, when they sent the bank statement
out, she would want to know why I never deposited my salary until the sixth.
Things like that never occur to a woman.

　　　　"I had no answer to my letter about Quentin's easter dress. Did it arrive
　　　　all right? I've had no answer to the last two letters I wrote her, though the
　　　　check in the second one was cashed with the other check. Is she sick?
　　　　Let me know at once or I'll come there and see for myself. You promised
　　　　you would let me know when she needed things. I will expect to hear from
　　　　you before the 10th. No you'd better wire me at once. You are opening my
　　　　letters to her. I know that as well as if I were looking at you. You'd better
　　　　wire me at once about her to this address."

About that time Earl started yelling at Job, so I put them away and went over
to try to put some life into him. What this country needs is white labor. Let
these dam trifling niggers starve for a couple of years, then they'd see what
a soft thing they have.

Along toward ten oclock I went up front. There was a drummer there. It was a
couple of minutes to ten, and I invited him up the street to get a dope. We got
to talking about crops.

"There's nothing to it," I says. "Cotton is a speculator's crop. They fill the
farmer full of hot air and get him to raise a big crop for them to whipsaw on
the market, to trim the suckers with. Do you think the farmer gets anything out
of it except a red neck and a hump in his back? You think the man that sweats
to put it into the ground gets a red cent more than a bare living," I says.
"Let him make a big crop and it wont be worth picking; let him make a small
crop and he wont have enough to gin. And what for? so a bunch of dam eastern
jews I'm not talking about men of the jewish religion," I says. "I've known
some jews that were fine citizens. You might be one yourself," I says.

"No," he says. "I'm an American."

"No offense," I says. "I give every man his due, regardless of religion or a-
nything else. I have nothing against jews as an individual," I says. "It's just
the race. You'll admit that they produce nothing. They follow the pioneers into
a new country and sell them clothes."

"You're thinking of Armenians," he says, "aren't you. A pioneer wouldn't have
any use for new clothes."

"No offense," I says. "I dont hold a man's religion against him."

"Sure," he says. "I'm an American. My folks have some French blood, why I have
a nose like this. I'm an American, all right."

"So am I," I says. "Not many of us left. What I'm talking about is the fellows
that sit up there in New York and trim the sucker gamblers."

"That's right," he says. "Nothing to gambling, for a poor man. There ought to
be a law against it."

"Dont you think I'm right?" I says.

"Yes," he says. "I guess you're right. The farmer catches it coming and going."

"I know I'm right," I says. "It's a sucker game, unless a man gets inside in--
formation from somebody that knows what's going on. I happen to be associated
with some people who're right there on the ground. They have one of the biggest
manipulators in New York for an adviser. Way I do it," I says, "I never risk
much at a time. It's the fellow that thinks he knows it all and is trying to
make a killing with three dollars that they're laying for. That's why they are
in the business."

Then it struck ten. I went up to the telegraph office. It opened up a little, just
like they said. I went into the corner and took out the telegram again, just to
be sure. While I was looking at it a report came in. It was up two points. They
were all buying. I could tell that from what they were saying. Getting aboard.
Like they didn't know it could go but one way. Like there was a law or some-
thing against doing anything but buying. Well, I reckon those eastern jews have
got to live too. But I'll be damned if it hasn't come to a pretty pass when any
dam foreigner that cant make a living in the country where God put him, can
come to this one and take money right out of an American's pockets. It was
up two points more. Four points. But hell, they were right there and knew what
was going on. And if I wasn't going to take the advice, what was I paying them
ten dollars a month for. I went out, then I remembered and came back and sent
the wire. "All well. Q writing today."

"Q?" the operator says.

"Yes," I says. "Q. Cant you spell Q?"

"I just asked to be sure," he says.

"You send it like I wrote it and I'll guarantee you to be sure," I says.
"Send it collect."

"What you sending, Jason?" Doc Wright says, looking over my shoulder. "Is
that a code message to buy?"

"That's all right about that," I says. "You boys use your own judgment. You
know more about it than those New York folks do."

"Well, I ought to," Doc says. "I'd a saved money this year raising it at two
cents a pound."

Another report came in. It was down a point.

"Jason's selling," Hopkins says. "Look at his face."

"That's all right about what I'm doing," I says. "You boys follow your own
judgment. Those rich New York jews have got to live like everybody else," I
says.

I went on back to the store. Earl was busy up front. I went on back to the
desk and read Lorraine's letter. "Dear daddy wish you were here. No good
parties when daddys out of town I miss my sweet daddy." I reckon she does.
Last time I gave her forty dollars. Gave it to her. I never promise a woman
anything nor let her know what I'm going to give her. That's the only way
to manage them. Always keep them guessing. If you cant think of any other
way to surprise them, give them a bust in the jaw.

I tore it up and burned it over the spittoon. I make it a rule never to keep
a scrap of paper bearing a woman's hand, and I never write them at all. Lor-
raine is always after me to write to her but I says anything I forgot to tell
you will save till I get to Memphis again but I says I dont mind you writing
me now and then in a plain envelope, but if you ever try to call me up on the
telephone, Memphis wont hold you I says. I says when I'm up there I'm one of
the boys, but I'm not going to have any woman calling me on the telephone.
Here I says, giving her the forty dollars. If you ever get drunk and take a
notion to call me on the phone, just remember this and count ten before you
do it.

"When'll that be?" she says.

"What?" I says.

"When you're coming back," she says.

"I'll let you know," I says. Then she tried to buy a beer, but I wouldn't let
her. "Keep your money," I says. "Buy yourself a dress with it." I gave the
maid a five, too. After all, like I say money has no value; it's just the way
you spend it. It dont belong to anybody, so why try to hoard it. It just be-
longs to the man that can get it and keep it. There's a man right here in
Jefferson made a lot of money selling rotten goods to niggers, lived in a
room over the store about the size of a pigpen, and did his own cooking.
About four or five years ago he was taken sick. Scared the hell out of him
so that when he was up again he joined the church and bought himself a Chi-
nese missionary, five thousand dollars a year. I often think how mad he'll
be if he was to die and find out there's not any heaven, when he thinks a-
bout that five thousand a year. Like I say, he'd better go on and die now
and save money.

When it was burned good I was just about to shove the others into my coat
when all of a sudden something told me to open Quentin's before I went home,
but about that time Earl started yelling for me up front, so I put them away
and went and waited on the dam redneck while he spent fifteen minutes deci-
ding whether he wanted a twenty cent hame string or a thirty-five cent one.

"You'd better take that good one," I says. "How do you fellows ever expect
to get ahead, trying to work with cheap equipment?"

"If this one aint any good," he says, "why have you got it on sale?"

"I didn't say it wasn't any good," I says. "I said it's not as good as that
other one."

"How do you know it's not," he says. "You ever use airy one of them?"

"Because they dont ask thirty-five cents for it," I says. "That's how I know
it's not as good."

He held the twenty cent one in his hands, drawing it through his fingers. "I
reckon I'll take this hyer one," he says. I offered to take it and wrap it,
but he rolled it up and put it in his overalls. Then he took out a tobacco
sack and finally got it untied and shook some coins out. He handed me a quar-
ter. "That fifteen cents will buy me a snack of dinner," he says.

"All right," I says. "You're the doctor. But dont come complaining to me next
year when you have to buy a new outfit."

"I aint makin next year's crop yit," he says. Finally I got rid of him, but
every time I took that letter out something would come up. They were all in
town for the show, coming in in droves to give their money to something that
brought nothing to the town and wouldn't leave anything except what those
grafters in the Mayor's office will split among themselves, and Earl chasing
back and forth like a hen in a coop, saying "Yes, ma'am, Mr Compson will wait
on you. Jason, show this lady a churn or a nickel's worth of screen hooks."

Well, Jason likes work. I says no I never had university advantages because
at Harvard they teach you how to go for a swim at night without knowing how
to swim and at Sewanee they dont even teach you what water is. I says you
might send me to the state University; maybe I'll learn how to stop my clock
with a nose spray and then you can send Ben to the Navy I says or to the ca-
valry anyway, they use geldings in the cavalry. Then when she sent Quentin
home for me to feed too I says I guess that's right too, instead of me hav-
ing to go way up north for a job they sent the job down here to me and then
Mother begun to cry and I says it's not that I have any objection to having
it here; if it's any satisfaction to you I'll quit work and nurse it myself
and let you and Dilsey keep the flour barrel full, or Ben. Rent him out to
a sideshow; there must be folks somewhere that would pay a dime to see him,
then she cried more and kept saying my poor afflicted baby and I says yes
he'll be quite a help to you when he gets his growth not being more than one
and a half times as high as me now and she says she'd be dead soon and then
we'd all be better off and so I says all right, all right, have it your way.
It's your grandchild, which is more than any other grandparents it's got can
say for certain. Only I says it's only a question of time. If you believe
she'll do what she says and not try to see it, you fool yourself because the
first time that was the Mother kept on saying thank God you are not a Compson
except in name, because you are all I have left now, you and Maury and I says
well I could spare Uncle Maury myself and then they came and said they were
ready to start. Mother stopped crying then. She pulled her veil down and we
went down stairs. Uncle Maury was coming out of the diningroom, his handker-
chief to his mouth. They kind of made a lane and we went out the door just
in time to see Dilsey driving Ben and T. P. back around the corner. We went
down the steps and got in. Uncle Maury kept saying Poor little sister, poor
little sister, talking around his mouth and patting Mother's hand. Talking
around whatever it was.

"Have you got your band on?" she says. "Why dont they go on, before Benjamin
comes out and makes a spectacle. Poor little boy. He doesn't know. He cant
even realise."

"There, there," Uncle Maury says, patting her hand, talking around his mouth.
"It's better so. Let him be unaware of bereavement until he has to."

"Other women have their children to support them in times like this," Mother
says.

"You have Jason and me," he says.

"It's so terrible to me," she says. "Having the two of them like this, in
less than two years."

"There, there," he says. After a while he kind of sneaked his hand to his
mouth and dropped them out the window. Then I knew what I had been smelling.
Clove stems. I reckon he thought that the least he could do at Father's or
maybe the sideboard thought it was still Father and tripped him up when he
passed. Like I say, if he had to sell something to send Quentin to Harvard
we'd all been a dam sight better off if he'd sold that sideboard and bought
himself a one-armed strait jacket with part of the money. I reckon the rea-
son all the Compson gave out before it got to me like Mother says, is that
he drank it up. At least I never heard of him offering to sell anything to
send me to Harvard.

So he kept on patting her hand and saying "Poor little sister", patting her
hand with one of the black gloves that we got the bill for four days later
because it was the twenty-sixth because it was the same day one month that
Father went up there and got it and brought it home and wouldn't tell any-
thing about where she was or anything and Mother crying and saying "And
you didn't even see him? You didn't even try to get him to make any prov-
ision for it?" and Father says "No she shall not touch his money not one
cent of it" and Mother says "He can be forced to by law. He can prove no-
thing, unless--Jason Compson," she says. "Were you fool enough to tell--"

"Hush, Caroline," Father says, then he sent me to help Dilsey get that old
cradle out of the attic and I says,

"Well, they brought my job home tonight" because all the time we kept hop-
ing they'd get things straightened out and he'd keep her because Mother
kept saying she would at least have enough regard for the family not to je-
opardise my chance after she and Quentin had had theirs.

"And whar else do she belong?" Dilsey says. "Who else gwine raise her cep
me? Aint I raised ev'y one of y'all?"

"And a dam fine job you made of it," I says. "Anyway it'll give her some-
thing to sure enough worry over now." So we carried the cradle down and
Dilsey started to set it up in her old room. Then Mother started sure e-
nough.

"Hush, Miss Cahline," Dilsey says. "You gwine wake her up."

"In there?" Mother says. "To be contaminated by that atmosphere? It'll be
hard enough as it is, with the heritage she already has."

"Hush," Father says. "dont be silly."

"Why aint she gwine sleep in here," Dilsey says. "In the same room whar I
put her maw to bed ev'y night of her life since she was big enough to
sleep by herself."

"You dont know," Mother says. "To have my own daughter cast off by her
husband. Poor little innocent baby," she says, looking at Quentin. "You
will never know the suffering you've caused."

"Hush, Caroline," Father says.

"What you want to go on like that fo Jason fer?" Dilsey says.

"I've tried to protect him," Mother says. "I've always tried to protect
him from it. At least I can do my best to shield her."

"How sleepin in dis room gwine hurt her, I like to know," Dilsey says.

"I cant help it," Mother says. "I know I'm just a troublesome old woman.
But I know that people cannot flout God's laws with impunity."

"Nonsense," Father says. "Fix it in Miss Caroline's room then, Dilsey."

"You can say nonsense," Mother says. "But she must never know. She must
never even learn that name. Dilsey, I forbid you ever to speak that name
in her hearing. If she could grow up never to know that she had a mother,
I would thank God."

"Dont be a fool," Father says.

"I have never interfered with the way you brought them up," Mother says.
"But now I cannot stand anymore. We must decide this now, tonight. Either
that name is never to be spoken in her hearing, or she must go, or I will
go. Take your choice."

"Hush," Father says. "You're just upset. Fix it in here, Dilsey."

"En you's about sick too," Dilsey says. "You looks like a hant. You git
in bed and I'll fix you a toddy and see kin you sleep. I bet you aint had
a full night's sleep since you lef."

"No," Mother says. "dont you know what the doctor says? Why must you en-
courage him to drink? That's what's the matter with him now. Look at me, I
suffer too, but I'm not so weak that I must kill myself with whiskey."

"Fiddlesticks," Father says. "What do doctors know? They make their liv-
ings advising people to do whatever they are not doing at the time, which
is the extent of anyone's knowledge of the degenerate ape. You'll have a
minister in to hold my hand next." Then Mother cried, and he went out.
Went down stairs, and then I heard the sideboard. I woke up and heard him
going down again. Mother had gone to sleep or something, because the house
was quiet at last. He was trying to be quiet too, because I couldn't hear
him, only the bottom of his nightshirt and his bare legs in front of the
sideboard.

Dilsey fixed the cradle and undressed her and put her in it. She never had
waked up since he brought her in the house.

"She pretty near too big fer hit," Dilsey says. "Dar now. I gwine spread
me a pallet right across de hall, so you wont need to git up in de night."

"I wont sleep," Mother says. "You go on home. I wont mind. I'll be happy
to give the rest of my life to her, if I can just prevent--"

"Hush, now," Dilsey says. "We gwine take keer of her. En you go on to bed
too," she says to me. "You got to go to school tomorrow."

So I went out, then Mother called me back and cried on me a while.

"You are my only hope," she says. "Every night I thank God for you." While
we were waiting there for them to start she says Thank God if he had to be
taken too, it is you left me and not Quentin. Thank God you are not a Com-
pson, because all I have left now is you and Maury and I says, Well I
could spare Uncle Maury myself. Well, he kept on patting her hand with his
black glove, talking away from her. He took them off when his turn with
the shovel came. He got up near the first, where they were holding the um-
brellas over them, stamping every now and then and trying to kick the mud
off their feet and sticking to the shovels so they'd have to knock it off,
making a hollow sound when it fell on it, and when I stepped back around
the hack I could see him behind a tombstone, taking another one out of a
bottle. I thought he never was going to stop because I had on my new suit
too, but it happened that there wasn't much mud on the wheels yet, only
Mother saw it and says I dont know when you'll ever have another one and
Uncle Maury says, "Now, now. Dont you worry at all. You have me to de-
pend on, always."

And we have. Always. The fourth letter was from him. But there wasn't any
need to open it. I could have written it myself, or recited it to her from
memory, adding ten dollars just to be safe. But I had a hunch about that
other letter. I just felt that it was about time she was up to some of her
tricks again. She got pretty wise after that first time. She found out pret-
ty quick that I was a different breed of cat from Father. When they begun
to get it filled up toward the top Mother started crying sure enough, so
Uncle Maury got in with her and drove off. He says You can come in with
somebody; they'll be glad to give you a lift. I'll have to take your mo-
ther on and I thought about saying, Yes you ought to brought two bottles
instead of just one only I thought about where we were, so I let them go
on. Little they cared how wet I got, because then Mother could have a
whale of a time being afraid I was taking pneumonia.

Well, I got to thinking about that and watching them throwing dirt into
it, slapping it on anyway like they were making mortar or something or
building a fence, and I began to feel sort of funny and so I decided to
walk around a while. I thought that if I went toward town they'd catch
up and be trying to make me get in one of them, so I went on back toward
the nigger graveyard. I got under some cedars, where the rain didn't come
much, only dripping now and then, where I could see when they got through
and went away. After a while they were all gone and I waited a minute and
came out.

I had to follow the path to keep out of the wet grass so I didn't see her
until I was pretty near there, standing there in a black cloak, looking
at the flowers. I knew who it was right off, before she turned and looked
at me and lifted up her veil.

"Hello, Jason," she says, holding out her hand. We shook hands.

"What are you doing here?" I says. "I thought you promised her you wouldn't
come back here. I thought you had more sense than that."

"Yes?" she says. She looked at the flowers again. There must have been fif-
ty dollars' worth. Somebody had put one bunch on Quentin's. "You did?" she
says.

"I'm not surprised though," I says. "I wouldn't put anything past you. You
dont mind anybody. You dont give a dam about anybody."

"Oh," she says, "that job." She looked at the grave. "I'm sorry about that,
Jason."

"I bet you are," I says. "You'll talk mighty meek now. But you needn't
have come back. There's not anything left. Ask Uncle Maury, if you dont
believe me."

"I dont want anything," she says. She looked at the grave. "Why didn't
they let me know?" she says. "I just happened to see it in the paper. On
the back page. Just happened to."

I didn't say anything. We stood there, looking at the grave, and then I got
to thinking about when we were little and one thing and another and I got
to feeling funny again, kind of mad or something, thinking about now we'd
have Uncle Maury around the house all the time, running things like the way
he left me to come home in the rain by myself. I says,

"A fine lot you care, sneaking in here soon as he's dead. But it wont do
you any good. Dont think that you can take advantage of this to come snea-
king back. If you cant stay on the horse you've got, you'll have to walk,"
I says. "We dont even know your name at that house," I says. "Do you know
that? We dont even know your name. You'd be better off if you were down
there with him and Quentin," I says. "Do you know that?"

"I know it," she says. "Jason," she says, looking at the grave, "if you'll
fix it so I can see her a minute I'll give you fifty dollars."

"You haven't got fifty dollars," I says.

"Will you?" she says, not looking at me.

"Let's see it," I says. "I dont believe you've got fifty dollars."

I could see where her hands were moving under her cloak, then she held her
hand out. Dam if it wasn't full of money. I could see two or three yellow
ones.

"Does he still give you money?" I says. "How much does he send you?"

"I'll give you a hundred," she says. "Will you?"

"Just a minute," I says. "And just like I say. I wouldn't have her know
it for a thousand dollars "

"Yes," she says. "Just like you say do it. Just so I see her a minute. I
wont beg or do anything. I'll go right on away."

"Give me the money," I says.

"I'll give it to you afterward," she says.

"Dont you trust me?" I says.

"No," she says. "I know you. I grew up with you."

"You're a fine one to talk about trusting people," I says. "Well," I
says. "I got to get on out of the rain. Goodbye." I made to go away.

"Jason," she says. I stopped.

"Yes?" I says. "Hurry up. I'm getting wet."

"All right," she says. "Here." There wasn't anybody in sight. I went
back and took the money. She still held to it. "You'll do it?" she says,
looking at me from under the veil. "You promise?"

"Let go," I says. "You want somebody to come along and see us?"

She let go. I put the money in my pocket. "You'll do it, Jason?" she says.
"I wouldn't ask you, if there was any other way."

"You dam right there's no other way," I says. "Sure I'll do it. I said I
would, didn't I? Only you'll have to do just like I say, now."

"Yes," she says. "I will." So I told her where to be, and went to the li-
very stable. I hurried and got there just as they were unhitching the hack.
I asked if they had paid for it yet and he said No and I said Mrs Compson
forgot something and wanted it again, so they let me take it. Mink was dri-
ving. I bought him a cigar, so we drove around until it begun to get dark
on the back streets where they wouldn't see him. Then Mink said he'd have
to take the team on back and so I said I'd buy him another cigar and so we
drove into the lane and I went across the yard to the house. I stopped in
the hall until I could hear Mother and Uncle Maury upstairs, then I went
on back to the kitchen. She and Ben were there with Dilsey. I said Mother
wanted her and I took her into the house. I found Uncle Maury's raincoat
and put it around her and picked her up and went back to the lane and got
in the hack. I told Mink to drive to the depot. He was afraid to pass the
stable, so we had to go the back way and I saw her standing on the corner
under the light and I told Mink to drive close to the walk and when I said
Go on, to give the team a bat.Then I took the raincoat off of her and
held her to the window and Caddy saw her and sort of jumped forward.

"Hit 'em, Mink!" I says, and Mink gave them a cut and we went past her
like a fire engine. "Now get on that train like you promised," I says. I
could see her running after us through the back window. "Hit 'em again,"
I says. "Let's get on home." When we turned the corner she was still run-
ning.

And so I counted the money again that night and put it away, and I didn't
feel so bad. I says I reckon that'll show you. I reckon you'll know now
that you cant beat me out of a job and get away with it. It never occur-
red to me she wouldn't keep her promise and take that train. But I didn't
know much about them then; I didn't have any more sense than to believe
what they said, because the next morning dam if she didn't walk right into
the store, only she had sense enough to wear the veil and not speak to an-
ybody. It was Saturday morning, because I was at the store, and she came
right on back to the desk where I was, walking fast.

"Liar," she says. "Liar."

"Are you crazy?" I says. "What do you mean? coming in here like this?"
She started in, but I shut her off. I says, "You already cost me one job; do
you want me to lose this one too? If you've got anything to say to me,
I'll meet you somewhere after dark. What have you got to say to me?" I
says. "Didn't I do everything I said? I said see her a minute, didn't I?
Well, didn't you?" She just stood there looking at me, shaking like an
ague-fit, her hands clenched and kind of jerking. "I did just what I said
I would," I says. "You're the one that lied. You promised to take that
train. Didn't you? Didn't you promise? If you think you can get that mon-
ey back, just try it," I says. "If it'd been a thousand dollars, you'd
still owe me after the risk I took. And if I see or hear you're still in
town after number 17 runs," I says, "I'll tell Mother and Uncle Maury.
Then hold your breath until you see her again." She just stood there,
looking at me, twisting her hands together.

"Damn you," she says. "Damn you."

"Sure," I says. "That's all right too. Mind what I say, now. After number
17, and I tell them."

After she was gone I felt better. I says I reckon you'll think twice be-
fore you deprive me of a job that was promised me. I was a kid then. I be-
lieved folks when they said they'd do things. I've learned better since.
Besides, like I say I guess I dont need any man's help to get along I can
stand on my own feet like I always have. Then all of a sudden I thought of
Dilsey and Uncle Maury. I thought how she'd get around Dilsey and that
Uncle Maury would do anything for ten dollars. And there I was, couldn't
even get away from the store to protect my own Mother. Like she says, if
one of you had to be taken, thank God it was you left me I can depend on
you and I says well I dont reckon I'll ever get far enough from the store
to get out of your reach. Somebody's got to hold on to what little we have
left, I reckon. So as soon as I got home I fixed Dilsey. I told Dilsey she
had leprosy and I got the bible and read where a man's flesh rotted off
and I told her that if she ever looked at her or Ben or Quentin they'd
catch it too. So I thought I had everything all fixed until that day when
I came home and found Ben bellowing. Raising hell and nobody could quiet
him. Mother said, Well, get him the slipper then. Dilsey made out she
didn't hear. Mother said it again and I says I'd go I couldn't stand that
dam noise. Like I say I can stand lots of things I dont expect much from
them but if I have to work all day long in a dam store dam if I dont think
I deserve a little peace and quiet to eat dinner in. So I says I'd go and
Dilsey says quick, "Jason!"

Well, like a flash I knew what was up, but just to make sure I went and
got the slipper and brought it back, and just like I thought, when he saw
it you'd thought we were killing him. So I made Dilsey own up, then I told
Mother. We had to take her up to bed then, and after things got quieted
down a little I put the fear of God into Dilsey. As much as you can into
a nigger, that is. That's the trouble with nigger servants, when they've
been with you for a long time they get so full of self importance that
they're not worth a dam. Think they run the whole family.

"I like to know whut's de hurt in lettin dat po chile see her own baby,"
Dilsey says. "If Mr Jason was still here hit ud be different."

"Only Mr Jason's not here," I says. "I know you wont pay me any mind, but
I reckon you'll do what Mother says. You keep on worrying her like this
until you get her into the graveyard too, then you can fill the whole
house full of ragtag and bobtail. But what did you want to let that dam
boy see her for?"

"You's a cold man, Jason, if man you is," she says. "I thank de Lawd I got
mo heart den dat, even ef hit is black."

"At least I'm man enough to keep that flour barrel full," I says. "And if
you do that again, you wont be eating out of it either."

So the next time I told her that if she tried Dilsey again, Mother was go-
ing to fire Dilsey and send Ben to Jackson and take Quentin and go away.
She looked at me for a while. There wasn't any street light close and I
couldn't see her face much. But I could feel her looking at me. When we
were little when she'd get mad and couldn't do anything about it her up-
per lip would begin to jump. Everytime it jumped it would leave a little
more of her teeth showing, and all the time she'd be as still as a post,
not a muscle moving except her lip jerking higher and higher up her teeth.
But she didn't say anything. She just said,

"All right. How much?"

"Well, if one look through a hack window was worth a hundred," I says. So
after that she behaved pretty well, only one time she asked to see a state-
ment of the bank account.

"I know they have Mother's indorsement on them," she says. "But I want to
see the bank statement. I want to see myself where those checks go."

"That's in Mother's private business," I says. "If you think you have any
right to pry into her private affairs I'll tell her you believe those checks are
being misappropriated and you want an audit because you dont trust her."

She didn't say anything or move. I could hear her whispering Damn you oh
damn you oh damn you.

"Say it out," I says. "I dont reckon it's any secret what you and I think
of one another. Maybe you want the money back," I says.

"Listen, Jason," she says. "dont lie to me now. About her. I wont ask to
see anything. If that isn't enough, I'll send more each month. Just pro-
mise that she'll--that she--You can do that. Things for her. Be kind to
her. Little things that I cant, they wont let…. But you wont. You never
had a drop of warm blood in you. Listen," she says. "If you'll get Mother
to let me have her back, I'll give you a thousand dollars."

"You haven't got a thousand dollars," I says. "I know you're lying now."

"Yes I have. I will have. I can get it."

"And I know how you'll get it," I says. "You'll get it the same way you
got her. And when she gets big enough--" Then I thought she really was
going to hit at me, and then I didn't know what she was going to do. She
acted for a minute like some kind of a toy that's wound up too tight and
about to burst all to pieces.

"Oh, I'm crazy," she says. "I'm insane. I cant take her. Keep her. What
am I thinking of. Jason," she says, grabbing my arm. Her hands were hot
as fever. "You'll have to promise to take care of her, to-- She's kin to
you; your own flesh and blood. Promise, Jason. You have Father's name:
do you think I'd have to ask him twice? once, even?"

"That's so," I says. "He did leave me something. What do you want me to
do," I says. "Buy an apron and a gocart? I never got you into this," I
says. "I run more risk than you do, because you haven't got anything at
stake. So if you expect--"

"No," she says, then she begun to laugh and to try to hold it back all
at the same time. "No. I have nothing at stake," she says, making that
noise, putting her hands to her mouth. "Nuh-nuh-nothing," she says.

"Here," I says. "Stop that!"

"I'm tr-trying to," she says, holding her hands over her mouth. "Oh God,
oh God."

"I'm going away from here," I says. "I cant be seen here. You get on out
of town now, you hear?"

"Wait," she says, catching my arm. "I've stopped. I wont again. You pro-
mise, Jason?" she says, and me feeling her eyes almost like they were
touching my face. "You promise? Mother--that--money if sometimes she needs
things-- If I send checks for her to you, other ones besides those, you'll
give them to her? You wont tell? You'll see that she has things like other
girls?"

"Sure," I says. "As long as you behave and do like I tell you."

And so when Earl came up front with his hat on he says, "I'm going to step
up to Rogers' and get a snack. We wont have time to go home to dinner, I
reckon."

"What's the matter we wont have time?" I says.

"With this show in town and all," he says. "They're going to give an after-
noon performance too, and they'll all want to get done trading in time to
go to it. So we'd better just run up to Rogers'."

"All right," I says. "It's your stomach. If you want to make a slave of
yourself to your business, it's all right with me."

"I reckon you'll never be a slave to any business," he says.

"Not unless it's Jason Compson's business," I says.

So when I went back and opened it the only thing that surprised me was it
was a money order not a check. Yes, sir. You cant trust a one of them. Af-
ter all the risk I'd taken, risking Mother finding out about her coming
down here once or twice a year sometimes, and me having to tell Mother
lies about it. That's gratitude for you. And I wouldn't put it past her
to try to notify the postoffice not to let anyone except her cash it. Gi-
ving a kid like that fifty dollars. Why I never saw fifty dollars until
I was twentyone years old, with all the other boys with the afternoon off
and all day Saturday and me working in a store. Like I say, how can they
expect anybody to control her, with her giving her money behind our backs.
She has the same home you had I says, and the same raising. I reckon Mo-
ther is a better judge of what she needs than you are, that haven't even
got a home. "If you want to give her money," I says, "you send it to Mo-
ther, dont be giving it to her. If I've got to run this risk every few
months, you'll have to do like I say, or it's out."

And just about the time I got ready to begin on it because if Earl thought
I was going to dash up the street and gobble two bits worth of indigestion
on his account he was bad fooled. I may not be sitting with my feet on a
mahogany desk but I am being payed for what I do inside this building and
if I cant manage to live a civilised life outside of it I'll go where I
can. I can stand on my own feet; I dont need any man's mahogany desk to
prop me up. So just about the time I got ready to start I'd have to drop
everything and run to sell some redneck a dime's worth of nails or some-
thing, and Earl up there gobbling a sandwich and half way back already,
like as not, and then I found that all the blanks were gone. I remember-
ed then that I had aimed to get some more, but it was too late now, and
then I looked up and there she came. In the back door. I heard her asking
old Job if I was there. I just had time to stick them in the drawer and
close it.

She came around to the desk. I looked at my watch.

"You been to dinner already?" I says. "It's just twelve; I just heard it
strike. You must have flown home and back."

"I'm not going home to dinner," she says. "Did I get a letter today?"

"Were you expecting one?" I says. "Have you got a sweetie that can write?"

"From Mother," she says. "Did I get a letter from Mother?" she says, look-
ing at me.

"Mother got one from her," I says. "I haven't opened it. You'll have to
wait until she opens it. She'll let you see it, I imagine."

"Please, Jason," she says, not paying any attention. "Did I get one?"

"What's the matter?" I says. "I never knew you to be this anxious about
anybody. You must expect some money from her."

"She said she-- " she says. "Please, Jason," she says. "Did I?"

"You must have been to school today, after all," I says. "Somewhere
where they taught you to say please. Wait a minute, while I wait on that
customer."

I went and waited on him. When I turned to come back she was out of
sight behind the desk. I ran. I ran around the desk and caught her as she
jerked her hand out of the drawer. I took the letter away from her, beat-
ing her knuckles on the desk until she let go.

"You would, would you?" I says.

"Give it to me," she says. "You've already opened it. Give it to me.
Please, Jason. It's mine. I saw the name."

"I'll take a hame string to you," I says. "That's what I'll give you.
Going into my papers."

"Is there some money in it?" she says, reaching for it. "She said she
would send me some money. She promised she would. Give it to me."

"What do you want with money?" I says.

"She said she would," she says. "Give it to me. Please, Jason. I wont e-
ver ask you anything again, if you'll give it to me this time."

"I'm going to, if you'll give me time," I says. I took the letter and
the money order out and gave her the letter. She reached for the money
order, not hardly glancing at the letter. "You'll have to sign it first,"
I says.

"How much is it?" she says.

"Read the letter," I says. "I reckon it'll say."

She read it fast, in about two looks.

"It dont say," she says, looking up. She dropped the letter to the floor.
"How much is it?"

"It's ten dollars," I says.

"Ten dollars?" she says, staring at me.

"And you ought to be dam glad to get that," I says. "A kid like you.
What are you in such a rush for money all of a sudden for?"

"Ten dollars?" she says, like she was talking in her sleep. "Just ten
dollars?" She made a grab at the money order. "You're lying," she says.
"Thief!" she says. "Thief!"

"You would, would you?" I says, holding her off.

"Give it to me!" she says. "It's mine. She sent it to me. I will see it.
I will."

"You will?" I says, holding her. "How're you going to do it?"

"Just let me see it, Jason," she says. "Please. I wont ask you for any-
thing again."

"Think I'm lying, do you?" I says. "Just for that you wont see it."

"But just ten dollars," she says. "She told me she--she told me--Jason,
please please please. I've got to have some money. I've just got to. Give
it to me, Jason. I'll do anything if you will."

"Tell me what you've got to have money for," I says.

"I've got to have it," she says. She was looking at me. Then all of a
sudden she quit looking at me without moving her eyes at all. I knew she
was going to lie. "It's some money I owe," she says. "I've got to pay it.
I've got to pay it today."

"Who to?" I says. Her hands were sort of twisting. I could watch her try-
ing to think of a lie to tell. "Have you been charging things at stores
again?" I says. "You needn't bother to tell me that. If you can find any-
body in this town that'll charge anything to you after what I told them,
I'll eat it."

"It's a girl," she says. "It's a girl. I borrowed some money from a girl.
I've got to pay it back. Jason, give it to me. Please. I'll do anything.
I've got to have it. Mother will pay you. I'll write to her to pay you
and that I wont ever ask her for anything again. You can see the letter.
Please, Jason. I've got to have it."

"Tell me what you want with it, and I'll see about it," I says. "Tell
me." She just stood there, with her hands working against her dress. "
All right," I says. "If ten dollars is too little for you, I'll just take it
home to Mother, and you know what'll happen to it then. Of course, if
you're so rich you dont need ten dollars--"

She stood there, looking at the floor, kind of mumbling to herself. "She
said she would send me some money. She said she sends money here and you
say she dont send any. She said she's sent a lot of money here. She says
it's for me. That it's for me to have some of it. And you say we haven't
got any money."

"You know as much about that as I do," I says. "You've seen what happens
to those checks."

"Yes," she says, looking at the floor. "Ten dollars," she says. "Ten dol-
lars."

"And you'd better thank your stars it's ten dollars," I says. "Here," I
says. I put the money order face down on the desk, holding my hand on it.
"Sign it."

"Will you let me see it?" she says. "I just want to look at it. Whatever
it says, I wont ask for but ten dollars. You can have the rest. I just
want to see it."

"Not after the way you've acted," I says. "You've got to learn one thing,
and that is that when I tell you to do something, you've got it to do.
You sign your name on that line."

She took the pen, but instead of signing it she just stood there with her
head bent and the pen shaking in her hand. Just like her mother. "Oh,
God," she says, "oh, God."

"Yes," I says. "That's one thing you'll have to learn if you never learn
anything else. Sign it now, and get on out of here."

She signed it. "Where's the money?" she says. I took the order and blot-
ted it and put it in my pocket. Then I gave her the ten dollars.

"Now you go on back to school this afternoon, you hear?" I says. She did-
n't answer. She crumpled the bill up in her hand like it was a rag or some-
thing and went on out the front door just as Earl came in. A customer came
in with him and they stopped up front. I gathered up the things and put on
my hat and went up front.

"Been much busy?" Earl says.

"Not much," I says. He looked out the door.

"That your car over yonder?" he says. "Better not try to go out home to
dinner. We'll likely have another rush just before the show opens. Get you
a lunch at Rogers' and put a ticket in the drawer."

"Much obliged," I says. "I can still manage to feed myself, I reckon."

And right there he'd stay, watching that door like a hawk until I came
through it again. Well, he'd just have to watch it for a while; I was doing
the best I could. The time before I says that's the last one now; you'll
have to remember to get some more right away. But who can remember anything
in all this hurrah. And now this dam show had to come here the one day I'd
have to hunt all over town for a blank check, besides all the other things
I had to do to keep the house running, and Earl watching the door like a
hawk.

I went to the printing shop and told him I wanted to play a joke on a fel-
low, but he didn't have anything. Then he told me to have a look in the old
opera house, where somebody had stored a lot of papers and junk out of the
old Merchants' and Farmers' Bank when it failed, so I dodged up a few more
alleys so Earl couldn't see me and finally found old man Simmons and got
the key from him and went up there and dug around. At last I found a pad
on a Saint Louis bank. And of course she'd pick this one time to look at it
close. Well, it would have to do. I couldn't waste any more time now.

I went back to the store. "Forgot some papers Mother wants to go to the
bank," I says. I went back to the desk and fixed the check. Trying to hurry
and all, I says to myself it's a good thing her eyes are giving out, with
that little whore in the house, a Christian forbearing woman like Mother. I
says you know just as well as I do what she's going to grow up into but I
says that's your business, if you want to keep her and raise her in your
house just because of Father. Then she would begin to cry and say it was
her own flesh and blood so I just says All right. Have it your way. I can
stand it if you can.

I fixed the letter up again and glued it back and went out.

"Try not to be gone any longer than you can help," Earl says.

"All right," I says. I went to the telegraph office. The smart boys were
all there.

"Any of you boys made your million yet?" I says.

"Who can do anything, with a market like that?" Doc says.

"What's it doing?" I says. I went in and looked. It was three points under
the opening. "You boys are not going to let a little thing like the cotton
market beat you, are you?" I says. "I thought you were too smart for that."

"Smart, hell," Doc says. "It was down twelve points at twelve oclock.
Cleaned me out."

"Twelve points?" I says. "Why the hell didn't somebody let me know? Why
didn't you let me know?" I says to the operator.

"I take it as it comes in," he says. "I'm not running a bucket shop."

"You're smart, aren't you?" I says. "Seems to me, with the money I spend
with you, you could take time to call me up. Or maybe your dam company's in
a conspiracy with those dam eastern sharks."

He didn't say anything. He made like he was busy.

"You're getting a little too big for your pants," I says. "First thing you
know you'll be working for a living."

"What's the matter with you?" Doc says. "You're still three points to the
good."

"Yes," I says. "If I happened to be selling. I haven't mentioned that yet,
I think. You boys all cleaned out?"

"I got caught twice," Doc says. "I switched just in time."

"Well," I. O. Snopes says. "I've picked hit; I reckon taint no more than
fair fer hit to pick me once in a while."

So I left them buying and selling among themselves at a nickel a point. I
found a nigger and sent him for my car and stood on the corner and waited.
I couldn't see Earl looking up and down the street, with one eye on the
clock, because I couldn't see the door from here. After about a week he got
back with it.

"Where the hell have you been?" I says. "Riding around where the wenches
could see you?"

"I come straight as I could," he says. "I had to drive clean around the
square, wid all dem wagons."

I never found a nigger yet that didn't have an airtight alibi for whatever
he did. But just turn one loose in a car and he's bound to show off. I got
in and went on around the square. I caught a glimpse of Earl in the door a-
cross the square.

I went straight to the kitchen and told Dilsey to hurry up with dinner.

"Quentin aint come yit," she says.

"What of that?" I says. "You'll be telling me next that Luster's not quite
ready to eat yet. Quentin knows when meals are served in this house. Hurry
up with it, now."

Mother was in her room. I gave her the letter. She opened it and took the
check out and sat holding it in her hand. I went and got the shovel from
the corner and gave her a match. "Come on," I says. "Get it over with.
You'll be crying in a minute."

She took the match, but she didn't strike it. She sat there, looking at the
check. Just like I said it would be.

"I hate to do it," she says. "To increase your burden by adding Quentin…."

"I guess we'll get along," I says. "Come on. Get it over with."

But she just sat there, holding the check.

"This one is on a different bank," she says. "They have been on an Indiana-
polis bank."

"Yes," I says. "Women are allowed to do that too."

"Do what?" she says.

"Keep money in two different banks," I says.

"Oh," she says. She looked at the check a while. "I'm glad to know she's so
...she has so much…. God sees that I am doing right," she says.

"Come on," I says. "Finish it. Get the fun over."

"Fun?" she says. "When I think--"

"I thought you were burning this two hundred dollars a month for fun," I says.
"Come on, now. Want me to strike the match?"

"I could bring myself to accept them," she says. "For my children's sake. I
have no pride."

"You'd never be satisfied," I says. "You know you wouldn't. You've settled that
once, let it stay settled. We can get along."

"I leave everything to you," she says. "But sometimes I become afraid that in
doing this I am depriving you all of what is rightfully yours. Perhaps I shall
be punished for it. If you want me to, I will smother my pride and accept them."

"What would be the good in beginning now, when you've been destroying them for
fifteen years?" I says. "If you keep on doing it, you have lost nothing, but if
you'd begin to take them now, you'll have lost fifty thousand dollars. We've got
along so far, haven't we?" I says. "I haven't seen you in the poorhouse yet."

"Yes," she says. "We Bascombs need nobody's charity. Certainly not that of a
fallen woman."

She struck the match and lit the check and put it in the shovel, and then the en-
velope, and watched them burn.

"You dont know what it is," she says. "Thank God you will never know what a moth-
er feels."

"There are lots of women in this world no better than her," I says.

"But they are not my daughters," she says. "It's not myself," she says. "I'd gladly
take her back, sins and all, because she is my flesh and blood. It's for Quentin's sake."

Well, I could have said it wasn't much chance of anybody hurting Quentin much,
but like I say I dont expect much but I do want to eat and sleep without a cou-
ple of women squabbling and crying in the house.

"And yours," she says. "I know how you feel toward her."

"Let her come back," I says, "far as I'm concerned."

"No," she says. "I owe that to your father's memory."

"When he was trying all the time to persuade you to let her come home when Her-
bert threw her out?" I says.

"You dont understand," she says. "I know you dont intend to make it more diffi-
cult for me. But it's my place to suffer for my children," she says. "I can bear
it."

"Seems to me you go to a lot of unnecessary trouble doing it," I says. The paper
burned out. I carried it to the grate and put it in. "It just seems a shame to
me to burn up good money," I says.

"Let me never see the day when my children will have to accept that, the wages
of sin," she says. "I'd rather see even you dead in your coffin first."

"Have it your way," I says. "Are we going to have dinner soon?" I says. "Be-
cause if we're not, I'll have to go on back. We're pretty busy today." She got
up. "I've told her once," I says. "It seems she's waiting on Quentin or Luster
or somebody. Here, I'll call her. Wait." But she went to the head of the stairs
and called.

"Quentin aint come yit," Dilsey says.

"Well, I'll have to get on back," I says. "I can get a sandwich downtown. I
dont want to interfere with Dilsey's arrangements," I says. Well, that got her
started again, with Dilsey hobbling and mumbling back and forth, saying,

"All right, all right, Ise puttin hit on fast as I kin."

"I try to please you all," Mother says. "I try to make things as easy for you
as I can."

"I'm not complaining, am I?" I says. "Have I said a word except I had to go
back to work?"

"I know," she says. "I know you haven't had the chance the others had, that
you've had to bury yourself in a little country store. I wanted you to get a-
head. I knew your father would never realise that you were the only one who had
any business sense, and then when everything else failed I believed that when
she married, and Herbert … after his promise--"

"Well, he was probably lying too," I says. "He may not have even had a bank.
And if he had, I dont reckon he'd have to come all the way to Mississippi to
get a man for it."

We ate a while. I could hear Ben in the kitchen, where Luster was feeding him.
Like I say, if we've got to feed another mouth and she wont take that money,
why not send him down to Jackson. He'll be happier there, with people like him.
I says God knows there's little enough room for pride in this family, but it
dont take much pride to not like to see a thirty year old man playing around
the yard with a nigger boy, running up and down the fence and lowing like a
cow whenever they play golf over there. I says if they'd sent him to Jackson
at first we'd all be better off today. I says, you've done your duty by him;
you've done all anybody can expect of you and more than most folks would do,
so why not send him there and get that much benefit out of the taxes we pay.
Then she says, "I'll be gone soon. I know I'm just a burden to you" and I says
"You've been saying that so long that I'm beginning to believe you" only I says
you'd better be sure and not let me know you're gone because I'll sure have him
on number seventeen that night and I says I think I know a place where they'll
take her too and the name of it's not Milk street and Honey avenue either. Then
she begun to cry and I says All right all right I have as much pride about my
kinfolks as anybody even if I dont always know where they come from.

We ate for a while. Mother sent Dilsey to the front to look for Quentin again.

"I keep telling you she's not coming to dinner," I says.

"She knows better than that," Mother says. "She knows I dont permit her to run
about the streets and not come home at meal time. Did you look good, Dilsey?"

"Dont let her, then," I says.

"What can I do," she says. "You have all of you flouted me. Always."

"If you wouldn't come interfering, I'd make her mind," I says. "It wouldn't
take me but about one day to straighten her out."

"You'd be too brutal with her," she says. "You have your Uncle Maury's temper."

That reminded me of the letter. I took it out and handed it to her. "You wont
have to open it," I says. "The bank will let you know how much it is this
time."

"It's addressed to you," she says.

"Go on and open it," I says. She opened it and read it and handed it to me.

　　　　"'My dear young nephew', it says,

　　　　'You will be glad to learn that I am now in a position to avail myself of
　　　　an opportunity regarding which, for reasons which I shall make obvious to
　　　　you, I shall not go into details until I have an opportunity to divulge it
　　　　to you in a more secure manner. My business experience has taught me to be
　　　　chary of committing anything of a confidential nature to any more concrete
　　　　medium than speech, and my extreme precaution in this instance should give
　　　　you some inkling of its value. Needless to say, I have just completed a
　　　　most exhaustive examination of all its phases, and I feel no hesitancy in
　　　　telling you that it is that sort of golden chance that comes but once in
　　　　a lifetime, and I now see clearly before me that goal toward which I have
　　　　long and unflaggingly striven: i.e., the ultimate solidification of my
　　　　affairs by which I may restore to its rightful position that family of
　　　　which I have the honor to be the sole remaining male descendant; that
　　　　family in which I have ever included your lady mother and her children.

　　　　'As it so happens, I am not quite in a position to avail myself of this
　　　　opportunity to the uttermost which it warrants, but rather than go out
　　　　of the family to do so, I am today drawing upon your Mother's bank for
　　　　the small sum necessary to complement my own initial investment, for
　　　　which I herewith enclose, as a matter of formality, my note of hand at
　　　　eight percent. per annum. Needless to say, this is merely a formality,
　　　　to secure your Mother in the event of that circumstance of which man is
　　　　ever the plaything and sport. For naturally I shall employ this sum as
　　　　though it were my own and so permit your Mother to avail herself of this
　　　　opportunity which my exhaustive investigation has shown to be a bonanza--
　　　　if you will permit the vulgarism--of the first water and purest ray se-
　　　　rene.

　　　　'This is in confidence, you will understand, from one business man to an-
　　　　other; we will harvest our own vineyards, eh? And knowing your Mother's
　　　　delicate health and that timorousness which such delicately nurtured Sou-
　　　　thern ladies would naturally feel regarding matters of business, and their
　　　　charming proneness to divulge unwittingly such matters in conversation,
　　　　I would suggest that you do not mention it to her at all. On second
　　　　thought, I advise you not to do so. It might be better to simply restore
　　　　this sum to the bank at some future date, say, in a lump sum with the o-
　　　　ther small sums for which I am indebted to her, and say nothing about it
　　　　at all. It is our duty to shield her from the crass material world as much
　　　　as possible.
　　　　
　　　　'Your affectionate Uncle, 'Maury L. Bascomb.' "

"What do you want to do about it?" I says, flipping it across the table.

"I know you grudge what I give him," she says.

"It's your money," I says. "If you want to throw it to the birds even, it's
your business."

"He's my own brother," Mother says. "He's the last Bascomb. When we are gone
there wont be any more of them."

"That'll be hard on somebody, I guess," I says. "All right, all right," I says.
"It's your money. Do as you please with it. You want me to tell the bank to pay
it?"

"I know you begrudge him," she says. "I realise the burden on your shoulders.
When I'm gone it will be easier on you."

"I could make it easier right now," I says. "All right, all right, I wont men-
tion it again. Move all bedlam in here if you want to."

"He's your own brother," she says. "Even if he is afflicted."

"I'll take your bank book," I says. "I'll draw my check today."

"He kept you waiting six days," she says. "Are you sure the business is sound?
It seems strange to me that a solvent business cannot pay its employees prompt-
ly."

"He's all right," I says. "Safe as a bank. I tell him not to bother about mine
until we get done collecting every month. That's why it's late sometimes."

"I just couldn't bear to have you lose the little I had to invest for you," she
says. "I've often thought that Earl is not a good business man. I know he doesn't
take you into his confidence to the extent that your investment in the business
should warrant. I'm going to speak to him."

"No, you let him alone," I says. "It's his business."

"You have a thousand dollars in it."

"You let him alone," I says. "I'm watching things. I have your power of attorney.
It'll be all right."

"You dont know what a comfort you are to me," she says. "You have always been my
pride and joy, but when you came to me of your own accord and insisted on banking
your salary each month in my name, I thanked God it was you left me if they had
to be taken."

"They were all right," I says. "They did the best they could, I reckon."

"When you talk that way I know you are thinking bitterly of your father's memory,"
she says. "You have a right to, I suppose. But it breaks my heart to hear you."

I got up. "If you've got any crying to do," I says, "you'll have to do it alone,
because I've got to get on back. I'll get the bank book."

"I'll get it," she says.

"Keep still," I says. "I'll get it." I went up stairs and got the bank book out
of her desk and went back to town. I went to the bank and deposited the check and
the money order and the other ten, and stopped at the telegraph office. It was one
point above the opening. I had already lost thirteen points, all because she had
to come helling in there at twelve, worrying me about that letter.

"What time did that report come in?" I says.

"About an hour ago," he says.

"An hour ago?" I says. "What are we paying you for?" I says. "Weekly reports? How
do you expect a man to do anything? The whole dam top could blow off and we'd not
know it."

"I dont expect you to do anything," he says. "They changed that law making folks
play the cotton market."

"They have?" I says. "I hadn't heard. They must have sent the news out over the
Western Union."

I went back to the store. Thirteen points. Dam if I believe anybody knows anything
about the dam thing except the ones that sit back in those New York offices and
watch the country suckers come up and beg them to take their money. Well, a man
that just calls shows he has no faith in himself, and like I say if you aren't go-
ing to take the advice, what's the use in paying money for it. Besides, these pe-
ople are right up there on the ground; they know everything that's going on. I
could feel the telegram in my pocket. I'd just have to prove that they were using
the telegraph company to defraud. That would constitute a bucket shop. And I woul-
dn't hesitate that long, either. Only be damned if it doesn't look like a company
as big and rich as the Western Union could get a market report out on time. Half
as quick as they'll get a wire to you saying Your account closed out. But what the
hell do they care about the people. They're hand in glove with that New York crowd.
Anybody could see that.

When I came in Earl looked at his watch. But he didn't say anything until the cust-
omer was gone. Then he says,

"You go home to dinner?"

"I had to go to the dentist," I says because it's not any of his business where I
eat but I've got to be in the store with him all the afternoon. And with his jaw
running off after all I've stood. You take a little two by four country storekeep-
er like I say it takes a man with just five hundred dollars to worry about it fif-
ty thousand dollars' worth.

"You might have told me," he says. "I expected you back right away."

"I'll trade you this tooth and give you ten dollars to boot, any time," I says.
"Our agreement was an hour for dinner," I says, "and if you dont like the way I
do, you know what you can do about it."

"I've known that some time," he says. "If it hadn't been for your mother I'd have
done it before now, too. She's a lady I've got a lot of sympathy for, Jason. Too
bad some other folks I know cant say as much."

"Then you can keep it," I says. "When we need any sympathy I'll let you know in
plenty of time."

"I've protected you about that business a long time, Jason," he says.

"Yes?" I says, letting him go on. Listening to what he would say before I shut
him up.

"I believe I know more about where that automobile came from than she does."

"You think so, do you?" I says. "When are you going to spread the news that I
stole it from my mother?"

"I dont say anything," he says. "I know you have her power of attorney. And I
know she still believes that thousand dollars is in this business."

"All right," I says. "Since you know so much, I'll tell you a little more: go to
the bank and ask them whose account I've been depositing a hundred and six-
ty dollars on the first of every month for twelve years."

"I dont say anything," he says. "I just ask you to be a little more careful a-
fter this."

I never said anything more. It doesn't do any good. I've found that when a man
gets into a rut the best thing you can do is let him stay there. And when a man
gets it in his head that he's got to tell something on you for your own good,
goodnight. I'm glad I haven't got the sort of conscience I've got to nurse like
a sick puppy all the time. If I'd ever be as careful over anything as he is to
keep his little shirt tail full of business from making him more than eight per-
cent. I reckon he thinks they'd get him on the usury law if he netted more than
eight percent. What the hell chance has a man got, tied down in a town like this
and to a business like this. Why I could take his business in one year and fix
him so he'd never have to work again, only he'd give it all away to the church
or something. If there's one thing gets under my skin, it's a dam hypocrite. A
man that thinks anything he dont understand all about must be crooked and that
first chance he gets he's morally bound to tell the third party what's none of
his business to tell. Like I say if I thought every time a man did something I
didn't know all about he was bound to be a crook, I reckon I wouldn't have any
trouble finding something back there on those books that you wouldn't see any
use for running and telling somebody I thought ought to know about it, when
for all I knew they might know a dam sight more about it now than I did, and
if they didn't it was dam little of my business anyway and he says, "My books
are open to anybody. Anybody that has any claim or believes she has any claim
on this business can go back there and welcome."

"Sure, you wont tell," I says. "You couldn't square your conscience with that.
You'll just take her back there and let her find it. You wont tell, yourself."

"I'm not trying to meddle in your business," he says. "I know you missed out
on some things like Quentin had. But your mother has had a misfortunate life
too, and if she was to come in here and ask me why you quit, I'd have to tell
her. It aint that thousand dollars. You know that. It's because a man never
gets anywhere if fact and his ledgers dont square. And I'm not going to lie
to anybody, for myself or anybody else."

"Well, then," I says. "I reckon that conscience of yours is a more valuable
clerk than I am; it dont have to go home at noon to eat. Only dont let it in-
terfere with my appetite," I says, because how the hell can I do anything
right, with that dam family and her not making any effort to control her nor
any of them like that time when she happened to see one of them kissing Caddy
and all next day she went around the house in a black dress and a veil and e-
ven Father couldn't get her to say a word except crying and saying her little
daughter was dead and Caddy about fifteen then only in three years she'd been
wearing haircloth or probably sandpaper at that rate. Do you think I can af-
ford to have her running about the streets with every drummer that comes to
town, I says, and them telling the new ones up and down the road where to
pick up a hot one when they made Jefferson. I haven't got much pride, I cant
afford it with a kitchen full of niggers to feed and robbing the state asylum
of its star freshman. Blood, I says, governors and generals. It's a dam good
thing we never had any kings and presidents; we'd all be down there at Jackson
chasing butterflies. I says it'd be bad enough if it was mine; I'd at least
be sure it was a bastard to begin with, and now even the Lord doesn't know
that for certain probably.

So after a while I heard the band start up, and then they begun to clear out.
Headed for the show, every one of them. Haggling over a twenty cent hame
string to save fifteen cents, so they can give it to a bunch of Yankees that
come in and pay maybe ten dollars for the privilege. I went on out to the
back. "Well," I says. "If you dont look out, that bolt will grow into your
hand. And then I'm going to take an axe and chop it out. What do you reckon
the boll-weevils'll eat if you dont get those cultivators in shape to raise
them a crop?" I says, "sage grass?"

"Dem folks sho do play dem horns," he says. "Tell me man in dat show kin play
a tune on a handsaw. Pick hit like a banjo."

"Listen," I says. "Do you know how much that show'll spend in this town? A-
bout ten dollars," I says. "The ten dollars Buck Turpin has in his pocket
right now."

"Whut dey give Mr Buck ten dollars fer?" he says.

"For the privilege of showing here," I says. "You can put the balance of what
they'll spend in your eye."

"You mean dey pays ten dollars jest to give dey show here?" he says.

"That's all," I says. "And how much do you reckon--"

"Gret day," he says. "You mean to tell me dey chargin um to let um show here?
I'd pay ten dollars to see dat man pick dat saw, ef I had to. I figures dat
tomorrow mawnin I be still owin um nine dollars and six bits at dat rate."

And then a Yankee will talk your head off about niggers getting ahead. Get
them ahead, what I say. Get them so far ahead you cant find one south of Lou-
isville with a blood hound. Because when I told him about how they'd pick up
Saturday night and carry off at least a thousand dollars out of the county,
he says,

"I dont begridge um. I kin sho afford my two bits."

"Two bits hell," I says. "That dont begin it. How about the dime or fifteen
cents you'll spend for a dam two cent box of candy or something. How about
the time you're wasting right now, listening to that band."

"Dat's de troof," he says. "Well, ef I lives twell night hit's gwine to be
two bits mo dey takin out of town, dat's sho."

"Then you're a fool," I says.

"Well," he says. "I dont spute dat neither. Ef dat uz a crime, all chain-
gangs wouldn't be black."

Well, just about that time I happened to look up the alley and saw her. When
I stepped back and looked at my watch I didn't notice at the time who he was
because I was looking at the watch. It was just two thirty, forty-five minutes
before anybody but me expected her to be out. So when I looked around the door
the first thing I saw was the red tie he had on and I was thinking what the
hell kind of a man would wear a red tie. But she was sneaking along the alley,
watching the door, so I wasn't thinking anything about him until they had gone
past. I was wondering if she'd have so little respect for me that she'd not
only play out of school when I told her not to, but would walk right past the
store, daring me not to see her. Only she couldn't see into the door because
the sun fell straight into it and it was like trying to see through an auto-
mobile searchlight, so I stood there and watched her go on past, with her face
painted up like a dam clown's and her hair all gummed and twisted and a dress
that if a woman had come out doors even on Gayoso or Beale street when I was
a young fellow with no more than that to cover her legs and behind, she'd been
thrown in jail. I'll be damned if they dont dress like they were trying to
make every man they passed on the street want to reach out and clap his hand
on it. And so I was thinking what kind of a dam man would wear a red tie when
all of a sudden I knew he was one of those show folks well as if she'd told
me. Well, I can stand a lot; if I couldn't dam if I wouldn't be in a hell of
a fix, so when they turned the corner I jumped down and followed. Me, without
any hat, in the middle of the afternoon, having to chase up and down back al-
leys because of my mother's good name. Like I say you cant do anything with a
woman like that, if she's got it in her. If it's in her blood, you cant do an-
ything with her. The only thing you can do is to get rid of her, let her go on
and live with her own sort.

I went on to the street, but they were out of sight. And there I was, without
any hat, looking like I was crazy too. Like a man would naturally think, one
of them is crazy and another one drowned himself and the other one was turned
out into the street by her husband, what's the reason the rest of them are not
crazy too. All the time I could see them watching me like a hawk, waiting for
a chance to say Well I'm not surprised I expected it all the time the whole
family's crazy. Selling land to send him to Harvard and paying taxes to sup-
port a state University all the time that I never saw except twice at a base-
ball game and not letting her daughter's name be spoken on the place until
after a while Father wouldn't even come down town anymore but just sat there
all day with the decanter I could see the bottom of his nightshirt and his
bare legs and hear the decanter clinking until finally T.P. had to pour it
for him and she says You have no respect for your Father's memory and I says
I dont know why not it sure is preserved well enough to last only if I'm
crazy too God knows what I'll do about it just to look at water makes me sick
and I'd just as soon swallow gasoline as a glass of whiskey and Lorraine tell-
ing them he may not drink but if you dont believe he's a man I can tell you
how to find out she says If I catch you fooling with any of these whores you
know what I'll do she says I'll whip her grabbing at her I'll whip her as
long as I can find her she says and I says if I dont drink that's my busi-
ness but have you ever found me short I says I'll buy you enough beer to
take a bath in if you want it because I've got every respect for a good hon-
est whore because with Mother's health and the position I try to uphold to
have her with no more respect for what I try to do for her than to make her
name and my name and my Mother's name a byword in the town.

She had dodged out of sight somewhere. Saw me coming and dodged into an-
other alley, running up and down the alleys with a dam show man in a red tie
that everybody would look at and think what kind of a dam man would wear a
red tie. Well, the boy kept speaking to me and so I took the telegram without
knowing I had taken it. I didn't realise what it was until I was signing for
it, and I tore it open without even caring much what it was. I knew all the
time what it would be, I reckon. That was the only thing else that could hap-
pen, especially holding it up until I had already had the check entered on
the pass book.

I dont see how a city no bigger than New York can hold enough people to
take the money away from us country suckers. Work like hell all day every
day, send them your money and get a little piece of paper back, Your account
closed at 20.62. Teasing you along, letting you pile up a little paper pro-
fit, then bang! Your account closed at 20.62. And if that wasn't enough, pay-
ing ten dollars a month to somebody to tell you how to lose it fast, that ei-
ther dont know anything about it or is in cahoots with the telegraph company.
Well, I'm done with them. They've sucked me in for the last time. Any fool
except a fellow that hasn't got any more sense than to take a jew's word for
anything could tell the market was going up all the time, with the whole dam
delta about to be flooded again and the cotton washed right out of the ground
like it was last year. Let it wash a man's crop out of the ground year after
year, and them up there in Washington spending fifty thousand dollars a day
keeping an army in Nicarauga or some place. Of course it'll overflow again,
and then cotton'll be worth thirty cents a pound. Well, I just want to hit
them one time and get my money back. I dont want a killing; only these small
town gamblers are out for that, I just want my money back that these dam jews
have gotten with all their guaranteed inside dope. Then I'm through; they can
kiss my foot for every other red cent of mine they get.

I went back to the store. It was half past three almost. Dam little time to
do anything in, but then I am used to that. I never had to go to Harvard to
learn that. The band had quit playing. Got them all inside now, and they
wouldn't have to waste any more wind. Earl says,

"He found you, did he? He was in here with it a while ago. I thought you were
out back somewhere."

"Yes," I says. "I got it. They couldn't keep it away from me all afternoon.
The town's too small. I've got to go out home a minute," I says. "You can dock
me if it'll make you feel any better."

"Go ahead," he says. "I can handle it now. No bad news, I hope."

"You'll have to go to the telegraph office and find that out," I says. "They-
'll have time to tell you. I haven't."

"I just asked," he says. "Your mother knows she can depend on me."

"She'll appreciate it," I says. "I wont be gone any longer than I have to."

"Take your time," he says. "I can handle it now. You go ahead."

I got the car and went home. Once this morning, twice at noon, and now again,
with her and having to chase all over town and having to beg them to let me
eat a little of the food I am paying for. Sometimes I think what's the use of
anything. With the precedent I've been set I must be crazy to keep on. And
now I reckon I'll get home just in time to take a nice long drive after a bas-
ket of tomatoes or something and then have to go back to town smelling like a
camphor factory so my head wont explode right on my shoulders. I keep telling
her there's not a dam thing in that aspirin except flour and water for imagi-
nary invalids. I says you dont know what a headache is. I says you think I'd
fool with that dam car at all if it depended on me. I says I can get along
without one I've learned to get along without lots of things but if you want
to risk yourself in that old wornout surrey with a halfgrown nigger boy all
right because I says God looks after Ben's kind, God knows He ought to do
something for him but if you think I'm going to trust a thousand dollars'
worth of delicate machinery to a halfgrown nigger or a grown one either,
you'd better buy him one yourself because I says you like to ride in the
car and you know you do.

Dilsey said she was in the house. I went on into the hall and listened, but
I didn't hear anything. I went up stairs, but just as I passed her door she
called me.

"I just wanted to know who it was," she says. "I'm here alone so much that
I hear every sound."

"You dont have to stay here," I says. "You could spend the whole day visit-
ing like other women, if you wanted to." She came to the door.

"I thought maybe you were sick," she says. "Having to hurry through your
dinner like you did."

"Better luck next time," I says. "What do you want?"

"Is anything wrong?" she says.

"What could be?" I says. "Cant I come home in the middle of the afternoon
without upsetting the whole house?"

"Have you seen Quentin?" she says.

"She's in school," I says.

"It's after three," she says. "I heard the clock strike at least a half an
hour ago. She ought to be home by now."

"Ought she?" I says. "When have you ever seen her before dark?"

"She ought to be home," she says. "When I was a girl--"

"You had somebody to make you behave yourself," I says. "She hasn't."

"I cant do anything with her," she says. "I've tried and I've tried."

"And you wont let me, for some reason," I says. "So you ought to be satis-
fied." I went on to my room. I turned the key easy and stood there until
the knob turned. Then she says,

"Jason."

"What," I says.

"I just thought something was wrong."

"Not in here," I says. "You've come to the wrong place."

"I dont mean to worry you," she says.

"I'm glad to hear that," I says. "I wasn't sure. I thought I might have
been mistaken. Do you want anything?"

After a while she says, "No. Not any thing." Then she went away. I took
the box down and counted out the money and hid the box again and unlocked
the door and went out. I thought about the camphor, but it would be too
late now, anyway. And I'd just have one more round trip. She was at her
door, waiting.

"You want anything from town?" I says.

"No," she says. "I dont mean to meddle in your affairs. But I dont know
what I'd do if anything happened to you, Jason."

"I'm all right," I says. "Just a headache."

"I wish you'd take some aspirin," she says. "I know you're not going to
stop using the car."

"What's the car got to do with it?" I says. "How can a car give a man a
headache?"

"You know gasoline always made you sick," she says. "Ever since you were
a child. I wish you'd take some aspirin."

"Keep on wishing it," I says. "It wont hurt you."

I got in the car and started back to town. I had just turned onto the
street when I saw a ford coming helling toward me. All of a sudden it stop-
ped. I could hear the wheels sliding and it slewed around and backed and
whirled and just as I was thinking what the hell they were up to, I saw
that red tie. Then I recognised her face looking back through the window.
It whirled into the alley. I saw it turn again, but when I got to the back
street it was just disappearing, running like hell.

I saw red. When I recognised that red tie, after all I had told her, I forgot
about everything. I never thought about my head even until I came to the
first forks and had to stop. Yet we spend money and spend money on roads and
dam if it isn't like trying to drive over a sheet of corrugated iron roofing.
I'd like to know how a man could be expected to keep up with even a wheelbar-
row. I think too much of my car; I'm not going to hammer it to pieces like it
was a ford. Chances were they had stolen it, anyway, so why should they give
a dam. Like I say blood always tells. If you've got blood like that in you,
you'll do anything. I says whatever claim you believe she has on you has al-
ready been discharged; I says from now on you have only yourself to blame be-
cause you know what any sensible person would do. I says if I've got to spend
half my time being a dam detective, at least I'll go where I can get paid for
it.

So I had to stop there at the forks. Then I remembered it. It felt like some-
body was inside with a hammer, beating on it. I says I've tried to keep you
from being worried by her; I says far as I'm concerned, let her go to hell as
fast as she pleases and the sooner the better. I says what else do you expect
except every dam drummer and cheap show that comes to town because even these
town jellybeans give her the go-by now. You dont know what goes on I says, you
dont hear the talk that I hear and you can just bet I shut them up too. I says
my people owned slaves here when you all were running little shirt tail country
stores and farming land no nigger would look at on shares.

If they ever farmed it. It's a good thing the Lord did something for this coun-
try; the folks that live on it never have. Friday afternoon, and from right here
I could see three miles of land that hadn't even been broken, and every able bo-
died man in the county in town at that show. I might have been a stranger star-
ving to death, and there wasn't a soul in sight to ask which way to town even.
And she trying to get me to take aspirin. I says when I eat bread I'll do it at
the table. I says you always talking about how much you give up for us when you
could buy ten new dresses a year on the money you spend for those dam patent
medicines. It's not something to cure it I need it's just an even break not to
have to have them but as long as I have to work ten hours a day to support a kit-
chen full of niggers in the style they're accustomed to and send them to the show
where every other nigger in the county, only he was late already. By the time he
got there it would be over.

After a while he got up to the car and when I finally got it through his head if
two people in a ford had passed him, he said yes. So I went on, and when I came
to where the wagon road turned off I could see the tire tracks. Ab Russell was
in his lot, but I didn't bother to ask him and I hadn't got out of sight of his
barn hardly when I saw the ford. They had tried to hide it. Done about as well
at it as she did at everything else she did. Like I say it's not that I object
to so much; maybe she cant help that, it's because she hasn't even got enough
consideration for her own family to have any discretion. I'm afraid all the time
I'll run into them right in the middle of the street or under a wagon on the
square, like a couple of dogs.

I parked and got out. And now I'd have to go way around and cross a plowed field,
the only one I had seen since I left town, with every step like somebody was wal-
king along behind me, hitting me on the head with a club. I kept thinking that
when I got across the field at least I'd have something level to walk on, that
wouldn't jolt me every step, but when I got into the woods it was full of under-
brush and I had to twist around through it, and then I came to a ditch full of
briers. I went along it for a while, but it got thicker and thicker, and all the
time Earl probably telephoning home about where I was and getting Mother all up-
set again.

When I finally got through I had had to wind around so much that I had to stop
and figure out just where the car would be. I knew they wouldn't be far from it,
just under the closest bush, so I turned and worked back toward the road. Then
I couldn't tell just how far I was, so I'd have to stop and listen, and then with
my legs not using so much blood, it all would go into my head like it would ex-
plode any minute, and the sun getting down just to where it could shine straight
into my eyes and my ears ringing so I couldn't hear anything. I went on, trying
to move quiet, then I heard a dog or something and I knew that when he scented
me he'd have to come helling up, then it would be all off. I had gotten beggar lice
and twigs and stuff all over me, inside my clothes and shoes and all, and then I
happened to look around and I had my hand right on a bunch of poison oak. The on-
ly thing I couldn't understand was why it was just poison oak and not a snake or
something. So I didn't even bother to move it. I just stood there until the dog
went away. Then I went on.

I didn't have any idea where the car was now. I couldn't think about anything ex-
cept my head, and I'd just stand in one place and sort of wonder if I had really
seen a ford even, and I didn't even care much whether I had or not. Like I say,
let her lay out all day and all night with everthing in town that wears pants,
what do I care. I dont owe anything to anybody that has no more consideration for
me, that wouldn't be a dam bit above planting that ford there and making me spend
a whole afternoon and Earl taking her back there and showing her the books just
because he's too dam virtuous for this world. I says you'll have one hell of a
time in heaven, without anybody's business to meddle in only dont you ever let me
catch you at it I says, I close my eyes to it because of your grandmother, but
just you let me catch you doing it one time on this place, where my mother lives.
These dam little slick haired squirts, thinking they are raising so much hell,
I'll show them something about hell I says, and you too. I'll make him think that
dam red tie is the latch string to hell, if he thinks he can run the woods with
my niece.

With the sun and all in my eyes and my blood going so I kept thinking every time
my head would go on and burst and get it over with, with briers and things grab-
bing at me, then I came onto the sand ditch where they had been and I recognised
the tree where the car was, and just as I got out of the ditch and started running
I heard the car start. It went off fast, blowing the horn. They kept on blowing it,
like it was saying Yah. Yah. Yaaahhhhhhhh, going out of sight. I got to the road
just in time to see it go out of sight.

By the time I got up to where my car was, they were clean out of sight, the horn
still blowing. Well, I never thought anything about it except I was saying Run. Run
back to town. Run home and try to convince Mother that I never saw you in that car.
Try to make her believe that I dont know who he was. Try to make her believe that
I didn't miss ten feet of catching you in that ditch. Try to make her believe you
were standing up, too.

It kept on saying Yahhhhh, Yahhhhh, Yaaahhhhhhhhh, getting fainter and fainter.
Then it quit, and I could hear a cow lowing up at Russell's barn. And still I ne-
ver thought. I went up to the door and opened it and raised my foot. I kind of
thought then that the car was leaning a little more than the slant of the road
would be, but I never found it out until I got in and started off.

Well, I just sat there. It was getting on toward sundown, and town was about five
miles. They never even had guts enough to puncture it, to jab a hole in it. They
just let the air out. I just stood there for a while, thinking about that kitchen
full of niggers and not one of them had time to lift a tire onto the rack and screw
up a couple of bolts. It was kind of funny because even she couldn't have seen far
enough ahead to take the pump out on purpose, unless she thought about it while he
was letting out the air maybe. But what it probably was was somebody took it out
and gave it to Ben to play with for a squirt gun because they'd take the whole car
to pieces if he wanted it and Dilsey says, Aint nobody teched yo car. What we want
to fool with hit fer? and I says You're a nigger. You're lucky, do you know it? I
says I'll swap with you any day because it takes a white man not to have anymore
sense than to worry about what a little slut of a girl does.

I walked up to Russell's. He had a pump. That was just an oversight on their part,
I reckon. Only I still couldn't believe she'd have had the nerve to. I kept think-
ing that. I dont know why it is I cant seem to learn that a woman'll do anything.
I kept thinking, Let's forget for a while how I feel toward you and how you feel
toward me: I just wouldn't do you this way. I wouldn't do you this way no matter
what you had done to me. Because like I say blood is blood and you cant get around
it. It's not playing a joke that any eight year old boy could have thought of, it's
letting your own uncle be laughed at by a man that would wear a red tie. They come
into town and call us all a bunch of hicks and think it's too small to hold them.
Well he doesn't know just how right he is. And her too. If that's the way she feels
about it, she'd better keep right on going and a dam good riddance.

I stopped and returned Russell's pump and drove on to town. I went to the drugstore
and got a shot and then I went to the telegraph office. It had closed at 20.21, for-
ty points down. Forty times five dollars; buy something with that if you can, and
she'll say, I've got to have it I've just got to and I'll say that's too bad you'll have
to try somebody else, I haven't got any money; I've been too busy to make any.

I just looked at him.

"I'll tell you some news," I says. "You'll be astonished to learn that I am inter-
ested in the cotton market," I says. "That never occurred to you, did it?"

"I did my best to deliver it," he says. "I tried the store twice and called up
your house, but they didn't know where you were," he says, digging in the drawer.

"Deliver what?" I says. He handed me a telegram. "What time did this come?" I
says.

"About half past three," he says.

"And now it's ten minutes past five," I says.

"I tried to deliver it," he says. "I couldn't find you."

"That's not my fault, is it?" I says. I opened it, just to see what kind of a lie
they'd tell me this time. They must be in one hell of a shape if they've got to
come all the way to Mississippi to steal ten dollars a month. Sell, it says. The
market will be unstable, with a general downward tendency. Do not be alarmed fol-
lowing government report.

"How much would a message like this cost?" I says. He told me.

"They paid it," he says.

"Then I owe them that much," I says. "I already knew this. Send this collect," I
says, taking a blank. Buy, I wrote, Market just on point of blowing its head off.
Occasional flurries for purpose of hooking a few more country suckers who haven't
got in to the telegraph office yet. Do not be alarmed.

"Send that collect," I says.

He looked at the message, then he looked at the clock. "Market closed an hour
ago," he says.

"Well," I says. "That's not my fault either. I didn't invent it; I just bought a
little of it while under the impression that the telegraph company would keep me
informed as to what it was doing."

"A report is posted whenever it comes in," he says.

"Yes," I says. "And in Memphis they have it on a blackboard every ten seconds,"
I says. "I was within sixty-seven miles of there once this afternoon."

He looked at the message. "You want to send this?" he says.

"I still haven't changed my mind," I says. I wrote the other one out and counted
the money. "And this one too, if you're sure you can spell b-u-y."

I went back to the store. I could hear the band from down the street. Prohibiti-
on's a fine thing. Used to be they'd come in Saturday with just one pair of shoes
in the family and him wearing them, and they'd go down to the express office and
get his package; now they all go to the show barefooted, with the merchants in the
door like a row of tigers or something in a cage, watching them pass. Earl says,

"I hope it wasn't anything serious."

"What?" I says. He looked at his watch. Then he went to the door and looked at the
courthouse clock. "You ought to have a dollar watch," I says. "It wont cost you so
much to believe it's lying each time."

"What?" he says.

"Nothing," I says. "Hope I haven't inconvenienced you."

"We were not busy much," he says. "They all went to the show. It's all right."

"If it's not all right," I says, "you know what you can do about it."

"I said it was all right," he says.

"I heard you," I says. "And if it's not all right, you know what you can do about
it."

"Do you want to quit?" he says.

"It's not my business," I says. "My wishes dont matter. But dont get the idea
that you are protecting me by keeping me."

"You'd be a good business man if you'd let yourself, Jason," he says.

"At least I can tend to my own business and let other people's alone,"
I says.

"I dont know why you are trying to make me fire you," he says. "You
know you could quit anytime and there wouldn't be any hard feelings
between us."

"Maybe that's why I dont quit," I says. "As long as I tend to my job, that's
what you are paying me for." I went on to the back and got a drink of water
and went on out to the back door. Job had the cultivators all set up at last.
It was quiet there, and pretty soon my head got a little easier. I could hear them
singing now, and then the band played again. Well, let them get every quarter
and dime in the county; it was no skin off my back. I've done what I could; a
man that can live as long as I have and not know when to quit is a fool. Espe-
cially as it's no business of mine. If it was my own daughter now it would be
different, because she wouldn't have time to; she'd have to work some to feed
a few invalids and idiots and niggers, because how could I have the face to bring
anybody there. I've too much respect for anybody to do that. I'm a man, I can
stand it, it's my own flesh and blood and I'd like to see the color of the man's
eyes that would speak disrespectful of any woman that was my friend it's these
dam good women that do it I'd like to see the good, church-going woman that's
half as square as Lorraine, whore or no whore. Like I say if I was to get married
you'd go up like a balloon and you know it and she says I want you to be happy
to have a family of your own not to slave your life away for us. But I'll
be gone soon and then you can take a wife but you'll never find a
woman who is worthy of you and I says yes I could. You'd get right
up out of your grave you know you would. I says no thank you I have
all the women I can take care of now if I married a wife she'd pro-
bably turn out to be a hophead or something. That's all we lack in
this family, I says.

The sun was down beyond the Methodist church now, and the pigeons
were flying back and forth around the steeple, and when the band sto-
pped I could hear them cooing. It hadn't been four months since
Christmas, and yet they were almost as thick as ever. I reckon Par-
son Walthall was getting a belly full of them now. You'd have thought
we were shooting people, with him making speeches and even holding
onto a man's gun when they came over. Talking about peace on earth
good will toward all and not a sparrow can fall to earth. But what
does he care how thick they get, he hasn't got anything to do: what
does he care what time it is. He pays no taxes, he doesn't have to
see his money going every year to have the courthouse clock cleaned
to where it'll run. They had to pay a man forty-five dollars to clean
it. I counted over a hundred half-hatched pigeons on the ground.
You'd think they'd have sense enough to leave town. It's a good thing
I dont have anymore ties than a pigeon, I'll say that.

The band was playing again, a loud fast tune, like they were breaking
up. I reckon they'd be satisfied now. Maybe they'd have enough music
to entertain them while they drove fourteen or fifteen miles home and
unharnessed in the dark and fed the stock and milked. All they'd have
to do would be to whistle the music and tell the jokes to the live
stock in the barn, and then they could count up how much they'd made
by not taking the stock to the show too. They could figure that if a
man had five children and seven mules, he cleared a quarter by taking
his family to the show. Just like that. Earl came back with a couple
of packages.

"Here's some more stuff going out," he says. "Where's Uncle Job?"

"Gone to the show, I imagine," I says. "Unless you watched him."

"He doesn't slip off," he says. "I can depend on him.

"Meaning me by that," I says.

He went to the door and looked out, listening.

"That's a good band," he says. "It's about time they were breaking up,
I'd say."

"Unless they're going to spend the night there," I says. The swallows
had begun, and I could hear the sparrows beginning to swarm in the
trees in the courthouse yard. Every once in a while a bunch of them
would come swirling around in sight above the roof, then go away.
They are as big a nuisance as the pigeons, to my notion. You cant e-
ven sit in the courthouse yard for them. First thing you know, bing.
Right on your hat. But it would take a millionaire to afford to shoot
them at five cents a shot. If they'd just put a little poison out
there in the square, they'd get rid of them in a day, because if a
merchant cant keep his stock from running around the square, he'd bet-
ter try to deal in something besides chickens, something that dont eat,
like plows or onions. And if a man dont keep his dogs up, he either
dont want it or he hasn't any business with one. Like I say if all
the businesses in a town are run like country businesses, you're go-
ing to have a country town.

"It wont do you any good if they have broke up," I says. "They'll have
to hitch up and take out to get home by midnight as it is."

"Well," he says. "They enjoy it. Let them spend a little money on a
show now and then. A hill farmer works pretty hard and gets mighty
little for it."

"There's no law making them farm in the hills," I says. "Or anywhere
else."

"Where would you and me be, if it wasn't for the farmers?" he says.

"I'd be home right now," I says. "Lying down, with an ice pack on my
head."

"You have these headaches too often," he says. "Why dont you have your
teeth examined good? Did he go over them all this morning?"

"Did who?" I says.

"You said you went to the dentist this morning.

"Do you object to my having the headache on your time?" I says. "Is
that it?" They were crossing the alley now, coming up from the show.

"There they come," he says. "I reckon I better get up front." He went
on. It's a curious thing how, no matter what's wrong with you, a man'll
tell you to have your teeth examined and a woman'll tell you to get
married. It always takes a man that never made much at any thing to
tell you how to run your business, though. Like these college profes-
sors without a whole pair of socks to his name, telling you how to
make a million in ten years, and a woman that couldn't even get a
husband can always tell you how to raise a family.

Old man Job came up with the wagon. After a while he got through wrap-
ping the lines around the whip socket.

"Well," I says. "Was it a good show?"

"I aint been yit," he says. "But I kin be arrested in dat tent tonight,
dough."

"Like hell you haven't," I says. "You've been away from here since
three oclock. Mr Earl was just back here looking for you."

"I been tendin to my business," he says. "Mr Earl knows whar I been."

"You may can fool him," I says. "I wont tell on you."

"Den he's de onliest man here I'd try to fool," he says. "Whut I want
to waste my time foolin a man whut I dont keer whether I sees him Sat-
'dy night er not? I wont try to fool you," he says. "You too smart fer
me. Yes, suh," he says, looking busy as hell, putting five or six lit-
tle packages into the wagon. "You's too smart fer me. Aint a man in dis
town kin keep up wid you fer smartness. You fools a man whut so smart
he cant even keep up wid hisself," he says, getting in the wagon and
unwrapping the reins.

"Who's that?" I says.

"Dat's Mr Jason Compson," he says. "Git up dar, Dan!"

One of the wheels was just about to come off. I watched to see if he'd
get out of the alley before it did. Just turn any vehicle over to a nig-
ger, though. I says that old rattletrap's just an eyesore, yet you'll
keep it standing there in the carriage house a hundred years just so
that boy can ride to the cemetery once a week. I says he's not the first
fellow that'll have to do things he doesn't want to. I'd make him ride
in that car like a civilised man or stay at home. What does he know about
where he goes or what he goes in, and us keeping a carriage and a horse
so he can take a ride on Sunday afternoon.

A lot Job cared whether the wheel came off or not, long as he wouldn't
have too far to walk back. Like I say the only place for them is in the
field, where they'd have to work from sunup to sundown. They cant stand
prosperity or an easy job. Let one stay around white people for a while
and he's not worth killing. They get so they can outguess you about work
before your very eyes, like Roskus the only mistake he ever made was he
got careless one day and died. Shirking and stealing and giving you a
little more lip and a little more lip until some day you have to lay
them out with a scantling or something. Well, it's Earl's business. But
I'd hate to have my business advertised over this town by an old dodder-
ing nigger and a wagon that you thought every time it turned a corner
it would come all to pieces.

The sun was all high up in the air now, and inside it was beginning to
get dark. I went up front. The square was empty. Earl was back closing
the safe, and then the clock begun to strike.

"You lock the back door?" he says. I went back and locked it and came
back. "I suppose you're going to the show tonight," he says. "I gave
you those passes yesterday, didn't I?"

"Yes," I says. "You want them back?"

"No, no," he says. "I just forgot whether I gave them to you or not. No
sense in wasting them."

He locked the door and said Goodnight and went on. The sparrows were
still rattling away in the trees, but the square was empty except for a
few cars. There was a ford in front of the drugstore, but I didn't even
look at it. I know when I've had enough of anything. I dont mind trying
to help her, but I know when I've had enough. I guess I could teach Lus-
ter to drive it, then they could chase her all day long if they wanted
to, and I could stay home and play with Ben.

I went in and got a couple of cigars. Then I thought I'd have another
headache shot for luck, and I stood and talked with them a while.

"Well," Mac says. "I reckon you've got your money on the Yankees this
year."

"What for?" I says.

"The Pennant," he says. "Not anything in the league can beat them."

"Like hell there's not," I says. "They're shot," I says. "You think a
team can be that lucky forever?"

"I dont call it luck," Mac says.

"I wouldn't bet on any team that fellow Ruth played on," I says. "Even
if I knew it was going to win."

"Yes?" Mac says.

"I can name you a dozen men in either league who're more valuable than
he is," I says.

"What have you got against Ruth?" Mac says.

"Nothing," I says. "I haven't got any thing against him. I dont even like
to look at his picture." I went on out. The lights were coming on, and peo-
ple going along the streets toward home. Sometimes the sparrows never got
still until full dark. The night they turned on the new lights around the
courthouse it waked them up and they were flying around and blundering in-
to the lights all night long. They kept it up two or three nights, then
one morning they were all gone. Then after about two months they all came
back again.

I drove on home. There were no lights in the house yet, but they'd all be
looking out the windows, and Dilsey jawing away in the kitchen like it was
her own food she was having to keep hot until I got there. You'd think to
hear her that there wasn't but one supper in the world, and that was the
one she had to keep back a few minutes on my account. Well at least I could
come home one time without finding Ben and that nigger hanging on the gate
like a bear and a monkey in the same cage. Just let it come toward sundown
and he'd head for the gate like a cow for the barn, hanging onto it and
bobbing his head and sort of moaning to himself. That's a hog for punish-
ment for you. If what had happened to him for fooling with open gates had
happened to me, I never would want to see another one. I often wondered
what he'd be thinking about, down there at the gate, watching the girls
going home from school, trying to want something he couldn't even remem-
ber he didn't and couldn't want any longer. And what he'd think when
they'd be undressing him and he'd happen to take a look at himself and
begin to cry like he'd do. But like I say they never did enough of that.
I says I know what you need you need what they did to Ben then you'd be-
have. And if you dont know what that was I says, ask Dilsey to tell you.

There was a light in Mother's room. I put the car up and went on into
the kitchen. Luster and Ben were there.

"Where's Dilsey?" I says. "Putting supper on?"

"She up stairs wid Miss Cahline," Luster says. "Dey been goin hit. Ever
since Miss Quentin come home. Mammy up there keepin um fum fightin. Is
dat show come, Mr Jason?"

"Yes," I says.

I thought I heard de band," he says. "Wish I could go," he says. "I could
ef I jes had a quarter."

Dilsey came in. "You come, is you?" she says. "Whut you been up to dis
evenin? You knows how much work I got to do; whyn't you git here on
time?"

"Maybe I went to the show," I says. "Is supper ready?"

"Wish I could go," Luster says. "I could ef I jes had a quarter."

"You aint got no business at no show," Dilsey says. "You go on in de
house and set down," she says. "dont you go up stairs and git um started
again, now."

"What's the matter?" I says.

"Quentin come in a while ago and says you been follerin her around all
evenin and den Miss Cahline jumped on her. Whyn't you let her alone?
Cant you live in de same house wid yo own blood niece widout quoilin?"

"I cant quarrel with her," I says, "because I haven't seen her since
this morning. What does she say I've done now? made her go to school?
That's pretty bad," I says.

"Well, you tend to yo business and let her lone," Dilsey says. "I'll
take keer of her ef you'n Miss Cahline'll let me. Go on in afar now
and behave yoself swell I git supper on."

"Ef I jes had a quarter," Luster says, "I could go to dat show."

"En ef you had wings you could fly to heaven," Dilsey says. "I dont
want to hear another word about dat show."

"That reminds me," I says. "I've got a couple of tickets they gave
me." I took them out of my coat.

"You fixin to use um?" Luster says.

"Not me," I says. "I wouldn't go to it for ten dollars."

"Gimme one of um, Mr Jason," he says.

"I'll sell you one," I says. "How about it?"

"I aint got no money," he says.

"That's too bad," I says. I made to go out.

"Gimme one of um, Mr Jason," he says. "You aint gwine need um bofe."

"Hush yo mouf," Dilsey says. "dont you know he aint gwine give nothin
away?"

"How much you want fer hit?" he says.

"Five cents," I says.

"I aint got dat much," he says.

"How much you got?" I says.

"I aint got nothin," he says.

"All right," I says. I went on.

"Mr Jason," he says.

"Whyn't you hush up?" Dilsey says. "He jes teasin you. He fixin to use
dem tickets hisself. Go on, Jason, and let him lone."

"I dont want them," I says. I came back to the stove. "I came in here
to burn them up. But if you want to buy one for a nickel?" I says, look-
ing at him and opening the stove lid.

"I aint got dat much," he says.

"All right," I says. I dropped one of them in the stove.

"You, Jason," Dilsey says. "Aint you shamed?"

"Mr Jason," he says. "Please, suh. I'll fix dem tires ev'y day fer a
mont."

"I need the cash," I says. "You can have it for a nickel."

"Hush, Luster," Dilsey says. She jerked him back. "Go on," she says.
"Drop hit in. Go on. Git hit over with."

"You can have it for a nickel," I says.

"Go on," Dilsey says. "He aint got no nickel. Go on. Drop hit in."

"All right," I says. I dropped it in and Dilsey shut the stove.

"A big growed man like you," she says. "Git on outen my kitchen.
Hush," she says to Luster. "Dont you git Benjy started. I'll git
you a quarter fum Frony tonight and you kin go tomorrow night.
Hush up, now."

I went on into the living room. I couldn't hear anything from upstairs.
I opened the paper. After a while Ben and Luster came in. Ben went to
the dark place on the wall where the mirror used to be, rubbing his
hands on it and slobbering and moaning. Luster begun punching at the
fire.

"What're you doing?" I says. "We dont need any fire tonight."

"I tryin to keep him quiet," he says. "Hit always cold Easter," he
says.

"Only this is not Easter," I says. "Let it alone."

He put the poker back and got the cushion out of Mother's chair and
gave it to Ben, and he hunkered down in front of the fireplace and got
quiet.

I read the paper. There hadn't been a sound from upstairs when Dilsey
came in and sent Ben and Luster on to the kitchen and said supper was
ready.

"All right," I says. She went out. I sat there, reading the paper. Af-
ter a while I heard Dilsey looking in at the door.

"Whyn't you come on and eat?" she says.

"I'm waiting for supper," I says.

"Hit's on the table," she says. "I done told you."

"Is it?" I says. "Excuse me. I didn't hear anybody come down."

"They aint comin," she says. "You come on and eat, so I can take some-
thing up to them."

"Are they sick?" I says. "What did the doctor say it was? Not Smallpox,
I hope."

"Come on here, Jason," she says. "So I kin git done."

"All right," I says, raising the paper again. "I'm waiting for supper
now." I could feel her watching me at the door. I read the paper.

"Whut you want to act like this fer?" she says. "When you knows how much
bother I has anyway."

"If Mother is any sicker than she was when she came down to dinner,
all right," I says. "But as long as I am buying food for people younger
than I am they'll have to come down to the table to eat it. Let me know
when supper's ready," I says, reading the paper again. I heard her
climbing the stairs, dragging her feet and grunting and groaning like
they were straight up and three feet apart. I heard her at Mother's
door, then I heard her calling Quentin, like the door was locked, then
she went back to Mother's room and then Mother went and talked to
Quentin. Then they came down stairs. I read the paper.

Dilsey came back to the door. "Come on," she says, "fo you kin think up
some mo devilment. You just tryin yoself tonight."

I went to the diningroom. Quentin was sitting with her head bent. She
had painted her face again. Her nose looked like a porcelain insulator.

"I'm glad you feel well enough to come down," I says to Mother.

"It's little enough I can do for you, to come to the table," she says.
"No matter how I feel. I realise that when a man works all day he likes
to be surrounded by his family at the supper table. I want to please
you. I only wish you and Quentin got along better. It would be easier
for me."

"We get along all right," I says. "I dont mind her staying locked up
in her room all day if she wants to. But I cant have all this whoop-
de-do and sulking at mealtimes. I know that's a lot to ask her, but
I'm that way in my own house. Your house, I meant to say."

"It's yours," Mother says. "You are the head of it now."

Quentin hadn't looked up. I helped the plates and she begun to eat.

"Did you get a good piece of meat?" I says. "If you didn't, I'll try
to find you a better one."

She didn't say anything.

"I say, did you get a good piece of meat?" I says.

"What?" she says. "Yes. It's all right."

"Will you have some more rice?" I says.

"No," she says.

"Better let me give you some more," I says.

"I dont want any more," she says.

"Not at all," I says. "You're welcome."

"Is your headache gone?" Mother says.

"Headache?" I says.

"I was afraid you were developing one," she says. "When you came in
this afternoon."

"Oh," I says. "No, it didn't show up. We stayed so busy this afternoon
I forgot about it."

"Was that why you were late?" Mother says. I could see Quentin listen-
ing. I looked at her. Her knife and fork were still going, but I caught
her looking at me, then she looked at her plate again. I says,

"No. I loaned my car to a fellow about three oclock and I had to wait
until he got back with it." I ate for a while.

"Who was it?" Mother says.

"It was one of those show men," I says. "It seems his sister's husband
was out riding with some town woman, and he was chasing them."

Quentin sat perfectly still, chewing.

"You ought not to lend your car to people like that," Mother says. "You
are too generous with it. That's why I never call on you for it if I can
help it."

"I was beginning to think that myself, for a while," I says. "But he got
back, all right. He says he found what he was looking for."

"Who was the woman?" Mother says.

"I'll tell you later," I says. "I dont like to talk about such things be-
fore Quentin." Quentin had quit eating. Every once in a while she'd take
a drink of water, then she'd sit there crumbling a biscuit up, her face
bent over her plate.

"Yes," Mother says. "I suppose women who stay shut up like I do have no
idea what goes on in this town."

"Yes," I says. "They dont."

"My life has been so different from that," Mother says. "Thank God I dont
know about such wickedness. I dont even want to know about it. I'm not
like most people."

I didn't say any more. Quentin sat there, crumbling the biscuit until I
quit eating. Then she says, "Can I go now?" without looking at anybody.

"What?" I says. "Sure, you can go. Were you waiting on us?"

She looked at me. She had crumpled all the bread, but her hands still
went on like they were crumpling it yet and her eyes looked like they
were cornered or something and then she started biting her mouth like
it ought to have poisoned her, with all that red lead.

"Grandmother," she says. "Grandmother--"

"Did you want something else to eat?" I says.

"Why does he treat me like this, Grandmother?" she says. "I never hurt
him."

"I want you all to get along with one another," Mother says. "You are
all that's left now, and I do want you all to get along better."

"It's his fault," she says. "He wont let me alone, and I have to. If
he doesn't want me here, why wont he let me go back to--"

"That's enough," I says. "Not another word."

"Then why wont he let me alone?" she says. "He--he just--"

"He is the nearest thing to a father you've ever had,"

Mother says. "It's his bread you and I eat. It's only right that he
should expect obedience from you."

"It's his fault," she says. She jumped up. "He makes me do it. If he
would just--" she looked at us, her eyes cornered, kind of jerking her
arms against her sides.

"If I would just what?" I says.

"Whatever I do, it's your fault," she says. "If I'm bad, it's because
I had to be. You made me. I wish I was dead. I wish we were all dead."
Then she ran. We heard her run up the stairs. Then a door slammed.

"That's the first sensible thing she ever said," I says.

"She didn't go to school today," Mother says.

"How do you know?" I says. "Were you down town?"

"I just know," she says. "I wish you could be kinder to her."

"If I did that I'd have to arrange to see her more than once a day,"
I says. "You'll have to make her come to the table every meal. Then
I could give her an extra piece of meat every time."

"There are little things you could do," she says.

"Like not paying any attention when you ask me to see that she goes
to school?" I says.

"She didn't go to school today," she says. "I just know she didn't.
She says she went for a car ride with one of the boys this afternoon
and you followed her."

"How could I," I says. "When somebody had my car all afternoon? Whe-
ther or not she was in school today is already past," I says. "If
you've got to worry about it, worry about next Monday."

"I wanted you and she to get along with one another," she says. "But
she has inherited all of the headstrong traits. Quentin's too. I thought
at the time, with the heritage she would already have, to give her that
name, too. Sometimes I think she is the judgment of both of them upon
me."

"Good Lord," I says. "You've got a fine mind. No wonder you keep your-
self sick all the time."

"What?" she says. "I dont understand."

"I hope not," I says. "A good woman misses a lot she's better off with-
out knowing."

"They were both that way," she says. "They would make interest with
your father against me when I tried to correct them. He was always say-
ing they didn't need controlling, that they already knew what cleanli-
ness and honesty were, which was all that anyone could hope to be
taught. And now I hope he's satisfied."

"You've got Ben to depend on," I says. "Cheer up."

"They deliberately shut me out of their lives," she says. "It was al-
ways her and Quentin. They were always conspiring against me. Against
you too, though you were too young to realise it. They always looked on
you and me as outsiders, like they did your Uncle Maury. I always told
your father that they were allowed too much freedom, to be together
too much. When Quentin started to school we had to let her go the next
year, so she could be with him. She couldn't bear for any of you to do
anything she couldn't. It was vanity in her, vanity and false pride.
And then when her troubles began I knew that Quentin would feel that
he had to do something just as bad. But I didn't believe that he would
have been so selfish as to--I didn't dream that he--"

"Maybe he knew it was going to be a girl," I says. "And that one more
of them would be more than he could stand."

"He could have controlled her," she says. "He seemed to be the only
person she had any consideration for. But that is a part of the judg-
ment too, I suppose."

"Yes," I says. "Too bad it wasn't me instead of him. You'd be a lot
better off."

"You say things like that to hurt me," she says. "I deserve it though.
When they began to sell the land to send Quentin to Harvard I told your
father that he must make an equal provision for you. Then when Herbert
offered to take you into the bank I said, Jason is provided for now,
and when all the expense began to pile up and I was forced to sell our
furniture and the rest of the pasture, I wrote her at once because I
said she will realise that she and Quentin have had their share and
part of Jason's too and that it depends on her now to compensate him.
I said she will do that out of respect for her father. I believed that,
then. But I'm just a poor old woman; I was raised to believe that peo-
ple would deny themselves for their own flesh and blood. It's my fault.
You were right to reproach me."

"Do you think I need any man's help to stand on my feet?" I says. "Let
alone a woman that cant name the father of her own child."

"Jason," she says.

"All right," I says. "I didn't mean that. Of course not."

"If I believed that were possible, after all my suffering."

"Of course it's not," I says. "I didn't mean it."

"I hope that at least is spared me," she says.

"Sure it is," I says. "She's too much like both of them to doubt that."

"I couldn't bear that," she says.

"Then quit thinking about it," I says. "Has she been worrying you any
more about getting out at night?"

"No. I made her realise that it was for her own good and that she'd
thank me for it some day. She takes her books with her and studies af-
ter I lock the door. I see the light on as late as eleven oclock some
nights."

"How do you know she's studying?" I says.

"I dont know what else she'd do in there alone," she says. "She never
did read any."

"No," I says. "You wouldn't know. And you can thank your stars for
that," I says. Only what would be the use in saying it aloud. It would
just have her crying on me again.

I heard her go up stairs. Then she called Quentin and Quentin says
What? through the door.

"Goodnight," Mother says. Then I heard the key in the lock, and Mother
went back to her room.

When I finished my cigar and went up, the light was still on. I could
see the empty keyhole, but I couldn't hear a sound. She studied quiet.
Maybe she learned that in school. I told Mother goodnight and went on
to my room and got the box out and counted it again. I could hear the
Great American Gelding snoring away like a planing mill. I read some-
where they'd fix men that way to give them women's voices. But maybe
he didn't know what they'd done to him. I dont reckon he even knew what
he had been trying to do, or why Mr Burgess knocked him out with the
fence picket. And if they'd just sent him on to Jackson while he was
under the ether, he'd never have known the difference. But that would
have been too simple for a Compson to think of. Not half complex enough.
Having to wait to do it at all until he broke out and tried to run a
little girl down on the street with her own father looking at him. Well,
like I say they never started soon enough with their cutting, and they
quit too quick. I know at least two more that needed something like
that, and one of them not over a mile away, either. But then I dont
reckon even that would do any good. Like I say once a bitch always a
bitch. And just let me have twenty-four hours without any dam New York
jew to advise me what it's going to do. I don't want to make a killing;
save that to suck in the smart gamblers with. I just want an even chance
to get my money back. And once I've done that they can bring all Beale
street and all bedlam in here and two of them can sleep in my bed and
another one can have my place at the table too.




　　　　　　　　　　　　April 8, 1928




The day dawned bleak and chill, a moving wall of gray light out of the
northeast which, instead of dissolving into moisture, seemed to disinte-
grate into minute and venomous particles, like dust that, when Dilsey
opened the door of the cabin and emerged, needled laterally into her
flesh, precipitating not so much a moisture as a substance partaking of
the quality of thin, not quite congealed oil. She wore a stiff black
straw hat perched upon her turban, and a maroon velvet cape with a bor-
der of mangy and anonymous fur above a dress of purple silk, and she
stood in the door for a while with her myriad and sunken face lifted
to the weather, and one gaunt hand flac-soled as the belly of a fish,
then she moved the cape aside and examined the bosom of her gown.

The gown fell gauntly from her shoulders, across her fallen breasts,
then tightened upon her paunch and fell again, ballooning a little a-
bove the nether garments which she would remove layer by layer as the
spring accomplished and the warm days, in color regal and moribund. She
had been a big woman once but now her skeleton rose, draped loosely in
unpadded skin that tightened again upon a paunch almost dropsical, as
though muscle and tissue had been courage or fortitude which the days
or the years had consumed until only the indomitable skeleton was left
rising like a ruin or a landmark above the somnolent and impervious
guts, and above that the collapsed face that gave the impression of the
bones themselves being outside the flesh, lifted into the driving day
with an expression at once fatalistic and of a child's astonished dis-
appointment, until she turned and entered the house again and closed
the door.

The earth immediately about the door was bare. It had a patina, as
though from the soles of bare feet in generations, like old silver or
the walls of Mexican houses which have been plastered by hand. Beside
the house, shading it in summer, stood three mulberry trees, the fledg-
ed leaves that would later be broad and placid as the palms of hands
streaming flatly undulant upon the driving air. A pair of jaybirds came
up from nowhere, whirled up on the blast like gaudy scraps of cloth or
paper and lodged in the mulberries, where they swung in raucous tilt
and recover, screaming into the wind that ripped their harsh cries on-
ward and away like scraps of paper or of cloth in turn. Then three more
joined them and they swung and tilted in the wrung branches for a time,
screaming. The door of the cabin opened and Dilsey emerged once more,
this time in a man's felt hat and an army overcoat, beneath the frayed
skirts of which her blue gingham dress fell in uneven balloonings,
streaming too about her as she crossed the yard and mounted the steps
to the kitchen door.

A moment later she emerged, carrying an open umbrella now, which she
slanted ahead into the wind, and crossed to the woodpile and laid the
umbrella down, still open. Immediately she caught at it and arrested
it and held to it for a while, looking about her. Then she closed it
and laid it down and stacked stovewood into her crooked arm, against
her breast, and picked up the umbrella and got it open at last and re-
turned to the steps and held the wood precariously balanced while she
contrived to close the umbrella, which she propped in the corner just
within the door. She dumped the wood into the box behind the stove.
Then she removed the overcoat and hat and took a soiled apron down
from the wall and put it on and built a fire in the stove. While she
was doing so, rattling the grate bars and clattering the lids, Mrs
Compson began to call her from the head of the stairs.

She wore a dressing gown of quilted black satin, holding it close un-
der her chin. In the other hand she held a red rubber hot water bottle
and she stood at the head of the back stairway, calling "Dilsey" at
steady and inflectionless intervals into the quiet stairwell that de-
scended into complete darkness, then opened again where a gray window
fell across it. "Dilsey," she called, without inflection or emphasis
or haste, as though she were not listening for a reply at all. "Dilsey."
Dilsey answered and ceased clattering the stove, but before she could
cross the kitchen Mrs Compson called her again, and before she crossed
the diningroom and brought her head into relief against the gray splash
of the window, still again.

"All right," Dilsey said. "All right, here I is. I'll fill hit soon ez I git
some hot water." She gathered up her skirts and mounted the stairs,
wholly blotting the gray light. "Put hit down dar en g'awn back to bed."

"I couldn't understand what was the matter," Mrs Compson said. "I've been
lying awake for an hour at least, without hearing a sound from the kitchen."

"You put hit down and g'awn back to bed," Dilsey said. She toiled pain-
fully up the steps, shapeless, breathing heavily. "I'll have de fire gwine
in a minute, en de water hot in two mo."

"I've been lying there for an hour, at least," Mrs Compson said. "I thought
maybe you were waiting for me to come down and start the fire."

Dilsey reached the top of the stairs and took the water bottle. "I'll fix
hit in a minute," she said. "Luster overslep dis mawnin, up half de night
at dat show. I gwine build de fire myself. Go on now, so you wont wake de
others swell I ready."

"If you permit Luster to do things that interfere with his work, you'll
have to suffer for it yourself," Mrs Compson said. "Jason wont like this
if he hears about it. You know he wont."

"'Twusn't none of Jason's money he went on," Dilsey said. "Dat's one thing
shot" She went on down the stairs. Mrs Compson returned to her room. As
she got into bed again she could hear Dilsey yet descending the stairs with
a sort of painful and terrific slowness that would have become maddening had
it not presently ceased beyond the flapping diminishment of the pantry door.

She entered the kitchen and built up the fire and began to prepare breakfast.
In the midst of this she ceased and went to the window and looked out toward
her cabin, then she went to the door and opened it and shouted into the dri-
ving weather.

"Luster!" she shouted, standing to listen, tilting her face from the wind.
"You, Luster!" She listened, then as she prepared to shout again Luster ap-
peared around the corner of the kitchen.

"Ma'am?" he said innocently, so innocently that Dilsey looked down at him,
for a moment motionless, with something more than mere surprise.

"Whar you at?" she said.

"Nowhere," he said. "Jes in de cellar."

"Whut you doin in de cellar?" she said. "Dont stand dar in de rain, fool,"
she said.

"Aint doin nothin," he said. He came up the steps.

"Dont you dare come in dis do widout a armful of wood," she said. "Here I
done had to tote yo wood en build yo fire bofe. Didn't I tole you not to
leave dis place last night befo dat woodbox wus full to de top?"

"I did," Luster said. "I filled hit."

"Whar hit gone to, den?"

"I dont know'm. I aint teched hit."

"Well, you git hit full up now," she said. "And git on up dar en see bout
Benjy."

She shut the door. Luster went to the woodpile. The five jaybirds whirled
over the house, screaming, and into the mulberries again. He watched them.
He picked up a rock and threw it. "Whoo," he said. "Git on back to hell,
whar you belong at. 'Taint Monday yit."

He loaded himself mountainously with stove wood. He could not see over it,
and he staggered to the steps and up them and blundered crashing against
the door, shedding billets. Then Dilsey came and opened the door for him
and he blundered across the kitchen. "You, Luster!"Hah!"" she shouted, but
he had already hurled the wood into the box with a thunderous crash. "Hah!"
he said.

"Is you tryin to wake up de whole house?" Dilsey said. She hit him on the
back of his head with the flat of her hand. "Go on up dar and git Benjy
dressed, now."

"Yessum," he said. He went toward the outer door.

"Whar you gwine Dilsey said.

"I thought I better go round de house en in by de front, so I wont wake up
Miss Cahline en dem."

"You go on up dem back stairs like I tole you en git Benjy's clothes on him,"
Dilsey said. "Go on, now."

"Yessum," Luster said. He returned and left by the diningroom door. After a
while it ceased to flap. Dilsey prepared to make biscuit. As she ground the
sifter steadily above the bread board, she sang, to herself at first, some-
thing without particular tune or words, repetitive, mournful and plaintive,
austere, as she ground a faint, steady snowing of flour onto the bread board.
The stove had begun to heat the room and to fill it with murmurous minors of
the fire, and presently she was singing louder, as if her voice too had been
thawed out by the growing warmth, and then Mrs Compson called her name again
from within the house. Dilsey raised her face as if her eyes could and did
penetrate the walls and ceiling and saw the old woman in her quilted dress-
ing gown at the head of the stairs, calling her name with machinelike regu-
larity.

"Oh, Lawd," Dilsey said. She set the sifter down and swept up the hem of her
apron and wiped her hands and caught up the bottle from the chair on which
she had laid it and gathered her apron about the handle of the kettle which
was now jetting faintly. "Jes a minute," she called. "De water jes dis min-
ute got hot."

It was not the bottle which Mrs Compson wanted, however, and clutching it
by the neck like a dead hen Dilsey went to the foot of the stairs and look-
ed upward.

"Aint Luster up dar wid him?" she said.

"Luster hasn't been in the house. I've been lying here listening for him.
I knew he would be late, but I did hope he'd come in time to keep Benjamin
from disturbing Jason on Jason's one day in the week to sleep in the morning."

"I dont see how you expect anybody to sleep, wid you standin in de hall,
holl'in at folks fum de crack of dawn," Dilsey said. She began to mount the
stairs, toiling heavily. "I sent dat boy up dar half an hour ago."

Mrs Compson watched her, holding the dressing gown under her chin. "What
are you going to do?" she said.

"Gwine git Benjy dressed en bring him down to de kitchen, whar he wont wake
Jason en Quentin," Dilsey said.

"Haven't you started breakfast yet?"

"I'll tend to dat too," Dilsey said. "You better git back in bed swell Lus-
ter make yo fire. Hit cold dis mawnin."

"I know it," Mrs Compson said. "My feet are like ice. They were so cold
they waked me up."

She watched Dilsey mount the stairs. It took her a long while. "You know how
it frets Jason when breakfast is late," Mrs Compson said.

"I cant do but one thing at a time," Dilsey said. "You git on back to bed,
fo I has you on my hands dis mawnin too."

"If you're going to drop everything to dress Benjamin, I'd better come down
and get breakfast. You know as well as I do how Jason acts when it's late."

"En who gwine eat yo messin?" Dilsey said. "Tell me dat. Go on now," she
said, toiling upward. Mrs Compson stood watching her as she mounted, stead-
ying herself against the wall with one hand, holding her skirts up with the
other.

"Are you going to wake him up just to dress him?" she said.

Dilsey stopped. With her foot lifted to the next step she stood there, her
hand against the wall and the gray splash of the window behind her, motion-
less and shapeless she loomed.

"He aint awake den?" she said.

"He wasn't when I looked in," Mrs Compson said. "But it's past his time.
He never does sleep after half past seven. You know he doesn't."

Dilsey said nothing. She made no further move, but though she could not
see her save as a blobby shape without depth, Mrs Compson knew that she
had lowered her face a little and that she stood now like cows do in the
rain, holding the empty water bottle by its neck.

"You're not the one who has to bear it," Mrs Compson said. "It's not your
responsibility. You can go away. You dont have to bear the brunt of it day
in and day out. You owe nothing to them, to Mr Compson's memory. I know
you have never had any tenderness for Jason. You've never tried to conceal
it."

Dilsey said nothing. She turned slowly and descended, lowering her body
from step to step, as a small child does, her hand against the wall. "You
go on and let him alone," she said. "Dont go in dar no mo, now. I'll send
Luster up soon as I find him. Let him alone, now."

She returned to the kitchen. She looked into the stove, then she drew her
apron over her head and donned the overcoat and opened the outer door and
looked up and down the yard. The weather drove upon her flesh, harsh and
minute, but the scene was empty of all else that moved. She descended the
steps, gingerly, as if for silence, and went around the corner of the kit-
chen. As she did so Luster emerged quickly and innocently from the cellar
door.

Dilsey stopped. "Whut you up to?" she said.

"Nothin," Luster said. "Mr Jason say fer me to find out whar dat water
leak in de cellar fum."

"En when wus hit he say fer you to do dat?" Dilsey said. "Last New Year's
day, wasn't hit?"

"I thought I jes be lookin whiles dey sleep," Luster said. Dilsey went to
the cellar door. He stood aside and she peered down into the obscurity o-
dorous of dank earth and mold and rubber.

"Huh," Dilsey said. She looked at Luster again. He met her gaze blandly,
innocent and open. "I dont know whut you up to, but you aint got no busi-
ness doin hit. You jes tryin me too dis mawnin cause de others is, aint you?
You git on up dar en see to Benjy, you hear?"

"Yessum," Luster said. He went on toward the kitchen steps, swiftly.

"Here," Dilsey said. "You git me another armful of wood while I got you."

"Yessum," he said. He passed her on the steps and went to the woodpile.
When he blundered again at the door a moment later, again invisible and
blind within and beyond his wooden avatar, Dilsey opened the door and
guided him across the kitchen with a firm hand.

"Jes thow hit at dat box again," she said. "Jes thow hit."

"I got to," Luster said, panting. "I cant put hit down no other way."

"Den you stand dar en hold hit a while," Dilsey said. She unloaded him
a stick at a time. "Whut got into you dis mawnin? Here I sont you fer
wood en you aint never brought mo'n six sticks at a time to save yo
life swell today. Whut you fixin to ax me kin you do now? Aint dat
show lef town yit?"

"Yessum. Hit done gone."

She put the last stick into the box. "Now you go on up dar wid Benjy,
like I tole you befo," she said. "And I dont want nobody else yellin
down dem stairs at me swell I rings de bell. You hear me." "Yessum,"
Luster said. He vanished through the swing door. Dilsey put some more
wood in the stove and returned to the bread board. Presently she began
to sing again.

The room grew warmer. Soon Dilsey's skin had taken on a rich, lustrous
quality as compared with that as of a faint dusting of wood ashes which
both it and Luster's had worn as she moved about the kitchen, gathering
about her the raw materials of food, coordinating the meal. On the wall
above a cupboard, invisible save at night, by lamp light and even then
evincing an enigmatic profundity because it had but one hand, a cabinet
clock ticked, then with a preliminary sound as if it had cleared its
throat, struck five times.

"Eight oclock," Dilsey said. She ceased and tilted her head upward, lis-
tening. But there was no sound save the clock and the fire. She opened the
oven and looked at the pan of bread, then stooping she paused while some-
one descended the stairs. She heard the feet cross the diningroom, then
the swing door opened and Luster entered, followed by a big man who appe-
ared to have been shaped of some substance whose particles would not or
did not cohere to one another or to the frame which supported it. His
skin was dead looking and hairless; dropsical too, he moved with a sham-
bling gait like a trained bear. His hair was pale and fine. It had been
brushed smoothly down upon his brow like that of children in daguerro-
types. His eyes were clear, of the pale sweet blue of cornflowers, his
thick mouth hung open, drooling a little.

"Is he cold?" Dilsey said. She wiped her hands on her apron and touched
his hand.

"Ef he aint, I is," Luster said. "Always cold Easter. Aint never seen hit
fail. Miss Cahline say ef you aint got time to fix her hot water bottle to
never mind about hit." "Oh, Lawd," Dilsey said. She drew a chair into the
corner between the woodbox and the stove. The man went obediently and sat
in it. "Look in de dinin room and see whar I laid dat bottle down," Dilsey
said. Luster fetched the bottle from the diningroom and Dilsey filled it
and gave it to him. "Hurry up, now," she said. "See ef Jason wake now.
Tell em hit's all ready."

Luster went out. Ben sat beside the stove. He sat loosely, utterly motion-
less save for his head, which made a continual bobbing sort of movement
as he watched Dilsey with his sweet vague gaze as she moved about. Luster
returned.

"He up," he said. "Miss Cahline say put hit on de table." He came to the
stove and spread his hands palm down above the firebox. "He up, too," he
said. "Gwine hit wid bofe feet dis mawnin." "Whut's de matter now?" Dilsey
said. "Git away fum dar. How kin I do anything wid you standin over de
stove?"

"I cold," Luster said.

"You ought to thought about dat whiles you was down dar in dat cellar,"
Dilsey said. "Whut de matter wid Jason?"

"Sayin me en Benjy broke dat winder in his room."

"Is dey one broke?" Dilsey said.

"Dat's whut he sayin," Luster said. "Say I broke hit."

"How could you, when he keep hit locked all day en night?"

"Say I broke hit chunkin rocks at hit," Luster said.

"En did you?"

"Nome," Luster said.

"Dont lie to me, boy," Dilsey said.

"I never done hit," Luster said. "Ask Benjy ef I did. I aint stud'in dat
winder."

"Who could a broke hit, den?" Dilsey said. "He jes tryin hisself, to wake
Quentin up," she said, taking the pan of biscuits out of the stove.

"Reckin so," Luster said. "Dese funny folks. Glad I aint none of em."

"Aint none of who?" Dilsey said. "Lemme tell you somethin, nigger boy, you
got jes es much Compson devilment in you es any of em. Is you right sho you
never broke dat window?"

"Whut I want to break hit fur?"

"Whut you do any of yo devilment fur?" Dilsey said. "Watch him now, so he
cant burn his hand again swell I git de table set."

She went to the diningroom, where they heard her moving about, then she re-
turned and set a plate at the kitchen table and set food there. Ben watched
her, slobbering, making a faint, eager sound. "All right, honey," she said.
"Here yo breakfast. Bring his chair, Luster." Luster moved the chair up and
Ben sat down, whimpering and slobbering. Dilsey tied a cloth about his neck
and wiped his mouth with the end of it. "And see kin you keep fum messin up
his clothes one time," she said, handing Luster a spoon.

Ben ceased whimpering. He watched the spoon as it rose to his mouth. It was
as if even eagerness were musclebound in him too, and hunger itself inarti-
culate, not knowing it is hunger. Luster fed him with skill and detachment.
Now and then his attention would return long enough to enable him to feint
the spoon and cause Ben to close his mouth upon the empty air, but it was
apparent that Luster's mind was elsewhere. His other hand lay on the back
of the chair and upon that dead surface it moved tentatively, delicately,
as if he were picking an inaudible tune out of the dead void, and once he
even forgot to tease Ben with the spoon while his fingers teased out of the
slain wood a soundless and involved arpeggio until Ben recalled him by whim-
pering again.

In the diningroom Dilsey moved back and forth. Presently she rang a small
clear bell, then in the kitchen Luster heard Mrs Compson and Jason descend-
ing, and Jason's voice, and he rolled his eyes whitely with listening.

"Sure, I know they didn't break it," Jason said. "Sure, I know that. Maybe
the change of weather broke it."

"I dont see how it could have," Mrs Compson said. "Your room stays locked
all day long, just as you leave it when you go to town. None of us ever go
in there except Sunday, to clean it. I dont want you to think that I would
go where I'm not wanted, or that I would permit anyone else to."

"I never said you broke it, did I?" Jason said.

"I dont want to go in your room," Mrs Compson said. "I respect anybody's
private affairs. I wouldn't put my foot over the threshold, even if I had
a key."

"Yes," Jason said. "I know your keys wont fit. That's why I had the lock
changed. What I want to know is, how that window got broken."

"Luster say he didn't do hit," Dilsey said.

"I knew that without asking him," Jason said. "Where's Quentin?" he said.

"Where she is ev'y Sunday mawnin," Dilsey said. "Whut got into you de last
few days, anyhow?"

"Well, we're going to change all that," Jason said. "Go up and tell her
breakfast is ready."

"You leave her alone now, Jason," Dilsey said. "She gits up fer breakfast
ev'y week mawnin, en Miss Cahline lets her stay in bed ev'y Sunday. You
knows dat."

"I cant keep a kitchen full of niggers to wait on her pleasure, much as
I'd like to," Jason said. "Go and tell her to come down to breakfast."

"Aint nobody have to wait on her," Dilsey said. "I puts her breakfast in
de warmer en she--"

"Did you hear me?" Jason said.

"I hears you," Dilsey said. "All I been hearin, when you in de house. Ef
hit aint Quentin er yo maw, hit's Luster en Benjy. Whut you let him go on
dat way fer, Miss Cahline?"

"You'd better do as he says," Mrs Compson said. "He's head of the house
now. It's his right to require us to respect his wishes. I try to do it, and if I
can, you can too."

"'Taint no sense in him bein so bad tempered he got to make Quentin git
up jes to suit him," Dilsey said. "Maybe you think she broke dat window."

"She would, if she happened to think of it," Jason said. "You go and do
what I told you."

"En I wouldn't blame her none ef she did," Dilsey said, going toward the
stairs. "Wid you naggin at her all de blessed time you in de house."

"Hush, Dilsey," Mrs Compson said. "It's neither your place nor mine to
tell Jason what to do. Sometimes I think he is wrong, but I try to obey
his wishes for you all's sakes. If I'm strong enough to come to the ta-
ble, Quentin can too."

Dilsey went out. They heard her mounting the stairs. They heard her a
long while on the stairs.

"You've got a prize set of servants," Jason said. He helped his mother
and himself to food. "Did you ever have one that was worth killing? You
must have had some before I was big enough to remember."

"I have to humor them," Mrs Compson said. "I have to depend on them so
completely. It's not as if I were strong. I wish I were. I wish I could do all
the house work myself. I could at least take that much off your shoulders."

"And a fine pigsty we'd live in, too," Jason said. "Hurry up, Dilsey,"
he shouted.

"I know you blame me," Mrs Compson said, "for letting them off to go
to church today."

"Go where?" Jason said. "Hasn't that damn show left yet?"

"To church," Mrs Compson said. "The darkies are having a special Easter
service. I promised Dilsey two weeks ago that they could get off."

"Which means we'll eat cold dinner," Jason said, "or none at all."

"I know it's my fault," Mrs Compson said. "I know you blame me."

"For what?" Jason said. "You never resurrected Christ, did you?"

They heard Dilsey mount the final stair, then her slow feet overhead.

"Quentin," she said. When she called the first time Jason laid his knife
and fork down and he and his mother appeared to wait across the table
from one another in identical attitudes; the one cold and shrewd, with
close-thatched brown hair curled into two stubborn hooks, one on either
side of his forehead like a bartender in caricature, and hazel eyes with
black-ringed irises like marbles, the other cold and querulous, with per-
fectly white hair and eyes pouched and baffled and so dark as to appear
to be all pupil or all iris.

"Quentin," Dilsey said. "Get up, honey. Dey waitin breakfast on you."

"I cant understand how that window got broken," Mrs Compson said. "Are
you sure it was done yesterday? It could have been like that a long time,
with the warm weather. The upper sash, behind the shade like that."

"I've told you for the last time that it happened yesterday," Jason said.
"Dont you reckon I know the room I live in? Do you reckon I could have
lived in it a week with a hole in the window you could stick your
hand…." his voice ceased, ebbed, left him staring at his mother with
eyes that for an instant were quite empty of anything. It was as though
his eyes were holding their breath, while his mother looked at him, her
face flaccid and querulous, interminable, clairvoyant yet obtuse. As
they sat so Dilsey said,

"Quentin. Dont play wid me, honey. Come on to breakfast, honey. Dey wait-
in fer you."

"I cant understand it," Mrs Compson said. "It's just as if somebody had
tried to break into the house--" Jason sprang up. His chair crashed over
backward. "What--" Mrs Compson said, staring at him as he ran past her
and went jumping up the stairs, where he met Dilsey. His face was now in
shadow, and Dilsey said,

"She sullin. Yo maw aint unlocked--" But Jason ran on past her and along
the corridor to a door. He didn't call. He grasped the knob and tried it,
then he stood with the knob in his hand and his head bent a little, as
if he were listening to something much further away than the dimensioned
room beyond the door, and which he already heard. His attitude was that
of one who goes through the motions of listening in order to deceive him-
self as to what he already hears. Behind him Mrs Compson mounted the
stairs, calling his name. Then she saw Dilsey and she quit calling him
and began to call Dilsey instead.

"I told you she aint unlocked dat do yit," Dilsey said.

When she spoke he turned and ran toward her, but his voice was quiet,
matter of fact. "She carry the key with her?" he said. "Has she got it
now, I mean, or will she have--"

"Dilsey," Mrs Compson said on the stairs.

"Is which?" Dilsey said. "Whyn't you let--"

"The key," Jason said. "To that room. Does she carry it with her all the
time. Mother." Then he saw Mrs Compson and he went down the stairs and
met her. "Give me the key," he said. He fell to pawing at the pockets of
the rusty black dressing sacque she wore. She resisted.

"Jason," she said. "Jason! Are you and Dilsey trying to put me to bed a-
gain?" she said, trying to fend him off. "Cant you even let me have Sun-
day in peace?"

"The key," Jason said, pawing at her. "Give it here." He looked back at
the door, as if he expected it to fly open before he could get back to
it with the key he did not yet have. "You, Dilsey!" Mrs Compson said,
clutching her sacque about her.

"Give me the key, you old fool!" Jason cried suddenly. From her pocket
he tugged a huge bunch of rusted keys on an iron ring like a mediaeval
jailer's and ran back up the hall with the two women behind him.

"You, Jason!" Mrs Compson said. "He will never find the right one," she
said. "You know I never let anyone take my keys, Dilsey," she said. She
began to wail.

"Hush," Dilsey said. "He aint gwine do nothin to her. I aint gwine let
him."

"But on Sunday morning, in my own house," Mrs Compson said. "When
I've tried so hard to raise them christians. Let me find the right key, Ja-
son," she said. She put her hand on his arm. Then she began to struggle
with him, but he flung her aside with a motion of his elbow and looked
around at her for a moment, his eyes cold and harried, then he turned
to the door again and the unwieldy keys.

"Hush," Dilsey said. "You, Jason!"

"Something terrible has happened," Mrs Compson said, wailing again. "I
know it has. You, Jason," she said, grasping at him again. "He wont e-
ven let me find the key to a room in my own house!"

"Now, now," Dilsey said. "Whut kin happen? I right here. I aint gwine
let him hurt her. Quentin," she said, raising her voice, "dont you be
skeered, honey, I'se right here."

The door opened, swung inward. He stood in it for a moment, hiding the
room, then he stepped aside. "Go in," he said in a thick, light voice.
They went in. It was not a girl's room. It was not anybody's room, and
the faint scent of cheap cosmetics and the few feminine objects and the
other evidences of crude and hopeless efforts to feminise it but added
to its anonymity, giving it that dead and stereotyped transience of
rooms in assignation houses. The bed had not been disturbed. On the
floor lay a soiled undergarment of cheap silk a little too pink, from
a half open bureau drawer dangled a single stocking. The window was o-
pen. A pear tree grew there, close against the house. It was in bloom
and the branches scraped and rasped against the house and the myriad
air, driving in the window, brought into the room the forlorn scent of
the blossoms.

"Dar now," Dilsey said. "Didn't I told you she all right?"

"All right?" Mrs Compson said. Dilsey followed her into the room and
touched her. "You come on and lay down, now," she said. "I find her in
ten minutes."

Mrs Compson shook her off. "Find the note," she said. "Quentin left a
note when he did it."

"All right," Dilsey said. "I'll find hit. You come on to yo room, now."

"I knew the minute they named her Quentin this would happen," Mrs Comp-
son said. She went to the bureau and began to turn over the scattered
objects there--scent bottles, a box of powder, a chewed pencil, a pair
of scissors with one broken blade lying upon a darned scarf dusted with
powder and stained with rouge. "Find the note," she said.

"I is," Dilsey said. "You come on, now. Me and Jason'll find hit. You
come on to yo room."

"Jason," Mrs Compson said. "Where is he?" She went to the door. Dilsey
followed her on down the hall, to another door. It was closed. "Jason,"
she called through the door. There was no answer. She tried the knob,
then she called him again. But there was still no answer, for he was
hurling things backward out of the closet, garments, shoes, a suitcase.
Then he emerged carrying a sawn section of tongue-and-groove planking
and laid it down and entered the closet again and emerged with a metal
box. He set it on the bed and stood looking at the broken lock while he
dug a keyring from his pocket and selected a key, and for a time longer
he stood with the selected key in his hand, looking at the broken lock.
Then he put the keys back in his pocket and carefully tilted the con-
tents of the box out upon the bed. Still carefully he sorted the papers,
taking them up one at a time and shaking them. Then he upended the box
and shook it too and slowly replaced the papers and stood again, look-
ing at the broken lock, with the box in his hands and his head bent.
Outside the window he heard some jaybirds swirl shrieking past and a-
way, their cries whipping away along the wind, and an automobile passed
somewhere and died away also. His mother spoke his name again beyond
the door, but he didn't move. He heard Dilsey lead her away up the hall,
and then a door closed. Then he replaced the box in the closet and flung
the garments back into it and went down stairs to the telephone. While
he stood there with the receiver to his ear waiting Dilsey came down
the stairs. She looked at him, without stopping, and went on.

The wire opened. "This is Jason Compson," he said, his voice so harsh
and thick that he had to repeat himself. "Jason Compson," he said, con-
trolling his voice. "Have a car ready, with a deputy, if you cant go, in ten
minutes. I'll be there-- What?--Robbery. My house. I know who it--Rob-
bery, I say. Have a car read-- What?? Aren't you a paid law enforcement
-- Yes, I'll be there in five minutes. Have that car ready to leave at once.
If you dont, I'll report it to the governor."

He clapped the receiver back and crossed the diningroom, where the
scarce broken meal lay cold now on the table, and entered the kitchen.
Dilsey was filling the hot water bottle. Ben sat, tranquil and empty.
Beside him Luster looked like a fice dog, brightly watchful. He was
eating something. Jason went on across the kitchen.

"Aint you going to eat no breakfast?" Dilsey said. He paid her no at-
tention. "Go on en eat yo breakfast, Jason." He went on. The outer door
banged behind him. Luster rose and went to the window and looked out.

"Whoo," he said. "Whut happenin up dar? He been beatin Miss Quentin?"

"You hush yo mouf," Dilsey said. "You git Benjy started now en I beat
yo head off. You keep him quiet es you kin swell I git back, now." She
screwed the cap on the bottle and went out. They heard her go up the
stairs, then they heard Jason pass the house in his car. Then there
was no sound in the kitchen save the simmering murmur of the kettle
and the clock.

"You know whut I bet?" Luster said. "I bet he beat her. I bet he knock
her in de head en now he gone fer de doctor. Dat's whut I bet." The
clock tick-tocked, solemn and profound. It might have been the dry
pulse of the decaying house itself, after a while it whirred and cle-
ared its throat and struck six times. Ben looked up at it, then he
looked at the bulletlike silhouette of Luster's head in the window
and he begun to bob his head again, drooling. He whimpered.

"Hush up, looney," Luster said without turning. "Look like we aint
"gwine git to go to no church today." But Ben sat in the chair, his
big soft hands dangling between his knees, moaning faintly. Suddenly
he wept, a slow bellowing sound, meaningless and sustained. "Hush,"
Luster said. He turned and lifted his hand. "You want me to whup you?"
But Ben looked at him, bellowing slowly with each expiration. Luster
came and shook him. "You hush dis minute!" he shouted. "Here," he
said. He hauled Ben out of the chair and dragged the chair around
facing the stove and opened the door to the firebox and shoved Ben
into the chair. They looked like a tug nudging at a clumsy tanker
in a narrow dock. Ben sat down again facing the rosy door. He hushed.
Then they heard the clock again, and Dilsey slow on the stairs. When
she entered he began to whimper again. Then he lifted his voice.

"Whut you done to him?" Dilsey said. "Why cant you let him lone dis
mawnin, of all times?"

"I aint doin nothin to him," Luster said. "Mr Jason skeered him,
dat's whut hit is. He aint kilt Miss Quentin, is he?"

"Hush, Benjy," Dilsey said. He hushed. She went to the window and
looked out. "Is it quit rainin?" she said.

"Yessum," Luster said. "Quit long time ago."

"Den y'all go out do's a while," she said. "I jes got Miss Cahline
quiet now."

"Is we gwine to church?" Luster said.

"I let you know bout dat when de time come. You keep him away fum
de house swell I calls you."

"Kin we go to de pastuh?" Luster said.

"All right. Only you keep him away fum de house. I done stood all I
kin."

"Yessum," Luster said. "Whar Mr Jason gone, mammy?"

"Dat's some mo of yo business, aint it?" Dilsey said. She began to
clear the table. "Hush, Benjy. Luster gwine take you out to play."

"Whut he done to Miss Quentin, mammy?" Luster said.

"Aint done nothin to her. You all git on outen here."

"I bet she aint here," Luster said.

Dilsey looked at him. "How you know she aint here?"

"Me and Benjy seed her clamb out de window last night. Didn't us,
Benjy?"

"You did?" Dilsey said, looking at him.

"We sees her doin hit ev'y night," Luster said. "Clamb right down
dat pear tree."

"Dont you lie to me, nigger boy," Dilsey said.

"I aint lyin. Ask Benjy ef I is."

"Whyn't you say somethin about it, den?"

"'Twarn't none o my business," Luster said. "I aint gwine git mixed
up in white folks' business. Come on here, Benjy, les go out do's."

They went out. Dilsey stood for a while at the table, then she went
and cleared the breakfast things from the diningroom and ate her
breakfast and cleaned up the kitchen. Then she removed her apron
and hung it up and went to the foot of the stairs and listened for
a moment. There was no sound. She donned the overcoat and the hat
and went across to her cabin.

The rain had stopped. The air now drove out of the southeast,bro-
ken overhead into blue patches. Upon the crest of a hill beyond the
trees and roofs and spires of town sunlight lay like a pale scrap of
cloth, was blotted away. Upon the air a bell came, then as if at a
signal, other bells took up the sound and repeated it.

The cabin door opened and Dilsey emerged, again in the maroon cape
and the purple gown, and wearing soiled white elbow-length gloves
and minus her headcloth now. She came into the yard and called Lus-
ter. She waited a while, then she went to the house and around it
to the cellar door, moving close to the wall, and looked into the
door. Ben sat on the steps. Before him Luster squatted on the damp
floor. He held a saw in his left hand, the blade sprung a little by
pressure of his hand, and he was in the act of striking the blade
with the worn wooden mallet with which she had been making
beaten biscuit for more than thirty years. The saw gave forth a
single sluggish twang that ceased with lifeless alacrity, leaving
the blade in a thin clean curve between Luster's hand and the
floor. Still, inscrutable, it bellied.

"Dat's de way he done hit," Luster said. "I jes aint foun de right
thing to hit it wid."

"Dat's whut you doin, is it?" Dilsey said. "Bring me dat mallet,"
she said.

"I aint hurt hit," Luster said.

"Bring hit here," Dilsey said. "Put dat saw whar you got hit
first."

He put the saw away and brought the mallet to her. Then Ben wailed
again, hopeless and prolonged. It was nothing. Just sound. It might
have been all time and injustice and sorrow become vocal for an in-
stant by a conjunction of planets.

"Listen at him," Luster said. "He been gwine on dat way ev'y since
you sont us outen de house. I dont know whut got in to him dis maw-
nin."

"Bring him here," Dilsey said.

"Come on, Benjy," Luster said. He went back down the steps and took
Ben's arm. He came obediently, wailing, that slow hoarse sound that
ships make, that seems to begin before the sound itself has started,
seems to cease before the sound itself has stopped.

"Run and git his cap," Dilsey said. "Dont make no noise Miss Cahline
kin hear. Hurry, now. We already late."

"She gwine hear him anyhow, ef you dont stop him," Luster said.

"He stop when we git off de place," Dilsey said. "He smellin hit.
Dat's whut hit is."

"Smell whut, mammy?" Luster said.

"You go git dat cap," Dilsey said. Luster went on. They stood in the
cellar door, Ben one step below her. The sky was broken now into scud-
ding patches that dragged their swift shadows up out of the shabby gar-
den, over the broken fence and across the yard. Dilsey stroked Ben's
head, slowly and steadily, smoothing the bang upon his brow. He wailed
quietly, unhurriedly. "Hush," Dilsey said. "Hush, now. We be gone in a
minute. Hush, now." He wailed quietly and steadily.

Luster returned, wearing a stiff new straw hat with a colored band and
carrying a cloth cap. The hat seemed to isolate Luster's skull, in the
beholder's eye as a spotlight would, in all its individual planes and
angles. So peculiarly individual was its shape that at first glance the
hat appeared to be on the head of someone standing immediately behind
Luster. Dilsey looked at the hat.

"Whyn't you wear yo old hat?" she said.

"Couldn't find hit," Luster said.

"I bet you couldn't. I bet you fixed hit last night so you couldn't
find hit. You fixin to ruin dat un."

"Aw, mammy," Luster said. "Hit aint gwine rain."

"How you know? You go git dat old hat en put dat new un away."

"Aw, mammy."

"Den you go git de umbreller."

"Aw, mammy."

"Take yo choice," Dilsey said. "Git yo old hat, er de umbreller. I dont
keer which."

Luster went to the cabin. Ben wailed quietly.

"Come on," Dilsey said. "Dey kin ketch up wid us. We "wine to hear de
singin." They went around the house, toward the gate. "Hush," Dilsey said
from time to time as they went down the drive. They reached the gate. Dil-
sey opened it. Luster was coming down the drive behind them, carrying the
umbrella. A woman was with him. "Here dey come," Dilsey said. They passed
out the gate. "Now, den," she said. Ben ceased. Luster and his mother ov-
ertook them. Frony wore a dress of bright blue silk and a flowered hat.
She was a thin woman, with a flat, pleasant face.

"You got six weeks' work right dar on yo back," Dilsey said. "Whut you
gwine do ef hit rain?"

"Git wet, I reckon," Frony said. "I aint never stopped no rain yit."

"Mammy always talkin bout hit gwine rain," Luster said.

"Ef I dont worry bout y'all, I dont know who is," Dilsey said. "Come on,
we already late."

"Rev'un Shegog gwine preach today," Frony said.

"Is?" Dilsey said. "Who him?"

"He fum Saint Looey," Frony said. "Dat big preacher."

"Huh," Dilsey said. "Whut dey needs is a man kin put de fear of God into
dese here triflin young niggers."

"Rev'un Shegog kin do dat," Frony said. "So dey tells."

They went on along the street. Along its quiet length white people in
bright clumps moved churchward, under the windy bells, walking now and
then in the random and tentative sun. The wind was gusty, out of the
southeast, chill and raw after the warm days.

"I wish you wouldn't keep on bringin him to church, mammy," Frony said.
"Folks talkin."

"Whut folks?" Dilsey said.

"I hears em," Frony said.

"And I knows whut kind of folks," Dilsey said. "Trash white folks. Dat's
who it is. Thinks he aint good enough fer white church, but nigger church
aint good enough fer him."

"Dey talks, jes de same," Frony said.

"Den you send um to me," Dilsey said. "Tell um de good Lawd dont keer whe-
ther he bright er not. Dont nobody but white trash keer dat."

A street turned off at right angles, descending, and became a dirt road.
On either hand the land dropped more sharply; a broad flat dotted with small
cabins whose weathered roofs were on a level with the crown of the road.
They were set in small grassless plots littered with broken things, bricks,
planks, crockery, things of a once utilitarian value. What growth there was
consisted of rank weeds and the trees were mulberries and locusts and syca-
mores--trees that partook also of the foul desiccation which surrounded the
houses; trees whose very burgeoning seemed to be the sad and stubborn remnant
of September, as if even spring had passed them by, leaving them to feed u-
pon the rich and unmistakable smell of negroes in which they grew.

From the doors negroes spoke to them as they passed, to Dilsey usually:

"Sis' Gibson! How you dis mawnin?" "I'm well. Is you well?"

"I'm right well, I thank you."

They emerged from the cabins and struggled up the sharing levee to the road--
men in staid, hard brown or black, with gold watch chains and now and then a
stick; young men in cheap violent blues or stripes and swaggering hats; women
a little stiffly sibilant, and children in garments bought second hand of white
people, who looked at Ben with the covertness of nocturnal animals:

"I bet you wont go up en tech him."

"How come I wont?"

"I bet you wont. I bet you skeered to."

"He wont hurt folks. He des a looney."

"How come a looney wont hurt folks?"

"Dat un wont. I teched him."

"I bet you wont now."

"Case Miss Dilsey lookin."

"You wont no ways."

"He dont hurt folks. He des a looney."

And steadily the older people speaking to Dilsey, though, unless they were quite
old, Dilsey permitted Frony to respond.

"Mammy aint feelin well dis mawnin."

"Dat's too bad. But Rev'un Shegog'll kyo dat. He'll give her de comfort en de
unburdenin."

The road rose again, to a scene like a painted backdrop. Notched into a cut of
red clay crowned with oaks the road appeared to stop short off, like a cut ribbon.
Beside it a weathered church lifted its crazy steeple like a painted church, and
the whole scene was as flat and without perspective as a painted cardboard set u-
pon the ultimate edge of the flat earth, against the windy sunlight of space and
April and a midmorning filled with bells. Toward the church they thronged with
slow sabbath deliberation, the women and children went on in, the men stopped out-
side and talked in quiet groups until the bell ceased ringing. Then they too enter-
ed.

The church had been decorated, with sparse flowers from kitchen gardens and hedge-
rows, and with streamers of colored crepe paper. Above the pulpit hung a battered
Christmas bell, the accordion sort that collapses. The pulpit was empty, though the
choir was already in place, fanning themselves although it was not warm.

Most of the women were gathered on one side of the room. They were talking. Then
the bell struck one time and they dispersed to their seats and the congregation sat
for an instant, expectant. The bell struck again one time. The choir rose and began
to sing and the congregation turned its head as one as six small children--four girls
with tight pigtails bound with small scraps of cloth like butterflies, and two boys with
close napped heads--entered and marched up the aisle, strung together in a harness
of white ribbons and flowers, and followed by two men in single file. The second man
was huge, of a light coffee color, imposing in a frock coat and white tie. His head was
magisterial and profound, his neck rolled above his collar in rich folds. But he was
familiar to them, and so the heads were still reverted when he had passed, and it
was not until the choir ceased singing that they realised that the visiting clergyman
had already entered, and when they saw the man who had preceded their minister
enter the pulpit still ahead of him an indescribable sound went up, a sigh, a sound
of astonishment and disappointment.

The visitor was undersized, in a shabby alpaca coat. He had a wizened black face like
a small, aged monkey. And all the while that the choir sang again and while the six
children rose and sang in thin, frightened, tuneless whispers, they watched the insig-
nificant looking man sitting dwarfed and countrified by the minister's imposing bulk,
with something like consternation. They were still looking at him with consternation
and unbelief when the minister rose and introduced him in rich, rolling tones whose
very unction served to increase the visitor's insignificance.

"En dey brung dat all de way fum Saint Looey," Frony whispered.

"I've knowed de Lawd to use cuiser tools den dat," Dilsey said. "Hush, now," she said
to Ben.

"Dey fixin to sing again in a minute."

When the visitor rose to speak he sounded like a white man. His voice was level and
cold. It sounded too big to have come from him and they listened at first through cur-
iosity, as they would have to a monkey talking. They began to watch him as they would
a man on a tight rope. They even forgot his insignificant appearance in the virtuosity
with which he ran and poised and swooped upon the cold inflectionless wire of his voice,
so that at last, when with a sort of swooping glide he came to rest again beside the
reading desk with one arm resting upon it at shoulder height and his monkey body as reft
of all motion as a mummy or an emptied vessel, the congregation sighed as if it waked
from a collective dream and moved a little in its seats. Behind the pulpit the choir
fanned steadily. Dilsey whispered, "Hush, now. Dey fixin to sing in a minute."

Then a voice said, "Brethren."

The preacher had not moved. His arm lay yet across the desk, and he still held that
pose while the voice died in sonorous echoes between the walls. It was as different as
day and dark from his former tone, with a sad, timbrous quality like an alto horn, sink-
ing into their hearts and speaking there again when it had ceased in fading and cumulate
echoes.

"Brethren and sisteren," it said again. The preacher removed his arm and he began to
walk back and forth before the desk, his hands clasped behind him, a meagre figure,
hunched over upon itself like that of one long immured in striving with the implacable
earth, "I got the recollection and the blood of the Lamb!" He tramped steadily back and
forth beneath the twisted paper and the Christmas bell, hunched, his hands clasped be-
hind him. He was like a worn small rock whelmed by the successive waves of his voice.
With his body he seemed to feed the voice that, succubus like, had fleshed its teeth in
him. And the congregation seemed to watch with its own eyes while the voice consumed
him, until he was nothing and they were nothing and there was not even a voice but in-
stead their hearts were speaking to one another in chanting measures beyond the need
for words, so that when he came to rest against the reading desk, his monkey face lifted
and his whole attitude that of a serene, tortured crucifix that transcended its shabbiness
and insignificance and made it of no moment, a long moaning expulsion of breath rose
from them, and a woman's single soprano: "Yes, Jesus!"

As the scudding day passed overhead the dingy windows glowed and faded in ghostly retro-
grade. A car passed along the road outside, laboring in the sand, died away. Dilsey sat
bolt upright, her hand on Ben's knee. Two tears slid down her fallen cheeks, in and out
of the myriad coruscations of immolation and abnegation and time.

"Brethren," the minister said in a harsh whisper, without moving.

"Yes, Jesus!" the woman's voice said, hushed yet.

"Breddren en sistuhn!" His voice rang again, with the horns. He removed his arm and stood
erect and raised his hands. "I got de ricklickshun en de blood of de Lamb!" They did not
mark just when his intonation, his pronunciation, became negroid, they just sat swaying a
little in their seats as the voice took them into itself.

"When de long, cold--Oh, I tells you, breddren, when de long, cold…. I sees de light en
I sees de word, po sinner! Dey passed away in Egypt, de swingin chariots; de generations
passed away. Wus a rich man: whar he now, O breddren? Wus a po man: whar he now, O sis-
tuhn? Oh I tells you, ef you aint got de milk en de dew of de old salvation when de long,
cold years rolls away!"

"Yes, Jesus!"

"I tells you, breddren, en I tells you, sistuhn, dey'll come a time. Po sinner sayin Let
me lay down wid de Lawd, lemme lay down my load. Den whut Jesus "wine say, O breddren?
O sistuhn? Is you got de ricklickshun en de Blood of de Lamb? Case I aint gwine load down
heaven!"

He fumbled in his coat and took out a handkerchief and mopped his face. A low concerted
sound rose from the congregation: "Mmmmmmmmmmmmm!" The woman's voice said, "Yes,
Jesus! Jesus!"

"Breddren! Look at dem little chiller settin dar. Jesus wus like dat once. He mammy suf-
fered de glory en de pangs. Sometime maybe she heft him at de nightfall, whilst de angels
singin him to sleep; maybe she look out de do en see de Roman po-lice passin." He tramped
back and forth, mopping his face. "Listen, breddren! I sees de day. Ma'y settin in de do
wid Jesus on her lap, de little Jesus. Like dem chiller dar, de little Jesus. I hears de
angels singin de peaceful songs en de glory; I sees de closin eyes; sees Mary jump up,
sees de sojer face: We gwine to kill! We gwine to kill! We gwine to kill yo little Jesus!
I hears de weepin en de lamentation of de po mammy widout de salvation en de word of
God!"

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm! Jesus! Little Jesus! and another voice, rising:

"I sees, O Jesus! Oh I sees!" and still another, without words, like bubbles rising in wa-
ter.

"I sees hit, breddren! I sees hit! Sees de blastin, blindin sight! I sees Calvary, wid de
sacred trees, sees de thief en de murderer en de least of dese; I hears de boastin en de
braggin: Ef you be Jesus, lif up yo tree en walk! I hears de wailin of women en de evenin
lamentations; I hears de weepin en de cryin en de turns-away face of God: dey done kilt
Jesus; dey done kilt my Son!"

"Mmmmmmmmmmmmm. Jesus! I sees, O Jesus!"

"O blind sinner! Breddren, I tells you; sistuhn, I says to you, when de Lawd did turn His
mighty face, say, Aint gwine overload heaven! I can see de widowed God shet His do; I sees
de whelmin flood roll between; I sees de darkness en de death everlastin upon de generati-
ons. Den, lo! Breddren! Yes, breddren! Whut I see? Whut I see, O sinner? I sees de resur-
rection en de light; sees de meek Jesus sayin Dey kilt me dat ye shall live again; I died
dat dem whut sees en believes shall never die. Breddren, O breddren! I sees de doom crack
en de golden horns shoutin down de glory, en de arisen dead whut got de blood en de rick-
lickshun of de Lamb!"

In the midst of the voices and the hands Ben sat, rapt in his sweet blue gaze. Dilsey sat
bolt upright beside, crying rigidly and quietly in the annealment and the blood of the re-
membered Lamb.

As they walked through the bright noon, up the sandy road with the dispersing congregation
talking easily again group to group, she continued to weep, unmindful of the talk.

"He sho a preacher, mon!! He didn't look like much at first, but hush!"

"He seed de power en de glory."

"Yes, suh. He seed hit. Face to face he seed hit."

Dilsey made no sound, her face did not quiver as the tears took their sunken and devious
courses, walking with her head up, making no effort to dry them away even.

"Whyn't you quit dat, mammy?" Frony said. "Wid all dese people lookin. We be passin white
folks soon."

"I've seed de first en de last," Dilsey said. "Never you mind me."

"First en last whut?" Frony said.

"Never you mind," Dilsey said. "I seed de beginnin, en now I sees de endin."

Before they reached the street though she stopped and lifted her skirt and dried her eyes
on the hem of her topmost underskirt. Then they went on. Ben shambled along beside Dilsey,
watching Luster who anticked along ahead, the umbrella in his hand and his new straw hat
slanted viciously in the sunlight, like a big foolish dog watching a small clever one. They
reached the gate and entered. Immediately Ben began to whimper again, and for a while all
of them looked up the drive at the square, paintless house with its rotting portico.
　
"Whut's gwine on up dar today?" Frony said. "Somethin is."

"Nothin," Dilsey said. "You tend to yo business en let de whitefolks tend to deir'n."

"Somethin is," Frony said. "I heard him first thing dis mawnin. 'Taint none of my business,
dough."

"En I knows whut, too," Luster said.

"You knows mo den you got any use fer," Dilsey said. "Aint you jes heard Frony say hit aint
none of yo business? You take Benjy on to de back and keep him quiet swell I put dinner on."

"I knows whar Miss Quentin is," Luster said.

"Den jes keep hit," Dilsey said. "Soon es Quentin need any of yo egvice, I'll let you know.
Y'all g'awn en play in de back, now."

"You know whut gwine happen soon es dey start playin dat ball over yonder," Luster said.

"Dey wont start fer a while yit. By dat time T. P. be here to take him ridin. Here, you gim-
me dat new hat."

Luster gave her the hat and he and Ben went on across the back yard. Ben was still whimper-
ing, though not loud. Dilsey and Frony went to the cabin. After a while Dilsey emerged, a-
gain in the faded calico dress, and went to the kitchen. The fire had died down. There was
no sound in the house. She put on the apron and went up stairs. There was no sound anywhere.
Quentin's room was as they had left it. She entered and picked up the undergarment and put
the stocking back in the drawer and closed it. Mrs Compson's door was closed. Dilsey stood
beside it for a moment, listening. Then she opened it and entered, entered a pervading reek
of camphor. The shades were drawn, the room in halflight, and the bed, so that at first she
thought Mrs Compson was asleep and was about to close the door when the other spoke.

"Well?" she said. "What is it?"

"Hit's me," Dilsey said. "You want anything?"

Mrs Compson didn't answer. After a while, without moving her head at all, she said: "Where's
Jason?"

"He aint come back yit," Dilsey said. "Whut you want?"

Mrs Compson said nothing. Like so many cold, weak people, when faced at last by the
incontrovertible disaster she exhumed from somewhere a sort of fortitude, strength. In her
case it was an unshakable conviction regarding the yet unplumbed event. "Well," she said
presently. "Did you find it?"

"Find whut? Whut you talkin about?"

"The note. At least she would have enough consideration to leave a note. Even Quentin did
that."

"Whut you talkin about?" Dilsey said. "Dont you know she all right? I bet she be walkin
right in dis do befo dark."

"Fiddlesticks," Mrs Compson said. "It's in the blood. Like uncle, like niece. Or mother. I
dont know which would be worse. I dont seem to care."

"Whut you keep on talkin that way fur?" Dilsey said. "Whut she want to do anything like that
fur?"

"I dont know. What reason did Quentin have? Under God's heaven what reason did he have? It
cant be simply to flout and hurt me. Whoever God is, He would not permit that. I'm a lady.
You might not believe that from my offspring, but I am."

"You des wait en see," Dilsey said. "She be here by night, right dar in her bed." Mrs Comp-
son said nothing. The camphor soaked cloth lay upon her brow. The black robe lay across the
foot of the bed. Dilsey stood with her hand on the door knob.

"Well," Mrs Compson said. "What do you want? Are you going to fix some dinner for Jason and
Benjamin, or not?"

"Jason aint come yit," Dilsey said. "I gwine fix somethin. You sho you dont want nothin?
Yo bottle still hot enough?"

"You might hand me my bible."

"I give hit to you dis mawnin, befo I left."

"You laid it on the edge of the bed. How long did you expect it to stay there?"

Dilsey crossed to the bed and groped among the shadows beneath the edge of it and found
the bible, face down. She smoothed the bent pages and laid the book on the bed again.
Mrs Compson didn't open her eyes. Her hair and the pillow were the same color, beneath
the wimple of the medicated cloth she looked like an old nun praying. "Dont put it there
again," she said, without opening her eyes. "That's where you put it before. Do you want
me to have to get out of bed to pick it up?"

Dilsey reached the book across her and laid it on the broad side of the bed. "You cant
see to read, noways," she said. "You want me to raise de shade a little?"

"No. Let them alone. Go on and fix Jason something to eat."

Dilsey went out. She closed the door and returned to the kitchen. The stove was almost
cold. While she stood there the clock above the cupboard struck ten times. "One oclock,"
she said aloud. "Jason aint comin home. Ise seed de first en de last," she said, look-
ing at the cold stove. "I seed de first en de last." She set out some cold food on a
table. As she moved back and forth she sang, a hymn. She sang the first two lines over
and over to the complete tune. She arranged the meal and went to the door and called
Luster, and after a time Luster and Ben entered. Ben was still moaning a little, as to
himself.

"He aint never quit," Luster said.

"Y'all come on en eat," Dilsey said. "Jason aint comin to dinner." They sat down at the
table. Ben could manage solid food pretty well for himself, though even now, with cold
food before him, Dilsey tied a cloth about his neck. He and Luster ate. Dilsey moved a-
bout the kitchen, singing the two lines of the hymn which she remembered. "Y'all kin
g'awn en eat," she said. "Jason aint comin home."

He was twenty miles away at that time. When he left the house he drove rapidly to town,
overreaching the slow sabbath groups and the peremptory bells along the broken air. He
crossed the empty square and turned into a narrow street that was abruptly quieter even
yet, and stopped before a frame house and went up the flower bordered walk to the porch.

Beyond the screen door people were talking. As he lifted his hand to knock he heard
steps, so he withheld his hand until a big man in black broadcloth trousers and a stiff
bosomed white shirt without collar opened the door. He had vigorous untidy iron-gray
hair and his gray eyes were round and shiny like a little boy's. He took Jason's hand
and drew him into the house, still shaking it.

"Come right in," he said. "Come right in."

"You ready to go now?" Jason said.

"Walk right in," the other said, propelling him by the elbow into a room where a man
and a woman sat. "You know Myrtle's husband, dont you? Jason Compson, Vernon."

"Yes," Jason said. He did not even look at the man, and as the sheriff drew a chair
across the room the man said,

"We'll go out so you can talk. Come on, Myrtle."

"No, no," the sheriff said. "You folks keep your seat. I reckon it aint that serious,
Jason? Have a seat."

"I'll tell you as we go along," Jason said. "Get your hat and coat."

"We'll go out," the man said, rising.

"Keep your seat," the sheriff said. "Me and Jason will go out on the porch."

"You get your hat and coat," Jason said. "They've already got a twelve hour start."
The sheriff led the way back to the porch. A man and a woman passing spoke to him.
He responded with a hearty florid gesture. Bells were still ringing, from the dir-
ection of the section known as Nigger Hollow. "Get your hat, Sheriff," Jason said.
The sheriff drew up two chairs.

"Have a seat and tell me what the trouble is."

"I told you over the phone," Jason said, standing. "I did that to save time. Am I
going to have to go to law to compel you to do your sworn duty?"

"You sit down and tell me about it," the sheriff said. "I'll take care of you all
right."

"Care, hell," Jason said. "Is this what you call taking care of me?"

"You're the one that's holding us up," the sheriff said. "You sit down and tell me
about it."

Jason told him, his sense of injury and impotence feeding upon its own sound, so
that after a time he forgot his haste in the violent cumulation of his self justi-
fication and his outrage. The sheriff watched him steadily with his cold shiny eyes.

"But you dont know they done it," he said. "You just think so."

"Dont know?" Jason said. "When I spent two damn days chasing her through alleys,
trying to keep her away from him, after I told her what I'd do to her if I ever
caught her with him, and you say I dont know that that little b-- "

"Now, then," the sheriff said. "That'll do. That's enough of that." He looked out
across the street, his hands in his pockets.

"And when I come to you, a commissioned officer of the law," Jason said.

"That show's in Mottson this week," the sheriff said.

"Yes," Jason said. "And if I could find a law officer that gave a solitary damn
about protecting the people that elected him to office, I'd be there too by now."
He repeated his story, harshly recapitulant, seeming to get an actual pleasure
out of his outrage and impotence. The sheriff did not appear to be listening at
all.

"Jason," he said. "What were you doing with three thousand dollars hid in the
house?"

"What?" Jason said. "That's my business where I keep my money. Your business is
to help me get it back."

"Did your mother know you had that much on the place?"

"Look here," Jason said. "My house has been robbed. I know who did it and I know
where they are. I come to you as the commissioned officer of the law, and I ask
you once more, are you going to make any effort to recover my property, or not?"

"What do you aim to do with that girl, if you catch them?"

"Nothing," Jason said. "Not anything. I wouldn't lay my hand on her. The bitch
that cost me a job, the one chance I ever had to get ahead, that killed my father
and is shortening my mother's life every day and made my name a laughing stock
in the town. I wont do anything to her," he said. "Not anything."

"You drove that girl into running off, Jason," the sheriff said.

"How I conduct my family is no business of yours," Jason said. "Are you going to
help me or not?"

"You drove her away from home," the sheriff said. "And I have some suspicions a-
bout who that money belongs to that I dont reckon I'll ever know for certain."

Jason stood, slowly wringing the brim of his hat in his hands. He said quietly:
"You're not going to make any effort to catch them for me?"

"That's not any of my business, Jason. If you had any actual proof, I'd have to
act. But without that I dont figger it's any of my business."

"That's your answer, is it?" Jason said. "Think well, now."

"That's it, Jason."

"All right," Jason said. He put his hat on. "You'll regret this. I wont be help-
less. This is not Russia, where just because he wears a little metal badge, a man
is immune to law." He went down the steps and got in his car and started the engine.
The sheriff watched him drive away, turn, and rush past the house toward town.

The bells were ringing again, high in the scudding sunlight in bright disorderly
tatters of sound. He stopped at a filling station and had his tires examined and
the tank filled.

"Gwine on a trip, is you?" the negro asked him. He didn't answer. "Look like hit
gwine fair off, after all," the negro said.

"Fair off, hell," Jason said. "It'll be raining like hell by twelve oclock." He
looked at the sky, thinking about rain, about the slick clay roads, himself stal-
led somewhere miles from town. He thought about it with a sort of triumph, of
the fact that he was going to miss dinner, that by starting now and so serving his
compulsion of haste, he would be at the greatest possible distance from both towns
when noon came. It seemed to him that in this circumstance was giving him a break,
so he said to the negro:

"What the hell are you doing? Has somebody paid you to keep this car standing here
as long as you can?"

"Dis here ti' aint got no air a-tall in hit," the negro said.

"Then get the hell away from there and let me have that tube," Jason said.

"Hit up now," the negro said, rising. "You kin ride now."

Jason got in and started the engine and drove off. He went into second gear, the
engine spluttering and gasping, and he raced the engine, jamming the throttle down
and snapping the choker in and out savagely. "It's going to rain," he said. "Get
me half way there, and rain like hell." And he drove on out of the bells and out
of town, thinking of himself slogging through the mud, hunting a team. "And every
damn one of them will be at church." He thought of how he'd find a church at last
and take a team and of the owner coming out, shouting at him and of himself strik-
ing the man down. "I'm Jason Compson. See if you can stop me. See if you can elect
a man to office that can stop me," he said, thinking of himself entering the court-
house with a file of soldiers and dragging the sheriff out. "Thinks he can sit with
his hands folded and see me lose my job. I'll show him about jobs." Of his niece he
did not think at all, nor of the arbitrary valuation of the money. Neither of them
had had entity or individuality for him for ten years; together they merely symbol-
ised the job in the bank of which he had been deprived before he ever got it.

The air brightened, the running shadow patches were now the obverse, and it seemed
to him that the fact that the day was clearing was another cunning stroke on the
part of the foe, the fresh battle toward which he was carrying ancient wounds. From
time to time he passed churches, unpainted frame buildings with sheet iron steeples,
surrounded by tethered teams and shabby motorcars, and it seemed to him that each
of them was a picket-post where the rear guards of Circumstance peeped fleetingly
back at him. "And damn You, too," he said. "See if You can stop me," thinking of
himself, his file of soldiers with the manacled sheriff in the rear, dragging Om-
nipotence down from his throne, if necessary; of the embattled legions of both hell
and heaven through which he tore his way and put his hands at last on his fleeing
niece.

The wind was out of the southeast. It blew steadily upon his cheek. It seemed that
he could feel the prolonged blow of it sinking through his skull, and suddenly with
an old premonition he clapped the brakes on and stopped and sat perfectly still.
Then he lifted his hand to his neck and began to curse, and sat there, cursing in a
harsh whisper. When it was necessary for him to drive for any length of time he for-
tified himself with a handkerchief soaked in camphor, which he would tie about his
throat when clear of town, thus inhaling the fumes, and he got out and lifted the
seat cushion on the chance that there might be a forgotten one there. He looked be-
neath both seats and stood again for a while, cursing, seeing himself mocked by his
own triumphing. He closed his eyes, leaning on the door. He could return and get the
forgotten camphor, or he could go on. In either case, his head would be splitting,
but at home he could be sure of finding camphor on Sunday, while if he went on he
could not be sure. But if he went back, he would be an hour and a half later in rea-
ching Mottson. "Maybe I can drive slow," he said. "Maybe I can drive slow, thinking
of something else…."

He got in and started. "I'll think of something else," he said, so he thought about
Lorraine. He imagined himself in bed with her, only he was just lying beside her,
pleading with her to help him, then he thought of the money again, and that he had
been outwitted by a woman, a girl. If he could just believe it was the man who had
robbed him. But to have been robbed of that which was to have compensated him
for the lost job, which he had acquired through so much effort and risk, by the very
symbol of the lost job itself, and worst of all, by a bitch of a girl. He drove on,
shielding his face from the steady wind with the corner of his coat.

He could see the opposed forces of his destiny and his will drawing swiftly together
now, toward a junction that would be irrevocable; he became cunning. I cant make a
blunder, he told himself. There would be just one right thing, without alternatives:
he must do that. He believed that both of them would know him on sight, while he'd
have to trust to seeing her first, unless the man still wore the red tie. And the
fact that he must depend on that red tie seemed to be the sum of the impending dis-
aster; he could almost smell it, feel it above the throbbing of his head.

He crested the final hill. Smoke lay in the valley, and roofs, a spire or two above
trees. He drove down the hill and into the town, slowing, telling himself again of
the need for caution, to find where the tent was located first. He could not see
very well now, and he knew that it was the disaster which kept telling him to go
directly and get something for his head. At a filling station they told him that
the tent was not up yet, but that the show cars were on a siding at the station.
He drove there.

Two gaudily painted pullman cars stood on the track. He reconnoitred them before he
got out. He was trying to breathe shallowly, so that the blood would not beat so in
his skull. He got out and went along the station wall, watching the cars. A few gar-
ments hung out of the windows, limp and crinkled, as though they had been recently
laundered. On the earth beside the steps of one sat three canvas chairs. But he saw
no sign of life at all until a man in a dirty apron came to the door and emptied a
pan of dishwater with a broad gesture, the sunlight glinting on the metal belly of
the pan, then entered the car again.

Now I'll have to take him by surprise, before he can warn them, he thought. It ne-
ver occurred to him that they might not be there, in the car. That they should not
be there, that the whole result should not hinge on whether he saw them first or
they saw him first, would be opposed to all nature and contrary to the whole rhy-
thm of events. And more than that: he must see them first, get the money back, then
what they did would be of no importance to him, while otherwise the whole world
would know that he, Jason Compson, had been robbed by Quentin, his niece, a bitch.

He reconnoitred again. Then he went to the car and mounted the steps, swiftly and
quietly, and paused at the door. The galley was dark, rank with stale food. The
man was a white blur, singing in a cracked, shaky tenor. An old man, he thought,
and not as big as I am. He entered the car as the man looked up.

"Hey?" the man said, stopping his song.

"Where are they?" Jason said. "Quick, now. In the sleeping car?"

"Where's who?" the man said.

"Dont lie to me," Jason said. He blundered on in the cluttered obscurity.

"What's that?" the other said. "Who you calling a liar?" and when Jason grasped
his shoulder he exclaimed, "Look out, fellow!"

"Dont lie," Jason said. "Where are they?"

"Why, you bastard," the man said. His arm was frail and thin in Jason's grasp.
He tried to wrench free, then he turned and fell to scrabbling on the littered
table behind him.

"Come on," Jason said. "Where are they?"

"I'll tell you where they are," the man shrieked. "Lemme find my butcher knife."

"Here," Jason said, trying to hold the other. "I'm just asking you a question."

"You bastard," the other shrieked, scrabbling at the table. Jason tried to grasp
him in both arms, trying to prison the puny fury of him. The man's body felt so
old, so frail, yet so fatally singlepurposed that for the first time Jason saw
clear and unshadowed the disaster toward which he rushed.

"Quit it!" he said. "Here. Here! I'll get out. Give me time, and I'll get out."

"Call me a liar," the other wailed. "Lemme go. Lemme go just one minute. I'll
show you."

Jason glared wildly about, holding the other. Outside it was now bright and sunny,
swift and bright and empty, and he thought of the people soon to be going qui-
etly home to Sunday dinner, decorously festive, and of himself trying to hold
the fatal, furious little old man whom he dared not release long enough to turn
his back and run.

"Will you quit long enough for me to get out?" he said. "Will you?" But the o-
ther still struggled, and Jason freed one hand and struck him on the head. A
clumsy, hurried blow, and not hard, but the other slumped immediately and slid
clattering among pans and buckets to the floor. Jason stood above him, panting,
listening. Then he turned and ran from the car. At the door he restrained him-
self and descended more slowly and stood there again. His breath made a hah hah
hah sound and he stood there trying to repress it, darting his gaze this way
and that, when at a scuffling sound behind him he turned in time to see the
little old man leaping awkwardly and furiously from the vestibule, a rusty
hatchet high in his hand.

He grasped at the hatchet, feeling no shock but knowing that he was falling,
thinking So this is how it'll end, and he believed that he was about to die
and when something crashed against the back of his head he thought How did he
hit me there? Only maybe he hit me a long time ago, he thought, And I just now
felt it, and he thought Hurry. Hurry. Get it over with, and then a furious de-
sire not to die seized him and he struggled, hearing the old man wailing and
cursing in his cracked voice.

He still struggled when they hauled him to his feet, but they held him and he
ceased.

"Am I bleeding much?" he said. "The back of my head. Am I bleeding?" He was
still saying that while he felt himself being propelled rapidly away, heard
the old man's thin furious voice dying away behind him. "Look at my head," he
said. "Wait, I'--"

"Wait, hell," the man who held him said. "That damn little wasp'll kill you.
Keep going. You aint hurt."

"He hit me," Jason said. "Am I bleeding?"

"Keep going," the other said. He led Jason on around the corner of the station,
to the empty platform where an express truck stood, where grass grew rigidly in
a plot bordered with rigid flowers and a sign in electric lights: Keep your eye on
Mottson, the gap filled by a human eye with an electric pupil. The man released
him.

"Now," he said. "You get on out of here and stay out. What were you trying to
do? commit suicide?"

"I was looking for two people," Jason said. "I just asked him where they were."

"Who you looking for?"

"It's a girl," Jason said. "And a man. He had on a red tie in Jefferson yester-
day. With this show. They robbed me."

"Oh," the man said. "You're the one, are you. Well, they aint here."

"I reckon so," Jason said. He leaned against the wall and put his hand to the
back of his head and looked at his palm. "I thought I was bleeding," he said.
"I thought he hit me with that hatchet."

"You hit your head on the rail," the man said. "You better go on. They aint
here."

"Yes. He said they were not here. I thought he was lying."

"Do you think I'm lying?" the man said.

"No," Jason said. "I know they're not here."

"I told him to get the hell out of there, both of them," the man said. "I wont
have nothing like that in my show. I run a respectable show, with a respecta-
ble troupe."

"Yes," Jason said. "You dont know where they went?"

"No. And I dont want to know. No member of my show can pull a stunt like that.
You her...brother?"

"No," Jason said. "It dont matter. I just wanted to see them. You sure he didn't
hit me? No blood, I mean."

"There would have been blood if I hadn't got there when I did. You stay away
from here, now. That little bastard'll kill you. That your car yonder?"

"Yes."

"Well, you get in it and go back to Jefferson. If you find them, it wont be in
my show. I run a respectable show. You say they robbed you?"

"No," Jason said. "It dont make any difference." He went to the car and got in.
What is it I must do? he thought. Then he remembered. He started the engine and
drove slowly up the street until he found a drugstore. The door was locked. He
stood for a while with his hand on the knob and his head bent a little. Then he
turned away and when a man came along after a while he asked if there was a
drugstore open anywhere, but there was not. Then he asked when the northbound
train ran, and the man told him at two thirty. He crossed the pavement and got
in the car again and sat there. After a while two negro lads passed. He called
to them.

"Can either of you boys drive a car?"

"Yes, suh."

"What'll you charge to drive me to Jefferson right away?"

They looked at one another, murmuring.

"I'll pay a dollar," Jason said.

They murmured again. "Couldn't go fer dat," one said. "What will you go for?"

"Kin you go?" one said.

"I cant git off," the other said. "Whyn't you drive him up dar? You aint got no-
thin to do."

"Yes I is."

"Whut you got to do?"

They murmured again, laughing.

"I'll give you two dollars," Jason said. "Either of you." "I cant git away nei-
ther," the first said.

"All right," Jason said. "Go on."

He sat there for some time. He heard a clock strike the half hour, then people
began to pass, in Sunday and easter clothes. Some looked at him as they passed,
at the man sitting quietly behind the wheel of a small car, with his invisible
life ravelled out about him like a wornout sock, and went on. After a while a
negro in overalls came up.

"Is you de one wants to go to Jefferson?" he said.

"Yes," Jason said. "What'll you charge me?"

"Fo dollars."

"Give you two."

"Cant go fer no less'n fo." The man in the car sat quietly. He wasn't even look-
ing at him. The negro said, "You want me er not?"

"All right," Jason said. "Get in.

He moved over and the negro took the wheel. Jason closed his eyes. I can get
something for it at Jefferson, he told himself, easing himself to the jolting,
I can get something there. They drove on, along the streets where people were
turning peacefully into houses and Sunday dinners, and on out of town. He
thought that. He wasn't thinking of home, where Ben and Luster were eating
cold dinner at the kitchen table. Something--the absence of disaster, threat,
in any constant evil--permitted him to forget Jefferson as any place which he
had ever seen before, where his life must resume itself.

When Ben and Luster were done Dilsey sent them outdoors. "And see kin you let
him alone swell fo oclock. T. P. be here den."

"Yessum," Luster said. They went out. Dilsey ate her dinner and cleared up the
kitchen. Then she went to the foot of the stairs and listened, but there was no
sound. She returned through the kitchen and out the outer door and stopped on
the steps. Ben and Luster were not in sight, but while she stood there she heard
another sluggish twang from the direction of the cellar door and she went to the
door and looked down upon a repetition of the morning's scene.

"He done hit jes dat way," Luster said. He contemplated the motionless saw with
a kind of hopeful dejection. "I aint got de right thing to hit it wid yit," he said.

"En you aint gwine find hit down here, neither," Dilsey said. "You take him on
out in de sun. You bofe get pneumonia down here on dis wet flo."

She waited and watched them cross the yard toward a clump of cedar trees near
the fence. Then she went on to her cabin.

"Now, dont you git started," Luster said. "I had enough trouble wid you today."
There was a hammock made of barrel staves slatted into woven wires. Luster lay
down in the swing, but Ben went on vaguely and purposelessly. He began to whimper
again. "Hush, now," Luster said. "I fixin to whup you." He lay back in the swing.
Ben had stopped moving, but Luster could hear him whimpering. "Is you gwine hush,
er aint you?" Luster said. He got up and followed and came upon Ben squatting
before a small mound of earth. At either end of it an empty bottle of blue glass
that once contained poison was fixed in the ground. In one was a withered stalk
of jimson weed. Ben squatted before it, moaning, a slow, inarticulate sound.
Still moaning he sought vaguely about and found a twig and put it in the other
bottle. "Whyn't you hush?" Luster said. "You want me to give you somethin to sho
nough moan about? Sposin I does dis." He knelt and swept the bottle suddenly up
and behind him. Ben ceased moaning. He squatted, looking at the small depression
where the bottle had sat, then as he drew his lungs full Luster brought the bot-
tle back into view. "Hush!" he hissed. "Dont you dast to beller! Dont you. Dar
hit is. See? Here. You fixin to start ef you stays here. Come on, les go see ef
dey started knockin ball yit." He took Ben's arm and drew him up and they went
to the fence and stood side by side there, peering between the matted honeysuck-
le not yet in bloom.

"Dar," Luster said. "Dar come some. See um?"

They watched the foursome play onto the green and out, and move to the tee and
drive. Ben watched, whimpering, slobbering. When the foursome went on he follow-
ed along the fence, bobbing and moaning. One said,

"Here, caddie. Bring the bag."

"Hush, Benjy," Luster said, but Ben went on at his shambling trot, clinging to
the fence, wailing in his hoarse, hopeless voice. The man played and went on,
Ben keeping pace with him until the fence turned at right angles, and he clung
to the fence, watching the people move on and away.

"Will you hush now?" Luster said. "Will you hush now?" He shook Ben's arm. Ben
clung to the fence, wailing steadily and hoarsely. "Aint you gwine stop?" Lust-
er said. "Or is you?" Ben gazed through the fence. "All right, den," Luster said.
"You want somethin to belier about?" He looked over his shoulder, toward the
house. Then he whispered: "Caddy! Beller now. "Caddy! "Caddy! "Caddy!

A moment later, in the slow intervals of Ben's voice, Luster heard Dilsey call-
ing. He took Ben by the arm and they crossed the yard toward her.

"I tole you he warnt gwine stay quiet," Luster said.

"You vilyun!" Dilsey said. "Whut you done to him?"

"I aint done nothin. I tole you when dem folks start playin, he git started up."

"You come on here," Dilsey said. "Hush, Benjy. Hush, now." But he wouldn't hush.
They crossed the yard quickly and went to the cabin and entered. "Run git dat
shoe," Dilsey said. "Dont you sturb Miss Cahline, now. Ef she say anything, tell
her I got him. Go on, now; you kin sho do dat right, I reckon." Luster went out.
Dilsey led Ben to the bed and drew him down beside her and she held him, rocking
back and forth, wiping his drooling mouth upon the hem of her skirt. "Hush, now,"
she said, stroking his head. "Hush. Dilsey got you." But he bellowed slowly, ab-
jectly, without tears; the grave hopeless sound of all voiceless misery under
the sun. Luster returned, carrying a white satin slipper. It was yellow now,
and cracked, and soiled, and when they gave it into Ben's hand he hushed for a
while. But he still whimpered, and soon he lifted his voice again.

"You reckon you kin find T. P.?" Dilsey said.

"He say yistiddy he gwine out to St John's today. Say he be back at fo."

Dilsey rocked back and forth, stroking Ben's head.

"Dis long time, O Jesus," she said. "Dis long time."

"I kin drive dat surrey, mammy," Luster said.

"You kill bofe y'all," Dilsey said. "You do hit fer devilment. I knows you got
plenty sense to. But I cant trust you. Hush, now," she said. "Hush. Hush."

"Nome I wont," Luster said. "I drives wid T. P." Dilsey rocked back and forth,
holding Ben. "Miss Cahline say ef you cant quiet him, she gwine git up en come
down en do hit."

"Hush, honey," Dilsey said, stroking Ben's head. "Luster, honey," she said.
"Will you think about yo ole mammy en drive dat surrey right?"

"Yessum," Luster said. "I drive hit jes like T. P."

Dilsey stroked Ben's head, rocking back and forth. "I does de bes I kin," she
said. "Lewd knows dat. Go git it, den," she said, rising. Luster scuttled out.
Ben held the slipper, crying. "Hush, now. Luster gone to git de surrey en take
you to de graveyard. We aint gwine risk gittin yo cap," she said. She went to
a closet contrived of a calico curtain hung across a corner of the room and got
the felt hat she had worn. "We's down to worse'n dis, ef folks jes knowed," she
said. "You's de Lawd's chile anyway. En I be His'n too, fo long, praise Jesus.
Here." She put the hat on his head and buttoned his coat. He wailed steadily.
She took the slipper from him and put it away and they went out. Luster came
up, with an ancient white horse in a battered and lopsided surrey.

"You gwine be careful, Luster?" she said.

"Yessum," Luster said. She helped Ben into the back seat. He had ceased crying,
but now he began to whimper again.

"Hit's his flower," Luster said. "Wait, I'll git him one."

"You set right dar," Dilsey said. She went and took the cheekstrap. "Now, hurry
en git him one."

Luster ran around the house, toward the garden. He came back with a single nar-
cissus.

"Dat un broke," Dilsey said. "Whyn't you git him a good un?"

"Hit de onliest one I could find," Luster said. "Y'all took all of um Friday to
dec'rate de church. Wait, I'll fix hit." So while Dilsey held the horse Luster
put a splint on the flower stalk with a twig and two bits of string and gave it
to Ben. Then he mounted and took the reins. Dilsey still held the bridle.

"You knows de way now?" she said. "Up de street, round de square, to de grave-
yard, den straight back home."

"Yessum," Luster said. "Hum up, Queenie."

"You gwine be careful, now?"

"Yessum." Dilsey released the bridle.

"Hum up, Queenie," Luster said.

"Here," Dilsey said. "You hen me dat whup."

"Aw, mammy," Luster said.

"Give hit here," Dilsey said, approaching the wheel. Luster gave it to her rel-
uctantly.

"I wont never git Queenie started now."

"Never you mind about dat," Dilsey said. "Queenie know mo bout whar she gwine
den you does.

All you got to do es set dar en hold dem reins. You knows de way, now?"

"Yessum. Same way T. P. goes ev'y Sunday."

"Den you do de same thing dis Sunday."

"Cose I is. Aint I drove fer T. P. mo'n a hund'ed times?"

"Den do hit again," Dilsey said. "G'awn, now. En ef you hurts Benjy, nigger boy,
I dont know whut I do. You bound fer de chain gang, but I'll send you dar fo
even chain gang ready fer you."

"Yessum," Luster said. "Hum up, Queenie."

He flapped the lines on Queenie's broad back and the surrey lurched into motion.

"You; Luster!" Dilsey said.

"Hum up, dar!" Luster said. He flapped the lines again. With subterranean rum-
blings Queenie jogged slowly down the drive and turned into the street, where
Luster exhorted her into a gait resembling a prolonged and suspended fall in a
forward direction.

Ben quit whimpering. He sat in the middle of the seat, holding the repaired flo-
wer upright in his fist, his eyes serene and ineffable. Directly before him Lus-
ter's bullet head turned backward continually until the house passed from view,
then he pulled to the side of the street and while Ben watched him he descended
and broke a switch from a hedge. Queenie lowered her head and fell to cropping
the grass until Luster mounted and hauled her head up and harried her into mo-
tion again, then he squared his elbows and with the switch and the reins held
high he assumed a swaggering attitude out of all proportion to the sedate crop-
ping of Queenie's hooves and the organlike basso of her internal accompaniment.
Motors passed them, and pedestrians; once a group of half grown negroes:

"Dar Luster. Whar you gwine Luster? To de boneyard?"

"Hi," Luster said. "Aint de same boneyard y'all headed fen Hum up, elefump."

They approached the square, where the Confederate soldier gazed with empty eyes
beneath his marble hand in wind and weather. Luster took still another notch in
himself and gave the impervious Queenie a cut with the switch, casting his glance
about the square. "Dar Mr Jason car," he said, then he spied another group of ne-
groes. "Les show dem niggers how quality does, Benjy," he said. "Whut you say?"
He looked back. Ben sat, holding the flower in his fist, his gaze empty and
untroubled. Luster hit Queenie again and swung her to the left at the monument.

For an instant Ben sat in an utter hiatus. Then he bellowed. Bellow on bellow,
his voice mounted, with scarce interval for breath. There was more than astoni-
shment in it, it was horror; shock; agony eyeless, tongueless; just sound, and
Luster's eyes backrolling for a white instant. "Gret God," he said. "Hush! Hush!
Gret God!" He whirled again and struck Queenie with the switch. It broke and he
cast it away and with Ben's voice mounting toward its unbelievable crescendo
Luster caught up the end of the reins and leaned forward as Jason came jumping
across the square and onto the step.

With a backhanded blow he hurled Luster aside and caught the reins and sawed
Queenie about and doubled the reins back and slashed her across the hips. He
cut her again and again, into aplunging gallop, while Ben's hoarse agony roared
about them, and swung her about to the right of the monument. Then he struck
Luster over the head with his fist.

"Dont you know any better than to take him to the left?" he said. He reached
back and struck Ben, breaking the flower stalk again. "Shut up!" he said. "Shut
up!" He jerked Queenie back and jumped down. "Get to hell on home with him. If
you ever cross that gate with him again, I'll kill you!"

"Yes, suh!" Luster said. He took the reins and hit Queenie with the end of them.
"Git up! Git up, dar! Benjy, fer God's sake!"

Ben's voice roared and roared. Queenie moved again, her feet began to clop-clop
steadily again, and at once Ben hushed. Luster looked quickly back over his sho-
ulder, then he drove on. The broken flower drooped over Ben's fist and his eyes
were empty and blue and serene again as cornice and facade flowed smoothly
once more from left to right, post and tree, window and doorway and signboard
each in its ordered place.


New York, N.Y.
October 1928