When David Hardy was a tall boy of fifteen, he, like his mother, had an
adventure that changed the whole current of his life and sent him out
of his quiet corner into the world. The shell of the circumstances of
his life was broken and he was compelled to start forth. He left
Winesburg and no one there ever saw him again. After his disappearance,
his mother and grandfather both died and his father became very rich.
He spent much money in trying to locate his son, but that is no part of
this story.
It was in the late fall of an unusual year on the Bentley farms.
Everywhere the crops had been heavy. That spring, Jesse had bought part
of a long strip of black swamp land that lay in the valley of Wine
Creek. He got the land at a low price but had spent a large sum of
money to improve it. Great ditches had to be dug and thousands of tile
laid. Neighboring farmers shook their heads over the expense. Some of
them laughed and hoped that Jesse would lose heavily by the venture,
but the old man went silently on with the work and said nothing.
When the land was drained he planted it to cabbages and onions, and
again the neighbors laughed. The crop was, however, enormous and
brought high prices. In the one year Jesse made enough money to pay for
all the cost of preparing the land and had a surplus that enabled him
to buy two more farms. He was exultant and could not conceal his
delight. For the first time in all the history of his ownership of the
farms, he went among his men with a smiling face.
Jesse bought a great many new machines for cutting down the cost of
labor and all of the remaining acres in the strip of black fertile
swamp land. One day he went into Winesburg and bought a bicycle and a
new suit of clothes for David and he gave his two sisters money with
which to go to a religious convention at Cleveland, Ohio.
In the fall of that year when the frost came and the trees in the
forests along Wine Creek were golden brown, David spent every moment
when he did not have to attend school, out in the open. Alone or with
other boys he went every afternoon into the woods to gather nuts. The
other boys of the countryside, most of them sons of laborers on the
Bentley farms, had guns with which they went hunting rabbits and
squirrels, but David did not go with them. He made himself a sling with
rubber bands and a forked stick and went off by himself to gather nuts.
As he went about thoughts came to him. He realized that he was almost a
man and wondered what he would do in life, but before they came to
anything, the thoughts passed and he was a boy again. One day he killed
a squirrel that sat on one of the lower branches of a tree and
chattered at him. Home he ran with the squirrel in his hand. One of the
Bentley sisters cooked the little animal and he ate it with great
gusto. The skin he tacked on a board and suspended the board by a
string from his bedroom window.
That gave his mind a new turn. After that he never went into the woods
without carrying the sling in his pocket and he spent hours shooting at
imaginary animals concealed among the brown leaves in the trees.
Thoughts of his coming manhood passed and he was content to be a boy
with a boy’s impulses.
One Saturday morning when he was about to set off for the woods with
the sling in his pocket and a bag for nuts on his shoulder, his
grandfather stopped him. In the eyes of the old man was the strained
serious look that always a little frightened David. At such times Jesse
Bentley’s eyes did not look straight ahead but wavered and seemed to be
looking at nothing. Something like an invisible curtain appeared to
have come between the man and all the rest of the world. “I want you to
come with me,” he said briefly, and his eyes looked over the boy’s head
into the sky. “We have something important to do today. You may bring
the bag for nuts if you wish. It does not matter and anyway we will be
going into the woods.”
Jesse and David set out from the Bentley farmhouse in the old phaeton
that was drawn by the white horse. When they had gone along in silence
for a long way they stopped at the edge of a field where a flock of
sheep were grazing. Among the sheep was a lamb that had been born out
of season, and this David and his grandfather caught and tied so
tightly that it looked like a little white ball. When they drove on
again Jesse let David hold the lamb in his arms. “I saw it yesterday
and it put me in mind of what I have long wanted to do,” he said, and
again he looked away over the head of the boy with the wavering,
uncertain stare in his eyes.
After the feeling of exaltation that had come to the farmer as a result
of his successful year, another mood had taken possession of him. For a
long time he had been going about feeling very humble and prayerful.
Again he walked alone at night thinking of God and as he walked he
again connected his own figure with the figures of old days. Under the
stars he knelt on the wet grass and raised up his voice in prayer. Now
he had decided that like the men whose stories filled the pages of the
Bible, he would make a sacrifice to God. “I have been given these
abundant crops and God has also sent me a boy who is called David,” he
whispered to himself. “Perhaps I should have done this thing long ago.”
He was sorry the idea had not come into his mind in the days before his
daughter Louise had been born and thought that surely now when he had
erected a pile of burning sticks in some lonely place in the woods and
had offered the body of a lamb as a burnt offering, God would appear to
him and give him a message.
More and more as he thought of the matter, he thought also of David and
his passionate self-love was partially forgotten. “It is time for the
boy to begin thinking of going out into the world and the message will
be one concerning him,” he decided. “God will make a pathway for him.
He will tell me what place David is to take in life and when he shall
set out on his journey. It is right that the boy should be there. If I
am fortunate and an angel of God should appear, David will see the
beauty and glory of God made manifest to man. It will make a true man
of God of him also.”
In silence Jesse and David drove along the road until they came to that
place where Jesse had once before appealed to God and had frightened
his grandson. The morning had been bright and cheerful, but a cold wind
now began to blow and clouds hid the sun. When David saw the place to
which they had come he began to tremble with fright, and when they
stopped by the bridge where the creek came down from among the trees,
he wanted to spring out of the phaeton and run away.
A dozen plans for escape ran through David’s head, but when Jesse
stopped the horse and climbed over the fence into the wood, he
followed. “It is foolish to be afraid. Nothing will happen,” he told
himself as he went along with the lamb in his arms. There was something
in the helplessness of the little animal held so tightly in his arms
that gave him courage. He could feel the rapid beating of the beast’s
heart and that made his own heart beat less rapidly. As he walked
swiftly along behind his grandfather, he untied the string with which
the four legs of the lamb were fastened together. “If anything happens
we will run away together,” he thought.
In the woods, after they had gone a long way from the road, Jesse
stopped in an opening among the trees where a clearing, overgrown with
small bushes, ran up from the creek. He was still silent but began at
once to erect a heap of dry sticks which he presently set afire. The
boy sat on the ground with the lamb in his arms. His imagination began
to invest every movement of the old man with significance and he became
every moment more afraid. “I must put the blood of the lamb on the head
of the boy,” Jesse muttered when the sticks had begun to blaze
greedily, and taking a long knife from his pocket he turned and walked
rapidly across the clearing toward David.
Terror seized upon the soul of the boy. He was sick with it. For a
moment he sat perfectly still and then his body stiffened and he sprang
to his feet. His face became as white as the fleece of the lamb that,
now finding itself suddenly released, ran down the hill. David ran
also. Fear made his feet fly. Over the low bushes and logs he leaped
frantically. As he ran he put his hand into his pocket and took out the
branched stick from which the sling for shooting squirrels was
suspended. When he came to the creek that was shallow and splashed down
over the stones, he dashed into the water and turned to look back, and
when he saw his grandfather still running toward him with the long
knife held tightly in his hand he did not hesitate, but reaching down,
selected a stone and put it in the sling. With all his strength he drew
back the heavy rubber bands and the stone whistled through the air. It
hit Jesse, who had entirely forgotten the boy and was pursuing the
lamb, squarely in the head. With a groan he pitched forward and fell
almost at the boy’s feet. When David saw that he lay still and that he
was apparently dead, his fright increased immeasurably. It became an
insane panic.
With a cry he turned and ran off through the woods weeping
convulsively. “I don’t care—I killed him, but I don’t care,” he sobbed.
As he ran on and on he decided suddenly that he would never go back
again to the Bentley farms or to the town of Winesburg. “I have killed
the man of God and now I will myself be a man and go into the world,”
he said stoutly as he stopped running and walked rapidly down a road
that followed the windings of Wine Creek as it ran through fields and
forests into the west.
On the ground by the creek Jesse Bentley moved uneasily about. He
groaned and opened his eyes. For a long time he lay perfectly still and
looked at the sky. When at last he got to his feet, his mind was
confused and he was not surprised by the boy’s disappearance. By the
roadside he sat down on a log and began to talk about God. That is all
they ever got out of him. Whenever David’s name was mentioned he looked
vaguely at the sky and said that a messenger from God had taken the
boy. “It happened because I was too greedy for glory,” he declared, and
would have no more to say in the matter.