façade blotted slowly across the road. We came to the livery stable. The
marshall wasnt 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 either.
“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
friendly. 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
halfmoon 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 movement 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,
interrogatory. 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
little 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
later.”
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 couldnt 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
her head and clutched under her chin. 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 filthy 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 coloured garments on lines, a barn
broken-backed, decaying quietly among rank orchard trees, unpruned and
weed-choked, 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
behind me now. There were vines and creepers where at home would be
honeysuckle. 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
crisscrossed into the flesh tingling scouring her head. Say calf rope
say it_
_I didnt 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 didnt you tell me you lived out this way, sister?” The loaf was
wearing 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 couldnt hear anything but the roof and
as 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_
_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 wasnt 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 havent 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
infrequent 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 hearing
the roof loud now I could see Natalie going through the garden among 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 myself.” 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 beavers, the
water lipping 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, leveller. “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
forehead 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 clutched 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 running
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 metal 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 against 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 seester,” 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 marshall 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 peaceable,
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 couldnt.
“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 other
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 wouldnt quit
trying to laugh, like retching after your stomach is empty.
“Whoa, now,” Anse said. “Get a grip on yourself.”
“Yes,” I said, tightening my throat. There was another yellow butterfly,
like one of the sunflecks had come loose. After a while I didnt 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 materializing from somewhere until when we turned
into the main street we had quite a procession. Before the drugstore
stood an auto, a big one, but I didn’t recognise 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 didnt know the
two girls.
“Quentin Compson!” Mrs Bland said.
“Good afternoon,” I said, raising my hat. “I’m under arrest. I’m sorry I
didnt 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 didnt remember forgetting them. I didnt 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 hadnt 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. Sorry I
couldnt 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
cognizance 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, looking 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 table a man with a fierce roach
of iron grey 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 slowly
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
kidnapping—”
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 honour,” Spoade said. “He’s just a country boy in school up
there. He dont mean any harm. I think the marshall’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 giva her she eat. She go weetha.”
“H’m,” the squire said. “Well, son, I calculate you owe Julio something
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
honour?”
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,
violent, 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 Boston 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
Daingerfield 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 country
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.