The sound and the fury
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.”