The sound and the fury (33 page)

     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 single-purposed 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 quietly 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 other 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 himself 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 desire 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 
     "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 yesterday. 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 respectable 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 nothin 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 neither," 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 looking 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 bottle 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 honeysuckle 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 followed 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?" Luster 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 calling. 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, abjectly, 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 tees 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.