Raintree County

by Ross Lockridge

  —Try to bring ’em to the Saloon, Cash said. Through the back way. If we can get ’em upstairs there, they’ll be perfectly safe. The sheriff’s practically in my pay, anyway.

  Horsed and galloping in the warm night, the four boys rode into Freehaven, to make inquiries at the Square.

  For the first time in Johnny’s memory, murderous passions were unleashed in Raintree County. Through this warm night, where the foliage of the young summer shook out moist odors on the air, armed men like blind projectiles thundered through the County, and somewhere in that maze of dark roads a buggy fled toward dark intersections.

  And all this was only because love was a flower that wanted to tear its tassel and scatter its ecstasy of seed in spring beside the river.

  He remembered certain columns of print in Harper’s Weekly, stiff engravings, facsimiles of letters.

  Finally, the injured husband may take the life of him who has injured him. This is the American system: and latterly it has been followed in many parts of Europe. Terrible as homicide is, this method must, on the whole, be admitted to be the most effectual, the wisest, and the most natural revenge of an outraged husband.

  All the way to Freehaven Johnny carried a singularly vivid image. He kept seeing the two lovers in bed together somewhere in the County, enlaced in their forbidden love. Then in the night heavy-booted feet stamped on boards, a door splintered, blackbearded faces, glittering eyes, hoarse male breath filled up the room suddenly. The lovers, clinging to each other, sat up in bed, blinking in the flare of the torches and the swinging arcs of the lamps. The men stood hushed a moment, fully clothed in thick pants, broadbrimmed hats, heavy boots. Then blast after blast of lead seed tore the frail bodies of the lovers, still warm from each other.

  Hundreds of people were in the Square talking about the flight of the two lovers. Johnny had seldom seen so many happy, excited faces. Rumors ran wild everywhere. One man insisted that he had heard someone say that the lovers had been caught in bed together down in the southeastern part of the County and that the Reverend had blown the Perfessor’s head off with a shotgun. Another man said, no, he heard that they caught the Perfessor and Mrs. Gray in bed together up in the northwestern part of the County, and that the Perfessor had blown the Reverend’s head off with a shotgun. A report came that a man with no clothes on was seen driving a buggy in the western part of the County. Soon a dozen people swore that they had seen the now fabulous buggy with their own eyes in a dozen different parts of the County.

  —Godamighty! Garwood said. The Perfessor sure is travelling fast. Why doesn’t he just stop somewhere and enjoy what he’s got until they catch up with him and blow him to Kingdom Come?

  There seemed to be no way of getting the truth from this welter of particulars. Even the original testimony about the buggy’s appearance at Three Mile Junction could be collected in a dozen different versions. Meanwhile, parties of pursuers were beating up and down the County like mad. The four boys decided to wait until they had something definite to go on.

  The break came around midnight. Most of the posses had come back to the Square by that time to compare results. The main party, including the Reverend Gray himself and the heavy man who had flashed a lantern in Johnny’s face, had just ridden up to the Saloon and dismounted. The heavy man had a hempen rope in his hand, and the Reverend still cradled the shotgun. While they were trying to get news, a man came up and said,

  —Reverend, is that ’ere buggy of yours black with a scroll on her tailboard?

  —It is, brother, the Reverend said.

  —Is it a black mare with a white mark on her forehead?

  —It is, brother, the Reverend said.

  —Well, they’s a horse and buggy just like that a-settin’ in front a your house right now not two blocks from here. I just came by there and seen it with my own eyes.

  No one said anything. The Reverend’s dry lips opened and snapped shut. He set off the safety on his shotgun and started walking down the street in the direction of his house, which was just one block west from the Square on the same street. A hundred men formed behind and around him and walked with him in a silent, purposeful wedge. The Reverend’s eyes shone like balls of blue flint. He licked his lips. The skin on his forehead jerked.

  Suddenly, someone broke into a run. With one impulse the mass of men around the Reverend and the Reverend himself began to run. Without a word, scores of people, mostly men and boys, ran through the Square.

  Far ahead was Johnny Shawnessy, who had been the first to think of running. He ran hard, doubling his fists. He felt his coat split at the shoulder seams. He could hear the feet of the crowd behind. He had the sensation that they were chasing him. He kept expecting a blast of gunfire from the voiceless, pursuing crowd. He reached the house. He saw the buggy, covered with dust, one wheel sagging and nearly off, and the horse, lathered and jaded. He bounded to the porch in a single leap and flung open the front door.

  —Professor, he yelled. Professor! They’re coming!

  The downstairs hall in the large frame house was dark, but a faint light came from upstairs. Johnny called again and listened. He thought he heard someone going down a back stair and a door shutting somewhere in the back of the house, but he couldn’t be sure, for already twenty men were on the porch and through the front door, shoving and shouldering their way into the hall and pouring through the lower floor.

  —Try upstairs! Johnny yelled, to divert the crowd.

  He himself ran up the stair.

  In a room at the head of the stair, sitting in a chair that faced the door, was Lydia Gray. Her head hung to one side, and her eyes were closed. Her yellow hair was unloosened. Her face was flushed but tearless. She had on the dress that she had worn to the picnic, and in one hand she held her widebrimmed hat trailing to the floor. The room was small, and there was obviously no one there but Lydia.

  At the door, Johnny was shoved aside by the Reverend and half a dozen other men armed with shotguns.

  —Woman, the Reverend said, where is your lover?

  Without changing her position, the woman opened her eyes and said,

  —He’s not here.

  Johnny had expected tears, entreaties, protestations of innocence—anything but this beautiful indifference. The men removed their hats and looked sheepishly at each other.

  —Woman, the Reverend said, what can you say for yourself?

  —I have nothing to say, she said. I don’t want Mr. Stiles hurt. He isn’t guilty.

  The men shuffled their feet uneasily and began to try to put their guns where they couldn’t be seen.

  —Ma’am, the heavy man with the rope said in an absurdly courteous voice, could you tell us the whereabouts of Mr. Stiles?

  —I don’t know, the woman said.

  —Yes, ma’am, the heavy man said. Don’t trouble yourself, ma’am.

  —Let’s go, a man said.

  All but the Reverend began to bow out of the room. Heavy-booted, they pushed clumsily through the door, replacing their hats. The Reverend stayed in the house, but all the rest of the men went out into the yard. Some of them were giggling like girls with embarrassment and relief.

  —Reckon we ought to spread out and comb the town, boys? the heavy man said without conviction.

  —Spread out yourself, one of the men said. I’m goin’ home.

  There was a vague feeling of disappointment in the crowd.

  —You reckon he did? a citizen said.

  —Does a cat have claws? a second citizen said.

  As he rode home, Johnny was remembering the woman in the chair, trying to recall where he had seen such a thing before. Then he remembered. It was a picture that had appeared in a Harper’s Weekly about the time of the Sickles trial, an engraving of a statue ‘Eve Repentant,’ by the young American sculptor Bartholomew. The beautiful naked woman was seated, her long hair trailed over her shoulders, her gentle head was bent over and slightly averted, and her eyes were closed. In her hand she held the half-eaten appl
e, and on the ground beneath the seat coiled the serpent.

  Johnny felt a hot, choking sensation that made him want to go off and hide his face, but it was shame for himself and himself only. For Lydia and the Perfessor, he felt only pity. They had been lovers and brave. Now they were discovered. And that was over. No, the shame was for himself, as if the hunt had really been for him, the obscene guns for him, the glaring torches for him.

  As for Lydia, she was a woman lost, sitting, it might be, on the chair still, her hat trailing the floor, her hair touching her cheeks, and her husband flapping his withered lips at her.

  When Johnny and Zeke got home, they had to tell the whole thing to T. D. and Ellen. Johnny felt the shame come back hot and strong as these things were talked of in the presence of his mother.

  —Isn’t it terrible! Ellen kept saying. Poor woman! Well, I must say, I blame Perfessor Stiles. Look at all the trouble he caused.

  Johnny felt as if he had personally planned and executed the whole thing and as if everyone secretly suspected it.

  —If, said T. D., there was only just some way to prove that there wasn’t any uh physical uh any—well, people make such a point of such things.

  Johnny went outdoors to put up the horses and get the cold night air on his skin. He kept telling himself that he had, after all, only kissed a girl and swum with her in the Shawmucky River. But it was no use. The feeling of guilt persisted strong as ever.

  When he stepped into the barn, a tall figure stood in the gloom.

  —Hello, John. Fancy meeting you here.

  The Perfessor still had his cane, his straw hat, and his glasses, but he was dusty and sweaty, and his clothes were torn. He looked as if he had been crawling and rolling all over Raintree County.

  —Professor, Johnny said, you’ve got to get out of the County!

  —This idea has also occurred to me, boy, the Perfessor said. But tell me, what about Lydia?

  Johnny told him how they had found her.

  —Wonderful woman! the Perfessor said, rapping the barn wall sharply with his cane. I really wanted to carry her away. If we hadn’t missed that goddam train at the Junction, we’d’ve been a hundred miles away by now. Damn buggy wheel nearly came off when we turned in a ditch. We drove all the way down to Beardstown to get the train there. I left the buggy a block from the station and walked in. First man I saw said, You hear about the guy ran away with a preacher’s wife in Freehaven? I’m a stranger in these parts, myself, I said. They telegraphed down here to watch for them, he said. I looked out of the window and saw three men with guns marching up and down the platform. On my way back to the buggy, I passed a whole platoon of God’s cavalry going by hellbent for the station. I got in the buggy, turned her back to Freehaven, deciding I better take Lydia home and put a good face on the thing before somebody got shot. We rode high and handsome all the way back to Freehaven, and not a soul stopped us. I parked the buggy right in front of the Reverend’s house and went upstairs and thought up a beautiful lie to explain the whole thing. Then I heard the yelling and saw that mob of righteous citizens roaring down the street. I hesitated for a minute, and then I heard you yell, and I lit down the backstair. That’s about all there is to it. I guess you think I’m a scoundrel—eh, John?

  —I don’t know what to think, Johnny said slowly.

  —Ah, John, John! the Perfessor said in his slightly fake tragic manner, love is a strong thing. I loved that woman, boy. Believe it or not, this skinny breast is capable of a generous emotion. I loved and pitied her, and I wanted to carry her away. Don’t think too badly of me, my boy.

  —I don’t, Professor. Somehow I can’t. I want to help you get away, if I can.

  —I suppose the heroic thing would have been for me to stay around when that mob came thundering up and let the outraged husband discharge his righteous fury by blowing off various parts of my anatomy with his shotgun. But I hate that sanctimonious bastard too much to give him the satisfaction. Besides, I was scared.

  —What are you going to do?

  —I haven’t decided yet, the Perfessor said. The more I think about this, the madder I get. O, goddamn the injustice of it all!

  The Perfessor seated himself in the hay.

  —One thing really hurts me, John. I didn’t get a thing. But the hell of it is that no one will ever believe that. Every old venom-dripping hag in the County will have it that I raked the lady fore and aft, and her damned old he-whore of a husband will think the same, and dammit, John, if they’re going to think it, there might as well have been some truth in it.

  —I wish there was some way to prove——

  —No chance, the Perfessor said. I could go before the Reverend and make a virtuous denial. I’d get my head blown off, and no one would believe it anyway. Well, I managed the whole thing badly. You see, John, I’m a very impetuous man. It all happened in a flash this afternoon.

  —But, couldn’t you have waited, Professor, for some legal remedy?

  Professor Jerusalem Webster Stiles shook his head sadly and recited,

  —Of guilt or peril do they deem

  In that tumultuous tender dream!

  He and Johnny talked a long time, but there seemed nothing to do except that the Perfessor would have to get out of the County and go back East.

  And thus, in the early dawn, Johnny Shawnessy and Professor Jerusalem Webster Stiles rose from a ditch at the base of the grail-road embankment beside the Danwebster Graveyard. Somewhere down the track they heard the train coming along the branchline on its way out of Freehaven, and they knew it would be moving slow enough for a man to hook on when it reached the top of the upgrade.

  The tall, skinny figure of the Perfessor stood up against the eastern sky. His black eyes looked at Johnny intently.

  —John, my boy, the Perfessor said, holding out his hand and adopting his rhetorical manner, at this affecting moment I find myself inarticulate. What can I say, my boy, that shall convey to you my deep and genuine fondness and admiration? Let me only say that I expect great things of you. Don’t let the world nail you on the cross of respectability. You and I are alike in only a few ways, but those are fundamental. We both love life and beauty. If a series of misadventures have made me a cynic, that need not happen to you, my boy. You have a beautiful girl who loves you and whom you love. By all means, my boy, marry her, love her, beget broods of happy cherubim, go on, my boy, to greater and better things, and in the years that are to come let your mind sometimes revert, not without a feeling of affection, to that amiable miscreant, your misguided but perhaps not wholly misguiding mentor. Your hand, my boy. A scrap of verse may not be unfitting at this moment, if I can lay my tongue to one. Well, perhaps this will do.

  The Perfessor winked and, arms gesticulating in his best classroom manner, recited,

  —O, may your pathway ever gleam

  With sincere love and joy supreme.

  May Him whose eye is felt for miles,

  Bless you with Nellie’s brightest smiles

  And all that fairest love can dream:

  Such is the wish of your friend, Jerusalem Webster Stiles.

  The train was drawing abreast, a lantern swinging from the cowcatcher. The Perfessor climbed the bank. With brittle agility, black coattails flapping, he leaped upon the rear of the ultimate car. Johnny heard a high voice crackling above the sullen rumble of the train:

  —Ave atque vale!

  —Good-by, Professor! Johnny called, waving.

  He saw a long, thin arm shaken obscurely against the dull sky. Then the Perfessor was gone in the grayness of the just beginning day.

  Johnny’s eyes were blurred with tears. It was because a beautiful, mournful dawn was breaking in the sky, it was because he felt that there had just been a great departure in his life, it was because in this parting he knew that he had not only said good-by to the departing one but to a portion of himself as well. An era of his life was ending. He had discovered that the earth of Raintree County was not only full of beauty but of
peril, and that its Hesperian fruits were guarded by dragons breathing fire. All this he had learned in part from the gifted but erring creature who had just gone down the track to eastward, but he knew that he had always suspected it himself.

  When he finally got back to the Home Place and in bed, beneath his shut eyes the day just passed sprang to life again. Dreaming, he relived it in bizarre distortions. This dream, like many of his dreams, disturbed him with strange, savage encounters and adventures. And yet his dreaming self passed through the dream’s protean, erotic landscapes somehow always in the best Johnny Shawnessy tradition, pursuing an eternal quest for beauty and the good. This night, more vividly than usual (and his dreams were always vivid) the remorseless comedy of life streamed on; and just before awakening, he dreamed perhaps the most delicious, if frustrating, dream that he had ever dreamed.

  He was, it seemed, coming into Freehaven along the oldest pathway of his childhood. Down the road, he saw the redbrick structure of the Court House in a clearing stubbled with stumps. It was some vision of early times in Indiana when the founders of Raintree County imposed their austere dream of freedom on the forest earth. Riding in the wagon with T. D., Ellen, and the other children, he felt as if the scene had been conceived and colored by his own verbal magic, he the budding bard of Raintree County, who like William Shakespeare would write the epic dramas of his people. For him, lusty dialogues in the manner of the elder poets, bards of deathless dramas!

  Everyone was waiting for a certain important personage to arrive so that the program might begin. The sky darkened. Over the roofs of Freehaven shot a fiery streak, perhaps the burning stick of a rocket, descending till it became a train pulling into the station. Someone sprang lightly down, turning a somersault in the air, black coattails stiff out behind, eyes compounded by brilliant lenses, black hair slicked flat to a reptile skull.

  PROFESSOR JERUSALEM WEBSTER STILES

  bowing gracefully to crowd, twirling malacca cane,

  —Greetings, one and all, from foreign parts. As I was about to say before I was so rudely interrupted by the Protestant Reformation, I trust you all perceive the object that I hold in my hand.