Raintree County

by Ross Lockridge

  Preacher Jarvey’s voice was elaborately ironical. His small eyes glared lustfully around as he plucked and tore imaginary fruit from an imaginary tree.

  —. . . and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.

  And they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day: and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden.

  Esther had been so absorbed in the Preacher’s discourse that she had failed until this moment to observe a buggy approaching on the road from Moreland. Now, looking up, she saw what looked like Pa’s big shiny black pulling a buggy, though dust and distance obscured the face of the driver.

  —Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception; in sorrow thou shalt bring forth children; and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall rule over thee.

  And unto Adam he said, Because thou hast hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life. . . .

  The buggy was only a few hundred feet now from the tent. In the seat, Esther saw Pa’s erect, broad form, his broadbrimmed black hat, his patriarchal beard.

  —In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground; for out of it wast thou taken: for dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.

  The buggy began to slow down. Esther could see Pa’s black eyes searching the rows of heads under the Revival Tent. His right hand gripped the handle of a whip.

  —And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all living. . . .

  —And the Lord God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live forever:

  Therefore the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

  So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.

  Preacher Jarvey put the book down and closed it resoundingly. He removed his glasses. His great hairy head dripped sweat. The front of his shirt was soaked. The horn of his voice had been muted to a pitch of resignation and sadness.

  —So endeth, brothers and sisters in Adam and children of the errin’ mother of mankind, so endeth the Oldest Story in the World. In Adam’s fall we sinned all. The highest wisdom is to know that we are sinners. In the pride and pomp of this day on which we celebrate the birth of our nation, let us not forget the birth of our race. With one hand, God giveth, and with the other He taketh away.

  The citizens of Raintree County picked up their hymnbooks. The ladies, daughters of Eve, fanned themselves briskly, looked shrewdly around at each other, twisted uncomfortably in their cloth, bone, and metal cages, badges of lost innocence.

  The service over, Esther found Pa waiting for her outside the tent.

  —I’d like to have a word with you, Esther, he said. I’ll drive you to where you’re goin’.

  —I’m going to the schoolhouse to help fix the G.A.R. Banquet.

  She got into the buggy with him and they drove slowly through parked vehicles to the National Road. Pa plucked at his black-veined beard and played with the handle of the whip coiled in his lap.

  —Esther, he said finally, weighing his words, you know my second wife has died and I’m alone at the old farm. Supposin’ I was to say that you could come and bring the children, and I was to say that I’d take them in and help care for ’em like they was my own, and——

  —I’ll come back and visit any time, Pa, when I can bring Mr. Shawnessy.

  Her father went on plucking at his beard. His voice was a heavy monotone.

  —Supposin’ you was to find out before the day was over that he wasn’t a fittin’ husband for you. And supposin’ you was to regret marryin’ him and runnin’ away from your old pa the way you done fourteen years ago.

  —That never could happen, Pa.

  They sat in the buggy, side by side, the broad figure of Gideon Root, the slim figure of his daughter Esther. Both looked straight ahead. Their black eyes had the same look of stern endurance.

  —It might happen, Pa said. And if it does, you remember what I said. The old home is waitin’ for you, Esther.

  They were turning west at the intersection. She could see Mr. Shawnessy sitting in the middle one of three chairs backed against the wall of the General Store. The buggy proceeded west toward the schoolhouse. A vague anxiety had touched her for the tall form in the black schoolmaster’s suit. Was he entirely safe there sitting beside the Great Road?

  She realized that she had never felt quite secure in her possession of this strange, wise, godlike creature who had ruled her life from childhood on. She had never quite severed herself from the dark earth of her origin, the obscure, violent parentage embodied in the figure on the seat beside her. Part of her was still living with a divided heart back in the era of a

  House Divided

  MAY RESULT FROM COMING ELECTION

  SENATOR WARNS ON EVE OF DEPARTURE

  Washington, July 1. On the eve of his departure from the Nation’s Capital to mend political fences back home, the Hon. Garwood B. Jones, Senior Senator from Indiana, expressed his belief that the issues at stake in the present election are the gravest faced by this country since the Election of 1860. ‘Unless an intelligent citizenry registers an overwhelming voice of disapprobation against the forces of anarchy which are abroad in the land, we may face the prospect of a House Divided, such as that which confronted the immortal Lincoln in 1860. The opposing points of view are fundamental and irreconcilable. Our Union is threatened as never before, by a more insidious foe than open rebellion.’ The Senator declined to elaborate further on this statement made in the course of some impromptu remarks during a little farewell gathering at the home of James C. Parks, longtime friend and supporter of the popular statesman from . . .

  The Indianapolis News-Historian smelled damp and gray. Mr. Shawnessy glanced at the front page and reached the paper to the Perfessor. The Senator was still talking with the ladies of the Sitting and Sewing Society.

  —Time for our history lesson, children, the Perfessor said, shaking out the paper and running his eyes over the front page. Let’s see how the Supreme Being is ruling his creation in A.D. 1892. Hmmmmmm. I see by this that the Senator left Washington amid kisses and tears. If there were truth in print, this article ought to read as follows:

  SENATOR FEASTS SELF AT WHORE’S HOUSE WOOS NEW VOTES AND OLD DRAB

  (Epic Fragment from the Cosmic Enquirer)

  Garwood Jones, the Senator from Indiana, who is solicitous of keeping his seat (size forty-six) in the Senate, threw a farewell party for himself at the home of his current mistress, that versatile and available female, Mrs. Petronia Parks, whose alleged husband seems to be chronically and cornutely absent from the City on business. The party was well attended by a great many people whose political eggs are in the Senator’s basket. The Senator delivered an impromptu speech, of which advance copies were available to the press. There was a great deal of fun, festivity, and other fricatives. The food was passable, the liquor was plentiful, Petronia was a bad girl again, and a good time was had by all.

  The Perfessor flapped pages of the News-Historian, folded it neatly, dropped it on the ground, and plucked a notebook from his coatpocket.

  —It’s impossible to report the news as it really is. But, if you’re interested, John, here’s my digest of the news in the year of our Lord 1892, as compiled from the News-Historians of our Nation. I amused myself doing this on the train down.

  He adjusted his pince-nez and read in a metallic monotone:

  —LIFE IN OUR TIME

  (Epic Fragments from the Cosmic Enquirer)r />
  We the people of the United States in the year 1892, four hundred years after the Discovery of America, one hundred and sixteen years after the Declaration of Independence, seventy-two years after the founding of Raintree County, and nine years before the beginning of the Twentieth Century, have produced the following commentary on the great documents under which we are governed:

  A MORE PERFECT UNION

  The various political factions by which our Republic is controlled began to hate each other with official ferocity. The Republican Party, representing money and the main chance, held a convention in June and nominated Benjamin Harrison for the Presidency. The Democratic Party, representing money and the main chance, held a convention in June and nominated Grover Cleveland. The Populist Party, representing the people against their will, met in convention on July 4 for a result not yet known. All over America, government was conducted by the few for the few.

  ESTABLISH JUSTICE

  A colored man was jerked to Jesus in a lynching jubilee down in Memphis, Tennessee, to remind the Negro in an Election Year that the Constitution like the Decalogue is a Sunday instrument.

  DOMESTIC TRANQUILLITY

  The domestic manners of the Americans exhibited the usual spicy variety. A wife beat her husband’s actress whore with a whip. An actress beat her stage-manager paramour with a whip. Jack the Ripper cut throats. A Boston man drowned his pregnant sweetheart in the Mystic River. Lesbian love crept into America’s papers when Alice Mitchell, a nice little Southern girl of good family, jealously cut the throat of her sweetheart, Freda Ward, another nice little Southern girl of good family. In North Carolina, the hill people went on swapping wives according to a time-honored custom.

  THE COMMON DEFENSE

  Secretary of State James G. Blaine, the Plumed Knight, assisted by Sancho Panza Benjamin Harrison, Twenty-Third President of the United States, ran a course against various windmills. Little Chile talked sassy to Uncle Sam after Chileans beat up American sailors in Valparaiso. Sam made a fist. Chile yelled Uncle. The Eagle and the Lion engaged in controversy over sealing rights in the Bering Straits. The Seal, interested third party, was not consulted. As Election Day drew on apace, Ben and Blaine tugged vigorously at the Lion’s Tail. While protecting Home Industries, the McKinley Tariff stifled economic recovery in America and free trade everywhere.

  THE GENERAL WELFARE

  Victims of youthful error of either sex were earnestly besought in all newspapers to use Sanativo, sure cure for nervous debility, early decay, and lost manhood, without the aid and publicity of a doctor.

  THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY

  In Pittsburgh, on the Fourth of July, the workers at the Homestead Mill prepared to defend their practical right to feed and clothe themselves and their families, while the employers prepared to defend their sacred right to accrue wealth by the enslavement of men. Three hundred miners were entombed somewhere. Strikes spread as Americans, the richest and happiest people in the world, starved.

  GOD AND THE WORLD

  The Reverend Lyman Abbott affirmed that God’s Word was a typographical error and that Christianity was civilized paganism. He recommended the marriage of Darwin and Jesus for the salvation of the world. Little blind and deaf Helen Keller asked her instructor, Miss Sullivan, the following questions:

  1. Who made God?

  2. Where is God?

  3. What did God make the universe out of?

  4. What is a soul?

  5. If God is love, why does he permit sin and suffering?

  6. If God made all things, did he not also make the evil in the world?

  Dozens of doctors and divines, rushing eagerly into print, flunked the exam.

  SPORTS AND GAMES

  A female heavyweight wrestler subtly illustrated the general trend of the Nineteenth Century by flattening a succession of males and planting her broad rump on their chests. Thomas Lake Harris was alleged to be conducting a sex community as naughtily nude as Oneida, with Edenic baths and other pastoral pastimes.

  LOST AND FOUND

  Various nude, ravished, dead girls’ bodies in various parts of the United States.

  MODERN ENLIGHTENMENT

  At the suggestion of friends, a man dug up the corpse of his consumptive wife and cremated it lest her diseased lungs feed upon her children’s.

  CIRCUS MAXIMUS

  Trains jumped trestles, rivers flooded, ships foundered, and hotels burnt to kill thousands and entertain millions.

  LITERATURE AND THE ARTS

  People went to the theatre to see Shiloh, a play about the Civil War; Around the World in Eighty Days, a play about the speed of modern transportation; The White Patrol, a play about the Hay-market Bombing; The White Slave, a play about prostitution; The Lost Paradise, a play about a factory owner and a factory waif; and Cleopatra, a play about Madame Sarah Bernhardt. In addition, they saw Lillian Russell, Shakespeare, the Vaudeville, and a Program of Gems, Varieties, Specialties, and Minstrel Comedians. A lionmaned Pole named Paderewski made a majestic assault on America’s concert keyboards. Stoddard lectured. Mark Twain, America’s most famous living writer, hacked out The American Claimant. Americans continued to read Looking Backward, Progress and Poverty, and The Young Mail Carrier of the Rockies. In Camden, New Jersey, Walt Whitman died obscure. Last words: ‘Warry, shift.’

  SCIENTIFIC NOTES

  Anthropology: John L. Sullivan, Boston Strong Boy, Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the World, in training for his title defense against Challenger Gentleman Jim Corbett, had his right biceps muscle measured and recorded a circumference of seventeen inches. Biology: A twoheaded boy was exhibited talking German on one stalk, Italian on the other. Technology: Reporters were admitted for the first time to an electrocution in Sing Sing. Mineralogy: There was a gold rush near Denver.

  FINANCIAL PAGE

  Bulls and bears butted and cuffed each other on Wall Street while the Nation ran down hill to another depression.

  OURSELVES AND OUR POSTERITY

  The Dove of Peace spread its wings on a world becalmed in one of its rare seasons of tranquillity, a blessing conferred upon humanity by the Industrial Revolution, bourgeois enterprise, and Queen Victoria. In Russia, millions were starving, and Count Leo Tolstoi, well-fed, bled for them. In America, on Memorial Day, people laid flowers on the graves of young men who died in the Civil War thirty years ago. Cash, not beauty or intelligence, ruled society. It was generally agreed in pulpits, newspapers, books, barrooms, brothels, congresses, caucuses, schoolrooms, and the Home that humanity had never been so blessed and that the Cosmos was infallibly moving toward a millennial century of Peace and Prosperity.

  The Perfessor closed the notebook and returned it to his pocket.

  —There, he said, is Life in Our Time. What do you think of it?

  Mr. Shawnessy picked up the News-Historian and rubbed a sheet of it between his fingers.

  —Fifty years from now, this paper will be a brittle dust. No rag content.

  The Hon. Garwood B. Jones was making senatorial faces for the members of the Sitting and Sewing Society. Through the mist of Mr. Shawnessy’s cigar, the Senator in his duckbottomed suit became a stiff cartoon on faded paper. Fat men made word balloons about forgotten issues. Around them swirled brittle bits of headlines. Brown dust of the year 1892 settled slowly in guts of old libraries.

  —Remember the papers of the sixties, Professor? Much better paper. Life had an epic quality in those days of the rag content. There was something worth preserving. Thirty years ago the great issues were the Union and Human Slavery. Today, the main parties electioneer over the protective tariff and the free coinage of silver, both artificial issues. But down underneath, the great issues wait to be recognized again. They are still what they’ve always been in human affairs—Union and Human Slavery.

  —The Republic has to relax, the Perfessor said, after its moral and military orgies. These are the brown decades. No doubt in a few years we’ll get excited about your so-called great issues again.
Meanwhile, we have the Indianapolis News-Historian to remind us that we’re living in a new age, the age of the Modern Man, or perhaps still better, the Common Man—common because he’s becoming commoner all the time and more and more like every other man. The reason for this is that through the free press and the blessings of literacy he shares the atrocities of mankind more fully with his fellows. The newspaper is the true epic of this modern Odysseus, the Common Man. He’s the most exciting hero of all time. The world’s his oyster, and he opens it every morning over his coffee. In the space of a few minutes, he lays the Atlantic Cable, wins and loses wars in Europe, abdicates thrones, treads a tightrope over Niagara, and rapes an unidentified woman on a deserted part of the New York waterfront. For this, he’s lynched from the nearest limb and cured of impotence, baldness, old age, and the piles. His heroic form is carried in pomp and ceremony to the vault of the Vanderbilts in a casket that weighs a ton. Resurrected, he goes off a trestle at ninety miles an hour and around the world in sixty-nine days. He lives a life of gilded ease on Fifth Avenue in New York and makes a pile on the stock market. Taking a vacation from respectability, he murders innocent bystanders with anarchist bombs and assassinates Presidents. The jungle fascinates him, and he buys a sun helmet and bustles off to Darkest Africa, where he emerges into a clearing, bland face smiling, hand outstretched, and greets himself, bland face smiling, hand outstretched, after living two years among the aborigines. Despite his emaciated condition, he has his chest measured for all the world to see, is admired for the bulge of his biceps and the size of his triceps, and wins the heavyweight boxing championship of the Cosmos. All this the Common Man accomplishes by the expenditure of a penny, while sitting squarely on his prosaic beam in the Main Street of Waycross, sucking on a five-cent cigar.

  —Meanwhile, Mr. Shawnessy said, the real world goes on, the world of the only possible fact.

  —What is this fact?

  —A human life. That’s the only thing that ever happens, whereas the News-Historian, like History, deals with something called the Event.