He plunged down the length of the store and, while a middle-aged clerk filling a prescription poised his bottle to watch in dull amazement, George Farr tore his shirt open at the throat and thrust his whole head beneath a gushing water tap in a frenzy of activity.
(Cecily, oh, Cecily!)
10
He seemed so old, so tired, as he sat at the head of the table toying with his food, as if the very fibre of him had lost all resilience. Gilligan ate with his usual informal appetite and Donald and Emmy sat side by side so that Emmy could help him. Emmy enjoyed mothering him, now that she could never have him again for a lover; she objected with passionate ardour when Mrs Powers offered to relieve her. The Donald she had known was dead; this one was but a sorry substitute, but Emmy was going to make the best of it, as women will. She had even got accustomed to taking her food after it had cooled.
Mrs Powers sat watching them. Emmy’s shock of no-particular-colour hair was near his worn head in intent devotion, her labour-worried hand seemed to have an eye of its own, so quick, so tender, it was to anticipate him and guide his hand with the food she had prepared for him. Mrs Powers wondered which Donald Emmy loved the more, wondering if she had not perhaps forgotten the former one completely save as a symbol of sorrow. Then the amazing logical thought occurred to her that here was the woman for Donald to marry.
Of course it was. Why had no one thought of that before? Then she told herself that no one had done very much thinking during the whole affair, that it had got on without any particular drain on any intelligence. Why did we take it for granted that he must marry Cecily, and no other? Yet we all accepted it as an arbitrary fact and off we went with our eyes closed and our mouths open, like hounds in full cry.
But would Emmy take him? Wouldn’t she be so frightened at the prospect that she’d be too selfconscious with him afterward to care for him as skilfully as she does now; wouldn’t it cause her to confuse in her mind to his detriment two separate Donalds — a lover and an invalid? I wonder what Joe will think about it.
She looked at Emmy impersonal as Omnipotence, helping Donald with effacing skill, seeming to envelop him, yet never touching him. Anyway, I’ll ask her, she thought, sipping her tea.
Night was come. Tree-frogs, remembering last night’s rain, resumed their monotonous moulding of liquid beads of sound; grass blades and leaves losing shapes of solidity gained shapes of sound: the still suspire of earth, of the ground preparing for slumber; flowers by day, spikes of bloom, became, with night, spikes of scent; the silver tree at the corner of the house hushed its never-still never-escaping ecstasy. Already toads hopped along concrete pavements drinking prisoned heat through their dragging bellies.
Suddenly the rector started from his dream. ‘Tut, tut. We are making mountains from mole hills, as usual. If she wants to marry Donald I am sure her people will not withhold their consent always. Why should they object to their daughter marrying him? Do you know—’
‘Hush!’ she said. He looked up at her startled, then, seeing her warning glance touch Mahon’s oblivious head, he understood. She saw Emmy’s wide shocked eyes on her and she rose at her place. ‘You are through, aren’t you?’ she said to the rector. ‘Suppose we go to the study.’
Mahon sat quiet, chewing. She could not tell whether or not he heard. She passed behind Emmy and leaning to her whispered ‘I want to speak to you. Don’t say anything to Donald.’
The rector, preceding her, fumbled the light on in the study. ‘You must be careful,’ she told him, ‘how you talk before him, how you tell him.’
‘Yes,’ he agreed apologetically. ‘I was so deep in thought.’
‘I know you were. I don’t think it is necessary to tell him at all, until he asks.’
‘And that will never be. She loves Donald: she will not let her people prevent her marrying him. I am not customarily in favour of such a procedure as instigating a young woman to marry against her parents’ wishes, but in this case. . . . You do not think that I am inconsistent, that I am partial because my son is involved?’
‘No, no. Of course not.’
‘Don’t you agree with me, that Cecily will insist on the wedding?’
‘Yes, indeed.’ What else could she say?
Gilligan and Mahon had gone, and Emmy was clearing the table when she returned. Emmy whirled upon her.
‘She ain’t going to take him? What was Uncle Joe saying?’
‘Her people don’t like the idea. That’s all. She hasn’t refused. But I think we had better stop it now, Emmy. She has changed her mind so often nobody can tell what she’ll do.’
Emmy turned back to the table, lowering her head, scraping a plate. Mrs Powers watched her busy elbow, hearing the little clashing noises of china and silver. A bowl of white roses shattered slowly upon the centre of the table.
‘What do you think, Emmy?’
‘I don’t know,’ Emmy replied, sullenly. ‘She ain’t my kind. I don’t know nothing about it.’
Mrs Powers approached the table. ‘Emmy,’ she said. The other did not raise her head, made no reply. She turned the girl gently by the shoulder. ‘Would you marry him, Emmy?’
Emmy straightened hotly, clutching a plate and a fork. ‘Me? Me marry him? Me take another’s leavings? (Donald, Donald.) And her leavings, at that, her that’s run after every boy in town, dressed up in her silk clothes?’
Mrs Powers moved back to the door and Emmy scraped dishes fiercely. This plate became blurred, she blinked and saw something splash on it. She shan’t see me cry! she whispered passionately, bending her head lower, waiting for Mrs Powers to ask her again. (Donald, Donald. . . .)
When she was young, going to school in the spring, having to wear coarse dresses and shoes while other girls wore silk and thin leather; being not pretty at all while other girls were pretty —
Walking home to where work awaited her while other girls were riding in cars or having ice-cream or talking to boys and dancing with them, with boys that had no use for her; sometimes he would step out beside her, so still, so quick, all of a sudden — and she didn’t mind not having silk.
And when they swam and fished and roamed the woods together she forgot she wasn’t pretty, even. Because he was beautiful, with his body all brown and quick, so still . . . making her feel beautiful, too.
And when he said Come here, Emmy, she went to him, and wet grass and dew under her and over her his head with the whole sky for a crown, and the moon running on them like water that wasn’t wet and that you couldn’t feel. . . .
Marry him? Yes! Yes! Let him be sick: she would cure him; let him be a Donald that had forgotten her — she had not forgotten: she could remember enough for both of them. Yes! Yes! she cried, soundlessly, stacking dishes, waiting for Mrs Powers to ask her again. Her red hands were blind, tears splashed fatly on her wrists. Yes! Yes! trying to think it so loudly that the other must hear. She shan’t see me cry! she whispered again. But the other woman only stood in the door watching her busy back. So she gathered up the dishes slowly, there being no reason to linger any longer. Keeping her head averted she carried the dishes to the pantry door, slowly, waiting for the other to speak again. But the other woman said nothing, and Emmy left the room, her pride forbidding her to let the other see her tears.
11
The study was dark when she passed, but she could see the rector’s head in dim silhouette against the more spacious darkness outside the window. She passed slowly on to the veranda. Leaning her quiet tall body against a column in the darkness beyond the fan of light from the door, she listened to the hushed myriad life of night things, to the slow voices of people passing unseen along an unseen street, watching the hurried staring twin eyes of motor-cars like restless insects. A car slowing, drew up to the corner, and after a while a dark figure came along the pale gravel of the path, hurried yet diffident. It paused and screamed delicately in midpath, then it sped on towards the steps, where it stopped again, and Mrs Powers stepped forward from beside her post.
>
‘Oh,’ gasped Miss Cecily Saunders, starting, lifting her hand slimly against her dark dress. ‘Mrs Powers?’
‘Yes. Come in, won’t you?’
Cecily ran with nervous grace up the steps. ‘It was a f-frog,’ she explained between her quick respirations. ‘I nearly stepped — ugh!’ She shuddered, a slim muted flame hushed darkly in dark clothing. ‘Is Uncle Joe here? May I—’ her voice died away diffidently.
‘He is in the study,’ Mrs Powers answered. What has happened to her? she thought. Cecily stood so that the light from the hall fell full on her. There was in her face a thin nervous despair, a hopeless recklessness, and she stared at the other woman’s shadowed face for a long moment. Then she said ‘Thank you, thank you,’ suddenly, hysterically, and ran quickly into the house. Mrs Powers looked after her, then, following, saw her dark dress. She is going away, Mrs Powers thought, with conviction.
Cecily flew on ahead like a slim dark bird, into the unlighted study. ‘Uncle Joe?’ she said, poised, touching either side of the door-frame. The rector’s chair creaked suddenly.
‘Eh?’ he said, and the girl sailed across the room like a bat, dark in the darkness, sinking at his feet, clutching his knees. He tried to raise her but she clung to his legs the tighter, burrowing her head into his lap.
‘Uncle Joe, forgive me, forgive me?’
‘Yes, yes. I knew you would come to us. I told them—’
‘No, no. I — I — You have always been so good, so sweet to me, that I couldn’t. . . .’ She clutched him again fiercely.
‘Cecily, what is it? Now, now, you mustn’t cry about it. Come now, what is it?’ Knowing a sharp premonition he raised her face, trying to see it. But it was only a formless soft blur warmly in his hands.
‘Say you forgive me first, dear Uncle Joe. Won’t you? Say it, say it. If you won’t forgive me, I don’t know what’ll become of me.’ His hands slipping downward felt her delicate tense shoulders and he said:
‘Of course, I forgive you.’
‘Thank you. Oh, thank you. You are so kind—’ she caught his hand, holding it against her mouth.
‘What is it, Cecily?’ he asked, quietly, trying to soothe her.
She raised her head. ‘I am going away.’
‘Then you aren’t going to marry Donald?’
She lowered her head to his knees again, clutching his hand in her long nervous fingers, holding it against her face. ‘I cannot, I cannot. I am a — I am not a good woman any more, dear Uncle Joe. Forgive me, forgive me. . . .’
He withdrew his hand and she let herself be raised to her feet, feeling his arms, his huge kind body. ‘There, there,’ patting her back with his gentle heavy hand. ‘Don’t cry.’
‘I must go,’ she said at last, moving slimly and darkly against his bulk. He released her. She clutched his hand again sharply, letting it go. ‘Good-bye,’ she whispered, and fled swift and dark as a bird, gracefully to a delicate tapping of heels, as she had come.
She passed Mrs Powers on the porch without seeing her and sped down the steps. The other woman watched her slim dark figure until it disappeared . . . after an interval the car that had stopped at the corner of the garden flashed on its lights and drove away. . . .
Mrs Powers, pressing the light switch, entered the study. The rector stared at her as she approached the desk, quiet and hopeless.
‘Cecily has broken the engagement, Margaret. So the wedding is off.’
‘Nonsense,’ she told him sharply, touching him with her firm hand. ‘I’m going to marry him myself. I intended to all the time. Didn’t you suspect?’
12
San Francisco, Cal.
25 April 1919
Darling Margaret,
I told mother last night and of coarse she thinks we are too young. But I explained to her how times have changed since the war how the war makes you older than they used to. I see fellows my age that did not serve specially flying which is an education in itself and they seem like kids to me because at last I have found the woman I want and my kid days are over. After knowing so many women to found you so far away when I did not expect it. Mother says for me to go in business and make money if I expect a woman to marry me so I am going to start in tomorrow I have got the place already. So it will not be long till I see you and take you in my arms at last and always. How can I tell you how much I love you you are so different from them. Loving you has already made me a serious man realizing responsabilities. They are all so silly compared with you talking of jazz and going some place where all the time I have been invited on parties but I refuse because I rather sit in my room thinking of you putting my thoughts down on paper let them have their silly fun. I think of you all ways and if it did not make you so unhappy I want you to think of me always. But don’t I would not make you unhappy at all my own dearest. So think of me and remember I love you only and will love you only will love you all ways.
Forever yours
Julian
13
The Baptist minister, a young dervish in a white lawn tie, being most available, came and did his duty and went away. He was young and fearfully conscientious and kind-hearted; upright and passionately desirous of doing good: so much so that he was a bore. But he had soldiered after a fashion and he liked and respected Dr Mahon, refusing to believe that simply because Dr Mahon was Episcopal he was going to hell as soon as he died.
He wished them luck and fled busily away, answering his own obscure compulsions. They watched his busy energetic backside until he was out of sight, then Gilligan silently helped Mahon down the steps and across the lawn to his favourite seat beneath the tree. The new Mrs Mahon walked silently beside them. Silence was her wont, but not Gilligan’s. Yet he had spoken no word to her. Walking near him she put out her hand and touched his arm: he turned to her a face so bleak, so reft, that she knew a sharp revulsion, a sickness with everything. (Dick, Dick. How well you got out of this mess!) She looked quickly away, across the garden, beyond the spire where pigeons crooned the afternoon away, unemphatic as sleep, biting her lips. Married, and she had never felt so alone.
Gilligan settled Mahon in his chair with his impersonal half-reckless care. Mahon said:
‘Well, Joe, I’m married at last.’
‘Yes,’ answered Gilligan. His careless spontaneity was gone. Even Mahon noticed it in his dim oblivious way. ‘I say Joe.’
‘What is it, Loot?’
Mahon was silent and his wife took her customary chair, leaning back and staring up into the tree. He said at last: ‘Carry on, Joe.’
‘Not now, Loot. I don’t feel so many. Think I’ll take a walk,’ he answered, feeling Mrs Mahon’s eyes on him. He met her gaze harshly, combatively.
‘Joe,’ she said quietly, bitterly.
Gilligan saw her pallid face, her dark unhappy eyes, her mouth like a tired scar, and he knew shame. His own bleak face softened.
‘All right, Loot,’ he said, quietly matching her tone, with a trace of his old ambiguous unseriousness. ‘What’ll it be? Bust up a few more minor empires, huh?’
Just a trace, but it was there. Mrs Mahon looked at him again with gratitude and that old grave happiness which he knew so well, unsmiling but content, which had been missing for so long, so long; and it was as though she had laid her firm strong hand on him. He looked quickly away from her face, sad and happy, not bitter any more.
‘Carry on, Joe.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
1
SAN FRANCISCO, CAL.
27 April 1919
My Dearest Sweetheart,
Just a line to let you know that I have gone into business into the banking business making money for you. To give ourselves the position in the world you deserve and a home of our own. The work is congenal talking to other people in the business that don’t know anything about aviation. All they think about is going out to dance with men. Everyday means one day less for us to be with you forever. All my love.
Yours forever
Julian<
br />
2
Nine-day or ninety-day or nine-hundred-day sensations have a happy faculty for passing away into the oblivion whence pass sooner or later all of man’s inventions. Keeps from getting the world all cluttered up. You say right off that this is God’s work. But it must be a woman: no man could be so utilitarian. But then, women preserve only those things which can or might be used again. So this theory is also exploded.
After a while there were no more of the local curious to call; after a while those who had said I told you so when Miss Cecily Saunders let it be known that she would marry the parson’s son and who said I told you so when she did not marry the parson’s son forgot about it. There were other things to think and talk of: this was the lying-in period of the K.K.K. and the lying-out period of Mr Wilson, a democratish gentleman living in Washington, D.C.
Besides, it was all legal now. Miss Cecily Saunders was safely married — though nobody knew where they were from the time they drove out of town in George Farr’s car until they were properly married by a priest in Atlanta the next day (but then I always told you about that girl). They all hoped for the worst. And that Mrs What’s-her-name, that tall black-headed woman at Mahon’s had at last married someone, putting an end to that equivocal situation.
And so April became May. There were fair days when the sun, becoming warmer and warmer, rising, drank off the dew, and flowers bloomed like girls ready for a ball, then drooped in the languorous fulsome heat like girls after the ball; when earth, like a fat woman, recklessly trying giddy hat after hat, trying a trimming of apple and pear and peach, threw it away; tried narcissi and jonquil and flag: threw it away — so early flowers bloomed and passed and later flowers bloomed to fade and fall, giving place to yet later ones. Fruit blossoms were gone, pear was forgotten: what were once tall candlesticks, silvery with white bloom, were now tall jade candlesticks of leaves beneath the blue cathedral of sky across which, in hushed processional, went clouds like choirboys slow and surpliced.
Leaves grew larger and greener until all rumour of azure and silver and pink had gone from them; birds sang and made love and married and built houses in them and in the tree at the corner of the house that yet swirled its white-bellied leaves in never-escaping skyward ecstasies; bees broke clover upon the lawn interrupted at intervals by the lawn mower and its informal languid conductor.
Complete Works of William Faulkner Page 25
