Though the first thing Mr de Spain did after he got to be mayor was to have an ordinance passed that no cut-out could be opened inside the town limits. So it had been years now since we had heard one. Then one morning we did. I mean we — Grandfather and Mother and Father and Uncle Gavin and Gowan — did, because it was right in front of our house. It was just about the time everybody would be going to school or to work and Gowan knew which car it was even before he got to the window because Lucius’s Ford made a different sound, and besides nobody but the mayor would have risked that cutout with the cut-out law in force. It was him: the red car just going out of sight and the cut-out off again as soon as he had passed the house; and Uncle Gavin still sitting at the table finishing his breakfast just as if there hadn’t been any new noise at all.
And as Gowan reached the corner on the way home from school at noon, he heard it again; Mr de Spain had driven blocks out of his way to rip past our house again in second gear with the cut-out wide open; and again while Mother and Father and Grandfather and Uncle Gavin and he were still sitting at the table finishing dinner, with Mother sitting right still and not looking at anything and Father looking at Uncle Gavin and Uncle Gavin sitting there stirring his coffee like there wasn’t a sound anywhere in the world except maybe his spoon in the cup.
And again about half-past five, about dark, when the storekeepers and doctors and lawyers and mayors and such as that would be going home at the end of the day to eat supper all quiet and peaceful, without having to go back to town until tomorrow morning; and this time Gowan could even see Uncle Gavin listening to the cut-out when it passed the house. I mean, this time Uncle Gavin didn’t mind them seeing that he heard it, looking up from the paper a little and holding the paper in front of him until the sound went on and then quit off when Mr de Spain passed the end of our yard and picked up his foot; Uncle Gavin and Grandfather both looking up while it passed though all Grandfather did yet was just to frown a little and Uncle Gavin not even doing that: just waiting, almost peaceful, so that Gowan could almost hear him saying That’s all at last. He had to make the fourth run past to get back home.
And so it was all, through supper and afterward when they went to the office where Mother would sit in the rocking chair always sewing something though it seemed to be mostly darning socks and Gowan’s stockings and Grandfather and Father would sit across the desk from one another playing checkers and sometimes Uncle Gavin would come in too with his book when he wouldn’t feel like trying again to teach Mother to play chess until I got born next year and finally got big enough so he could begin to try to teach me. And now it was already past the time when the ones going to the picture show would have gone to it, and the men just going back to town after supper to loaf in Christian’s drugstore or to talk with the drummers in the Holston House lobby or drink some more coffee in the café, and anybody would have thought he was safe. Only this time it wasn’t even Father. It was Grandfather himself jerking his head up and saying:
“What the devil’s that? That’s the second time today.”
“It’s the fifth time today,” Father said. “His foot slipped.”
“What?” Grandfather said.
“He was trying to mash on the brake to go quiet past the house,” Father said. “Only his foot slipped and mashed on the cut-out instead.”
“Telephone Connors,” Grandfather said. That was Mr Buck Connors. “I wont have it.”
“That’s Gavin’s job,” Father said. “He’s the acting City Attorney when you’re in a checker game. He’s the one to speak to the marshal. Or better still, the mayor. Aint that right, Gavin?” And Gowan said they all looked at Uncle Gavin, and that he himself was ashamed, not of Uncle Gavin: of us, the rest of them. He said it was like watching somebody’s britches falling down while he’s got to use both hands trying to hold up the roof: you are sorry it is funny, ashamed you had to be there watching Uncle Gavin when he never even had any warning he would need to try to hide his face’s nakedness when that cut-out went on and the car ripped slow in second gear past the house again after you would have thought that anybody would have had the right to believe that other time before supper would be the last one at least until tomorrow, the cut-out ripping past and sounding just like laughing, still sounding like laughing even after the car had reached the corner where Mr de Spain would always lift his foot off the cut-out. Because it was laughing: it was Father sitting at his side of the checker board, looking at Uncle Gavin and laughing.
“Charley!” Mother said. “Stop it!” But it was already too late. Uncle Gavin had already got up, quick, going toward the door like he couldn’t quite see it, and on out.
“What the devil’s this?” Grandfather said.
“He rushed out to telephone Buck Connors,” Father said. “Since this was the fifth time today, he must have decided that fellow’s foot never slipped at all.” Now Mother was standing right over Father with the stocking and the darning egg in one hand and the needle in the other like a dagger.
“Will you please hush, dearest?” she said. “Will you please shut your gee dee mouth? — I’m sorry, Papa,” she said to Grandfather. “But he—” Then she was at Father again: “Will you? Will you now?”
“Sure, kid,” Father said. “I’m all for peace and quiet too.” Then Mother was gone too and then it was bed time and then Gowan told how he saw Uncle Gavin sitting in the dark parlor with no light except through the hall door, so that he couldn’t read if he tried. Which Gowan said he wasn’t: just sitting there in the half-dark, until Mother came down the stairs in her dressing gown and her hair down and said,
“Why dont you go to bed? Go on now. Go on,” and Gowan said,
“Yessum,” and she went on into the parlor and stood beside Uncle Gavin’s chair and said,
“I’m going to telephone him,” and Uncle Gavin said,
“Telephone who?” and Mother came back and said,
“Come on now. This minute,” and waited until Gowan went up the stairs in front of her. When he was in bed with the light off she came to the door and said Goodnight and all they would have to do now would be just to wait. Because even if five was an odd number and it would take an even number to make the night whole for Uncle Gavin, it couldn’t possibly be very long because the drugstore closed as soon as the picture show was out, and anybody still sitting in the Holston House lobby after the drummers had all gone to bed would have to explain it to Jefferson some time or other, no matter how much of a bachelor he was. And Gowan said he thought how at least Uncle Gavin and he had their nice warm comfortable familiar home to wait in, even if Uncle Gavin was having to sit up in the dark parlor by himself, instead of having to use the drugstore or the hotel to put off finally having to go home as long as possible.
And this time Gowan said Mr de Spain opened the cut-out as soon as he left the Square; he could hear it all the way getting louder and louder as it turned the two corners into our street, the ripping loud and jeering but at least not in second gear this time, going fast past the house and the dark parlor where Uncle Gavin was sitting, and on around the other two corners he would have to turn to get back into the street he belonged in, dying away at last until all you could hear was just the night and then Uncle Gavin’s feet coming quiet up the stairs. Then the hall light went out, and that was all.
All for that night, that day I mean. Because even Uncle Gavin didn’t expect it to be completely all. In fact, the rest of them found out pretty quick that Uncle Gavin didn’t aim for it to be all; the next morning at breakfast it was Uncle Gavin himself that raised his head first and said: “There goes Manfred back to our salt-mine,” and then to Gowan: “Mr de Spain has almost as much fun with his automobile as you’re going to have with one as soon as your Cousin Charley buys it, doesn’t he?” Whenever that would be because Father said almost before Uncle Gavin could finish getting the words out:
“Me own one of those stinking noisy things? I wouldn’t dare. Too many of my customers use horses and mules for a
living.” But Gowan said that if Father ever did buy one while he was there, he would find something better to do with it besides running back and forth in front of the house with the cut-out open.
And again while he was on the way home at noon to eat dinner, and again while they were sitting at the table. Nor was it just Gowan who found out Uncle Gavin didn’t aim for that to be all because Mother caught Gowan almost before Uncle Gavin turned his back. Gowan didn’t know how she did it. Aleck Sander always said that his mother could see and hear through a wall (when he got bigger he said Guster could smell his breath over the telephone) so maybe all women that were already mothers or just acting like mothers like Mother had to while Gowan lived with us, could do that too and that was how Mother did it: stepping out of the parlor just as Gowan put his hand in his pocket.
“Where is it?” Mother said. “What Gavin just gave you. It was a box of tacks; wasn’t it a box of tacks? to scatter out there in the street where he will run over them? Wasn’t it? Acting just like a high school sophomore. He should marry Melisandre Backus before he ruins the whole family.”
“I thought you said it’s too late for that,” Gowan said. “That the one that marries Cousin Gavin will have to be a widow with four children.”
“Maybe I meant too early,” Mother said. “Melisandre hasn’t even got the husband yet.” Then she wasn’t seeing Gowan. “Which is exactly what Manfred de Spain is acting like,” she said. “A high school sophomore.” Gowan said she was looking right at him but she wasn’t seeing him at all, and all of a sudden he said she was pretty, looking just like a girl. “No: exactly what we are all acting like,” and now she was seeing him again. “But dont you dare let me see you doing it, do you hear? Dont you dare!”
“Yessum,” Gowan said. It was no trouble. All he and Top had to do after school was just divide the tacks into their hands and kind of fool around out in the middle of the street like they were trying to decide what to do next while the tacks dribbled down across the tracks of the automobile; Mr de Spain had made nine trips by now so Gowan said he almost had two ruts. Only he and Top had to stay out in the cold now because they wanted to see it. Top said that when the wheels blew up, they would blow the whole automobile up. Gowan didn’t think so, but he didn’t know either and Top might be partly right, enough right anyway to be worth watching.
So they had to stand behind the big jasmine bush and it began to get dark and it got colder and colder and Guster opened the kitchen door and begun to holler for Top then after a while she came to the front door and hollered for both of them; it was full dark and good and cold now when at last they saw the lights coming, it reached the corner of the yard and the cut-out went on and the car ripped slow and loud past and they listened and watched both but nothing happened, nothing at all, it just went on and even the cut-out went back off; Gowan said how maybe it would take a little time for the tacks to finally work in and blow the wheels up and they waited for that too but nothing happened. And now it had been long enough for him to be home.
And after supper, all of them in the office again, but not anything at all this time, not even anything passed the house so Gowan thought maybe it hadn’t blown up until after he was home and now Uncle Gavin never would know when it would be safe to come out of the dark parlor and go upstairs to bed; so that he, Gowan, made a chance to whisper to Uncle Gavin: “Do you want me to go up to his house and look?” Only Father said,
“What? What’re you whispering about?” so that didn’t do any good either. And the next morning nothing happened either, the cut-out ripping slow past the house like next time it was coming right through the dining room itself. And twice more at noon and that afternoon when Gowan got home from school Top jerked his head at him and they went to the cellar; Top had an old rake-head with a little of the handle still in it so they built a fire behind the stable and burned the handle out and when it was dark enough Gowan watched up and down the street while Top scraped a trench across the tire-rut and set the rake teeth-up in it and scattered some leaves over to hide it and they watched from behind the jasmine bush again while the car ripped past. And nothing happened though when the car was gone they went and saw for themselves where the wheels had mashed right across the rake.
“We’ll try it once more,” Gowan said. And they did: the next morning: and nothing. And that afternoon Top worked on the rake a while with an old file and then Gowan worked on it a while even after they both knew they would still be working on it that way when the Cotillion Club would be planning next year’s Christmas Ball. “We need a grindstone,” Gowan said.
“Unk Noon,” Top said.
“We’ll take the gun like we are going rabbit hunting,” Gowan said. So they did: as far as Uncle Noon Gatewood’s blacksmith shop on the edge of town. Uncle Noon was big and yellow; he had a warped knee that just seemed to fit exactly into the break of a horse’s forearm and pastern; he would pick up a horse’s hind leg and set the foot inside the knee and reach out with one hand and take hold of the nearest post and if the post held, the horse could jerk and plunge all it wanted to and Uncle Noon and the horse might sway back and forth but the foot wouldn’t move. He let Gowan and Top use his rock and while Top turned and tilted the water-can Gowan held the teeth one by one to the stone until they would have gone through almost anything that mashed against them, let alone an automobile.
And Gowan said they sure did have to wait for dark this time. For dark and late too, when they knew nobody would see them. Because if the sharpened rake worked, the car might not blow up so bad that Mr de Spain wouldn’t have time to wonder what caused it and start looking around and find the rake. And at first it looked like it was going to be a good thing it was a long December night too because the ground was frozen that they had to dig the trench through, not just a short trench like before to set the rake in but one long enough so they could tie a string to the rake and then snatch the rake back into the yard between the time the wheel blew up and Mr de Spain could begin to hunt for what caused it. But Gowan said at least tomorrow was Saturday so they would have all day to fix the rake so they could be behind the jasmine bush and see it by daylight.
So they were: already behind the bush with the rake-head fixed and the end of the string in Gowan’s hand when they heard it coming and then saw it, then the cut-out came on and it came ripping past with the cut-out like it was saying HAha-HAhaHAha until they were already thinking they had missed this time too when the wheel said BANG and Gowan said he didn’t have time to snatch the string because the string did the snatching, out of his hand and around the jasmine bush like the tail of a snake, the car saying HAhaHAhaclankHAhaHAhaclank every time the rake that seemed to be stuck to the wheel would wham against the mudguard again, until Mr de Spain finally stopped it. Then Gowan said the parlor window behind them opened, with Mother and Father standing in it until Mother said:
“You and Top go out and help him so you both will learn something about automobiles when your Cousin Charley buys one.”
“Me buy one of those noisy stinking things?” Father said. “Why, I’d lose every horse and mule customer I’ve got—”
“Nonsense,” Mother said. “You’d buy one today if you thought Papa would stand for it. — No,” she said to Gowan. “Just you help Mr de Spain. I want Top in the house.”
So Top went into the house and Gowan went out to the car where Mr de Spain was standing beside the crumpled wheel holding the rake-head in his hand and looking down at it with his lips poked out like he was kind of whistling a tune to himself Gowan said. Then he looked around at Gowan and took out his knife and cut the string loose and put the rake-head into his overcoat pocket and begun to roll the string up, watching the string where it came jerking out of our yard, his mouth still pursed out like he was whistling to himself. Then Top came up. He was wearing the white jacket he wore when Mother would try to teach him to wait on the table, carrying a tray with a cup of coffee and the cream and sugar bowl. “Miss Maggie say would you care for a cup of
coffee while you resting in the cold?” he said.
“Much obliged,” Mr de Spain said. He finished rolling the string up and took the tray from Top and set it on the mudguard of the car and then handed the rolled-up string to Top. “Here’s a good fish line for you,” he said.
“It aint none of mine,” Top said.
“It is now,” Mr de Spain said. “I just gave it to you.” So Top took the string. Then Mr de Spain told him to take off that clean white coat first and then he opened the back of the automobile and showed Gowan and Top the jack and tire tool and then he drank the coffee while Top crawled under the car and set the jack in place and he and Gowan wound up the wheel. Then Mr de Spain put down the empty cup and took off his overcoat and hunkered down by the crumpled wheel with the tire tool. Except that from then on Gowan said all he and Top learned was some curse-words they never had heard before, until Mr de Spain stood up and threw the tire tool at the wheel and said, to Gowan this time: “Run in the house and telephone Buck Connors to bring Jabbo here double quick.” Only Father was there by that time.
“Maybe you’ve got too many experts,” he said. “Come on in and have a drink. I know it’s too early in the morning but this is Christmas.”
So they all went into the house and Father telephoned Mr Connors to bring Jabbo. Jabbo was Uncle Noon Gatewood’s son. He was going to be a blacksmith too until Mr de Spain brought that first red automobile to town and, as Uncle Noon said, ‘ruint him’. Though Gowan said that never made much sense to him because Jabbo used to get drunk and wind up in jail three or four times a year while he was still only a blacksmith, while now, since automobiles had come to Jefferson, Jabbo was the best mechanic in the county and although he still got drunk and into jail as much as ever, he never stayed longer than just overnight anymore because somebody with an automobile always needed him enough to pay his fine by morning.
Complete Works of William Faulkner Page 466
