Sanctuary

laggard part to catch up. Then she was gone like a shadow around the

corner of the house. He stood in the door, the plate of food in his hand.

Then he turned his head and looked down the hall just in time to see her

flit across the darkness toward the kitchen. "Durn them fellers."

He was standing there when the others returned to the porch.

"He's got a plate of grub," Van said. "He's trying to get his with a

plate full of ham."

"Git my whut?" Tommy said.

"Look here," Gowan said.

Van struck the plate from Tommy's hand. He turned to Gowan. "Dont you

like it?"

"No," Gowan said, "I dont."

"What are you going to do about it?" Van said.

"Van," Goodwin said.

"Do you think you're big enough to not like it?" Van said.

"I am," Goodwin said.

When Van went back to the kitchen Tommy followed him. He stopped at the

door and heard Van in the kitchen.

"Come for a walk, little bit," Van said.

"Get out of here, Van," the woman said.

"Come for a little walk," Van said. "I'm a good guy. Ruby'll tell you."

"Get out of here, now," the woman said. "Do you want me to call Lee?" Van

stood against the light, in a khaki shirt and breeches, a cigarette

behind his ear against the smooth sweep of his blond hair. Beyond him

Temple stood behind the chair

40 WILLIAM FAULKNER

in which the woman sat at the table, her mouth open a little, her eyes

quite black.

When Tommy went back to the porch with the jug he said to Goodwin~ "Why

don't them tellers quit pesterin' that gal?"

"Who's pestering her?"

"Van is. She's skeered. Whyn't they leave her be?"

"It's none of your business. You keep out of it. You hear?"

"Them fellers ought to quit pesterin' her," Tommy said. He squatted

against the wall. They were drinking, passing the jug back and forth,

talking. With the top of his mind he listened to them, to Van's gross and

stupid tales of city life with rapt interest, guffawing now and then,

drinking in his turn. Van and Gowan were doing the talking, and Tommy

listened to them. "Them two's fixin' to have hit out with one another,"

he whispered to Goodwin in a chair beside him. "Hyear 'em?" They were

talking quite loud; Goodwin moved swiftly and lightly from his chair, his

feet striking the floor with light thuds; Tommy saw Van standing and

Gowan holding himself erect by the back of his chair.

"I never meant-" Van said.

"Dont say it then," Goodwin said.

Gowan said something. That durn feller, Tommy thought. Cant even talk no

more.

"Shut up, you," Goodwin said.

"Think talk 'bout my-" Gowan said. He moved, swayed against the chair.

It fell over. Gowan blundered into the wall.

"By God, I'll-" Van said.

11-ginia gentleman; I don't give a-" Gowan said. Goodwin flung him aside

with a backhanded blow of his arm, and grasped Van. Gowan fell against

the wall.

I . I When I say sit down, I mean it," Goodwin said.

After that they were quiet for a while. Goodwin returned to his chair.

They began to talk again, passing the jug, and Tommy listened. But soon

he began to think about Temple again. He could feel his feet scouring on

the floor and his whole body writhing in an acute discomfort. "They ought

to let that gal alone," he whispered to Goodwin. "They ought to quit

pesterin' her."

"It's none of your business," Goodwin said. "Let every damned one of them

. . ."

"They ought to quit pesterin' her."

Popeye came out the door. He lit a cigarette. Tommy watched his face

flare out between his hands, his cheeks sucking; he followed with his

eyes the small comet of the match into the weeds. Him too, he said. Two

of 'em; his body writhing slowly. Pore little crittur. I be dawg ef I

aint a mind to go down to the barn and stay there, I be dawg ef I aint.

He

SANCTUARY 41

rose, his feet making no sound on the porch. He stepped down into the path

and went around the house. There was a light in the window there. Dont

nobody never use in there, he said, stopping, then he said, That's where

she'll be stayin', and he went to the window and looked in. The sash was

down. Across a missing pane a sheet of rusted tin was nailed.

Temple was sitting on the bed, her legs tucked under her, erect, her

hands lying in her lap, her hat tilted on the back of her head. She

looked quite small, her very attitude an outrage to muscle and tissue of

more than seventeen and more compatible with eight or ten, her elbows

close to her sides, her face turned toward the door against which a chair

was wedged. There was nothing in the room save the bed, with its faded

patchwork quilt, and the chair. The walls had been plastered once, but

the plaster had cracked and fallen in places, exposing the lathing and

molded shreds of cloth. On the wall hung a raincoat and a khaki-covered

canteen.

Temple's head began to move. It turned slowly, as if she were following

the passage of someone beyond the wall. It turned on to an excruciating

degree, though no other muscle moved, like one of those papier-mfich6

Easter toys filled with candy, and became motionless in that reverted

position. Then it turned back, slowly, as though pacing invisible feet