Sanctuary

tediously and unevenly laid and worn in rich, random maroon mosaic into

the black earth which the noon sun never reached; at that moment pressed

into the concrete near the entrance of the drive, were the prints of his

and his sister's naked feet in the artificial stone.

The infrequent lamps mounted to crescendo beneath the arcade of a

filling-station at the comer. The woman leaned suddenly forward. "Stop

here, please, boy," she said. Isom put on the brakes. "I'll get out here

and walk," she said.

"You'll do nothing of the kind," Horace said. "Go on, Isom."

"No; wait," the woman said. "We'll be passing people that know you. And

then on the square."

"Nonsense," Horace said. "Go on, Isom."

"You get out and wait, then," she said. "He can come straight back."

"You'll do no such thing," Horace said. "By heaven, IDrive on, Isoml"

"You'd better," the woman said. She sat back in the seat. Then she leaned

forward again. "Listen. You've been kind. You mean all right, but-"

"You don't think I am lawyer enough, you mean?"

"I guess I've got just what was coming to me. There's no use fighting

it."

70 WILLIAM FAULKNER

"Certainly not, if you feel that way about it. But you don't. Or you'd

have told Isom to drive you to the railroad station. Wouldn't you?" She

was looking down at the child, fretting the blanket about its face. "You

get a good night's rest and I'll be in early tomorrow." They passed the

jail-a square building slashed harshly by pale slits of light. Only the

central window was wide enough to be called a window, criss-crossed by

slender bars. In it the negro murderer leaned; below along the fence a

row of heads hatted and bare above work-thickened shoulders, and the

blended voices swelled rich and sad into the soft, depthless evening,

singing of heaven and being tired. "Dont you worry at all, now. Everybody

knows Lee didn't do it."

They drew up to the hotel, where the drummers sat in chairs along the

curb, listening to the singing. "I must-" the woman said. Horace got down

and held the door open. She didn't move. "Listen. I've got to tell-"

"Yes," Horace said, extending his hand. "I know. I'll be in early

tomorrow." He helped her down. They entered the hotel, the drummers

turning to watch her legs, and went to the desk. The singing followed

them, dimmed by the walls, the lights.

The woman stood quietly nearby, holding the child, until Horace had done.

"Listen," she said. The porter went on with the key, toward the stairs.

Horace touched her arm, turning her that way. "I've got to tell you," she

said.

"In the morning," he said. "I'll be in early," he said, guiding her

toward the stairs. Still she hung back, looking at him; then she freed

her arm by turning to face him.

"All right, then," she said. She said, in a low, level tone, her face

bent a little toward the child: "We haven't got any money. rll tell you

now. That last batch Popeye didn't-"

"Yes, yes," Horace said; "first thing in the morning. I'll be in by the

time you finish breakfast. Goodnight." He returned to the car, into the

sound of the singing. "Home, Isom," he said. They turned and passed the

jail again and the leaning shape beyond the bars and the heads along the

fence. Upon the barred and slitted wall the splotched shadow of the

heaven tree shuddered and pulsed monstrously in scarce any wind; rich and

sad, the singing fell behind. The car went on, smooth and swift, passing

the narrow street. "Here," Horace said, " where are you-" Isom clapped

on the brakes.

"Miss Narcissa say to bring you back out home," he said.

"Oh, she did?" Horace said. "That was kind of her. You can tell her I

changed her mind."

Isom backed and turned into the narrow street and then into the cedar

drive, the lights lifting and boring ahead into

SANCTUARY 71

the unpruned tunnel as though into the most profound blackness of the sea,

as though among straying rigid shapes to which not even light could give

color. The car stopped at the door and Horace got out. "You might tell her

it was not to her I ran," he said. "Can you remember that?"

XVII

THE LAST TRUMPET-SHAPED BLOOM HAD FALLEN FROM THE heaven tree at the

corner of the jail yard. They lay thick, viscid underfoot, sweet and

oversweet in the nostrils with a sweetness surfeitive and moribund, and

at night now the ragged shadow of full-fledged leaves pulsed upon the

barred window in shabby rise and fall. The window was in the general room,

the white-washed walls of which were stained with dirty hands, scribbled

and scratched over with names and dates and blasphemous and obscene

doggerel in pencil or nail or knife-blade. Nightly the negro murderer

leaned there, his face checkered by the shadow of the grating in the

restless interstices of leaves, singing in chorus with those along the

fence below.

Sometimes during the day he sang also, alone then save for the slowing

passerby and ragamuffin boys and the garage men across the way. "One day

mo! Aint not place fer you in heavum! Aint no place fer you in hell! Aint

not place fer you in whitefolks' jail! Nigger, whar you gwine to? Whar