Sanctuary

legs close together, listening to the hot minute seeping of her blood,

saying dully to herself, I'm still bleeding. I'm still bleeding.

It was a bright, soft day, a wanton morning filled with that unbelievable

soft radiance of May, rife with a promise of noon and of heat, with high

fat clouds like gobs of whipped cream floating lightly as reflections in

a mirror, their shadows scudding sedately across the road. It had been

a lavender spring. The fruit trees, the white ones, had been in small

leaf when the blooms matured; they had never attained that brilliant

whiteness of last spring, and the dogwood had come into full bloom after

the leaf also, in green retrograde before crescendo. But lilac and

wistaria and redbud, even the shabby heaven trees, had never been finer,

fulgent, with a burning scent blowing for a hundred yards along the

vagrant air of April and May. The bougainvillea against the veranda would

78 WILLIAM FAULKNER

be large as basketballs and lightly poised as balloons, and looking vacantly

and stupidly at the rushing roadside Temple began to scream.

It started as a wail, raising, cut suddenly off by Popeye's hand. With her

hands lying on her lap, sitting erect, she screamed, tasting the gritty

acridity of his fingers while the car slewed squealing in the gravel,

feeling her secret blood. Then he gripped her by the back of the neck and

she sat motionless, her mouth round and open like a small empty cave. He

shook her head.

"Shut it," he said, "shut it;" gripping her silent. "Look at yourself.

Here." With the other hand he swung the mirror on the windshield around and

she looked at her image, at the uptilted hat and her matted hair and her

round mouth. She began to fumble at her coat pockets, looking at her

reflection. He released her and she produced the compact and opened it and

peered into the mirror, whimpering a little. She powdered her face and

rouged her mouth and straightened her hat, whimpering into the tiny mirror

on her lap while Popeye watched her. He lit a cigarette. "Aint you ashamed

of yourself?" he said.

"It's stiH running," she whimpered. "I can feel it." With the lipstick

poised she looked at him and opened her mouth again. He gripped her by the

back of the neck.

"Stop it, now. You going to shut it?"

"Yes," she whimpered.

"See you do, then. Come on. Get yourself fixed."

She put the compact away. He started the car again.

The road began to thicken with pleasure cars Sunday-bent --small,

clay-crusted Fords and Chevrolets; an occasional larger car moving swiftly,

with swathed women, and dustcovered hampers; trucks loaded with

wooden-faced country people in garments like a colored wood meticulously

carved; now and then a wagon or a buggy. Before a weathered frame church on

a hill the grove was full of tethered teams and battered cars and trucks.

The woods gave way to fields; houses became more frequent. Low above the

skyline, above roofs and a spire or two, smoke hung. The gravel became

asphalt and they entered Dumfries.

Temple began to look about, like one waking from sleep. "Not herel" she

said. " I can't-"

"Hush it, now," Popeye said.

"I cant-I might-" she whimpered. "I'm hungry," she said. "I haven't eaten

since . . ."

"Ah, you aint hungry. Wait till we get to town."

She looked about with dazed, glassy eyes. "There might be people here . .

." He swung in toward a filling station. "I

SANCTUARY 79

cant get out," she whimpered. "It's still running, I tell you!" "Who told you

to get out?" He descended and looked at her across the wheel. "Dont you

move." She watched him go up the street and enter a door. It was a dingy

confectionery. He bought a pack of cigarettes and put one in his mouth.

"Gimme a couple of bars of candy," he said.

"What kind?"

"Candy," he said. Under a glass bell on the counter a plate of sandwiches

sat. He took one and flipped a dollar on the counter and turned toward

the door.

"Here's your change," the clerk said.

"Keep it," he said. 'You'll get rich faster."

When he saw the car it was empty. He stopped ten feet away and changed

the sandwich to his left hand, the unlighted cigarette slanted beneath

his chin. The mechanic hanging the hose up, saw him and jerked his thumb

toward the corner of the building.

Beyond the comer the wall made an offset. In the niche was a greasy

barrel half full of scraps of metal and rubber. Between the barrel and

the wall Temple crouched. "He nearly saw me!" she whispered. "He was

almost looking right at me!"

"Who?" Popeye said. He looked back up the street. "Who saw you?"

"He was coming right toward mel A boy. At school. He was looking right

toward-"

"Come on. Come out of it."

"He was look-" Popeye took her by the arm. She crouched in the corner,

jerking at the arm he held, her wan face craned around the corner.

"Come on, now." Then his hand was at the back of her neck, gripping it.

"Oh," she wailed in a choked voice. It was as though he were lifting her

slowly erect by that one hand. Excepting that, there was no movement

between them. Side by side, almost of a height, they appeared as decorous