Sanctuary

him in the car. He emerged among the overalls, slowly; he got into the car

stiffly, like an old man, with a drawn face. "Do you want to go home?"

Narcissa said.

"Yes," Horace said.

"I mean, to the house, or out home?"

"Yes," Horace said.

She was driving the car, the engine was running, She looked at him, in

a dark dress with a severe white collar, a dark hat.

"Which one?"

"Home," he said. "I dont care. Just home."

They passed the jail. Standing along the fence were the

SANCTUARY 165

loafers, the countrymen, the blackguard boys and youths who had followed

Goodwin and the deputy from the courthouse. Beside the gate the woman stood,

in the gray hat with the veil, carrying the child in her arms. "Standing

where he can see it through the window," Horace said. "I smell ham, too.

Maybe he'll be eating ham before we get home." Then he began to cry, sitting

in the car beside his sister. She drove steadily, not fast. Soon they had

left the town and the stout rows of young cotton swung at either hand in

parallel and diminishing retrograde. There was still a little snow of locust

blooms on the mounting drive. "It does last," Horace said. "Spring does.

You'd almost think there was some purpose to it."

He stayed to supper. He ate a lot. "I'll go and see about your room," his

sister said, quite gently.

"All right," Horace said. "It's nice of you." She went out. Miss Jenny's

wheel chair sat on a platform slotted for the wheels. "It's nice of her,"

Horace said. "I think I'll go outside and smoke my pipe."

"Since when have you quit smoking it in here?" Miss Jenny said.

"Yes," Horace said. "It was nice of her." He walked across the porch. "I

intended to stop here," Horace said. He watched himself cross the porch and

then tread the diffident snow of the last locusts; he turned out of the

iron gates, onto the gravel. After about a mile a car slowed and offered

him a ride. "I'm just walking before supper," he said; "I'll turn back

soon." After another mile he could see the lights of town. It was a faint

glare, low and close. It got stronger as he approached. Before he reached

town he began to hear the sound, the voices. Then he saw the people, a

shifting mass filling the street, and the bleak, shallow yard above which

the square and slotted bulk of the jail loomed. In the yard, beneath the

barred window, a man in his shirt sleeves faced the crowd, hoarse, ges-

ticulant. The barred window was empty.

Horace went on toward the square. The sheriff was among the drummers before

the hotel, standing along the curb. He was a fat man, with a broad, dull

face which belied the expression of concern about his eyes. "They won't do

anything," he said. "There is too much talk. Noise. And too early. When a

mob means business, it dont take that much time and talk. And it dont go

about its business where every man can see it."

The crowd stayed in the street until late. It was quite orderly, though. It

was as though most of them had come to see, to look at the jail and the

barred window, or to listen to the man in shirt sleeves. After a while he

talked himself out. Then they began to move away, back to the square and

166 WILLIAM FAULKNER

some of them homeward, until there was left only a small group beneath the

arc light at the entrance to the square, among whom were two temporary

deputies, and the night marshal in a broad pale hat, a flash light, a time

clock and a pistol. "Git on home now," he said. "Show's over. You boys done

had your fun. Git on home to bed, now."

The drummers sat a while longer along the curb before the hotel, Horace

among them; the south-bound train ran at one o'clock. "They're going to let

him get away with it, are they?" a drummer said. "With that corn cob? What

kind of folks have you got here? What does it take to make you folks mad?"

"He wouldn't a never got to trial, in my town," a second said.

"To jail, even," a third said. "Who was she?"

"College girl. Good looker. Didn't you see her?"

"I saw her. She was some baby. Jeez. I wouldn't have used no cob."

Then the square was quiet. The clock struck eleven; the drummers went in

and the negro porter came and turned the chairs back into the wall. "You

waiting for the train?" he said to Horace.

"Yes. Have you got a report on it yet?"

"It's on time. But that's two hours yet. You could lay down in the Sample

Room, if you want."

"Can IT' Horace said.

"I'll show you," the negro said. The Sample Room was where the drummers

showed their wares. It contained a sofa. Horace turned off the light and

lay down on the sofa. He could see the trees about the courthouse, and one

wing of the building rising above the quiet and empty square. But people

were not asleep. He could feel the wakefulness, the people awake about the

town. "I could not have gone to sleep, anyway," he said to himself.

He heard the clock strike twelve. Then-it might have been thirty minutes or

maybe longer than that-he heard someone pass under the window, running. The

runner's feet sounded louder than a horse, echoing across the empty square,