We ate for awhile. Mother sent Dilsey to the front to look for Quentin again.
“I keep telling you she’s not coming to dinner,” I says.
“She knows better than that,” Mother says, “She knows I dont permit her to run about the streets and not come home at meal time. Did you look good, Dilsey?”
“Dont let her, then,” I says.
“What can I do,” she says. “You have all of you flouted me. Always.”
“If you wouldn’t come interfering, I’d make her mind,” I says. “It wouldn’t take me but about one day to straighten her out.”
“You’d be too brutal with her,” she says. “You have your Uncle Maury’s temper.”
That reminded me of the letter. I took it out and handed it to her. “You wont have to open it,” I says. “The bank will let you know how much it is this time.”
“It’s addressed to you,” she says.
“Go on and open it,” I says. She opened it and read it and handed it to me.
“ ‘My dear young nephew,’ it says,
‘You will be glad to learn that I am now in a position to avail myself of an opportunity regarding which, for reasons which I will make obvious to you, I shall not go into details until I have an opportunity to divulge it to you in a more secure manner. My business experience has taught me to be chary of committing anything of a confidential nature to any more concrete medium than speech, and my extreme precaution in this instance should give you some inkling of its value. Needless to say, I have just completed a most exhaustive examination of all its phases, and I feel no hesitancy in telling you that it is that sort of golden chance that comes but once in a lifetime, and I now see clearly before me that goal toward which I have long and unflaggingly striven: i.e., the ultimate solidification of my affairs by which I may restore to its rightful position that family of which I have the honour to be the sole remaining male descendant; that family in which I have ever included your lady mother and her children.
‘As it so happens, I am not quite in a position to avail myself of this opportunity to the uttermost which it warrants, but rather than go out of the family to do so, I am today drawing upon your Mother’s bank for the small sum necessary to complement my own initial investment, for which I herewith enclose, as a matter of formality, my note of hand at eight percent per annum. Needless to say, this is merely a formality, to secure your Mother in the event of that circumstance of which man is ever the plaything and sport. For naturally I shall employ this sum as though it were my own and so permit your Mother to avail herself of this opportunity which my exhaustive investigation has shown to be a bonanza—if you will permit the vulgarism—of the first water and purest ray serene.
‘This is in confidence, you will understand, from one business man to another; we will harvest our own vineyards, eh? And knowing your Mother’s delicate health and that timorousness which such delicately nurtured Southern ladies would naturally feel regarding matters of business, and their charming proneness to divulge unwittingly such matters in conversation, I would suggest that you do not mention it to her at all. On second thought, I advise you not to do so. It might be better to simply restore this sum to the bank at some future date, say, in a lump sum with the other small sums for which I am indebted to her, and say nothing about it at all. It is our duty to shield her from the crass material world as much as possible.
“Your affectionate Uncle,
‘Maury L. Bascomb.’ ”
“What do you want to do about it?” I says, flipping it across the table.
“I know you grudge what I give him,” she says.
“It’s your money,” I says. “If you want to throw it to the birds even, it’s your business.”
“He’s my own brother,” Mother says. “He’s the last Bascomb. When we are gone there wont be any more of them.”
“That’ll be hard on somebody, I guess,” I says. “All right, all right,” I says, “It’s your money. Do as you please with it. You want me to tell the bank to pay it?”
“I know you begrudge him,” she says. “I realise the burden on your shoulders. When I’m gone it will be easier on you.”
“I could make it easier right now,” I says. “All right, all right, I wont mention it again. Move all bedlam in here if you want to.”
“He’s your own brother,” she says, “Even if he is afflicted.”
“I’ll take your bank book,” I says. “I’ll draw my check today.”
“He kept you waiting six days,” she says. “Are you sure the business is sound? It seems strange to me that a solvent business cannot pay its employees promptly.”
“He’s all right,” I says, “Safe as a bank. I tell him not to bother about mine until we get done collecting every month. That’s why it’s late sometimes.”
“I just couldn’t bear to have you lose the little I had to invest for you,” she says. “I’ve often thought that Earl is not a good business man. I know he doesn’t take you into his confidence to the extent that your investment in the business should warrant. I’m going to speak to him.”
“No, you let him alone,” I says. “It’s his business.”
“You have a thousand dollars in it.”
“You let him alone,” I says, “I’m watching things. I have your power of attorney. It’ll be all right.”
“You dont know what a comfort you are to me,” she says. “You have always been my pride and joy, but when you came to me of your own accord and insisted on banking your salary each month in my name, I thanked God it was you left me if they had to be taken.”
“They were all right,” I says. “They did the best they could, I reckon.”
“When you talk that way I know you are thinking bitterly of your father’s memory,” she says. “You have a right to, I suppose. But it breaks my heart to hear you.”
I got up. “If you’ve got any crying to do,” I says, “you’ll have to do it alone, because I’ve got to get on back. I’ll get the bank book.”
“I’ll get it,” she says.
“Keep still,” I says, “I’ll get it.” I went upstairs and got the bank book out of her desk and went back to town. I went to the bank and deposited the check and the money order and the other ten, and stopped at the telegraph office. It was one point above the opening. I had already lost thirteen points, all because she had to come helling in there at twelve, worrying me about that letter.
“What time did that report come in?” I says.
“About an hour ago,” he says.
“An hour ago?” I says. “What are we paying you for?” I says, “Weekly reports? How do you expect a man to do anything? The whole damn top could blow off and we’d not know it.”
“I dont expect you to do anything,” he says. “They changed that law making folks play the cotton market.”
“They have,” I says. “I hadn’t heard. They must have sent the news out over the Western Union.”
I went back to the store. Thirteen points. Damn if I believe anybody knows anything about the damn thing except the ones that sit back in those New York offices and watch the country suckers come up and beg them to take their money. Well, a man that just calls shows he has no faith in himself, and like I say if you aren’t going to take the advice, what’s the use in paying money for it. Besides, these people are right up there on the ground; they know everything that’s going on. I could feel the telegram in my pocket. I’d just have to prove that they were using the telegraph company to defraud. That would constitute a bucket shop. And I wouldn’t hesitate that long, either. Only be damned if it doesn’t look like a company as big and rich as the Western Union could get a market report out on time. Half as quick as they’ll get a wire to you saying Your account closed out. But what the hell do they care about the people. They’re hand in glove with that New York crowd. Anybody could see that.
When I came in Earl looked at his watch. But he didn’t say anything until the customer was gone. Then he says,
“Yo
u go home to dinner?”
“I had to go to the dentist,” I says because it’s not any of his business where I eat but I’ve got to be in the store with him all the afternoon. And with his jaw running off after all I?ve stood. You take a little two by four country storekeeper like I say it takes a man with just five hundred dollars to worry about it fifty thousand dollars’ worth.
“You might have told me,” he says. “I expected you back right away.”
“I’ll trade you this tooth and give you ten dollars to boot, any time,” I says. “Our agreement was an hour for dinner,” I says, “and if you dont like the way I do, you know what you can do about it.”
“I’ve known that some time,” he says. “If it hadn’t been for your mother I’d have done it before now, too. She’s a lady I’ve got a lot of sympathy for, Jason. Too bad some other folks I know cant say-as much.”
“Then you can keep it,” I says. “When we need any sympathy I’ll let you know in plenty of time.”
“I’ll protected you about that business a long time, Jason,” he says.
“Yes?” I says, letting him go on. Listening to what he would say before I shut him up.
“I believe I know more about where that automobile came from than she does.”
“You think so, do you?” I says. “When are you going to spread the news that I stole it from my mother?”
“I dont say anything,” he says, “I know you have her power of attorney. And I know she still believes that thousand dollars is in this business.”
“All right,” I says, “Since you know so much, I’ll tell you a little more: go to the bank and ask them whose account I’ve been depositing a hundred and sixty dollars on the first of every month for twelve years.”
“I dont say anything,” he says, “I just ask you to be a little more careful after this.”
I never said anything more. It doesn’t do any good. I’ve found that when a man gets into a rut the best thing you can do is let him stay there. And when a man gets it in his head that he’s got to tell something on you for your own good, good-night. I’m glad I haven’t got the sort of conscience I’ve got to nurse like a sick puppy all the time. If I’d ever be as careful over anything as he is to keep his little shirt tail full of business from making him more than eight percent. I reckon he thinks they’d get him on the usury law if he netted more than eight percent. What the hell chance has a man got, tied down in a town like this and to a business like this. Why I could take his business in one year and fix him so he’d never have to work again, only he’d give it all away to the church or something. If there’s one thing gets under my skin, it’s a damn hypocrite. A man that thinks anything he dont understand all about must be crooked and that first chance he gets he’s morally bound to tell the third party what’s none of his business to tell. Like I say if I thought every time a man did something I didn’t know all about he was bound to be a crook, I reckon I wouldn’t have any trouble finding something back there on those books that you wouldn’t see any use for running and telling somebody I thought ought to know about it, when for all I knew they might know a damn sight more about it now than I did, and if they didn’t it was damn little of my business anyway and he says, “My books are open to anybody. Anybody that has any claim or believes she has any claim on this business can go back there and welcome.”
“Sure, you wont tell,” I says, “You couldn’t square your conscience with that. You’ll just take her back there and let her find it. You wont tell, yourself.”
“I’m not trying to meddle in your business,” he says. “I know you missed out on some things like Quentin had. But your mother has had a misfortunate life too, and if she was to come in here and ask me why you quit, I’d have to tell her. It aint that thousand dollars. You know that. It’s because a man never gets anywhere if fact and his ledgers dont square. And I’m not going to lie to anybody, for myself or anybody else.”
“Well, then,” I says, “I reckon that conscience of yours is a more valuable clerk than I am; it dont have to go home at noon to eat-Only dont let it interfere with my appetite,” I says, because how the hell can I do anything right, with that damn family and her not making any effort to control her nor any of them, like that time when she happened to see one of them kissing Caddy and all next day she went around the house in a black dress and a veil and even Father couldn’t get her to say a word except crying and saying her little daughter was dead and Caddy about fifteen then only in three years she’d been wearing haircloth or probably sandpaper at that rate. Do you think I can afford to have her running about the streets with every drummer that comes to town, I says, and them telling the new ones up and down the road where to pick up a hot one when they made Jefferson. I haven’t got much pride, I can’t afford it with a kitchen full of niggers to feed and robbing the state asylum of its star freshman. Blood, I says, governors and generals. It’s a damn good thing we never had any kings and presidents; we’d all be down there at Jackson chasing butterflies. I say it’d be bad enough if it was mine; I’d at least be sure it was a bastard to begin with, and now even the Lord doesn’t know that for certain probably.
So after awhile I heard the band start up, and then they begun to clear out. Headed for the show, every one of them. Haggling over a twenty cent hame string to save fifteen cents, so they can give it to a bunch of Yankees that come in and pay maybe ten dollars for the privilege. I went on out to the back.
“Well,” I says, “If you dont look out, that bolt will grow into your hand. And then I’m going to take an axe and chop it out. What do you reckon the boll-weevils’ll eat if you dont get those cultivators in shape to raise them a crop?” I says, “sage grass?”
“Dem folks sho do play dem horns,” he says. “Tell me man in dat show kin play a tune on a handsaw. Pick hit like a banjo.”
“Listen,” I says. “Do you know how much that show’ll spend in this town? About ten dollars,” I says. “The ten dollars Buck Turpin has in his pocket right now.”
“Whut dey give Mr Buck ten dollars fer?” he says.
“For the privilege of showing here,” I says. “You can put the balance of what they’ll spend in your eye.”
“You mean dey pays ten dollars jest to give dey show here?” he says.
“That’s all,” I says. “And how much do you reckon …”
“Gret day,” he says, “You mean to tell me dey chargin um to let um show here? I’d pay ten dollars to see dat man pick dat saw, ef I had to. I figures dat tomorrow mawnin I be still owin um nine dollars and six bits at dat rate.”
And then a Yankee will talk your head off about niggers getting ahead. Get them ahead, what I say. Get them so far ahead you cant find one south of Louisville with a blood hound. Because when I told him about how they’d pick up Saturday night and carry off at least a thousand dollars out of the county, he says,
“I dont begrudge urn. I kin sho afford my two bits.”
“Two bits hell.” I says. “That dont begin it. How about the dime or fifteen cents you’ll spend for a damn two cent box of candy or something. How about the time you’re wasting right now, listening to that band.”
“Dat’s de troof,” he says. “Well, ef I lives twell night hit’s gwine to be two bits mo dey takin out of town, dat’s sho.”
“Then you’re a fool,” I says.
“Well,” he says, “I dont spute dat neither. Ef dat uz a crime, all chain-gangs wouldn’t be black.”
Well, just about that time I happened to look up the alley and saw her. When I stepped back and looked at my watch I didn’t notice at the time who he was because I was looking at the watch. It was just two thirty, forty-five minutes before anybody but me expected her to be out. So when I looked around the door the first thing I saw was the red tie he had on and I was thinking what the hell kind of a man would wear a red tie. But she was sneaking along the alley, watching the door, so I wasn’t thinking anything about Trim until they had gone past. I was wondering if she’d have so little
respect for me that she’d not only play out of school when I told her not to but would walk right past the store, daring me not to see her. Only she couldn’t see into the door because the sun fell straight into it and it was like trying to see through an automobile searchlight, so I stood there and watched her go on past, with her face painted up like a damn clown’s and her hair all gummed and twisted and a dress that if a woman had come out doors even on Gayoso or Beale street when I was a young fellow with no more than that to cover her legs and behind, she’d been thrown in jail. I’ll be damned if they dont dress like they were trying to make every man they passed on the street want to reach out and clap his hand on it. And so I was thinking what kind of a damn man would wear a red tie when all of a sudden I knew he was one of those show folks well as if she’d told me. Well, I can stand a lot; if I couldn’t, damn if I wouldn’t be in a hell of a fix, so when they turned the corner I jumped down and followed. Me, without any hat, in the middle of the afternoon, having to chase up and down back alleys because of my mother’s good name. Like I say you cant do anything with a woman like that, if she’s got it in her. If it’s in her blood, you cant do anything with her. The only thing you can do is to get rid of her, let her go on and live with her own sort.
I went on to the street, but they were out of sight. And there I was, without any hat, looking like I was crazy too. Like a man would naturally think, one of them is crazy and another one drowned himself and the other one was turned out into the street by her husband, what’s the reason the rest of them are not crazy too. All the time I could see them watching me like a hawk, waiting for a chance to say Well I’m not surprised I expected it all the time the whole family’s crazy. Selling land to send him to Harvard and paying taxes to support a state University all the time that I never saw except twice at a baseball game and not letting her daughter’s name be spoken on the place until after a while Father wouldn’t even come down town anymore but just sat there all day with the decanter I could see the bottom of his nightshirt and his bare legs and hear the decanter clinking until finally T. P. had to pour it for him and she says You have no respect for your Father’s memory and I says I dont know why not it sure is preserved well enough to last only if I’m crazy too God knows what I’ll do about it just to look at water makes me sick and I’d just as soon swallow gasoline as a glass of whiskey and Lorraine telling them he may not drink but if you dont believe he’s a man I can tell you how to find out she says If I catch you fooling with any of these whores you know what I’ll do she says I’ll whip her grabbing at her I’ll whip her as long as I can find her she says and I says if I dont drink that’s my business but have you ever found me short I says I’ll buy you enough beer to take a bath in if you want it because I’ve got every respect for a good honest whore because with Mother’s health and the position I try to uphold to have her with no more respect for what I try to do for her than to make her name and my name and my Mother’s name a byword in the town.