A Courtship, William Faulkner

A Courtship

THIS IS HOW it was in the old days, when old Issetibbeha was still the Man, and Ikkemotubbe, Issetibbeha’s nephew, and David Hogganbeck, the white man who told the steamboat where to walk, courted Herman Basket’s sister.

The People all lived in the Plantation now. Issetibbeha and General Jackson met and burned sticks and signed a paper, and now a line ran through the woods, although you could not see it. It ran straight as a bee’s flight among the woods, with the Plantation on one side of it, where Issetibbeha was the Man, and America on the other side, where General Jackson was the Man.

So now when something happened on one side of the line, it was a bad fortune for some and a good fortune for others, depending on what the white man happened to possess, as it had always been. But merely by occurring on the other side of that line which you couldn’t even see, it became what the white men called a crime punishable by death if they could just have found who did it.

Which seemed foolish to us. There was one uproar which lasted off and on for a week, not that the white man had disappeared, because he had been the sort of white man which even other white men did not regret, but because of a delusion that he had been eaten.

As if any man, no matter how hungry, would risk eating the flesh of a coward or thief in this country where even in winter there is always something to be found to eat; — this land for which, as Issetibbeha used to say after he had become so old that nothing more was required of him except to sit in the sun and criticise the degeneration of the People and the folly and rapacity of politicians, the Great Spirit has done more and man less than for any land he ever heard of.

But it was a free country, and if the white man wished to make a rule even that foolish in their half of it, it was all right with us.

Then Ikkemotubbe and David Hogganbeck saw Herman Basket’s sister. As who did not, sooner or later, young men and old men too, bachelors and widowers too, and some who were not even widowers yet, who for more than one reason within the hut had no business looking anywhere else, though who is to say what age a man must reach or just how unfortunate he must have been in his youthful compliance, when he shall no longer look at the Herman Basket’s sisters of this world and chew his bitter thumbs too, aihee.

Because she walked in beauty, Or she sat in it, that is, because she did not walk at all unless she had to. One of the earliest sounds in the Plantation would be the voice of Herman Basket’s aunt crying to know why she had not risen and gone to the spring for water with the other girls, which she did not do sometimes until Herman Basket himself rose and made her, or in the afternoon crying to know why she did not go to the river with the other girls and women to wash, which she did not do very often either. But she did not need to. Anyone who looks as Herman Basket’s sister did at seventeen and eighteen and nineteen does not need to wash.

Then one day Ikkemotubbe saw her, who had known her all his life except during the first two years. He was Issetibbeha’s sister’s son. One night he got into the steamboat with David Hogganbeck and went away.

And suns passed and then moons and then three high waters came and went and old Issetibbeha had entered the earth a year and his son Moketubbe was the Man when Ikkemotubbe returned, named Doom now, with the white friend called the Chevalier Sœur-Blonde de Vitry and the eight new slaves which we did not need either, and his gold-laced hat and cloak and the little gold box of strong salt and the wicker wine hamper containing the four other puppies which were still alive, and within two days Moketubbe’s little son was dead and within three Ikkemotubbe whose name was Doom now was himself the Man.

But he was not Doom yet. He was still just Ikkemotubbe, one of the young men, the best one, who rode the hardest and fastest and danced the longest and got the drunkest and was loved the best, by the young men and the girls and the older women too who should have had other things to think about. Then one day he saw Herman Basket’s sister, whom he had known all his life except for the first two years.

After Ikkemotubbe looked at her, my father and Owl-by-Night and Sylvester’s John and the other young men looked away. Because he was the best of them and they loved him then while he was still just Ikkemotubbe. They would hold the other horse for him as, stripped to the waist, his hair and body oiled with bear’s grease as when racing (though with honey mixed into the bear’s grease now) and with only a rope hackamore and no saddle as when racing, Ikkemotubbe would ride on his new racing pony past the gallery where Herman Basket’s sister sat shelling corn or peas into the silver wine pitcher which her aunt had inherited from her second cousin by marriage’s great-aunt who was old David Colbert’s wife, while Log-in-the-Creek (one of the young men too, though nobody paid any attention to him.

He raced no horses and fought no cocks and cast no dice, and even when forced to, he would not even dance fast enough to keep out of the other dancers’ way, and disgraced both himself and the others each time by becoming sick after only five or six horns of what was never even his whisky) leaned against one of the gallery posts and blew into his harmonica.

Then one of the young men held the racing pony, and on his gaited mare now and wearing his flower-painted weskit and pigeon-tailed coat and beaver hat in which he looked handsomer than a steamboat gambler and richer even than the whisky-trader, Ikkemotubbe would ride past the gallery where Herman Basket’s sister shelled another pod of peas into the pitcher and Log-in-the-Creek sat with his back against the post and blew into the harmonica.

Then another of the young men would take the mare too and Ikkemotubbe would walk to Herman Basket’s and sit on the gallery too in his fine clothes while Herman Basket’s sister shelled another pod of peas perhaps into the silver pitcher and Log-in-the-Creek lay on his back on the floor, blowing into the harmonica. Then the whisky-trader came and Ikkemotubbe and the young men invited Log-in-the-Creek into the woods until they became tired of carrying him.

And although a good deal wasted outside, as usual Log-in-the-Creek became sick and then asleep after seven or eight horns, and Ikkemotubbe returned to Herman Basket’s gallery, where for a day or two at least he didn’t have to not listen to the harmonica.

Finally Owl-at-Night made a suggestion. “Send Herman Basket’s aunt a gift.” But the only thing Ikkemotubbe owned which Herman Basket’s aunt didn’t, was the new racing pony. So after a while Ikkemotubbe said, “So it seems I want this girl even worse than I believed,” and sent Owl-at-Night to tie the racing pony’s hackamore to Herman Basket’s kitchen door handle.

Then he thought how Herman Basket’s aunt could not even always make Herman Basket’s sister just get up and go to the spring for water. Besides, she was the second cousin by marriage to the grand-niece of the wife of old David Colbert, the chief Man of all the Chickasaws in our section, and she looked upon Issetibbeha’s whole family and line as mushrooms.

“But Herman Basket has been known to make her get up and go to the spring,” my father said. “And I never heard him claim that old Dave Colbert’s wife or his wife’s niece or anybody else’s wife or niece or aunt was any better than anybody else. Give Herman the horse.”

“I can beat that,” Ikkemotubbe said. Because there was no horse in the Plantation or America either between Natchez and Nashville whose tail Ikkemotubbe’s new pony ever looked at. “I will run Herman a horse-race for his influence,” he said. “Run,” he told my father. “Catch Owl-at-Night before he reaches the house.” So my father brought the pony back in time.

But just in case Herman Basket’s aunt had been watching from the kitchen window or something, Ikkemotubbe sent Owl-at-Night and Sylvester’s John home for his crate of gamecocks, though he expected little from this since Herman Basket’s aunt already owned the best cocks in the Plantation and won all the money every Sunday morning anyway.

And then Herman Basket declined to commit himself, so a horse-race would have been merely for pleasure and money. And Ikkemotubbe said how money could not help him, and with that damned girl on his mind day and night his tongue had forgotten the savor of pleasure. But the whisky-trader always came, and so for a day or two at least he wouldn’t have to not listen to the harmonica.

Then David Hogganbeck also looked at Herman Basket’s sister, whom he too had been seeing once each year since the steamboat first walked to the Plantation. After a while even winter would be over and we would begin to watch the mark which