He could see the opposed forces of his destiny and his will drawing swiftly together now, toward a junction that would be irrevocable; he became cunning. I cant make a blunder, he told himself. There would be just one right thing, without alternatives: he must do that. He believed that both of themwould know himon sight, while he’d have to trust to seeing her first, unless the man still wore the red tie. And the fact that he must depend on that red tie seemed to be the sumof the impending disaster; he could almost smellit, feelit above the throbbing of his head.
He crested the final hill. Smoke lay in the valley, and roofs, a spire or two above trees. He drove down the hill and into the town, slowing, telling himself again of the need for caution, to find where the tent was located first. He could not see very well now, and he knew that it was the disaster which kept telling him to go directly and get something for his head. At a filling station they told himthat the tent was not up yet, but that the show cars were on a siding at the station. He drove there.
Two gaudily painted pullman cars stood on the track. He reconnoitred them before he got out. He was trying to breathe shallowly, so that the blood would not beat so in his skull. He got out and went along the station wall, watching the cars. A few garments hung out of the windows, limp and crinkled, as though they had been recently laundered. On the earth beside the steps of one sat three canvas chairs. But he saw no sign of life at all until a man in a dirty apron came to the door and emptied a pan of dishwater with a broad gesture, the sunlight glinting on the metalbelly of the pan, then entered the car again.
Now I’ll have to take him by surprise, before he can warn them, he thought. It never occurred to himthat they might not be there, in the car. That they should not be there, that the whole result should not hinge on whether he saw them first or they saw him first, would be opposed to all nature and contrary to the whole rhythmof events. And more than that: he must see themfirst, get the money back, then what they did would be of no importance to him, while otherwise the whole world would know that he, Jason Compson, had been robbed by Quentin, his niece, a bitch.
He reconnoitred again. Then he went to the car and mounted the steps, swiftly and quietly, and paused at the door. The galley was dark, rank with stale food. The man was a white blur, singing in a cracked, shaky tenor. An old man, he thought, and not as big as I am. He entered the car as the man looked up.
“Hey?” the man said, stopping his song.
“Where are they?” Jason said. “Quick, now. In the sleeping car?” “Where’s who?” the man said.
“Dont lie to me,” Jason said. He blundered on in the cluttered obscurity.
“What’s that?” the other said, “Who you calling a liar?” And when Jason grasped his shoulder he exclaimed, “Look out, fellow!”
“Dont lie,” Jason said, “Where are they?”
“Why, you bastard,” the man said. His arm was frail and thin in Jason’s grasp. He tried to wrench free, then he turned and fellto scrabbling on the littered table behind him.
“Come on,” Jason said, “Where are they?”
“I’lltellyou where they are,” the man shrieked, “Lemme find my butcher knife.” “Here,” Jason said, trying to hold the other, “I’mjust asking you a question.”
“You bastard,” the other shrieked, scrabbling at the table. Jason tried to grasp him in both arms, trying to prison the puny fury of him. The man’s body felt so old, so frail, yet so fatally single-purposed that for the first time Jason saw clear and unshadowed the disaster toward which he rushed.
“Quit it!” he said, “Here! Here! I’llget out. Give me time, and I’llget out.”
“Callme a liar,” the other wailed, “Lemme go. Lemme go just one minute. I’llshow you.” Jason glared wildly about, holding the other. Outside it was now bright and sunny, swift
and bright and empty, and he thought of the people soon to be going quietly home to Sunday dinner, decorously festive, and of himself trying to hold the fatal, furious little old man whomhe dared not release long enough to turn his back and run.
“Will you quit long enough for me to get out?” he said, “Will you?” But the other still struggled, and Jason freed one hand and struck him on the head. A clumsy, hurried blow, and not hard, but the other slumped immediately and slid clattering among pans and buckets to the floor. Jason stood above him, panting, listening. Then he turned and ran from the car. At the door he restrained himself and descended more slowly and stood there again. His breath made a hah hah hah sound and he stood there trying to repress it, darting his gaze this way and that, when at a scuffling sound behind him he turned in time to see the little old man leaping awkwardly and furiously fromthe vestibule, a rusty hatchet high in his hand.
He grasped at the hatchet, feeling no shock but knowing that he was falling, thinking So this is how it’ll end, and he believed that he was about to die and when something crashed against the back of his head he thought How did he hit me there? Only maybe he hit me a long time ago, he thought, And I just now felt it, and he thought Hurry. Hurry. Get it over with, and then a furious desire not to die seized him and he struggled, hearing the old man wailing and cursing in his cracked voice.
He stillstruggled when they hauled himto his feet, but they held himand he ceased.
“AmI bleeding much?” he said, “The back of my head. AmI bleeding?” He was still saying that while he felt himself being propelled rapidly away, heard the old man’s thin furious voice dying away behind him. “Look at my head,” he said, “Wait, I—”
“Wait, hell,” the man who held himsaid, “That damn little wasp’ll kill you. Keep going. You aint hurt.”
“He hit me,” Jason said. “AmI bleeding?”
“Keep going,” the other said. He led Jason on around the corner of the station, to the empty platform where an express truck stood, where grass grew rigidly in a plot bordered with
rigid flowers and a sign in electric lights: Keep your on Mottson, the gap filled by a
human eye with an electric pupil. The man released him.
“Now,” he said, “You get on out of here and stay out. What were you trying to do? Commit suicide?”
“I was looking for two people,” Jason said. “I just asked himwhere they were.” “Who you looking for?”
“It’s a girl,” Jason said. “And a man. He had on a red tie in Jefferson yesterday. With this
show. They robbed me.”
“Oh,” the man said. “You’re the one, are you. Well, they aint here.”
“I reckon so,” Jason said. He leaned against the wall and put his hand to the back of his head and looked at his palm. “I thought I was bleeding,” he said. “I thought he hit me with that hatchet.”
“You hit your head on the rail,” the man said. “You better go on. They aint here.” “Yes. He said they were not here. I thought he was lying.”
“Do you think I’mlying?” the man said. “No,” Jason said. “I know they’re not here.”
“I told him to get the hell out of there, both of them,” the man said. “I wont have nothing like that in my show. I run a respectable show, with a respectable troupe.”
“Yes,” Jason said. “You dont know where they went?”
“No. And I dont want to know. No member of my show can pull a stunt like that. You her— brother?”
“No,” Jason said. “It dont matter. I just wanted to see them. You sure he didn’t hit me? No blood, I mean.”
“There would have been blood if I hadn’t got there when I did. You stay away from here, now. That little bastard’llkillyou. That your car yonder?”
“Yes.”
“Well, you get in it and go back to Jefferson. If you find them, it wont be in my show. I run a respectable show. You say they robbed you?”
“No,” Jason said, “It dont make any difference.” He went to the car and got in. What is it I must do? he thought. Then he remembered. He started the engine and drove slowly up the street until he found a drugstore. The door was locked. He stood for a while with his hand on the knob and his head bent a little. Then he turned away and when a man came along after a while he asked if there was a drugstore open anywhere, but there was not. Then he asked when the northbound train ran, and the man told himat two thirty. He crossed the pavement and got in the car again and sat there. After a while two negro lads passed. He called to them.
“Can either of you boys drive a car?” “Yes, suh.”
“What’llyou charge to drive me to Jefferson right away?” They looked at one another, murmuring.
“I’llpay a dollar,” Jason said.
They murmured again. “Couldn’t go fer dat,” one said. “What willyou go for?”
“Kin you go?” one said.
“I cant git off,” the other said. “Whyn’t you drive himup dar? You aint got nothin to do.” “Yes I is.”
“Whut you got to do?”
They murmured
