Part Two Chapter 25
To Kill a Mockingbird
"Don't do that, Scout. Set him out on the back steps."
"Jem, are you crazy?...."
"I said set him out on the back steps."
Sighing, I scooped up the small creature, placed him on the bottom
step and went back to my cot. September had come, but not a trace of
cool weather with it, and we were still sleeping on the back screen
porch. Lightning bugs were still about, the night crawlers and
flying insects that beat against the screen the summer long had not
gone wherever they go when autumn comes.
A roly-poly had found his way inside the house; I reasoned that
the tiny varmint had crawled up the steps and under the door. I was
putting my book on the floor beside my cot when I saw him. The
creatures are no more than an inch long, and when you touch them
they roll themselves into a tight gray ball.
I lay on my stomach, reached down and poked him. He rolled up. Then,
feeling safe, I suppose, he slowly unrolled. He traveled a few
inches on his hundred legs and I touched him again. He rolled up.
Feeling sleepy, I decided to end things. My hand was going down on him
when Jem spoke.
Jem was scowling. It was probably a part of the stage he was going
through, and I wished he would hurry up and get through it. He was
certainly never cruel to animals, but I had never known his charity to
embrace the insect world.
"Why couldn't I mash him?" I asked.
"Because they don't bother you," Jem answered in the darkness. He
had turned out his reading light.
"Reckon you're at the stage now where you don't kill flies and
mosquitoes now, I reckon," I said. "Lemme know when you change your
mind. Tell you one thing, though, I ain't gonna sit around and not
scratch a redbug."
"Aw dry up," he answered drowsily.
Jem was the one who was getting more like a girl every day, not I.
Comfortable, I lay on my back and waited for sleep, and while
waiting I thought of Dill. He had left us the first of the month
with firm assurances that he would return the minute school was out-
he guessed his folks had got the general idea that he liked to spend
his summers in Maycomb. Miss Rachel took us with them in the taxi to
Maycomb Junction, and Dill waved to us from the train window until
he was out of sight. He was not out of mind: I missed him. The last
two days of his time with us, Jem had taught him to swim-
Taught him to swim. I was wide awake, remembering what Dill had told
me.
Barker's Eddy is at the end of a dirt road off the Meridian
highway about a mile from town. It is easy to catch a ride down the
highway on a cotton wagon or from a passing motorist, and the short
walk to the creek is easy, but the prospect of walking all the way
back home at dusk, when the traffic is light, is tiresome, and
swimmers are careful not to stay too late.
According to Dill, he and Jem had just come to the highway when they
saw Atticus driving toward them. He looked like he had not seen
them, so they both waved. Atticus finally slowed down; when they
caught up with him he said, "You'd better catch a ride back. I won't
be going home for a while." Calpurnia was in the back seat.
Jem protested, then pleaded, and Atticus said, "All right, you can
come with us if you stay in the car."
On the way to Tom Robinson's, Atticus told them what had happened.
They turned off the highway, rode slowly by the dump and past the
Ewell residence, down the narrow lane to the Negro cabins. Dill said a
crowd of black children were playing marbles in Tom's front yard.
Atticus parked the car and got out. Calpurnia followed him through the
front gate.
Dill heard him ask one of the children, "Where's your mother,
Sam?" and heard Sam say, "She down at Sis Stevens's, Mr. Finch. Want
me run fetch her?"
Dill said Atticus looked uncertain, then he said yes, and Sam
scampered off. "Go on with your game, boys," Atticus said to the
children.
A little girl came to the cabin door and stood looking at Atticus.
Dill said her hair was a wad of tiny stiff pigtails, each ending in
a bright bow. She grinned from ear to ear and walked toward our
father, but she was too small to navigate the steps. Dill said Atticus
went to her, took off his hat, and offered her his finger. She grabbed
it and he eased her down the steps. Then he gave her to Calpurnia.
Sam was trotting behind his mother when they came up. Dill said
Helen said, "'evenin', Mr. Finch, won't you have a seat?" But she
didn't say any more. Neither did Atticus.
"Scout," said Dill, "she just fell down in the dirt. Just fell
down in the dirt, like a giant with a big foot just came along and
stepped on her. Just ump-" Dill's fat foot hit the ground. "Like you'd
step on an ant."
Dill said Calpurnia and Atticus lifted Helen to her feet and half
carried, half walked her to the cabin. They stayed inside a long time,
and Atticus came out alone. When they drove back by the dump, some
of the Ewells hollered at them, but Dill didn't catch what they said.
Maycomb was interested by the news of Tom's death for perhaps two
days; two days was enough for the information to spread through the
county. "Did you hear about?.... No? Well, they say he was runnin' fit
to beat lightnin'..." To Maycomb, Tom's death was typical. Typical
of a n*gger to cut and run. Typical of a n*gger's mentality to have no
plan, no thought for the future, just run blind first chance he saw.
Funny thing, Atticus Finch might've got him off scot free, but
wait-? Hell no. You know how they are. Easy come, easy go. Just
shows you, that Robinson boy was legally married, they say he kept
himself clean, went to church and all that, but when it comes down
to the line the veneer's mighty thin. n*gger always comes out in 'em.
A few more details, enabling the listener to repeat his version in
turn, then nothing to talk about until The Maycomb Tribune¯
appeared the following Thursday. There was a brief obituary in the
Colored News, but there was also an editorial.
Mr. B. B. Underwood was at his most bitter, and he couldn't have
cared less who canceled advertising and subscriptions. (But Maycomb
didn't play that way: Mr. Underwood could holler till he sweated and
write whatever he wanted to, he'd still get his advertising and
subscriptions. If he wanted to make a fool of himself in his paper
that was his business.) Mr. Underwood didn't talk about miscarriages
of justice, he was writing so children could understand. Mr. Underwood
simply figured it was a sin to kill cripples, be they standing,
sitting, or escaping. He likened Tom's death to the senseless
slaughter of songbirds by hunters and children, and Maycomb thought he
was trying to write an editorial poetical enough to be reprinted in
The Montgomery Advertiser.¯
How could this be so, I wondered, as I read Mr. Underwood's
editorial. Senseless killing- Tom had been given due process of law to
the day of his death; he had been tried openly and convicted by twelve
good men and true; my father had fought for him all the way. Then
Mr. Underwood's meaning became clear: Atticus had used every tool
available to free men to save Tom Robinson, but in the secret courts
of men's hearts Atticus had no case. Tom was a dead man the minute
Mayella Ewell opened her mouth and screamed.
The name Ewell gave me a queasy feeling. Maycomb had lost no time in
getting Mr. Ewell's views on Tom's demise and passing them along
through that English Channel of gossip, Miss Stephanie Crawford.
Miss Stephanie told Aunt Alexandra in Jem's presence ("Oh foot, he's
old enough to listen.") that Mr. Ewell said it made one down and about
two more to go. Jem told me not to be afraid, Mr. Ewell was more hot
gas than anything. Jem also told me that if I breathed a word to
Atticus, if in any way I let Atticus know I knew, Jem would personally
never speak to me again.