The Complete Stories - Flannery O'Connor [15]
By the time he got home, he had the beginnings of an outline for an argument. It would be filled in with no waste words, no big words—no easy job, he could see.
He got right to work on it. He worked on it until suppertime and had four sentences—all crossed out. He got up once in the middle of the meal to go to his desk and change one. After supper he crossed the correction out.
“What is the matter with you?” his wife wanted to know.
“Not a thing,” Rayber said, “not a thing. I just have to work.”
“I’m not stopping you,” she said.
When she went out, he kicked the board loose on the bottom of the desk. By eleven o’clock he had one page. The next morning it came easier, and he finished it by noon. He thought it was blunt enough. It began, “For two reasons, men elect other men to power,” and it ended, “Men who use ideas without measuring them are walking on wind.” He thought the last sentence was pretty effective. He thought the whole thing was effective enough.
In the afternoon he took it around to Jacob’s office. Blakeley was there but he left. Rayber read the paper to Jacobs.
“Well,” Jacobs said, “so what? What do you call yourself doing?” He had been jotting figures down on a record sheet all the time Rayber was reading.
Rayber wondered if he were busy. “Defending myself against barbers,” he said. “You ever tried to argue with a barber?”
“I never argue,” Jacobs said.
“That’s because you don’t know this kind of ignorance,” Rayber explained. “You’ve never experienced it.”
Jacobs snorted. “Oh yes I have,” he said.
“What happened?”
“I never argue.”
“But you know you’re right,” Rayber persisted.
“I never argue.”
“Well, I’m going to argue,” Rayber said. “I’m going to say the right thing as fast as they can say the wrong. It’ll be a question of speed. Understand,” he went on, “this is no mission of conversion; I’m defending myself.”
“I understand that,” Jacobs said. “I hope you’re able to do it.”
“I’ve already done it! You read the paper. There it is.” Rayber wondered if Jacobs were dense or preoccupied.
“Okay, then, leave it there. Don’t spoil your complexion arguing with barbers.”
“It’s got to be done,” Rayber said.
Jacobs shrugged.
Rayber had counted on discussing it with him at length. “Well, I’ll see you,” he said.
“Okay,” Jacobs said.
Rayber wondered why he had ever read the paper to him in the first place.
Before he left for the barber’s Tuesday afternoon, Rayber was nervous and he thought that by way of practice he’d try the paper out on his wife. He didn’t know but what she was for Hawkson herself. Whenever he mentioned the election, she made it a point to say, “Just because you teach doesn’t mean you know everything.” Did he ever say he knew anything at all? Maybe he wouldn’t call her. But he wanted to hear how the thing was actually going to sound said casually. It wasn’t long; wouldn’t take up much of her time. She would probably dislike being called. Still, she might possibly be affected by what he said. Possibly. He called her.
She said all right, but he’d just have to wait until she got through what she was doing; it looked like every time she got her hands in something, she had to leave and go do something else.
He said he didn’t have all day to wait—it was only forty-five minutes until the shop closed—and would she please hurry up?
She came in wiping her hands and said all right; all right, she was there, wasn’t she? Go ahead.
He began saying it very easily and casually, looking over her head. The sound of his voice playing over the words was not bad. He wondered it it were the words themselves or his tones that made them sound the way they