The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner [122]
“You gwine be careful, Luster?” she said.
“Yessum,” Luster said. She helped Ben into the back seat. He had ceased crying, but now he began to whimper again.
“Hit’s his flower,” Luster said. “Wait, I’ll git him one.”
“You set right dar,” Dilsey said. She went and took the cheekstrap. “Now, hurry en git him one.” Luster ran around the house, toward the garden. He came back with a single narcissus.
“Dat un broke,” Dilsey said. “Whyn’t you git him a good un?”
“Hit de onliest one I could find,” Luster said. “Y’all took all of um Friday to dec’rate de church. Wait, I’ll fix hit.” So while Dilsey held the horse Luster put a splint on the flower stalk with a twig and two bits of string and gave it to Ben. Then he mounted and took the reins. Dilsey still held the bridle.
“You knows de way now?” she said. “Up de street, round de square, to de graveyard, den straight back home.”
“Yessum,” Luster said. “Hum up, Queenie.”
“You gwine be careful, now?”
“Yessum.” Dilsey released the bridle.
“Hum up, Queenie,” Luster said.
“Here,” Dilsey said. “You han me dat whup.”
“Aw, mammy,” Luster said.
“Give hit here,” Dilsey said, approaching the wheel. Luster gave it to her reluctantly.
“I wont never git Queenie started now.”
“Never you mind about dat,” Dilsey said. “Queenie know mo bout whar she gwine dan you does. All you got to do es set dar en hold dem reins. You knows de way, now?”
“Yessum. Same way T. P. goes ev’y Sunday.”
“Den you do de same thing dis Sunday.”
“Cose I is. Aint I drove fer T. P. mo’n a hund’ed times?”
“Den do hit again,” Dilsey said. “G’awn, now. En ef you hurts Benjy, nigger boy, I dont know whut I do. You bound fer de chain gang, but I’ll send you dar fo even chain gang ready fer you.”
“Yessum,” Luster said. “Hum up, Queenie.”
He flapped the lines on Queenie’s broad back and the surrey lurched into motion.
“You, Luster!” Dilsey said.
“Hum up, dar!” Luster said. He flapped the lines again. With subterranean rumblings Queenie jogged slowly down the drive and turned into the street, where Luster exhorted her into a gait resembling a prolonged and suspended fall in a forward direction.
Ben quit whimpering. He sat in the middle of the seat, holding the repaired flower upright in his fist, his eyes serene and ineffable. Directly before him Luster’s bullet head turned backward continually until the house passed from view, then he pulled to the side of the street and while Ben watched him he descended and broke a switch from a hedge. Queenie lowered her head and fell to cropping the grass until Luster mounted and hauled her head up and harried her into motion again, then he squared his elbows and with the switch and the reins held high he assumed a swaggering attitude out of all proportion to the sedate clopping of Queenie’s hooves and the organlike basso of her internal accompaniment. Motors passed them, and pedestrians; once a group of half grown negroes:
“Dar Luster. Whar you gwine, Luster? To de boneyard?”
“Hi,” Luster said. “Aint de same boneyard y’all headed fer. Hum up, elefump.”
They approached the square, where the Confederate soldier gazed with empty eyes beneath his marble hand in wind and weather. Luster took still another notch in himself and gave the impervious Queenie a cut with the switch, casting his glance about the square. “Dar Mr Jason car,” he said, then he spied another group of negroes. “Les show dem niggers how quality does, Benjy,” he said. “Whut you say?” He looked back. Ben sat, holding the flower in his fist, his gaze empty and untroubled. Luster hit Queenie again and swung her to the left at the monument.
For an instant Ben sat in an utter hiatus. Then he bellowed. Bellow on bellow, his voice mounted,