The Sound and the Fury - William Faulkner [98]
I read the paper. There hadn’t been a sound from upstairs when Dilsey came in and sent Ben and Luster on to the kitchen and said supper was ready.
“All right,” I says. She went out. I sat there, reading the paper. After a while I heard Dilsey looking in at the door.
“Whyn’t you come on and eat?” she says.
“I’m waiting for supper,” I says.
“Hit’s on the table,” she says. “I done told you.”
“Is it?” I says. “Excuse me. I didn’t hear anybody come down.”
“They aint comin,” she says. “You come on and eat, so I can take something up to them.”
“Are they sick?” I says. “What did the doctor say it was? Not Smallpox, I hope.”
“Come on here, Jason,” she says. “So I kin git done.”
“All right,” I says, raising the paper again. “I’m waiting for supper now.”
I could feel her watching me at the door. I read the paper.
“Whut you want to act like this fer?” she says. “When you knows how much bother I has anyway.”
“If Mother is any sicker than she was when she came down to dinner, all right,” I says. “But as long as I am buying food for people younger than I am, they’ll have to come down to the table to eat it. Let me know when supper’s ready,” I says, reading the paper again. I heard her climbing the stairs, dragging her feet and grunting and groaning like they were straight up and three feet apart. I heard her at Mother’s door, then I heard her calling Quentin, like the door was locked, then she went back to Mother’s room and then Mother went and talked to Quentin. Then they came down stairs. I read the paper.
Dilsey came back to the door. “Come on,” she says, “fo you kin think up some mo devilment. You just tryin yoself tonight.”
I went to the diningroom. Quentin was sitting with her head bent. She had painted her face again. Her nose looked like a porcelain insulator.
“I’m glad you feel well enough to come down,” I says to Mother.
“It’s little enough I can do for you, to come to the table,” she says. “No matter how I feel. I realise that when a man works all day he likes to be surrounded by his family at the supper table. I want to please you. I only wish you and Quentin got along better. It would be easier for me.”
“We get along all right,” I says. “I dont mind her staying locked up in her room all day if she wants to. But I cant have all this whoop-de-do and sulking at mealtimes. I know that’s a lot to ask her, but I’m that way in my own house. Your house, I meant to say.”
“It’s yours,” Mother says. “You are the head of it now.”
Quentin hadn’t looked up. I helped the plates and she begun to eat.
“Did you get a good piece of meat?” I says. “If you didn’t, I’ll try to find you a better one.”
She didn’t say anything.
“I say, did you get a good piece of meat?” I says.
“What?” she says. “Yes. It’s all right.”
“Will you have some more rice?” I says.
“No,” she says.
“Better let me give you some more,” I says.
“I dont want any more,” she says.
“Not at all,” I says. “You’re welcome.”
“Is your headache gone?” Mother says.
“Headache?” I says.
“I was afraid you were developing one,” she says. “When you came in this afternoon.”
“Oh,” I says. “No, it didn’t show up. We stayed so busy this afternoon I forgot about it.”
“Was that why you were late?” Mother says. I could see Quentin listening. I looked at her. Her knife and fork were still going, but I caught her looking at me, then she looked at her plate again. I says,
“No. I loaned my car to a fellow about three oclock and I had to wait until he got back with it.” I ate for a while.
“Who was it?” Mother says.
“It was one of those show men,” I says. “It seems his sister’s husband was out riding with some town woman, and he was chasing them.”
Quentin sat perfectly still, chewing.
“You ought not to lend your car to people like that,” Mother says. “You are too generous with it. That’s why I never call on you for it if I can help it.”
“I was beginning to think that myself, for a while,” I says. “But he got back, all right. He says he found what he was