Soldiers’ Pay by William Faulkner (digital e reader txt) 📕

“Yes, sir.” (I’ll fix you.)

“What’ll I tell him?” (Do it, if you think you can. You have never come off very well yet. You fat worm.)

“Tell him, by all means, that I had intended calling upon him myself. Yes, indeed. Ah, Mr. Jones, we are all to be congratulated this morning.”

“Yes, sir.” (You little slut.)

“Tell him, by all means, Emmy.”

“All right.” (I told you I’d do it! I told you you can’t fool with me. Didn’t I, now?)

“And, Emmy, Mr. Jones will be with us for lunch. A celebration is in order, eh, Mr. Jones?”

“Without doubt. We all have something to celebrate.” (That’s what makes me so damn mad: you said you would and I let you do it. Slam a door on my hand! Damn you to hell.)

“All right. He can stay if he wants to.” (Damn you to hell.) Emmy arrowed him another hot exulting glance and slammed the door as a parting shot.

The rector tramped heavily, happily, like a boy. “Ah, Mr. Jones, to be as young as he is, to have your life circumscribed, moved hither and yonder at the vacillations of such delightful pests. Women, women! How charming never to know exactly what you want! While we men are always so sure we do. Dullness, dullness, Mr. Jones. Perhaps that’s why we like them, yet cannot stand very much of them. What do you think?”

Jones, glumly silent, nursing his hand, said after a while: “I don’t know. But it seemed to me your son has had extraordinarily good luck with his women.”

“Yes?” the rector said, with interest. “How so?”

“Well (I think you told me that he was once involved with Emmy?), well, he no longer remembers Emmy (damn her soul: slam a door on me) and now he is about to become involved with another whom he will not even have to look at. What more could one ask than that?”

The rector looked at him keenly and kindly a moment. “You have retained several of your youthful characteristics, Mr. Jones.”

“What do you mean?” asked Jones, with defensive belligerence. A car drew up to the gate, and after Mr. Saunders had descended, drove away.

“One in particular: that of being unnecessarily and pettily brutal about rather insignificant things. Ah,” he added, looking up, “here is Mr. Saunders. Excuse me, will you? You will probably find Mrs. Powers and Mr. Gilligan in the garden,” he said, over his shoulder, greeting his caller.

Jones, in a vindictive rage, saw them shake hands. They ignored him and he lounged viciously past them seeking his pipe. It eluded him and he cursed it slowly, beating at his various pockets.

“I had intended calling upon you today.” The rector took his caller affectionately by the elbow. “Come in, come in.”

Mr. Saunders allowed himself to be propelled across the veranda. Murmuring a conventional response the rector herded him heartily beneath the fanlight, down the dark hall and into the study, without noticing the caller’s air of uncomfortable reserve. He moved a chair for the guest and took his own seat at the desk. Through the window he could see a shallow section of the tree that, unseen but suggested, swirled upward in an ecstasy of never-escaping silver-bellied leaves.

The rector’s swivel chair protested, tilting. “Ah, yes, you smoke cigars, I recall. Matches at your elbow.”

Mr. Saunders rolled his cigar slowly in his fingers. At last he made up his mind and lit it.

“Well, the young people have taken things out of our hands, eh?” the rector spoke around his pipe stem. “I will say now that I have long desired it and, frankly, I have expected it. Though I would not have insisted, knowing Donald’s condition. But as Cecily herself desires it⁠—”

“Yes, yes,” agreed Mr. Saunders, slowly. The rector did not notice.

“You, I know, have been a staunch advocate of it all along. Mrs. Powers repeated your conversation to me.”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“And do you know, I look for this marriage to be better than a medicine for him. Not my own idea,” he added, in swift explanation. “Frankly, I was skeptical but Mrs. Powers and Joe⁠—Mr. Gilligan⁠—advanced it first, and the surgeon from Atlanta convinced us all. He assured us that Cecily could do as much if not more for him than anyone. These were his very words, if I recall correctly. And now, since she desires it so much, since you and her mother support her.⁠ ⁠… Do you know,” he slapped his caller upon the shoulder, “do you know, were I a betting man I would wager that we will not know the boy in a year’s time!”

Mr. Saunders had trouble getting his cigar to burn properly. He bit the end from it savagely, then wreathing his head in smoke he blurted: “Mrs. Saunders seems to have a few doubts yet.” He fanned the smoke away and saw the rector’s huge face gone gray and quiet. “Not objections, exactly, you understand,” he added, hurriedly, apologetically. Damn the woman, why couldn’t she have come herself instead of sending him?

The divine made a clicking sound. “This is bad. I had not expected this.”

“Oh, I am sure we can convince her, you and I. Especially with Sis on our side.” He had forgotten his own scruples, forgotten that he did not want his daughter to marry anyone.

“This is bad,” the rector repeated, hopelessly.

“She will not refuse her consent,” Mr. Saunders lied hastily. “It is only that she is not convinced as to its soundness, considering Do⁠—Cecily’s⁠—Cecily’s youth, you see,” he finished with inspiration. “On the contrary, in fact. I only brought it up so that we could have a clear understanding. Don’t you think it is best to know all the facts?”

“Yes, yes.” The rector was having trouble with his own tobacco. He put his pipe aside, pushing it away. He rose and tramped heavily along the worn path in the rug.

“I am sorry,” said Mr. Saunders.

(This was Donald, my son. He is dead.)

“But come, come. We are making a mountain out of a molehill,” the rector exclaimed at last without conviction. “As you say, if the girl wants to marry Donald I am sure her mother