and rendered her speechless," said Jem carefully. "Doesn't that
sound nice?"
"Yeah, she can say nice things sometimes. She wouldn't have a
watch and chain anyway."
"Dear sir," said Jem. "We appreciate the- no, we appreciate
everything which you have put into the tree for us. Yours very
truly, Jeremy Atticus Finch."
"He won't know who you are if you sign it like that, Jem."
Jem erased his name and wrote, "Jem Finch." I signed, "Jean Louise
Finch (Scout)," beneath it. Jem put the note in an envelope.
Next morning on the way to school he ran ahead of me and stopped
at the tree. Jem was facing me when he looked up, and I saw him go
stark white.
"Scout!"
I ran to him.
Someone had filled our knot-hole with cement.
"Don't you cry, now, Scout... don't cry now, don't you worry-" he
muttered at me all the way to school.
When we went home for dinner Jem bolted his food, ran to the porch
and stood on the steps. I followed him. "Hasn't passed by yet," he
said.
Next day Jem repeated his vigil and was rewarded.
"Hidy do, Mr. Nathan," he said.
"Morning Jem, Scout," said Mr. Radley, as he went by.
"Mr. Radley," said Jem.
Mr. Radley turned around.
"Mr. Radley, ah- did you put cement in that hole in that tree down
yonder?"
"Yes," he said. "I filled it up."
"Why'd you do it, sir?"
"Tree's dying. You plug 'em with cement when they're sick. You ought
to know that, Jem."
Jem said nothing more about it until late afternoon. When we
passed our tree he gave it a meditative pat on its cement, and
remained deep in thought. He seemed to be working himself into a bad
humor, so I kept my distance.
As usual, we met Atticus coming home from work that evening. When we
were at our steps Jem said, "Atticus, look down yonder at that tree,
please sir."
"What tree, son?"
"The one on the corner of the Radley lot comin' from school."
"Yes?"
"Is that tree dyin'?"
"Why no, son, I don't think so. Look at the leaves, they're all
green and full, no brown patches anywhere-"
"It ain't even sick?"
"That tree's as healthy as you are, Jem. Why?"
"Mr. Nathan Radley said it was dyin'."
"Well maybe it is. I'm sure Mr. Radley knows more about his trees
than we do."
Atticus left us on the porch. Jem leaned on a pillar, rubbing his
shoulders against it.
"Do you itch, Jem?" I asked as politely as I could. He did not
answer. "Come on in, Jem," I said.
"After while."
He stood there until nightfall, and I waited for him. When we went
in the house I saw he had been crying; his face was dirty in the right
places, but I thought it odd that I had not heard him.
8
For reasons unfathomable to the most experienced prophets in Maycomb
County, autumn turned to winter that year. We had two weeks of the
coldest weather since 1885, Atticus said. Mr. Avery said it was
written on the Rosetta Stone that when children disobeyed their
parents, smoked cigarettes and made war on each other, the seasons
would change: Jem and I were burdened with the guilt of contributing
to the aberrations of nature, thereby causing unhappiness to our
neighbors and discomfort to ourselves.
Old Mrs. Radley died that winter, but her death caused hardly a
ripple- the neighborhood seldom saw her, except when she watered her
cannas. Jem and I decided that Boo had got her at last, but when
Atticus returned from the Radley house he said she died of natural
causes, to our disappointment.
"Ask him," Jem whispered.
"You ask him, you're the oldest."
"That's why you oughta ask him."
"Atticus," I said, "did you see Mr. Arthur?"
Atticus looked sternly around his newspaper at me: "I did not."
Jem restrained me from further questions. He said Atticus was
still touchous about us and the Radleys and it wouldn't do to push him
any. Jem had a notion that Atticus thought our activities that night
last summer were not solely confined to strip poker. Jem had no firm
basis for his ideas, he said it was merely a twitch.
Next morning I awoke, looked out the window and nearly died of
fright. My screams brought Atticus from his bathroom half-shaven.
"The world's endin', Atticus! Please do something-!" I dragged him
to the window and pointed.
"No it's not," he said. "It's snowing."
Jem asked Atticus would it keep up. Jem had never seen snow
either, but he knew what it was. Atticus said he didn't know any
more about snow than Jem did. "I think, though, if it's watery like
that, it'll turn to rain."
The telephone rang and Atticus left the breakfast table to answer
it. "That was Eula May," he said when he returned. "I quote- 'As it
has not snowed in Maycomb County since 1885, there will be no school
today.'"
Eula May was Maycomb's leading telephone operator. She was entrusted
with issuing public announcements, wedding invitations, setting off
the fire siren, and giving first-aid instructions when Dr. Reynolds
was away.
When Atticus finally called us to order and bade us look at our
plates instead of out the windows, Jem asked, "How do you make a
snowman?"
"I haven't the slightest idea," said Atticus. "I don't want you
all to be disappointed, but I doubt if there'll be enough snow for a
snowball, even."
Calpurnia came in and said she thought it was sticking. When we
ran to the back yard, it was covered with a feeble layer of soggy
snow.
"We shouldn't walk about in it," said Jem. "Look, every step you
take's wasting it."
I looked back at my mushy footprints. Jem said if we waited until it
snowed some more we could scrape it all up for a snowman. I stuck
out my tongue and caught a fat flake. It burned.
"Jem, it's hot!"
"No it ain't, it's so cold it burns. Now don't eat it, Scout, you're
wasting it. Let it come down."
"But I want to walk in it."
"I know what, we can go walk over at Miss Maudie's."
Jem hopped across the front yard. I followed in his tracks. When
we were on the sidewalk in front of Miss Maudie's, Mr. Avery
accosted us. He had a pink face and a big stomach below his belt.
"See what you've done?" he said. "Hasn't snowed in Maycomb since
Appomattox. It's bad children like you makes the seasons change."
I wondered if Mr. Avery knew how hopefully we had watched last
summer for him to repeat his performance, and reflected that if this
was our reward, there was something to say for sin. I did not wonder
where Mr. Avery gathered his meteorological statistics: they came
straight from the Rosetta Stone.
"Jem Finch, you Jem Finch!"
"Miss Maudie's callin' you, Jem."
"You all stay in the middle of the yard. There's some thrift
buried under the snow near the porch. Don't step on it!"
"Yessum!" called Jem. "It's beautiful, ain't it, Miss Maudie?"
"Beautiful my hind foot! If it freezes tonight it'll carry off all
my azaleas!"
Miss Maudie's old sunhat glistened with snow crystals. She was
bending over some small bushes, wrapping them in burlap bags. Jem
asked her what she was doing that for.
"Keep 'em warm," she said.
"How can flowers keep warm? They don't circulate."
"I cannot answer that question, Jem Finch. All I know is if it
freezes tonight these plants'll freeze, so you cover 'em up. Is that
clear?"
"Yessum. Miss Maudie?"
"What, sir?"
"Could Scout and me borrow some of your snow?"
"Heavens alive, take it all! There's an old peach basket under the
house, haul it off in that." Miss Maudie's eyes narrowed. "Jem
Finch, what are you going to do with my snow?"
"You'll see," said Jem, and we transferred as much snow as we
could from Miss Maudie's yard to ours, a slushy operation.
"What are we gonna do, Jem?" I asked.
"You'll see," he said. "Now get the basket and haul all the snow you
can rake up from the back yard to the front. Walk back in your tracks,
though," he cautioned.
"Are we gonna have a snow baby, Jem?"
"No, a real snowman. Gotta work hard, now."
Jem ran to the back yard, produced the garden hoe and began
digging quickly behind the woodpile, placing any worms he found to one
side. He went in the house, returned with the laundry hamper, filled
it with earth and carried it to the front yard.
When we had five baskets of earth and two baskets of snow, Jem
said we were ready to begin.
"Don't you think this is kind of a mess?" I asked.
"Looks messy now, but it won't later," he said.
Jem scooped up an armful of dirt, patted it into a mound on which he
added another load, and another until he had constructed a torso.
"Jem, I ain't ever heard of a nigger snowman," I said.
"He won't be black long," he grunted.
Jem procured some peachtree switches from the back yard, plaited
them, and bent them into bones to be covered with dirt.
"He looks like Stephanie Crawford with her hands on her hips," I
