I looked down and found myself clutching a brown woolen blanket I
was wearing around my shoulders, squaw-fashion.
"Atticus, I don't know, sir... I-"
I turned to Jem for an answer, but Jem was even more bewildered than
I. He said he didn't know how it got there, we did exactly as
Atticus had told us, we stood down by the Radley gate away from
everybody, we didn't move an inch- Jem stopped.
"Mr. Nathan was at the fire," he babbled, "I saw him, I saw him,
he was tuggin' that mattress- Atticus, I swear..."
"That's all right, son." Atticus grinned slowly. "Looks like all
of Maycomb was out tonight, in one way or another. Jem, there's some
wrapping paper in the pantry, I think. Go get it and we'll-"
"Atticus, no sir!"
Jem seemed to have lost his mind. He began pouring out our secrets
right and left in total disregard for my safety if not for his own,
omitting nothing, knot-hole, pants and all.
"...Mr. Nathan put cement in that tree, Atticus, an' he did it to
stop us findin' things- he's crazy, I reckon, like they say, but
Atticus, I swear to God he ain't ever harmed us, he ain't ever hurt
us, he coulda cut my throat from ear to ear that night but he tried to
mend my pants instead... he ain't ever hurt us, Atticus-"
Atticus said, "Whoa, son," so gently that I was greatly heartened.
It was obvious that he had not followed a word Jem said, for all
Atticus said was, "You're right. We'd better keep this and the blanket
to ourselves. Someday, maybe, Scout can thank him for covering her
up."
"Thank who?" I asked.
"Boo Radley. You were so busy looking at the fire you didn't know it
when he put the blanket around you."
My stomach turned to water and I nearly threw up when Jem held out
the blanket and crept toward me. "He sneaked out of the house- turn
'round- sneaked up, an' went like this!"
Atticus said dryly, "Do not let this inspire you to further glory,
Jeremy."
Jem scowled, "I ain't gonna do anything to him," but I watched the
spark of fresh adventure leave his eyes. "Just think, Scout," he said,
"if you'd just turned around, you'da seen him."
Calpurnia woke us at noon. Atticus had said we need not go to school
that day, we'd learn nothing after no sleep. Calpurnia said for us
to try and clean up the front yard.
Miss Maudie's sunhat was suspended in a thin layer of ice, like a
fly in amber, and we had to dig under the dirt for her hedge-clippers.
We found her in her back yard, gazing at her frozen charred azaleas.
"We're bringing back your things, Miss Maudie," said Jem. "We're
awful sorry."
Miss Maudie looked around, and the shadow of her old grin crossed
her face. "Always wanted a smaller house, Jem Finch. Gives me more
yard. Just think, I'll have more room for my azaleas now!"
"You ain't grievin', Miss Maudie?" I asked, surprised. Atticus
said her house was nearly all she had.
"Grieving, child? Why, I hated that old cow barn. Thought of settin'
fire to it a hundred times myself, except they'd lock me up."
"But-"
"Don't you worry about me, Jean Louise Finch. There are ways of
doing things you don't know about. Why, I'll build me a little house
and take me a couple of roomers and- gracious, I'll have the finest
yard in Alabama. Those Bellingraths'll look plain puny when I get
started!"
Jem and I looked at each other. "How'd it catch, Miss Maudie?" he
asked.
"I don't know, Jem. Probably the flue in the kitchen. I kept a
fire in there last night for my potted plants. Hear you had some
unexpected company last night, Miss Jean Louise."
"How'd you know?"
"Atticus told me on his way to town this morning. Tell you the
truth, I'd like to've been with you. And I'd've had sense enough to
turn around, too."
Miss Maudie puzzled me. With most of her possessions gone and her
beloved yard a shambles, she still took a lively and cordial
interest in Jem's and my affairs.
She must have seen my perplexity. She said, "Only thing I worried
about last night was all the danger and commotion it caused. This
whole neighborhood could have gone up. Mr. Avery'll be in bed for a
week- he's right stove up. He's too old to do things like that and I
told him so. Soon as I can get my hands clean and when Stephanie
Crawford's not looking, I'll make him a Lane cake. That Stephanie's
been after my recipe for thirty years, and if she thinks I'll give
it to her just because I'm staying with her she's got another think
coming."
I reflected that if Miss Maudie broke down and gave it to her,
Miss Stephanie couldn't follow it anyway. Miss Maudie had once let
me see it: among other things, the recipe called for one large cup
of sugar.
It was a still day. The air was so cold and clear we heard the
courthouse clock clank, rattle and strain before it struck the hour.
Miss Maudie's nose was a color I had never seen before, and I inquired
about it.
"I've been out here since six o'clock," she said. "Should be
frozen by now." She held up her hands. A network of tiny lines
crisscrossed her palms, brown with dirt and dried blood.
"You've ruined 'em," said Jem. "Why don't you get a colored man?"
There was no note of sacrifice in his voice when he added, "Or
Scout'n'me, we can help you."
Miss Maudie said, "Thank you sir, but you've got a job of your own
over there." She pointed to our yard.
"You mean the Morphodite?" I asked. "Shoot, we can rake him up in
a jiffy."
Miss Maudie stared down at me, her lips moving silently. Suddenly
she put her hands to her head and whooped. When we left her, she was
still chuckling.
Jem said he didn't know what was the matter with her- that was
just Miss Maudie.
9
"You can just take that back, boy!"
This order, given by me to Cecil Jacobs, was the beginning of a
rather thin time for Jem and me. My fists were clenched and I was
ready to let fly. Atticus had promised me he would wear me out if he
ever heard of me fighting any more; I was far too old and too big
for such childish things, and the sooner I learned to hold in, the
better off everybody would be. I soon forgot.
Cecil Jacobs made me forget. He had announced in the schoolyard
the day before that Scout Finch's daddy defended niggers. I denied it,
but told Jem.
"What'd he mean sayin' that?" I asked.
"Nothing," Jem said. "Ask Atticus, he'll tell you."
"Do you defend niggers, Atticus?" I asked him that evening.
"Of course I do. Don't say nigger, Scout. That's common."
"'s what everybody at school says."
"From now on it'll be everybody less one-"
"Well if you don't want me to grow up talkin' that way, why do you
send me to school?"
My father looked at me mildly, amusement in his eyes. Despite our
compromise, my campaign to avoid school had continued in one form or
another since my first day's dose of it: the beginning of last
September had brought on sinking spells, dizziness, and mild gastric
complaints. I went so far as to pay a nickel for the privilege of
rubbing my head against the head of Miss Rachel's cook's son, who
was afflicted with a tremendous ringworm. It didn't take.
But I was worrying another bone. "Do all lawyers defend n-Negroes,
Atticus?"
"Of course they do, Scout."
"Then why did Cecil say you defended niggers? He made it sound
like you were runnin' a still."
Atticus sighed. "I'm simply defending a Negro- his name's Tom
Robinson. He lives in that little settlement beyond the town dump.
He's a member of Calpurnia's church, and Cal knows his family well.
She says they're clean-living folks. Scout, you aren't old enough to
understand some things yet, but there's been some high talk around
town to the effect that I shouldn't do much about defending this
man. It's a peculiar case- it won't come to trial until summer
session. John Taylor was kind enough to give us a postponement..."
"If you shouldn't be defendin' him, then why are you doin' it?"
"For a number of reasons," said Atticus. "The main one is, if I
didn't I couldn't hold up my head in town, I couldn't represent this
county in the legislature, I couldn't even tell you or Jem not to do
something again."
"You mean if you didn't defend that man, Jem and me wouldn't have to
mind you any more?"
"That's about right."
"Why?"
"Because I could never ask you to mind me again. Scout, simply by
the nature of the work, every lawyer gets at least one case in his
lifetime that affects him personally. This one's mine, I guess. You
might hear some ugly talk about it at school, but do one thing for
me if you will: you just hold your head high and keep those fists
down. No matter what anybody says to you, don't you let 'em get your
goat. Try fighting with your head for a change... it's a good one,
even if it does resist learning."
"Atticus, are we going to win it?"
"No, honey."
"Then why-"
"Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started
is no reason for us not to try to win," Atticus said.
"You sound like Cousin Ike Finch," I said. Cousin Ike Finch was
Maycomb County's sole surviving Confederate veteran. He wore a General
Hood type beard of which he was inordinately vain. At least once a
year Atticus, Jem and I called on him, and I would have to kiss him.
It was horrible. Jem and I would listen respectfully to Atticus and
Cousin Ike rehash the war. "Tell you, Atticus," Cousin Ike would
say, "the Missouri Compromise was what licked us, but if I had to go
through it agin I'd walk every step of the way there an' every step
back jist like I did before an' furthermore we'd whip 'em this time...
