YOU CAN'T GO HOME AGAIN. Thomas Wolfe

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      This went on for some time. But in the face of all their urgings Nebraska remained his characteristic self. He was respectful and good-natured, but a little dubious, and fundamentally stubborn.

      “I already got me a farm out in Zebulon,” he said, and, grinning —“It’s paid fer, too! When I git through playin’ baseball, I’m comin’ back an’ settle down out there an’ farm it. It’s three hundred acres of the purtiest bottom land you ever seen. That’s all I want. I couldn’t use no more.”

      As Nebraska talked to them in his simple, homely way, he spoke as a man of the earth for whom the future opened up serenely, an independent, stubborn man who knew what he wanted, a man who was firmly rooted, established, secure against calamity and want. He was completely detached from the fever of the times — from the fever of the boom-mad town as well as from the larger fever of the nation. The others talked incessantly about land, but George saw that Nebraska Crane was the only one who still conceived of the land as a place on which to live, and of living on the land as a way of life.

      At last Nebraska detached himself from the group and said he was going back to take a smoke. George started to follow him. As he passed down the aisle behind his friend and came abreast of the last seat, suddenly a quiet, toneless voice said:

      “Good evening, Webber.”

      He stopped and spun round. The blind man was seated there before him. He had almost forgotten about him. The blind man had not moved as he spoke. He was still leaning a little forward on his cane, his thin, white face held straight before him as if he were still listening for something. George felt now, as he had always felt, the strange fascination in that evil shadow of a smile that hovered about the corners of the blind man’s mouth. He paused, then said:

      “Judge Bland.”

      “Sit down, son.” And like a child under the spell of the Pied Piper, he sat down. “Let the dead bury their dead. Come sit among the blind.”

      The words were uttered tonelessly, yet their cruel and lifeless contempt penetrated nakedly throughout the car. The other men stopped talking and turned as if they had received an electric shock. George did not know what to say; in the embarrassment of the moment he blurted out:

      “I— I— there are a lot of people on the train from home. I— I’ve been talking to them — Mayor Kennedy, and ——”

      The blind man, never moving, in his terrible toneless voice that carried to all ears, broke in:

      “Yes, I know. As eminent a set of sons-of-bitches as were ever gathered together in the narrow confines of a single pullman-car.”

      The whole car listened in an appalled silence. The group in the middle looked at one another with fear in their eyes, and in a moment they began ‘talking feverishly again.

      “I hear you were in France again last year,” the voice now said. “And did you find the French whores any different from the homegrown variety?”

      The naked words, with their toneless evil, pierced through the car like a flash of sheer terror. All conversation stopped. Everyone was stunned, frozen into immobility.

      “You’ll find there’s not much difference,” Judge Bland observed calmly and in the same tone. “Syphilis makes the whole world kin. And if you want to lose your eyesight, you can do it in this great democracy as well as anywhere on earth.”

      The whole car was as quiet as death. In another moment the stunned faces turned towards one another, and the men began to talk in furtive whispers.

      Through all of this the expression on that white and sunken face had never altered, and the shadow of that ghostly smile still lingered around the mouth. But now, low and casually, he said to the young man:

      “How are you, son? I’m glad to see you.” And in that simple phrase, spoken by the blind man, there was the suggestion of a devilish humour, although his expression did not change a bit.

      “You — you’ve been in Baltimore, Judge Bland?”

      “Yes, I still come up to Hopkins now and then. It does no good, of course. You see, son,” the tone was low and friendly now, “I’ve gone completely blind since I last saw you.”

      “I didn’t know. But you don’t mean that you ——”

      “Oh, utterly! Utterly!” replied Judge Bland, and all at once he threw his sightless face up and laughed with sardonic glee, displaying blackened rims of teeth, as if the joke was too good to be kept. “My dear boy, I assure you that I am utterly blind. I can no longer distinguish one of our most prominent local bastards two feet off —Now, Jarvis!” he suddenly cried out in a chiding voice in the direction of the unfortunate Riggs, who had loudly resumed his discussion of property values —“you know that’s not true! Why, man, I can tell by the look in your eyes that you’re lying!” And again he lifted his face and was shaken by devilish, quiet laughter. “Excuse the interruption, son,” he went on. “I believe the subject of our discourse was bastardy. Why, can you believe it?”— he leaned forward again his long fingers playing gently on the polished ridges of his stick —“where bastardy is concerned, I find I can no longer trust my eyes at all. I rely exclusively on the sense of smell. And”— for the first time his face was sunken deliberately in weariness and disgust —“it is enough. A sense of smell is all you need.” Abruptly changing now, he said: “How are the folks?”

      “Why — Aunt Maw’s dead. I— I’m going home to the funeral.”

      “Dead, is she?”

      That was all he said. None of the usual civilities, no expression of polite regret, just that and nothing more. Then, after a moment:

      “So you’re going down to bury her.” It was a statement, and he said it reflectively, as though meditating upon it; then —“And do you think you can go home again?”

      George was a little startled and puzzled: “Why — I don’t understand. How do you mean, Judge Bland?”

      There was another flare of that secret, evil laughter. “I mean, do you think you can really go home again?” Then, sharp, cold, peremptory —“Now answer me! Do you think you can?”

      “Why — why yes! Why —” the young man was desperate, almost frightened now, and, earnestly, beseechingly, he said —“why look here, Judge Bland — I haven’t done anything — honestly I haven’t!”

      Again the low, demonic laughter: “You’re sure?”

      Frantic now with the old terror which the man had always inspired in him as a boy: “Why — why of course I’m sure! Look here, Judge Bland — in the name of God, what have I done?” He thought desperately of a dozen wild, fantastic things, feeling a sickening and overwhelming consciousness of guilt, without knowing why. He thought: “Has he heard about my book? Does he know I wrote about the town? Is that what he means?”

      The blind man cackled thinly to himself, enjoying with evil tenderness his little cat’s play with the young man: “The guilty fleeth where no man pursueth. Is that it, son?”

      Frankly distracted: “Why — why — I’m not guilty!” Angrily: “Why damn it, I’m not guilty of anything!” Passionately, excitedly: “I can hold up my head with any man! СКАЧАТЬ