William Faulkner, SANCTUARY – WordPress.com - literature save 2

together, listening to the hot minute seeping of her blood, saying dully to herself, I'm still
bleeding. I'm still bleeding.
It was a bright, soft day, a wanton morning filled with that unbelievable soft
radiance of May, rife with a promise of noon and of heat, with high fat clouds like gobs
of whipped cream floating lightly as reflections in a mirror, their shadows scudding
sedately across the road. It had been a lavender spring. The fruit trees, the white ones, had
been in small leaf when the blooms matured; they had never attained that brilliant
whiteness of last spring, and the dogwood had come into full bloom after the leaf also, in
green retrograde before crescendo. But lilac and wistaria and redbud, even the shabby
heaven trees, had never been finer, fulgent, with a burning scent blowing for a hundred
yards along the vagrant air of April and May. The bougainvillea against the veranda
would be large as basketballs and lightly poised as balloons, and looking vacantly and
stupidly at the rushing roadside Temple began to scream.
It started as a wail, raising, cut suddenly off by Popeye's hand. With her hands
lying on her lap, sitting erect, she screamed, tasting the gritty acridity of his fingers while
the car slewed squealing in the gravel, feeling her secret blood. Then he gripped her by
the back of the neck and she sat motionless, her mouth round and open like a small empty
cave. He shook her head.
"Shut it," he said, "shut it;" gripping her silent. "Look at yourself. Here." With the
other hand he swung the mirror on the windshield around and she looked at her image, at
the uptilted hat and her matted hair and her round mouth. She began to fumble at her coat
pockets, looking at her reflection. He released her and she produced the compact and
opened it and peered into the mirror, whimpering a little. She powdered her face and
rouged her mouth and straightened her hat, whimpering into the tiny mirror on her lap
while Popeye watched her. He lit a cigarette. "Aint you ashamed of yourself?" he said.
"It's still running," she whimpered. "I can feel it." With the lipstick poised she
looked at him and opened her mouth again. He gripped her by the back of the neck.
"Stop it, now. You going to shut it?"
"Yes," she whimpered.
"See you do, then. Come on. Get yourself fixed."
She put the compact away. He started the car again.
The road began to thicken with pleasure cars Sunday-bent--small, clay-crusted
Fords and Chevrolets; an occasional larger car moving swiftly, with swathed women, and
dust-covered hampers; trucks loaded with wooden-faced country people in garments like
a colored wood meticulously carved; now and then a wagon or a buggy. Before a
weathered frame church on a hill the grove was full of tethered teams and battered cars
and trucks. The woods gave way to fields; houses became more frequent. Low above the
skyline, above roofs and a spire or two, smoke hung. The gravel became asphalt and they
entered Dumfries.
Temple began to look about, like one waking from sleep. "Not here!" she said. " I
cant--"
"Hush it, now," Popeye said.
"I cant--I might--" she whimpered. "I'm hungry," she said. "I haven't eaten since .
. ."
"Ah, you aint hungry. Wait till we get to town."