Book Five: Chapter XXII

by Sherwood Anderson

　　The car driven by Tom Butterworth stopped at a town, and Tom got out tofill his pockets with cigars and incidentally to enjoy the wonder andadmiration of the citizens. He was in an exalted mood and words flowed fromhim. As the motor under its hood purred, so the brain under the graying oldhead purred and threw forth words. He talked to the idlers before the drugstores in the towns and, when the car started again and they were out inthe open country, his voice, pitched in a high key to make itself heardabove the purring engine, became shrill. Having struck the shrill tone ofthe new age the voice went on and on.

　　But the voice and the swift-moving car did not stir Clara. She tried notto hear the voice, and fixing her eyes on the soft landscape flowing pastunder the moon, tried to think of other times and places. She thought ofnights when she had walked with Kate Chanceller through the streets ofColumbus, and of the silent ride she had taken with Hugh that night theywere married. Her mind went back into her childhood and she remembered thelong days she had spent riding with her father in this same valley, goingfrom farm to farm to haggle and dicker for the purchase of calves and pigs.Her father had not talked then but sometimes, when they had driven far andwere homeward bound in the failing light of evening, words did come to him.She remembered one evening in the summer after her mother died and whenher father often took her with him on his drives. They had stopped for theevening meal at the house of a farmer and when they got on the road again,the moon came out. Something present in the spirit of the night stirredTom, and he spoke of his life as a boy in the new country and of hisfathers and brothers. "We worked hard, Clara," he said. "The whole countrywas new and every acre we planted had to be cleared." The mind of theprosperous farmer fell into a reminiscent mood and he spoke of littlethings concerning his life as a boy and young man; the days of cutting woodalone in the silent, white forest when winter came and it was time forgetting out firewood and logs for new farm buildings, the log rollings towhich neighboring farmers came, when great piles of logs were made and setafire that space might be cleared for planting. In the winter the boy wentto school in the village of Bidwell and as he was even then an energetic,pushing youth, already intent on getting on in the world, he set traps inthe forest and on the banks of streams and walked the trap line on his wayto and from school. In the spring he sent his pelts to the growing town ofCleveland where they were sold. He spoke of the money he got and of how hehad finally saved enough to buy a horse of his own.

　　Tom had talked of many other things on that night, of the spelling-downs atthe schoolhouse in town, of huskings and dances held in the barns and ofthe evening when he went skating on the river and first met his wife. "Wetook to each other at once," he said softly. "There was a fire built on thebank of the river and after I had skated with her we went and sat down towarm ourselves.

　　"We wanted to get married to each other right away," he told Clara. "Iwalked home with her after we got tired of skating, and after that Ithought of nothing but how to get my own farm and have a home of my own."

　　As the daughter sat in the motor listening to the shrill voice of thefather, who now talked only of the making of machines and money, that otherman talking softly in the moonlight as the horse jogged slowly alongthe dark road seemed very far away. All such men seemed very far away."Everything worth while is very far away," she thought bitterly. "Themachines men are so intent on making have carried them very far from theold sweet things."

　　The motor flew along the roads and Tom thought of his old longing to ownand drive fast racing horses. "I used to be half crazy to own fast horses,"he shouted to his son-in-law. "I didn't do it, because owning fast horsesmeant a waste of money, but it was in my mind all the time. I wanted to gofast: faster than any one else." In a kind of ecstasy he gave the motormore gas and shot the speed up to fifty miles an hour. The hot, summer air,fanned into a violent wind, whistled past his head. "Where would the damnedrace horses be now," he called, "where would your Maud S. or your J.I.C.be, trying to catch up with me in this car?"

　　Yellow wheat fields and fields of young corn, tall now and in the lightbreeze that was blowing whispering in the moonlight, flashed past, lookinglike squares on a checker board made for the amusement of the child of somegiant. The car ran through miles of the low farming country, through themain streets of towns, where the people ran out of the stores to standon the sidewalks and look at the new wonder, through sleeping bits ofwoodlands--remnants of the great forests in which Tom had worked as aboy--and across wooden bridges over small streams, beside which grewtangled masses of elderberries, now yellow and fragrant with blossoms.

　　At eleven o'clock having already achieved some ninety miles Tom turned thecar back. Running more sedately he again talked of the mechanical triumphsof the age in which he had lived. "I've brought you whizzing along, you andClara," he said proudly. "I tell you what, Hugh, Steve Hunter and I havebrought you along fast in more ways that one. You've got to give Stevecredit for seeing something in you, and you've got to give me credit forputting my money back of your brains. I don't want to take no credit fromSteve. There's credit enough for all. All I got to say for myself is that Isaw the hole in the doughnut. Yes, sir, I wasn't so blind. I saw the holein the doughnut."

　　Tom stopped to light a cigar and then drove on again. "I'll tell your what,Hugh," he said, "I wouldn't say so to any one not of my family, but thetruth is, I'm the man that's been putting over the big things there inBidwell. The town is going to be a city now and a mighty big city. Townsin this State like Columbus, Toledo and Dayton, had better look out forthemselves. I'm the man has always kept Steve Hunter steady and goingstraight ahead down the track, as this car goes with my hand at thesteering wheel.

　　"You don't know anything about it, and I don't want you should talk, butthere are new things coming to Bidwell," he added. "When I was in Chicagolast month I met a man who has been making rubber buggy and bicycletires. I'm going in with him and we're going to start a plant for makingautomobile-tires right in Bidwell. The tire business is bound to be oneof the greatest on earth and they ain't no reason why Bidwell shouldn'tbe the biggest tire center ever known in the world." Although the carnow ran quietly, Tom's voice again became shrill. "There'll be hundredsof thousands of cars like this tearing over every road in America," hedeclared. "Yes, sir, they will; and if I calculate right Bidwell'll be thegreat tire town of the world."

　　For a long time Tom drove in silence, and when he again began to talk itwas a new mood. He told a tale of life in Bidwell that stirred both Hughand Clara deeply. He was angry and had Clara not been in the car would havebecome violently profane.

　　"I'd like to hang the men who are making trouble in the shops in town," hebroke forth. "You know who I mean, I mean the labor men who are trying tomake trouble for Steve Hunter and me. There's a socialist talking everynight on the street over there. I'll tell you, Hugh, the laws of thiscountry are wrong." For ten minutes he talked of the labor difficulties inthe shops.

　　"They better look out," he declared, and was so angry that his voice roseto something like a suppressed scream. "We're inventing new machines prettyfast now-days," he cried. "Pretty soon we'll do all the work by machines.Then what'll we do? We'll kick all the workers out and let 'em strike tillthey're sick, that's what we'll do. They can talk their fool socialism allthey want, but we'll show 'em, the fools."

　　His angry mood passed, and as the car turned into the last fifteen-milestretch of road that led to Bidwell, he told the tale that so deeplystirred his passengers. Chuckling softly he told of the struggle of theBidwell harness maker, Joe Wainsworth, to prevent the sale of machine-madeharness in the community, and of his experience with his employee, JimGibson. Tom had heard the tale in the bar-room of the Bidwell House andit had made a profound impression on his mind. "I'll tell you what," hedeclared, "I'm going to get in touch with Jim Gibson. That's the kind ofman to handle workers. I only heard about him to-night, but I'm going tosee him to-morrow."

　　Leaning back in his seat Tom laughed heartily as he told of the travelingman who had visited Joe Wainsworth's shop and the placing of the order forthe factory-made harness. In some intangible way he felt that when JimGibson laid the order for the harness on the bench in the shop and by theforce of his personality compelled Joe Wainsworth to sign, he justifiedall such men as himself. In imagination he lived in that moment with Jim,and like Jim the incident aroused his inclination to boast. "Why, a lotof cheap laboring skates can't down such men as myself any more than JoeWainsworth could down that Jim Gibson," he declared. "They ain't got thecharacter, you see, that's what the matter, they ain't got the character."Tom touched some mechanism connected with the engine of the car and it shotsuddenly forward. "Suppose one of them labor leaders were standing in theroad there," he cried. Instinctively Hugh leaned forward and peered intothe darkness through which the lights of the car cut like a great scythe,and on the back seat Clara half rose to her feet. Tom shouted with delightand as the car plunged along the road his voice rose in triumph. "The damnfools!" he cried. "They think they can stop the machines. Let 'em try. Theywant to go on in their old hand-made way. Let 'em look out. Let 'em lookout for such men as Jim Gibson and me."

　　Down a slight incline in the road shot the car and swept around a widecurve, and then the jumping, dancing light, running far ahead, revealed asight that made Tom thrust out his foot and jam on the brakes.

　　In the road and in the very center of the circle of light, as thoughperforming a scene on the stage, three men were struggling. As the carcame to a stop, so sudden that it pitched both Clara and Hugh out of theirseats, the struggle came to an end. One of the struggling figures, a smallman without coat or hat, had jerked himself away from the others andstarted to run toward the fence at the side of the road and separating itfrom a grove of trees. A large, broad-shouldered man sprang forward andcatching the tail of the fleeing man's coat pulled him back into the circleof light. His fist shot out and caught the small man directly on the mouth.He fell like a dead thing, face downward in the dust of the road.

　　Tom ran the car slowly forward and its headlight continued to play over thethree figures. From a little pocket at the side of his driver's seat hetook a revolver. He ran the car quickly to a position near the group in theroad and stopped.

　　"What's up?" he asked sharply.

　　Ed Hall the factory superintendent, the man who had struck the blow thathad felled the little man, stepped forward and explained the tragichappenings of the evening in town. The factory superintendent hadremembered that as a boy he had once worked for a few weeks on the farm ofwhich the wood beside the road was a part, and that on Sunday afternoonsthe harness maker had come to the farm with his wife and the two people hadgone to walk in the very place where he had just been found. "I had a hunchhe would be out here," he boasted. "I figured it out. Crowds started out oftown in all directions, but I cut out alone. Then I happened to see thisfellow and just for company I brought him along." He put up his hand and,looking at Tom, tapped his forehead. "Cracked," he declared, "he alwayswas. A fellow I knew saw him once in that woods," he said pointing."Somebody had shot a squirrel and he took on about it as though he had losta child. I said then he was crazy, and he has sure proved I was right."

　　At a word from her father Clara went to sit on the front seat on Hugh'sknees. Her body trembled and she was cold with fear. As her father hadtold the story of Jim Gibson's triumph over Joe Wainsworth she had wantedpassionately to kill that blustering fellow. Now the thing was done. Inher mind the harness maker had come to stand for all the men and women inthe world who were in secret revolt against the absorption of the age inmachines and the products of machines. He had stood as a protesting figureagainst what her father had become and what she thought her husband hadbecome. She had wanted Jim Gibson killed and it had been done. As a childshe had gone often to Wainsworth's shop with her father or some farm hand,and she now remembered sharply the peace and quiet of the place. At thethought of the same place, now become the scene of a desperate killing, herbody shook so that she clutched at Hugh's arms, striving to steady herself.

　　Ed Hall took the senseless figure of the old man in the road into his armsand half threw it into the back seat of the car. To Clara it was as thoughhis rough, misunderstanding hands were on her own body. The car startedswiftly along the road and Ed told again the story of the night'shappenings. "I tell you, Mr. Hunter is in mighty bad shape, he may die,"he said. Clara turned to look at her husband and thought him totallyunaffected by what had happened. His face was quiet like her father's face.The factory superintendent's voice went on explaining his part in theadventures of the evening. Ignoring the pale workman who sat lost in theshadows in a corner of the rear seat, he spoke as though he had undertakenand accomplished the capture of the murderer single-handed. As heafterwards explained to his wife, Ed felt he had been a fool not to comealone. "I knew I could handle him all right," he explained. "I wasn'tafraid, but I had figured it all out he was crazy. That made me feel shaky.When they were getting up a crowd to go out on the hunt, I says to myself,I'll go alone. I says to myself, I'll bet he's gone out to that woods onthe Riggly farm where he and his wife used to go on Sundays. I started andthen I saw this other man standing on a corner and I made him come with me.He didn't want to come and I wish I'd gone alone. I could have handled himand I'd got all the credit."

　　In the car Ed told the story of the night in the streets of Bidwell. Someone had seen Steve Hunter shot down in the street and had declared theharness maker had done it and had then run away. A crowd had gone to theharness shop and had found the body of Jim Gibson. On the floor of the shopwere the factory-made harnesses cut into bits. "He must have been in thereand at work for an hour or two, stayed right in there with the man he hadkilled. It's the craziest thing any man ever done."

　　The harness maker, lying on the floor of the car where Ed had thrown him,stirred and sat up. Clara turned to look at him and shivered. His shirt wastorn so that the thin, old neck and shoulders could be plainly seen in theuncertain light, and his face was covered with blood that had dried and wasnow black with dust. Ed Hall went on with the tale of his triumph. "I foundhim where I said to myself I would. Yes, sir, I found him where I said tomyself I would."

　　The car came to the first of the houses of the town, long rows of cheaplybuilt frame houses standing in what had once been Ezra French's cabbagepatch, where Hugh had crawled on the ground in the moonlight, workingout the mechanical problems that confronted him in the building of hisplant-setting machine. Suddenly the distraught and frightened man crouchedon the floor of the car, raised himself on his hands and lurched forward,trying to spring over the side. Ed Hall caught him by the arm and jerkedhim back. He drew back his arm to strike again but Clara's voice, cold andintense with passion, stopped him. "If you touch him, I'll kill you," shesaid. "No matter what he does, don't you dare strike him again."

　　Tom drove the car slowly through the streets of Bidwell to the door ofa police station. Word of the return of the murderer had run ahead, anda crowd had gathered. Although it was past two o'clock the lights stillburned in stores and saloons, and crowds stood at every corner. With theaid of a policeman, Ed Hall, with one eye fixed cautiously on the frontseat where Clara sat, started to lead Joe Wainsworth away. "Come on now, wewon't hurt you," he said reassuringly, and had got his man free of the carwhen he broke away. Springing back into the rear seat the crazed man turnedto look at the crowd. A sob broke from his lips. For a moment he stoodtrembling with fright, and then turning, he for the first time saw Hugh,the man in whose footsteps he had once crept in the darkness in Turner'sPike, the man who had invented the machine by which the earnings of alifetime had been swept away. "It wasn't me. You did it. You killed JimGibson," he screamed, and springing forward sank his fingers and teeth intoHugh's neck.