THE MORNING WATCH
231
heaviness stayed, so that he felt as if he were carrying an all but im–
possible weight in the middle of his body.
By now they could see the first of the buildings through
the
light–
leaved woods; and now the whole of the School stood up before them
and the two boys ahead walked more slowly, wondering what lie, if
any, might lighten their trouble. But they could not
think
of any that
would. do and when Richard overtook them, lingering unhappily at the
stile, they were so far beyond hope that they didn't even bother
to
ask
him
whether he had any ideas.
Now that he was with them again, the heaviness was somewhat less
severe, and he began to wonder what had made him so deeply weak and
unhappy, and what kind of trouble they would be in for; now he could
clearly foresee Father Whitman's hard sleepless eyes in his first look at
them as they would come up from the woods, their hair spiky with in–
criminating wetness; and much as he dreaded in advance the punish–
ment, which would be a whipping for sure, he told himself, he dreaded
even more the first meeting with these eyes, and the first words that would
be spoken, though he suspected that these would be tempered to the day.
He heard Jimmy say to Hobe that he better get rid of that snake, and he
thought that he sure better; and he was neither surprised nor particularly
troubled when, a few moments later, Hobe slung the snake in among
the hogs. He stood with the other children at the fence and watched
with interest while two of the hogs, with snarling squeals, scuffled over
the snake, tore it apart at its middle wound and, while the two portions
still tingled in the muck, gobbled them down.
It
occurred to
him,
with
a lancing quailing of horror and pity, that the snake was still alive, and
would stay alive in their bellies, however chewed, and mangled, and
dif–
fused by acids, until the end of the day; but now, remembering the head,
he told himself that the snake was so far gone by now that he must be a
way beyond really feeling anything, ever any more (the phrase jumped at
him): (Who had said that? His mother. "Daddy was terribly hurt so
God has taken him up to Heaven to be with Him and he won't come
back to .us ever any more.") "Ever any more," he heard his quiet voice
repeat within him; and within the next moment he ceased to
think
of the snake with much pain. When the boys turned from the sty he
followed them toward the Main Building carrying, step by step with less
difficulty, the diminishing weight in his soul and body, his right hand
hanging with a feeling of subtle enlargement at his thigh, his left hand
sustaining, in exquisite protectiveness, the bodiless shell which rested
against
his
heart.
(The Morning Watch
will appear in book form in April
under the imprint of Houghton Mifflin.)
