"What in the tarnation you put it on there for," Mr Gillespie said.
"I thought it would steady it some," pa said.
"I just aimed to help him."
They got the flat iron and the hammer.
Dewey Dell held the lamp.
They had to hit it hard.
And then Cash went to sleep.
"He's asleep now," I said.
"It cant hurt him while he's asleep."
It just cracked.
It wouldn't come off.
"It'll take the hide, too," Mr Gillespie said.
"Why in the tarnation you put it on there.
Didn't none of you think to grease his leg first?"
"I just aimed to help him," pa said.
"It was Darl put it on."
"Where is Darl?" they said.
"Didn't none of you have more sense than that?" Mr Gillespie said.
"I'd a thought he would, anyway."
Jewel was lying on his face.
His back was red.
Dewey Dell put the medicine on it.
The medicine was made out of butter and soot, to draw out the fire.
Then his back was black.
"Does it hurt, Jewel?" I said.
"Your back looks like a nigger's, Jewel," I said.
Cash's foot and leg looked like a nigger's.
Then they broke it off.
Cash's leg bled.
"You go on back and lay down," Dewey Dell said.
"You ought to be asleep."
"Where is Darl?" they said.
He is out there under the apple tree with her, lying on her.
He is there so the cat wont come back.
I said,
"Are you going to keep the cat away, Darl?"
The moonlight dappled on him too.
On her it was still, but on Darl it dappled up and down.
"You needn't to cry," I said.
"Jewel got her out.
You needn't to cry, Darl."
The barn is still red. It used to be redder than this.
Then it went swirling, making the stars run backward without falling.
It hurt my heart like the train did.
When I went to find where they stay at night, I saw something that Dewey Dell says I mustn't tell nobody.
Darl.
We have been passing the signs for some time now: the drugstores, the clothing stores, the patent medicine and the garages and cafes, and the mile-boards diminishing, becoming more starkly raccruent: 3 mi., 2 mi.
From the crest of a hill, as we get into the wagon again, we can see the somke low and flat, seemingly unmoving in the unwinded afternoon.
"Is that it, Darl?" Vardaman says.
"Is that Jefferson?"