Chapter Twelve

When Dude looked up, he saw that the door had been opened and that Ellie May, Ada, and the grandmother were crowding through it. He did not know what to do, but he tried to motion to them to go away. He could not see Jeeter, because Jeeter was behind him, standing¹ half-way up in the window with his feet supported on one of the rungs of the ladder. Bessie saw Jeeter, but she could not see the others. Dude heard his grandmother groan² and walk away. He could hear her feet sliding over the pine boards of the hail floor, the horse-collar shoes making an irritating sound as she went towards the front yard. He paid no more attention to the others. After a while Jeeter cleared his throat and called Bessie. She did not answer him the first time he called, nor the next. Neither she nor Dude wanted to be disturbed. When she persisted in not answering him, Jeeter climbed through the window, and walked across the room to the bed. He shook Dude by the collar until he turned around. Jeeter, however, did not have anything to say to Dude. It was Bessie he wanted to speak to. "I been thinking just now about it, Sister Bessie, and the more I think it over in my mind, the more I convince myself that you was right about what we was discussing yesterday on the porch." "What you want with me, Jeeter?" she asked. "Now, about that place in the Bible where it says if a man's eye offends God he ought to go and take it out." "That's what the Bible says," she answered. "I know It does. And that's what's worrying my soul so bad right now." "But you is a religious man, Jeeter," she said. "Nothing ought to bother your conscience now. I prayed for you about them turnips³ you took from Lov. The Lord has forgot all about it now. He ain't going to hound you none on that account." "It ain't about the turnips. It's about cutting myself off. Now, I reckon what you said was right. I ought to go and do it." Dude turned around and tried to push Jeeter to the floor. Jeeter clung to the bedstead, and would not move away. "Why you want to do that?" Bessie said. "I been thinking about all you said so much that right now I know I ought to go ahead and cut myself off, so the Lord won't let me be tempted⁴ no more. I offended Him, and I know I ought to cut myself off so I won't do it no more. Ain't that right, Sister Bessie?" "That's right," she said. "That's what the Bible says a man ought to do when he's powerful sinful." Jeeter looked at Bessie. He pulled back the quilt so he could see her better. "Maybe I can put it off a little while, though," he said, after thinking several minutes. "Now, maybe it ain't so bad as I thought it was. This time of year puts a queer feeling into a man, and he says a lot of things he don't stop to take into account. Along about when the time to plow⁵ the land and put seed in the rows comes around, a man feels like he ain't got no control over his tongue--and don't want none. It's the same way with his actions. I feel that way every late February and early March. No matter how many children a man's got, he always wants to get more." There was a silence in the house for a long time. Ellie May and Ada made no sound in the doorway⁶. Jeeter sat on the bed deep in thought until Dude pushed him to his feet. Dude climbed out behind him. When all of them were out in the yard again, Dude sat in the automobile⁷ and blew the horn. The women were busy wiping off the dust that had settled on the hood⁸ and fenders. The grandmother, though, did not come close to the car. She took her place behind a chinaberry tree and watched every movement of the others. Jeeter sat on his heels beside the chimney, and thought over what Sister Bessie had said in the house. He was more convinced than ever that God expected him to fix himself so he would not have any more sinful thoughts about Bessie. He decided⁹, however, not to carry out his intentions just then. There was plenty of time left yet, he told himself, when he could go ahead and cut himself off, and so long as he did it before he offended God any more, it would be satisfactory. In the meanwhile, he would have time in which to try to convince himself more thoroughly¹⁰ that he should do it. There was a little fat-back on rinds left in the kitchen, and Ada had baked some cornbread. The bread had been made with meal, salt, water, and grease. All of them sat down at the table in the kitchen and ate the fat-back and cornbread with full appetite. It was the first time that day that any of them had had food, and it would probably be the last. After the meat plate had been wiped clean of grease, and after the last of the cornbread was eaten, they went out into the yard again to look at the new automobile. The grandmother had hidden a piece of the bread in her apron¹¹ pocket, and she put it under the mattress¹² of her bed so she would have something to eat the next day in case Jeeter failed to buy some more meal and meat. Jeeter wanted to take a ride right away. He told Bessie he wanted to go, and that he was ready. Bessie had other plans, however. She said she and Dude were going to take a little ride that afternoon all alone, so they could talk over their marriage together without any disturbance¹³. She promised Jeeter she would let him ride when they came back. She and Dude got in, and Dude drove the car out of the yard and into the tobacco road towards the State highway. Jeeter thought they might be going to Augusta, but before he could ask them if they were, they had gone too far to hear him call. "That Dude is the luckiest man alive," he told Ellie May. "Now ain't he?" Ellie May started down the road through the cloud of dust to see him leave. She heard Jeeter talking to her, but she was too much interested in seeing the new car go down the road and in hearing Dude blow the horn to listen to what Jeeter said. "Dude, he has got a brand-new car to ride around in, and he's got married all at the same time," Jeeter continued. "There's not many men who get all that in the same day, I tell you. The new car is a fine piece of goods to own. There ain't nobody else that I know of between here and the river who has got a brand-new automobile. And there ain't many men who has a wife as fine-looking as Sister Bessie -is at her age, neither. Bessie makes a fine woman for a man--any man, I don't care where you find him. She might be just a little bit more than Dude can take care of though, I fear. It looked to me like she requires a heap of satisfaction, one way and another, for a little woman no bigger than a gal¹⁴. I don't know if Dude is that kind or not, but it won't take long for Bessie to find out. Now, if it was me, there wouldn't be no question of it. I'd please Sister Bessie coming and going, right from the start, and keep it up clear to the end." Now Ellie May heard what Jeeter was saying, and it interested her. She waited to hear more. "Now, you, Ellie May, it's time you was finding yourself a man. All my other children has got married. It's your time next. It was your time a long while ago, 'way before Pearl and Dude got married, but I make allowances for you on account of your face. I know it's harder for you to mate up than it is for anybody else, but in this country everybody has got to get mated up. You ought to go out and find yourself a man to marry right away, and not wait no longer. It might be too late pretty soon, and you don't want that to happen. It ain't going to get you nowhere fooling around with Lov like you was doing, because you can't get him that way. He's already married. It's the unmarried men you has got to get. There's a fine lot of boys running that sawmill over at Big Creek¹⁵. You can walk over that way some day and make them take notice of you. It ain't hard to do. Women know how to make men take notice of them, and you're old enough to know all about it at your age. Them boys at the sawmill down there at Big-Creek ought to take a liking¹⁶ to you in spite of the way you look in the face. When a man looks at you from behind, he ought to want to mate up with you right there and then. That's what I heard Lov say one time, and he ought to know, because he's mated up now. Just don't show your face too much, and that won't stop the boys from getting after you." When Jeeter looked at Ellie May again, she was crying. It was about the first time he had even seen her cry since she was a baby. He did not know what to do about it, nor to say about it, because he had never before had the occasion to try to calm a crying woman. Ada never cried. She never did anything. Before he could ask her what the matter was, she had run off into the old cotton field; she ran towards the woods behind the house, jumping through the brown broom-sedge like a frightened rabbit. "Now, I never seen the likes of that before," Jeeter said, "I wonder what it was that I could have said that made her carry-on like that?"

1 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

2 groan   

vi./n.呻吟，抱怨；(发出)呻吟般的声音

参考例句：

• The wounded man uttered a groan.那个受伤的人发出呻吟。
• The people groan under the burden of taxes.人民在重税下痛苦呻吟。

3 turnips   

芜青( turnip的名词复数 )； 芜菁块根； 芜菁甘蓝块根； 怀表

参考例句：

• Well, I like turnips, tomatoes, eggplants, cauliflowers, onions and carrots. 噢，我喜欢大萝卜、西红柿、茄子、菜花、洋葱和胡萝卜。 来自魔法英语-口语突破（高中）
• This is turnip soup, made from real turnips. 这是大头菜汤，用真正的大头菜做的。

4 tempted   

v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词）

参考例句：

• I was sorely tempted to complain, but I didn't. 我极想发牢骚，但还是没开口。
• I was tempted by the dessert menu. 甜食菜单馋得我垂涎欲滴。

5 plow   

n.犁，耕地，犁过的地；v.犁，费力地前进[英]plough

参考例句：

• At this time of the year farmers plow their fields.每年这个时候农民们都在耕地。
• We will plow the field soon after the last frost.最后一场霜过后，我们将马上耕田。

6 doorway   

n.门口，(喻)入门；门路，途径

参考例句：

• They huddled in the shop doorway to shelter from the rain.他们挤在商店门口躲雨。
• Mary suddenly appeared in the doorway.玛丽突然出现在门口。

7 automobile   

n.汽车，机动车

参考例句：

• He is repairing the brake lever of an automobile.他正在修理汽车的刹车杆。
• The automobile slowed down to go around the curves in the road.汽车在路上转弯时放慢了速度。

8 hood   

n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖

参考例句：

• She is wearing a red cloak with a hood.她穿着一件红色带兜帽的披风。
• The car hood was dented in.汽车的发动机罩已凹了进去。

9 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

10 thoroughly   

adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地

参考例句：

• The soil must be thoroughly turned over before planting.一定要先把土地深翻一遍再下种。
• The soldiers have been thoroughly instructed in the care of their weapons.士兵们都系统地接受过保护武器的训练。

11 apron   

n.围裙；工作裙

参考例句：

• We were waited on by a pretty girl in a pink apron.招待我们的是一位穿粉红色围裙的漂亮姑娘。
• She stitched a pocket on the new apron.她在新围裙上缝上一只口袋。

12 mattress   

n.床垫，床褥

参考例句：

• The straw mattress needs to be aired.草垫子该晾一晾了。
• The new mattress I bought sags in the middle.我买的新床垫中间陷了下去。

13 disturbance   

n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调

参考例句：

• He is suffering an emotional disturbance.他的情绪受到了困扰。
• You can work in here without any disturbance.在这儿你可不受任何干扰地工作。

14 gal   

n.姑娘，少女

参考例句：

• We decided to go with the gal from Merrill.我们决定和那个从梅里尔来的女孩合作。
• What's the name of the gal? 这个妞叫什么？

15 creek   

n.小溪，小河，小湾

参考例句：

• He sprang through the creek.他跳过小河。
• People sunbathe in the nude on the rocks above the creek.人们在露出小溪的岩石上裸体晒日光浴。

16 liking   

n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢

参考例句：

• The word palate also means taste or liking.Palate这个词也有“口味”或“嗜好”的意思。
• I must admit I have no liking for exaggeration.我必须承认我不喜欢夸大其词。