No More Learning

”
“Would Miss Mayella talk to you? ” “Yes sir, she talked to me. ”
As Tom Robinson gave his testimony, it came to me that Mayella Ewell must have been the loneliest person in the world. She was even lonelier than Boo Radley, who had not been out of the house in twenty-five years. When Atticus asked had she any friends, she seemed not to know what he meant, then she thought he was making fun of her. She was as sad, I thought, as what Jem called a mixed child: white people wouldn’t have anything to do with her because she lived among pigs; Negroes wouldn’t have anything to do with her because she was white. She couldn’t live like Mr. Dolphus Raymond, who preferred the company of Negroes, because she didn’t own a riverbank and she wasn’t from a fine old family. Nobody said, “That’s just their way,” about the Ewells. Maycomb gave them Christmas baskets, welfare money, and the back of its hand. Tom Robinson was probably the only person who was ever decent to her. But she said he took advantage of her, and when she stood up she looked at him as if he were dirt beneath her feet.
“Did you ever,” Atticus interrupted my meditations, “at any time, go on the Ewell property—did you ever set foot on the Ewell property without an express invitation from one of them? ”
“No suh, Mr. Finch, I never did. I wouldn’t do that, suh. ”
Atticus sometimes said that one way to tell whether a witness was lying or telling the truth was to listen rather than watch: I applied his test—Tom denied it three
times in one breath, but quietly, with no hint of whining in his voice, and I found myself believing him in spite of his protesting too much. He seemed to be a respectable Negro, and a respectable Negro would never go up into somebody’s yard of his own volition.
“Tom, what happened to you on the evening of November twenty-first of last year? ”
Below us, the spectators drew a collective breath and leaned forward. Behind us, the Negroes did the same.
Tom was a black-velvet Negro, not shiny, but soft black velvet. The whites of his eyes shone in his face, and when he spoke we saw flashes of his teeth. If he had been whole, he would have been a fine specimen of a man.
“Mr. Finch,” he said, “I was goin‘ home as usual that evenin’, an‘ when I passed the Ewell place Miss Mayella were on the porch, like she said she were. It seemed real quiet like, an’ I didn’t quite know why. I was studyin‘ why, just passin’ by, when she says for me to come there and help her a minute. Well, I went inside the fence an‘ looked around for some kindlin’ to work on, but I didn’t see none, and she says, ‘Naw, I got somethin’ for you to do in the house. Th‘ old door’s off its hinges an’ fall’s comin‘ on pretty fast. ’ I said you got a screwdriver, Miss Mayella? She said she sho‘ had. Well, I went up the steps an’ she motioned me to come inside, and I went in the front room an‘ looked at the door. I said Miss Mayella, this door look all right. I pulled it back’n forth and those hinges was all right. Then she shet the door in my face. Mr. Finch, I was wonderin’ why it was so quiet like, an‘ it come to me that there weren’t a chile on the place, not a one of ’em, and I said Miss Mayella, where the chillun? ”
Tom’s black velvet skin had begun to shine, and he ran his hand over his face.
“I say where the chillun? ” he continued, “an‘ she says—she was laughin’, sort of —she says they all gone to town to get ice creams. She says, ‘took me a slap year to save seb’m nickels, but I done it. They all gone to town. ’”
Tom’s discomfort was not from the humidity. “What did you say then, Tom? ” asked Atticus.
“I said somethin‘ like, why Miss Mayella, that’s right smart o’you to treat ’em. An‘ she said, ’You think so? ‘ I don’t think she understood what I was thinkin’—I
meant it was smart of her to save like that, an‘ nice of her to treat em. ” “I understand you, Tom. Go on,” said Atticus.
“Well, I said I best be goin‘, I couldn’t do nothin’ for her, an‘ she says oh yes I could, an’ I ask her what, and she says to just step on that chair yonder an‘ git that box down from on top of the chiffarobe. ”
“Not the same chiffarobe you busted up? ” asked Atticus.
The witness smiled. “Naw suh, another one. Most as tall as the room. So I done what she told me, an‘ I was just reachin’ when the next thing I knows she—she’d grabbed me round the legs, grabbed me round th‘ legs, Mr. Finch. She scared me so bad I hopped down an’ turned the chair over—that was the only thing, only furniture, ‘sturbed in that room, Mr. Finch, when I left it. I swear ’fore God. ”
“What happened after you turned the chair over? ”
Tom Robinson had come to a dead stop. He glanced at Atticus, then at the jury, then at Mr. Underwood sitting across the room.
“Tom, you’re sworn to tell the whole truth. Will you tell it? ”
Tom ran his hand nervously over his mouth.
“What happened after that? ”
“Answer the question,” said Judge Taylor. One-third of his cigar had vanished.
“Mr. Finch, I got down offa that chair an‘ turned around an’ she sorta jumped on me. ”
“Jumped on you? Violently? ”
“No suh, she—she hugged me. She hugged me round the waist. ”
This time Judge Taylor’s gavel came down with a bang, and as it did the overhead lights went on in the courtroom. Darkness had not come, but the afternoon sun had left the windows. Judge Taylor quickly restored order.
“Then what did she do? ”
The witness swallowed hard. “She reached up an‘ kissed me ’side of th‘ face. She says she never kissed a grown man before an’ she might as well kiss a nigger. She says what her papa do to her don’t count. She says, ‘Kiss me back, nigger. ’ I say Miss Mayella lemme outa here an‘ tried to run but she got her back to the door
an’ I’da had to push her. I didn’t wanta harm her, Mr. Finch, an‘ I say lemme pass, but just when I say it Mr. Ewell yonder hollered through th’ window. ”
“What did he say? ”
Tom Robinson swallowed again, and his eyes widened. “Somethin‘ not fittin’ to say—not fittin‘ for these folks’n chillun to hear—”
“What did he say, Tom? You must tell the jury what he said. ”
Tom Robinson shut his eyes tight. “He says you goddamn whore, I’ll kill ya. ”
“Then what happened? ”
“Mr. Finch, I was runnin‘ so fast I didn’t know what happened. ”
“Tom, did you rape Mayella Ewell? ”
“I did not, suh. ”
“Did you harm her in any way? ”
“I did not, suh. ”
“Did you resist her advances? ”
“Mr. Finch, I tried. I tried to ‘thout bein’ ugly to her. I didn’t wanta be ugly, I didn’t wanta push her or nothin‘. ”
It occurred to me that in their own way, Tom Robinson’s manners were as good as Atticus’s. Until my father explained it to me later, I did not understand the subtlety of Tom’s predicament: he would not have dared strike a white woman under any circumstances and expect to live long, so he took the first opportunity to run—a sure sign of guilt.
“Tom, go back once more to Mr. Ewell,” said Atticus. “Did he say anything to you? ”
“Not anything, suh. He mighta said somethin‘, but I weren’t there—”
“That’ll do,” Atticus cut in sharply. “What you did hear, who was he talking to? ” “Mr. Finch, he were talkin‘ and lookin’ at Miss Mayella. ”
“Then you ran? ”
“I sho‘ did, suh. ”
“Why did you run? ”
“I was scared, suh. ”
“Why were you scared? ”
“Mr. Finch, if you was a nigger like me, you’d be scared, too. ”
Atticus sat down. Mr. Gilmer was making his way to the witness stand, but before he got there Mr. Link Deas rose from the audience and announced:
“I just want the whole lot of you to know one thing right now. That boy’s worked for me eight years an‘ I ain’t had a speck o’trouble outa him. Not a speck. ”
“Shut your mouth, sir! ” Judge Taylor was wide awake and roaring. He was also pink in the face. His speech was miraculously unimpaired by his cigar. “Link Deas,” he yelled, “if you have anything you want to say you can say it under oath and at the proper time, but until then you get out of this room, you hear me? Get out of this room, sir, you hear me? I’ll be damned if I’ll listen to this case again! ”
Judge Taylor looked daggers at Atticus, as if daring him to speak, but Atticus had ducked his head and was laughing into his lap. I remembered something he had said about Judge Taylor’s ex cathedra remarks sometimes exceeding his duty, but that few lawyers ever did anything about them. I looked at Jem, but Jem shook his head. “It ain’t like one of the jurymen got up and started talking,” he said. “I think it’d be different then. Mr. Link was just disturbin‘ the peace or something. ”
Judge Taylor told the reporter to expunge anything he happened to have written down after Mr. Finch if you were a nigger like me you’d be scared too, and told the jury to disregard the interruption. He looked suspiciously down the middle aisle and waited, I suppose, for Mr. Link Deas to effect total departure. Then he said, “Go ahead, Mr. Gilmer. ”
“You were given thirty days once for disorderly conduct, Robinson? ” asked Mr. Gilmer.
“Yes suh. ”
“What’d the nigger look like when you got through with him? ” “He beat me, Mr. Gilmer. ”
“Yes, but you were convicted, weren’t you? ”
Atticus raised his head. “It was a misdemeanor and it’s in the record, Judge. ” I thought he sounded tired.
“Witness’ll answer, though,” said Judge Taylor, just as wearily. “Yes suh, I got thirty days. ”
I knew that Mr. Gilmer would sincerely tell the jury that anyone who was convicted of disorderly conduct could easily have had it in his heart to take advantage of Mayella Ewell, that was the only reason he cared. Reasons like that helped.
“Robinson, you’re pretty good at busting up chiffarobes and kindling with one hand, aren’t you? ”
“Yes, suh, I reckon so. ”
“Strong enough to choke the breath out of a woman and sling her to the floor? ”
“I never done that, suh. ”
“But you are strong enough to? ”
“I reckon so, suh. ”
“Had your eye on her a long time, hadn’t you, boy? ”
“No suh, I never looked at her. ”
“Then you were mighty polite to do all that chopping and hauling for her, weren’t you, boy? ”
“I was just tryin‘ to help her out, suh. ”
“That was mighty generous of you, you had chores at home after your regular work, didn’t you? ”
“Yes suh. ”
“Why didn’t you do them instead of Miss Ewell’s? ”
“I done ‘em both, suh. ”
“You must have been pretty busy. Why? ”
“Why what, suh? ”
“Why were you so anxious to do that woman’s chores? ”
Tom Robinson hesitated, searching for an answer. “Looked like she didn’t have nobody to help her, like I says—”
“With Mr. Ewell and seven children on the place, boy? ”
“Well, I says it looked like they never help her none—”
“You did all this chopping and work from sheer goodness, boy? ”
“Tried to help her, I says. ”
Mr. Gilmer smiled grimly at the jury. “You’re a mighty good fellow, it seems— did all this for not one penny? ”
“Yes, suh. I felt right sorry for her, she seemed to try more’n the rest of ‘em—”
“You felt sorry for her, you felt sorry for he? ” Mr. Gilmer seemed ready to rise to the ceiling.
The witness realized his mistake and shifted uncomfortably in the chair. But the damage was done.
Below us, nobody liked Tom Robinson’s answer. Mr. Gilmer paused a long time to let it sink in.
“Now you went by the house as usual, last November twenty-first,” he said, “and she asked you to come in and bust up a chiffarobe? ”
“No suh. ”
“Do you deny that you went by the house? ”
“No suh—she said she had somethin‘ for me to do inside the house—”
“She says she asked you to bust up a chiffarobe, is that right? ”
“No suh, it ain’t. ”
“Then you say she’s lying, boy? ”
Atticus was on his feet, but Tom Robinson didn’t need him. “I don’t say she’s lyin‘, Mr. Gilmer, I say she’s mistaken in her mind. ”
To the next ten questions, as Mr. Gilmer reviewed Mayella’s version of events, the witness’s steady answer was that she was mistaken in her mind.
“Didn’t Mr. Ewell run you off the place, boy? ”
“No suh, I don’t think he did. ”
“Don’t think, what do you mean? ”
“I mean I didn’t stay long enough for him to run me off. ” “You’re very candid about this, why did you run so fast? ” “I says I was scared, suh. ”
“If you had a clear conscience, why were you scared? ”
“Like I says before, it weren’t safe for any nigger to be in a—fix like that. ”
“But you weren’t in a fix—you testified that you were resisting Miss Ewell. Were you so scared that she’d hurt you, you ran, a big buck like you? ”
“No suh, I’s scared I’d be in court, just like I am now. ”
“Scared of arrest, scared you’d have to face up to what you did? ” “No suh, scared I’d hafta face up to what I didn’t do. ”
“Are you being impudent to me, boy? ”
“No suh, I didn’t go to be. ”
This was as much as I heard of Mr. Gilmer’s cross-examination, because Jem made me take Dill out. For some reason Dill had started crying and couldn’t stop; quietly at first, then his sobs were heard by several people in the balcony. Jem said if I didn’t go with him he’d make me, and Reverend Sykes said I’d better go, so I went. Dill had seemed to be all right that day, nothing wrong with him, but I guessed he hadn’t fully recovered from running away.
“Ain’t you feeling good? ” I asked, when we reached the bottom of the stairs.
Dill tried to pull himself together as we ran down the south steps. Mr. Link Deas was a lonely figure on the top step. “Anything happenin‘, Scout? ” he asked as we went by. “No sir,” I answered over my shoulder. “Dill here, he’s sick. ”
“Come on out under the trees,” I said. “Heat got you, I expect. ” We chose the fattest live oak and we sat under it.
“It was just him I couldn’t stand,” Dill said.
“Who, Tom? ”
“That old Mr. Gilmer doin‘ him thataway, talking so hateful to him—”
“Dill, that’s his job. Why, if we didn’t have prosecutors—well, we couldn’t have defense attorneys, I reckon. ”
Dill exhaled patiently. “I know all that, Scout. It was the way he said it made me sick, plain sick. ”
“He’s supposed to act that way, Dill, he was cross—”
“He didn’t act that way when—” “Dill, those were his own witnesses. ”
“Well, Mr. Finch didn’t act that way to Mayella and old man Ewell when he cross- examined them. The way that man called him ‘boy’ all the time an‘ sneered at him, an’ looked around at the jury every time he answered—”
“Well, Dill, after all he’s just a Negro. ”
“I don’t care one speck. It ain’t right, somehow it ain’t right to do ‘em that way. Hasn’t anybody got any business talkin’ like that—it just makes me sick. ”
“That’s just Mr. Gilmer’s way, Dill, he does ‘em all that way. You’ve never seen him get good’n down on one yet. Why, when—well, today Mr. Gilmer seemed to me like he wasn’t half trying. They do ’em all that way, most lawyers, I mean. ”
“Mr. Finch doesn’t. ”
“He’s not an example, Dill, he’s—” I was trying to grope in my memory for a sharp phrase of Miss Maudie Atkinson’s. I had it: “He’s the same in the courtroom as he is on the public streets. ”
“That’s not what I mean,” said Dill.
“I know what you mean, boy,” said a voice behind us. We thought it came from the tree-trunk, but it belonged to Mr. Dolphus Raymond. He peered around the trunk at us. “You aren’t thin-hided, it just makes you sick, doesn’t it? ”
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Chapter 20
“Come on round here, son, I got something that’ll settle your stomach. ”
As Mr. Dolphus Raymond was an evil man I accepted his invitation reluctantly, but I followed Dill. Somehow, I didn’t think Atticus would like it if we became friendly with Mr. Raymond, and I knew Aunt Alexandra wouldn’t.
“Here,” he said, offering Dill his paper sack with straws in it. “Take a good sip,
it’ll quieten you. ”
Dill sucked on the straws, smiled, and pulled at length.
“Hee hee,” said Mr. Raymond, evidently taking delight in corrupting a child.
“Dill, you watch out, now,” I warned.
Dill released the straws and grinned. “Scout, it’s nothing but Coca-Cola. ”
Mr. Raymond sat up against the tree-trunk. He had been lying on the grass. “You little folks won’t tell on me now, will you? It’d ruin my reputation if you did. ”
“You mean all you drink in that sack’s Coca-Cola? Just plain Coca-Cola? ”
“Yes ma’am,” Mr. Raymond nodded. I liked his smell: it was of leather, horses, cottonseed. He wore the only English riding boots I had ever seen. “That’s all I drink, most of the time. ”
“Then you just pretend you’re half—? I beg your pardon, sir,” I caught myself. “I didn’t mean to be—”
Mr. Raymond chuckled, not at all offended, and I tried to frame a discreet question: “Why do you do like you do? ”
“Wh—oh yes, you mean why do I pretend? Well, it’s very simple,” he said. “Some folks don’t—like the way I live. Now I could say the hell with ‘em, I don’t care if they don’t like it. I do say I don’t care if they don’t like it, right enough— but I don’t say the hell with ’em, see? ”
Dill and I said, “No sir. ”
“I try to give ‘em a reason, you see. It helps folks if they can latch onto a reason. When I come to town, which is seldom, if I weave a little and drink out of this sack, folks can say Dolphus Raymond’s in the clutches of whiskey—that’s why he won’t change his ways. He can’t help himself, that’s why he lives the way he does. ”
“That ain’t honest, Mr. Raymond, making yourself out badder’n you are already —”
“It ain’t honest but it’s mighty helpful to folks. Secretly, Miss Finch, I’m not much of a drinker, but you see they could never, never understand that I live like I do because that’s the way I want to live. ”
I had a feeling that I shouldn’t be here listening to this sinful man who had mixed children and didn’t care who knew it, but he was fascinating. I had never encountered a being who deliberately perpetrated fraud against himself. But why had he entrusted us with his deepest secret? I asked him why.
“Because you’re children and you can understand it,” he said, “and because I heard that one—”
He jerked his head at Dill: “Things haven’t caught up with that one’s instinct yet. Let him get a little older and he won’t get sick and cry. Maybe things’ll strike him as being—not quite right, say, but he won’t cry, not when he gets a few years on him. ”
“Cry about what, Mr. Raymond? ” Dill’s maleness was beginning to assert itself.
“Cry about the simple hell people give other people—without even thinking. Cry about the hell white people give colored folks, without even stopping to think that they’re people, too. ”
“Atticus says cheatin‘ a colored man is ten times worse than cheatin’ a white man,” I muttered. “Says it’s the worst thing you can do. ”
Mr. Raymond said, “I don’t reckon it’s—Miss Jean Louise, you don’t know your pa’s not a run-of-the-mill man, it’ll take a few years for that to sink in—you haven’t seen enough of the world yet. You haven’t even seen this town, but all you gotta do is step back inside the courthouse. ”
Which reminded me that we were missing nearly all of Mr. Gilmer’s cross- examination. I looked at the sun, and it was dropping fast behind the store-tops on the west side of the square. Between two fires, I could not decide which I wanted to jump into: Mr. Raymond or the 5th Judicial Circuit Court. “C’mon, Dill,” I said. “You all right, now? ”
“Yeah. Glad t’ve metcha, Mr. Raymond, and thanks for the drink, it was mighty settlin‘. ”
We raced back to the courthouse, up the steps, up two flights of stairs, and edged our way along the balcony rail. Reverend Sykes had saved our seats.
The courtroom was still, and again I wondered where the babies were. Judge Taylor’s cigar was a brown speck in the center of his mouth; Mr. Gilmer was
writing on one of the yellow pads on his table, trying to outdo the court reporter, whose hand was jerking rapidly. “Shoot,” I muttered, “we missed it. ”
Atticus was halfway through his speech to the jury. He had evidently pulled some papers from his briefcase that rested beside his chair, because they were on his table. Tom Robinson was toying with them.
“. . . absence of any corroborative evidence, this man was indicted on a capital charge and is now on trial for his life. . . ”
I punched Jem. “How long’s he been at it? ”
“He’s just gone over the evidence,” Jem whispered, “and we’re gonna win, Scout. I don’t see how we can’t. He’s been at it ‘bout five minutes. He made it as plain and easy as—well, as I’da explained it to you. You could’ve understood it, even. ”
“Did Mr. Gilmer—? ”
“Sh-h. Nothing new, just the usual. Hush now. ”
We looked down again. Atticus was speaking easily, with the kind of detachment he used when he dictated a letter. He walked slowly up and down in front of the jury, and the jury seemed to be attentive: their heads were up, and they followed Atticus’s route with what seemed to be appreciation. I guess it was because Atticus wasn’t a thunderer.
Atticus paused, then he did something he didn’t ordinarily do. He unhitched his watch and chain and placed them on the table, saying, “With the court’s permission—”
Judge Taylor nodded, and then Atticus did something I never saw him do before or since, in public or in private: he unbuttoned his vest, unbuttoned his collar, loosened his tie, and took off his coat. He never loosened a scrap of his clothing until he undressed at bedtime, and to Jem and me, this was the equivalent of him standing before us stark naked. We exchanged horrified glances.
Atticus put his hands in his pockets, and as he returned to the jury, I saw his gold collar button and the tips of his pen and pencil winking in the light.
“Gentlemen,” he said. Jem and I again looked at each other: Atticus might have said, “Scout. ” His voice had lost its aridity, its detachment, and he was talking to the jury as if they were folks on the post office corner.
“Gentlemen,” he was saying, “I shall be brief, but I would like to use my remaining time with you to remind you that this case is not a difficult one, it requires no minute sifting of complicated facts, but it does require you to be sure beyond all reasonable doubt as to the guilt of the defendant. To begin with, this case should never have come to trial. This case is as simple as black and white.
“The state has not produced one iota of medical evidence to the effect that the crime Tom Robinson is charged with ever took place. It has relied instead upon the testimony of two witnesses whose evidence has not only been called into serious question on cross-examination, but has been flatly contradicted by the defendant. The defendant is not guilty, but somebody in this courtroom is.
“I have nothing but pity in my heart for the chief witness for the state, but my pity does not extend so far as to her putting a man’s life at stake, which she has done in an effort to get rid of her own guilt.
“I say guilt, gentlemen, because it was guilt that motivated her. She has committed no crime, she has merely broken a rigid and time-honored code of our society, a code so severe that whoever breaks it is hounded from our midst as unfit to live with. She is the victim of cruel poverty and ignorance, but I cannot pity her: she is white. She knew full well the enormity of her offense, but because her desires were stronger than the code she was breaking, she persisted in breaking it. She persisted, and her subsequent reaction is something that all of us have known at one time or another. She did something every child has done—she tried to put the evidence of her offense away from her. But in this case she was no child hiding stolen contraband: she struck out at her victim—of necessity she must put him away from her—he must be removed from her presence, from this world. She must destroy the evidence of her offense.