No More Learning

“Seb’m,” she said, and I wondered if they were all like the specimen I had seen the first day I started to school.
“You the eldest? The oldest? ”
“Yes. ”
“How long has your mother been dead? ”
“Don’t know—long time. ”
“Did you ever go to school? ”
“Read’n‘write good as Papa yonder. ”
Mayella sounded like a Mr. Jingle in a book I had been reading. “How long did you go to school? ”
“Two year—three year—dunno. ”
Slowly but surely I began to see the pattern of Atticus’s questions: from questions that Mr. Gilmer did not deem sufficiently irrelevant or immaterial to object to, Atticus was quietly building up before the jury a picture of the Ewells’ home life. The jury learned the following things: their relief check was far from enough to feed the family, and there was strong suspicion that Papa drank it up anyway—he sometimes went off in the swamp for days and came home sick; the weather was seldom cold enough to require shoes, but when it was, you could make dandy ones from strips of old tires; the family hauled its water in buckets from a spring that ran out at one end of the dump—they kept the surrounding area clear of trash —and it was everybody for himself as far as keeping clean went: if you wanted to wash you hauled your own water; the younger children had perpetual colds and suffered from chronic ground-itch; there was a lady who came around sometimes and asked Mayella why she didn’t stay in school—she wrote down the answer; with two members of the family reading and writing, there was no need for the rest of them to learn—Papa needed them at home.
“Miss Mayella,” said Atticus, in spite of himself, “a nineteen-year-old girl like
you must have friends. Who are your friends? ” The witness frowned as if puzzled. “Friends? ”
“Yes, don’t you know anyone near your age, or older, or younger? Boys and girls? Just ordinary friends? ”
Mayella’s hostility, which had subsided to grudging neutrality, flared again. “You makin‘ fun o’me agin, Mr. Finch? ”
Atticus let her question answer his
.
“Do you love your father, Miss Mayella? ” was his next.
“Love him, whatcha mean? ”
“I mean, is he good to you, is he easy to get along with? ”
“He does tollable, ‘cept when—”
“Except when? ”
Mayella looked at her father, who was sitting with his chair tipped against the railing. He sat up straight and waited for her to answer.
“Except when nothin‘,” said Mayella. “I said he does tollable. ”
Mr. Ewell leaned back again.
“Except when he’s drinking? ” asked Atticus so gently that Mayella nodded.
“Does he ever go after you? ”
“How you mean? ”
“When he’s—riled, has he ever beaten you? ”
Mayella looked around, down at the court reporter, up at the judge. “Answer the question, Miss Mayella,” said Judge Taylor.
“My paw’s never touched a hair o’my head in my life,” she declared firmly. “He never touched me. ”
Atticus’s glasses had slipped a little, and he pushed them up on his nose. “We’ve had a good visit, Miss Mayella, and now I guess we’d better get to the case. You say you asked Tom Robinson to come chop up a—what was it? ”
“A chiffarobe, a old dresser full of drawers on one side. ”
“Was Tom Robinson well known to you? ”
“Whaddya mean? ”
“I mean did you know who he was, where he lived? ”
Mayella nodded. “I knowed who he was, he passed the house every day. ” “Was this the first time you asked him to come inside the fence? ”
Mayella jumped slightly at the question. Atticus was making his slow pilgrimage to the windows, as he had been doing: he would ask a question, then look out, waiting for an answer. He did not see her involuntary jump, but it seemed to me that he knew she had moved. He turned around and raised his eyebrows. “Was—” he began again.
“Yes it was. ”
“Didn’t you ever ask him to come inside the fence before? ”
She was prepared now. “I did not, I certainly did not. ”
“One did not’s enough,” said Atticus serenely. “You never asked him to do odd jobs for you before? ”
“I mighta,” conceded Mayella. “There was several niggers around. ”
“Can you remember any other occasions? ”
“No. ”
“All right, now to what happened. You said Tom Robinson was behind you in the room when you turned around, that right? ”
“Yes. ”
“You said he ‘got you around the neck cussing and saying dirt’—is that right? ”
“‘t’s right. ”
Atticus’s memory had suddenly become accurate. “You say ‘he caught me and choked me and took advantage of me’—is that right? ”
“That’s what I said. ”
“Do you remember him beating you about the face? ”
The witness hesitated.
“You seem sure enough that he choked you. All this time you were fighting back,
remember? You ‘kicked and hollered as loud as you could. ’ Do you remember him beating you about the face? ”
Mayella was silent. She seemed to be trying to get something clear to herself. I thought for a moment she was doing Mr. Heck Tate’s and my trick of pretending there was a person in front of us. She glanced at Mr. Gilmer.
“It’s an easy question, Miss Mayella, so I’ll try again. Do you remember him beating you about the face? ” Atticus’s voice had lost its comfortableness; he was speaking in his arid, detached professional voice. “Do you remember him beating you about the face? ”
“No, I don’t recollect if he hit me. I mean yes I do, he hit me. ” “Was your last sentence your answer? ”
“Huh? Yes, he hit—I just don’t remember, I just don’t remember. . . it all happened so quick. ”
Judge Taylor looked sternly at Mayella. “Don’t you cry, young woman—” he began, but Atticus said, “Let her cry if she wants to, Judge. We’ve got all the time in the world. ”
Mayella sniffed wrathfully and looked at Atticus. “I’ll answer any question you got—get me up here an‘ mock me, will you? I’ll answer any question you got—”
“That’s fine,” said Atticus. “There’re only a few more. Miss Mayella, not to be tedious, you’ve testified that the defendant hit you, grabbed you around the neck, choked you, and took advantage of you. I want you to be sure you have the right man. Will you identify the man who raped you? ”
“I will, that’s him right yonder. ”
Atticus turned to the defendant. “Tom, stand up. Let Miss Mayella have a good long look at you. Is this the man, Miss Mayella? ”
Tom Robinson’s powerful shoulders rippled under his thin shirt. He rose to his feet and stood with his right hand on the back of his chair. He looked oddly off balance, but it was not from the way he was standing. His left arm was fully twelve inches shorter than his right, and hung dead at his side. It ended in a small shriveled hand, and from as far away as the balcony I could see that it was no use to him.
“Scout,” breathed Jem. “Scout, look! Reverend, he’s crippled! ”
Reverend Sykes leaned across me and whispered to Jem. “He got it caught in a cotton gin, caught it in Mr. Dolphus Raymond’s cotton gin when he was a boy. . . like to bled to death. . . tore all the muscles loose from his bones—”
Atticus said, “Is this the man who raped you? ”
“It most certainly is. ”
Atticus’s next question was one word long. “How? ”
Mayella was raging. “I don’t know how he done it, but he done it—I said it all happened so fast I—”
“Now let’s consider this calmly—” began Atticus, but Mr. Gilmer interrupted with an objection: he was not irrelevant or immaterial, but Atticus was browbeating the witness.
Judge Taylor laughed outright. “Oh sit down, Horace, he’s doing nothing of the sort. If anything, the witness’s browbeating Atticus. ”
Judge Taylor was the only person in the courtroom who laughed. Even the babies were still, and I suddenly wondered if they had been smothered at their mothers’ breasts.
“Now,” said Atticus, “Miss Mayella, you’ve testified that the defendant choked and beat you—you didn’t say that he sneaked up behind you and knocked you cold, but you turned around and there he was—” Atticus was back behind his table, and he emphasized his words by tapping his knuckles on it. “—do you wish to reconsider any of your testimony? ”
“You want me to say something that didn’t happen? ”
“No ma’am, I want you to say something that did happen. Tell us once more, please, what happened? ”
“I told’ja what happened. ”
“You testified that you turned around and there he was. He choked you then? ” “Yes. ”
“Then he released your throat and hit you? ”
“I said he did. ”
“He blacked your left eye with his right fist? ”
“I ducked and it—it glanced, that’s what it did. I ducked and it glanced off. ” Mayella had finally seen the light.
“You’re becoming suddenly clear on this point. A while ago you couldn’t remember too well, could you? ”
“I said he hit me. ”
“All right. He choked you, he hit you, then he raped you, that right? ”
“It most certainly is. ”
“You’re a strong girl, what were you doing all the time, just standing there? ” “I told’ja I hollered’n‘kicked’n’fought—”
Atticus reached up and took off his glasses, turned his good right eye to the witness, and rained questions on her. Judge Taylor said, “One question at a time, Atticus. Give the witness a chance to answer. ”
“All right, why didn’t you run? ”
“I tried. . . ”
“Tried to? What kept you from it? ”
“I—he slung me down. That’s what he did, he slung me down’n got on top of me. ”
“You were screaming all this time? ”
“I certainly was. ”
“Then why didn’t the other children hear you? Where were they? At the dump? ”
“Where were they? ”
No answer.
“Why didn’t your screams make them come running? The dump’s closer than the woods, isn’t it? ”
No answer.
“Or didn’t you scream until you saw your father in the window? You didn’t think to scream until then, did you? ”
No answer.
“Did you scream first at your father instead of at Tom Robinson? Was that it? ” No answer.
“Who beat you up? Tom Robinson or your father? ”
No answer.
“What did your father see in the window, the crime of rape or the best defense to it? Why don’t you tell the truth, child, didn’t Bob Ewell beat you up?
”
When Atticus turned away from Mayella he looked like his stomach hurt, but Mayella’s face was a mixture of terror and fury. Atticus sat down wearily and polished his glasses with his handkerchief.
Suddenly Mayella became articulate. “I got somethin‘ to say,” she said. Atticus raised his head. “Do you want to tell us what happened? ”
But she did not hear the compassion in his invitation. “I got somethin‘ to say an’ then I ain’t gonna say no more. That nigger yonder took advantage of me an‘ if you fine fancy gentlemen don’t wanta do nothin’ about it then you’re all yellow stinkin‘ cowards, stinkin’ cowards, the lot of you. Your fancy airs don’t come to nothin‘—your ma’amin’ and Miss Mayellerin‘ don’t come to nothin’, Mr. Finch —”
Then she burst into real tears. Her shoulders shook with angry sobs. She was as good as her word. She answered no more questions, even when Mr. Gilmer tried to get her back on the track. I guess if she hadn’t been so poor and ignorant, Judge Taylor would have put her under the jail for the contempt she had shown everybody in the courtroom. Somehow, Atticus had hit her hard in a way that was not clear to me, but it gave him no pleasure to do so. He sat with his head down, and I never saw anybody glare at anyone with the hatred Mayella showed when she left the stand and walked by Atticus’s table.
When Mr. Gilmer told Judge Taylor that the state rested, Judge Taylor said, “It’s time we all did. We’ll take ten minutes. ”
Atticus and Mr. Gilmer met in front of the bench and whispered, then they left the courtroom by a door behind the witness stand, which was a signal for us all to stretch. I discovered that I had been sitting on the edge of the long bench, and I was somewhat numb. Jem got up and yawned, Dill did likewise, and Reverend
Sykes wiped his face on his hat. The temperature was an easy ninety, he said.
Mr. Braxton Underwood, who had been sitting quietly in a chair reserved for the Press, soaking up testimony with his sponge of a brain, allowed his bitter eyes to rove over the colored balcony, and they met mine. He gave a snort and looked away.
“Jem,” I said, “Mr. Underwood’s seen us. ”
“That’s okay. He won’t tell Atticus, he’ll just put it on the social side of the Tribune. ” Jem turned back to Dill, explaining, I suppose, the finer points of the trial to him, but I wondered what they were. There had been no lengthy debates between Atticus and Mr. Gilmer on any points; Mr. Gilmer seemed to be prosecuting almost reluctantly; witnesses had been led by the nose as asses are, with few objections. But Atticus had once told us that in Judge Taylor’s court any lawyer who was a strict constructionist on evidence usually wound up receiving strict instructions from the bench. He distilled this for me to mean that Judge Taylor might look lazy and operate in his sleep, but he was seldom reversed, and that was the proof of the pudding. Atticus said he was a good judge.
Presently Judge Taylor returned and climbed into his swivel chair. He took a cigar from his vest pocket and examined it thoughtfully. I punched Dill. Having passed the judge’s inspection, the cigar suffered a vicious bite. “We come down sometimes to watch him,” I explained. “It’s gonna take him the rest of the afternoon, now. You watch. ” Unaware of public scrutiny from above, Judge Taylor disposed of the severed end by propelling it expertly to his lips and saying, “Fhluck! ” He hit a spittoon so squarely we could hear it slosh. “Bet he was hell with a spitball,” murmured Dill.
As a rule, a recess meant a general exodus, but today people weren’t moving. Even the Idlers who had failed to shame younger men from their seats had remained standing along the walls. I guess Mr. Heck Tate had reserved the county toilet for court officials.
Atticus and Mr. Gilmer returned, and Judge Taylor looked at his watch. “It’s gettin‘ on to four,” he said, which was intriguing, as the courthouse clock must have struck the hour at least twice. I had not heard it or felt its vibrations.
“Shall we try to wind up this afternoon? ” asked Judge Taylor. “How ‘bout it,
Atticus? ”
“I think we can,” said Atticus. “How many witnesses you got? ” “One. ”
“Well, call him. ”
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Chapter 19
Thomas Robinson reached around, ran his fingers under his left arm and lifted it. He guided his arm to the Bible and his rubber-like left hand sought contact with the black binding. As he raised his right hand, the useless one slipped off the Bible and hit the clerk’s table. He was trying again when Judge Taylor growled, “That’ll do, Tom. ” Tom took the oath and stepped into the witness chair. Atticus very quickly induced him to tell us:
Tom was twenty-five years of age; he was married with three children; he had been in trouble with the law before: he once received thirty days for disorderly conduct.
“It must have been disorderly,” said Atticus. “What did it consist of? ”
“Got in a fight with another man, he tried to cut me. ”
“Did he succeed? ”
“Yes suh, a little, not enough to hurt. You see, I—” Tom moved his left shoulder. “Yes,” said Atticus. “You were both convicted? ”
“Yes suh, I had to serve ‘cause I couldn’t pay the fine. Other fellow paid his’n. ”
Dill leaned across me and asked Jem what Atticus was doing. Jem said Atticus was showing the jury that Tom had nothing to hide.
“Were you acquainted with Mayella Violet Ewell? ” asked Atticus.
“Yes suh, I had to pass her place goin‘ to and from the field every day. ” “Whose field? ”
“I picks for Mr. Link Deas. ”
“Were you picking cotton in November? ”
“No suh, I works in his yard fall an‘ wintertime. I works pretty steady for him all year round, he’s got a lot of pecan trees’n things. ”
“You say you had to pass the Ewell place to get to and from work. Is there any other way to go? ”
“No suh, none’s I know of. ” “Tom, did she ever speak to you? ”
“Why, yes suh, I’d tip m’hat when I’d go by, and one day she asked me to come inside the fence and bust up a chiffarobe for her. ”
“When did she ask you to chop up the—the chiffarobe? ”
“Mr. Finch, it was way last spring. I remember it because it was choppin‘ time and I had my hoe with me. I said I didn’t have nothin’ but this hoe, but she said she had a hatchet. She give me the hatchet and I broke up the chiffarobe. She said, ‘I reckon I’ll hafta give you a nickel, won’t I? ’ an‘ I said, ’No ma’am, there ain’t no charge. ‘ Then I went home. Mr. Finch, that was way last spring, way over a year ago. ”
“Did you ever go on the place again? ” “Yes suh. ”
“When? ”
“Well, I went lots of times. ”
Judge Taylor instinctively reached for his gavel, but let his hand fall. The murmur below us died without his help.
“Under what circumstances? ”
“Please, suh? ”
“Why did you go inside the fence lots of times? ”
Tom Robinson’s forehead relaxed. “She’d call me in, suh. Seemed like every time
I passed by yonder she’d have some little somethin‘ for me to do—choppin’ kindlin‘, totin’ water for her. She watered them red flowers every day—”
“Were you paid for your services? ”
“No suh, not after she offered me a nickel the first time. I was glad to do it, Mr. Ewell didn’t seem to help her none, and neither did the chillun, and I knowed she didn’t have no nickels to spare. ”
“Where were the other children? ”
“They was always around, all over the place. They’d watch me work, some of ‘em, some of ’em’d set in the window. ”
“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.