The rolling brilliant blue and yellow balls, the stiff white wickets, the dark sweet grass lay beyond the fence, and a large man in a white shirt, his coat on the grass, was kneeling, squinting along the handle of his mallet, while a girl in white slippers, puffs of rabbity fuzz at the toes and heels, in a gauzy dress as green as the grass was, as cool, turned very slowly about and swung her mallet in a slow circle; and Mrs. Kermit Hazen was there too, her feet well spaced, leaning forward a little and using her mallet like a cane, speaking rapidly to the man as he sighted until brushing his knees, he straightened up and pointed the grass-stained nose of his mallet at her, making her teeter with laughter; then, taking his stroke, the beautiful bright ball rolled down a gentle slope through the wicket and struck the yellow with a resonant clack. There was also a ferret-faced boy in a black suit and white collar who kept clearing his throat and spitting and who was supposed to be playing though he didn't know how but only rubbed his stomach and complained of an ache.
Futile…Oh my deliberately driven heels clattered on the shale and I held the Bible like a black stone tightly to my chest, pressing the buttons of my coat against me, and I said is this a Sunday thing and does the service come so easy off that you can laugh and shout within the hearing of the steeple? His heart replied to the pressure of the buttons, thundering. The congregation had come by the riverside, going home, while Omensetter was throwing sticks for the dog, shattering images in the water, when a sudden gust blew the ragged straw he always wore on Sunday into the Ohio where the current swept it quickly out of reach. It was studded with fish hooks and sat on the crown of his head like an untidy nest. As if it were a stick, his yellow dog pursued it. There was consequently great excitement and the betting and the bowling of the laughter rose to Furber with such a ring of vulgar, brazen joy that he rushed in anger from his garden, as pale-eyed and black as he could make himself, and flew down among them to stalk stiff-legged like a jackdaw, clacking futilely.
Initially, between the trees, he caught sight of whirling, jumping bodies. Heya-heya-heya. Someone climbing. Rocks pitched after a board; and on the river, tilting patches of reflection. Heya-fulla-heya-heya. Boys were sliding down the bank on their buttocks, roughing the scaly sand. They sailed a can lid on the water where at first it turned, floating, then sank, burning like a mirror. Hiyah-smilah. Hee-mee? Coltch. Skirts rose slowly, slowly subsided. A parasol flew open with a snap. Or-rawk. Gah. Houf. Half buried in the shingle, a deep red brick was then awash. Yo-yo giggy. Teetoo. Sheek? Nam! Lissa-lissa. A willow leaned out, trailing its leaves in the water. Someone was biding under the canopy. A stream of sand poured down the Cate girl's back. Though she wriggled suggestively, hand to her mouth, she had no points to her chest, and Furber decided she still had a glabrous cleft. Ze-e-e-p. A ribbon went up, revolving, and fell over a branch. Sweeping the beach with a broom of leaves was a flimsy little girl in pale green organdy frock, very stiff and frilly, very city. He couldn't place her. Whar? Bally. Karck! karck! karck! Some were crying for the hat; some were shouting for the river; others favored the dog. But no one was really prepared to bet against Omensetter. Furber knew they were pretending that.
The current caught the hat, spinning it round and round on its crown. The dog, his nose cresting the water, swam faster, and the crowd's excitement grew. Children ran frantically about. The women tried to restrain them and restrain their husbands who were slapping their knees, waving their own hats, and calling out encouragement to hat, dog, and river. Arthur was clearly gaining and there was cheering for him. Omensetter smiled. He had the wide moist mouth he bragged his son would have. The hat leaped ahead then, finding its place in the blood of the river. Arthur lunged, and the hat bobbed. There was more cheering. The fever was rising. The hat sped away, a speck in the plaster light. Omensetter yelled come back above the shouting and his girls yelled too, come back, come back. His wife sat placidly, her hands folded on her belly.
This is the church. This is the steeple. Look inside and see all the people.
The testaments against his heart, he kept a firm grip on himself. Trailing kerchiefs, violet and green, pale hands like iris out of sleeves, the young girls were turning. That night he would dream of maidenly garments. He smelled sachets of lavender. People began shading their eyes and leaning forward. Omensetter was yelling come back. Arr-thurrl His brick-red neck was netted with thin lines. Piercingly, his daughters yelled come back, severing their words. Their bare feet were clenching pebbles and water ran down their legs. People shouted kum-baack! heyheyhey kum-baack! Children ceased running and scuffling. A few took hold of their mothers' hands. One of the Hatstat boys was standing on his head and his brothers were clapping. Kangaroo, Furber thought. Kangaroo, he almost shouted. Why in the world should I want to do that? Yazebo heenie, yazebo! The dog was tired when he turned. He was deeper in the water and his nose dipped once or twice. Higher on the bank, Furber saw the hat go on. He felt it spinning on its crown, the hooks in its band hanging down in the water to the nose and teeth of fishes. The dog had failed, and the hat that Furber had so often seen and hated, Sundays, on that thick unwholesome head was finally gone. He regretted that he had not flipped it from those popping eyes himself, and sailed it off. Now he felt no elation for what the wind had done. The dog bobbed and thrashed. If Omensetter swam for the dog, would he take off his trousers? Lord save us from that. Light streamed from the water and he passed his hand wearily over his eyes. The river was a streak of red on his lids. A jay was calling. He devoutly hoped the dog would drown.
It was a mistake to have come here. The women had red hands and peasant bodies — legs as thick as trees. Not that it mattered. He'd forsaken all that. Furber stirred, deliberately and painfully kicking his ankles. The book was uncomfortable. Not nearly wide enough, it was biting his thighs. He slid to the bench and immediately felt the damp through his trousers. The Cate girl, for instance, or May Cobb. What would happen to them? They'd grow dugs and hair like any woman. May Cobb already had. Blond doubtless, downy, curling under, perhaps a hint of red, of reddish… it was one of the laws of God. They'd carry their new mouths about with them for a few months — always moist, a bit inflamed. The farm boys would finger their breasts with less skill, certainly, than they milked the cows, preferring the unbuttoned flies of their friends. Their thick stubby fingers were like chewed on school pencils, rows of dents like rings around them, the paint broken and scaling, yellow mostly, why was that?… they had dirty, bitten, discolored nails; their hands were rough already; they had stupid hands; they had stumbling, bad-hearted hands; clumsily pawing hands, clumsily unhooking hands, poking, pulling, parting, jerking, why?. to insert a cold wet nose? ah, the dog with damp fur! say, chuck chuck Charlie, a smart slap on the butt and bottom's up old girl, that's love… mmmn pet the love dog, Dickie, nnnm? Eeee, goody geedge! Then to marry and settle down. How fares the thumb, boy? well? Aye, merry, 'tis the sign of the penis. With the women, look you, observe the ear. The parts appear and come together. So obesity and malice. So grumbling and nagging. So gossip, envy, spite, and avarice. Slowly settling into. So feminine weakness. Heartless piety. Savage morals. They come together. No more goody geedge. Ruthless, lifelong revenge. Zrr. Grease in a cold pan. Stay off from gingerly lobed and delicately whorled ones. Thus appear the parts. Mind your uncle, boy, who knows. And the men then. Lewd speech and slovenly habits. And the peasant's suspicion, his cruelty and rancor, his anger, drunkenness, pig-headed ignorance and bestiality. Inevitable they should be parts. Hoolyhoohoo. All in the normal course of nature. And they were saying we had evolved. What did it mean? But, he said in a voice that was clearly audible, I protest this world of unilluminated cocks. He caught the sense of his own words — so absurd — and his body began to shake — half in laughter, half in despair.