214 WILLIAM FAULKNER
I'm trying. I'm really trying. Maybe it wouldn't be so hard if I could
just understand why they dont stinkwhat reason they would have for not
stinking. . . .
(she stops; it is as if she had heard a sound presaging Gow-
an's return, or perhaps simply knew by instinct or from
knowledge of her own house that he had had time to heat a
cup of milk. Then continues, rapid and quiet)
There was no man there. You see? I told you, warned you, that you would
get nothing from me. Oh, I know; you could have put me on the stand at
any time, under oath; of course, your jury wouldn't have liked it-that
wanton crucifixion of a bereaved mamma, but what's that in the balance
with justice? I dont know why you didn't. Or maybe you still intend
to-provided you can catch us before we cross the Tennessee line tonight.
(quick, tense, bard)
All right. I'm sorry. I know better. So maybe it's just my own stinking
after all that I find impossible to doubt.
(the pantry door slaps again; they both hear it)
Because I'm not even going to take Gowan with me when I say good-bye and
go up stairs.-And who knows-
She stops. Gowan enters, carrying a small tray bearing a glass of milk, a
salt-shaker and a napkin, and comes to the table.
GOWAN
What are you talking about now?
TEMPLE
Nothing. I was telling Uncle Gavin that he had something of Virginia or
some sort of gentleman in him too that he must have inherited from you
through your grandfather, and that I'm going up to give Bucky his bath
and supper.
(she touches the glass for heat, then takes it up, to Gowan)
Thank you, dear.
GOWAN
Right, dear.
REQUIEM FOR A NUN 215
(to Stevens)
You see? Not just a napkin; the right napkin. That's how I'm trained.
(he stops suddenly, noticin- Trmple, who has done not' inq annarently:
just standing ttie-e holding the milk. But he see-is to ki.low what
is going on: to her) What's this for?
TEMPLE
I don't know.
He moves; they kiss, not Iona but not a peck either-, dcfinitely a kiss
between a man and a woman. Then, carrying the milk, Temple crosses toward
the hall door.
(to Stevens)
Good-bye then until next June. Bucky will send you and Maggie a
postcard.
(she goes on to the dnor, pauses and looks back at Stevens) I may even
be wrong ahout Temple Drake's odor too; if you should hannen to hear
sometbing you haven't heard yet and it's true, I may even ratify it.
Nl~,ybe you can even believe that-if you can believe you are going to
hear anything that you haven't heard yet.
STEVENS
Do you?
TEMPLE
1~,Fter a moment)
Not from me, Uncle Gavin. If s-mcone wants to go to heaven, who am I
to stop them? Good night. Goodbye.
She exits, closes the door. Stevens, very grave, turns back and sets his
highball down on the tray.
GOWAN
Drink up. After all, I've got to eat supper and do some packing too.
How about it?
STEVrNS
About what? The packing, or the drink? What about you? I thought you
were going to have one.
GOWAN
Oh, sure, sure.
(takes up the sm,,ill filled gl-iss) Maybe you had better
go on and leave us to our revenge.
216 WILLIAM FAULKNER
STEVENS
I wish it could comfort you.
GOWAN
I wish to God it could. I wish to God that what I wanted was only
revenge. An eye for an eye-were ever words emptier? Only, you have got
to have lost the eye to know it.
STEVENS
Yet she still has to die.
GOWAN
Why not? Even if she would be any loss-a nigger whore, a drunkard, a
dope-fiend-
STEVENS
-a vagabond, a tramp, hopeless until one day Mr and Mrs Gowan Stevens
out of simple pity and humanity picked her up out of the gutter to
give her one more chance-
(Gowan stands motionless, his hand tightening slowly about
the glass. Stevens watches him)
And then in return for it-
GOWAN
Look, Uncle Gavin. Why dont you go for God's sake home? Or to hell,
or anywhere out of here?
STEVENS
I am, in a minute. Is that why you think-why you would still say she
has to die?
GOWAN
I dont. I had nothing to do with it. I wasn't even the plaintiff. I
didn't even instigate-that's the word, isn't 0-the suit. My only
connection with it was, I happened by chance to be the father of the
child she- Who in hell ever called that a drink?
He dashes the whiskey, glass and all, into the ice bowl, quickly catches
up one of the empty tumblers in one hand and, at the same time, tilts the
whiskey bottle over it, pouring. At first he makes no sound, but at once
it is obvious that he is laughing: laughter which begins normally enough,
but almost immediately it is out of hand, just on hysteria, while he still
pours whiskey into the glass, which in a moment now will overflow, except
that Stevens reaches his hand and grasps the bottle and stops it.
REQUIEM FOR A NUN 217
STEVENS
Stop it. Stop it, now. Here.
He takes the bottle from Gowan, sets it down, takes the tumbler and tilts
part of its contents into the other empty one, leaving at least a
reasonable, a believable, drink, and hands it to Gowan. Gowan takes it,
stopping the crazy laughter, gets hold of himself again.
GOWAN
(holding the glass untasted)
Eight years. Eight years on the wagon-and this is what I got for it:
my child murdered by a dope-fiend nigger whore that wouldn't even run
so that a cop or somebody could have shot her down like the maddog-You
see? Eight years without the drink, and so I got whatever it was I was
buying by not drinking, and now I've got whatever it was I was paying
for and it's paid for and so I can drink again. And now I dont want
the drink. You see? Like whatever it was I was buying I not only
didn't want, but what I was paying for it wasn't worth anything,
wasn't even any loss. So I have a laugh coming. That's triumph. Be-
cause I got a bargain even in what I didn't want. I got a cut rate.
I had two children. I had to pay only one of them to find out it
wasn't really costing me anything- Half price: a child, and a
dope-fiend nigger whore on a public gallows: that's all I had to pay
for immunity.
STEVENS
There's no such thing.
GOWAN
From the past. From my folly. My drunkenness.
My cowardice, if you like
STEVENS
There's no such thing as past either.