Thomas Wolfe - Thomas Wolfe - Of Time and the River, You Can't Go Home Again & Look Homeward, Angel

They were touched with the old bitter shame: they dared not look at one another. But they were awed and made quiet by the vast riddle of pain and confusion that scarred their lives.

“No one, ‘Gene,” Luke began quietly, “has turned against you. We want to help you — to see you amount to something. You’re the last chance — if booze gets you the way it has the rest of us, you’re done for.”

The boy felt very tired; his voice was flat and low. He began to speak with the bluntness of despair: what he said had undebatable finality.

“And how are you going to keep booze from getting me, Luke?” he said. “By jumping on my back and trying to strangle me? That’s on a level with every other effort you’ve ever made to know me.”

“Oh,” said Luke ironically, “you don’t think we understand you?”

“No,” Eugene said quietly. “I don’t think you do. You know nothing whatever about me. I know nothing about you — or any of you. I have lived here with you for seventeen years and I’m a stranger. In all that time have you ever talked to me like a brother? Have you ever told me anything of yourself? Have you ever tried to be a friend or a companion to me?”

“I don’t know what you want,” Luke answered, “but I thought I was acting for the best. As to telling you about myself, what do you want to know?”

“Well,” said Eugene slowly, “you’re six years older than I am: you’ve been away to school, you’ve worked in big cities, and you are now enlisted in the United States Navy. Why do you always act like God Almighty,” he continued with rankling bitterness. “I know what sailors do! You’re no better than I am! What about liquor? What about women?”

“That’s no way to talk before your mother,” said Luke sternly.

“No, son,” said Eliza in a troubled voice. “I don’t like that way of talking.”

“Then I won’t talk like that,” Eugene said. “But I had expected you to say that. We do not want to be told what we know. We do not want to call things by their names, although we’re willing to call one another bad ones. We call meanness nobility and hatred honor. The way to make yourself a hero is to make me out a scoundrel. You won’t admit that either, but it’s true. Well, then, Luke, we won’t talk of the ladies, black or white, you may or may not know, because it would make you uncomfortable. Instead, you can keep on being God and I’ll listen to your advice, like a little boy in Sunday School. But I’d rather read the Ten Commandments where it’s written down shorter and better.”

“Son,” said Eliza again with her ancient look of trouble and frustration, “we must try to get on together.”

“No,” he said. “Alone. I have done an apprenticeship here with you for seventeen years, but it is coming to an end. I know now that I shall escape; I know that I have been guilty of no great crime against you, and I am no longer afraid of you.”

“Why, boy!” said Eliza. “We’ve done all we could for you. What crime have we accused you of?”

“Of breathing your air, of eating your food, of living under your roof, of having your life and your blood in my veins, of accepting your sacrifice and privation, and of being ungrateful for it all.”

“We should all be thankful for what we have,” said Luke sententiously. “Many a fellow would give his right eye for the chance you’ve been given.”

“I’ve been given nothing!” said Eugene, his voice mounting with a husky flame of passion. “I’ll go bent over no longer in this house. What chance I have I’ve made for myself in spite of you all, and over your opposition. You sent me away to the university when you could do nothing else, when it would have been a crying disgrace to you among the people in this town if you hadn’t. You sent me off after the Leonards had cried me up for three years, and then you sent me a year too soon — before I was sixteen — with a box of sandwiches, two suits of clothes, and instructions to be a good boy.”

“They sent you some money, too,” said Luke. “Don’t forget that.”

“I’d be the only one who would, if I did,” the boy answered. “For that is really what is behind everything, isn’t it? My crime the other night was not in getting drunk, but in getting drunk without any money of my own. If I did badly at the university with money of my own, you’d dare say nothing, but if I do well on money you gave me, I must still be reminded of your goodness and my unworthiness.”

“Why, son!” said Eliza diplomatically, “no one has a word to say against the way you’ve done your work. We’re very proud of you.”

“You needn’t be,” he said sullenly. “I’ve wasted a great deal of time and some money. But I’ve had something out of it — more than most — I’ve done as much work for my wages as you deserve. I’ve given you a fair value for your money; I thank you for nothing.”

“What’s that! What’s that!” said Eliza sharply.

“I said I thank you for nothing, but I take that back.”

“That’s better!” said Luke.

“Yes, I have a great deal to give thanks for,” said Eugene. “I give thanks for every dirty lust and hunger that crawled through the polluted blood of my noble ancestors. I give thanks for every scrofulous token that may ever come upon me. I give thanks for the love and mercy that kneaded me over the washtub the day before my birth. I give thanks for the country slut who nursed me and let my dirty bandage fester across my navel. I give thanks for every blow and curse I had from any of you during my childhood, for every dirty cell you ever gave me to sleep in, for the ten million hours of cruelty or indifference, and the thirty minutes of cheap advice.”

“Unnatural!” Eliza whispered. “Unnatural son! You will be punished if there’s a just God in heaven.”

“Oh, there is! I’m sure there is!” cried Eugene. “Because I have been punished. By God, I shall spend the rest of my life getting my heart back, healing and forgetting every scar you put upon me when I was a child. The first move I ever made, after the cradle, was to crawl for the door, and every move I have made since has been an effort to escape. And now at last I am free from you all, although you may hold me for a few years more. If I am not free, I am at least locked up in my own prison, but I shall get me some beauty, I shall get me some order out of this jungle of my life: I shall find my way out of it yet, though it take me twenty years more — alone.”

“Alone?” said Eliza, with the old suspicion. “Where are you going?”

“Ah,” he said, “you were not looking, were you? I’ve gone.”

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During the few remaining days of his holiday, he stayed almost entirely away from the house, coming for a brief and mumbled meal, and late at night, for bed. He waited for departure as a prisoner for release. The dolorous prelude to a journey — the wet platform eyes, the sudden radiation of hectic warmth, the declarations of love at sound of the whistle — left him this time unmoved. The tear-ducts, he was beginning to discover, had, like sweat-glands, dermic foundations, and were easily brought to a salty sparkle at mere sight of a locomotive. He had, therefore, the somewhat detached composure of a gentleman on his way to a comfortable week-end, who stands in a noisy crowd, waiting for the ferry.

He gave benediction to the words in which he had so happily defined his position as wage-earner. They stated and confirmed an attitude, and in some measure protected him against the constant betrayals of sentiment. During the Spring he worked stupendously at joining activities, knowing that here was coin whose ring they could hear. He wrote conscientiously each item of his distinctions; his name found its way back more than once to the indulgent Altamont papers. Gant kept the clippings proudly, and gave public readings when he could.