John Barth - The Sot-Weed Factor

McEvoy had found a walking stick in the path; now he swung and bobbed a cattail with it.

"Marry come up!" he swore. "I am unmanned in any case!"

"Eh?" Ebenezer looked over in surprise. "How's that?"

McEvoy scowled and slashed. "Ye saved my life, that's how it is, and I'm eternally beholden for't! What's worse, ye'd every cause to hate me. But ye save my life instead!" He was unable to raise his eyes to Ebenezer's. "I'faith, how can a man live with't? If the salvages had gelded me, at least I could have hollowed like a hero and died soon after; here ye've gelded me nonetheless, but I must grovel and sing your praises for't, and live a steer's life till Heav'n knows when!"

"But that's absurd!" the blushing poet protested. " 'Twas a practical expedient; not a favor."

McEvoy shook his head. "Ye've no need to go on thus; 'tis my conscience makes me grovel, not you, and the more you protest I'm not beholden, the deeper I sink in the Slough of Obligation. I must love ye, says my conscience, and that voice makes me despise ye, and that despisal makes me farther loathe myself for crass ingratitude."

"Ah, prithee, don't whip yourself so! Put by these thoughts!"

"There I sink, another hand's-breadth in the Mire!" McEvoy grumbled, keeping his eyes averted. "If only ye'd call for gratitude o'ermuch, I might hate ye and have done with't! As't is, I am fair snared, a fawning castrato."

Up to this point the poet had been more embarrassed than annoyed, for McEvoy's confession made him realize that he had in fact enjoyed, most unchristianly, a feeling of moral superiority to his comrade in consequence of having saved the fellow's life. But now his embarrassment was supplanted by irritation, perhaps directed at himself as much as at McEvoy; he too fetched up a walking stick, and laid low a brace of cattails on his side of the path.

"Henry Burlingame once told me," he said coldly, "that in ethical philosophy the schoolmen speak of moralities of motive and moralities of deed. By which they mean, a wight may do a good deed for a bad reason, or an ill deed with good intentions." He unstrung another cattail and slashed at a fourth. "Now, 'tis e'er the wont of simple folk to prize the deed and o'erlook the motive, and of learned folk to discount the deed and lay open the soul of the doer. Burlingame declared the difference 'twixt sour pessimist and proper gentleman lies just here: that the one will judge good deeds by a morality of motive and ill by a morality of deed, and so condemn the twain together, whereas your gentleman doth the reverse, and hath always grounds to pardon his wayward fellows."

" 'Tis all profound, I'm sure," McEvoy began, "but how it bears upon — "

"Hear me out," Ebenezer broke in. "The point of't is, methinks I see two pathways from this silly mire you wallow in. The first is to appraise whate'er I say and do from a morality of motive, and you'll find grounds for more contempt than gratitude: I chose you in lieu of Bertrand purely for revenge, to make you roast in the fire of conscience and to even the score for Bertrand's past offenses; I urge you not to thank me overmuch, to the end of driving you to thank me all the more. ."

McEvoy sighed. "D'ye think I've not clutched at that broomstraw already?"

"Aha. And to no avail? Thou'rt still unmanned by gratitude?" Swish went the stick, and another cattail dangled from its stalk. "Then here's your other pathway, friend: turn your morality of motive upon yourself, and see that behind this false predicament lies simple cowardice."

The Irishman looked up for the first time, his eyes flashing. "What drivel is this?"

"Aye, cowardice," Ebenezer declared. "Why is't you make no move to second my pledge to Chicamec? Forget this casuistry of who's obliged to whom and mortgage your life along with mine! Bind yourself to come hither with me one month from now, when our quest hath borne no fruit, and we'll commend ourselves together to Chicamec's mercies! How doth that strike you, eh? A fart for these airy little members of the soul; lay your flesh-and-blood privates on the line, as I have, and we're quit for all eternity!" He laughed and slashed triumphantly with his stick. "How's that for a pathway, John McEvoy? I'Christ, 'tis a grande avenue, a camino real, a very boulevard; at one end lies your Slough of False Integrity — to call it by its name on the Map of Truth — and at the other stands the storied Town. . where Responsibility rears her golden towers. ." He faltered; for a moment his voice lost the irony with which he had strung out the figure, but he quickly recovered it. "There, now; take a stroll in that direction, and if you vow thou'rt still a gelding, why then sing descant and be damned to you!"

McEvoy made no reply, but it was clear he felt the sting of the poet's challenge: the anger went out of his face, and he put his stick to the homely chore of helping him walk. As for Ebenezer, his outburst had raised his pulse, respiration, and temperature; his step took on a spring; exhilaration narrowed his eyes and buzzed in his fancy; he opened his coat to dry the perspiration and unstrung a phalanx of cattails with one smite.

As the weak winter daylight failed they began to look about for lodging. To expect an inn in such desolate countryside would have been idle; they turned their attention to a barn far up the road and agreed that they were not likely to find better quarters before dark. Ebenezer's position was that they should ask the owner's permission to sleep in the hayloft, on the chance he might have room for them in the house; McEvoy held out for stealing unnoticed into the hay, on the grounds that the planter might send them packing if they asked for his consent. Their debate on the relative merits of these strategies was interrupted by the approach of a wagon from behind them, the first traffic they had encountered all afternoon.

"Whoa, there, Aphrodite; whoa, girl! Climb up here lads, and rest your feet a spell!"

From a distance the driver had seemed to be a man, but now they saw it to be a dumpy, leather-faced woman in the hat and deerskin coat of a fur-trapper. The light was poor, but even in the dark Ebenezer would have known her at once.

"I'God, what chance is this?" He laughed incredulously and stepped close to convince himself. "Is't Mary Mungummory I see?"

"No other soul," Mary answered cheerily. "Get up with ye now, and tell me whither thou'rt bound."

They climbed to the wagon-seat readily, glad to rest their legs, and McEvoy named their destination and intent.

Mary shook her head. "Well, lads, 'tis your own affair where ye sleep, but take care; 'tis a cruel and cranky wight owns yonder barn. Thou'rt free to sleep back in the wagon, if ye wish to; I've no end o' quilts and coverlets back there, and nobody to use 'em till we reach Church Creek. Giddap, Aphrodite!"

She whipped up her white mare, and they proceeded up the road.

"Mary Mungummory!" Ebenezer cried again. " 'Tis a proper miracle! How is't thou'rt here in this Avernus of a marsh?"

" 'Tis the fundament o' Dorset, right enough," the woman admitted, "but it's on my regular route nonetheless. Just now I'm out o' girls," she explained to McEvoy, who plainly did not know what to make of her, "but there's one in Church Creek I've heard is ripe for whoring."

"Ah Mary!" laughed Ebenezer, still astonished. "Thou'rt the person I've yearned all day to see, and you have forgot me! What news I have to tell you!"

"There's many a lad yearns to see this wagon down the lane," Mary observed, but peered at her passenger more closely. "Why, praise God, now! Is't Eben Cooke the poet? I declare it is, and your poor wife told me ye'd flown to England!"

McEvoy frowned, and the poet blushed with shame. "You've seen Joan?"