Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" Chapters 21-31

His sleeves were perforated with little holes.

Jem made a feral noise in his throat.

The name Ewell gave me a queasy feeling.

Pre-judice," she enunciated carefully.

Mr. Merriweather, a faithful Methodist under duress, apparently saw nothing personal in singing, "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me .

I got rid of my ham costume and
departed in a hurry, for Mrs. Merriweather was standing at a
lectern in front of the first row of seats making last minute,
frenzied changes in the script.

We squandered our first nickels
on the House of Horrors, which scared us not at all; we entered
the black seventh grade room and were led around by the temporary
ghoul in residence and were made to touch several objects alleged
to be the component

Her voice soared over the clink of coffee cups and the soft bovine sounds of the ladies munching their dainties.

His cheeks were thin to hollowness; his mouth was wide; there
were shallow, almost delicate indentations at his temples, and
his gray eyes were so colorless I thought he was blind.

There was no acknowledgement save heen bouncing
off the distant schoolhouse wall.

When nothing materialized,
she yelled, "Pork!"

A boy
trudged down the sidewalk dragging a fishing, pole behind him.

High above us in the darkness a solitary mocker poured out his
repertoire in blissful unawareness of whose tree he sat in,
plunging from the shrill kee, kee of the sunflower bird to the
irascible quack of a bluejay, to the sad lament of Poor Will,

He was carrying Jem. Jem's arm was dangling crazily
in front of him.

His gavel was in his fist, but he wasn't using it.

"Yes sir," she murmured, fumbling at her apron.

The remaining cars were parked on
the other side of the building, and their headlights were little
help.

I jerked awake and made an honest effort to remain so, by looking down and concentrating on the heads below: there were sixteen bald ones, fourteen men that could pass for redheads, forty heads varying between brown and black, and-I remembered something J

He said the Cunninghams hadn't taken anything from or off of anybody iince they migrated to the New World.

There was a brief obituary in the Colored News, but there was also an editorial.

Atticus disengaged himself and looked at me.

The man was walking with the staccato steps
of someone carrying a load too heavy for him.

"Hush," he said to Ann Taylor, his
fat nondescript dog.

Out there in J. Grimes Everett's land there's nothing but sin and squalor."

"It's like bein' a caterpillar in a cocoon, that's what it is," he said.

Apparently you had to kick and holler, you had to be overpowered and stomped on, preferably knocked stone cold.

High above us in the darkness a solitary mocker poured out his
repertoire in blissful unawareness of whose tree he sat in,
plunging from the shrill kee, kee of the sunflower bird to the
irascible quack of a bluejay, to the sad lament of Poor Will,

Just shows you, that Robinson boy was legally married, they say he kept himself clean, went to church and all that, but when it comes down to the line the veneer's mighty thin.

There was something about them, no matter how much they cussed and drank and gambled And chewed; no matter how un- delectable they were, there was something about them that I instinctively liked . . . they weren't-
"Hypocrites, Mrs. Perkins, born h

Honed it down and bided his time, just bided his time."

"Dill, you've got to stop goin' off without tellin' her," said Jem. "It just aggravates her."

Jem was adamant.

I tried pressing my behind against the door as Cal. purnia had done, but the door didn't budge.

From somewhere near by came
scuffling, kicking sounds, sounds of shoes and flesh scraping
dirt and roots.

It was either a straight acquittal or nothing."

"Old Adolf Hitler has been prosecutin' the-"
"Persecuting, Cecil .

Jem waved my question away as being infantile.

She grinned from ear to ear and walked toward our father, but she was too small to navigate the steps.

Mr. Merriweather, a faithful Methodist under duress, apparently saw nothing personal in singing, "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me .

Somewhere along when the Finches were in Egypt one of 'em must have learned a hieroglyphic or two and he taught his boy."

Maycomb had lost no time in getting Mr. Ewell's views on Tom's demise and passing them along through that English Channel of gossip, Miss Stephanie Crawford.

Sometimes a baby would cry out fretfully, and a child would scurry out, but the grown people sat as if they were in church.

Then the assembled company
would sing, "Maycomb County, Maycomb County, we will aye be true
to thee," as the grand finale, and Mrs. Merriweather would mount
the stage with the state flag.

We squandered our first nickels
on the House of Horrors, which scared us not at all; we entered
the black seventh grade room and were led around by the temporary
ghoul in residence and were made to touch several objects alleged
to be the component

Typical of a nigger's mentality to have no plan, no thought for the future, just run blind first chance he saw.

I sometimes felt a twinge of remorse, when passing by the old place, at ever having taken part in what must have been sheer torment to Arthur Radley-what reasonable recluse wants children peeping through his shutters, delivering greetings on the en

They put the women out in huts when their time came, whatever that was; they had no sense of family-I knew that'd distress Aunty-they subjected children to terrible ordeals when they were thirteen; they were crawling with yaws and earworms, they chewed up

There was no acknowledgement save heen bouncing
off the distant schoolhouse wall.

I went away, not sure that I could explain to Atticus what was on my mind, not sure that I could clarify what was only a feeling.

When Miss Maudie was angry her brevity was icy.

The rural children who could, usually brought clippings from what they called The Grit Paper, a publication spurious in the eyes of Miss Gates, our teacher.

Haints, Hot Steams, incantations, secret signs, had
vanished with our years as mist with sunrise.

Its owner said, "Uff!" and tried to catch my arms,
but they were Lightly pinioned.

Atticus was standing under the street light looking as though nothing had happened: his vest was buttoned, his collar and tie were neatly in place, his watch-chain glistened, he was his impassive self again.

One Sunday night, lost in fruity metaphors and florid diction,
Judge Taylor's attention was wrenched from the page by an
irritating scratching noise.

A curious contest, the nature of which eluded me, was developing
between my father and the sheriff.

Mr. Tate sniffed.

"But they don't have to go tb the courthouse and wallow in it--"
"It's just as much Maycomb County as missionary teas."

Jem went in grinning, and Calpurnla nodded tacit consent to having Dill in to supper.

"Mr. Jem," Reverend Sykes demurred, "this ain't a polite thing for little ladies to hear .

Jem yelped.

I suppose his brief
burst of fame brought on a briefer burst of industry, but his job
lasted only as long as his notoriety: Mr. Ewell found himself as
forgotten as Tom Robinson.

Judge Taylor
savored his Sunday night hour alone in his big house, and church
time found him holed up in his study reading the writings of Bob
Taylor (no kin, but the judge would have been proud to claim it).

"The jury might be out and back in a minute, we don't know--' but we could tell Atticus was relenting.

Colonel Maycomb persevered in his efforts to make
the region safe for democracy, but his first campaign was his
last.

As I said it, I half pointed to the man in the corner, but
brought my arm down quickly lest Atticus reprimand me for
pointing.

"Something furtive," Aunt Alexandra said.

After consulting a tree to ascertain from its
lichen which way was south, and taking no lip from the
subordinates who ventured to correct him, Colonel Maycomb set out
on a purposeful journey to rout the enemy and entangled his
troops so far northwest in t

I got rid of my ham costume and
departed in a hurry, for Mrs. Merriweather was standing at a
lectern in front of the first row of seats making last minute,
frenzied changes in the script.

Dill said Atticus looked uncertain, then he said yes, and Sam scampered off.

High above us in the darkness a solitary mocker poured out his
repertoire in blissful unawareness of whose tree he sat in,
plunging from the shrill kee, kee of the sunflower bird to the
irascible quack of a bluejay, to the sad lament of Poor Will,

"It's not time to worry yet," Atticus reassured him, as we went to the diningroom.

Jem seemed to have put out of his
mind whatever it was he wanted to forget, and our classmates
mercifully let us forget our father's eccentricities.

The band played the national anthem, and we heard the audience
rise.

Mrs. Merriweather had run out of air, I judged, and was replenishing her supply while Mrs. Farrow composed herself to speak.

We squandered our first nickels
on the House of Horrors, which scared us not at all; we entered
the black seventh grade room and were led around by the temporary
ghoul in residence and were made to touch several objects alleged
to be the component

Mr. Tate flicked open the knife.

Atticus rose at his usual ungodly hour and was in the livingroom behind the Mobile Register when we stumbled in.

"When you analyze it, there was little risk.

Metal ripped on
metal and I fell to the ground and rolled as far as I could,
floundering to escape my wire prison.

Maybe it
was the wind rustling the trees.

A few more details, enabling the listener to repeat his version in turn, then nothing to talk about until The Maycomb Tribune appeared the following Thursday.

Nothing less than the bloodhounds must be used to locate
their furniture, Miss Tutti insisted, so Mr. Tate was obliged to
go ten miles out the road, round up the county hounds, and put
them on the trail.

Jem's morning face posed the question his sleepy lips struggled to ask.

They stopped at an oak tree, delighted, puzzled, apprehensive.

Most of the county, it seemed, was
there: the hall was teeming with slicked up country people.

"I don't like it, Atticus, I don't like it at all," was Aunt
Alexandra's assessment of these events.

"Let's see now," he droned to himself.

"First thing you can do, Ewell, is get your stinkin' carcass
off my property.

Why she frowned when a child recited from The Grit Paper I never knew, but in some way it was associated with liking fiddling, eating syrupy biscuits for lunch, being a holy-roller, singing Sweetly Sings the Donkey and pronouncing it dunkey, all of

Why she frowned when a child recited from The Grit Paper I never knew, but in some way it was associated with liking fiddling, eating syrupy biscuits for lunch, being a holy-roller, singing Sweetly Sings the Donkey and pronouncing it dunkey, all of which

Jern was chuckling.

Sighing, I scooped up the small creature, placed him on the bottom step and went back to my cot.

The Radley Place had ceased to terrify me, but it was no less gloomy, no less chilly under its great oaks, and no less uninviting.

We squandered our first nickels
on the House of Horrors, which scared us not at all; we entered
the black seventh grade room and were led around by the temporary
ghoul in residence and were made to touch several objects alleged
to be the component

Chapter
One."
I willed myself to stay awake, but the rain was so soft and the
room was so warm and his voice was so deep and his knee was so
snug that I slept.

The ladies were cool in fragile pastel prints: most of them were heavily powdered but unrouged; the only lipstick in the room was Tangee Natural.

"Hitler is the government," said Miss Gates, and seizing an opportunity to make education dynamic, she went to the blackboard.

I looked up, and his face was vehement.

I guess it's to protect our frail ladies from sordid cases like Tom's. Besides," Atticus grinned, "I doubt if we'd ever get a complete case tried-the ladies'd be interrupting to ask questions."

Cutex Natural sparkled on their fingernails, but some of the younger ladies wore Rose.

"His kind'd do anything to pay off a grudge.

It's-cynical."

When you oughta be hangin' your head in shame you go along laughin'---" Calpurnia revived a series of rusty threats that moved Jem to little remorse, and she sailed up the front steps with her classic, "If Mr. Finch don't wear you out, I will-get i

Then the assembled company
would sing, "Maycomb County, Maycomb County, we will aye be true
to thee," as the grand finale, and Mrs. Merriweather would mount
the stage with the state flag.

When you oughta be hangin' your head in shame you go along laughin'---" Calpurnia revived a series of rusty threats that moved Jem to little remorse, and she sailed up the front steps with her classic, "If Mr. Finch don't wear you out, I will-get i

Mrs. Merriweather had run out of air, I judged, and was replenishing her supply while Mrs. Farrow composed herself to speak.

I jerked awake and made an honest effort to remain so, by looking down and concentrating on the heads below: there were sixteen bald ones, fourteen men that could pass for redheads, forty heads varying between brown and black, and-I remembered some

Judge Taylor clumped to the back porch to let Ann out and found
the screen door swinging open.

Perhaps I was too convincing, because Jem hushed and never discussed the subject again.

For certainly Mrs. Merriweather was the most devout lady in Maycomb.

Atticus heard us and poked his head around the door.

Atticus was standing under the street light looking as though nothing had happened: his vest was buttoned, his collar and tie were neatly in place, his watch-chain glistened, he was his impassive self again.

Aunt Alexandra got up from the table and swiftly passed more refreshments, neatly engaging Mrs. Merriweather and Mrs. Gates in brisk conversation.

"He's not supposed to lean, Reverend, but don't fret, we've won it," he said wisely.

When you oughta be hangin' your head in shame you go along laughin'---" Calpurnia revived a series of rusty threats that moved Jem to little remorse, and she sailed up the front steps with her classic, "If Mr. Finch don't wear you out, I will-get i

I saw something only a lawyer's child could be expected to see, could be expected to watch for, and it was like watching Atticus walk into the street, raise a rifle to his shoulder and pull the trigger, but watching all the time knowing that the gu

He must have wanted to go home the short way, because he walked quickly down the middle aisle toward the south exit.

She brought me something to put on and had
I thought about it then, I would have never let her forget it: in
her distraction, Aunty brought me my overalls.

Ca1purnia poured milk, dished out potato salad and ham, muttering, :"shamed of yourselves," in varying degrees of intensity.

The thing about it is, our kind of folks don't like the Cunninghams, the Cunninghams don't like the Ewells, and the Ewells hate and despise the colored folks."

"She's run distracted lookin' for you-you watch out she don't ship you back to Meridian first thing in the mornin'."

He acknowledged my salute with a nod, and resumed his tour.

"Aw, Atticus, let us come back," pleaded Jem. "Please let us hear the verdict, please sir."

"What kin was that man to Mr. Walter Cunningham?"

The streetlights were on, and we glimpsed Calpurnia's indignant profile as we passed beneath them.

Atticus rose at his usual ungodly hour and was in the livingroom behind the Mobile Register when we stumbled in.

There was a brief obituary in the Colored News, but there was also an editorial.