Free Uncollected Stories of William Faulkner by William Faulkner Page B

all of a sudden there was an officer holding his scabbarded sword by the little end like a stick and hanging onto the wagon and hollering at us. I could see his little white face with a stubble of beard on it and a long streak of blood, and bareheaded, and with his mouth open.
    “Get back!” he hollered. “Get back! We’re going to blow the bridge!” and Granny hollering back at him, with Mrs. Compson’s hat knocked to one side of her head, and hers and the Yankee’s faces not a yard apart:
    “I want my silver! I’m John Sartoris’ mother-in-law! Send Colonel Dick to me!” Then the Yankee officer was gone, right in the middle of hollering and still beating at the nigger heads with his saber, and with his little hollering face and all. I don’t know what became of him; he just vanished holding onto the wagon and flailing about him with the sword, and then Cousin Drusilla was there, on Bobolink; she had our nigh horse by the bridle and shewas trying to turn the wagon sideways. I started to jump down. “Stay in the wagon,” she said. She didn’t holler; she just said it. “Take the lines and turn them.” When we got the wagon turned sideways, we stopped. And then for a minute I thought we were going backward, until I saw that it was the niggers. Then I saw that the cavalry had broken; I saw the whole mob of it—horses and men and sabers and niggers—kind of rolling toward the end of the bridge, like when a dam breaks, for about ten clear seconds behind the last of the infantry. And then the bridge vanished. I was looking right at it; I could see the clear gap between the infantry and the wave of niggers and cavalry, with the little empty thread of bridge joining them together in the air above the water, and then there was a bright glare, and then I felt my insides suck, and then a clap of wind hit me on the back of the head. I didn’t hear anything at all. I just sat there in the wagon with a funny buzzing in my ears and a funny taste in my mouth, and watched little toy men and horses and pieces of plank floating along over the water. But I couldn’t hear anything at all; I couldn’t even hear Cousin Drusilla. She was right beside the wagon now, leaning toward us, hollering something.
    “What?” I hollered.
    “Stay in the wagon!” she hollered.
    “I can’t hear you!” I hollered. That’s what I said; that’s what I was thinking; I didn’t realize even that the wagon was moving again. But then I did; it was like the whole side of the river had turned and risen up and was rushing down toward the water, and us sitting in the wagon and rushing down toward the water on another river of faces that couldn’t see or hear either. Cousin Drusilla had the nigh horse by the bridle again, and I dragged at them, too, and Granny was standing up in the wagon and beating at the faces with Mrs. Compson’s parasol, and then the whole rotten bridle came off in Cousin Drusilla’s hand.
    “Get away!” I hollered. “The wagon will float!”
    “Yes,” she said, “it will float. Just stay in it. Watch Aunt Rosa and Ringo.”
    “Yes,” I hollered. Then she was gone. We passed her; turned, and holding Bobolink like a rock again and leaning down talking to him and patting his cheek, she was gone. Then maybe the bankdid cave. I don’t know. I didn’t even know we were in the river. It was just like the earth had fallen out from under the wagon and the faces and all, and we all rushed down slow, with the faces looking up and their eyes blind and their mouths open and their arms held up. High up in the air across the river I saw a cliff and a big fire on it running fast sideways; and then all of a sudden the wagon was moving fast sideways, and then a dead horse came shining up from out of the yelling faces and went down slow again, exactly like a fish feeding, with, hanging over his rump by one stirrup, a man in a black uniform, and then I realized that the uniform was blue, only it was wet. They were screaming