“If you tell me that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely I will throw this coffee at you.”
“The only thing I’m afraid of about this country is that its government will someday become so monstrous that the smallest person in it will be trampled underfoot, and then it wouldn’t be worth living in. The only thing in America that is still unique in this tired world is that a man can go as far as his brains will take him or he can go to hell if he wants to, but it won’t be that way much longer.”
Dr. Finch grinned like a friendly weasel. “Melbourne said once, that the only real duties of government were to prevent crime and preserve contracts, to which I will add one thing since I find myself reluctantly in the twentieth century: and to provide for the common defense.”
“That’s a cloudy statement.”
“Indeed it is. It leaves us with so much freedom.”
Jean Louise put her elbows on the table and ran her fingers through her hair. Something was the matter with him. He was deliberately making some eloquent unspoken plea to her, he was deliberately keeping off the subject. He was oversimplifying here, skittering off there, dodging and feinting. She wondered why. It was so easy to listen to him, to be lulled by his gentle rain of words, that she did not miss the absence of his purposeful gestures, the shower of “hum”s and “hah”s that peppered his usual conversation. She did not know he was deeply worried.
“Uncle Jack,” she said. “What’s this got to do with the price of eggs in China, and you know exactly what I mean.”
“Ho,” he said. His cheeks became rosy. “Gettin’ smart, aren’t you?”
“Smart enough to know that relations between the Negroes and white people are worse than I’ve ever seen them in my life—by the way, you never mentioned them once—smart enough to want to know what makes your sainted sister act the way she does, smart enough to want to know what the hell has happened to my father.”
Dr. Finch clenched his hands and tucked them under his chin. “Human birth is most unpleasant. It’s messy, it’s extremely painful, sometimes it’s a risky thing. It is always bloody. So is it with civilization. The South’s in its last agonizing birth pain. It’s bringing forth something new and I’m not sure I like it, but I won’t be here to see it. You will. Men like me and my brother are obsolete and we’ve got to go, but it’s a pity we’ll carry with us the meaningful things of this society—there were some good things in it.”
“Stop woolgathering and answer me!”
Dr. Finch stood up, leaned on the table, and looked at her. The lines from his nose sprang to his mouth and made a harsh trapezoid. His eyes blazed, but his voice was still quiet:
“Jean Louise, when a man’s looking down the double barrel of a shotgun, he picks up the first weapon he can find to defend himself, be it a stone or a stick of stovewood or a citizens’ council.”
“That is no answer!”
Dr. Finch shut his eyes, opened them, and looked down at the table.
“You’ve been giving me some kind of elaborate runaround, Uncle Jack, and I’ve never known you to do it before. You’ve always given me a straight answer to anything I ever asked you. Why won’t you now?”
“Because I cannot. It is neither within my power nor my province to do so.”
“I’ve never heard you talk like this.”
Dr. Finch opened his mouth and clamped it shut again. He took her by the arm, led her into the next room, and stopped in front of the gilt-framed mirror.
“Look at you,” he said.
She looked.
“What do you see?”
“Myself, and you.” She turned toward her uncle’s reflection. “You know, Uncle Jack, you’re handsome in a horrible sort of way.”
She saw the last hundred years possess her uncle for an instant. He made a cross between a bow and a nod, said, “That’s kind of you, ma’am,” stood behind her, and gripped her shoulders. “Look at you,” he said. “I can only tell you this much. Look at your eyes. Look at your nose. Look at your chin. What do you see?”
“I see myself.”
“I see two people.”
“You mean the tomboy and the woman?”
She saw Dr. Finch’s reflection shake its head. “No-o, child. That’s there all right, but it’s not what I mean.”
“Uncle Jack, I don’t know why you elect to disappear into the mist….”
Dr. Finch scratched his head and a tuft of gray hair stood up. “I’m sorry,” he said. “Go ahead. Go ahead and do what you’re going to do. I can’t stop you and I mustn’t stop you, Childe Roland. But it’s such a messy, risky thing. Such a bloody business—”
“Uncle Jack, sweetie, you’re not with us.”
Dr. Finch faced her and held her at arm’s length. “Jean Louise, I want you to listen carefully. What we’ve talked about today—I want to tell you something and see if you can hook it all together. It’s this: what was incidental to the issue in our War Between the States is incidental to the issue in the war we’re in now, and is incidental to the issue in your own private war. Now think it over and tell me what you think I mean.”
Dr. Finch waited.