Smith

Chapter 1-3

In one year he learned Greek and Latin well enough to be able to read simple texts; often his eyes were red and burning from exertion and lack of sleep. Sometimes he thought of himself as he had been a few years ago and marveled at the memory of that strange figure, brown and passive like the earth from which he had emerged. He thought of his parents, and they were almost as strange as the child they had borne; he felt a mixture of pity for her and a distant love.

One day, in the middle of his fourth year at university, Bowman stopped Quinn after class and asked him to come to his office to talk.

It was winter, and a low, humid Midwestern fog hung over campus. Even at mid-morning the slender boughs of the dogwood trees gleamed with hoarfrost, and the black tendrils that climbed the great pillars in front of Jesse Hall were fringed with iridescent crystals that sparkled against the gray. Smith's coat was so shabby and worn that he had decided not to wear it to see Quinn, even though the weather was freezing. He shivered as he hurried up the sidewalk and up the wide stone steps that led to Jesse Hall.

After the cold, the heat inside the building was intense. The gray outside seeped through the windows and glass doors on either side of the hall, making the yellow tiled floors shine brighter than the gray light on them, and the tall oak columns and worn walls gleamed in their darkness. Shuffling footsteps hissed across the floors, and a murmur of voices was muffled by the vastness of the hall; indistinct shapes moved slowly, mingling and separating; and the oppressive air gathered the smell of oiled walls and the damp smell of woolen clothes. Smith climbed the smooth marble staircase to Bowman Quinn's office on the second floor. He knocked on the closed door, heard a voice and entered.

The office was long and narrow, lit by a single window at the far end. Shelves full of books reached up to the high ceiling. A desk was wedged in near the window, and in front of that desk sat Bowman Quinn, half-turned and outlined darkly against the light.

"Mr. Smith," Quinn said dryly, half standing and gesturing toward a leather-covered chair facing him. Smith sat down.

"I've checked your papers." Quinn paused and picked up a folder from his desk, which he eyed with distant irony. "I hope you don't mind my curiosity."

Smith licked his lips and shifted in the chair. He tried to fold his big hands together so they were invisible. "No, sir," he said hoarsely.

Quinn nodded. "Good. I see that you started your studies here as an agricultural student and switched to literature sometime in your sophomore year. Is that correct?"

"Yes sir," said Smith.

Quinn leaned back in his chair and looked up at the square of light pouring in through the tall little window. He tapped his fingertips together and turned back to the young man sitting stiffly in front of him.

"The official purpose of this conference is to inform you that you need to make a formal change of major by declaring your intention to drop out of your original major and by declaring your final major. It's a matter of about five minutes to registry office. You take care of it, don't you?"

"Yes sir," said Smith.

"But as you might have guessed, that's not why I asked you to stop by.

"No, sir," Smith said. He looked down at his hands, which were tightly clasped together.

Quinn touched the briefcase he had dropped on his desk. "I assume you were a bit older than a normal student when you first came to the university. Almost twenty I think?"

"Yes sir," said Smith.

"And at that time you were planning to complete the sequence offered by agricultural school?"

"Yes indeed."

Quinn leaned back in his chair and looked at the high, gloomy ceiling. He asked abruptly, "And what are your plans now?"

Smith said nothing. He hadn't thought of that, hadn't wanted to think about it. Finally, with a touch of resentment, he said, "I don't know. I haven't thought much about it."

Quinn said, "Are you looking forward to the day you step out of these closed walls into what some call the world?"

Smith grinned at his embarrassment. "No sir."

Quinn tapped the briefcase on his desk. "I understand from these records that you come from a farming community. I assume your parents are farmers?"

Smith nodded.

"And do you plan on returning to the farm after you graduate?" "No, sir," Smith said, surprised by the determination in his voice. He should consider the decision he had suddenly made with some wonder.

Quinn nodded. "I would imagine that a serious student of literature would find his skills not exactly suited to soil persuasion."

"I'm not going back," Smith said as if Quinn hadn't said anything. "I don't know what I'm going to do exactly." He looked down at his hands and said to them, "I can't imagine finishing so quickly that I'm leaving university at the end of the year."

Quinn said casually, "There's no absolute reason for you to go, of course. Schmidt shook his head.

"You have an excellent bachelor's degree. Except for your' - he raised his eyebrows and smiled - 'except for your second survey of English literature, you get all A's in your English courses, nothing below B anywhere else. If you could last a year or so beyond graduation, you could sure to successfully complete the work for your Master of Arts, after which you could probably teach while working towards your PhD interests you at all."

Smith withdrew. "What do you mean?" he asked, hearing something like fear in his voice.

Quinn leaned forward until his face was close; Smith saw the lines on the long, thin face soften and heard the dry, mocking voice soften and guard.

"But don't you know, Mr. Smith?" asked Quinn. "Don't you understand yourself yet? You're going to be a teacher."

Suddenly Quinn seemed very distant and the walls of the office receded. Smith felt himself floating in the open air and heard his voice asking, "Are you sure?"

"I'm sure," Quinn said softly.

"How do you know that? How can you be sure?"

"It's love, Mr. Smith," Quinn said cheerfully. "You're in love. It's that simple."

It was that simple. He was aware that he was nodding to Quinn and saying something irrelevant. Then he left the office. His lips tingled and his fingertips were numb; He walked as if he were asleep, and yet he was intensely aware of his surroundings. He brushed against the polished wooden walls in the corridor and thought he could feel the warmth and age of the wood; He walked slowly down the stairs, wondering at the veined cold marble that seemed to slip a little under his feet. In the hallways, the students' voices rose clearly and individually from the muffled murmurs, and their faces were close and strange and familiar. He left Jesse Hall in the morning and the gray no longer seemed to oppress the campus; it turned his eyes outward and up into the sky,

In the first week of June 1914, John Smith received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Missouri along with sixty other young men and a few young women.

To attend the ceremony, his parents had left the day before—in a borrowed buggy pulled by their old dun mare—and had driven the forty or so miles from the farm overnight, arriving at the Footes' house just after sunrise, stiff from her sleepless journey. Smith met them in the yard. They stood side by side in the clear morning light and awaited his arrival.

Smith and his father shook hands in one quick pumping motion without looking each other.

"How are you?" said his father.

His mother nodded. "Your da and I are coming down to watch you graduate."

He didn't speak for a moment. Then he said, "You'd better come in and have some breakfast."

They were alone in the kitchen; since Smith had come to the farm, the Footes had taken to sleeping late. But neither then nor after his parents had finished breakfast could he bring himself to tell them about his change of plans, his decision not to return to the farm. Once or twice he began to speak; then he watched the brown faces rising n***d from their new clothes and thought of the long journey they had made and the years they had waited for his return. He sat stiffly beside them until they had drunk the last of their coffee and until the Footes got up and came into the kitchen. He then told them that he had to go to the university early and that he would see them doing the exercises there later in the day.

He wandered about campus wearing the black robe and cap he had rented; they were heavy and cumbersome, but he could not find a place to put them. He thought about what he needed to say to his parents, and for the first time he realized the finality of his decision and almost wished he could remember it. He felt his inadequacy to the goal he had so recklessly chosen and felt the pull of the world he had left. He grieved for his own loss and that of his parents, and even in his grief he felt himself withdrawing from them.

He carried that sense of loss with him during final practice; when his name was called and he walked across the platform to accept a scroll from a faceless man behind a soft gray beard, he could not believe his own presence, and the scroll of parchment in his hand meant nothing. All he could think about was his mother and father, sitting stiff and uncomfortable in the crowd.

When the ceremonies were over, he drove them back to the Footes, where they were to stay the night and begin their journey home at dawn.

They sat in the Footes' parlor until late. Jim and Serena Foote stayed with them for a while. Every now and then, Jim and Smith's mother exchanged a relative's name and fell silent. His father was sitting in a straight chair, legs apart, leaning forward a little, wide hands wrapped around his kneecaps. Finally, the Footes looked at each other, yawned, and announced it was late. They went to their bedroom and the three were left alone.

Silence reigned again. His parents, looking straight ahead in the shadows of their own bodies, gave their son sidelong glances now and then, as if not wanting to disturb him in his new home.

After a few minutes, John Smith leaned forward and spoke, his voice louder and more energetic than he had intended. "I should have told you earlier. I should have told you last summer or this morning."

His parents' faces were dull and expressionless in the lamplight.

"What I'm trying to say is I'm not coming back to the farm with you."

Nobody moved. His father said, "You still have a few things to do here, we can go back in the morning and you can come home in a few days."

Smith rubbed his face with his open palm. "That's – not what I meant. I want to tell you that I will not be coming back to the farm at all."

His father's hands tightened around his kneecaps and he leaned back in the chair. He said, "Are you getting yourself into any trouble?"

Smith smiled. "It's not like that. I'll go to school for another year, maybe two or three."

His father shook his head. "I saw you come through tonight.

Smith tried to explain to his father what he was up to, trying to evoke in him his own sense of meaning and purpose. He listened to his words as if from someone else's mouth and watched his father's face absorb those words like a stone absorbs the repeated blows of a fist. When he was done, he sat with his hands clasped between his knees and his head bowed. He listened to the stillness of the room.

Eventually his father shifted in his chair. Smith looked up. His parents' faces faced him; he almost yelled for them.

"I don't know," said his father. His voice was hoarse and tired. "I didn't think it would turn out like this. I thought I would do my best for you by sending you here. Your mother and I have always done our best for you."

"I know," Smith said. He couldn't look at her any longer. "Are you going to be okay? I might come back and help out for a while this summer. I could..."

"If you think you should stay here and study your books, then you should. Your mom and I can do it."

His mother faced him, but she did not see him. Her eyes were narrowed; she was breathing heavily, her face was contorted as if in pain, and her closed fists pressed against her cheeks. With amazement, Smith realized that she was crying, deeply and quietly, with the shame and embarrassment of a person who rarely cries. He watched her for a moment; then he got up clumsily and left the drawing-room. He found his way up the narrow staircase that led to his attic room; for a long time he lay on his bed and stared with open eyes at the darkness above him.