Since their quarrel in early spring, Roman and Proctor had not resolved their differences, or managed to see them as unimportant. They made, or took advantage of, opportunities to come together physically, without being able to achieve any understanding of minds. The mind is more fastidious and less realistic than the body. They were glad of each other; there was no one else as close to either. But pride and what they called principle made them watchful in their encounters and prevented their acknowledging even to themselves, let alone to each other, that the sum of their love was greater than its subtractions. If there had been urgent need of it, pride and principle would have tumbled or been compromised, but Proctor’s days were full helping Adam prepare himself for the University of Virginia; and Roman had Rachel. He was the only one of her three favorites always available to her that summer, and the differences in their ages was so large it made no difference at all.

On the neighboring farm, Alonzo continued to oversee his fields with more of conscious application than commitment of heart and spirit. He was up early each morning to rouse his slaves and set them to work for an hour or two before Maude and Geraldine were ready to provide breakfast for them. Summoned by the lackadaisical ringing of a hand bell, they would leave the fields and gather around the back steps to eat from tin plates, their bare feet still wet with the morning dew, and sandy earth clinging to the soles and sides.

Alonzo ate alone at the kitchen table while they fed outside. He was always finished before they were and waiting to witness their return to work. His assiduity resulted from boredom that seeks relief in any activity. Boredom also made him impatient with lazy, muttering old Maude and her bad cooking and worse housekeeping. He complained to his mother about Maude on one of her visits to the farm, and after scolding the woman, who responded only with biggety cackles, Clovis made up her mind to stay at the farm and see Alonzo through the harvest season.

Roscoe made no objection when she told him; he was glad to be rid of her. Her body had long since ceased to give him any pleasure—for that he sought and found elsewhere—and he would have laughed if anybody had suggested that Clovis or any other woman had a mind. During the last two years she had taken to drinking more than she ought, and several times during recent months he had come home from overseeing his various land holdings and business dealings to find her drunk and abusive, or drunk and weeping, or drunk and snoring, often as not on the floor. Beating her effected no correction in her behavior. He had not tried to talk to her, but then he never had done that.