Summary
If I’d just had a mother so I could say
Mother Mother
(See Important Quotations Explained)
Quentin Compson wakes up in his dorm room at Harvard,
hearing his watch ticking. He realizes that it is between seven
and eight o’clock in the morning. Quentin remembers his father giving
him the watch and saying that the watch might allow Quentin an occasional
moment when he could forget about time. He thinks about the inevitability
of his own awareness of time and remembers that St. Francis called
death his “Little Sister,” though, Quentin thinks, St. Francis never
had a sister. Quentin gets up briefly, then goes back to bed. He
has a memory of his sister Caddy’s wedding announcement: “Mr
and Mrs Jason Richmond Compson announce the marriage of. . . .” Caddy
was married in April, just two months ago.
Quentin’s roommate Shreve interrupts Quentin’s thoughts, appearing
in his doorway to remind him that the class bell will ring in only
two minutes. Quentin says he had no idea it was so late, and that
he will hurry to class. He tells Shreve not to wait for him. When Shreve
leaves, Quentin goes to the window and watches the students rushing
by. He spends a moment gazing at the unhurried Spoade, a Harvard
senior who once mocked Quentin’s virginity by calling Shreve his
husband. He thinks about both his and Caddy’s virginity.
Quentin suddenly remembers falsely confessing to his
father that he had committed incest, and that he, not Dalton Ames,
was the father of Caddy’s child. He muses on Dalton Ames’s name
and remembers his father telling him that his great tragic feelings
were meaningless and that there was no help to be had.
Quentin breaks the glass face of his watch against the
corner of his dresser, cutting his finger in the process. The watch
continues to tick. Quentin cleans up the glass and then packs a
suitcase. He takes a bath and shaves. He puts the key to his trunk
in an envelope along with two notes, which he addresses to his father.
At the post office he mails the envelope, then tucks a similar note
to Shreve inside his front pocket. Outside, Quentin looks for Deacon,
a black man he knows, but when unable to find him he goes to a store
for breakfast. Quentin then goes into a clock shop and shows his
broken watch to the proprietor, but then tells the man not to fix
it. Quentin asks if any of the clocks in the window are correct,
but then asks not to be told what time it is.
Quentin buys a set of tailor’s weights, hoping they will
be “heavy enough,” but he does not say for what. He goes to the
train station and boards a train. As he rides, he remembers counting
the seconds to himself as a child in school. He remembers that he
never counted correctly, and never was able to guess exactly when
the bell would ring. Quentin briefly remembers the day Benjy’s name
was changed from Maury. The train stops and Quentin gets off. He
walks to a bridge and looks down at the water, thinking of shadows
and of drowning.
Quentin sees Gerald Bland, a swaggering Harvard student,
rowing across the river. Quentin goes through a series of painful
memories, thinking of Caddy’s promiscuity and her marriage to Herbert Head.
He remembers his mother’s letters about Caddy and Herbert, and Herbert’s
promise to give Jason a job in his bank. Quentin thinks vaguely
about his mother’s pride and emptiness, musing that Caddy never
had a real mother and that he himself could never turn to his mother
in times of need. Quentin finds Deacon, the black man he was seeking
earlier. He gives Deacon the note he has written for Shreve, and
asks him to take it to Shreve tomorrow.
