Chapter 10 — Teaching Companion

What it asks It asks what Charles’s one rule is guarding. The first time, Adam has just said that Charles gets up early because he wants to, “and then you take credit for it—like taking credit for six fingers.” Years later, at another breakfast, Adam asks, “Will you tell me, Charles, what in hell we’re working for?” Both times Charles answers with the rule and nothing more; the second time he stirs the bacon. The student says what the line keeps safe. It feeds the hinge: Charles is the brother who stays and works, Adam the one who roams and asks why, and the last question asks what Charles feels when the roaming brother turns out to have worn leg irons. The card must not say where Cyrus’s money came from; Charles notes only the missing papers, and Adam answers, “Maybe he burned it up.”

One reading

A question he cannot answer. Adam asks what the work is for, with no wife and only more land to come, and Charles has no reason to give, only a rule. A rule needs no reason. When Adam pushes on, Charles cannot get comfortable and wants the talk to stop.

• Will you tell me, Charles, what in hell we’re working for?
• Fellow can’t get comfortable.

Another reading

His claim to the place. The rule says who runs the farm, and it is Charles. Both brothers are rich, and the place is half Adam’s, but Charles sets the hour and wakes his brother to it. When Adam says the place is his as much as Charles’s, Charles answers with the same claim in other words.

• This is my place as much as yours.
• Then why don’t you do some work on it?

Listen for

• Notices that the line comes back word for word after years apart, and asks what in Charles has not moved.
• Hears what Charles told Adam a minute before the first time: “You’re a rich man. You can lay in bed all day.” Asks who the rule is really for.
• Notices Adam’s jab right after the first time, as Charles blows the coals into flame: “You wouldn’t use a match.” Asks what Adam keeps picking at.
• Weighs Charles’s two plain “Yes” answers, that he likes it here and wants to live here all his life, against Adam’s “I wish I had it that easy,” and asks how easy it is.

If stuck

• What has Adam just said each time Charles gives this answer?
• What does Charles say when Adam asks whether he likes it here?
• If Charles stayed in bed one morning, what would he have to think about?

A strong answer A strong response names what the line guards and stands on both breakfasts. One reader says it guards Charles from a question he cannot answer: Adam asks what in hell they are working for, a rule needs no reason, and soon Charles says he cannot get comfortable. Another says it guards his claim to the place: the farm is half Adam’s, but Charles is the one who runs it, and he answers “This is my place as much as yours” with “Then why don’t you do some work on it?” The best answers notice that Charles himself told Adam a rich man can lay in bed all day, and ask who the rule is for.

What it asks It asks why Adam ends his one tender story from the army the way he does. Charles thinks Adam’s trouble is “knocker fever” and offers the inn. Adam says he never took much satisfaction in a whore, and tells of a woman he kept in the regiment: “She’d wash my clothes and mend and do a little cooking.” He calls her “kind of soft and sweet.” Charles asks what happened to her. “Smallpox.” Then the burning: over two hundred bodies, brush and coal oil. Then the bacon. The student says why Adam turns away there. It feeds the hinge: here Adam has something he could tell his brother and does not, as he has kept the road gang to himself for years. The card must not pass lightly over the burning; it is the one place the chapter shows what Adam carries from the army.

One reading

Because it hurts too much to go on. His eyes are pained as he speaks of the burning, and the bacon is a way out. The brothers have a habit of leaving the worst things unsaid: they stood at their father’s grave a long time and never spoke of him. Adam does the same with the woman.

• Adam’s eyes were pained.
• The brothers stood by the grave a long time, then they went away and they didn’t mention Cyrus.

Another reading

Because Charles is not hearing it. Charles asks whether he got another one, as if one woman could be swapped for the next, and answers the burning with something he has heard. Adam sees that his brother cannot follow him, and closes the subject with the nearest plain fact in the kitchen.

• You didn’t get another one?
• I’ve heard they can’t stand smallpox.

Listen for

• Hears what Adam is answering: Charles calls his trouble “knocker fever,” and Adam answers with a woman who washed and mended. Asks what Adam is saying he lacks.
• Notices that Charles really is burning the bacon, and covers it with “I like it crisp.” Asks how each brother covers himself.
• Hears how plainly Adam tells the burning: a number, brush, coal oil, and no word of feeling. He never even says the word burn; the first “burning” in the scene is the bacon. Asks what that plainness hides or shows.
• Keeps to the page: the woman has no name, and the chapter gives nothing of her beyond what Adam says here.

If stuck

• What does Charles think is wrong with Adam, and what does he offer?
• What did the woman in the regiment do for Adam?
• What happened to her, and to the others?

A strong answer A strong response says why Adam turns away and stands on the scene. One reader says the memory hurts too much: his eyes are pained, and the brothers already have a habit of not speaking of what matters, as at their father’s grave. Another says Charles is not hearing it: he asks whether Adam got another one and answers the burning with hearsay, so Adam closes the door. The best answers notice what Adam was trying to tell his brother before the story turned, that he wants something gentler than the inn, and ask why he gives up on saying it.

What it asks It asks the student to listen to Charles talk about the schoolteacher the town drove out. He mentions her small feet three times, her clothes from New York, her singing in the choir, and the crowd at church. The town’s women “got together,” and the school board had her out halfway through the term. Adam asks, “Did you get to know her?” Charles answers: “No. I only went to church. Couldn’t hardly get in. Girl that pretty’s got no right in a little town. Just makes people uneasy. Causes trouble.” The student says whose unease Charles is describing. It feeds the hinge: this is how Charles deals with what unsettles him, and at the same breakfast he shouts at his brother, “I want you out of here!”

One reading

The town’s. Charles is passing on the verdict of the women who grew restless and drove her out. Most of what he knows is what he heard. He takes the town’s side the way he keeps the farm’s routine: whatever upsets the settled order should go.

• The women got kind of restless with her here.
• I heard she wore silk underwear.

Another reading

His own. He caught the marrying fever with every other young man, went to church to look at her, and still remembers her feet. He never got to know her. The unease was his, and he blames her for it, as the town did.

• I guess there wasn’t a young buck in the county didn’t get the marrying fever.
• Feet no longer than that.

Listen for

• Hears Charles’s words for Adam at the same breakfast, “You make me itch” and “Fellow can’t get comfortable,” and asks who else unsettles him.
• Notices that both pretty girls the brothers talk of end up gone, and that Adam’s next thought is “Maybe we ought to go away from here” just before Charles’s temper tears.
• Hears how much is hearsay: “I heard” comes three times, once about the silk underwear and twice about the Samuels girl in Philadelphia.
• Asks why the schoolteacher comes up right after Adam’s story of the woman who died: each brother has now told of a woman who is gone.

If stuck

• What does Charles remember about the schoolteacher?
• Who drove her out, and what reasons does Charles give?
• Did Charles get to know her? Why did he go to church back then?

A strong answer A strong response names whose unease Charles means and stands on his story. One reader says the town’s: he repeats what the women did and what he heard, and sides with the settled order against the one who disturbed it. Another says his own: he caught the marrying fever, went to church to look at her, never got to know her, and still remembers her feet. The best answers hear the words Charles uses for Adam at the same table, that he makes him itch and makes him nervous, and notice that in this chapter what unsettles Charles is told to go.

What it asks It asks why one small house brings out the chapter’s most violent line, from a man who has just asked his brother to leave. When Adam says he is going to be thirty-seven and calls it half a life, Charles asks, “couldn’t you just go away and save all the trouble?” and Adam laughs and agrees. Then Adam asks for a new house for both of them, with “bathtub and running water and a water closet,” and Charles answers twice, “You take your fancy ideas away.” Then Adam, amused, offers to build “a pretty little house right over by the woodlot” so they will not get on each other’s nerves. “I don’t want it on the place.” “The place is half mine.” “I’ll buy you out.” “But I don’t have to sell.” Then the threat, and Adam, “suddenly sobered”: “I believe you really would.” The student says why the house is worse to Charles than Adam’s going. It feeds the hinge: the brothers can neither share the farm nor stay away from it, and this house would put Adam on the place and apart at once. The card must not treat the threat as a joke; Adam does not.

One reading

A split in the farm. Charles has made it “the prettiest farm anywhere about,” as Adam says, and he would rather own all of it than share it. If Adam goes, Charles runs the whole place alone, as he did while Adam was away. A house of Adam’s would make “half mine” something anyone could see, standing on the place for good, and Adam will not sell. Burning it is the only way Charles has left to keep the place whole.

• I don’t want it on the place.
• But I don’t have to sell.

Another reading

A brother next door who is not with him. Charles has said he misses Adam when he is gone, and that the polite stage of their quarrels is worse than the angry one. A house across the woodlot would make that politeness last: the two of them near each other and apart. Adam can share the house or go away; Charles cannot bear a third way.

• We’ll get mad at each other and then we’ll get polite to each other—and that’s worse.
• I miss you when you’re not here.

Listen for

• Weighs Adam’s “I believe you really would,” said “suddenly sobered,” and asks what Adam knows about his brother that makes him believe it.
• Notices that Charles refuses a new house for both of them before the little one, and asks whether he hates the newness or the separation.
• Notices that the threat leads straight to the hundred dollars: “I’ve thought about it a lot.”
• Hears that Adam is “amused” when he offers the little house, and asks whether he is teasing.

If stuck

• What did Charles ask Adam to do the next time he got restless?
• Where would the little house go, and why does Adam want it?
• Which would keep the brothers closer, the little house or Adam going away?

A strong answer A strong response says why the house is worse to Charles than Adam’s going, and stands on the third part. One reader says a split in the farm: if Adam goes, Charles runs the whole place alone, but a house of Adam’s would stand on it for good as the half Adam will not sell. Another says a brother near and apart: Charles misses Adam when he is gone, and each leaving ends in a return, but a house across the woodlot would make the polite stage he hates last. The best answers take the threat as seriously as Adam does, and notice that Charles moves from it straight to the old debt.

What it asks It asks the student to test Adam’s honesty by his two debts. He tells Charles he was taken up for vagrancy, put on a road gang for six months, picked up again, and escaped three days before the second six months ended. He waited because “I figured I owed the state six months. That was the sentence. I didn’t feel right about cheating. I only cheated three days.” He robbed a store for clothes and paid it back with interest. Yet when Charles says the hundred dollars was never repaid, Adam says, “I must have.” The student builds a thesis on how one man keeps both accounts, meets the strongest objection, and revises. It feeds the hinge: this is the confession, and the strictness, that Charles laughs at. The card must not add anything about what Adam did in Boston or South America; the chapter gives only what he tells.

One reading

His honesty is a rule about the law and strangers. With the state and the store, a debt is a sum to be settled exactly: six months, three days, ten per cent. Between brothers, money is shared; Adam says the place is half his. A debt to Charles never felt like a debt, so it slipped his mind.

• I figured I owed the state six months.
• I sent the money back with ten per cent interest,

Another reading

He was not careless; he was ashamed. To pay Charles he would have had to say what the money was for. He kept the jail secret, and the debt stayed buried with it. When he finally tells, he ranks the shames himself: the unpaid debt is worse.

• And I never told. Maybe I was ashamed.
• But I’m more ashamed that I didn’t pay you.

Listen for

• Tests Charles’s “You don’t tell lies” against Adam’s “I must have,” and asks what kind of honesty forgets.
• Weighs the strict sum, “I only cheated three days,” and asks whether it is admirable, a little mad, or both; Charles calls him “crazy” with affection.
• Notices how fast Adam answers the debt once it is named: “I’ll pay you in the morning,” twice.
• Keeps to the page: the chapter tells nothing of Boston or South America beyond what Adam says, and his honesty is judged from this talk alone.

If stuck

• How long was Adam’s sentence, and when did he escape?
• What did he do about the store he robbed?
• What does Adam say when Charles tells him the debt was never paid?

A strong answer A strong response builds a thesis on Adam’s two debts, meets the strongest objection, and revises. One thesis says his honesty is a rule he keeps with the law and with strangers, exact to the day and the per cent, while money between brothers never felt owed. The strongest objection is Adam’s own word, “ashamed”: paying Charles meant telling him about the jail, so the silence kept the debt along with the secret, and Adam says the debt shames him more. A good revision might hold that Adam is strict with any debt he can settle alone, and slow with one that would make him explain himself. The best answers carry this into the last question, where Charles hears the whole story and laughs.

What it asks It asks the chapter’s whole question. For years Charles has held the hundred dollars against Adam and waited for him to bring it up: “I gave you plenty of time to offer.” Then he hears that it paid for an escape from a road gang. He believes it at once (“You don’t tell lies.”), drops the debt (“Oh, forget it”), and says, “My brother a jailbird!” Adam answers, “You don’t have to look so happy.” Charles says he does not know why, “but it makes me kind of proud.” He laughs at the six months owed, calls Adam crazy “with affection,” and asks to hear about the road gang. The student builds a thesis, meets the strongest objection, and revises. The card must not say the brothers part for good; the chapter ends on “Sure I will.” It must not claim Charles knows where their father’s money came from.

One reading

Glad to know him better. A secret Adam was ashamed of, kept for years, comes out at the table, and the grievance goes with it. Charles refused to hear about South America, but he asks to hear about the road gang. What warms him is not Adam’s fall but his telling, and the strange, strict conscience it shows.

• he said with affection
• Tell me about the road gang, Adam.

Another reading

Glad to see him brought down. Adam is the brother who roams, comes home brown with a foreign look, and brings fancy ideas, while Charles works the farm and grows rich. Now the free brother turns out to have been a vagrant in leg irons. Adam himself sees gloating in his brother’s face.

• My brother a jailbird!
• You don’t have to look so happy.

Listen for

• Sets “I don’t want to hear about it,” said of South America, beside “Tell me about the road gang, Adam,” and asks why Charles wants one story and not the other.
• Weighs what “kind of proud” is proud of: the escape’s good sense (“That makes sense”), the conscience, or a brother no longer above him.
• Notices that Charles asks for Adam’s reasons before he laughs, and that the laugh comes at the most scrupulous reason, the six months owed.
• Keeps to the page on the ending: the chapter stops on Adam’s promise to tell, and says nothing yet of what comes after.

If stuck

• What had Charles held against Adam for years?
• What does Charles say when he hears Adam was in jail?
• Which story of Adam’s did Charles refuse to hear earlier in this part?

A strong answer A strong response builds a thesis, meets the strongest objection, and revises. One thesis says Charles is glad to know Adam better: a secret kept for years comes out, the grievance is dropped, and the brother who would not hear about South America asks to hear about the road gang. The strongest objection is Charles’s delight itself and Adam’s “You don’t have to look so happy”: the roaming brother with fancy ideas turns out to have worn leg irons, while Charles stayed and grew rich. A good revision might hold that the two cannot be pulled apart: Adam brought down is the Adam Charles can know, a brother close enough to laugh with. The best answers keep to the page, where the chapter ends on a promise to tell, not on a parting.