![]() I just wanted to see where he was.”We were taking a short cut across the square when four dusty cars came in fromthe Meridian highway, moving slowly in a line. “Don’t go to him,” he said, “he might not likeit. He was sitting in one of his office chairs, and he wasreading, oblivious of the nightbugs dancing over his head.I made to run, but Jem caught me. In the light from its bare bulb, Atticus was sitting proppedagainst the front door. The jail wasMaycomb’s only conversation piece: its detractors said it looked like a Victorianprivy its supporters said it gave the town a good solid respectable look, and nostranger would ever suspect that it was full of niggers.As we walked up the sidewalk, we saw a solitary light burning in the distance.“That’s funny,” said Jem, “jail doesn’t have an outside light.”“Looks like it’s over the door,” said Dill.A long extension cord ran between the bars of a second-floor window and downthe side of the building. It stood on no lonely hill, but was wedgedbetween Tyndal’s Hardware Store and The Maycomb Tribune office. Its fantasy was heightened by its red brick facade and the thick steelbars at its ecclesiastical windows. Starkly out of place in a town of square-facedstores and steep-roofed houses, the Maycomb jail was a miniature Gothic jokeone cell wide and two cells high, complete with tiny battlements and flyingbuttresses. The Maycomb jail was the most venerable and hideous of the county’s buildings.Atticus said it was like something Cousin Joshua St. ![]() The office building was on the northwest corner of the square,and to reach it we had to pass the jail. He covered the courthouse and jailhouse news simply by looking out hisupstairs window. Underwood not only ran The Maycomb Tribune office, he lived in it. It was dark.Jem peered in the bank door to make sure. Looking down the hall,we should have seen Atticus Finch, Attorney-at-Law in small sober letters againstthe light from behind his door. His office was reached by a long hallway. A larger square of stores surrounded the courthouse square dim lightsburned from deep within them.Atticus’s office was in the courthouse when he began his law practice, but afterseveral years of it he moved to quieter quarters in the Maycomb Bank building.When we rounded the corner of the square, we saw the car parked in front of thebank. A light shone in the county toilet, otherwise that side of the courthouse wasdark. Giant monkey-puzzle bushes bristledon each corner, and between them an iron hitching rail glistened under the streetlights. ![]() There were eight more houses to the postoffice corner.The south side of the square was deserted. ![]() Dubose’s house, standing empty and shuttered, her camelliasgrown up in weeds and johnson grass. ![]() “What’s up?”“Jem’s got the look-arounds,” an affliction Calpurnia said all boys caught at hisage.“I’ve just got this feeling,” Jem said, “just this feeling.”We went by Mrs. Anold campaigner, he did not speak until we were on the sidewalk. Dill’s face appeared at the screen,disappeared, and five minutes later he unhooked the screen and crawled out. There was no moon tonight.“Dill’ll wanta come,” I whispered.“So he will,” said Jem gloomily.We leaped over the driveway wall, cut through Miss Rachel’s side yard and wentto Dill’s window. ![]()
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