In the Heat of the Night

“At ten minutes to three in the morning, the city of Wells lay inert, hot and stagnant. Most of its eleven thousand people tossed restlessly; the few who couldn’t sleep at all damned the fact that there was no breeze to lift the stifling effect of the night. The heat of the Carolinas in August hung thick and heavy in the air.” 

The opening lines of the novel reveal information about the setting, allowing the reader to gain a sense of place and scale, and establish an uneasy tone. Ball uses darkness and heat to create tension and discomfort. Everyone in Wells feels oppressed by the heat and opening the story at night further creates a scene appropriate for a murder mystery. 

“Sam pictured himself again, squatting in the street, holding the animal’s head and looking into its shocked, pained, trusting, beseeching eyes. Then he had seen death come, and although he frequently went hunting, and was generally rated a tough man, Sam had been torn by pity for the dog and chagrin that he had caused its death. Sam kept his eyes on the road, avoided the worst of the holes, and watched out for dogs.” 

Physically, Sam is an imposing figure. The sympathy he feels for the dying dog shows his emotional side—he isn’t just a racist small-town cop. Though Sam’s concern for wandering dogs shows he has the capacity to care, he doesn’t apply that same care toward Virgil and the Black residents of Wells. Still, the moment shows that Sam could grow into a more caring person. 

“‘They don’t feel it when they get hit the way you or I would,’ he explained. ‘They haven’t got the same nervous system. They’re like animals; you’ve got to hit ‘em with a poleax to knock ‘em down, that’s all. That’s how they win fights, why they’re not afraid to get in the ring.’”

On his break, Sam casually makes racist statements about Black boxers with Ralph. Sam never doubts the validity of what he’s saying when he compares Black people to animals, or when he suggests they need to be hurt more to be defeated. Sam’s overt racism, and his ease in being racist out in the open, establishes his character’s prejudice, and shows that Wells is a city where Sam’s beliefs are completely acceptable.