Witness

Leonora listens to Mr. Field’s stories about his life while she cleans his house. She offers to take him outside so he can see better to paint, even though she doesn’t like “being seen with white folks” (100), but Mr. Field tells her that he’d rather sit and remember what he’s seen before and think about it. Leonora decides that she has a lot of seeing to do before she can sit and think about it as well.

Constable Johnson complains that he has to protect 200 Black men—both from the Klan and from themselves—who have moved to Vermont to build a dam. Harvey, on the other hand, becomes more involved in the Klan’s illegal activities. In a ham-fisted gesture to support the Prohibition, he breaks into a hotel and smashes all the liquor bottles and then is forced to pay for them. This leads to another argument with Viola, who asks him if he thinks he will “save the world from the / evils of drink / by raiding the place and smashing a few bottles?” (102). In a humorous aside, Harvey becomes concerned about whether his head is small, even though it is “locust-stump” sized.

Reynard muses that the Klan has gotten its fingers into every aspect of Vermont life—schools, factories, homes, and stores—and if the town doesn’t begin to “mend the rents soon, / we’ll fall to pieces” (103).