Burgess Girl

In The Sound and the Fury the Burgesses live near if not across the street from the Compsons. The little girl in the family comes home from school just as Caddy used to. She is used to Benjy "running along the fence" (53), and unafraid. When Benjy finds the gate unlocked one day after Caddy's wedding, he catches at this girl and "tries to say" (53) something to her - he himself cannot say what even to himself - but her father, assuming he intends to assault her, knocks him out with a fence picket. She is not named in the "Appendix" Faulkner wrote to the novel in 1945, but referred to as the "passing female child" whom Benjy accosts; the acount there of Benjy's "fumbling abortive attempt" to engage with her makes it seem more likely that Mr. Burgess was right (339).