Narcissa Benbow Sartoris

Sister of Horace Benbow, with whom she seems to have an unusually close relationship, and second wife of (Young) Bayard Sartoris, whom she married in 1919 and with whom her relationship is always strained. The most eligible upper-class woman in Jefferson, she is courted openly by Dr. Alford, and clandestinely by Bryon Snopes, whose anonymous love letters she keeps in her bedroom until Byron steals them. ("There Was a Queen" tells the story of how she recovered these letters.) On June 5, 1920, the same day of her husband's death, she gave birth to a son. Aunt Jenny wanted her to name him John, but Narcissa chose Benbow "Bory" Sartoris, perhaps hoping break the self-destructive pattern repeated by the male Sartorises.