Tom-Tom's Cabin (Location Key)

In "Centaur in Brass" Tom-Tom lives with his third wife in a cabin "two miles from town and from the power plant where he spent twelve hours a day with a shovel and bar," working to feed the boiler fire with coal (15). When Faulkner re-tells his story in The Town, the wife with whom he lives in this cabin is "his fourth" (16). The novel adds the detail that this cabin is "two miles down the railroad track" (16), which we interpret as putting it in the part of Yoknapatawpha that Faulkner uses the least: the southwest quadrant. In both texts, Tom-Tom's property includes "a little piece of corn" - i.e. a small field - behind the cabin, and a barn that is big enough to contain the "corn-crib" where the stolen brass fittings are hidden (156, 159; 21, 29). In The Town the cabin includes "the back window" - the definite article, suggesting there is just one back window, reminds us how small these cabins typically are - which is Turl's way of entering while Tom-Tom is away (25).