Light in August: Chapter 17 Summary & Analysis

Early the next morning, Monday, Lena’s child is born. Byron goes to Hightower’s house and finds Hightower asleep in bed. He wakes him, saying that Lena is in labor and that he is going to fetch a doctor. He asks if Hightower still has the book he used to deliver the black woman’s child, in case he is too late bringing the doctor back. Byron then promises he will be as quick as he can and leaves. As he hurries away, Byron curses himself for not making arrangements with the doctor earlier. The doctor is an old man and moves slowly. He is annoyed at having been woken so early in the morning, and can’t find the key to his car, though he refuses to let Byron smash the lock.

When Byron and the doctor arrive at the cabin, the birth has already taken place, and the doctor says that with Hightower there his presence was hardly needed. Mrs. Hines is there too, holding the newborn baby, and the doctor says he didn’t know the whole family would be there, including grandparents. Mrs. Hines whispers to Byron that he can take care of “Milly” now, while she looks after “Joey.” It suddenly occurs to Byron that he somehow never quite believed Lena was really pregnant, that she would actually have a baby. He’d refused to believe it because in his mind, Lena was a virgin. He now realizes that he will have to tell Brown, who until this point he hadn’t even let himself believe was real.

Hightower heads home, feeling exhausted and slightly resenting Byron for the fact that he now has to walk the whole two miles home. Once there, he makes coffee, planning to go back to bed but knowing he will be unable to sleep. Then, in the midst of his loneliness, he feels a sudden surge of “triumph and pride.” For the first time in 25 years, he has a sense of purpose. He takes a copy of Henry IV from his bookshelf and sits in his deck chair underneath the mulberry tree to read. He then goes back into the house, shaves, and puts on some nice clothes, thinking: “I must do this more often.”

Hightower goes back to the cabin and finds Lena lying there alone with the baby. Byron has gone into town, and when Mrs. Hines realized this, she followed him. Lena admits that although she is grateful for Mrs. Hines’s help, she is glad she is now gone, because she kept calling the baby Joey. Hightower asks what the baby’s actual name is, and Lena replies that she has not named him yet. Hightower realizes that Lena has combed her hair and made up her face because she is waiting for Lucas to come. He tells her that Byron is “a good man,” but that she should send him away. Lena replies that she has never tried to keep Byron with her in the first place.

Lena then reveals that five days ago Byron asked her to marry him, and she said no. She says she doesn’t know where he is now, but that before he left, he said that the authorities would bring Lucas to see her that evening, checking that this was okay. Lena said it was, and Byron left without saying anything else. She then begins to cry, saying that she said no to him, and now will never see him again. Hightower goes to the planing mill and is informed that Byron quit his job there that morning. A man working there advises him that Byron is probably at the courthouse, explaining that the Grand Jury is meeting that day to convict the murderer.