Adam's blessing: one whispered word

Cal comes home to every light burning: Aron is dead, and reading the telegram aloud has burst something in Adam's brain. Dr. Murphy explains the paralysed left side and says Adam may live a week or two years or die tonight. Cal sits by the bed and confesses everything, and can read nothing in the calm eyes but accusation. When he says he cannot stand it, Lee seizes his wrist and asks why his sorrow should be finer than anyone else's, then sends him to Abra. Turned off the Bacons' porch, Cal is caught up in the street by Abra, who has gone out the back. He tells her his mother was a whore and he has her blood; she answers that her father is a thief and she has his. He wants to take her inside the willow tree; she refuses because he is running away, and walks him back to his father's house. Then Lee stands at the bed and asks Adam not to leave his son alone with his guilt. Adam's hand lifts an inch, and his lips shape one word: "Timshel!"

The blessing has to be extracted rather than given, and Lee does the extracting knowing it may kill the man, taking the blame on himself in Samuel's words. Abra's refusal of the willow tree is the chapter's other decision: she will not be a hiding place. The word dug out of Hebrew comes back as a dying man's single breath, and it is a permission rather than a pardon.