The Hitch-Hikers by Eudora Welty

This is a difficult story because there are a lot of sentences which have deep psychological meaning.

The protagonist, Harris, picks up two hitch-hikers. While he is away from his car, one of them, a guitar player, is killed by the other named Sobby. Sobby says, “It’s his [guitarist] notion to run off with the car.”

Both men are lonely; the guitarist is talkative and the other is silent, who confesses, “He was uppity, though. He bragged. He carried a guitar around.”

That seems to be the reason he kills him.

Harris identifies himself with them; he was also alienated with the town’s people. He does not belong to their community. He has no particular destination to go to.

This is not a moving story, but a kind of sad one. It depicts loneliness of a man.