Sarty's betrayal of his father in William Faulkner's story "Barn Burning" is justified. The reader is introduced to Sarty's father as he is being tried for burning down Mr. Harris's stable. Lacking evidence, the justice of the peace drops the charges against Abner Snopes, Sarty's father, and he is ordered to leave the country. A stark image of Sarty's father is presented in the verse, "he [Sarty] followed the stiff black coat, the shaggy figure walking somewhat stiffly from where a Confederate provost's musket ball had hit him in the heel on a stolen horse thirty years later" (2177). The reader is given insight into Snopes' shady past and learns that he has never been a law-abiding citizen. Sarty's inner turmoil centers on his sense of loyalty to his father and his conflict with the knowledge that his father's actions are wrong. Through Faulkner's use of stream-of-consciousness narration, the reader is aware of Sarty's thoughts. In one instance, Sarty alludes to Mr. Harris as "his father's enemy (our enemy he thought in that despair, ours, mine, and his both! He is my father!)" (2176). After hearing the hiss of someone accusing his father of burning barns, Sarty feels "the old fierce pull of blood" and is blindly pushed into a fight, only to be pushed back physically by his father's hand and voice cold ordering him to enter. As the Snope family leaves town, Sarty consoles himself with the hope that this is the last time his father commits an act he can't even think about: "Perhaps he's satisfied now, now that he has" (2177). Deep down, Sarty knows his father won't end his destructive rampage. Sarty, a ten-year-old boy, cannot understand the true reasons for his father's actions: "that the fire element spoke to some deep spring of his father's being" and, more importantly, fire served as "the only weapon for the preservation of [its] integrity" (2178). Sarty's thoughts when he realizes that he may be questioned about the barn fire reflect the fear and desperation he experiences: "Aim to make me lie and I'll have to." (2176). Later, Sarty's father violently reminds him that blood is thicker than water when he accuses Sarty of being ready to betray him..