Todd Hewitt—Mayor Prentiss

Todd Hewitt’s connection to Mayor Prentiss is shown as an asymmetrical pursuit: the Mayor’s power reaches Todd not through a personal exchange but through the advancing ranks of Prentisstown. At Farbranch, the sight of that force makes Todd understand that he and Viola are being pursued by an army, not a small posse.

The pursuit becomes an army

From a hill above Farbranch, Todd sees men and women retreating as mounted men cross the ridge, followed by rows of armed men marching five abreast. The horses at the front seem to him to be the Mayor’s. He identifies the force as Prentisstown and realizes that, in his words to himself, it is every man from the town. The scale turns the Mayor’s pursuit from an immediate local threat into a military one.

The imbalance is concrete: Todd estimates that the advancing force has three times Farbranch’s population and three times as many guns. He understands that the army is coming after both him and Viola. The Mayor’s authority is therefore present as organized reach and numerical advantage, even though the evidence here does not show Todd and the Mayor speaking or meeting face to face.

Todd’s response to the threat

Todd and Viola duck behind bushes despite the darkness, the distance across the valley, and the noise of the commotion below. Todd recognizes that the army cannot hear his Noise from where it is, yet he hides anyway. The detail makes the danger feel physical before it becomes immediate: the sight of the force is enough to make concealment instinctive. His whispered question about whether the binoculars can see in the dark also shows the pair trying to assess the advancing force while remaining hidden.

A counterpoint on the road

Later, as Todd and Viola sit against separate trees, Todd finds himself calmer than he thinks he ought to be. The song of Here still seems to him to be singing, though he cannot hear it and it is miles away on the plain; he hums in an effort to recover its feeling of connection and belonging. This moment does not resolve his conflict with Mayor Prentiss, but it contrasts the isolating pressure of being hunted with Todd’s desire to feel that someone is there with him. He looks over at Viola as she eats from a packet of fruit, placing that fragile companionship within the larger danger surrounding their flight.