Answer:
2. The image emphasizes that Mr. Shiftlet lives in an uncaring world.
Explanation:
Flannery O'Connor's short story "The Life You Save May Be Your Own" is part of the numerous short stories collection "A Good Man is Hard to Find". The story revolves around the character of Tom Shiflet and his acts in trying to survive the world, cheating Lucynell and her mother.
Similes are literary devices that compares words with another directly, a bit different from a metaphor (Metaphors compare things indirectly related). This simile in the sentence compares the words spoken by the old woman Lucynell to that of "<em>a group of buzzards in the top of a tree</em>". The "<em>ugly words</em>" of Mrs. Lucynell was that Shiflet was "<em>a poor disabled friendless drifting man</em>", but she also considers him capable enough to be her daughter's husband. This way of addressing him by the woman who expects him to marry her daughter shows that the world or society he lives in doesn't have much care about others, everyone for themselves.
