East of Eden

Kate put her head down on the blotter between her crooked hands. She was cold and desolate, alone and desolate. Whatever she had done, she had been driven to do. She was different—she had something more than other people. She raised her head and made no move to wipe her streaming eyes. That was true. She was smarter and stronger than other people. She had something they lacked.

And right in the middle of her thought, Cal’s dark face hung in the air in front of her and his lips were smiling with cruelty. The weight pressed down on her, forcing her breath out.

They had something she lacked, and she didn’t know what it was. Once she knew this, she was ready; and once ready, she knew she had been ready for a long time—perhaps all of her life. Her mind functioned like a wooden mind, her body moved crookedly like a badly operated marionette, but she went steadily about her business.

It was noon—she knew from the chatter of the girls in the dining room. The slugs had only just got up.

Kate had trouble with the doorknob and turned it finally by rolling it between her palms.

The girls choked in the middle of laughter and looked up at her. The cook came in from the kitchen.

Kate was a sick ghost, crooked and in some way horrible. She leaned against the dining-room wall and smiled at her girls, and her smile frightened them even more, for it was like the frame for a scream.

“Where’s Joe?” Kate asked.

“He went out, ma’am.”

“Listen,” she said. “I’ve had no sleep for a long time. I’m going to take some medicine and sleep. I don’t want to be disturbed, I don’t want any supper. I’ll sleep the clock around. Tell Joe I don’t want anybody to come near me for anything until tomorrow morning. Do you understand?”

“Yes, ma’am,” they said.

“Good night, then. It’s afternoon but I mean good night.”

“Good night, ma’am,” they chorused obediently.

Kate turned and walked crabwise back to her room.

She closed her door and stood looking around, trying to form her simple procedure. She went back to her desk. This time she forced her hand, in spite of the pain, to write plainly. “I leave everything I have to my son Aron Trask.” She dated the sheet and signed it “Catherine Trask.” Her fingers dwelt on the page, and then she got up and left her will face upward on the desk.

At the center table she poured cold tea into her cup and carried the cup to the gray room in the lean-to and set it on the reading table. Then she went to her dressing table and combed her hair, rubbed a little rouge all over her face, covered it lightly with powder, and put on the pale lipstick she always used. Last she filed her nails and cleaned them.

When she closed the door to the gray room the outside light was cut off and only the reading lamp threw its cone on the table. She arranged the pillows, patted them up, and sat down. She leaned her head experimentally against the down pillow. She felt rather gay, as though she were going to a party. Gingerly, she fished the chain out from her bodice, unscrewed the little tube, and shook the capsule into her hand. She smiled at it.

“Eat me,” she said and put the capsule in her mouth.

She picked up the tea cup. “Drink me,” she said and swallowed the bitter cold tea.

She forced her mind to stay on Alice—so tiny and waiting. Other faces peered in from the sides of her eyes—her father and mother, and Charles, and Adam, and Samuel Hamilton, and then Aron, and she could see Cal smiling at her.

He didn’t have to speak. The glint of his eyes said, “You missed something. They had something and you missed it.”

She thrust her mind back to Alice. In the gray wall opposite there was a nail hole. Alice would be in there. And she would put her arm around Cathy’s waist, and Cathy would put her arm around Alice’s waist, and they would walk away—best friends—and tiny as the head of a pin.

A warm numbness began to creep into her arms and legs. The pain was going from her hands. Her eyelids felt heavy—very heavy. She yawned.

She thought or said or thought, “Alice doesn’t know. I’m going right on past.”

Her eyes closed and a dizzy nausea shook her. She opened her eyes and stared about in terror. The gray room darkened and the cone of light flowed and rippled like water. And then her eyes closed again and her fingers curled as though they held small breasts. And her heart beat solemnly and her breathing slowed as she grew smaller and smaller and then disappeared—and she had never been.

2

When Kate dismissed him Joe went to the barbershop, as he always did when he was upset. He had his hair cut and an egg shampoo and tonic. He had a facial massage and a mud pack, and around the edges he had his nails manicured, and he had his shoes shined. Ordinarily this and a new necktie set Joe up, but he was still depressed when he left the barber with a fifty-cent tip.

Kate had trapped him like a rat—caught him with his pants down. Her fast thinking left him confused and helpless. The trick she had of leaving it to you whether she meant anything or not was no less confusing.

The night started dully, but then sixteen members and two pledges from Sigma Alpha Epsilon, Stanford chapter, came in hilarious from a pledge hazing in San Juan. They were full of horseplay.

Florence, who smoked the cigarette in the circus, had a hard cough. Every time she tried, she coughed and lost it. And the pony stallion had diarrhea.

The college boys shrieked and pounded each other in their amusement. And then they stole everything that wasn’t nailed down.

After they had left, two of the girls got into a tired and monotonous quarrel, and Therese turned up with the first symptoms of the old Joe. Oh, Christ, what a night!

And down the hall that brooding dangerous thing was silent behind its closed door. Joe stood by the door before he went to bed and he could hear nothing. He closed the house at two-thirty and was in bed by three—but he couldn’t sleep. He sat up in bed and read seven chapters of The Winning of Barbara Worth, and when it was daylight he went down to the silent kitchen and made a pot of coffee.

He rested his elbows on the table and held the coffee mug with both hands. Something had gone wrong and Joe couldn’t figure what it was. Maybe she’d found out that Ethel was dead. He’d have to watch his step. And then he made up his mind, and made it up firmly. He would go in to see her at nine and he’d keep his ears open. Maybe he hadn’t heard right. Best thing would be to lay it on the line and not be a hog. Just say he’d take a thousand bucks and get the hell out, and if she said no he’d get the hell out anyway. He was sick of working with dames. He could get a job dealing faro in Reno—regular hours and no dames. Maybe get himself an apartment and fix it up—big chairs and a davenport. No point in beating his brains out in this lousy town. Better if he got out of the state anyway. He considered going right now—just get up from this table, climb the stairs, two minutes to pack a suitcase, and gone. Three or four minutes at the most. Don’t tell nobody nothing. The idea appealed to him. The breaks about Ethel might not be as good as he thought at first, but a thousand bucks was a stake. Better wait.