فصل 36

Chapter 36

Salinas had two grammar schools, big yellow structures with tall windows, and the windows were baleful and the doors did not smile. These schools were called the East End and the West End. Since the East End School was way to hell and gone across town and the children who lived east of Main Street attended there, I will not bother with it.

The West End, a huge building of two stories, fronted with gnarled poplars, divided the play yards called girlside and boyside. Behind the school a high board fence separated girlside from boyside, and the back of the play yard was bounded by a slough of standing water in which tall tules and even cattails grew. The West End had grades from third to eighth. The first- and second-graders went to Baby School some distance away.

In the West End there was a room for each grade—third, four, and fifth on the ground floor, six, seventh, and eighth on the second floor. Each room had the usual desks of battered oak, a platform and square teacher’s desk, one Seth Thomas clock and one picture. The pictures identified the rooms, and the pre-Raphaelite influence was overwhelming. Galahad standing in full armor pointed the way for third-graders; Atalanta’s race urged on the fourth, the Pot of Basil confused the fifth grade, and so on until the denunciation of Cataline sent the eighth-graders on to high school with a sense of high civic virtue.

Cal and Aron were assigned to the seventh grade because of their age, and they learned every shadow of its picture—Laocoön completely wrapped in snakes.

The boys were stunned by the size and grandeur of the West End after their background in a one-room country school. The opulence of having a teacher for each grade made a deep impression on them. It seemed wasteful. But as is true of all humans, they were stunned for one day, admiring on the second, and on the third day could not remember very clearly ever having gone to any other school.

The teacher was dark and pretty, and by a judicious raising or withholding of hands the twins had no worries. Cal worked it out quickly and explained it to Aron. “You take most kids,” he said, “if they know the answer, why, they hold up their hands, and if they don’t know they just crawl under the desk. Know what we’re going to do?” “No. What?”

“Well, you notice the teacher don’t always call on somebody with his hand up. She lets drive at the others and, sure enough, they don’t know.” “That’s right,” said Aron.

“Now, first week we’re going to work like bedamned but we won’t stick up our hands. So she’ll call on us and we’ll know. That’ll throw her. So the second week we won’t work and we’ll stick up our hands and she won’t call on us. Third week we’ll just sit quiet, and she won’t ever know whether we got the answer or not. Pretty soon she’ll let us alone. She isn’t going to waste her time calling on somebody that knows.” Cal’s method worked. In a short time the twins were not only let alone but got themselves a certain reputation for smartness. As a matter of fact, Cal’s method was a waste of time. Both boys learned easily enough.

Cal was able to develop his marble game and set about gathering in all the chalkies and immies, glassies and agates, in the schoolyard. He traded them for tops just as marble season ended. At one time he had and used as legal tender at least forty-five tops of various sizes and colors, from the thick clumsy baby tops to the lean and dangerous splitters with their needle points.

Everyone who saw the twins remarked on their difference one from the other and seemed puzzled that this should be so. Cal was growing up dark-skinned, dark-haired. He was quick and sure and secret. Even though he may have tried, he could not conceal his cleverness. Adults were impressed with what seemed to them a precocious maturity, and they were a little frightened at it too. No one liked Cal very much and yet everyone was touched with fear of him and through fear with respect. Although he had no friends he was welcomed by his obsequious classmates and took up a natural and cold position of leadership in the schoolyard.

If he concealed his ingenuity, he concealed his hurts too. He was regarded as thick-skinned and insensitive—even cruel.

Aron drew love from every side. He seemed shy and delicate. His pink-and-white skin, golden hair, and wide-set blue eyes caught attention. In the schoolyard his very prettiness caused some difficulty until it was discovered by his testers that Aron was a dogged, steady, and completely fearless fighter, particularly when he was crying. Word got around, and the natural punishers of new boys learned to let him alone. Aron did not attempt to hide his disposition. It was concealed by being the opposite of his appearance. He was unchanging once a course was set. He had few facets and very little versatility. His body was as insensitive to pain as was his mind to subtleties.

Cal knew his brother and could handle him by keeping him off balance, but this only worked up to a certain point. Cal had learned when to sidestep, when to run away. Change of direction confused Aron, but that was the only thing that confused him. He set his path and followed it and he did not see nor was he interested in anything beside his path. His emotions were few and heavy. All of him was hidden by his angelic face, and for this he had no more concern or responsibility than has a fawn for the dappling spots on its young hide.

2

On Aron’s first day in school he waited eagerly for the recess. He went over to the girlside to talk to Abra. A mob of squealing girls could not drive him out. It took a full-grown teacher to force him back to the boyside.

At noon he missed her, for her father came by in his high-wheeled buggy and drove her home for her lunch. He waited outside the schoolyard gate for her after school.

She came out surrounded by girls. Her face was composed and gave no sign that she expected him. She was far the prettiest girl in the school, but it is doubtful whether Aron had noticed that.

The cloud of girls hung on and hung on. Aron marched along three paces behind them, patient and unembarrassed even when the girls tossed their squealing barbs of insult over their shoulders at him. Gradually some drifted away to their own homes, and only three girls were with Abra when she came to the white gate of her yard and turned in. Her friends stared at him a moment, giggled, and went on their way.

Aron sat down on the edge of the sidewalk. After a moment the latch lifted, the white gate opened, and Abra emerged. She walked across the walk and stood over him. “What do you want?” Aron’s wide eyes looked up at her. “You aren’t engaged to anybody?” “Silly,” she said.

He struggled up to his feet. “I guess it will be a long time before we can get married,” he said.

“Who wants to get married?”

Aron didn’t answer. Perhaps he didn’t hear. He walked along beside her.

Abra moved with firm and deliberate steps and she faced straight ahead. There was wisdom and sweetness in her expression. She seemed deep in thought. And Aron, walking beside her, never took his eyes from her face. His attention seemed tied to her face by a taut string.

They walked silently past the Baby School, and there the pavement ended. Abra turned right and led the way through the stubble of the summer’s hayfield. The black ‘dobe clods crushed under their feet.

On the edge of the field stood a little pump house, and a willow tree flourished beside it, fed by the overspill of water. The long skirts of the willow hung down nearly to the ground.

Abra parted the switches like a curtain and went into the house of leaves made against the willow trunk by the sweeping branches. You could see out through the leaves, but inside it was sweetly protected and warm and safe. The afternoon sunlight came yellow through the aging leaves.

Abra sat down on the ground, or rather she seemed to drift down, and her full skirts settled in a billow around her. She folded her hands in her lap almost as though she were praying.

Aron sat down beside her. “I guess it will be a long time before we can get married,” he said again. “Not so long,” Abra said. “I wish it was now.” “It won’t be so long,” said Abra. Aron asked, “Do you think your father will let you?” It was a new thought to her, and she turned and looked at him. “Maybe I won’t ask him.” “But your mother?”

“Let’s not disturb them,” she said. “They’d think it was funny or bad. Can’t you keep a secret?” “Oh, yes. I can keep secrets better than anybody. And I’ve got some too.” Abra said, “Well, you just put this one with the others.”

Aron picked up a twig and drew a line on the dark earth. “Abra, do you know how you get babies?” “Yes,” she said. “Who told you?”

“Lee told me. He explained the whole thing. I guess we can’t have any babies for a long time.” Abra’s mouth turned up at the corners with a condescending wisdom. “Not so long,” she said.

“We’ll have a house together some time,” Aron said, bemused. “We’ll go in and close the door and it will be nice. But that will be a long time.” Abra put out her hand and touched him on the arm. “Don’t you worry about long times,” she said. “This is a kind of a house. We can play like we live here while we’re waiting. And you will be my husband and you can call me wife.” He tried it over under his breath and then aloud. “Wife,” he said. “It’ll be like practicing,” said Abra.

Aron’s arm shook under her hand, and she put it, palm up, in her lap.

Aron said suddenly, “While we’re practicing, maybe we could do something else.” “What?”

“Maybe you wouldn’t like it.”

“What is it?”

“Maybe we could pretend like you’re my mother.”

“That’s easy,” she said.

“Would you mind?”

“No, I’d like it. Do you want to start now?”

“Sure,” Aron said. “How do you want to go about it?”

“Oh, I can tell you that,” said Abra. She put a cooing tone in her voice and said, “Come, my baby, put your head in Mother’s lap. Come, my little son. Mother will hold you.” She drew his head down, and without warning Aron began to cry and could not stop. He wept quietly, and Abra stroked his cheek and wiped the flowing tears away with the edge of her skirt.

The sun crept down toward its setting place behind the Salinas River, and a bird began to sing wonderfully from the golden stubble of the field. It was as beautiful under the branches of the willow tree as anything in the world can be.

Very slowly Aron’s weeping stopped, and he felt good and he felt warm.

“My good little baby,” Abra said. “Here, let Mother brush your hair back.” Aron sat up and said almost angrily, “I don’t hardly ever cry unless I’m mad. I don’t know why I cried.” Abra asked, “Do you remember your mother?”

“No. She died when I was a little bit of a baby.”

“Don’t you know what she looked like?”

“No.”

“Maybe you saw a picture.”

“No, I tell you. We don’t have any pictures. I asked Lee and he said no pictures—no, I guess it was Cal asked Lee.” “When did she die?”

“Right after Cal and I were born.”

“What was her name?”

“Lee says it was Cathy. Say, what you asking so much for?”

Abra went on calmly, “How was she complected?”

“What?”

“Light or dark hair?”

“I don’t know.”

“Didn’t your father tell you?”

“We never asked him.”

Abra was silent, and after a while Aron asked, “What’s the matter—cat got your tongue?” Abra inspected the setting sun.

Aron asked uneasily, “You mad with me”—and he added tentatively—“wife?” “No, I’m not mad. I’m just wondering.”

“What about?”

“About something.” Abra’s firm face was tight against a seething inner argument. She asked, “What’s it like not to have any mother?” “I don’t know. It’s like anything else.”

“I guess you wouldn’t even know the difference.”

“I would too. I wish you would talk out. You’re like riddles in the Bulletin.” Abra continued in her concentrated imperturbability, “Do you want to have a mother?” “That’s crazy,” said Aron. “ ‘Course I do. Everybody does. You aren’t trying to hurt my feelings, are you? Cal tries that sometimes and then he laughs.” Abra looked away from the setting sun. She had difficulty seeing past the purple spots the light had left on her eyes. “You said a little while ago you could keep secrets.” “I can.”

“Well, do you have a double-poison-and-cut-my-throat secret?”

“Sure I have.”

Abra said softly, “Tell me what it is, Aron.” She put a caress in his name.

“Tell you what?”

“Tell me the deepest down hell-and-goddam secret you know.”

Aron reared back from her in alarm. “Why, I will not,” he said. “What right you got to ask me? I wouldn’t tell anybody.” “Come on, my baby—tell Mother,” she crooned.

There were tears crowding up in his eyes again, but this time they were tears of anger. “I don’t know as I want to marry you,” he said. “I think I’m going home now.” Abra put her hand on his wrist and hung on. Her voice lost its coquetry. “I wanted to see. I guess you can keep secrets all right.” “Why did you go for to do it? I’m mad now. I feel sick.”

“I think I’m going to tell you a secret,” she said.

“Ho!” he jeered at her. “Who can’t keep a secret now?”

“I was trying to decide,” she said. “I think I’m going to tell you this secret because it might be good for you. It might make you glad.” “Who told you not to tell?”

“Nobody,” she said. “I only told myself.”

“Well, I guess that’s a little different. What’s your old secret?” The red sun leaned its rim on the rooftree of Tollot’s house on the Blanco Road, and Tollot’s chimney stuck up like a black thumb against it.

Abra said softly, “Listen, you remember when we came to your place that time?” “Sure!”

“Well, in the buggy I went to sleep, and when I woke up my father and mother didn’t know I was awake. They said your mother wasn’t dead. They said she went away. They said something bad must have happened to her, and she went away.” Aron said hoarsely, “She’s dead.”

“Wouldn’t it be nice if she wasn’t?”

“My father says she’s dead. He’s not a liar.”

“Maybe he thinks she’s dead.

He said, “I think he’d know.” But there was uncertainty in his tone.

Abra said, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we could find her? ‘Spose she lost her memory or something. I’ve read about that. And we could find her and that would make her remember.” The glory of the romance caught her like a rip tide and carried her away.

Aron said, “I’ll ask my father.”

“Aron,” she said sternly, “what I told you is a secret.”

“Who says?”

“I say. Now you just say after me—’I’ll take double poison and cut my throat if I tell.’ ” For a moment he hesitated and then he repeated, “I’ll take double poison and cut my throat if I tell.” She said, “Now spit in your palm—like this—that’s right. Now you give me your hand—see?—squidge the spit all together. Now rub it dry on your hair.” The two followed the formula, and then Abra said solemnly, “Now, I’d just like to see you tell that one. I knew one girl that told a secret after that oath and she burned up in a barn fire.” The sun was gone behind Toiler’s house and the gold light with it. The evening star shimmered over Mount Toro.

Abra said, “They’ll skin me alive. Come on. Hurry! I bet my father’s got the dog whistle out for me. I’ll get whipped.” Aron looked at her in disbelief. “Whipped! They don’t whip you?”

“That’s what you think!”

Aron said passionately, “You just let them try. If they go for to whip you, you tell them I’ll kill them.” His wide-set blue eyes were slitted and glinting. “Nobody’s going to whip my wife,” he said.

Abra put her arms around his neck in the dusk under the willow tree. She kissed him on his open mouth. “I love you, husband,” she said, and then she turned and bolted, holding up her skirts above her knees, her lace-edged white drawers flashing as she ran toward home.

3

Aron went back to the trunk of the willow tree and sat on the ground and leaned back against the bark. His mind was a grayness and there were churnings of pain in his stomach. He tried to sort out the feeling into thoughts and pictures so the pain would go away. It was hard. His slow deliberate mind could not accept so many thoughts and emotions at once. The door was shut against everything except physical pain. After a while the door opened a little and let in one thing to be scrutinized and then another and another, until all had been absorbed, one at a time. Outside his closed mind a huge thing was clamoring to get in. Aron held it back until last.

First he let Abra in and went over her dress, her face, the feel of her hand on his cheek, the odor that came from her, like milk a little and like cut grass a little. He saw and felt and heard and smelled her all over again. He thought how clean she was, her hands and fingernails, and how straightforward and unlike the gigglers in the schoolyard.

Then, in order, he thought of her holding his head and his baby crying, crying with longing, wanting something and in a way feeling that he was getting it. Perhaps the getting it was what had made him cry.

Next he thought of her trick—her testing of him. He wondered what she would have done if he had told her a secret. What secret could he have told her if he had wished? Right now- he didn’t recall any secret except the one that was beating on the door to get into his mind.

The sharpest question she had asked, “How does it feel not to have a mother?” slipped into his mind. And how did it feel? It didn’t feel like anything. Ah, but in the schoolroom, at Christmas and graduation, when the mothers of other children came to the parties—then was the silent cry and the wordless longing. That’s what it was like.

Salinas was surrounded and penetrated with swamps, with tule-filled ponds, and every pond spawned thousands of frogs. With the evening the air was so full of their song that it was a kind of roaring silence. It was a veil, a background, and its sudden disappearance, as after a clap of thunder, was a shocking thing. It is possible that if in the night the frog sound should have stopped, everyone in Salinas would have awakened, feeling that there was a great noise. In their millions the frog songs seemed to have a beat and a cadence, and perhaps it is the ears’ function to do this just as it is the eyes’ business to make stars twinkle.

It was quite dark under the willow tree now. Aron wondered whether he was ready for the big thing, and while he wondered it slipped through and was in.

His mother was alive. Often he had pictured her lying underground, still and cool and unrotted. But this was not so. Somewhere she moved about and spoke, and her hands moved and her eyes were open. And in the midst of his flood of pleasure a sorrow came down on him and a sense of loss, of dreadful loss. Aron was puzzled. He inspected the cloud of sadness. If his mother was alive, his father was a liar. If one was alive, the other was dead. Aron said aloud under the tree, “My mother is dead. She’s buried some place in the East.” In the darkness he saw Lee’s face and heard Lee’s soft speech. Lee had built very well. Having a respect that amounted to reverence for the truth, he had also its natural opposite, a loathing of a lie. He had made it very clear to the boys exactly what he meant. If something was untrue and you didn’t know it, that was error. But if you knew a true thing and changed it to a false thing, both you and it were loathsome.

Lee’s voice said, “I know that sometimes a lie is used in kindness. I don’t believe it ever works kindly. The quick pain of truth can pass away, but the slow, eating agony of a lie is never lost. That’s a running sore.” And Lee had worked patiently and slowly and he had succeeded in building Adam as the center, the foundation, the essence of truth.

Aron shook his head in the dark, shook it hard in disbelief. “If my father is a liar, Lee is a liar too.” He was lost. He had no one to ask. Cal was a liar, but Lee’s conviction had made Cal a clever liar. Aron felt that something had to die—his mother or his world.

His solution lay suddenly before him. Abra had not lied. She had told him only what she had heard, and her parents had only heard it too. He got to his feet and pushed his mother back into death and closed his mind against her.

He was late for supper. “I was with Abra,” he explained. After supper, when Adam sat in his new comfortable chair, reading the Salinas Index, he felt a stroking touch on his shoulder and looked up. “What is it, Aron?” he asked.

“Good night, Father,” Aron said.