“It’s not that, sir. He’s good. He’s really good. He never does anyone harm. He never says bad things about anyone. He’s not mean and he never complains and he’s brave. He doesn’t like to fight but he will.”
“You love your brother, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir. And I do bad things to him. I cheat him and I fool him. Sometimes I hurt him for no reason at all.”
“And then you’re miserable?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Is Aron ever miserable?”
“I don’t know. When I didn’t want to join the Church he felt bad. And once when Abra got angry and said she hated him he felt awful bad. He was sick. He had a fever. Don’t you remember? Lee sent for the doctor.”
Adam said with wonder, “I could live with you and not know any of these things! Why was Abra mad?”
Cal said, “I don’t know if I ought to tell.”
“I don’t want you to then.”
“It’s nothing bad. I guess it’s all right. You see, sir, Aron wants to be a minister. Mr. Rolf—well, he likes high church, and Aron liked that, and he thought maybe he would never get married and maybe go to a retreat.”
“Like a monk, you mean?”
“Yes, sir.”
“And Abra didn’t like that?”
“Like it? She got spitting mad. She can get mad sometimes. She took Aron’s fountain pen and threw it on the sidewalk and tramped on it. She said she’d wasted half her life on Aron.”
Adam laughed. “How old is Abra?”
“Nearly fifteen. But she’s—well, more than that some ways.”
“I should say she is. What did Aron do?”
“He just got quiet but he felt awful bad.”
Adam said, “I guess you could have taken her away from him then.”
“Abra is Aron’s girl,” said Cal.
Adam looked deeply into Cal’s eyes. Then he called, “Lee!” There was no answer. “Lee!” he called again. He said, ‘“I didn’t hear him go out. I want some fresh coffee.”
Cal jumped up. “I’ll make it.”
“Say,” said Adam, “you should be in school.”
“I don’t want to go.”
“You ought to go. Aron went.”
“I’m happy,” Cal said. “I want to be with you.”
Adam looked down at his hands. “Make the coffee,” he said softly and his voice was shy.
When Cal was in the kitchen Adam looked inward at himself with wonder. His nerves and muscles throbbed with an excited hunger. His fingers yearned to grasp, his legs to run. His eyes avidly brought the room into focus. He saw the chairs, the pictures, the red roses on the carpet, and new sharp things—almost people things but friendly things. And in his brain was born sharp appetite for the future—a pleased warm anticipation, as though the coming minutes and weeks must bring delight. He felt a dawn emotion, with a lovely day to slip golden and quiet over him. He laced his fingers behind his head and stretched his legs out stiff.
In the kitchen Cal urged on the water heating in the coffeepot, and yet he was pleased to be waiting. A miracle once it is familiar is no longer a miracle; Cal had lost his wonder at the golden relationship with his father but the pleasure remained. The poison of loneliness and the gnawing envy of the unlonely had gone out of him, and his person was clean and sweet, and he knew it was. He dredged up an old hatred to test himself, and he found the hatred gone. He wanted to serve his father, to give him some great gift, to perform some huge good task in honor of his father.
The coffee boiled over and Cal spent minutes cleaning up the stove. He said to himself, “I wouldn’t have done this yesterday.”
Adam smiled at him when he carried in the steaming pot. Adam sniffed and said, “That’s a smell could raise me out of a concrete grave.”
“It boiled over,” said Cal.
“It has to boil over to taste good,” Adam said. “I wonder where Lee went.”
“Maybe in his room. Shall I look?”
“No. He’d have answered.”
“Sir, when I finish school, will you let me run the ranch?”
“You’re planning early. How about Aron?”
“He wants to go to college. Don’t tell him I told you. Let him tell you, and you be surprised.”
“Why, that’s fine,” said Adam. “But don’t you want to go to college too?”
“I bet I could make money on the ranch—enough to pay Aron’s way through college.”
Adam sipped his coffee. “That’s a generous thing,” he said. “I don’t know whether I ought to tell you this but—well, when I asked you earlier what kind of boy Aron was, you defended him so badly I thought you might dislike him or even hate him.”
“I have hated him,” Cal said vehemently. “And I’ve hurt him too. But, sir, can I tell you something? I don’t hate him now. I won’t ever hate him again. I don’t think I will hate anyone, not even my mother—” He stopped, astonished at his slip, and his mind froze up tight and helpless.
Adam looked straight ahead. He rubbed his forehead with the palm of his hand. Finally he said quietly, “You know about your mother.” It was not a question.
“Yes—yes, sir.”
“All about her?”
“Yes, sir.”
Adam leaned back in his chair. “Does Aron know?”
“Oh, no! No—no, sir. He doesn’t know.”
“Why do you say it that way?”
“I wouldn’t dare to tell him.”
“Why not?”
Cal said brokenly, “I don’t think he could stand it. He hasn’t enough badness in him to stand it.” He wanted to continue, “—any more than you could, sir,” but he left the last unsaid.
Adam’s face looked weary. He moved his head from side to side. “Cal, listen to me. Do you think there’s any chance of keeping Aron from knowing? Think carefully.”
Cal said, “He doesn’t go near places like that. He’s not like me.”
“Suppose someone told him?”
“I don’t think he would believe it, sir. I think he would lick whoever told him and think it was a lie.”
“You’ve been there?”
“Yes, sir. I had to know.” And Cal went on excitedly, “If he went away to college and never lived in this town again—”
Adam nodded. “Yes. That might be. But he has two more years here.”
“Maybe I could make him hurry it up and finish in one year. He’s smart.”
“But you’re smarter?”
“A different kind of smart,” said Cal.
Adam seemed to grow until he filled one side of the room. His face was stern and his blue eyes sharp and penetrating. “Cal!” he said harshly.
“Sir?”
“I trust you, son,” said Adam.
2
Adam’s recognition brought a ferment of happiness to Cal. He walked on the balls of his feet. He smiled more often than he frowned, and the secret darkness was seldom on him.
Lee, noticing the change in him, asked quietly, “You haven’t found a girl, have you?”
“Girl? No. Who wants a girl?”
“Everybody,” said Lee.
And Lee asked Adam, “Do you know what’s got into Cal?”
Adam said, “He knows about her.”
“Does he?” Lee stayed out of trouble. “Well, you remember I thought you should have told them.”
“I didn’t tell him. He knew.”
“What do you think of that!” said Lee. “But that’s not information to make a boy hum when he studies and play catch with his cap when he walks. How about Aron?”
“I’m afraid of that,” said Adam. “I don’t think I want him to know.”
“It might be too late.”
“I might have a talk with Aron. Kind of feel around.”
Lee considered. “Something’s happened to you too.”
“Has it? I guess it has,” said Adam.
But humming and sailing his cap, driving quickly through his schoolwork, were only the smallest of Cal’s activities. In his new joy he appointed himself guardian of his father’s content. It was true what he had said about not feeling hatred for his mother. But that did not change the fact that she had been the instrument of Adam’s hurt and shame. Cal reasoned that what she could do before, she could do again. He set himself to learn all he could about her. A known enemy is less dangerous, less able to surprise.
At night he was drawn to the house across the tracks. Sometimes in the afternoon he lay hidden in the tall weeds across the street, watching the place. He saw the girls come out, dressed somberly, even severely. They left the house always in pairs, and Cal followed them with his eyes to the corner of Castroville Street, where they turned left toward Main Street. He discovered that if you didn’t know where they had come from you couldn’t tell what they were. But he was not waiting for the girls to come out. He wanted to see his mother in the light of day. He found that Kate emerged every Monday at one-thirty.