The Pastures of Heaven (21 page)

Mrs. Banks laughed a great deal—clear, sweet laughter which indicated mild amusement or even inattention. She had a way of laughing appreciatively at everything anyone said, and, to merit this applause, people tried to say funny things when she was about. After her work in the house was finished, she dug in the flower garden. She had been a town girl; that was why she liked flowers, the neighbors said. Guests, driving up to the house, were welcomed by the high, clear laughter of Cleo Banks, and they chuckled when they heard it. She was so jolly. She made people feel good. No one could ever remember that she said anything, but months after hearing it, they could recall the exact tones of her laughter.

Raymond Banks rarely laughed at all. Instead he pretended a sullenness so overdrawn that it was accepted as humor. These two people were the most popular hosts in the valley. Now and then they invited everyone in the Pastures of Heaven to a barbecue in the oak grove beside their house. They broiled little chickens over coals of oak bark and set out hundreds of bottles of home brewed beer. These parties were looked forward to and remembered with great pleasure by the people of the valley.

When Raymond Banks was in high school, his chum had been a boy who later became the warden at San Quentin prison. The friendship had continued, too. At Christmas time they still exchanged little presents. They wrote to each other when any important thing happened. Raymond was proud of his acquaintance with the warden. Two or three times a year he received an invitation to be a witness at an execution, and he always accepted it. His trips to the prison were the only vacations he took.

Raymond liked to arrive at the warden's house the night before the execution. He and his friend sat together and talked over their school days. They reminded each other of things both remembered perfectly. Always the same episodes were recalled and talked about. Then, the next morning, Raymond liked the excitement, the submerged hysteria of the other witnesses in the warden's office. The slow march of the condemned aroused his dramatic sense and moved him to a thrilling emotion. The hanging itself was not the important part, it was the sharp, keen air of the whole proceeding that impressed him. It was like a super-church, solemn and ceremonious and somber. The whole thing made him feel a fullness of experience, a holy emotion that nothing else in his life approached. Raymond didn't think of the condemned any more than he thought of the chicken when he pressed the blade into its brain. No strain of cruelty nor any gloating over suffering took him to the gallows. He had developed an appetite for profound emotion, and his meager imagination was unable to feed it. In the prison he could share the throbbing nerves of the other men. Had he been alone in the death chamber with no one present except the prisoner and the executioner, he would have been unaffected.

After the death was pronounced, Raymond liked the second gathering in the warden's office. The nerve-wracked men tried to use hilarity to restore their outraged imaginations. They were more jolly, more noisily happy than they ordinarily were. They sneered at the occasional witness, usually a young reporter, who fainted or came out of the chamber crying. Raymond enjoyed the whole thing. It made him feel alive; he seemed to be living more acutely than at other times.

After it was all over, he had a good dinner with the warden before he started home again. To some little extent the same emotion occurred to Raymond when the little boys came to watch him kill chickens. He was able to catch a slight spark of their excitement.

The Munroe family had not been long in the Pastures of Heaven before they heard about the fine ranch of Raymond Banks and about his visits to the prison. The people of the valley were interested, fascinated and not a little horrified by the excursions to see men hanged. Before he ever saw Raymond, Bert Munroe pictured him as a traditional executioner, a lank, dark man, with a dull, deathly eye; a cold, nerveless man. The very thought of Raymond filled Bert with a kind of interested foreboding.

When he finally met Raymond Banks and saw the jolly black eyes and the healthy, burned face, Bert was disillusioned, and at the same time a little disgusted. The very health and heartiness of Raymond seemed incongruous and strangely obscene. The paradox of his good nature and his love for children was unseemly.

On the first of May, the Bankses gave one of their parties under the oak trees on the flat. It was the loveliest season of the year; lupins and shooting stars, gallitos and wild violets smoldered with color in the new, short grass on the hillsides. The oaks had put on new leaves as shiny and clean as washed holly. The sun was warm enough to drench the air with sage, and all the birds made frantic, noisy holiday. From the chicken yards came the contented gabbling of scratching hens and the cynical, self-satisfied quacking of the ducks.

At least fifty people were standing about the long tables under the trees. Hundreds of bottles of beer were packed in washtubs of salt and ice, a mixture so cold that the beer froze in the necks of the bottles. Mrs. Banks went about among the guests, laughing in greeting and in response to greeting. She rarely said a word. At the barbecue pits, Raymond was grilling little chickens while a group of admiring men stood about, offering jocular advice.

“If any of you can do it better, just step up,” Raymond shouted at them. “I'm going to put on the steaks now for anyone that's crazy enough not to want chicken.”

Bert Munroe stood nearby watching the red hands of Raymond. He was drinking a bottle of the strong beer. Bert was fascinated by the powerful red hands constantly turning over the chickens on the grill.

When the big platters of broiled chicken were carried to the tables, Raymond went back to the pits to cook some more for those fine men who might require a second or even a third little chicken. Raymond was alone now, for his audience had all flocked to the tables. Bert Munroe looked up from his plate of beef steak and saw that Raymond was alone by the pits. He put down his fork and strolled over.

“What's the matter, Mr. Munroe? Wasn't your chicken good?” Raymond asked with genial anxiety.

“I had steak, and it was fine. I eat pretty fast, I guess. I never eat chicken, you know.”

“That so? I never could understand how anyone wouldn't like chicken, but I know plenty of people don't. Let me put on another little piece of meat for you.”

“Oh! I guess I've had enough. I always think people eat too much. You ought to get up from the table feeling a little bit hungry. Then you keep well, like the animals.”

“I guess that's right,” said Raymond. He turned the little carcasses over the fire. “I notice I feel better when I don't eat so much.”

“Sure you do. So do I. So would everybody. Everybody eats too much.” The two men smiled warmly at each other because they had agreed on this point, although neither of them believed it very strongly.

“You sure got a nice piece of land in here,” Raymond observed, to double their growing friendship with a second agreement.

“Well, I don't know. They say there's loco weed on it, but I haven't seen any yet.”

Raymond laughed. “They used to say the place was haunted before you came and fixed it up so nice. Haven't seen any ghosts, have you?”

“Not a ghost. I'm more scared of loco weed than I am of ghosts. I sure do hate loco weed.”

“Don't know as I blame you. Course with chickens it doesn't bother me much, but it raises hell with you people that run stock.”

Bert picked up a stick from the ground and knocked it gently on the winking coals. “I hear you're acquainted with the warden up to San Quentin.”

“Know him well. I went to school with Ed when I was a kid. You acquainted with him, Mr. Munroe?”

“Oh, no—no. He's in the papers quite a bit. A man in his position gets in the papers quite a bit.”

Raymond's voice was serious and proud. “Yeah. He gets a lot of publicity all right. But he's a nice fella, Mr. Munroe, as nice a fella as you'd want to meet. And in spite of having all those convicts on his hands, he's just as jolly and friendly. You wouldn't think, to talk to him, that he had a big responsibility like that.”

“Is that so? You wouldn't think that. I mean, you'd think he'd be kind of worried with all those convicts on his hands. Do you see him often?”

“Well—yes. I do. I told you I went to school with him. I was kind of chums with him. Well, he hasn't forgot me. Every once in a while he asks me up to the prison when there's a hanging.”

Bert shuddered in spite of the fact that he had been digging for this. “Is that so?”

“Yes. I think it's quite an honor. Not many people get in except newspaper men and official witnesses, sheriffs and police. I have a good visit with Ed every time too, of course.”

A strange thing happened to Bert. He seemed to be standing apart from his body. His voice acted without his volition. He heard himself say, “I don't suppose the warden would like it if you brought a friend along.” He listened to his words with astonishment. He had not wanted to say that at all.

Raymond was stirring the coals vigorously. He was embarrassed. “Why, I don't know, Mr. Munroe. I never thought about it. Did you want to go up with me?”

Again Bert's voice acted alone. “Yes,” it said.

“Well, I'll tell you what I'll do then. I'll write to Ed (I write to him pretty often, you see, so he won't think anything of it). I'll just kind of slip it in the letter about you wanting to go up. Then maybe he'll send two invitations next time. Of course I can't promise, though. Won't you have another little piece of steak?”

Bert was nauseated. “No. I've had enough,” he said. “I'm not feeling so good. I guess I'll go lie down under a tree for a little while.”

“Maybe you shook up some of the yeast in that beer, Mr. Munroe. You've got to be pretty careful when you pour it.”

Bert sat on the crackling dry leaves at the foot of an oak tree. The tables, lined with noisy guests, were on his right. The hoarse laughing of the men and the shrill cries of communicating women came to him faintly through a wall of thought. Between the tree trunks he could see Raymond Banks still moving about the meat pits, grilling chickens for those few incredible appetites that remained unappeased. The nausea which had forced him away was subtly changing. The choked feeling of illness was becoming a strange panting congestion of desire. The desire puzzled Bert and worried him. He didn't want to go to San Quentin. It would make him unhappy to see a man hanged. But he was glad he had asked to go. His very gladness worried him. As Bert watched, Raymond rolled his sleeves higher up on his thick red arms before he cleaned the grates. Bert jumped up and started toward the pits. Suddenly the nausea arose in him again. He swerved around and hurried to the table where his wife sat shrilling pleasantries around the gnawed carcass of a chicken.

“My husband never eats chicken,” she was crying.

“I'm going to walk home,” Bert said. “I feel rotten.”

His wife laid down the carcass of the chicken and wiped her fingers and mouth on a paper napkin. “What's the matter with you, Bert?”

“I don't know. I just feel kind of rotten.”

“Do you want me to go home with you in the car?”

“No, you stay. Jimmie'll drive you home.”

“Well,” said Mrs. Munroe, “you better say good-bye to Mr. and Mrs. Banks.”

Bert turned doggedly away. “You tell them good-bye for me,” he said. “I'm feeling too rotten.” And he strode quickly away.

A week later Bert Munroe drove to the Banks farm and stopped his Ford in front of the gate. Raymond came from behind a bush where he had been trying a shot at a hawk. He sauntered out and shook hands with his caller.

“I've heard so much about your place, I thought I'd just come down for a look,” Bert said.

Raymond was delighted. “Just let me put this gun away, and I'll show you around.” For an hour they walked over the farm, Raymond explaining and Bert admiring the cleanliness and efficiency of the chicken ranch. “Come on in and have a glass of beer,” Raymond said, when they had covered the place. “There's nothing like cold beer on a day like this.”

When they were seated Bert began uneasily, “Did you write that letter to the warden, Mr. Banks?”

“Yes—I did. Ought to have an answer pretty soon now.”

“I guess you wonder why I asked you. Well, I think a man ought to see everything he can. That's experience. The more experience a man has, the better. A man ought to see everything.”

“I guess that's right, all right,” Raymond agreed.

Bert drained his glass and wiped his mouth. “Of course I've read in the papers about hangings, but it isn't like seeing one really. They say there're thirteen steps up to the gallows for bad luck. That right?”

Raymond's face wore an expression of concentration. “Why, I don't know, Mr. Munroe. I never counted them.”

“How do they—fight and struggle much after they're dropped?”

“I guess so. You see they're strapped and a black cloth is over their heads. You can't see much of anything. It's more like fluttering, I'd say, than struggling.”

Bert's face was red and intent. His eyes glistened with interest. “The papers say it takes fifteen minutes to half an hour for them to die. Is that right?”

“I—I suppose it is. Of course they're really what you might call dead the minute they drop. It's like you cut a chicken's head off, and the chicken flutters around, but it's really dead.”

“Yes—I guess that's right. Just reflex, they call it. I suppose it's pretty hard on some people seeing it for the first time.”