Kate shook her head sadly, remembering the cut-off little girl.Separated and shut off from others, like a town cut off by a flood. Kate remembers herself as a little girl apart from everyone. The word names how the girl was, and leaves open who or what did the cutting.
East of Eden
Chapter 50 — Teaching Companion
John Steinbeck · Mountaineers 10th–12th
Coaching, not a script — and not an answer key: every question here has more than one defensible answer.
This chapter's big question
At the end Kate imagines Cal’s eyes saying, “They had something and you missed it.” What does she believe she missed?
The tension Kate weeps, sure that “She was smarter and stronger than other people. She had something they lacked”; then Cal’s face hangs before her and the thought turns over: “They had something she lacked, and she didn’t know what it was.”
Today's focus
Kate’s last day: a test of Joe, a letter to the sheriff, an old game remembered, and Joe’s last morning.
Two core ideas
- Kate’s self-belief has always rested on being apart from others, and the sight of her sons turns that apartness from a strength into an absence she cannot name.
- Her death follows the shape of a game from her earliest years, shrinking until no one can find her, so the chapter shows the end of a life by the logic that built it.
The shape at a glance
After her sons’ visit, Kate sits in her room staring at the wall, and Joe Valery, who works for her, is uneasy because he cannot read her face. Her mind drifts over the blond boy, Aron, mad with shock, and his dark brother, Cal, laughing in the doorway. The pain is back in her hands and hip. Joe brings tea and, hearing weakness in her voice, tells a story about a stranger who says Ethel wants to talk. When Kate asks whether the name Faye means anything to him, he says not a thing, and she reminds him that Faye used to own the house. She tests him with an offer of ten thousand dollars, reads his face, and sends him away. She writes a note asking that the sheriff check Joe Valery’s fingerprints, and sends Therese, one of the girls, to mail it and to buy chocolates, toothbrushes and tooth powder, hinting that Therese may be put in charge while she is in the hospital. Alone, Kate senses that the end has come: Joe will be put away, but there will be someone else, and there is always Ethel. A memory returns. As a small girl who knew she was smarter and prettier than anyone, she sometimes felt surrounded by enemies; after reading Alice in Wonderland she carried a bottle of sugar water labelled “Drink me” and in her mind grew tiny enough to hide, with Alice as her friend. She kept one secret reserve, to drink the whole bottle and disappear so that she would never have been, and never had to use it, because she had Alice. Kate weeps, telling herself she was driven to whatever she did and had something other people lacked. Then Cal’s face appears and the thought turns over: they had something she lacked, and she did not know what. Ready now, she tells the girls she will sleep until morning and must not be disturbed. She writes a two-line will leaving everything to her son Aron Trask, signs it Catherine Trask, and makes up her face. In the gray lean-to room she swallows a capsule from the tube on her neck chain with cold tea, saying “Eat me” and “Drink me.” Faces come to her, last of all Cal, whose eyes seem to say she missed something. She pictures Alice waiting in a nail hole in the wall but goes right on past, and, the narrator says, she had never been. In the second section Joe spends a bad night, nearly leaves town at dawn, decides to ask Kate for a thousand dollars first, and packs anyway. At nine he finds her dead. He takes the watch from her chain, the will, a book of records about the girls and eighty dollars, and laughs over a packet of photographs with names on the back, which he takes for a gold mine. Oscar Noble comes to say the sheriff wants a talk. On the street Oscar asks whether Joe has ever been fingerprinted, Joe runs, and Oscar shoots him. A crowd gathers around the body.
A way in
Read the chapter yourself before the lesson. It is the chapter of Kate’s death by suicide. Name that plainly, do not dwell on how it is done, and keep the talk on what she thinks and remembers. Readers know from earlier chapters that Kate is Cathy Ames, Adam Trask’s wife, who shot him and left him with their newborn twins, Cal and Aron; that she now runs the Salinas house that was once Faye’s; that her hands are crippled with pain; that she wears a little tube on a chain at her neck; and that Joe Valery works for her and has been looking for Ethel, a former girl of the house who knew something about Faye’s death. On Thanksgiving night Cal brought Aron to see her. This chapter gives that visit only in fragments: Aron’s shock and ugly words, and Cal laughing in the doorway. The lesson should not fill them in. The chapter gives no reason for the will, and it does not say what becomes of the will, the keys or the photographs; leave them where the chapter leaves them. A few terms: a holograph will is one written wholly in its maker’s hand; a lean-to is a room built against the side of a house; to be mugged and printed is to be photographed and fingerprinted by the police, and a pinch is an arrest; faro is a gambling card game; a mackinaw is a heavy wool coat; Sigma Alpha Epsilon is a college fraternity, and pledges are its new members. The chapter has curses and crude names for Kate and the girls, and its second section makes a few bawdy references to the business of the house. Decide before reading aloud how these will be handled, and say so plainly to the student. Slow down twice: Kate alone at her desk, from “When the girl was gone” to “but she went steadily about her business”, and Joe at her desk, from “The two-line holograph will attracted him” to “He might have overlooked something.”
Lesson plan
Retell The student tells the chapter back, from Joe watching Kate stare at the wall to the crowd in the street. Look for the order: Kate’s drifting thoughts of the two brothers and the pain in her hands; the tea and Joe’s story; the slip about Faye and the ten-thousand-dollar test; the letter about Joe’s fingerprints and Therese’s errand; the memory of the girl, Alice and the bottle; Kate weeping at her desk and Cal’s face; the girls at noon; the will, the dressing table and the gray room; the faces and the nail hole; then Joe’s barbershop, his bad night and his plan at dawn; the body and the search of the desk; Oscar Noble and the run. Look for nothing added about the brothers’ visit or the reason for the will. Then ask what in Joe’s morning answers something in Kate’s last day.
Imitate the author After copying, the student writes two short passages in the manner of these. The first is six sentences about a memory coming back: one that ends on a phrase set off by a comma and uses a hyphened adjective before a noun; two plain sentences in the past perfect; one that saves its strongest word for the end; one that names two people and adds a phrase after a dash; and one that opens on “And” and closes on a reason with “because”. The second is six sentences of someone insisting on something to themselves: one that opens on its object and holds its verb to the end; one that makes a claim and restates it after a dash; a long, plain sentence of action; a sentence of three words; and two that repeat the claim in new forms. Read both aloud beside Steinbeck’s.
Debate Take sides on the second written question. One side argues that the chapter refuses Kate her wish. It gathers the letter to the sheriff, Oscar Noble at the door, the will in Joe’s pocket, the photographs in “Kate’s neat, sharp handwriting”, and Joe face down in the street. The other side argues that the chapter grants it. It gathers the narrator’s own words, “and she had never been”, a body with “not a ring, not a pin”, a house that runs its loud night with her door shut, and a last scene in which the crowd gathers around Joe, not her. Each side must answer the other’s strongest piece. Neither may say what becomes of the will, the keys or the photographs, or call her death justice.
Purpose Close on the chapter’s design. It is built in two halves that mirror each other. In the first, Kate catches Joe and sets a trap, then goes back to a small girl’s game and plays it to its end; the half closes on a sentence that tries to erase her. In the second, Joe, sure he has the breaks, grooms himself, waits, robs her desk and runs into her trap; the half closes on a crowd in the street. Ask why Steinbeck did not stop at the end of section 1, and what the plain, half-comic second half does to the first. Name the habit it practises: reading a character by the story they tell about themselves, and testing that story against what the rest of the page shows.
Easier Read the memory aloud together, from “She was a very small girl” to “because she had Alice.” Talk through the third and fourth discussion questions (the three names, and Alice in the nail hole), then answer the last written question aloud before writing it.
On level Talk through all five discussion questions in order, then write the three written questions as a thesis, the strongest objection and a revised thesis, each with lines from the chapter.
Harder Ask for one argued essay on the story Kate tells about herself: the girl “smarter and prettier than anyone else”, the forest of enemies, “Whatever she had done, she had been driven to do”, and “something more than other people.” Set beside it the story Joe tells about himself, from “his first real good break” to “This was the real breaks.” Meet the strongest objection, that the chapter gives her desolation real weight and is not only exposing a lie she tells herself, and argue from this chapter alone.
Discussion
- When Joe slips up about Faye, Kate responds “to the challenge with something like pleasure.” What is she enjoying?Character
What it asks It asks the student to look closely at the one stretch of the morning in which Kate is herself again. Before Joe comes in, her mind drifts “the way a bat drifts and swoops in the evening” over the blond boy’s face and his dark brother laughing, and the pain creeps into her hands and hip. Joe, who has never heard “a tone of weakness in her” before, moves in with his story of the stranger in Kellogg’s cigar store. Kate asks, “Does the name Faye mean anything to you?”, and his “Not a thing” gives him away. The narrator says, “The sudden alarm was good for Kate. It took the blond head and the pain from her. It gave her something to do.” She tests him with ten thousand dollars, swings round to read his face, asks, “Did I catch you out, Joe?”, and sends him off with “You’re a nice boy.” The question ties to the hinge through Kate’s old belief that she is smarter than other people. It should not ask what she lacks; that is the last written question.
One reading
The win. Kate has always believed she is the cleverer one, and here is proof on a bad morning: a man trying to work her is caught by one question about a name. She draws it out, offers money she does not mean, watches him lick his lips, and sends him off with a pat on the head. The pleasure is in being smarter than someone again.
Her eyes would not let him go.
You’re a nice boy.
Another reading
The forgetting. What she enjoys is not Joe but the break from herself. For a few minutes the blond head and the pain are gone. The fight is a place to hide, like the old game, and as soon as Joe has gone and the letter is written, what she was hiding from comes back.
It took the blond head and the pain from her.
Here it was.
Listen for
- Hears the hedge in “something like pleasure”: the narrator does not quite call it pleasure.
- Notices that Joe moves in because he hears weakness, and that Kate turns his move on him with a question about a name.
- Sets “You’re a nice boy” beside “You’re a good girl” to Therese, and asks how Kate talks to the people she manages.
- Does not say what Kate lacks; the question is about what she has back for a few minutes.
If stuck
- What does the narrator say the alarm takes away from Kate?
- What does Kate do with her eyes when she offers Joe the money?
- Can a fight be a kind of rest?
A strong answer A strong response names what Kate enjoys and grounds it in the tea scene. One reader says it is the win: she has always been the cleverer one, and catching Joe with one question proves it on a morning when little else holds. Another says it is the forgetting: the danger takes the blond head and the pain from her, and they return the moment Joe is gone. The best answers hear the hedge in “something like” and notice how short the pleasure lasts.
- Kate tells her girls, “Good night, then. It’s afternoon but I mean good night.” Who is that line meant for?Inference
What it asks It asks the student to stand in the dining room at noon. Kate has just turned the doorknob “by rolling it between her palms.” The girls “choked in the middle of laughter”, and the cook comes in from the kitchen. The narrator calls her “a sick ghost, crooked and in some way horrible”, and her smile frightens them, “for it was like the frame for a scream.” She asks where Joe is. She says she will take some medicine and sleep: “I’ll sleep the clock around.” No one is to come near her “until tomorrow morning.” Then: “Good night, then. It’s afternoon but I mean good night.” The girls answer “obediently”, and she walks “crabwise back to her room.” Almost everything she says can be heard two ways, and no one in the room hears the second. The question ties to the hinge through the last time Kate stands among other people: she speaks to them in a form they cannot read. It should not ask what she lacks; that is the last written question. It should not dwell on how she dies.
One reading
Herself. It is a private joke, told where only she can get it. The girls hear an odd way of talking and answer on cue. The plan stays hers alone, the way the girl kept her reserve from everyone and laughed from an anthole where no one could find her. Even her goodbye is a hiding place.
“Good night, ma’am,” they chorused obediently.
That was her reserve—guarded from everyone.
Another reading
The house, tomorrow. The line is meant to be understood later. Tonight it sounds like a sick woman’s odd phrase. Once she is found, it will read as what it was. She sets the house to run without her until morning, and this is as close as she comes to saying goodbye to anyone.
Tell Joe I don’t want anybody to come near me for anything until tomorrow morning.
She leaned against the dining-room wall and smiled at her girls
Listen for
- Notices that almost everything Kate says to the girls can be heard two ways, and that they hear only one.
- Hears what the narrator shows, “a sick ghost” and a smile “like the frame for a scream”, and asks how much the girls half understand.
- Sets the line beside the girl “looking out of an anthole, laughing” where no one could find her.
- Keeps to what Kate says and how it is heard; does not dwell on how she dies.
If stuck
- What does Kate tell the girls she is going to do?
- How do the girls answer her?
- Can you say goodbye to someone without telling them?
A strong answer A strong response names who the line is for and grounds it in the dining-room scene. One reader says it is for Kate herself: a private joke the girls answer on cue, her plan kept from everyone as the girl kept her reserve. Another says it is meant to be read later: tonight it is an odd phrase, and once she is found it will read as a goodbye, the nearest she comes to one. The best answers notice that nearly every line she speaks can be heard two ways, and that her smile already frightens the girls.
- Kate signs her letter “Mrs. Kate” and her will “Catherine Trask”, and beside Alice she is Cathy. Which of them dies in the gray room?Author's choice
What it asks It asks the student to follow the names. The letter to Ralph is signed “Mrs. Kate.” The will reads, “I leave everything I have to my son Aron Trask.” She signs it “Catherine Trask”, and her fingers “dwelt on the page” before she leaves it face upward. The memory opens on “a very small girl” with no name. The name Cathy first comes as the girl hides: “Cathy would be under a leaf or looking out of an anthole, laughing.” The narrator calls her Kate until she walks “crabwise back to her room.” Once her door is shut, the name Kate does not come back until section 2, when Joe finds “Kate’s head” deep in the pillow. In the gray room she is only “she”, and it is Cathy whose arm goes around Alice’s waist. The last sentence of section 1 uses no name at all. The question asks about the writer’s choice, and through it about who Kate is at the end, which the hinge takes up. It should not give a reason for the will; the chapter gives none.
One reading
Cathy. The woman goes back to the girl. The game is the girl’s, the friend is the girl’s, and at the end the narrator gives the arm around Alice’s waist to Cathy. Kate and Catherine Trask are names she took on later; what walks off into the nail hole is the girl who first played.
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.
Another reading
Kate. The woman who dies has done a grown woman’s work all day: caught Joe, sent the letter, managed Therese and the girls, and made up her face as she always does. Cathy is a story she has to force her mind to hold. The narrator calls her Kate through her last hours among other people, and Kate again when Joe finds her.
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.
She forced her mind to stay on Alice—so tiny and waiting.
Listen for
- Finds where the name Cathy first appears, and that the memory begins with no name at all.
- Weighs the will as a third answer: the one paper in the chapter that calls her a mother, and her fingers resting on it.
- Notices that the name Kate stops when she shuts her door: in the gray room she is only “she” and Cathy, and the last sentence of section 1 says only “she”.
- Gives no reason for the will; the chapter gives none.
If stuck
- What name does Kate sign on the will?
- When does the narrator first call the small girl Cathy?
- Can anyone go back to being the person they were at five?
A strong answer A strong response chooses a name and grounds it in the narrator’s word choices. One reader says Cathy dies: the game, the friend and the wish all belong to the girl, and the narrator gives Cathy the arm around Alice’s waist. Another says Kate dies, the grown woman who spent her last day managing everyone and dressing as she always did, holding the girl’s story in place by force. The best answers weigh “Catherine Trask” on the will, notice where the name Kate stops, and hear the plain “she” at the end.
- In the gray room Kate thinks, or says, “Alice doesn’t know. I’m going right on past.” Why doesn’t she stop where Alice is waiting?Character
What it asks It asks the student to set the game’s two endings side by side. In the memory Alice was “always waiting to welcome her to tinyness”, and there was one more thing “held in reserve”: to drink the whole bottle and disappear. “But she had never gone clear out—never had to.” The narrator says the girl never had to drink it all “because she had Alice.” In the gray room Kate forces her mind “to stay on Alice—so tiny and waiting.” She pictures Alice in a nail hole in the wall, and the two of them walking away “tiny as the head of a pin.” Then she thinks, “Alice doesn’t know. I’m going right on past.” The question keeps Alice from being decoration: the remembered game shapes the whole last scene. It should not settle what Kate lacks; that is the last written question.
One reading
Alice cannot hold her now. The girl stopped at tininess because a friend was there. The woman has to force her mind onto Alice, and other faces push in from the edges of her eyes. A friend you must hold in place by effort is not enough to stop you.
She forced her mind to stay on Alice—so tiny and waiting.
Other faces peered in from the sides of her eyes
Another reading
She is doing what the game always promised. Its best part was never the friend; it was the reserve, her threat and her safety, kept from everyone. Even now she keeps it from Alice. She passes Alice because at last she wants the thing she held back.
It was her threat and her safety.
That was her reserve—guarded from everyone.
Listen for
- Notices “Alice doesn’t know”: even her one friend is not told.
- Sets “never had to” beside “I’m going right on past” and asks what is different now.
- Notices the nail hole: a mark in a gray wall, where the girl once had clover and towering grass.
- Keeps to Alice and the game, and does not dwell on how Kate dies.
If stuck
- Where does Kate picture Alice in the gray room?
- Why, says the narrator, did the girl never drink the whole bottle?
- Can a comfort stop working?
A strong answer A strong response explains why Kate goes past Alice and grounds it in the memory and the gray room. One reader says Alice can no longer hold her: the friend is now a picture held in place by force, while other faces crowd in. Another says the game’s real prize was always the reserve, guarded even from Alice, and now she takes it. The best answers set “never had to” beside “going right on past” and leave the hinge’s question for the end.
- Joe finds the photographs in Kate’s desk and laughs aloud. He thinks, “This was the real breaks.” What does a break mean to Joe?Character
What it asks It asks the student to follow one word through Joe’s half of the chapter. On the first page Kate is “his first real good break”, and his one plan is to keep her stirred up “until she gave herself away. Then he could jump in any direction.” Caught out over Faye, he wonders “if he’d bollixed up the breaks.” At dawn he weighs what he knows about Ethel: “The breaks about Ethel might not be as good as he thought at first, but a thousand bucks was a stake.” He pictures Reno, dealing faro with “regular hours and no dames”, and an apartment with “big chairs and a davenport.” He nearly leaves, then decides, “Better wait.” He packs his suitcase anyway. At nine, with Kate dead in the lean-to, he finds photographs with a name, an address and a title on the back in her hand, and laughs aloud. To him, “This was the real breaks.” “A gold mine—guy could live for years on these.” Minutes later he runs from Oscar Noble and is shot. The question keeps Joe’s half from being an afterthought: like Kate, he is sure he is the clever one. It should not ask what Kate lacks, and it should not say what becomes of the photographs.
One reading
A hold on someone. Every break Joe names is someone else’s slip or secret: Kate, if she can be stirred up until she gives herself away; what he knows about Ethel; a councilman in a photograph. He never plans to make anything. He waits for someone to give themselves away, and then he jumps. The real break is a drawer full of other people’s secrets, written in Kate’s own hand.
Then he could jump in any direction.
A gold mine—guy could live for years on these.
Another reading
A way out. What Joe wants from a break is a stake and an exit: Reno, regular hours, no dames, an apartment with big chairs. A break is luck big enough to let him stop. That is why the photographs make him laugh: he thinks they will carry him for years. Yet the same break keeps him in her room filling his pockets, with his suitcase already packed.
He could get a job dealing faro in Reno—regular hours and no dames.
Joe went back to his room and read some more and then he packed his suitcase.
Listen for
- Follows the word from “his first real good break” to “This was the real breaks”, and notices that the last one comes with Kate dead in the next room.
- Notices that a break, for Joe, always comes from outside: he waits for it and jumps.
- Hears what Kate said of him, “You’re good at figuring things out,” and weighs how good he is.
- Sets Joe’s laugh beside Kate’s letter, already on its way to the sheriff, and does not say what becomes of the photographs.
If stuck
- What does Joe find in the brown envelopes?
- What does Joe picture doing in Reno?
- Can a piece of luck also be a trap?
A strong answer A strong response says what a break means to Joe and grounds it in his own words across the chapter. One reader says a break is a hold on someone else: Kate’s weakness, what he knows about Ethel, a packet of photographs he thinks he can live on for years. Another says a break is a way out: a stake big enough to take him to Reno and regular hours. The best answers notice that every break comes to Joe from outside, that his suitcase is packed while he fills his pockets, and that Kate’s letter is already on its way.
Critical thinking
- Kate remembers herself as “the cut-off little girl.” Who cut that girl off?
What it asks It asks the student to read the memory for a cause the narrator’s word leaves out. Kate shakes her head “sadly, remembering the cut-off little girl.” The word names how the girl was, not who did the cutting. The memory gives material for both answers. The girl “knew she was smarter and prettier than anyone else.” Then “now and then a lonely fear would fall upon her so that she seemed surrounded by a tree-tall forest of enemies”, and “every thought and word and look was aimed to hurt her”, with “no place to run and no place to hide.” Her answer was the bottle marked “Drink me”: she would grow smaller and smaller, “Let her enemies look for her then!”, and Cathy would be under a leaf or in an anthole, laughing. “They couldn’t find her then.” Her one friend, Alice, came out of a book. The reserve was “guarded from everyone,” and the game was “so good that it was almost worth while to be miserable.” A paragraph later the woman tells herself, “She was different—she had something more than other people.” The question ties to the hinge through that apartness: whether the girl was shut out or shut herself away bears on what the woman comes to believe others had. It should not ask what Kate lacks; that is the last written question. It should not say she repents, and it should not dwell on how she dies.
One reading
The world did. To the girl the enemies are real. When the fear comes, every thought and word and look is aimed to hurt her, and she has no place to run. She cries in panic. The game is not a choice to be alone; it is the only way out a very small girl can find, and it works. The grown woman says the same of her whole life: whatever she did, she was driven to do.
Then every thought and word and look was aimed to hurt her, and she had no place to run and no place to hide.
And she would cry in panic because there was no escape and no sanctuary.
Another reading
She did. The fear comes first, and the enemies only seem to surround her. No enemy is ever named. She already knows she is smarter and prettier than anyone else, and her answer to fear is to get out of everyone’s reach: too small to find, laughing from an anthole, with a friend from a book and a reserve she keeps from everyone. The game makes being apart so good that misery is almost worth it.
Most of the time she knew she was smarter and prettier than anyone else.
But now and then a lonely fear would fall upon her so that she seemed surrounded by a tree-tall forest of enemies.
Listen for
- Hears “seemed”: the lonely fear comes first, and the forest of enemies follows from it.
- Notices that no enemy is ever named, that the one friend comes out of a book, and that the reserve is “guarded from everyone.”
- Sets “cut-off” beside “She was different—she had something more than other people,” and asks whether being cut off and being different are the same thing to Kate.
- States a thesis, meets the strongest objection and revises; does not say what Kate lacks, does not say she repents, and keeps away from how she dies.
If stuck
- What did the girl feel when the lonely fear fell on her?
- Who is the girl’s friend in the memory, and where does that friend come from?
- Can someone shut themselves away and still feel shut out?
A strong answer A strong response says who cut the girl off, meets the strongest objection, and revises, grounding each step in the memory. One thesis says the world did: the girl felt every thought and word and look aimed to hurt her, with no place to run, and the game was the only escape she could find. The strongest objection is that the page puts the fear first: she already knew she was smarter and prettier than anyone, a lonely fear fell on her so that she only “seemed” surrounded, and her answer was to hide from everyone, with a friend from a book and a reserve she kept to herself. A good revision might say the fear cut her off and the game kept her there. The best answers notice that “cut-off” names no one who did the cutting, and they leave what Kate lacks for the last question.
- Kate’s part of the chapter ends on the small girl’s old wish: “and she had never been.” How far does the rest of the chapter let that wish come true?
What it asks It asks the student to read section 2 against the last words of section 1. The narrator closes Kate’s part with her wish granted in its own grammar: “she grew smaller and smaller and then disappeared—and she had never been.” Then the chapter goes on. That night, to Joe, she is “that brooding dangerous thing” silent behind its closed door. He finds her dead, searches her room and finds “not a ring, not a pin”: “She didn’t have a goddam thing—not even a silver-backed hairbrush.” At her desk he pockets the will and a book with records of every girl, and pulls out photographs with “a name and address and a title” on the back in Kate’s hand. Then Oscar Noble comes: the sheriff wants a talk, and on the street Oscar asks whether Joe has ever been “mugged or printed”. Joe runs and is shot. The question sets Joe’s certainty, “This was the real breaks”, against the trap she set. It must not say what becomes of the will, the keys or the photographs; the chapter ends with Joe in the street.
One reading
Hardly at all. Everything she made goes on working after she is gone. Her letter brings Oscar Noble to the door with a question about prints. Her will, in her own hand, is in Joe’s pocket, and her envelopes look to him like a fortune. The woman who wished never to have been still settles her score with Joe the next morning.
Tell the sheriff it wouldn’t do any harm to check on Joe Valery’s fingerprints.
Ever been mugged or printed?
Another reading
A long way. The narrator grants the sentence and never takes it back. Joe finds no ring, no pin, not even a silver-backed hairbrush. No one grieves: the loud night goes on with her door shut, Joe thinks only of what he can take, and the chapter’s last picture is a crowd around Joe, not her. As a person she is already gone from her own story.
He crept to the lean-to and stood in front of her—not a ring, not a pin.
Oscar went into a Filipino poolroom to phone, and when he came out there was quite a crowd around the body.
Listen for
- Sets “everything I have” in the will beside “She didn’t have a goddam thing”.
- Notices that Kate trapped Joe “like a rat” and that he runs “like a rabbit”, into a trap she set before she died.
- Weighs Joe as her echo: sure he was clever, sure he had “the breaks”.
- Does not say what becomes of the will, the keys or the photographs, and does not call her death justice.
If stuck
- What does Joe find when he searches Kate’s room?
- What does Oscar Noble ask Joe on the way to the sheriff?
- Can a person disappear and still change what happens?
A strong answer A strong response weighs how far the wish comes true, meets the strongest objection, and revises. One thesis says hardly at all: her letter, her will and her photographs go on acting, and the man who thought he had beaten her dies in the trap she set. The strongest objection is that the narrator grants the sentence, Joe finds no ring and no pin on her, no one mourns, and the last crowd gathers around Joe. A good revision might say the woman vanishes while her schemes outlive her. The best answers keep to what the chapter shows and pass no verdict on her death.
- At the end Kate imagines Cal’s eyes saying, “They had something and you missed it.” What does she believe she missed?
What it asks It asks the chapter’s own question. Set the pieces side by side. At her desk Kate weeps, “cold and desolate, alone and desolate”, and tells herself, “She was smarter and stronger than other people. She had something they lacked.” Then “Cal’s dark face hung in the air in front of her and his lips were smiling with cruelty”, and the thought turns over: “They had something she lacked, and she didn’t know what it was.” In the gray room the faces come, “her father and mother, and Charles, and Adam, and Samuel Hamilton, and then Aron,” and last Cal. “He didn’t have to speak.” His eyes say, “You missed something. They had something and you missed it.” Earlier the blond boy’s face, “hurt, bewildered, despairing”, brought back the girl and Alice, the friend “to love her and trust her.” The question asks what Kate believes, and she herself says she does not know what it was; the student builds the answer from what the chapter puts in front of her. The answer should not say she repents, should not call her death justice or redemption, and should not invent what was said on the night of the visit.
One reading
Love. The girl never drank the whole bottle because she had a friend to love her and trust her. The woman has only a picture of that friend, which she must force her mind to hold. Cal’s eyes tell her the others had what Alice gave the girl, and that she let it go by.
And always there was Alice to play with, Alice to love her and trust her.
Alice was her friend, always waiting to welcome her to tinyness.
Another reading
The power to be hurt. Kate has always laughed to protect herself. Aron’s face was hurt and bewildered, and his ugly words were aimed more at himself than at her: he can be wounded, and he turns on himself. What the others have is the thing her cleverness kept out, and she cannot even name it.
Kate had laughed too—the quickest and best self-protection.
She heard his ugly words aimed not so much at her as at himself.
Listen for
- Notices that Kate “didn’t know what it was”, and treats the answer as a reading of her belief, built from the page.
- Weighs why the words come through Cal’s eyes and not Aron’s, and that Cal “didn’t have to speak”: whose voice is she hearing?
- Notices that the old thought, “She had something they lacked”, is turned over word for word, not let go.
- Does not say she repents, does not call her death justice or redemption, and does not invent what was said on the night of the visit.
If stuck
- What did the small girl have that kept her from drinking the whole bottle?
- What did Kate see in Aron’s face?
- Can you miss something without knowing what it was?
A strong answer A strong response says what Kate believes she missed, meets the strongest objection, and revises. One thesis says love: the girl was kept from the reserve by a friend who loved and trusted her, and the woman has only a picture of that friend. The strongest objection is that the page points elsewhere: Aron’s face could be hurt and his words turned on himself, while Kate always laughed for protection, so what she missed may be the power to be wounded. A good revision might join the two: to be loved, a person must be open to hurt. The best answers note that she “didn’t know what it was” and keep to her belief, without judging her death.
Vocabulary definitions
- cut-off
- driven
Whatever she had done, she had been driven to do.
Pushed or forced by something stronger than yourself, so that a choice hardly feels like your own. Kate tells herself she was driven to whatever she did. The word moves the weight of her acts onto whatever did the driving, and the chapter never names what that was.- self-protection
Kate had laughed too—the quickest and best self-protection.
Guarding yourself from harm, especially from being hurt or seen through. The narrator calls Kate’s laugh at her sons the quickest and best self-protection. The word turns the laugh into a shield, and leaves the reader to ask what she was shielding.- outpointed
He wanted to get out of this room where he was outpointed and outfought.
Beaten on points, the way a boxer loses a match without being knocked down. Kate has scored on every exchange, and Joe leaves still standing but beaten. The boxing word suits a man who sees life as a contest of breaks.- crabwise
Kate turned and walked crabwise back to her room.
Sideways, the way a crab moves. With her hip and hands in pain, Kate cannot walk straight back to her room. The word shows her crooked body, and fits a woman whose goodbye to the girls also comes sideways: “It’s afternoon but I mean good night.”- dwelt
Her fingers dwelt on the page, and then she got up and left her will face upward on the desk.
Stayed or lingered on something. Kate’s crippled fingers rest on her two-line will for a moment before she leaves it. The word marks a pause the chapter does not explain.