The Pastures of Heaven by John Steinbeck Read Free Book Online Page A

fruit trees. As though practice had made it adept, the farm fell quickly back to wildness. It was sold for taxes to a Monterey realty company, and the people of the Pastures of Heaven, whether they admitted it or not, were convinced that the Battle farm bore a curse. “It’s good land,” they said, “but I wouldn’t own it if you gave it to me. I don’t know what’s the matter, but there’s sure something funny about that place, almost creepy. Wouldn’t be hard for a fellow to believe in haunts.”
    A pleasant shudder went through the people of the Pastures of Heaven when they heard that the old Battle farm was again to be occupied. The rumor was brought in to the General Store by Pat Humbert who had seen automobiles in front of the old house, and T. B. Allen, the store proprietor, widely circulated the story. Allen imagined all the circumstances surrounding the new ownership and told them to his customers, beginning all his confidences with “They say.” “They say the fellow who’s bought the Battle place is one of those people that goes about looking for ghosts and writing about them.” T. B. Allen’s “they say” was his protection. He used it as newspapers use the word “alleged.”
    Before Bert Munroe took possession of his new property, there were a dozen stories about him circulating through the Pastures of Heaven. He knew that the people who were to be his new neighbors were staring at him although he could never catch them at it. This secret staring is developed to a high art among country people. They have seen every uncovered bit of you, have tabulated and memorized the clothes you are wearing, have noticed the color of your eyes and the shape of your nose, and, finally, have reduced your figure and personality to three or four adjectives, and all the time you thought they were oblivious to your presence.
    After he had bought the old place, Bert Munroe went to work in the overgrown yard while a crew of carpenters made over the house. Every stick of furniture was taken out and burned in the yard. Partitions were torn down and other partitions put in. The walls were repapered and the house reroofed with asbestos shingles. Finally a new coat of pale yellow paint was applied to the outside.
    Bert himself cut down all the vines, and all the trees in the yard, to let in the light. Within three weeks the old house had lost every vestige of its deserted, haunted look. By stroke after stroke of genius it had been made to look like a hundred thousand other country houses in the West.
    As soon as the paint inside and out was dry, the new furniture arrived, overstuffed chairs and a davenport, an enameled stove, steel beds painted to look like wood and guaranteed to provide a mathematical comfort. There were mirrors with scalloped frames, Wilton rugs and prints of pictures by a modem artist who has made blue popular.
    With the furniture came Mrs. Munroe and the three younger Munroes. Mrs. Munroe was a plump woman who wore a rimless pince nez on a ribbon. She was a good house manager. Again and again she had the new furniture moved about until she was satisfied, but once satisfied, once she had regarded the piece with a concentrated gaze and then nodded and smiled, that piece was fixed forever, only to be moved for cleaning.
    Her daughter Mae was a pretty girl with round smooth cheeks and ripe lips. She was voluptuous of figure, but under her chin there was a soft, pretty curve which indicated a future plumpness like her mother’s. Mae’s eyes were friendly and candid, not intelligent, but by no means stupid. Imperceptibly she would grow to be her mother’s double, a good manager, a mother of healthy children, a good wife with no regrets.
    In her own new room, Mae stuck dance programs between the glass and the frame of the mirror. On the walls she hung framed photographs of her friends in Monterey, and laid out her photograph album and her