Eden River (6 page)

For days he had wandered in strange country, neither seeing his former companions nor thinking of them except as factors in a problem. And now, with Kirith in his sight, he was blind to everything else. For she, to his sense, offered all the beauty of earth and sky, and much else besides. The darkness of night, he said, is in her hair, but the gold of her flesh is honey in the mouth. Her eyes are full of the moon, but her lips are red with morning. She is the tree of plenty and the river of joy. He said to her: I am Abel. And she answered: I am Kirith, a daughter of Eve. I have been many days in the forest looking for the camp of my brothers, looking for Zildah and Larian. Eve and Adam sent me to bring back news of them. But Abel said: Why didn't Adam come himself? There was a time when he came often to our camp, but since the women have been with us he hasn't come near. Was it Adam that sent you, or Eve? Kirith answered: It was Eve who said, Go to your sisters; and Adam—Here she paused as if in doubt, and when Abel questioned her again concerning Adam she put the question aside, saying: It is enough that I'm here. My search is ended. But where, she added after a pause, are my
sisters and your brother? Zildah and Larian, said Abel, have brought forth men-children, and Cain my brother is with them. They are far from here, Kirith. Let's go to them, said Kirith: I want to see my sisters and the home you've made with them. But Abel, looking on her beauty, had no mind for Cain and the others. Night is near, he said, and the darkness will be warm about us.

So they stayed together in that place for seven days and nights. And Abel, because of a strange new notion that had taken possession of him, gave his heart into the keeping of Kirith and held her for his own. We are one flesh, he said, and cannot be divided: no, not for a single day or a single night. And Kirith, being overwhelmed with love of him, received what he told her and was submissive in everything, counting herself as nothing but what he had made her, and studying only to give him pleasure, even to the point of watching him for signs of weariness and stealing out of sight so that the desire of his eyes might not be blunted by repletion. By love and art she might perhaps have prolonged his bliss for seven days more: he himself had no doubt of it, and it was therefore with a darkened glance that on the morning of the eighth day he observed Cain coming towards him,
lightly swinging his axe. Abel stared, afraid of what must follow, yet resolved on his secret plan. With one part of him he welcomed his brother and rejoiced in the memories of a long comradeship that started up in his mind at sight of him. But the dream to which he had dedicated himself forbad any yielding to that pleasure, and he stood, sullen-faced, waiting for Cain to speak.

Cain greeted him in brotherly fashion. So I've found you at last. But why, he asked, have you been so long away from us? It's pleasant here, answered Abel: I'm content with it. And he would have left his answer at that had not Kirith at this moment come by chance within sight. Kirith is with me, said Abel reluctantly. Kirith? What is Kirith? asked his brother. Kirith, she's here with me. She is the sister of Zildah and Larian. Cain's eyes had already found Kirith and found her fair. He uttered a word of pleasure and said happily: Come then. Let Kirith come with us to the camp. No, said Abel. No, he repeated with raised voice, Kirith is not for you: she's mine. Cain stared at his brother in bewilderment. She's mine, insisted Abel again. The brow of Cain clouded with trouble. What words are these? What is 'mine'? She is Kirith, isn't she? And getting no answer he
added in a puzzled tone: You said she was Kirith, didn't you? I don't understand. She's mine, said Abel for the third time. She is my woman and mine alone. She is to me as Eve is to Adam: you shan't touch her.

The flash of understanding that visited Cain's mind was a flash of darkness, and in that moment the golden age was ended. Abel repented of his harsh manners and began speaking in a quieter tone. Listen, Cain. There's something I must tell you that will make everything plain to you. We are of the seed of Adam given by Adam into the body of our mother Eve and brought forth by her. Cain stared stupidly. What is this? There is no meaning in what you say. You are talking in a dream, Abel. Come now to the camp, and Kirith with you. You are not yourself. But Abel, for answer, repeated his statement word for word, adding: It is true. I have found it in my mind. Let it be so, said Cain. It makes no meaning to me, and I'm tired of talking with you. Nevertheless, cried Abel urgently, you must hear me. You've seen the seed of the myrtle fall to the ground and be buried under the soil? I've seen that, agreed Cain. And you've seen a green finger growing out of the earth from that seed? I've seen that too, said Cain. Even so,
said Abel, even so in the act of love did Adam give the seed of his body into Eve's body and we that were born of her are the sons of Adam. But Cain would not understand his brother's strange doctrine. The sons of Adam! he echoed derisively: Adam is a man, and a man can't bring forth sons. Therefore you're talking in a dream. Come out of your dream, and be my brother that I know, and go with me to the camp where the women wait for us. I shall stay here, said Abel, and Kirith with me. And she shall bear the sons of my body. Cain pondered this saying darkly. The children of Zildah and Larian, he said, of whose seed are they? This was precisely the question that Abel had been seeking to drive into his brother's mind. Whose are they, Cain? We don't know. But you go back alone to Zildah and Larian, and let them be yours as Kirith is mine. And they will bear children to you. To me? said Cain. I don't care about that. A child is a child, and whether it comes of me or of you is nothing. To me, answered Abel, it's everything. In the bodies of my children I shall live again. In them I shall go to the ends of the earth, and their thoughts shall be my thoughts. They shall be as the leaves of the tree for number, and the darkness shall not swallow them up,
and I, I, I, shall possess the earth with my spirit and cover the earth with my substance.

Cain, looking intently on his brother, thought him mad, though of the nature of madness he knew nothing. And turning to Kirith, who all this time had stood silent with downcast eyes, he said: And you, Kirith, haven't you anything to say? Will you come with me to your sisters, or will you stay here with this dreamer and babbler? Saying nothing, she lifted up her eyes and looked at him; and because she was strange and dark and subtle, and because she was denied to him by his brother, he desired her. Kirith will stay with me, said Abel. Can't she speak for herself? asked Cain. Or are you her mother, and she a child at the breast, that you must speak for her? Listen to me, Abel, he added, with growing frenzy, if Kirith stays here I shall stay too. So saying he looked again at Kirith, and to his inflamed fancy it seemed that a kindness for himself burned in the dark of her eyes. In two strides he was with her, touching her hands. Away! shouted Abel. Keep away from her, Cain. She doesn't want you. And now Cain saw in her eyes, or thought he saw, that Abel's words were true, for she looked at him fearfully and ran from him into the arms of Abel. Never before had he
seen fear of himself in the eyes of a woman, or indeed of any creature: not so much as a bird had taken flight from him hitherto, except in playfulness. And the feeling that he was horrible in her sight made him ashamed, and his desire grew bitter. He stood as if stunned, hating Abel, hating earth and sky, hating his own body which she had spurned. Already the authors of his humiliation were out of sight, and Cain's thoughts followed them.

All day he stayed in that place, alone with his disease; and for the greater part of the night he paced to and fro or hobbled in a circle, like a beast at short tether, always coming back to the spot where Abel and Kirith had put him to shame. It was less for the woman that he suffered than for Abel. Desiring Kirith, he hated Abel for denying her to him. Loving Abel, he hated Kirith for alienating Abel's heart. But this hate was nothing but the desperate expedient of a love beating in vain against closed doors, and all the dreadful power of that love was in it. Loving Abel, and seeing his love rejected, he hated himself and vowed that he hated Abel; in this fantasy of hatred his writhing spirit sought to disguise the fact of loss; and to be reminded that Abel was still dear to him—as
happened whenever the tension of his resolution relaxed—pricked him to madness; in the gall of his anger lingered a loathly sweetness.

Towards morning he fell on the ground and slept fitfully, but he was up again at the first hint of light, prowling from tree to tree with mechanical iteration, insensible to the greenness of the grass, the spiced air of morning, the increasing rustle and chatter of birds. His feet hurried him here and there; his ears heard and his eyes saw nothing, until, with the effect of waking, the picture he had played with all night was pushed suddenly under his nose. Within three strides of him they lay, Kirith and Abel, asleep, his head lying in the crook of her arm and held close like a child at its mother's breast. Their posture touched a hidden nerve in Cain to intolerable anguish; a howl like a wolf's howling came out of his mouth. The lovers awoke, and Abel sprang to his feet, but the flint of Cain's axe struck him down. Ah that was good, said Cain. An immense relief flooded him. With no glance for Abel he looked round in search of the woman, but she was not there. He stood wondering for a moment, unable to keep pace with the events that overwhelmed him. Then tears gushed out of his eyes; he fell on his knees beside the body of Abel,
and stared at his work, bewildered, unbelieving. Abel did not move or speak. Why? His face was broken, his mouth hung open, his eyes stared. Blood poured in a pulsing rhythm from a hole in his temple and ran into the grass, varnishing its green a dull red. It was beyond Cain's understanding that his brother could behave like this. He seized his hands and spoke to him in a puzzled voice; stroked his face, pleaded with him. Wake up, Abel. Wake up. Speak to me. Wake up, it's Cain. Come and be my brother again. Come back to the camp. Abel, why don't you speak? He took him by the shoulders and shook him, at first gently, then with growing frenzy; and, seeing the head hang limp and fall into unnatural attitudes, he divined at last that something without precedent had happened to his brother, something ugly and unknown. He dropped the body and fell upon it with sobs, raging and imploring.

But Abel did not answer. A voice spoke to him but it was not Abel's voice, and when in despair he abandoned his attempt to win speech from him, and looked up, he saw the woman, Kirith, standing at a little distance. At sight of her he rose dizzily. Kirith, Abel's asleep. He won't wake up. He won't speak. He's in a dream and won't come out
of it. What shall we do? Kirith, without answering, came nearer to him. She glanced at Abel with incomprehension and distaste. What shall we do to wake him? asked Cain again. Take me, said Kirith, to the camp where my sisters are. She trembled, and came nearer still, and touched Cain's hand. Take me to my sisters, she said. But Cain, with eyes averted, pushed her away, saying: The voice of my brother's blood cries to me from the ground.

Waking a hundred times in the night, Cain started up to peer in terror at the surrounding darkness. What do you want with me? Keep away. There's blood on your face. Why do you stare at me? If it's Kirith you want, take her. I won't have her near me. Find her and take her away. This ghost of Abel was stiff and straight and staring. Cain could not exactly see it, for it cunningly kept out of the way: but he could hear its approach, could hear it lurching about in the shadows; and he saw in his mind the grin of its death-agony and the eyes that stared through him at the void. And it seemed to him that a voice came in the night, saying: Where is Abel your brother? And after the question there followed a hideous chuckling laugh, which told him that the voice was Abel's own. He shuddered, stretching out his arms in supplication. Is it really you, Abel? Are you awake at last? I am Abel, answered the voice. I am the blood of Abel walking in the night. Abel is locked fast in a dream from which he cannot wake, but I am his
blood which was his life. You have spilt his life from his body, and his body will fall into corruption and become a nest of crawling things, and you Cain shall be accurst of everything that lives. Cain disputed with the voice, saying: Three times I made a bed for him in the earth and covered him with stones so that he might have his long sleep in peace; but when I went again to that place, he was uncovered, and his eyes accused me and his tongue pointed at me. Why won't he rest in the bed I made him? But the voice laughed again, cruelly, and said: To this end you shall come too; and Adam; and Eve; and all the children of Eve.

In this fashion, at intervals throughout the night, Cain wrestled in prayer with his accuser; and in the morning, with Kirith following him unseen at a little distance, he went hotfoot to the camp of Adam, crying: I have killed my brother Abel. Killed? said Adam, staring. What is that? It is what I have done to my brother, answered Cain. I struck him with my axe and he fell down and the blood ran out of his head. And now he is asleep and won't speak to me, but the voice of his blood comes to me in the night and mocks me. Hearing the outcry that Cain made, Eve and her daughters came running to him to learn what had happened.
Three times I made a bed for him in the earth and covered him with stones, said Cain, looking round on that ring of faces; I made his bed deep and soft, so that he might have his long sleep in peace. But when I went again, he was uncovered. Three times it happened so. And I told this to the voice of his blood that troubled me in the night. Here Adam interrupted his son to say that they must make yet another bed for Abel. We will go together, Cain. You are not yourself. Abel is surely awake by now, but if he is still sleeping we will make a bed for him where he can sleep his fill.

So it was that Adam and all his people came to look on the face of death. They found the body of Abel where Cain had left it, and no one but Kirith knew who had taken him out of his three graves. The face of Abel was very terrible, and Adam said to Cain: Why did you strike him down? Cain answered: Because he would not come back to the camp we made together, and because he denied Kirith to me, and because Eve my mother gave suck to him and put me away. Adam pondered this answer, and finding in himself a jealousy akin to that of Cain's he was the more kindled against him. Nevertheless he said nothing at that time. With the sight of death a great darkness had come
into the minds of men, and they made a litter for Abel and carried him to the camp of Cain, where Zildah and Larian, with their children, had been many days waiting for the return of their men. And the body of Abel was laid on the bed under the great canopy that Larian had made; and walls were built; and this, the house of the dead, was the first house made for man. Adam said: We will gather food and set it beside him, for when he wakes he will be hungry. And having said this, and seen it done, he with his women, their eyes wide with a strange conjecture, their hearts trembling, went back to his own camp, leaving Cain and Zildah and Larian and the two babies to attend to the wants of the sleeping Abel.