John Irving - The Cider House Rules

'I never heard nobody read to nobody,' Sammy said.

'Yeah,' somebody said.

Melony saw that some of the men were propped on their elbows in their beds, waiting. Even Ma turned her great lump around and faced Melony's bed.

'Quiet, everybody,' Rather said. {398}

For the first time in her life, Melony was afraid. After all her efforts and her hard traveling, she felt she had been returned to the girls' division without being aware of it; but it wasn't only that. It was the first time anyone had expected something of her; she knew what Jane Eyre meant to her, but what could it mean to them? She'd read it to children too young to understand half the words, too young to pay attention until the end of a sentence, but they were orphans-prisoners of the routine of being read to aloud; it was the routine that mattered.

Melony was more than halfway in her third or fourth journey through Jane Eyre. She said, I'm on page two hundred and eight. There's a lot that's happened before.'

'Just read it,' Sammy said.

'Maybe I should start at the beginning,' Melony suggested.

'Just read what you readin' to yourself,' Rather said gently.

Her voice had never trembled before, but Melony began.

' “The wind roared high in the great tree which embowered the gates,” ' she read.

'What's “embowered”?' Wednesday asked her.

'Like a bower,' Melony said. 'Like a thing hanging

over you, like for grapes or roses.'

'It's a kind of bower where the shower is,' Sandra said.

'Oh,' someone said.

' “But the road as far as I could see,” ' Melony continued, ' “to the right hand and left, was all still and solitary.. ”

'What's that?' Sammy asked.

'Solitary is alone,' Melony said.

'Like solitaire, you know solitaire,' Rather said, and there was an aproving murmur.

'Shut up your interruptin',' Sandra said.

'Well, we got to understand,' Wednesday said.

'Just shut up!' Ma said. {399}

'Read,' Rather said to Melony, and she tried to go on.

' “…the road…all still and solitary: save for the shadows of clouds crossing it at intervals, as the moon looked out, it was but a long pale line, unvaried by one moving speck,” ' Melony read.

'Un-what?' someone asked.

'Unvaried means unchanged, not changed,' Melony said.

'I know that,' Wednesday said. 'I got that one.'

'Shut up,' Sandra said.

' “A puerile tear,” ' Melony began, but she stopped. 'I don't know what “puerile” means,' she said. “It's not important that you know what every word means.” 'Okay,' someone said. ' “A puerile tear dimmed my eye while I looked-a tear of disappointment and impatience: ashamed of it, wiped it away..”

'There, we know what it is, anyway,' Wednesday said.

' “…I lingered,” ' Melony read.

'You what?' Sammy asked.

'Hung around; to linger means to hang around!' Melony said sharply. She began again ' “…the moon shut herself wholly within her chamber, and drew close her curtain of dense cloud; the night grew dark..”

'It's gettin' scary now,' Wednesday observed.

' “…rain came driving fast on the wind.” ' Melony had changed “gale” to “wind” without their knowing it. ' “I wish he would come! I wish he would come! exclaimed, seized with hypochondriac foreboding.” ' Melony stopped with that; tears filled her eyes, and she couldn't see the words. There was a long silence before anyone spoke.

' What was she seized with?' Sammy asked, frightened.

'I don't know!' Melony said, sobbing. 'Some kind of fear, I think.'

They were respectful of Melony's sobs for a while, and then Sammy said, 'I guess it's some kind of horror story.'

'What you want to read that before you try to sleep?' {400} Rather asked Melony with friendly concern, but Melony lay down on her bed and turned off her reading light.

When all the lights were out, Melony felt Sandra sit on her bed beside her; if it had been Ma, she knew, her bed would have sagged more heavily. 'You ask me, you better forget that boyfriend,' Sandra said. 'If he didn't tell you how to find him, he ain't no good, anyway.' Melony had not felt anyone stroke her temples since Mrs. Grogan in the girls' division at St. Cloud's; she realized she missed Mrs. Grogan very much, and for a while this took her mind off Homer Wells.

When everyone else was asleep, Melony turned her reading light back on; whatever failure Jane Eyre might be for someone else, it had always worked for Melony-it had helped her-and she felt in need of its help, now. She read another twenty pages, or so, but Homer Wells would not leave her mind. 'I must part with you for my whole life,' she read, with horror. 'I must begin a new existence amongst strange faces and strange scenes.' The truth of that closed the book for her, forever. She slid the book under her bed in the bunkroom in the cider house at York Farm, where she would leave it. Had she just read the passage from David Copperfield that Homer Wells so loved and repeated to himself as if it were a hopeful prayer, she would have discarded David Copperfield, too. 'I have stood aside to see the phantoms of those days go by me.' Fat chance! Melony would have thought. She knew that all the phantoms of those days were attached to her and Homer more securely than their shadows. And so Melony cried herself to sleep-she was not hopeful, yet she was determined, her mind's eye searching the darkness for Homer Wells.

She could not have seen him that night-he was so well hidden beyond the range of the lights shining from the mill room at Ocean View. Even if he'd sneezed or fallen down, the sound of the grinder and the pump would have concealed his presence. He watched the redeyed glow of the cigarettes that darted and paused above {401} the roof of the cider house. When he got cold, he went to watch them pressing and to have a little cider and rum.

Mr. Rose seemed glad to see him; he gave Homer a drink with very little cider in it, and together they watched the orchestra of the pump and grinder. A man named Jack, who had a terrible scar across his throat -a hard-to-survive kind of scar-aimed the spout. A man named Orange slapped the racks in place and received the splatter with a wild kind of pride; his name was Orange because he had tried to dye his hair once, and orange was how it turned out-there was no evidence of that color on him now. The rum had made Jack and Orange both savage about their business and defiantly unwary of the flying mess, yet Homer felt that Mr. Rose, who seemed sober, was still in control-the conductor of both the men and the machinery and operating them both at full throttle.

'Let's try to get out of here by midnight, Mr. Rose said calmly. Jack choked the flow of pomace to the top rack; Orange levered the press into place.

In the other corner of the mill room, two men whom Homer Wells didn't know were bottling at high, speed. One of the men began to laugh, and his partner started to laugh with him so loudly that Mr. Rose called out to them, 'What's so funny?'

One of the men explained that his cigarette had fallen out of his mouth, into the vat; at this announcement, even Jack and Orange began to laugh, and Homer Wells smiled, but Mr. Rose said quietly, 'Then you better fish it out. Nobody wants that muckin' up the cider.'

The men were quiet, now; just the machinery went on with its sluicing and screaming. 'Go on,' Mr. Rose repeated. 'Go fish.'

The man with the lost cigarette stared into the thousand-gallon vat; it was only half full, but it was still a swimming pool. He took off his rubber boots, but Mr. Rose said, 'Not just the boots. Take off all your clothes, {402} and then go take a shower-and be quick about it. We got work to do.'

'What?' the man said. 'I ain't gonna strip and go wash just to go swimmin' in there!'