ne of the Watchers brought us the word, standing there looking at his shoes and twisting his hat around and around in his hands, uneasy to be the bearer of bad news to such exalted company. I looked for fireworks, but all God said was, "I expect we better go have a word with him."
We found Cain in the fields, watering his lentils. He finished emptying the skin he was carrying, then come over and stood looking at us, waiting. God let him wait a while. Finally he asked, "Where's your brother?"
"Blamed if I know. I didn't take him to raise. What am I, his keeper?"
"Watch your mouth," I said. God give me a look that said for me to stay out of this.
"What have you done, son?" God said, gently. "I can hear your brother's blood crying to me out of the ground."
Cain glanced quickly at a spot at the edge of the field, then sighed and give in. "I never meant to do it."
"You never meant not to do it either," God said. "Are you trying to tell me you didn't know if you took a rock so big you needed two hands to lift it and cracked somebody in the back of the head with it, you would do some serious damage?"
"Yes, I guess I knew that."
"And that's exactly what you done, wasn't it?"
"Yes, but --"
"No buts. You was mad at him."
"I wanted my part of the water."
"It was more than that. You was jealous because he had the easy life, because Adam was partial to him, because you thought I favored his offering over yours. You was mad because he was big enough to knock you around and make you holler uncle in front of your sisters. And so you abandoned all rational judgment and struck him a blow that killed him. Do you deny any of this?"
"No, Lord."
"Do you understand why not meaning to in no way excuses what you've done?"
"Yes, Lord."
"Knowing right from wrong is a terrible burden, son, but it must be borne. Justice must be served."
"Yes, sir."
"And justice demands a life for a life."
"Wait a minute," I said. "Cain is the last man left besides Adam. If we lose him, it's going to be quite a setback to the human race? Ain't there some other way?" Then I remembered he had warned me to keep out of it. "Sorry, I forgot."
"That's all right, Gabe. You make a good point. It looks like we're just going to have to delay justice for awhile." He turned back to Cain who was sagging with relief. "But don't think you're going to get off scot free."
"No, Lord," Cain said.
"First, you're going to have to find yourself another occupation. I cursed the earth to your daddy, now I double curse it to you. From now on, boy, you won't be able to grow even as much as a weed!"
"Yes, Lord," Cain said, but he didn't look too upset. Maybe he was thinking about taking over the sheep business.
"Next, you're going to have to find another place to live. And I don't mean just over the next hill, either. I'm talking about exile, so far away you'll never see this place or your mama or daddy again."
The color left Cain's face. "Then you might as well kill me outright," he said. "I wouldn't last a night out there in the wilderness. If a lion or tiger didn't get me, one of them Watchers, knowing I was out of favor with you, would do me in."
"Well, you're just going to have to take your chances with the lions and tigers. I expect you're smart enough to keep away from them. As for the Watchers, I'll give you my mark. When they see that they won't bother you. Hey, if you play your cards right you might just talk them into helping."
"Wait a minute," I said. "I don't see how this is going to help the situation any. If Cain is out there in the wilderness and all the rest of the family is here --?"
"Who said all the rest of the family was going to be here? The oldest girl -- Azura, is it?"
"Awan," Cain said, beginning to get his color back. "Azura is the next to oldest."
"Right, Awan. Well, I don't think I'm telling secrets when I say she's got eyes for Cain," God said to me. "Maybe she might want to go with him."
I sometimes wonder why I even bother. He is always way ahead of me, and if I had any sense, I would realize that and just keep my big mouth shut.
We called the family together and told them first about Abel, then about Cain. Adam put on a show. He staggered around, throwing up his hands and wailing, "Oh my sons, my boys, the fruit of my loins. What will I do without them? Who will tend the crops? Who will look after the sheep? Oh, that this should come to me, father of the human race, who has ruined his health that they might be born. Oh, it's too much, too much for this poor mortal to bear!"
"Maybe," God said, "we could ask the Watchers to take over until some more boy children come along."
And Adam was comforted.
We joined the family in seeing Cain and Awan off, struggling under loaded backpacks, making their way across the fields to the edge of the clearing. They turned at the line of trees to wave and then disappeared into the wilderness. We had witnessed a scene, God and me, very much like it once before. It was a different kind of sadness I felt now. Or was it?
On the way home I brought up something I had been wondering about. "Abel's name means a puff of air. Wonder why Eve named him that? You didn't by any chance plant that notion in her head, did you?"
"It's possible I might have."
"Because you knew from the start that was all he was going to amount to, didn't you? And then you arranged things where it would work out that way. I wondered why you let so much grief pile up on Cain, even to favoring Abel's offering over his. You goaded him into doing what he done."
"He was never forced. He could have chosen not to."
"But why?"
"Cain's got a good mind. He was wasted as a farmer. Then, too, his line will provide competition to Adam's line, and competition is what improves the product."
Cain and Awan had a lot of talented offspring. Cain took up the building trade, coached no doubt by the Watchers, and eventually built the first city, which he named after his first son, Enoch. One of Cain's descendants, Jabal, was the first tent dweller with livestock, a nomad who could move his belongings with the grazing herds so he never run out of pasture land. Another, Jubal, was the first to play the lyre and pipe and brought music to the world. And then there was the great Tubal-cain, who was the first to forge tools of copper and iron and made man's life infinitely easier.
Cain lived to a good age before a stone fell from the roof of a house he had built and took his life, just like with a stone he had took his brother's life many years before.
And justice at last was served.
