The Grapes of WrathbyJohn SteinbeckPage 3 of 394CHAPTER 1TO THE RED COUNTRY and part of the gray country of Oklahoma, the last rains came gently, and they didnot cut the scarred earth. The plows crossed and recrossed the rivulet marks. The last rains lifted the cornquickly and scattered weed colonies and grass along the sides of the roads so that the gray country and the darkred country began to disappear under a green cover. In the last part of May the sky grew pale and the clouds thathad hung in high puffs for so long in the spring were dissipated. The sun flared down on the growing corn dayafter day until a line of brown spread along the edge of each green bayonet. The clouds appeared, and wentaway, and in a while they did not try any more. The weeds grew darker green to protect themselves, and theydid not spread any more. The surface of the earth crusted, a thin hard crust, and as the sky became pale, so theearth became pale, pink in the red country and white in the gray country.In the water-cut gullies the earth dusted down in dry little streams. Gophers and ant lions started smallavalanches. And as the sharp sun struck day after day, the leaves of the young corn became less stiff and erect;they bent in a curve at first, and then, as the central ribs of strength grew weak, each leaf tilted downward. Thenit was June, and the sun shone more fiercely. The brown lines on the corn leaves widened and moved in on thecentral ribs. The weeds frayed and edged back toward their roots. The air was thin and the sky more pale; andevery day the earth paled.In the roads where the teams moved, where the wheels milled the ground and the hooves of the horses beat theground, the dirt crust broke and the dust formed. Every moving thing lifted the dust into the air: a walking manlifted a thin layer as high as his waist, and a wagon lifted the dust as high as the fence tops, and an automobileboiled a cloud behind it. The dust was long in settling back again.When June was half gone, the big clouds moved up out of Texas and the Gulf, high heavy clouds, rainheads.The men in the fields looked up at the clouds and sniffed at them and held wet fingers up to sense the wind. Andthe horses were nervous while the clouds were up. The rainheads dropped a little spattering and hurried on tosome other country. Behind them the sky was pale again and the sun flared. In the dust there were drop craterswhere the rain had fallen, and there were clean splashes on the corn, and that was all.A gentle wind followed the rain clouds, driving them on northward, a wind that softly clashed the drying corn.A day went by and the wind increased, steady, unbroken by gusts. The dust from the roads fluffed up andspread out and fell on the weeds beside the fields, and fell into the fields a little way. Now the wind grew strongand hard and it worked at the rain crust in the corn fields. Little by little the sky was darkened by the mixingdust, and the wind felt over the earth, loosened the dust, and carried it away. The wind grew stronger. The raincrust broke and the dust lifted up out of the fields and drove gray plumes into the air like sluggish smoke. Thecorn threshed the wind and made a dry, rushing sound. The finest dust did not settle back to earth now, butdisappeared into the darkening sky.The wind grew stronger, whisked under stones, carried up straws and old leaves, and even little clods, markingits course as it sailed across the fields. The air and the sky darkened and through them the sun shone redly, andthere was a raw sting in the air. During a night the wind raced faster over the land, dug cunningly among therootlets of the corn, and the corn fought the wind with its weakened leaves until the roots were freed by theprying wind and then each stalk settled wearily sideways toward the earth and pointed the direction of the wind.Page 4 of 394The dawn came, but no day. In the gray sky a red sun appeared, a dim red circle that gave a little light, likedusk; and as that day advanced, the dusk slipped back toward darkness, and the wind cried and whimpered overthe fallen corn.Men and women huddled in their houses, and they tied handkerchiefs over their noses when they went out, andwore goggles to protect their eyes.When the night came again it was black night, for the stars could not pierce the dust to get down, and thewindow lights could not even spread beyond their own yards. Now the dust was evenly mixed with the air, anemulsion of dust and air. Houses were shut tight, and cloth wedged around doors and windows, but the dustcame in so thinly that it could not be seen in the air, and it settled like pollen on the chairs and tables, on thedishes. The people brushed it from their shoulders. Little lines of dust lay at the door sills.In the middle of that night the wind passed on and left the land quiet. The dust-filled air muffled sound morecompletely