01
The recent succession of negative and hurtful incidents reminds me of a well-known novel that chronicles the fate of the perpetrators. It's The American James. M. Kane's best-known "The Postman Always Rings the Bell Twice".
The novel is based on a murder of a husband in the United States in 1927. A blonde woman named Ruth, together with her lover (a corseted male salesman), strangled Ruth's husband with a rope in an attempt to defraud Ruth of the personal accident insurance money that ruth had previously bought for him.
This story more than 90 years ago has been continuously featured on important pages in the American media because of extramarital affairs, murders and multiple gimmicks of fraud.
The novel "The Postman Always Rings the Bell Twice" uses a more dramatic approach to present the fear and disintegration of people after committing evil.
The novel was on the super bestseller list as soon as it came out, and was recognized by industry insiders as the first super bestseller in the history of American publishing.
In addition, the Boston police at that time thought that the novel was "too pornographic and violent" and listed it as a banned book, but it did not expect to accelerate the sales of the book, and later it was also known to the world for its many times being made into a movie and achieving good results.
The French writer Camus, famous for The Outsider, won the Nobel Prize in Literature. He has publicly stated that he took inspiration from the work "The Postman Always Rings the Bell Twice." Without this work there probably would be no Outsider.
Although many literary critics believe that this work is speculative fiction, biased toward tough guy detective novels, especially with Hemingway's concise language, coupled with the author Kane's experience as a journalist and on the battlefield, it is easy to be classified in Hemingway's style camp.
But the author, Kane, rejected the label that critics had labeled him, arguing that he had never written a novel about "Who is the murderer?"
He thinks it's not interesting enough to just catch the killer by the police as a story ending, and that this kind of punishment just by law isn't interesting enough.
He believes that he has always written an "algebraic" novel, and the reader himself confirms the sense of substitution, as long as the algebra is correct, the process is logical, but unexpected, and this is enough.
It can be seen that Kane at that time attached great importance to the sense of participation when reading, so as to feel a personal experience: "Those who choose to do evil will live under fear all their lives." ”
This consequence is often unbearable for the perpetrator. In fact, Kane's work is very realistic and educational, and this power of telling stories to persuade people not to do evil is, to some extent, using one greater fear to frighten another fear.
02
The novel begins with a self-narration by frank, a first-person criminal, and this beginning is also a classic in the history of English and American literature: "At noon, they threw me off the truck carrying the hay. ”
On this sentence, the daily role of the protagonist Frank. He was originally a tramp, who had made mistakes more than once in order to survive and impulsively, and was also a habitual prisoner in prison.
When others found him sneaking up on a truck carrying hay, they threw him down. He walked forward until he came to a place called the "Twin Oaks Hotel".
It's a small roadside sandwich bar, close to a small gas station, and there are several tiny accommodations in the shop, which is obviously a very small "chicken feather shop". To put it nicely, it's the motel we often see in American movies.
This was originally just a place to meet Frank's life, but because of the enthusiasm of the boss Greek Nick, Frank also stayed here to work without money.
Unexpectedly, Frank accidentally rubbed a spark of love with The shop's charming hostess, Cora.
As the relationship between the two people heats up rapidly, this relationship that should not have happened is like the fire of desire of an airplane with a giant engine, but it has to be stuffed into a small Ford Model T because of the ruthlessness of reality, and finally caused a huge explosion.
Cora now feels that her husband is full of grease, and perhaps the now very popular "middle-aged greasy man" saying, the earliest source is this novel?
Cora told Frank bluntly that he saw that her husband was greasy and had no appetite for food, let alone lying on his pillow every day.
Nor did Cora think much about Frank's past, and the beginning of the two men was initially nothing more than an unbearable desire.
Cora and Frank feel that Nick is getting in the way of the two of them, and they think of murdering Nick so that the two can stay together.
At this time, Cora had long forgotten her husband Nick's kindness to herself, and also forgot that her husband Nick was the first person she saw to wear a gold watch in the small restaurant where she worked, very hard for several months.
She looked down on her husband's appearance and origin, and always felt that the Greek Nick was not worthy of herself, but forgot that the life that her husband provided her was not rich and noble, but it was also warm and comfortable.
And Frank in front of her, although he is a tramp, is young and has a brain, and for her extreme loneliness at this moment, it is the antidote to life.
After a conspiracy, she followed Frank's advice and attacked her husband's head from behind with an iron rod, then made him fall into the bathtub, posing as if he had died accidentally.
As a result, the iron rod knocked over, and when her husband Nick had just fainted, a cat accidentally fell on the distribution box, and the whole house was suddenly dark due to a power outage.
Remembering that the police had just patrolled the neighborhood, the two of them decided to send Nick to the first aid in a hurry.
Nick's head looked seriously injured, but falling in the bathtub was also a thing of the past, and Nick himself couldn't remember what happened before he was injured anyway.
This time, Nick had a big life and retrieved one.
His wife, Cora, thinks of her past as a murderer and treats her recovered husband, Nick, much better than in the past.
Frank saw this, did not greet him, left the place, and then went wandering.
When Frank was out alone, he sometimes thought of the charming hostess, and twice he even couldn't help but run to the phone booth to make a call, but it was Nick who answered the phone, and Frank had to hang up in a hurry, so that time would dilute his thoughts.
It looked as if it was all over.
03
But the writer's divine stroke is the character postman who has never appeared in the novel, and the title of the novel is "The Postman Always Rings the Bell Twice".
In life, the postman always fulfills his duty by ringing the bell twice, alluding to the unexpected arrival of fate.
However, when the fate of everyone arrives, the result or the amazing windfall, or their own obituary, no one can say clearly, but sooner or later everything will come.
From the first time the bell rings, there may be a turnaround, but when the second ringing rings, there is only the result, but in the face of the result after the evil, can you really bear it?
No, when Frank was wandering on the road, he actually ran into Nick for the second time.
The kind and responsible Nick asks Frank why he didn't quit when he was sick? He said that there were no helpers in the store, and his wife was very hard.
He warmly invites Frank back and goes on vacation with him and his wife, revealing that he and his wife are preparing a "man-making plan."
Frank ghost sent the gods back, and the hostess, Cora, had forgotten his heart and was resurrected.
The two conspire on this vacation, killing Nick on the road and camouflaging it with a fake car accident. In the end, they did succeed, and even passed the investigation of the police and prosecutors, and they were safe for the time being.
Unexpectedly, the insurance policy that her husband Nick had insured for himself before he died was a huge fortune, because of this money, the two people began to doubt each other.
In the police investigation, the so-called deep lovers of the so-called people, it is easy to suspect that the other party has betrayed themselves, and the two people gradually have contradictions.
Slowly, the love between these two people turned into a deep fear of hatred.
Because Ofcora's unexpected pregnancy, the two discussed getting better and starting a good life. However, because when she was on vacation on the beach, Cora suddenly felt uncomfortable, and Frank took her to the hospital on the way to the hospital, which really happened in a car accident, which killed Cora on the spot.
The note written by Cora before his death records frankly killing her husband in the car for the second time, and Frank is immediately imprisoned and sentenced to death.
The two men, who had taken the lives of others, were eventually tortured to death by both sides. Whether it is an accident, or subjective intention, people who have harmed people have no good end after all, because they hide too many secrets for fear of being discovered, they always live in great fear, in fact, they are not happy at all.
Today, more than ninety years later, there are also many people in life who choose to go crazy to the end of the road because of love or profit or other. It's just that many people will find out later that this madness is not worth it at all.
Long-term fears, more terrible than madness and evil, will trap these people's hearts to death. No one who chooses this path can really feel comfortable.
This somewhat frightening story, after reading it, will see, the first-person self-narration, the kind of fear that comes from the heart.
I think that there are always impulsive and crazy evil people in life, and in general, these people, whether they still have a good social status and amazing wealth, to some extent, these people who choose to do evil are still people with very limited knowledge.
They simply do not have the ability to think about the consequences of their evil deeds and whether they can bear it.
In fact, most of the perpetrators overestimate their own ability to bear, and they are easily defeated by reality and human nature in front of the real world.
Many times, the perpetrators dig their own graves, and the greed of human nature makes them temporarily forget their fears and lack reverence for anything.
Once you start doing evil, you are actually sending yourself to the road of no return.
May all evildoers get the punishment they deserve, without saying much, but knowing and understanding nature. I hope that those who have a ghost fetus plan to do evil will first think about whether the consequences can bear and stop the idea of harming others and harming themselves as soon as possible.
@Author Nini:
He has been a journalist for many years, a lifelong learner of parent-child education and self-growth.
A 14-year-old handsome girl with a hot heart, a deep-rooted speaker, and a non-famous reading promoter with sincere humor.
Personal WeChat public account: Ninixw, welcome to exchange reading and life with Nini.
The pictures in this article are from the network, thanks to the author of the original picture.