The Pearl

The story is about an Indian pearl gatherer named Kino along with his wife Juana and his son Coyotito. Coyotito is stung by a scorpion and is in dire need of medical attention. Kino and Juana take Coyotito to the center of the town, where the doctor lives. They are turned away because he has nothing to pay the doctor with. They are told “The doctor has gone out,” “He was called to a serious case” (pg. 12). Kino and Juana stood next to each other at the gate for a long time. Just as they were about to leave Kino punched the gate with immense strength and hurt his hand.

The next morning, Kino, Juana and Coyotito go out on Kino’s grandfather’s canoe to go searching for pearls. All the other gatherers had been long gone when Kino and his family set out. They arrived at the oyster bed and saw that the other oyster gatherers were already there. Kino prepared to go down into the oyster bed and search for pearls. He was down there for a long time. He suddenly saw a ledge with an overhang. He saw an oyster that was partially opened. There was a gleam and the clam closed. He quickly went for it. At first he was hesitant to open the clam because he thought it may have just been just a part of a broken shell. Juana convinced Kino to open it. There, in the muscle of the clam, Kino saw the largest pearl he had ever seen. It was as large as a seagull’s egg. They called it the Pearl of the World. Juana told Kino to look at their son. Coyotito’s swelling had gone down.

By the time Kino got back to his village, everyone already knew that Kino found the Pearl of the World. Everyone is gathered in Kino’s house. He looks into the pearl and sees his family’s future. He sees himself and Juana getting married and wearing new white clothes. He sees a rifle. He says that he will get a new rifle with the money he gets from the pearl. He also sees Coyotito in school. He sees him reading books and making numbers. He gets visited by the priest and tells Kino that he is pleased that his first thought of what to do with the money from the pearl is in the act of god

Later, the doctor finds out about the pearl and visits them. He tells them that the venom will attack Coyotito in an hour. He gives him a pill filled with white powder. An hour later Coyotito gets terribly ill and starts to vomit. The doctor comes back and gives Coyotito a drink with a few drops of ammonia in it. It cured him. Kino was suspicious of the doctor and the pill filled with the white powder. He asks Kino how he is going to pay for the treatment. The other villagers tell him that he has a pearl. He pretended that he didn’t know he had a pearl. He asks Kino where it was, watching closely at his eyes hoping that he would glance over to where the pearl was. Kino did just what the doctor thought he would. He glanced over to the corner where he hid the pearl.
Later that night, while he was sleeping, he saw a dark figure in the corner of his house where he hid his pearl. He leaped up and stabbed the figure. The figure escaped from his house. He got hurt while in the struggle. Juana tells Kino that the pearl is evil, but he doesn’t want to give it up.

The next day Kino and his family go to sell the pearl. His brother along with the rest of the town comes with Kino. Kino shows the dealer the pearl. He tells Kino that it’s only worth 1000 pesos. He sees that the dealer is trying to trick him. He gets angry and storms out. The dealer offers 1500 pesos but it doesn’t work. He decided that he wants to sell the pearl at the capital. Later at night, he gets attacked by two people. The next morning Kino catches Juana trying to throw the pearl into the ocean. He beats her and gets the pearl back. On the way back Kino gets attacked by a man. He kills the other man. Juana found him and the dead man. Kino and Juana decide that they must find a safe place to hide. When they get back they find that their canoe has a hole drilled into it and their house burnt. They hide in Kino’s brother’s house and decide to go north. They set out and made sure to cover their tracks. The find out that three people are following them. Kino decides that the only way to get rid of the trackers is to kill them. He sneaks down to their camp while Juana and Coyotito hide in a cave. He manages to kill the trackers but also kills his son. The rifle that one of the trackers had had fired and shot Coyotito. They go back to the village and finally throw the pearl back into the sea.

My Response:

I think this story shows how greed can take over one’s life. There is so much greed in the world. The villagers were at first very happy for Kino that he found such a pearl but shortly after all they could think about was how it would benefit everyone. They respected Kino and were sure that he would help them out. The priest also exhibited greed. He knew a wedding and baptismal weren’t cheap. He was thinking about how he would benefit the church using that pearl. Greed also affected Kino. He slowly became more and more obsessed with the pearl. It became so bad that he actually hurt Juana. She saw the animosity in Kino then. She knew that he had changed. He was becoming an animal. The greed of people can get very bad. Kino wasn’t the only one who resorted to violence. Kino was attacked three times throughout the story all because of the pearl.
Greed can also change not just the person’s life who is being greedy, but everyone around the person also. Because of the Kino’s greediness, he put himself and his family in danger. They had their house burnt down and got a hole in his canoe. They were so fearful that they had to find a safe place to hide. They had to leave their home. Kino had to pay the ultimate price for his greed, while trying to save his family he lost his son. All of these things happened to him because of greed. Greed can take over your life and ruin it. The lesson to be learned from this story and that is to not let greed blind you. If you do you will end up paying the price.

-Jayke Manzano