32 pages • 1 hour read
The Postman Always Rings Twice
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Chapters 7-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary
Once again, Frank and Cora start covering their tracks to murder Nick. After getting into the car with Nick, they make sure that people see Nick and Frank drunk and Cora driving the car. Frank believes that their previous murder attempt “had cured of me of this idea we could pull a perfect murder” (35). This time, the murder will be “messy.” According to Frank, that means that he and Cora will have a higher chance of succeeding. Frank and Cora establish a witness at a gas station before driving off.
Claiming that she wants to see Malibu Beach, Cora turns the car onto a piece of road that is “about the worst piece of road in Los Angeles County” (36) so that she and Frank can stage an accident. Frank says, “yes sir, yes sir” (37), which is Cora’s cue to pull off the road next to a long drop. After she does this, a couple of cars pass by, and Nick starts singing because “Is a echo. Is a fine echo” (38). Once they get back in the car, Frank hits Nick over the head with a wrench, killing him.
Chapter 8 Summary
Now that Nick is dead, Frank and Cora carry out the rest of their plan. They pour wine over the wrench, maneuver the car over the edge of a drop, and get out. They push the car over the edge so that it “roll[s] over and over, down the gully, and banging so loud you could hear it a mile” (40). Frank then picks up Cora and slides down the ravine with her in case anyone looks at their footprints—“those sharp heels of hers, they had to be pointed in the right direction” (40).
Frank tears Cora’s shirt open so that she “would look banged up” (40). He then punches her in the face. In response, Cora gets worked up, and the two have sex.
Chapters 7-8 Analysis
These chapters employ the techniques of repetition and doubling. Frank and Cora try killing Nick again, and once more they work out a murder plan ahead of time. Nick sings a song before he is killed, and it is the same song he sang before Cora tried killing him the first time. Right before Nick dies, he sings a note into the ravine, which comes back as an echo: “It took the high note, like he did, and swelled, and stopped and waited” (39). The echo is a metaphor for the repetition of Cora and Frank’s murderous actions.
The image of a cat also reappears in these chapters. Though there is no cat present during this second murder attempt, Frank describes Nick’s corpse as “curled on the seat like a cat on a sofa” (39). Here, the cat symbolizes the inescapability of fate. Though he survived Frank and Cora’s first attack, Nick was destined to be murdered by them, and the cat-like shape of his corpse illustrates this.
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By James M. Cain
