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PARTISANREVIEW
pha. In the morning, however, Alpha is better at getting up and going
off to work."
As if to prove the presence of Alpha and Omega within herself, her
intimacy, so innocent and audacious at once, had by now drawn back,
and the pedant had appeared. One would have to win both sides of this
woman. It also occurred to me that I was not being very loyal to Hugh
Montague, but what the hell, that might be my Omega. "I just don't
see," I said, "why the two must react differently all the time."
"Remember," she said, holding up an instructor-like finger, "Alpha
and Omega originate from separate creatures. One is descended from the
sperm cell, Alpha; Omega from the ovum."
"You are saying we have a male and a female psyche inside our–
selves?"
"Why not? There's nothing mechanical about it," said Kittredge.
"The male side can be full of the so-called female qualities, whereas
Omega can be an outrageous bull of a woman just as virile and muscular
as a garbage collector." She gave a merry look as if to show the return
of her Alpha. Or was it Omega? "God wants us to be as various and
faceted as kaleidoscopes. Which looks to the next point: Hugh and I
agree on this: The war between God and the Devil usually goes on in
both psychic entities. That's as it should be. Schizophrenics tends to sep–
arate good and evil altogether, but in more balanced people, God and
the Devil fight not only in Alpha, but in Omega as well."
"There seems to be endless capacity for strife in your system."
"Of course there is. Doesn't that fit human nature?"
"Well," I said, "I still can't see why the Creator desired such a
complicated design."
"Because he wished to give us free will," she said. "I agree with
Hugh on this as well. Free
will
amounts to giving the Devil equal op–
portunity. "
"How can you know that?" I blurted out.
"It's what I think," she said simply. "Don't you see, we have a true
and real need for two developed psyches, each with its own superego,
ego, and id. That way, one can feel some three-dimensionality, so to
speak, in our moral experience. If Alpha and Omega are quite unalike,
and, believe me, they often are, then they can look upon the same hap–
pening from wholly separate points of view. It's why we have two eyes.
For the same reason. So we can estimate distance."
"Account for this," I said. "When our eyes become too different
from each other, we need glasses. If Alpha and Omega are awfully differ–
ent, how can a person function?"
"Look at Hugh," she said. "His Alpha and Omega must be as
far
apart as the sun and the moon. Great people, and artists, and extraordi-
