A Green and Ancient Light (27 page)

So, Mr. Girandole and I climbed up and got him. After checking on his healing progress, we steadied him as he sat on the top step and eased his way down, stair by stair. Mr. Girandole went
ahead of him to catch him if he fell; I moved beside R ——, ready to grab his good arm if need be. He rested on the terrace, gulping the air, looking around in bliss. “Isn't this far enough?” asked Mr. Girandole hopefully, but R —— shook his head and clambered toward the lower stairs.

At the bottom, he sat breathing hard and wiping away sweat with his sleeve, clearly delighted. Grandmother looked him over and nodded. “To the pool and back,” she ordered. “You don't want to overdo it.”

R —— gave her a military salute.

Mr. Girandole and I supported him between us, and Grand­mother supervised, directing us to watch his leg and go slowly and look out for fallen branches. We advanced over the mossy earth. R —— winced now and then, and we'd stop at once, afraid we were tearing his stitches loose. But he'd nod and urge us forward again.

“Nice fellows,” he said merrily, between hitching breaths. “This good, huh? Good rummies, good rummies! Three musket-men!” He squeezed our necks and planted a noisy kiss on Mr. Girandole's cheek.

“Do that again and you're on your own,” Mr. Girandole growled.

R —— cackled and sang, “Yo, ho! Yo, ho!”

“Will you be quiet?” said Mr. Girandole.

“I come home from tavern like this,” said R ——. “Just like this!”

From the corner of my eye, I saw Grandmother looking exasperated.

“Riddle for notebook,” said R ——. “What beast have six leg, three head, smell bad? . . . Us!”

Mr. Girandole muttered something under his breath, and I'm sure we reached the pool not a moment too soon. We lowered
R —— gingerly onto the rim, and as soon as he was safely down, Mr. Girandole squirmed free and retreated in a huff, fanning his face with his hat.

R —— looked at me with such infectious humor that I couldn't help smiling. Then he gazed around at the statues of the four women and remarked about what a good place this was.

Grandmother pointed out the inscription to him with her stick:
Y
ou have we have all have though perhaps home.

“Make nothing sense,” said R ——.

“As much sense as you make.” Grandmother rapped him lightly on the head with her knuckles.

R —— settled down, catching his breath, and grew more serious. “One part only,” he said, looking down at the carved letters. “No all here. Part of more big something.”

Grandmother sat beside him and sighed.

R —— grimaced as he stretched forward and picked up a twig. He used it to poke and stir the murky water. I watched a striped lizard skitter along the pool's curb just beyond the nearest statue. Already the day was warming up, even here. I could sense the late-morning heat ringing on the leaves above us, baking the rocks that lay at the bottoms of sunlight wells. The air was wonderfully aromatic. R ——'s twig made lazy splashes. The lizard vanished over the far rim. Grandmother began to look drowsy.

“Hey!” R —— said suddenly.

That woke Grandmother up, and when she saw R —— ­pointing into the pool behind her, she jumped to her feet and caught my arm for balance.

We watched a gray-brown snake, about the length of Grand­mother's stick, swimming across the pool toward us, gliding in
S-curves, its head just above the surface. R —— made a commotion with his twig, and the snake changed course, heading toward the pool's northwest corner.

“Is it dangerous?” I asked, feeling chills.

“No,” said Grandmother. “It's harmless.”

R —— started to say something, but at that moment, Mr. Girandole dashed closer, motioning for silence.

“Someone's coming,” he whispered.

A new chill struck me. I peered around, looking for movement, but saw only the green vaults and sun-spears receding into the distance.

R —— raised his head, alarmed, and glanced toward the leaning house.

“No time,” Mr. Girandole hissed. “On the ground.
Now.
” He half-lifted, half-dragged R —— off the pool's rim.

R —— grunted in pain but looked to Mr. Girandole, awaiting instructions.

Mr. Girandole jammed his hat into place and crouched behind R ——, putting his hands beneath the pilot's arms. “We'll be there, in the brush.” He indicated the dense bushes where the whale hid, just north of the pool. Then he nodded toward the southern arch. “M ——, you go that way, and make yourself obvious.” To me he said, “You'd better close up the bedroom.” At once, he began to drag R —— backward over the mossy ground, the pilot grimacing and flinching.

Grandmother had already pulled the medicine bottle out of her carpet bag and now thrust the bottle into my hands. “Go!” she said.

“Notebook!” I whispered back and started to rummage through the bag.

“Take the whole thing!” She gave it to me and hobbled away down the gentle slope.

I sprinted to the leaning house and up the steps, ascending to the upper room as quickly as I could go. Once there, I yanked R ——'s pallet into the secret space, set the medicine bottle on the sunken floor, and lifted down the half-full waste bucket. When I'd cleared the chamber's upper half of incriminating evidence, I unloaded my notebook, climbed out of the well, and heaved the floor shut. I clenched my teeth at the reverberating sound. Bounding down the stairs with the bag over my shoulder, I hurried to rejoin Grandmother. I saw no sign of Mr. Girandole and R ——; they'd successfully disappeared into the thicket.

I'd scarcely started across the glade when I heard Grandmother loudly calling my name. Approaching the arch, I saw her on its other side, standing in front of the dragon and dogs, apparently waiting for me. Just as I drew up with her, a voice called, “Good morning!”

On the slope leading up toward the parachute glen, I glimpsed someone advancing through the shade and sun-flecks. A military uniform.

I had a wild hope and shielded my eyes, squinting against the glare.

But it was the major.

“
Is
it still morning?” He checked his pocket watch. “Just barely.” Striding down to us, he tipped his hat and smiled. There was a sprinkling of seeds on his shirt, and he'd loosened his collar. He carried his jacket folded over one arm. His pistol rested in its shiny leather case at his side. “I hope you're not leaving already?”

I looked around for other soldiers, but I saw no one else.

“Major P ——,” said Grandmother. “It is a fine day for a walk.”

“That it is, Mrs. T ——. And so here you are, and here am I.”

“It's a very long walk from the garrison,” she said.

“I only walked from the village. From your cottage, in fact, where I left my car.”

“Your car is parked at my house, and neither we nor you are there. Major, you are clearly determined to start the most interesting rumors.”

He laughed, swatting at a mosquito on his neck and examining the blood-smear on his fingers. “Just as you are determined to ignore any order or request not to come up here.”

Grandmother looked startled. “Does that order still apply? Surely, any danger has passed.”

The major examined us. “You are well aware, Mrs. T ——, of the standing directive against interference with cultural treasures.”

“Ah,” said Grandmother. “The ban on art. We are not inter­fering, Major. This stonework has always been a part of our forest, and it will be here when the laws have changed again. I am a good citizen who loves her country, and I'm an old woman. Let me walk in my woods, sir.”

The major's face was hard, his eyes unkind. I saw the bear in them again. He walked a few steps past us, toward the arch. “So, since nothing I can say will keep you away, I decided to pay you a visit. I was hoping you might show me just what it is you do here.” He turned back and stared at us each in turn. “Come along. Share with me what is so intriguing about this place.”

“Major,” said Grandmother, sounding patient and instructive. “The sacred woods are here in plain sight. You've been to the grove quite a few times already, haven't you? You yourself said it was
intriguing on the first day we spoke. Beyond what your own eyes can see, there's nothing I can tell you that will help.” She looked at me. “Can
you
? Can you help the major understand why we come here?”

I shook my head.

“Sir, let me ask you this,” Grandmother continued. “Suppose my grandson and I were to walk into your headquarters. Do you have a war room there, with maps and pins and telephones and reports, and a big black book full of secret codes? Do you believe that we could understand what you do there? Could you explain it to us in an hour or a day?”

The major regarded her, then raised a hand and curled his finger several times, beckoning. “Let's walk,” he said. “Let's see this place.”

“As you like,” said Grandmother with a shrug. “We're not nearly as busy as you.”

“Indeed? My own observation would suggest otherwise.”

Grandmother gave a dismissive wave. “If one stops going and doing, one may as well be in the ground.”

He offered Grandmother his arm, but she declined with a gracious bow. “There are a few rough and rooty places where I will gratefully accept, but on the whole, I'm less dangerous if left to my own devices.”

This answer amused the major greatly. “Madam, I know of no one more dangerous when left to her own devices.”

“What do you know of it, sir?”

“Enough to come armed,” he said, “even if I come alone.”

Now Grandmother rewarded him with a chuckle.

I tagged along behind them as they passed through the arch, and Grandmother launched into what promised to be a tour of the garden. Showing him the statue of Neptune, she pointed out
the subtle carving of Scylla and Charybdis and made sure he knew the story.

“And this word?” he asked. “
Narrow
?”

Leaning on her stick, Grandmother angled her head and raised her brows. “A very narrow strait, I suppose. A narrow passage between the certain deaths on either side.”

“H'm,” said the major, eyeing Neptune carefully before they moved on.

After allowing Grandmother to explain to him the boar, the pool of the four women, and the Angel of the Bottomless Pit, he announced that he wanted to have a look inside the “tower,” as he called it.

“It may make you queasy,” she said. “It leans.”

“And it has an unpleasant odor,” he said, “I know.” Excusing himself, he climbed the stairs, his boots clicking on the stone, and glanced down at us from the terrace before vanishing inside. I believe he expected to find something in the upper chamber that would solve the mystery for him, something that would condemn us beyond any doubt—though what he suspected us of is anyone's guess. He appeared briefly at the window, which meant he had edged along the catwalk beside the forward well. All the evidence against us was just beneath his feet; he'd walked across the top of a compartment filled with bedding and medicine and a bucket of R ——'s pee. I was glad the stone house still reeked with the other stench.

After another minute, we heard the scrape of the roof hatch, and he stepped up to the crenellated wall. From atop the leaning house, the major surveyed us and the whole garden. He moved from end to end of the roof, studying all the ancient figures
arrayed before him in their cloaks of moss and leaves—all the images crafted by those long-dead artisans at the bidding of the long-dead duke.

As Grandmother calmly returned his gaze, I understood that the sacred woods had defeated the major. The commander of men and trucks and dogs, he stood high above us, his pistol in its shiny holster. His jaw was clenched in anger. He had penetrated to the very heart of our world, this place of green stillness; it was all around him and under his boots. He looked upon the mystery, and it was opaque to him. Grandmother's face wore an expression that I later understood was pity.

When at last he left us, having insisted on escorting us back to the cottage, he shook my hand and bowed to Grandmother. “I wish you good health and good fortune,” he said as he opened the door of his car. He'd come today without a driver. “But be reminded, Mrs. T ——, that no matter how clever we are, nothing is indefinitely sustainable.”

Grandmother answered with quiet sincerity. “You mean that nothing lasts forever. Of that, Major, we are painfully and constantly aware.”

He replaced his hat on his slicked hair. “The last word is yours, Madam.”

Neither of them quite smiled as he closed his door and started the engine.

*  *  *  *

In our conversation that evening at the cottage, it was clear that Mr. Girandole liked the major even less than my grandfather would have. Before Mr. Girandole would stop grumbling, Grandmother
had to apologize for serving the major lunch from the carpet bag on the terrace steps—the lunch she'd packed for us all.

When the mood had returned to normal, the three of us discussed what was to be done about R ——.

“He's clearly getting better physically,” said Mr. Girandole. “M ——, you should have been a doctor.”

“That's divine Providence,” said Grandmother. “My sewing projects don't usually turn out so well.”

“But what's he going to do,” I asked, “if we don't find the door into Faery?” I was thinking that he couldn't stay in the leaning house during the winter.

“He's almost well enough to walk properly,” Mr. Girandole said, pouring us each a cup of tea. “I can always guide him over the mountains to ——. From there, in a boat after dark, he could row to ——, which is enemy territory—friendly for him.”

Grandmother frowned. “That's too dangerous for both of you. There must be patrols all up and down the coast.”