A Gift Upon the Shore (40 page)

But first, evening service, and I wait impatiently until the family leaves the house for the church. I go to the kitchen, take one of the oil lanterns out of the cupboard, light the wick with a strip of kindling dipped into the stove's firebox. More pots of water squat on the stove top in preparation for the baths. I go out the backdoor, hear a hymn raggedly sweet in the twilight: “Nearer My God to Thee.” The yellow glow of the lantern precedes me along the east wall of the new wing and around to the north side. The wind, heavy with moisture not yet resolved into rain, whips around the corner. Inside the storeroom, the air smells of dust and rust, and the floor-to-ceiling shelves are filled with crates, jumbles of tools, loops of rope and chain and electric wire, empty cans, buckets, glass jars, pipes and plumbing fixtures, house paint and turpentine, stacks of lumber, nails and screws, nuts and bolts. The lantern casts dense shadows as I search for that small, wooden box. Perhaps I remember it so clearly—and everything about the dynamite—because I didn't want it here. It was a bitter symbol of humankind's violent history. I can even remember that Jerry brought exactly twenty sticks to Amarna. He used five to blow out the spring.

The light falls on a box marked in stenciled letters:
DYNAMITE
. The box has been recently moved; there are clean areas in the dust on the shelf. I open the lid, my pulse rushing in my ears. The sticks seem innocuous, perhaps an inch in diameter and eight inches long, wrapped in thick, oily, yellow-brown paper. There is no hint of their lethal potential, except the word printed in faded black:
DANGER
.

I count five sticks. Ten are missing.

I replace the lid, turn the lantern on the hand-lettered message on the smaller box next to the dynamite:
BLASTING CAPS—FUSE
. I don't bother to look inside. I've seen enough. Too much.

When I return to the house, I put away the lantern and go into the living room, where Shadow is sleeping on the couch. I build up the fire, then sit down beside her, stare into the flames, and remember evenings with Rachel here while we were still alone, then her casual “lessons” with Luke at this same fire. And in the last ten years there were many evenings when the family gathered here to talk or sing. I'm not sure when we stopped having those evening gatherings. Their cessation was a gradual thing. It began with Rebecca's death three years ago.

I take a deep breath, let it out in a sigh, and consider my options.

At least, now that I'm sure of Miriam's intentions, I can stop her. I can tell Jerry and the others that the dynamite is missing and demand a search. I wonder where she's hidden it.

I hear myself sighing again. I can't look to Jerry and the family to help me. But,
Mary, why would any of us steal the dynamite
? And if I explain why, they won't believe me.

Still, they might if Miriam succeeds. Which will be too late.

And even if I can stop her from destroying the books now, she has an advantage over me: an advantage of nearly forty years. I am constantly reminded that I'm an old woman. I'm lucky to have lived this long, and I can't count on living much longer. There is in Miriam's eyes that banked fire that tells me she is impatient to do something
now
. But if I stop her now, she has only to learn patience, to wait until I die. I wonder how long it will be after my death before all the family joins her in a Pauline frenzy of book burning.

No, I can't simply stop her. I must negate her influence, just as she must negate mine. And perhaps age has an advantage. You learn deviousness when you can no longer, physically, solve problems in a more direct fashion.

I hear rain slapping at the windows, a hard rain that will undoubtedly last all night, and I smile. I won't have to worry about her dynamiting the vault tonight. A storm might make her act of god more plausible—she could say god struck the vault with lightning—but it has its drawbacks. For one thing, it would be difficult to light a fuse in a driving rain. For another, she couldn't avoid getting soaked. None of the waterproof coats and boots are left. Now we arm ourselves against the rain with wool and leather, which once wet take hours to dry. It wouldn't make her story that she was asleep before the blast credible if she or any of her clothing were wet with rain.

No, she'll have to make her attempt on a clear night. That means I can sleep tonight. And I'll need it. There'll be no rest for the wicked for many nights to come.

Now that I truly understand the threat facing me, I feel a deep calm, a mental clarity. On this fifth day of May I wake ready to take up the gauntlet and capable of being amiable and almost garrulous at breakfast—much to the confoundment of the adults, especially Miriam. School is again an invigorating experience, although I have to curb my tendency to lecture on general principles as if this were my last lesson.

By noon, the clouds from last night's storm are breaking up to let the sun make shining spangles on the gray-green sea. After midday meal I manage to corner Jerry in private long enough to ask him to join Stephen and me for our lesson. He is irritable and almost eager to turn me down until I tell him I'm going to read his father's letter. For a moment he seems stunned, then he squares his shoulders and nods.

I go to my room and open the bottom drawer of the chest on the east wall. My souvenir drawer. I sift through it like an archaeologist on a midden, unearth letters my father wrote to me; a bottle of L'Interdit perfume; my college diploma; the sketchbook Rachel gave me when I left with Luke for the Ark; the sole copy of
October Flowers
; the handcuffs awarded to Jim Acres by the Shiloh Apies garrison—the key is still attached by a string; a blue silk scarf that was a gift from my mother on my sixteenth birthday; the first piece of fossil wood I found on the beach here; Topaz and the first Shadow's collars.

There. In a flat, wooden box, Luke's letter. The paper—ordinary typing paper, a relic from Before—rustles like dead leaves. The letter was written in ink with a blunt nib; the handwriting is large and childlike, and page after page becomes more erratic, and by the last page almost illegible. Jerry told me Luke worked at it a few minutes at a time while he fought the nameless fever that had already killed over half his Flock.

I close the drawer and pull myself to my feet. When I reach the deck, I find both Jerry and Stephen leaning against the railing, Jerry watching me as I approach, Stephen looking seaward. When Stephen turns, finally, and looks at me, I feel an inexplicable chill. It's what I saw in his eyes in the split second when he first focused on me that engendered the chill.

Doubt. Was that it? But why? And I remember that he was oddly withdrawn in school this morning. I attributed it to the familial tension of which he and all the children are so intensely, so silently aware.

No, this is something more, something new, but I'm distracted when Jerry asks, “Is that the letter?” He looks at it fixedly.

I sink into one of the chairs, gesture toward the other. “Yes, this is the letter. Have a seat, Jerry.”

He shrugs, nods at Stephen, who sits down beside me, while Jerry remains standing, arms folded in an attitude of mixed suspicion and uncertainty. Stephen is again looking out at the sea, as if he has no interest in the letter.

I unfold it carefully. “It begins, ‘My dear Mary . . . I waited too long to find my courage. Now I can't come to you, I can't speak to you face-to-face, because there's so little time left for me in this world. I am sending this letter with my son Jeremiah. He is my only son still living. I told him to find you, because I know how much he can learn from you. You were good and true, and I was blind to the truth, but the scales have fallen from my eyes, and I know I betrayed you and Rachel. I've known it for many years. Finally, before I die, I must tell you. I pray the Lord to give me the strength to finish this.' ”

I hear a muffled sound, look up to see Jerry's lips compressed, grief straining at his taut self-control. I turn the first page over.

“ ‘Mary, I wanted to go to Amarna many times, but never had the courage to face you. I think of you, and you are in my prayers every day. I see you as you were when we first met. In my mind you've never gotten old like I have. I see Rachel, too, and hope she lived in spite of her injury. When I count the years, I know she can't be living still, but I hope she died in peace. I wonder about our child. . . .' ” And I hesitate, refusing to look at Jerry, but aware of his gaze on me. “ ‘A child conceived in love, and I know it sustained him. Tell him his father was a foolish man, but he loved his mother.' ” I slide the sheet under the last one, swallowing against the tightness in my throat. I think Luke stopped there, too. The writing changes, becomes more erratic.

“ ‘That last day—I'll never forget it. You said if the Ark was our only hope, we had no hope. You spoke the truth like a prophetess. The Doctor kept saying Rachel was a witch, and I saw then that the Lord's grace had left him. She was a good woman, a woman of wisdom. But I didn't stand against him. He sinned by his lies, and I sinned by my silence. The night after you and Rachel left, he had a stroke. Some thought it was a judgment. Others said it was a witch's curse. I had to take over as preacher for a while.' ”

I turn the second, dryly rustling sheet, glance up at Jerry. His face is expressionless now, but the muscles of his arms flex intermittently. I study the page, read, “ ‘it was a bad time for us, but we came through it finally. The Doctor got over his stroke, except his left hand and leg were never strong again, and it was like all the power had gone out of him. Sometimes you could still feel the strength and love in him, but other times he was hard to be with. And sometimes he just couldn't manage like he used to, and the Elders had to step in. But those were still good years. There were more babies. Mary, I had four children once, and three grandchildren.' ”

I put the second sheet behind the others, and I'm sure there's been another lapse of time. The writing is getting difficult to read, the spelling degenerating.

“ ‘Night again. Bernadette wants to take my paper and pen away. Doesn't understand. Have to finish this. Brother Adam died today. He never believed you were evil. I was telling about the good years. Sixteen years, my sweet Mary, good crops and good years. But God sent a storm one night. Lightning hit the church, went down the steeple. You said we should have a lightning rod on that steeple, out in the open like it was, tallest thing around. A prophetess, yes. The church burned. Doctor was asleep in his room.' ” I turn the page over, remember the first time I read these words. “ ‘He got burned so bad you couldn't recognize him, but it wasn't till the next day that he passed on.' ”

And I remember I felt at that moment a resurgence of the old desire for revenge, and it seemed at first satisfied by the Doctor's painful death. I hoped that during the long hours he survived with burns so severe he was unrecognizable, he thought just once of Rachel, of the anguish
she
suffered, and finally understood what he had done. But I knew he did not. His death, even in agony, changed nothing.

Jerry says, “Please, Mary . . . go on.”

I focus again on the page. There's been another time lapse; I can barely decipher the words. “ ‘Sun's up. Been sleeping like Bernadette says. She'll come down with fever, too. Has to rest. After the Doctor's passing, we built a new church. Miss the bell. Half-melted, never rang true. We had two peaceful years. Seventy-eight souls here Christmas. Five came from near Eureka last October. Told you I saw smoke there. Good Christian people. Said there was fever where they came from, but they never had it. Maybe they brought this fever. Maybe God sent it. Only thirty-seven left.' ” I look up at Jerry, see his eyes unfocused, haunted. He remembers.

He says dully, “Brother Luke called it a judgment. Those were nearly his last words.”

I don't try to answer that, but turn to the next page. “ ‘I told the Flock to leave the Ark before they
all
died. Start new someplace else. No hope left at the Ark. Getting hard to write. Told Jeremiah how to find you. Others going south. Told him to redeem me to you. Teach him what I never could. And his children. Mary, forgive me. Pray for me.' ” My voice has become as erratic as Luke's writing, and I clear my throat before I add, “It's signed simply ‘Luke.' ”

Jerry is looking south into the wind. At length, he says huskily, “My father was a good Elder, a good shepherd to the Flock, but it seemed like nothing he did helped when so much grief came down on us. I don't understand it, why we had to suffer so much at the Ark.”

“Jeremiah, the Ark was a great success.”

His head comes around abruptly. “It's deserted—dead! How can you call it a success?”

“You didn't live through the years right after the End. Rachel and I searched for survivors and found nothing but death and desolation. Luke found only a few survivors and even more desolation. Yet at the Ark people lived. You're the second generation, and your children are the third. That two more generations came out of the Ark is a miracle.”

His face is as transparent in its revelation of emotions as Luke's was. I watch him run the gamut from grief to skepticism to amazement. He says softly, “Maybe we were driven out of the Ark for a purpose.”

“Maybe. But purpose is a human invention. We need purpose, but we impose it on ourselves.”

He ponders that, but makes no comment on it. He says, almost formally, “Thank you for reading the letter to me.”

And I wonder if he regrets as much as I do that I didn't read it to him sooner. “Jerry, I keep it in a drawer in my room. When I die, I want you to find it. It will be yours then.”

He nods. “I'll take good care of it.” He seems to want to say or ask more, but when he speaks, it's only to say, “I have to get out to the north pasture.” He glances at Stephen, as if he's forgotten why the boy is here, then departs without another word. I watch him until he disappears beyond the corner of the house.