by Wren, M. K.
She said, “But that’s bound to be a long time in the future.”
“Maybe. We never know what the Lord has in store for us. The Doctor’s had some trouble with his heart lately. Bernadette’s always boiling up foxglove for him. Not that he can’t work with the best of us, long and hard. Still, you never know. Got to look to the future.”
Mary wondered how much future Nehemiah foresaw if he, like the Doctor, believed the second coming of Christ was imminent. But she hadn’t decided how to word that delicate question, when Nehemiah stretched and came to his feet. “Well, I’d best get back to bed. The cows’ll be waiting early on for milking.”
She looked up at him. “I enjoyed talking to you, Brother Nehemiah.”
“I enjoyed it, too. You’ll be a blessing for Luke and for the Flock. Good night, Sister Mary.” And with that he lumbered away down the hall. She heard the latch on his door click.
Mary looked around into the silent shadows and knew she should go to bed, too, should try to sleep. But she couldn’t face that empty bed yet. She put another piece of wood on the fire and watched the flames whorling around it, listened to their rush and crackle, and thought about saints.
The wedge of wood was charred black, checkered in squares with incandescent edges, when she heard the creak of footsteps behind her. She turned, only to be disappointed again. It wasn’t Luke.
Bernadette. She wore a robe of berry-dyed wool, and her pale hair was even wilder than before. “Sister Mary.” The words signaled recognition, more than greeting. She went to the chair Nehemiah had vacated. Mary waited, wondering if she would prefer to be alone, and at length Bernadette looked at her with her steel bright, gray eyes and said, “Tell me about the woman who worked the farm with you.”
“I’d rather not.” That slipped out before she thought about it. She added, “I miss her very much. Talking about her doesn’t help.”
Bernadette pursed her lips. “Was she your mother?”
“No.”
“Your sister?”
“No. She’s my friend.”
Bernadette considered that, finally nodded. “Rare things, friends.” Then she reached into the pocket of her robe, but Mary couldn’t see what she brought out. She rose, got a piece of kindling from the wood box, held one end into the fire, then as she sank back into the chair, raised the flaming stick and casually lighted a leaf-wrapped cigarette.
Mary stared at her, while Bernadette tossed the kindling into the fire and puffed at the cigarette. When Mary got a whiff of the sweet scent of the smoke, she nearly laughed aloud. “I can’t believe it. That’s—”
“Cannabis,” Bernadette pronounced calmly. “Cannabis is soothing to the nerves and a good analgesic to a point. It eases gastric restlessness and promotes sleep. Here . . .” And she offered the cigarette to Mary.
But Mary didn’t take it. One reason was that she still harbored the hope that she was pregnant. The other reason she verbalized by asking, “Is this some sort of test? Am I being tempted by the Lord’s advocate?”
Bernadette laughed. “You’re not being tempted, Sister, and you passed my test when you didn’t go all righteous on me. Some people here frown on cannabis as a soporific. Why don’t you take a puff?”
“I . . . have my reasons.”
“Which are none of my business.” She nodded, then: “You’re going to have a hard time here, Sister. You’re not made in their mold.”
Mary contrasted those words with Nehemiah’s blithe assurance that she would be a blessing for Luke and the Flock. She asked, “Are you made in their mold?”
“Yes. I was raised in the mold. It’s just . . . well, the mold seems to have bent a little for me. Everybody thinks I’m a little strange. But they never go outside the Ark. You learn a lot out there in the forest or along the seashore.” She took another puff, savored the smoke. “Thing is, nobody worries about how strange I am. I’m a nurse, and I know medicines—the kinds we use—as well as the Doctor. I’m good at what I do, and what I do is important here. If people need you, they’ll put up with a little strangeness—if you don’t carry it too far.”
Mary restrained a smile. “Thanks for the advice.”
“Advice? I don’t give advice. Nothing but trouble in that.”
“That’s probably good advice, too. Sister Bernadette, would you consider teaching me medicine and nursing? I’d like to have a reason to go into the forest or along the seashore occasionally.”
“Would you, now?” Bernadette studied her through a veil of smoke. “Don’t know that I’d want the company. Of course, it’s not up to me. That’ll be for the Doctor to decide. Besides, you’ve got another way to make yourself needed here.”
“What do you mean?”
“Lord, woman, you know what I mean. All you have to do is get pregnant and have a live, sound baby. Can you do it?”
“Well, there’s no reason to think I can’t. My periods have always been regular, and I’m perfectly healthy.”
“Those are good signs. How old are you?”
“Thirty-four.”
Bernadette raised an eyebrow. “Don’t look it. Well, as long as you’re in good health, being a little past ideal childbearing age shouldn’t cause any problems. You give Luke a baby. They’ll love you like one of their own.”
Mary hadn’t thought about having a baby as a means of making herself acceptable here. It still seemed ironic—and incredible— that these people were so desperate for children in the imagined shadow of Armageddon and the second coming. She considered asking Bernadette the same question she’d wanted to ask Nehemiah, but she wasn’t sure how to phrase it. Finally she put it as a statement.
“The Doctor believes that Armageddon has already happened, and Jesus will come to Earth soon.”
Bernadette smiled benignly. “Yes, that’s what he tells us.”
Mary waited, refusing to say more, and Bernadette sighed. “You want to know if I believe that? Well, the truth is, I just don’t know, and I figure I may never know. Meanwhile, though, you have to keep on living, and that means you have to keep on planning for some sort of future, even if it’s just planting seeds in spring for fall harvest.”
“Do other people in the Flock feel that way?”
“I couldn’t say.” Bernadette paused, eyed her coolly. “But whatever people think in their hearts, you have to understand one thing: they’ll never go against the Doctor. That’s the way it has to be.”
Mary shivered. The cold was gathering at her back as the fire died. After a moment she rose. She was ready for sleep. At least, for solitude.
“Good night, Bernadette. I’ll see you in the morning.”
“Probably. By the way, I know where there’s wild aster and pearly everlasting blooming. I’ll bring you some—for your wedding bouquet.”
Mary was too moved to speak. Then at length, she said, “I’d love that. Thank you.”
Bernadette nodded without looking away from the embers.
I stood
Among them, but not of them; in a shroud
Of thoughts which were not their thoughts.
—GEORGE NOEL GORDON, LORD BYRON,
CHILDE HAROLD’S PILGRIMAGE (1812)
To love and bear; to hope till Hope creates
From its own wreck the thing it
contemplates . . .
—PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY, PROMETHEUS UNBOUND (1818–1819)
May Day was once a minor holiday celebrated mostly by schoolchildren, a pagan festival emasculated, as so many pagan celebrations were, like Easter and Christmas. At Amarna the family doesn’t recognize May Day. I do, but my celebration is simply a few minutes of prayerless gratitude for the imminent arrival of another summer.
Stephen and I are having our lesson on the beach today, sitting on the wave-smoothed trunk
of a redwood. This is the kind of day on which the beach is most alluring. There’s no wind to drive the sand in stinging veils, no clouds to come between me and the warmth of the sun. The sea is chatoyant blue green, the breakers turning lazily with no power behind them. It’s as if the world has slowed down to a contemplative stroll. Shadow is chasing gulls through the shallows, and her hectic movements seem out of synchronization with her context.
And on this May Day the allure of the beach for me is simply that it takes me away from the house, from the family.
Yet when I look back on the morning, I can’t pinpoint any particular words or actions that made me seek the solace of the sea. Of course, Miriam’s children weren’t in school, and after midday meal, Deborah returned the copy of Winnie-the-Pooh I loaned her last week. The child whose vivacity I treasure was subdued and near tears. But Miriam was almost cheerful today. Still, neither she nor anyone else mentioned the family meeting tomorrow night, and it hangs over us like an invisible shadow. The children show the tension more than the adults. They respond to it, as the adults do, by not talking about it, but the children are silent because they don’t know what questions to ask. The adults know, but won’t ask.
I haven’t brought a diary to the beach with me today. I wrote nothing while I was at the Ark, but the memories are acid-etched. I’ve been trying to tell Stephen about my wedding, which is difficult, since he doesn’t entirely understand the concept of marriage. But he understands religious ceremonies. He endures enough of them.
“It was a lovely, clear, fall day, Stephen, although I don’t suppose even a drenching rain would’ve dampened my spirits.”
He’s sitting sideways on the log, one leg propped up to support his elbow. On this sunny day he wears pants cut above his knees, and he’s taken off his moccasins. “It might’ve dampened you,” he says, laughing.
“So it would. Anyway, just after noon, Enid and a gaggle of women came to my room to dress me. The way the bride dressed was part of the wedding tradition. Brides always wore white. The women decked me out in a long skirt, a blouse with full sleeves gathered at the wrists, and a scarf that fell to my waist, all made of fine, white wool. Then Bernadette presented me a bouquet of lavender asters and white pearly everlasting, and Nehemiah came to take me to the church. He was to give me away, and he seemed as proud as if I really were his daughter.”
“He was to give . . . you away?”
“A bride was traditionally given to the groom by her father. Nehemiah served as my surrogate father. Oh, those were ancient and densely patriarchal traditions, Stephen.” I give him an oblique smile, but his answering smile is tentative. “Then with Nehemiah at my side, surrounded by those chirping women, I walked to the church, and everyone told me how beautiful I was. Well, I wasn’t beautiful then and never had been. Yet later, when I met Luke at the altar, I looked into his eyes and . . .”
And saw there all my hope, all my future, and he looked back as if he saw his hope and future in me.
“I saw that I was, at that moment, beautiful. At least, to Luke. I remember Sister Leah—she was Rebecca’s mother—sang ‘Amazing Grace,’ then Luke and I exchanged our vows of love and faith and obedience. Till death us do part. And Luke gave me his mother’s gold wedding band.” I look down at my left hand, wrinkled, disfigured with arthritis, and remember the hand, still smooth and straight, on which Luke placed that gold band. “And the Doctor smiled on Luke and me like a lesser sun and prayed that the lord should also smile on us, that out of our love would come the fruit of the lord’s mercy and wisdom.”
Stephen doesn’t seem to hear the hollowness in that. He says wistfully, “It must’ve been wonderful. I wish . . .”
“What, Stephen?”
He turns seaward. “We’ll never have weddings here, I guess.”
“Probably not unless other people come here. Maybe then there’ll be weddings.” And I hope there will be weddings and not wars.
He only nods, and I go on. “After the wedding there was a feast on tables set up outside the church. No music or dancing or spirits, of course, but there was a great deal of conviviality. The array of food was astounding. It was as if every woman were entering her dish in a contest. And there were gifts for Luke and me. Handwoven cloth, baby clothes, a crib, a down quilt. At dusk the tables were put away, and we went to the church for evening service, which, as I remember, was mercifully short. Then Luke and I walked together to our household. Our household, finally . . .”
And the air was crackling with the first frost, the stars so clear, it was dizzying. By candlelight Luke led me to the room where I had slept alone for two long nights, and he ceremoniously divested me of my white scarf and blouse and skirt and made love to me with sweet, furious vigor, and it was a homecoming we celebrated until dawn.
“It was a golden autumn, Stephen, warm days and frosty nights, and the harvest was good. Halcyon days, that September and October.”
He studies me a moment. “What does halcyon mean?”
“Oh, peaceful and happy. Not that those were easy days. They were working days, from dawn to dusk. I was astounded at how much the Flock accomplished, and it all seemed to happen without conscious organization. At least, that’s what I thought, until I realized the organizational decisions emanated from the church—from that room behind the altar where the Doctor lived. He not only lived behind the church, but he’d set up his clinic there. Well, it was only an examination room and another room with three beds in it. But it seemed fitting that he should live and work there at the center of the Ark.”
“Did you get to be Bernadette’s apprentice at nursing?”
“No. I didn’t have the nerve to ask. I knew that before I asked any favors, I had to prove myself as a working member of the Flock.” I give that a short laugh. “And I was indeed a working member.”
“What kind of work did you do?”
“Almost anything, Stephen. Fall was an especially busy time of year—just as it is here. There’s so much to do to prepare for winter. At the Ark we had grain to scythe, thresh, and winnow, and our methods weren’t far removed from those used in the Fertile Crescent five thousand years ago, even though the barley was a space-age hybrid adapted to cool climates. Unfortunately it wasn’t adaptable enough to grow here on the ocean front. And there were fruits and vegetables to can, animals to butcher, meat to salt or smoke, wood to cut, split, and stack. Plus the usual chores of laundry, ironing, mending, cooking, soap making, candle making, and cleaning, not only the household, but the privies, the bathhouse, even—or especially—the church.”
And I offered myself for any task, drove myself to the limits of endurance under the goad of my compulsion to prove myself. Luke was solicitous and proud, and that was my reward. He was with me, morning and evening, at the church services, and that made them bearable. I never ceased to be enthralled by the music nor appalled at the sermons, at the Doctor’s brutal eloquence, at the sheer nonsense of his messages. His recurrent themes were sin—and its consequences, told in Dantean detail—and the second coming of Christ. He hammered at those themes day after day, and I could understand why after all these years the Flock still expected Jesus to come and waft them to the heaven described by John the Divine, with its abundance of worldly treasures, where a man-shaped god sat on a throne as grand as any mortal king’s.
Stephen breaks my reverie. “It must’ve been hard for you at the Ark.”
“What? Oh. Yes, the work was exhausting, but that wasn’t the hardest part of my adjustment to the Ark.”
“What was the hardest?”
I look into his night-deep eyes. “The Doctor,” I answer. “Rather, his philosophy. The trouble was, I couldn’t agree with it, but neither could I express my disagreement, not if I hoped to stay at the Ark, and that was the only hope for any children I might bear. I wasn’t raised in his kind of religion, Stephen, and I think you have to be to ac
cept it.”
That brings a long, thoughtful pause. “What kind of religion were you raised in?” he asks finally.
I doubt Stephen is ready to accept even agnosticism, and certainly nothing beyond that. Not yet. So I hedge. “My mother belonged to another Christian denomination. I was raised in the philosophy that people should decide for themselves what to believe, that no mere human being should tell them what to believe. And I was raised in the philosophy that the concept of god can’t be made in the image of man.”
“But it was the other way around,” he objects.
“Was it, Stephen?”
He tilts his head, his heavy-lidded eyes half-closed. And at that moment Shadow comes bounding across the sand and greets him as if she’d been away on a long journey, and he laughs and ruffles her fur. I say no more about the image of god. Let him think about it awhile.
When Shadow settles herself at his feet, Stephen looks up at me and says, “I wish I could remember more about the Ark.”
“You were only three when you left it. Do you remember anything at all?”
“Only a room with log walls and a big fireplace. It must’ve been the kitchen of our household. And I think I remember Brother Luke. He had a long beard. It was nearly white.”
I’m trying to picture a white-bearded Luke when Stephen asks, “What else happened that fall?”
“Other than the long days of work, the hours spent listening to the Doctor’s sermons—well, there wasn’t time for much else.”
Except for making love. It was my salvation then. Night after night Luke and I coupled joyously in the encumbered warmth of that bed. I might exhaust myself physically with the day’s work, but I was never too spent to prove myself against his body. There were nights when he was absent from our bed on visitations—by decree of the Doctor, who kept a record of every woman’s menstrual cycles and calculated her days of maximum fertility. I didn’t begrudge those nights, nor did I feel any jealousy, only a piercing loneliness as I lay waiting for sleep.
