A Green and Ancient Light

by Frederic S. Durbin

  With the shadows playing over her face, Grandmother looked like an imp. Narrowing her eyes, she said, “Tell me. Deception or art?”

  I propped my chin on my palms. “He doesn’t even give us the choice that there’s a meaning.”

  “No? That could be hidden in the ‘deception,’ couldn’t it? All the nonsensical clues could be placed to trick us and lead us away from the meaning that’s there if we don’t give up. Or else . . . the duke might just be snickering up his sleeve. But I’ll tell you a secret: this word ‘deception’ used to have another meaning besides the one we’re left with today. It once also meant something like ‘magic’—the power to perform wonders.”

  Hurrying to get my pencil, I asked if Grandmother had any of the other inscriptions written down.

  “No,” she said. “I don’t even remember why I copied this one.”

  To keep myself busy that evening, I wrote a long letter to my parents, telling them all about the garden. Grandmother agreed that it would be safe enough now to go to the post office without much unwanted attention. I addressed the envelope to my mother and asked her in the letter to mail it on to my father when she’d read it. Of course, I said nothing about Mr. Girandole or our patient, R ——. Before I finished, I read over the most recent letter from my mother, which I’d been answering in mine. As always, she’d asked some earnest questions: “Are you eating well? Are you getting along with Grandmother? What are you finding to do?” She also said that the people in my wooden castle were holding a jousting tournament, but that some of the knights were still away on their quests, and they were greatly missed.

  I tapped my pencil on my chin, wondering how to answer. Mama wanted me to be well and comfortable, but I knew she’d be sad if I sounded like I was happier here than at home. I wrote, “Grandmother is very nice. I hope we can all visit her soon. I miss you and Papa. I’m eating very well, but I miss your tomato soup and the yellow sauce. Everything is clean, but the way we do the washing here, it all comes out stiffer.” I reviewed the lines, nodding with satisfaction. I added, “And a little scratchy.” Perfect.

  * * * *

  Morning came, bright and clear, with a soft wind blowing off the sea. We started earlier than usual, loaded up the carpet bag, and took along the hatchet and ropes for more “gathering of firewood” if the situation demanded such. We saw no soldiers, though we didn’t patrol the village.

  Mr. Girandole met us at the first archway with the news that R —— was awake but of course still very weak. So, his wounds and our surgery hadn’t killed him, but Grandmother said it came down now to his battle with infection. He really ought to be in a hospital, she said.

  Instead of the stone house, Mr. Girandole led us to the pool of the four women with their water pitchers. He motioned us to sit on the lichen-covered edge. The stagnant water reflected the green canopy of leaves and branches above it. Insects skimmed over the water, leaving rings where they touched the surface.

  It was awkward to sit with Grandmother between two life-size, unclothed women, two more looming behind us. My head kept wanting to turn. The glade was especially cool at this hour, before the day’s heat warmed it. Traces of mist lingered, and the shadows were in blues and purples. We could easily see the leaning house, the elephant, sea serpent, boar, Neptune, and Heracles rising gigantic near the ravine’s east wall. And away to our left, near the second arch, stood the terrible angel with the keys and chain.

  “What is that?” I asked quietly, nodding toward the angel as Mr. Girandole propped one booted hoof on the pool’s rim.

  He looked over his shoulder to follow my gaze. “Apollyon,” he said. “The Angel of the Bottomless Pit.”

  I shivered, only partly because of the morning’s chill. Whatever the name meant, it was fitting.

  “We’re talking here so the man in the house won’t hear us,” Mr. Girandole explained. I saw that he’d brought R ——’s notebook, which he opened and handed to Grandmother. As she read the translation of the poem R —— had written in his delirium, I opened my own notebook on my knees and copied it—the forward version for now: I could add the mirror-script later.

  A duke the secret knew

  And locked the riddle here

  Find twice the number Taurus follows with his eye

  Sisters dancing in the water and the sky

  Heed the words among the trees in stone

  Though not all words are true

  And they will lead you home

  “Taurus. . . .” Grandmother said at last, rubbing her chin. “Taurus is the bull.”

  “There aren’t any bull statues here,” I said. “Are there?”

  Mr. Girandole shook his head.

  “‘They will lead you home,’” Grandmother said, and looked at Mr. Girandole with a curious light in her eyes.

  “The ‘words among the trees in stone’ can only refer to the inscriptions on the statues,” Mr. Girandole said. “And the whole thing is clearly written about this garden—mention of the duke and all.”

  Grandmother nodded. “It would seem so . . . but how? How could a feverish man write a poem like this about a place he’s never heard of?”

  Mr. Girandole pushed his hat farther back and glanced at the leaning house. “That’s what I wanted to tell you. He’s been dreaming as he hung between life and death. And he speaks . . . Often, he speaks.” Lowering his voice, Mr. Girandole hunched closer. “He has said names—names he could not possibly know, for they are written in no book, and no mortal ear has heard them.”

  “Names?” Grandmother whispered back.

  “Names of fairies and fauns. People I know. Names of rivers and mountains in the land from which I came.”

  Grandmother watched him.

  “Don’t you see?” he asked. “Where departed souls go . . . Heaven, Hell, and Faery, my home—it’s all one when you’re through the Gates of Dawn—it all connects. R —— was there, on the edge of death—he was wandering in the mists—but he didn’t go on. He came back.”

  “What do you mean?” Grandmother asked.

  “For whatever the reason, he wasn’t allowed to stay. It wasn’t time for him to be there yet; I guess it means he has something yet to do here, in this world. This poem came back with him. It was sent with him.”

  “A message?”

  Mr. Girandole nodded. “It’s not easy anymore to find doors between here and Faery, although once they were everywhere. Even when I still lived there, the two worlds were growing farther apart. Doors were vanishing.”

  “I think you’ve told me that,” Grandmother said. “It’s why you can’t go home to your people.”

  “But you see, sometimes doors can still be discovered.” Mr. Girandole turned his hat between his hands, thinking. “Now and then, a mortal on this side stumbles upon a fragment of the ancient wisdom in very old writings or through a knowledge of the stars. We know that our duke was intrigued by alchemy—you’ve told me so, M ——. He may have found a secret in some musty book or scroll.”

  Alchemy. Magic . . . “deception” . . . the power to perform wonders.

  Grandmother spoke in a hush. “A doorway into your world?”

  “A doorway that can still open, though it would be hidden well and probably locked.”

  “But not the doorway you and the other fauns used before?” she asked. “You would remember that.”

  “No,” he said. “We didn’t use a doorway as such—we came to these woods in a dawn mist that made this world one with ours, when such things used to happen. If there’s a door here in the garden, we never knew it. When the fauns left, I’m sure they were following the Piper; the music of the pipes was their way home.”

  “Won’t the Piper call you someday?” I asked in a shaky voice.

  Mr. Girandole touched the notebook, still open in Grand­mother’s lap. “In this, I think perhaps he is. Do you see?
My people might know there’s a door here. They might have sent this message to help me find it.”

  “But I don’t understand,” I said, thinking of R ——’s poem. “If the fauns know about the door, why do they send hints? Why don’t they just come through it and lead you home?”

  Mr. Girandole smiled vaguely. “The poem didn’t come from the fauns. This is quite beyond them, sending words and dreams from one world to another. It must be the work of the Green Lord and the Lady of the Stars, who rule over Faery.”

  “Well, whoever sent it,” I said, “if they really want to help, why don’t they just tell us straight?”

  Before Mr. Girandole could answer, Grandmother laughed and said, “Nature abhors a straight line.”

  The faun smiled. “And a gardener abhors a straight path. It may be a test for me. I am in exile by my own choice. The Lord and Lady may have determined that if I want to come back, I must solve the duke’s puzzle. A mortal’s game, since I cast my lot with mortals.”

  Grandmother swallowed. “Then we must solve this garden’s puzzle. We must get you home.”

  “But—” Mr. Girandole said. Despite the darkness of his skin, he looked pale.

  “No buts. Girandole, I’m an old woman. Do you love this place so much that you want to stay here forever, waiting for other kindred souls to find the garden after you’ve buried me?”

  “Most definitely not,” he said.

  “Then if what you say is true, this is a gift to us both—the way we can be together.” Glancing at me, she added, “All of us. For more than a handful of years.” She turned back to Mr. Girandole and took his arm. “We humans don’t need magical doorways; we go there anyway, when it’s time. You’re the one who isn’t built to die, poor thing.”

  Mr. Girandole seemed at a loss for words. The turn this conver­sation had taken scared me—Grandmother dying of old age . . . Mr. Girandole going away through a magic door. The appeal of answering the grove’s riddle was swiftly dissolving.

  Grandmother patted my back. “There’s nothing to be sad about,” she said. “If that door really leads to what’s beyond this life, then the paths will join up on the other side.”

  I was baffled. “Heaven, Hell, and Faery are all the same?” How could so many disparate things be one?

  Mr. Girandole gripped my shoulder, his expression rueful and kind. “You can’t begin to understand it from this side. The way there looks the same, but there are choices among the paths—paths that we’re walking on even now, paths that your great-great-­grandparents walked. And they go on beyond. You have farther to travel, even after you leave here. It truly is a garden, all of this. Hell is where truly dead things go. But your grandmother is right. We can all be together where things live and bloom.”

  I could see something in his eyes that made me feel light inside—a wondering hope, as if he’d just awoken after a long sleep, as if he’d gazed at a marvelous, glowing eastern sky.

  “The journey does end,” said Grandmother, nudging him. “We do get there, don’t we, in a little while?”

  Eyes brimming, he nodded.

  * * * *

  Grandmother eyed the leaning house with a growl of disdain. Then, heaving a sigh, she ordered Mr. Girandole and me to stay close behind her on the stairs and catch her if she toppled backward. “And don’t fall yourselves,” she added. “A sorry state that would be, if we all ended up in a broken heap.”

  We kept ourselves well braced. I carried the carpet bag, and on the second step, Grandmother thrust her walking-stick into my hands and said, “Here’s your stick.” She went on hands and knees, with Mr. Girandole pushing, and eventually we reached the house’s upper chamber.

  In the sunken compartment, R —— had his head raised, as if he’d been alarmed at what sort of grunting, puffing beast might be pawing its way up the stairs.

  “Good morning,” said Grandmother briskly, snatching her stick back.

  “Good morning,” the pilot answered hoarsely, letting his head fall onto the pallet again. He looked haggard, but the slick pallor was gone from his skin. “I . . . memory you,” he said. “I hear what you do . . . thank you. You save me. Thank you.”

  “You aren’t saved yet,” said Grandmother, crouching on the well’s edge to study him. “How do you feel?”

  “Hurt all. Sick like dog.”

  Grandmother motioned that we should climb into the well and lift her down, which we did. It wasn’t hard with one of us on either side.

  We crowded around R —— and looked him over. Dried blood caked the bandages. Grandmother set about clipping them with her shears and gingerly peeling them loose. The pallet was stained and smelled of sweat.

  “You’ve kept him clean, anyway,” Grandmother noted. “Is the water in this bucket fresh?”

  “I brought it at dawn,” said Mr. Girandole.

  Lifting his good arm, R —— ran a hand through his matted, thinning hair. His neck and jaw sprouted golden beard stubble, like my father got when he was on holidays. The pilot grinned at me. “You name?”

  I told him my name, and he introduced himself, apparently not remembering that he’d done so before.

  “You old how many?”

  I told him I was nine, and he nodded.

  “You no goat people?”

  Grandmother glanced at Mr. Girandole, who had been R ——’s only nursemaid since he woke up. “No,” she said. “We’re people people.”

  “Good you here. Mr. Satyr no like me.”

  “I’d like you better if you’d stop calling me a satyr,” said Mr. Girandole. “I’ve told you I’m a faun. Satyrs are a vulgar folk. You won’t see me guzzling wine by the skinful.”

  Grandmother cocked an eyebrow at him.

  “Not by the skinful,” he said.

  “And woman?” R —— grinned waggishly. “You run catch woman?”

  “Mind your own business,” said Mr. Girandole. “And mind the company.”

  “What about you, R ——?” Grandmother asked, dampening a rag to clean the wounds. “Do you run and catch women? Do you have a family?”

  “Father have. Mother die. Two sister. Brother die. Wife go other man. Take child.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” Grandmother said.

  I didn’t quite follow who was alive and who was dead, but it sounded as if R —— didn’t have much of a family left.

  Grandmother had brought along a clean, raggedy sheet. She cut strips from it to make new bandages.

  “I already die?” asked R ——, looking at the ceiling.

  “Well, you’re clearly not in Heaven,” said Grandmother, “or you wouldn’t be in pain. And if you were in Hell, we wouldn’t be helping you. So, I’m afraid you’re stuck in the same old world.”

  R —— blinked a few times. “But this house . . . funny.”

  “Yes, it most certainly is funny. That’s not part of your fever. You’re in the forest near the village of ——, which means you’re well behind enemy lines.”

  R ——’s gaze focused on her. “But . . . you help me.”

  “I’m not sure if what we’re doing is helping you at all. I’ll say again: you should have a doctor and medicine if you want to live.”

  “Madam Grandma.” R ——’s hand found Grandmother’s wrist. “No doctor. Live, die—no distance.”

  “No difference?” Grandmother asked.

  “Yes.” R —— seemed to be looking beyond the stone walls. “The flute. They dance and sing. Better there, not back. Not go back.” His hand dropped to his side, as if he’d exhausted himself.

  “This is the way he talks,” said Mr. Girandole. “He’s been to the edge of Faery, and he’d rather be there than back in his own country, or fighting a war.”

  “H’m,” said Grandmother.

  I helped hold the sheet so she could cut it more easily.r />
  “You wrote this,” said Mr. Girandole, showing R —— the poem he’d written in the notebook.

  R ——’s eyes widened, and he brushed his fingers over the page.

  Mr. Girandole held the book steady for him. “What does it mean to you?”

  “Many man with goat foots . . . like you. Many man, woman, faces like sun, stars.”

  Mr. Girandole exchanged a look with Grandmother. “Why did you write the lines backward?” he asked R ——.

  “I write? Not remember.”

  It was difficult to imagine what a doctor could have provided that Grandmother did not. She made R —— swallow pills and tonics. She bathed his wounds in disinfectant, re-bandaged them, and had us help her pull the dirty canvas out from under him and replace it with what was left of the clean sheet. When all the boughs and leaves were stuffed into the pallet again, she announced that she had to get out of this leaning place. Before we helped her down the stairs, she told me to unpack the food we’d brought.

  “We’re out of milk,” she said. “We’ll have to buy more.”

  R —— asked for his notebook, and Mr. Girandole returned it with apparent reluctance. He also helped R —— relocate the stubby pencil. Grandmother said that was a good idea, that maybe the fairies would send another message.

  “You have gun?”

  Grandmother shook her head. “No one has it. It’s at the bottom of the sea.”

  Someday it will be inside a giant pearl, I added silently, remembering the mer-folk.

  The pilot blinked and squinted. “How get there?!”

  “I put it there,” she said.

  R —— looked regretful. “Good gun, was.”

  * * * *

  I spent the rest of the morning in the grove, running from statue to statue, hunting for the inscriptions and copying them into my notebook. When moss covered parts of the words, I scraped it carefully away.