Grandmother took a nap on one of the benches outside the stone house, using the carpet bag as a pillow. While we were there to keep an eye on the patient, Mr. Girandole made a trip to his own home high on the mountain. He brought back some herbs and roots and cooking ware, and he delivered to R —— a drab green shirt and a brown pair of trousers. Going a ways off into the woods, he built a campfire and made a pot of stew with a rabbit he’d caught. He also burned up the dirty bandages and R ——’s original shirt, pants, and gun holster.
We regrouped for a late lunch on the terrace. Mr. Girandole took stew and tea up to R —— and helped him eat. Then he and Grandmother explained difficult words for me, and we all read through the lines I’d found. In two cases, Grandmother and Mr. Girandole remembered a phrase differently from the way I’d written it, and I went back to the statue to check; once they were right, and once I was. It perplexed me that some of the inscriptions were not even complete thoughts. One gave me the impression that the engraver had grown bored and walked away, leaving the job unfinished; in other instances, he seemed to have begun carving in the middle of an idea. Grandmother wondered if they might be phrases copied or paraphrased from literature.
“It would be like the duke to paraphrase the classics for his own purposes,” Mr. Girandole said, “which would make it harder to identify the originals.”
I barely knew what “the classics” were; Papa used the word to refer collectively to some dusty books with dark brown covers on our shelves. I admired their stately row and their scent, like a solid old wall back in the dimness, holding up a part of our house. I’d never tried to read them, but it didn’t surprise me that Mr. Girandole seemed familiar with the great stories of our world.
I’d found ten different inscriptions:
My steps fall softly like the rain (from the sleeping woman)
Or a thousand cheeses times a thousand if you give me days enough (I found this concealed by bushes on the bear’s pedestal; it had taken some courage to approach the bear again, but in the brightness of midday, I managed it. An inscription about cheeses certainly seemed to be nonsense.)
Hurry now to find me draw near but not inside (from the centaur)
I am it is very true (the comforting words from the announcing angel)
Round and round the dancers go and my answer is in three and seven (from the chamber inside the screaming mouth, where the letters stood above embossed angels on a dull metal plating)
The Mermaid (engraved on a slab before the mermaid)
There was no writing I could see anywhere around the tortoise.
Or walls or ivied garden porch or doorstep have we none (written along the elephant’s base)
Behold in me (from the pedestal of the missing statue, of which only the sandaled feet were left) I searched in the bushes behind but found no fallen statue.
The wild boar had no letters. Perhaps non-mythical animals received no inscriptions, I thought at first—but no, the bear had his . . . as did the elephant.
You have we have all have though perhaps home (from the pool of the four women)
Narrow (This single word was carved on the high-arching back of Neptune’s throne.) Intriguingly, this “Narrow” arced along the top edge of an accompanying illustration: in an elliptical frame on the chair’s tall back, above Neptune’s head, a weathered relief sculpture depicted a ship sailing between two cliffs. Atop one cliff was a monster with several dog-like heads and one head that seemed to be that of a human woman, but it was hard to see—the carving had lost much detail to the passing years. Grandmother, who’d joined me when she finished her nap, pointed out a whirlpool on the ship’s other side. She explained that it was a picture of Odysseus and his crew sailing the narrow strait between the dangers of Scylla and Charybdis.
“That’s a good morning’s work,” said Mr. Girandole, running a dusky finger down my page one final time.
“But I don’t think they’re all here,” said Grandmother. “I seem to remember more.”
I suddenly recalled the Reason departs from the leaning house and wrote it down.
“Yes,” Mr. Girandole agreed, “there are probably a few more. For one thing, you haven’t climbed that last stairway.”
So I did that.
Grandmother returned to the cottage ahead of me; there was garden work that needed doing. I promised to come and help her as soon as I’d seen what was on the hilltop.
I followed the mossy steps upward at the north end of the ravine. Over the centuries, the elements had rounded their edges. Tendrils from the bushes crawled across the path, and I pushed through branches. I wondered if the stairway would make it all the way to the top, or if a wall of foliage would block my way. Insects whirred in the brush. A spray of blue wildflowers had blanketed the stairs in one place; I threaded cautiously through the patch so as not to damage them.
First, the stair climbed far to the right, and at its bend, I looked down the steep bank to the screaming mouth. Then the track switched back left. At the next turn, I was high above the announcing angel. Wandering back to the center, the steps emerged from the bushes and brought me to a grassy meadow on the brow of the hill in brilliant, warm sunlight.
The trees held their distance all around, their crowns still higher than the hill’s summit. Bright butterflies floated over the green carpet, the grasses tasseled in gold and sprinkled with more wild blossoms, an artist’s palette of colors. Straight before me, grand and gray, rose a many-pillared stone temple.
It reminded me of pictures of the Parthenon I’d seen in my mythology book, although this building was smaller and in better repair, with its walls and roof intact. People in airplanes would be able to see it if they looked carefully, I supposed, but the stone was so rimed by lichen and age, it would probably appear to them as no more than some decrepit and long-forgotten shed.
On the pediment above the columns, I found the words I am a gate. More accustomed to the antique mode of writing now, I was sure of the meaning. With excitement I copied the sentence and noted where in the garden it was from.
Was the doorway to the other world here, just beyond the columns? Surely, it couldn’t be so simple. I waded through the grass, which reached to my knees, and climbed carefully up onto the slab. Deep coolness radiated from the interior. I tipped back my head, studying the relief carvings on the triangular pediment: men and women in flowing garments . . . and fauns! I counted at least a dozen fauns, some dancing, some playing harps or pipes.
I turned, wondering if any part of the garden was visible from this high place, but I saw only the rolling tops of the trees. Even giant Heracles was lost beneath them. Trees screened the entire village from my view, though I could see the ocean in the distance, dotted by tiny boats.
The temple had only a single chamber. Two more stone tables stood among the shadows, flanked by their benches. The cross of Christ was molded onto the back wall: a plain cross of cylindrical poles, though only the forward halves of these emerged from the wall. No figure of the Lord hung there. On the floor at its base were a prayer rail and a shelf for kneeling.
I crossed myself, as I’d been taught to do when entering a church, and then padded slowly from wall to wall, from front to back, examining every pillar and corner. I pushed on the walls, tapped on the floor, and searched for anything that might indicate a hidden doorway. The cross was perfectly solid, a three-dimensional extension of the wall. I found no other inscriptions, no images.
I shook my head. I am a gate. How? What gate? Where?
I walked out into the sunlight and sat on the edge of the porch. In the steamy weeds, two bees hummed around the tops of my shoes. This place felt good to me, with all its brightness and air, its cross, and its lack of anything fanciful or grotesque. Much as I loved the gardens below, it was fitting that the path through the grove ended here.
The hilltop temple was the only part of the garden that w
as not on a circular course. Everything below could be approached from a clockwise or counter-clockwise direction; but to get here, one had to depart from the circles and move along a line. The stairway, though it meandered, led only here; nor could I discover any other path descending into the forest.
I hurried down the steps, my mind racing ahead. I wanted to ask Mr. Girandole if he thought that the temple might conceal the magic doorway. I dashed out from between the bushes, jumped off the bottom step into the upper garden—and found myself face to face with two soldiers. I felt the blood drain from my face.
“Hold it, there!” one ordered me.
I froze in panic, realizing that I’d left the carpet bag, hatchet, and firewood bundle on the terrace of the leaning house, to pick up on my way home. None of these things were in the soldiers’ hands, so perhaps they hadn’t been there yet. The men held their rifles—not aimed at me but ready. They must have heard me trotting down the steps, stirring the bushes.
I tried not to look terrified. I held my pencil in my hand, the notebook under my arm.
The soldiers moved closer, looking stern. Both were young. The one speaking had sharp, angry-looking features. “What are you doing?” he demanded.
“Playing,” I said. “I went up there.”
“What have you got there? Show it to me.”
Having no choice, I handed over the notebook. Like a fool, I showed them the pencil, too, but they weren’t interested in that.
They slung their rifles onto their shoulders, but the quiet one kept a close eye on me while the other opened the notebook.
I’d copied out R ——’s poem, but I hadn’t labeled it.
“What is this?” asked the soldier, turning a page and frowning at what he saw.
“The g-garden. I wrote down the words from the statues.”
“Why?” he asked, looking at me.
“I . . . I like the monsters.”
“‘A duke the secret knew’—what’s this poem?”
I took a breath. “My grandmother and I wrote it. We like to write things about the woods.”
“Is this your grandmother, M —— T ——?” He was looking at the name and address inside the cover.
I told him yes and explained how I was staying with her. He passed the notebook to the other man.
The second soldier flipped through the pages and looked up. “Is this for school?”
“No, sir,” I said. “School’s out for the summer.” It might be out for longer than that, the way things were going in the city.
My stomach squirmed as I thought of the carpet bag. It was full of empty tins and dirty dishes to be taken home and washed. That wasn’t bad—I could say we’d had a picnic. It held the kitchen shears. But far worse, I couldn’t remember what Grandmother had done with the bottles of medicine. Had she left them in the leaning house, or . . . ?
“Are you out here by yourself?”
I nodded. “My grandmother was here earlier, but she went home first.”
“All right. Now, listen: you can’t be up here. It’s dangerous. You tell your grandmother that.”
“Yes, sir.”
“We’re putting you on report,” the soldier said. “You tell your grandmother that, too. Do you understand?”
I said that I did.
The second man looked at the first and held up my notebook. “Are we taking this?”
The first soldier considered. “No. He can keep it.” To me, he added, “Go home now. And I mean it. Don’t come up here again.”
I accepted my notebook, skittered past the two men, and ran for the archway. If I could get far enough ahead of them, I hoped to scoop up my things from the terrace before the soldiers had a chance to find them. I kept listening as I went, though, and I just barely heard the first man say, “Let’s take a look up there.”
Good. They were going up to the temple. That bought me some time. I raced past the bear and the sleeping woman, through the arch, and past the Angel of the Bottomless Pit. This time, I had the presence of mind to look around. Seeing no one in the lower glade, I galloped up the steps to the foot of the leaning house.
I skidded to a halt, my eyes widening. My bundle, hatchet, and the carpet bag were gone. I looked under the benches—nothing.
Panic rising again in my chest, I glanced over the rail at the green shadows all around. There must have been more soldiers. I imagined them fanning out, doing a sweep of the grove, and two had found me. The carpet bag was likely on its way to the major right now.
Thinking I’d better warn Mr. Girandole, I was just about to duck into the house when something small and hard tapped me on the head.
An acorn—I saw it roll across the stones at my feet.
Looking up, I saw Mr. Girandole: not in the window, but on the roof. The sight of him brought some relief. “Are you all right?” he whispered.
I nodded.
“Your bag is inside, hidden,” he breathed. “Soldiers in the upper garden.” He waved me away. “You’d better go.”
With a wave, I was off at a run, overwhelmed with thankfulness for Mr. Girandole’s acute hearing. When he’d first heard the patrol coming, he’d popped down to the terrace, retrieved what I’d carelessly left there, and locked it all away with R —— in the secret compartment.
My knees felt like water. I’d have to be a lot more careful from now on.
* * * *
I had to sit through the second half of a neighborly visit from Mrs. D ——, and it became clear to me that Mrs. D —— had harbored no intention of leaving until she’d seen me return alive from the woods. She didn’t approve of my forays there any more than Mrs. F —— did, but Mrs. D —— also seemed to be a little in awe and kept comparing me to Papa regarding my bravery and my handsome looks. At last, she went on her way, and if Grandmother might never truly forgive her for finding out about the setcreasea and fuchsia through legerdemain, at least she praised the garden so highly that Grandmother later said, “I wonder what enthusiasm she has left for the gardens of Paradise.”
I told Grandmother about the soldiers as we weeded, with millipedes and grasshoppers darting away from our fingers.
“You had a close call,” she said. “Thank Heaven for Girandole. No harm was done. And this is the best kind of work to calm you down.”
“We’re on report,” I reminded her.
“I think we’ll survive that,” she said, pulling up a long root. She looked sidelong at me. “You told them we wrote that poem?”
“Camouflage,” I said sheepishly, and focused on weeding.
Before the post office closed, I trotted there with the letter I’d written to my parents and mailed it. I didn’t see any soldiers along the route. At first, I was afraid the building was closed, because the front window was covered by plywood. The postmaster looked tired, but he was glad to see me and inquired after Grandmother.
“Have you been well?” I asked, thinking he actually looked haggard.
“Spry as salt, Boss,” he said, reverting to his old nickname for me. Oddly, I felt somehow as if I’d lost ground, as if we were no longer as close. I couldn’t explain it, and we only exchanged a few words.
Still, I remarked to Grandmother about how strangely he’d acted.
“I’m sure this hasn’t been a good time for Mr. V ——,” she said, chopping an onion. That was the postmaster’s name. “The Army all over the village.”
“Why bad for him?”
She sighed. “He was the mayor before. The other party. He was lucky to keep his job at the post office when things changed—lucky not to have gone to prison. We all stood up for him. Mrs. F ——’s husband in particular, God rest him. I wrote some letters myself . . . well, we’re all fortunate, I guess, that things are no worse. I expect the major has made the last several days very unpleasant for him.”
I felt
sorry for Mr. V —— and disliked the major all the more.
Just before sunset, several trucks rolled down the street. Grandmother and I were finishing supper at the garden table, and she sent me around the house to see what I could see. I reached the corner just in time to glimpse the Army staff car passing. I supposed Major P —— was inside it. The trucks, I could see, were full of soldiers, and they were heading out of the village; I noticed which way they turned at the big road.
“That many of them leaving. I think they’ve called off the search,” Grandmother said. “We’re left to fend for ourselves against the enemy.”
“Do you really think so? They might just have something to do.” I remembered my father telling us how he’d helped turn a school into a hospital.
“They have lots of things to do,” said Grandmother. “Major P —— can’t spare the men here, chasing butterflies.”
“Does that mean we can go back to the woods tomorrow?” I asked.
“I think we’d better,” she said. “You’re running out of summer.”
With a pang of sadness, I went indoors to consult a calendar. When I’d arrived here, the spring and summer had seemed an endless time to spend away from home with this formidable old woman I didn’t know. I missed my parents terribly and my friends quite a bit; I wouldn’t mind seeing my sister—I supposed she’d grown a lot. But the thought of leaving Grandmother brought an ache to my chest.
I had just over two weeks remaining.
* * * *
In the peaceful hours before bed, Grandmother sat in her easy chair beside the radio, listening to the symphony. I bent over my notebook at the table, trying to add in the mirror-script, the reversed versions of each line in R ——’s poem. It wasn’t easy, and I needed to keep erasing.
Grandmother had her chin against her chest, and I thought she was asleep. But suddenly, she sprang up and hurried to the bookcase. At her request, I brought the lamp closer.
A Green and Ancient Light Page 13
