go home. We each have a mission to accomplish. That mission is the purpose of each of our lives.
AIf we went back, we might feel more secure, more comfortable . . .that is, until the ghosts of what we had left unaccomplished came to haunt us, until the men who gave us our missions confronted us in our dreams and condemned for cowardice.
AIf you turn back, I will not be your judge, but I will then take up the search for Robin myself: He paused, and then added, ABut I will ask that you give me the mirror.@
I confess that I broke down and cried. David put his hand on my shoulder to console me. AThank you, David. No, I will not give up. I will keep the mirror as a reminder to me that we both have work to do, and I must do my own part. We will go on together.@
And so we did.
A Road Less Traveled
I consulted the mirror again before we set out the following morning. The motel at which we had spent the night was at the end of the road on which we had traveled so long. Now we had to choose to turn right or left. The mirror showed our car turning to the left and, then, about a mile further on, turning to to the right.
The first road was a well-traveled highway, but the road to the right was narrow and unpaved. David filled up the tank since it was clear that we were unlikely to find a gas station on this road, if one might call it a road, because it seemed more like a wide dirt path into which wheels had worn two parallel ruts the width of an axle.
David was skeptical about taking such an unlikely route, so he told me to inquire of the mirror one more time. The mirror confirmed its instructions.
AOf course,@ said David, Awe don=t have to do what the mirror suggests. How are we going to get a big city, or even a small town, by going down a dirt road?@
AWe can=t disobey the mirror,@ I countered. AIf we tried to find the way to Robin on our own, we would have no idea at all how to do it. We just can=t drive around aimlessly hoping we=ll eventually find him. When I was with Martha and Samuel the mirror showed me that Robin was in a large city, but it didn=t say which large city. If we drove to a large city, we couldn=t be sure if it was the right large city; and even if it was the right large city, we still wouldn=t know where to find Robin. The mirror is our only hope.@
AI suppose you=re right,@ David answered, Abut I hardly think we=re going to find a large city down that dirt path. We don=t know where it goes. It could end in a swamp and we=d get stuck in the mud for all we know.@
ANo, we don=t know,@ I said somewhat testily, Abut we have to assume that the mirror knows. We don=t know what is down that road, but it seems that there must be something that the mirror wants us to see.@
AAll right,@ David replied with a sigh, AI=ll go along with the mirror again, but if this turns out badly, I=ll never trust the mirror again. It already got us in a lot of trouble in Hardwick@
AI=m sure it won=t turn out badly,@ I said, trying to hide my own doubts. AAnyway, if we get stuck, we=ll probably find there was a reason for that too.@
When we arrived at the dirt road, we pulled over to the side and stopped to give us a chance to take a closer look at what we were getting into. What we saw was not encouraging. The road was narrow. On the right there was a shoulder only some two feet wide before a steep embankment. On the left, there was a shoulder about a yard wide that ended in a thicket of bushes. If we met another car coming in the opposite direction, there was barely enough room for both cars to edge pass one another using the full width of the road and the shoulders. There was no hope of turning around, assuming we wanted to do so.
David scratched his head. AIt looks like once we=re on this road, we=ll have to follow it wherever it leads.@
A@I suppose that=s what the mirror expects us to do,@ I answered.
ASo the mirror wants us to take silly chances?@
AWe have to assume the mirror is sending us down the road for a purpose. Why else would it tell us to turn here?@
David paused before answering. AYes, the mirror has a purpose, but whose purpose is it? The mirror may have ideas of its own. We are supposed to be looking for Robin, and I doubt seriously that Robin is somewhere down this road.@
AI doubt that too. But if we do not follow the mirror=s instructions now, the mirror may no longer work. Have you thought of that? We have to do what the mirror wants us to do unless the mirror proves itself untrustworthy.@
AAnd the time that it proves itself untrustworthy, then what? We may be stuck in a swamp at the end of this stupid road, and then what will the mirror say? It may laugh at us for being such fools.@
ANow, David, you=re the one who is doubting our quest. You told me that if I wanted to give up, I could go, but you would carry on. Now are you telling me that you don=t want to carry on?@
AI=m not telling you anything of the sort. I am just saying that we have to be reasonable, and it is not reasonable to go down this road.@
ATell me, then, David, what is reasonable? We can do what the mirror tells us or we can strike out on our own. If we won=t obey the mirror, if we doubt every instruction it gives us and demand that it prove it is the right before we act, we might as well throw the mirror away and go home now. The mirror doesn=t think as you and I do. We don=t know how it knows or what its reasons are, but we must follow them or we will indeed get lost.
ADo you think it was reasonable that houses appear and disappear in the forest, or that strange men encourage us on our journey, or that an entire forest can appear and disappear right in front of us?
ASomeday perhaps we=ll understand all of this, but if we require understanding now before we act, I=m certain we=ll never accomplish what we set out to do.@
David stood quietly for a moment looking down the strange road the mirror told us to follow. AI was never good at venturing into the unknown. I=ve always tried to guide my life by reason and in an orderly way. I want to know how something will turn out before I attempt it. I want a clear plan to achieve the goals I set. And now here I am in a situation I don=t understand, not having any idea of where we=re going or what we=ll find when we get there.
AIt was the lack of order that caused me to run away. It was the greed of my aunt and uncle and the foolish conduct of my brother and sisters that caused me to flee and seek a life of my own away from them. And here I find myself in an even more irrational situation, following the instructions of a mirror that never explains itself and that is supposed to lead us to someone neither of us have ever met. This doesn=t make any sense at all. No, this doesn=t make any sense at all.@
We both were silent for more than a minute looking down the dirt road. David started the car, waited until it was safe to pull out from where we had stopped, and turned right on to the road the mirror had shown us.
The ruts were so rough that David dared not drive more than ten miles an hour. Puddles in the road reminded us that it had rained recently. The sky was now clear, but we both realized that a heavy rain might make the road impassable. If the car did get stuck in the mud, there was no one to call on to pull us out. If the car broke down, there would be no one to tow us to a service station. It was only our faith in the mirror that brought us to this point. Now we had to keep going and hope that our faith was not misplaced.
I took out the mirror again and asked it what we ought to do. It showed me only this same road ahead.
The Farm at the End of the Road
Although there were still puddles in some of the deepest parts of the road, the ground was dry enough in most places that we left a small cloud of dust behind us as David carefully maneuvered the car trying his best to avoid the worst bumps. The existence of the ruts proved that we were far from the first to use this road, but we met no one coming from the opposite direction, nor did we see anyone following behind us.
On we drove for fully half an hour until we saw a clump of trees ahead and a clearing at which the road ended. As we approached the clearing, we saw a house. Behind the house were broad fields in which of which we observed cows
grazing. Entering the clearing, we saw a pig sty about a hundred yards off to the right. The dirt road had led us to a farm.
We saw no one outside, so we parked the car under a large tree and watched the house to see if anyone came out to greet us. No one did.
AWell,@ David said, Athe mirror led us here, so I suppose there=s something here that we are supposed to see.@
ALet=s go up to the house,@ I suggested.
We got out of the car, walked to the house, up a set of steps to a porch, and crossed the porch to the front door. The house was painted white and was well-cared for. The porch was clean of debris. A mat offering us AWelcome@ lay in front of a screen door. I opened the screen door and reached for the knocker under a square window near the top of the front door and gave five hard raps.
We waited for about a minute but no one came. I rapped again as hard as I could six more times. Still no one came. I tried the door. It was not locked.
ADo you think we should go in?@ I asked.
AYou told me to trust the mirror, didn=t you,@ David replied, a bit sarcastically. AWe=re where the mirror led us, so I suppose we ought to go in.@
I gingerly opened the door and David followed me in to a vestibule, the floor of which was covered with a brown shag rug.. We could see a kitchen ahead of us and a parlor to our right. Everything seemed neat and in order.
AAt least it doesn=t look like your house or mine,@ David quipped. AAnd we=re not in the middle of a forest.@
AEmily, Emily, is that you?@ A soft voice called from a room off the living room.
David and I hesitated for a moment and then walked quickly in the direction of the voice. We entered a room in which a men was sitting up on pillows in a wide bed. A dresser stood opposite the bed. A window on the wall opposite the door opened on to the fields in back.
The man tried to raise himself from the pillows but quickly fell back with a moan. AWho are you,@ he asked, Aand where is Emily?@ His words were slightly slurred.
I started to explain to him that a mirror told us to come here, but quickly decided that this what not a good idea. AWho is Emily?@ I asked.
AEmily is my wife,@ he replied. She=s taken care of me after I had a stroke. She went out to feed the pigs, but she should have been back by now.
AMaybe it=s a good thing you came. I can=t get out of bed. Would you go out and try to find Emily?@
I remember the pig sty we had seen when we first arrived. AOf course, we=ll go out immediately and try to find her. You just wait here and we=ll be back soon. Is there anything you want us to do before we look for Emily?@
ANo, no, I just want you to find Emily. Make sure that nothing has happened to her.@
David and I left the room, exited the house, and walked toward the pig sty. We reached the pig sty and saw no one. Then from behind the open shed where the pigs could seek shelter from the sun and inclement weather, we heard a woman calling, AHelp me. Please help me.@
We ran to the back of the shed where we found a woman lying on the ground, a upturned pail of slop on the ground close by her. She looked at us with an expression that was part hope and part fear.
AWho are you?@ she asked, AIs Hiram all right?@ She struggled to get to her feet but fell back with a grimace. AI feel and sprained my ankle, maybe broke it. I can=t get up. Please help me.@
David and I studied the situation for a moment. Then David said, AIf we had a wheelchair, we could lift her into the chair and get her back to the house. There was a wheelchair in Hiram=s room on the far side of his bed.@
AI=ll run back and get it,@ I said, and started back immediately to do so.
When I entered Hiram=s room again, he asked if we had found Emily. I told him that we had and that she had fallen and sprained her ankle.
The Magic Mirror Page 11
