The Silver Bough

by Lisa Tuttle

  He’d certainly done his research. Or maybe he really was from the old orcharding family, and they’d brought him up on the ancient lore. “Well, thanks for your opinion. Now, I don’t want to be rude, but I’m going to have to—”

  “Wait,” he said, looking distressed. “This is no ordinary apple. You can’t—”

  “I know. It’s not to be sold for money, or left to rot, or eaten by a single person, only shared between lovers.”

  The surprise on his face was almost comical. “You know?”

  “I’ve read up on the mythology of apples as well as the facts,” she said coolly.

  “So what are you going to do with it?”

  Raising her chin, she gave him a challenging look. “I don’t think that’s any of your business.” She pointed at the door.

  His shoulders sagged. After a long moment, when she refused to relent or respond to his pleading look, he moved. “Expelled from the garden,” he muttered, trying and failing to catch her eye as he went. At the gate, he lingered. “Can I come back another day?”

  “I can’t think of any reason why you’d have to,” she said, and her look and her tone were implacable. He didn’t try to argue.

  She knew that sending him away had been the right thing to do, not just regardless of the feelings he’d aroused in her, but because of them. Once upon a time, lust was a deadly, dangerous sin; it made people outcasts from society, broke up families, destroyed lives. These days…well, these days society could hardly function without it; lust was not merely acceptable, it was practically a duty. You could get by perfectly well without love so long as you were “in lust” with someone. People thought there was something wrong with you if you weren’t constantly moving from one object of desire to another. Maybe the word had simply become debased and misused, maybe it was greed or boredom that made people want so many things they didn’t need, but everything was so sexualized now. People “lusted after” clothes, cars, Godiva chocolates, and new gadgets in the same way that they shopped for new lovers. She’d been guilty of it herself, and she mistrusted the sense she had that, by comparison with what she’d just felt for a stranger in her orchard, her other urges were mere fantasies, nothing more than flickering shadows.

  Later, when the image of Ronan came back to her while she was soaking in a hot bath, she banished regret by reminding herself of why it was necessary, why she could never, ever take the risk of letting someone get too close to her.

  When she was five years old, her parents had died in a car crash for which Nell still felt responsible. Her mother had been driving, bantering with her husband, ignoring Nell in the backseat, who responded with increasingly noisy demands for attention. Technically, the cause of the accident—which had involved several vehicles—was a truck that had been (inexplicably) driven the wrong way down the freeway, but Nell had known then and always that her mother—a quick-witted and skillful driver—might have taken evasive action and saved her own and her husband’s life if she hadn’t been fatally distracted by her hysterical child.

  She’d lived with relatives after that—people she could somehow never get really close to—and, as she grew older, had been sent to boarding school. She’d had friends there, and at college; she was never totally a loner—but there was no one who mattered to her in the way that (she supposed) her mother and father had, until she met Sam. A few years later, Sam was dead, and although she certainly hadn’t caused the accident that had sent him overboard (that was unlucky chance—plus a touch of carelessness on his part) she would always hold herself responsible for his death because she had been unable to save him from the sea.

  She believed she’d been born unlucky and the worst thing about her bad luck was that it was directed dangerously outward. It brought her pain—but it killed the people she loved. And it was for this reason that she’d chosen to live without love. But she didn’t have to be deprived of a sex life as long as her lovers stayed, safely, strangers.

  She thought of Ronan’s eyes, dark, the pupils dilated as he looked from the apple to her, and she shivered. As she got out of the bath and quickly toweled herself dry she imagined things she could have said to him: mocking, flirtatious, cruel.

  So, you think I ought to share the apple with you? Don’t we have to be lovers first?

  It doesn’t matter. Now, or later. There’ll be time.

  She could practically hear him saying it, and found herself wondering if he was interested in her at all, apart from the apple.

  What’s your heart’s desire?

  You.

  He would say that, the charming bastard. Could he really believe in that old wives’ tale about a magic apple? And yet, if he didn’t, why had he come here; how could she explain what had happened (or nearly happened) in the orchard?

  Now tell me yours, Nell.

  What I want’s impossible.

  That’s OK. It’s magic.

  I don’t believe in magic. All right, then. (This would put out that smug, mocking light in his warm, dark eyes.) What I want is for the past to be undone. No death. I want my parents back again. I want my husband Sam in my arms—not you.

  Having satisfactorily routed and crushed her uninvited visitor, she went off to get dressed.

  By the time Kathleen arrived, at the tail end of the day, Nell had worked herself back into a better mood. Thinking about life before Sam, she’d remembered the casual, satisfying friendships she’d had at school and in college—none of those people had come to an untimely end because of her, so far as she knew. Since Sam’s death she’d worked out a way of accommodating her sexual needs, but she hadn’t given similar thought to her social life. Discussions with tradesmen about paint, paving stones, or dwarfing rootstock, and exchanges about the weather with people she met from day to day was about the extent of it. She’d chosen not to join a church or the Women’s Institute or any local organization, and without a job or children, nothing threw her in the way of meeting people.

  It was clear when Kathleen arrived, clutching a bottle of wine in each hand, that she shared her anxiety about the evening ahead. And recognizing her visitor’s nervousness, Nell was able to forget her own as she switched into hostess mode, working to put her guest at her ease.

  “Oh, wow, this is a real farmhouse kitchen, isn’t it. So big!” Kathleen exclaimed, gazing around as Nell put her bottle of white wine into the fridge. “Is that an Aga? Did you paint the cupboards yourself? I love the garland and apple motif; I’ve never seen a stencil like that—where’d you find it?”

  “It’s my own design.”

  “Really? You’re good. And you don’t do this professionally? Oh, I love your big table!” She ran a hand over the smooth wooden surface, like stroking a horse. “I wish I had room for something like this.”

  The long, sturdy table would have suited a large family. Nell had bought it because the size of the kitchen demanded a substantial table, and because it was a beautiful piece of furniture; she didn’t need it.

  “I thought we’d eat out in the garden—with all the sunshine we’ve been having, and the Aga belching out heat as usual, it’s awfully warm in here. Do you mind?”

  Kathleen grinned. “Mind? I love eating outside—I didn’t get much chance this summer. Seems like whenever the sun was shining, I had to work. Besides, I’m looking forward to seeing your gardens.”

  “Shall I show you around the house first? Then we can take our drinks into the garden.” She couldn’t help warming to her guest’s enthusiastic appreciation; it was unexpectedly flattering to have her hard work so admired. It was in the nature of rewarding her with a special treat that she took her, finally, to the apple room.

  “Now, this is something different,” she said, pausing with her hand on the door handle. “It’s kind of old-fashioned, and it’s not ideal—but this is where I store my fruit.”

  She opened the door. Wooden shelves lined the walls of the cool, unfurnished room. Even this early in the year, with only a few of the shelves filled with rece
ntly picked apples, the unmistakable smell perfumed the air. She thought it must be the ghost of last year’s crop, for although she kept the window open to prevent the buildup of gases, the odor intensified as the apples matured, and a trace remained behind, perhaps trapped in the porous wood of the shelves, even after the fruit was all gone.

  “An apple store,” said Kathleen, gazing at the yellow Oslins and the bright red Lord Roseberys all set out in neat rows in their cozy nests of shredded paper. “Was this here when you bought the house?”

  “Oh, no. This was their dining room. Well—when they used it. The house was empty when I bought it. No, I thought about a purpose-built apple store outside—but it seemed like tempting fate, to go to all that trouble before my trees started cropping, and now—well, this works well enough. It’s not like I’m a big commercial venture.”

  “But you do sell them?”

  “I’ve taken a stall at the local farmers’ markets, and—you know the shop Green Jean’s? She agreed to take a few baskets after I swore upon my honor they were organically grown. I’m not trying to make a living out of it, I just don’t want them going to waste.”

  “How do you make your living? If you don’t mind me asking?”

  “I don’t do anything. I don’t have to; I was left pretty well-off. Investments and such.” She stepped back and let her guest out of the room before closing the door and leading the way back to the kitchen, feeling grateful that Kathleen made no comment about her “luck” at being so well-off.

  It was as she poured out two glasses of wine in the kitchen that the next, inevitable personal question came. “What made you decide to settle in Appleton? Is there a family connection?”

  She handed her guest a glass of wine. “Shall we go outside and wander around for a few minutes? Then I’ll put the soup on to reheat while I do a few last minute things to the main course.”

  “Sure.”

  It would be easy enough to redirect the conversation as they toured the grounds, she knew, but the unanswered question would hang there and take on a more dangerous weight, the longer she left it unanswered. She could give the sort of sound-bite answer she’d given to others who’d casually wondered how an American had ended up in such a back-of-beyond part of Scotland, but friendship—even the lightest, most superficial kind of friendship—surely deserved better. So she took a deep breath, and a steadying gulp of wine, and began.

  “I first set eyes on Appleton on my honeymoon. We spent it sailing around Britain because Sam loved to sail, and Britain was where he’d learned.”

  They paused on the patio, and Nell set her glass down on the mosaic-tiled top of the table and gazed at a lavender bush, a different scene before her mind’s eye.

  “The sun was low in the sky when we came into Appleton harbor; it made the golden dome on top of the library blaze. It was the most astonishing-looking place: the palm trees growing along the wide harbor-front Esplanade, and what looked like a huge, exotic temple plonked down in between some pastel-colored fishermen’s cottages, and a lot of elegant Victorian villas looking down their noses from the hillsides. To top it all, a pod of dolphins were leaping about, chasing along in front of the boat, welcoming us in…It was absolutely magical. We felt we’d sailed into another world, a kind of private paradise. And, I don’t know why, but after that night we suddenly had this full-blown, shared fantasy of the life we were going to lead after Sam retired. We’d buy a big old house on one of the hills overlooking the town and the sea. It had to have plenty of land, because we’d grow our own fruit and vegetables, and Sam would go fishing in a nearby trout stream, and whenever we felt a bit restless, we’d hop aboard our boat and sail away to somewhere else.”

  Kathleen smiled encouragingly. “Sounds like a beautiful dream.”

  “Yes.” She took a cautious sip of wine, just to wet her mouth, while she waited for the inevitable question.

  “Your husband…?”

  “He died.”

  A pained gasp, then, “Oh, I’m so sorry! Was it…was he…”

  “It was an accident. He drowned. A sailing accident. I was there; I couldn’t save him.” She met her eyes for the briefest instant before deliberately turning away, picking up her wineglass to make it perfectly clear she did not wish to be hugged or touched at all.

  “How awful. Oh, Nell, how awful for you. I’m so sorry.”

  “Yes, it was awful. I’m not really sure why I came back here, except…we hadn’t really been together all that long, and after he died—well, I was just trying, rather hopelessly, to hang on to him, so I set off on a kind of pilgrimage, visiting places from his past. I’d just been to visit his old school when I noticed Appleton on a map and decided to come here. I saw a picture of Orchard House in the estate agent’s window, and on a whim I went in and asked to view the property. And when I saw the place, well…” She gestured with both hands, to encompass both house and garden. “I saw something I could do, a place to fix up. I needed a new home, so…I bought it.”

  “You’ve done a wonderful job,” said Kathleen warmly. “I mean, of course I don’t know what it was like when you found it, but…it’s great.”

  “Thank you.” She smiled, relieved to have cleared the first hurdle. She guessed Kathleen would be sensitive enough not to bring up the subject of Sam unbidden. “Now, before I have to go inside and get cooking, would you like to see my orchard?”

  They left their drinks on the table and set off. Kathleen gave a soft cry of delight as they approached the door in the wall. “A walled garden! You’ve got a walled garden! No wonder you bought Orchard House.”

  Nell laughed softly. “Another fan of The Secret Garden?”

  “Of course. All the best people are!”

  The sun was very low in the sky now, and although it was still daylight in the meadow, inside the orchard dusk had gathered beneath the branches and in the cool embrace of the shadowed wall.

  “Kind of dark in here,” said Kathleen, her voice gone thin and uncertain.

  Nell felt no anxiety. Day or night, she felt more at home surrounded by her trees than anywhere else on earth. “It’s all right. Take my hand. Your eyes will adjust in a minute.”

  “What’s that humming, a machine?”

  “No, the bees. Wild bees; they live in the wall, and pollinate the blossom.”

  “They won’t sting us?”

  “They won’t sting us.”

  “I can see now.” Kathleen took back her hand. “The trees are smaller than I’d thought.” She took a few steps forward. “Are they espaliered?”

  “Some of them—those against the wall.”

  “How many are there?”

  “Twenty-four trees, ten different varieties—plus one.”

  Kathleen looked around. “What do you mean?”

  “I can name the ten varieties I bought, but one is a mystery tree. It fruited for the first time—” She turned toward the tree as she spoke, and what she saw dried the words in her mouth. She narrowed her eyes and stared uncomprehending at a change that had come about in the last few hours. Something new lay clustered along a single branch, something pale white and almost luminous in the gathering darkness.

  “Is that the tree with the blossom? Isn’t it too late for blossom? I mean, the other trees have apples…”

  Although the voice jarred against her ear, she was grateful to it as to a lifeline back to sanity. What she saw was real; she wasn’t hallucinating. She managed to speak, and heard herself sounding perfectly calm. “It happens sometimes. Unseasonable weather can trigger a second blossoming.”

  “Huh. I never heard of that. Fruit and blossom on the same branch…it reminds me of something; I can’t think what. It looks like magic.”

  It was magic, Nell thought, stunned. Still unable to believe her eyes, she went nearer to make sure what she thought she was seeing was not an optical illusion of some kind, caused, perhaps, by a late ray of sun reflected off the glossy leaves, or a horde of migrating moths who’d chanced to choose
this particular branch to settle on. But when she was close enough to smell the heavy scent, which had attracted one or two sleepy bees already, and see the almost purplish flush around the edges of the creamy petals, she had to accept that this was no illusion. As she raised one hand to touch the flowering branch—the very branch that bore the solitary yellow apple—she remembered seeing Ronan touch it hours before, when there had been not the slightest trace of the blossom which now grew so thickly out of season.

  From Mythology of the Celts

  by F. X. Robinson

  (Hale, 1902)

  AVALON, the idyllic “Island of Apples” where King Arthur was taken after receiving his fatal wound, is that same Land of Youth, always located on an island on the western horizon, to which Celtic heroes were summoned to dwell in eternity. Bran, as we have seen already, was beckoned by a beautiful woman bearing an apple-branch silver-white with blossom to Emain, described as an island in the west where apple trees are perpetually in flower and fruit at the same time.

  The connection between apples and immortality is of course very ancient, and found throughout Europe. In Scandinavian legend, the gods owed their eternal youth to a diet of magic apples, guarded by Idun, the goddess of Spring and renewal. The Greeks, too, had their magical apples of the Hesperides—those Western Isles again. From Ireland comes the tale of how Cu Roi hid his soul in an apple, that he might not be slain in battle, only to be destroyed when Cu Chulain split the fruit with his mighty sword.

  For a suggestion of why this should be, we have only to look at the language of symbolism and its reflection in the natural world. When an apple is halved crosswise, each half reveals the image of a five-pointed star. This, of course, is one of the most ancient and universally recognized emblems of immortality; a sacred sign, like the apple itself, of the Great Goddess and her supernatural realm.

  THE CHILDREN—JADE especially—were in a bad mood on Sunday morning, because they were missing their weekly cartoon fix. Although at first they assumed a fault in their rather elderly television set, they soon discovered that nobody in Appleton could receive television or radio signals.