Chapter 27 #3
“Wonderful to meet all of you,” Carolyn said.
“I wish it were under other circumstances, of course. But I’ll do whatever we can to make this work.
Let’s get you into the house and show you around.
It’s roomy and has a lot of bedrooms because farm families in the old days had lots of children.
Whenever they needed another room, they would just add one to the house. ”
Jane handed May to Katie, and the three adults each took a suitcase and a smaller bag, and walked to the white farmhouse together.
Jane was taking in everything as they walked—the traffic passing on the road, which was about two hundred yards away, the house, the big expanse of grassy land within the stone fence, the woods to the north and west that included big old trees, probably left standing by the farm family as a windbreak.
Carolyn said, “After I had lived in Lowery for a few years I saw that the farms were being bought up. It was inevitable that the farms around here would eventually be divided into a lot of regular blocks with houses on them. Fortunately, by then I had a little money, so when this farm came up for sale, I could put in a bid. I only kept the fifty acres with the house and barn in the middle and sold off the rest after the prices went up. It gives me a little permanent space, so people aren’t ever very close to the house unless I invite them. ”
The house had seven bedrooms, five of them upstairs.
Jane and Carey chose one of the two bedrooms downstairs so they would not disturb the others if May cried in the middle of the night.
Next, they all went for a walk on Carolyn’s property.
The sun was still high in the west, and the warm fresh air moving across the skin felt good after the hours sitting in the air-conditioned car.
Fifty acres let them stay a comfortable distance from the road, but they spent most of the time in the back parts, near the woods.
Carey wore May in a front-facing rig that allowed her to see where they were going.
They talked to May, pointing out the things they saw as though she understood.
She did seem to be aware that they were bringing things to her attention and she showed some interest in each of them.
As Jane explored, she was assessing risks. They were far enough away from the road and from neighboring properties to be nearly invisible, and it was possible to walk in the wooded areas and be actually impossible to see, except from the air.
Jane could see that both Carey and Katie were less tense than they had been for days, and that helped her to feel slightly better too.
That night after Katie went upstairs to the bedroom she’d chosen, Jane and Carey took May to their room and put her in the travel crib they had brought.
It had high sides like a playpen, with a mattress at the bottom.
They talked about the things they had done and seen during the day, about Carolyn’s farm, house, and loyalty.
It was a way of not talking about all the things that were uncertain and threatening.
Hours later, while Jane was deep asleep, she heard footsteps on the front porch, and the front door opening and closing.
She looked beside her for Carey, then for May, but they were both gone.
She stared at the bedroom door, but that part of the room was so dark that she had trouble seeing it clearly.
When the door opened, she saw Harry clearly enough, because in dreams people see what the mind tells them is there.
He came into the room and closed the door.
He stepped forward, and she could see the familiar shape, and the gray sport coat hanging from his bony shoulders. From where she lay, she was looking up and could see the big stitches the undertaker had used to close the slash across his throat that had killed him.
“Hello, Harry. What brings you into my dream this time?”
“Sky Woman’s twins are keeping an eye on the way this is going.
They seem to think you’re causing a balance problem.
Hawenneyu the Creator and Hanegoategeh the Destroyer, they’re like two kids of exactly equal weight on a teeter-totter.
Theoretically they could just sit there perfectly still and the board would stay horizontal and balanced, but they don’t, because the universe doesn’t work that way.
Things are moving and changing every second.
A mountain over here is getting pushed up higher by two tectonic plates colliding, and over there another mountain is getting rained on and eroding.
A war is killing people off, but it ends tomorrow, the boys come home, and the baby boom starts in ten months.
We little humans can predict things, but mostly it’s massive things.
One is that new people will be born, and every one of them will die. Everybody dies, no exceptions.”
“I noticed that at age five and learned I had to accept it as part of the bargain.”
“Yeah. You accepted the good stuff—delicious food, mind-bending sex—so—”
“—Harry?”
“—And the beauty of nature, great arts, and great thoughts, etcetera, that the Creator gave you, so you have to remember that it’s a take-it-and-leave-it deal.
You’re slowly delivering yourself into the hands of the Destroyer, who has to clear the field for the next person.
‘Nature, red in tooth and claw,’ you know? ”
“The brothers read Tennyson?”
“I don’t know where that came from. Maybe you’re so worried that your memory is leaking into your dreams. You’re trying to ignore the fact that you can’t save everybody you think might get killed.
You’re one puny human who has been allowed to play a tiny part in the immensity of reality.
But be careful. This time your boat is already too full.
You’re going to have to be ready to decide who goes overboard. ”
He went into the dark space toward the door and she lost sight of him.
Jane heard the bedroom door open and close, and then she was awake.
There was light coming from the window. Carey was beside her, and she could hear little sounds of movement in May’s crib.
She got up and picked up May, and her day had begun.