The Winds of Marble Arch and Other Stories

by Connie Willis

  That gave them some space. There was nothing Sharon could do about the rest of the music stands. Their metal frames were tangled together, and against the outside wall was a tall metal cabinet, with pots of Easter lilies in front of it. She could move the lilies to the top of the cabinet at least.

  She listened carefully with her ear to the door for a minute, and then stepped carefully over the manger between two lilies. She bent and picked up one of them and set it on top of the cabinet and then stopped, frowning at the wall. She bent down again, moving her hand along the floor in a slow semicircle.

  Cold air, and it was coming from behind the cabinet. She stood on tiptoe and looked behind it. “There’s a door,” she whispered. “To the outside.”

  “Sharon!” a muffled voice called from the sanctuary.

  Mary froze, and Joseph moved so he was between her and the door. Sharon put her hand on the light switch and waited, listening.

  “Mrs. Englert?” a man’s voice called. Another one, farther off, “Her car’s still here,” and then Reverend Farrison’s voice again, “Maybe she went downstairs.”

  Silence. Sharon put her ear against the door and listened, and then edged past Joseph to the side of the cabinet and peered behind it. The door opened outward. They wouldn’t have to move the cabinet out very far, just enough for her to squeeze through and open the door, and then there’d be enough space for all of them to get through, even Mary. There were bushes on this side of the church. They could hide underneath them until after the police left.

  She motioned Joseph to help her, and together they pushed the cabinet a few inches out from the wall. It knocked one of the Easter lilies over, and Mary stooped awkwardly and picked it up, cradling it in her arms.

  They pushed again. This time it made a jangling noise, as if there were coat hangers inside, and Sharon thought she heard voices again, but there was no help for it. She squeezed into the narrow space, thinking, What if it’s locked? and opened the door.

  Onto warmth. Onto a clear sky, black and pebbled with stars.

  “How—” she said stupidly, looking down at the ground in front of the door. It was rocky, with bare dirt in between. There was a faint breeze, and she could smell dust and something sweet. Oranges?

  She turned to say, “I found it. I found the door,” but Joseph was already leading Mary through it, pushing at the cabinet to make the space wider. Mary was still carrying the Easter lily, and Sharon took it from her and set it against the base of the door to prop it open and went out into the darkness.

  The light from the open door lit the ground in front of them and at its edge was a stretch of pale dirt. The path, she thought, but when she got closer, she saw it was the dried bed of a narrow stream. Beyond it the rocky ground rose up steeply. They must be at the bottom of a draw, and she wondered if this was where they had gotten lost.

  “Bott lom?” Joseph said behind her.

  She turned around. “Bott lom?” he said again, gesturing in front and to the sides, the way he’d done in the nursery. Which way?

  She had no idea. The door faced west, and if the direction held true, and if this was the Judean Desert it should lie to the southwest. “That direction,” she said, and pointed up the steepest part of the slope. “You go that way, I think.”

  They didn’t move. They stood watching her, Joseph standing slightly in front of Mary, waiting for her to lead them.

  “I’m not—” she said, and stopped. Leaving them here was no better than leaving them in the furnace room. Or out in the snow. She looked back at the door, almost wishing for Reverend Farrison and the police, and then set off toward what she hoped was the southwest, clambering awkwardly up the slope, her shoes slipping on the rocks.

  How did they do this, she thought, grabbing at a dry clump of weed for a handhold, even with a donkey? There was no way Mary could make it up this slope. She looked back, worried.

  They were following easily, sturdily, as certain of themselves as she had been on the stairs.

  But what if at the top of this draw there was another one, or a drop-off? And no path. She dug in her toes and scrambled up.

  There was a sudden sound, and Sharon whirled around and looked back at the door, but it still stood half-open, with the lily at its foot and the manger behind.

  The sound scraped again, closer, and she caught the crunch of footsteps and then a sharp wheeze.

  “It’s the donkey,” she said, and it plodded up to her as if it were glad to see her.

  She reached under it for its reins, which were nothing but a ragged rope, and it took a step toward her and blared in her ear, “Haw!” and then a wheeze that was practically a laugh.

  She laughed, too, and patted his neck. “Don’t wander off again,” she said, leading him over to Joseph, who was waiting where she’d left them. “Stay on the path.” She scrambled on up to the top of the slope, suddenly certain the path would be there, too.

  It wasn’t, but it didn’t matter. Because there to the southwest was Jerusalem, distant and white in the starlight, lit by a hundred hearthfires, a thousand oil lamps, and beyond it, slightly to the west, three stars low in the sky, so close they were almost touching.

  They came up beside her, leading the donkey. “Bott lom,” she said, pointing. “There, where the star is.”

  Joseph was fumbling in his sash again, holding out the little leather bag.

  “No,” she said, pushing it back to him. “You’ll need it for the inn in Bethlehem.”

  He put the bag back reluctantly, and she wished suddenly she had something to give them. Frankincense. Or myrrh.

  “Hunh-haw,” the donkey brayed, and started down the hill. Joseph lunged after him, grabbing for the rope, and Mary followed them, her head ducked.

  “Be careful,” Sharon said. “Watch out for King Herod.” She raised her hand in a wave, the sleeve of her choir robe billowing out in the warm breeze like a wing, but they didn’t see her. They went on down the hill, Mary with her hand on the donkey for steadiness, Joseph a little ahead. When they were nearly at the bottom, Joseph stopped and pointed at the ground and led the donkey off at an angle out of her sight, and Sharon knew they’d found the path.

  She stood there for a minute, enjoying the scented breeze, looking at the almost-star, and then went back down the slope, skidding on the rocks and loose dirt, and took the Easter lily out of the door and shut it. She pushed the cabinet back into position, took the blanket out from under the door, switched off the light, and went out into the darkened sanctuary.

  There was no one there. She went and got the chalice, stuck it into the wide sleeve of her robe, and looked out into the hall. There was no one there either. She went into the adult Sunday school room and put the chalice back into the display case and then went downstairs.

  “Where have you been?” Reverend Farrison said. Two uniformed policemen came out of the nursery, carrying flashlights.

  Sharon unzipped her choir robe and took it off. “I checked the Communion silver,” she said. “None of it’s missing.” She went into the choir room and hung up her robe.

  “We looked in there,” Reverend Farrison said, following her in. “You weren’t there.”

  “I thought I heard somebody at the door,” she said.

  By the end of the second verse of “O Little Town of Bethlehem,” Mary and Joseph were only three fourths of the way to the front of the sanctuary.

  “At this rate, they won’t make it to Bethlehem by Easter,” Dee whispered. “Can’t they get a move on?”

  “They’ll get there,” Sharon whispered, watching them. They paced slowly, unperturbedly, up the aisle, their eyes on the chancel. “‘How silently, how silently,’” Sharon sang, “‘the wondrous gift is given.’”

  They, went past the second pew from the front and out of the choir’s sight. The innkeeper came to the top of the chancel steps with his lantern, determinedly solemn.

  “‘So God imparts to human hearts,

  The blessings of his heaven
.’”

  “Where did they go?” Virginia whispered, craning her neck to try and see them. “Did they sneak out the back way or something?”

  Mary and Joseph reappeared, walking slowly, sedately, toward the palm trees and the manger. The innkeeper came down the steps, trying hard to look like he wasn’t waiting for then, like he wasn’t overjoyed to see them.

  “‘No ear may hear his coming,

  But in this world of sin…’”

  At the back of the sanctuary; the shepherds assembled, clanking their staffs, and Miriam handed the wise men their jewelry box and perfume bottles. Elizabeth adjusted her tinsel halo.

  “‘Where meek souls will receive him still,

  The dear Christ enters in.’”

  Joseph and Mary came to the center and stopped. Joseph stepped in front of Mary and knocked on an imaginary door, and the innkeeper came forward, grinning from ear to ear, to open it.

  Matters of Life and Death

  Samaritan

  The people of the Countrie, when they travaile in the Woods, make fires where they sleepe in the night; and in the morning, when they are gone, the Pongoes [orangutans] will come and sit about the fire, till it goeth out: for they have no understanding to lay the wood together.

  —Andrew Battell, 1625

  Reverend Hoyt knew immediately what Natalie wanted. His assistant pastor knocked on the half-open door of his study and then sailed in, dragging Esau by one hand behind her. The triumphant smile on her face was proof enough of what she was going to say.

  “Reverend Hoyt, Esau has something he wants to tell you.” She turned to the orangutan. He was standing up straight, something Reverend Hoyt knew was hard for him to do. He came almost to Natalie’s shoulder. His thick, squat body was covered almost entirely with long, neatly brushed auburn hair. He had only a little hair on top of his head. He had slicked it down with water. His wide face, inset and shadowed by his cheek flaps, was as impassive as ever.

  Natalie signed something to him. He stood silent, his long arms hanging limply at his sides. She turned back to Reverend Hoyt. “He wants to be baptized! Isn’t that wonderful? Tell him, Esau.”

  He had seen it coming. The Reverend Natalie Abreu, twenty-two and only one year out of Princeton, was one enthusiasm after another. She had revamped the Sunday school, taken over the grief counseling department, and initiated a standard of priestly attire that outraged Reverend Hoyt’s Presbyterian soul. Today she had on a trailing cassock with a red-and-gold-embroidered stole edged with fringe. It must be Pentecost. She was short and had close-cropped brown hair. She flew about her official duties like a misplaced choirboy in her ridiculous robes and surplices and chasubles. She had taken over Esau, too.

  She had not known how to use American Sign Language when she came. Reverend Hoyt knew only the bare minimum of signs himself, “yes” and “no” and “come here.” The jobs he wanted Esau to do he had acted out mostly in pantomime. He had asked Natalie to learn a basic vocabulary so they could communicate better with the orang. She had memorized the entire Ameslan handbook. She rattled on to Esau for hours at a time, her fingers flying, telling him Bible stories and helping him with his reading.

  “How do you know he wants to be baptized?”

  “He told me. You know how we had the confirmation class last Sunday and he asked me all about confirmation and I said, ‘Now they are God’s children, members of God’s family’ And Esau said, ‘I would like very much to be God’s beloved child, too.’”

  It was always disconcerting to hear Natalie translate what Esau said. She changed what was obviously labored and fragmented language into rhapsodies of adjectives, clauses, and modifiers. It was like watching one of those foreign films in which the actor rattled on for a paragraph and the subtitle only printed a cryptic, “That is so.” This was reversed, of course. Esau had signed something like, “Me like be child God,” if that, and Natalie had transformed it into something a seminary professor would say. It was impossible to have any real communication with Esau this way, but it was better than pantomime.

  “Esau,” he began resignedly, “do you love God?”

  “Of course he loves God,” Natalie said. “He’d hardly want to be baptized if he didn’t, would he?”

  “Natalie,” he said patiently, “I need to talk to Esau. Please ask him, ‘Do you love God?’”

  She looked disgusted but signed out the question. Reverend Hoyt winced. The sign for God was dreadful. It looked like a sideways salute. How could you ask someone if they loved a salute?

  Esau nodded. He looked terribly uncomfortable standing there. It infuriated Reverend Hoyt that Natalie insisted on his standing up. His backbone simply wasn’t made for it. She had tried to get him to wear clothes, too. She had bought him a workman’s uniform of coveralls and a cap and shoes. Reverend Hoyt had not even been patient with her that time. “Why on earth would we put shoes on him?” he had said. “He was hired because he has feet he can use like hands. He needs them both if he’s going to get up among the beams. Besides which, he is already clothed. His hair covers him far more appropriately than those ridiculous robes you wear cover you!” After that Natalie had worn some dreadful Benedictine thing made of horsehair and rope until Reverend Hoyt apologized. He had not given in on the matter of clothes for Esau, however.

  “Tell Esau to sit down in the chair,” he said. He smiled at the orangutan as he said it. He sat down also. Natalie remained standing. The orangutan climbed into the chair frontwards, then turned around. His short legs stuck out straight in front of him. His body hunched forward. He wrapped his long arms around himself, then glanced up at Natalie, and hastily let them hang at his sides. Natalie looked profoundly embarrassed.

  “Esau,” he began again, motioning to Natalie to translate “baptism is a serious matter. It means that you love God and want to serve him. Do you know what serve means?”

  Esau nodded slowly, then made a peculiar sign, tapping the side of his head with the flat of his hand.

  “What did he say, Natalie? And no embellishments, please. Just translate.”

  “It’s a sign I taught him,” she said stiffly. “In Sunday school. The word wasn’t in the book. It means talents. He means—”

  “Do you know the story of the ten talents, Esau?”

  She translated. Again he nodded.

  “And would you serve God with your talents?”

  This whole conversation was insane. He could not discuss Christian service with an orangutan. It made no sense. They were not free agents. They belonged to the Cheyenne Mountain Primate Research facility at what had been the old zoo. It was there that the first orangs had signed to each other. A young one raised until the age of three with humans, had lost both human parents in an accident and had been returned to the Center. He had a vocabulary of over twenty words in American Sign Language and could make simple commands. Before the end of the year, the entire colony of orangs had the same vocabulary and could form declarative sentences. Cheyenne Mountain did its best to educate their orangs and find them useful jobs out in society, but they still owned them. They came to get Esau once a month to breed him with females at the Center. He didn’t blame them. Orangs were now extinct in the wild. Cheyenne Mountain was doing the best they could to keep the species alive and they were not unkind to them, but he felt sorry for Esau, who would always serve.

  He tried something else. “Do you love God, Esau?” he asked again. He made the sign for “love” himself.

  Esau nodded. He made the sign for “love.”

  “And do you know that God loves you?”

  He hesitated. He looked at Reverend Hoyt solemnly with his round brown eyes and blinked. His eyelids were lighter than the rest of his face, a sandy color. He made his right hand into a fist and faced it out toward Reverend Hoyt. He put the short thumb outside and across the fingers, then moved it straight up, then tucked it inside, all very methodically.

  “S-A-M-” Natalie spelled. “Oh, he means the good Samaritan, that was
our Bible story last week. He has forgotten the sign we made for it.” She turned to Esau and dropped her flat hand to her open palm. “Good, Esau. Good Samaritan.” She made the S fist and tapped her waist with it twice. “Good Samaritan. Remember?”

  Esau looked at her. He put his fist up again and out toward Reverend Hoyt. “S-” he repeated, “A-M-A-R-” He spelled it all the way through.

  Natalie was upset. She signed rapidly at Esau. “Don’t you remember, Esau? Good Samaritan. He remembers the story. You can see that. He’s just forgotten the sign for it, that’s all.” She took his hands and tried to force them into the flattened positions for “good.” He resisted.

  “No,” Reverend Hoyt said, “I don’t think that’s what he’s talking about.”

  Natalie was nearly in tears. “He knows all his Bible stories. And he can read. He’s read almost all of the New Testament by himself.”

  “I know, Natalie,” Reverend Hoyt said patiently.

  “Well, are you going to baptize him?”

  He looked at the orang sitting hunched in the chair before him. “I’ll have to give the matter some thought.”

  She looked stubborn. “Why? He only wants to be baptized. The Ecumenical Church baptizes people, doesn’t it? We baptized fourteen people last Sunday. All he wants is to be baptized.”

  “I will have to give the matter some thought.”

  She looked as if she wanted to say something. “Come on, Esau,” she said, signing to the ape to follow her.

  He got out of the chair clumsily, trying to face forward while he did. Trying to please Natalie, Reverend Hoyt thought. Is that why he wants to be baptized, too, to please Natalie?

  Reverend Hoyt sat at his desk for some time. Then he walked down the endless hall from his office to the sanctuary. He stood at the side door and looked into the vast sunlit chamber. The church was one of the first great Ecumenical cathedrals, built before the Rapture. It was nearly four stories high, vaulted with great open pine beams from the Colorado mountains. The famous Lazetti window reached the full four stories and was made of stained glass set in strips of steel.