The Anything Box

by Зенна Гендерсон

  Since the Little House accommodates only two at a time, the rest of ususually wait against an outcropping of boulders that shelters a little from asoutheast wind which can cut a notch in your shinbones in less time than ittakes to tell it.

  I was jerkily explaining this to Annie as I stumbled along thesemiovergrown path—it hadn't received its summer beating-down yet. I wasreaching out to trail my hand across the first boulder, when Liesle gasped andstumbled back against me, squashing my toe completely.

  "What's the matter, child?" I gritted, waiting for the pain to stopshooting up my leg like a hot fountain. "There's nothing to be afraid of. YourMommie and I are here."

  "I wanna go back!" she suddenly sobbed, clinging to Annie. "I wanna gohome!"

  "Liesle, Liesle," crooned Annie, gathering her up in her arms. "Mother'shere. Daddy's here. No one is home. You'll have fun tomorrow, you'll see." Shelooked over Liesle's burrowing head at our goblinesque flashlighted faces."She's never camped before," she said apologetically. "She's homesick."

  "I'm afraid! I can't go any farther!" sobbed Liesle. I clamped Jinnie's armsharply. She was making noises like getting scared, too—and she a veteran ofcradle-camping.

  "There's nothing to be afraid of," I reiterated, wiggling my toe hopefully.Thank goodness, it could still wiggle. I thought it had been amputated.Liesle's answer was only a muffled wail. "Well, come on over here out of thewind," I said to Annie. "And 111 hold her while you go." I started to takeLiesle, but she twisted away from my hand.

  "No, no!" she cried. "I can't go any farther!" Then she slithered like aneel out of Annie's arms and hit off back down the trail. The dark swallowed her.

  "Liesle!" Annie set off in pursuit and I followed, trying to stab somehelpful light along the winding path. I caught up with the two of them on thecreek bridge. They were murmuring to each other, forehead to forehead. Annie'svoice was urgent, but Liesle was stubbornly shaking her head.

  "She won't go back," said Annie.

  "Oh, well," I said, suddenly feeling the altitude draining my blood out ofmy feathery head and burdening my tired feet with it. "Humor the childtonight. If she has to go, let her duck out in the bushes. She'll be okaytomorrow."

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  But she wasn't. The next day she still stubbornly refused to go that lastlittle way to the Little House. Jerry, her father, lost patience with her."It's utter nonsense!" he said. "Some fool notion. We're going to be up herefor two weeks. If you think I'm going to dig a special—

  "You stay here," he said to Annie. He grabbed Liesle's arm and trotted herbriskly down the path. I followed. I make no bones about being curious aboutpeople and things—and as long as I keep my mouth shut, I seldom get a doorslammed in my face. Liesle went readily enough, whimpering a little, halfrunning before his prodding finger, down the path, across the bridge, alongthe bank. And flatly refused to go any farther. Jerry pushed and she doubleddown, backing against his legs. He shoved her forward and she fell to herhands and knees, scrambling back along the path, trying to force her way pasthim—all in deathly panting silence. His temper flared and he pushed her again.She slid flat on the path, digging her fingers into the weedy grass along theedge, her cheek pressed to the muddy path. I saw her face then, blanched,stricken—old in its fierce determination, pitifully young in its bare terror.

  "Jerry—" I began.

  Anger had deafened and blinded him. He picked her up bodily and starteddown the path. She writhed and screamed a wild, despairing scream, "Daddy!Daddy! No! It's open! It's open!"

  He strode on, past the first boulder. He had taken one step beyond theaspen that leaned out between two boulders, when Liesle was snatched from hisarms. Relieved of her weight, his momentum carried him staggering forward,almost to his knees. Blankly, he looked around. Liesle was plastered to theboulder, spread-eagled above the path like a paper doll pasted on awall—except that this paper doll gurgled in speechless terror and was slowlybeing sucked into the rock. She was face to the rock, but as I gaped in shock,I could see her spine sinking in a concave curve, pushing her head and feetback sharper and sharper.

  "Grab her!" I yelled. "Jerry! Grab her feet!" I got hold of her shouldersand pulled with all my strength. Jerry got his hands behind her knees and Iheard his breath grunt out as he pulled. "O God in Heaven!" I sobbed. "O Godin Heaven!"

  There was a sucking, tearing sound and Liesle came loose from the rock. Thethree of us tumbled in a tangled heap in the marshy wetness beyond the trail.We sorted ourselves out and Jerry crouched in the muck rocking Liesle in hisarms, his face buried against her hair.

  I sat there speechless, feeling the cold wetness penetrating my jeans. Whatwas there to say?

  Finally Liesle stopped crying. She straightened up in Jerry's arms andlooked at the rock. "Oh," she said. "It's shut now."

  She wiggled out of Jerry's arms. "Gramma, I gotta go." Automatically Ihelped her unzip her jeans and sat there slack-jawed as she trotted down thepath past the huge boulder and into the Little House.

  "Don't ask me!" barked Jerry suddenly, rising dripping from the pathside."Don't ask me!"

  So I didn't.

  Well, a summer starting like that could be quite a summer, but insteadeverything settled down to a pleasant even pace and we fished and hiked andpicnicked and got rained on and climbed Baldy, sliding back down its snowslopes on the seats of our pants, much to their detriment.

  Then came the afternoon some of us females were straggling down the trailto camp, feet soaked as usual and with the kids clutching grimy snowballssalvaged from the big drift on the sharp north slope below the Salt House. Thelast of the sun glinted from the white peak of Baldy where we had left theothers hours ago still scrabbling around in the dust looking for more Indianbone beads. We seemed to be swimming through a valley of shadows that werealmost tangible.

  "I'm winded." Mrs. Davidson collapsed, panting, by the side of the trail,lying back on the smoothly rounded flank of one of the orderly little hills

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  near the creek.

  "We're almost there," I said. "If I get down, I won't get up again short ofmidnight."

  "So let it be midnight," she said, easing her shoulders back against thesoft crispness of the grass. "Maybe some robins will find us and cover us withstrawberries instead of strawberry leaves. Then we wouldn't have to cooksupper."

  "That'd be fun," said Leslie, hugging her knees beside Mrs. Davidson.

  "Oh, Liesle!" Jinnie was disgusted. "You don't think they really would, doyou?"

  "Why not?" Liesle's eyes were wide.

  "Oh, groan!" said Jinnie, folding up on the ground. "You'd believeanything! When you get as old as I am—"

  "What a thought!" I said, easing my aching feet in my hiking boots. "Do yousuppose she'd ever be ten years old?" I looked longingly at the cluster oftents on the edge of the flat. "Oh, well," I said and subsided on the hillbeside the others. I flopped over on my stomach and cradled my head on myarms. "Why! It's warm!" I said as my palm burrowed through the grass to theunderlying soil.

  "Sun," murmured Mrs. Davidson, her eyes hidden behind her folded arm. "Itsoaks it up all day and lets it out at night."

  "Mmmm." I let relaxation wash over me.

  "They're sleeping a long time," said Liesle.

  "Who?" I was too lax for conversation.

  "The beasts," she said. "These beasts we're on."

  "What beasts?" It was like having a personal mosquito.

  "These ones with the green fur," she said and giggled. "People thinkthey're just hills, but they're beasts."

  "If you say so." My fingers plucked at the grass. "And the green fur grewall around, all around—"

  "That's why it feels warm," said Liesle. "Don't pull its fur, Gramma. Itmight hurt it. 'Nen it'd get up. And spill us on the ground. And open its bigmouth—and stick out its great big teeth—" She clutched me wildly. "Gramma!"she cried, "Let's go home!"r />
  "Oh, botheration!" I said, sitting up. The chill of the evening was like asplash of cold water. "Say, it is getting cold. We'll catch our death oflive-forevers if we lie out here much longer."

  "But it's so warm and nice down here," sighed Mrs. Davidson.

  "Not up here," I shivered. "Come on, younguns, I’ll race you to the tent."

  The moonlight wakened me. It jabbed down through a tiny rip in the tentabove me and made it impossible for me to go back to sleep. Even with my eyesshut and my back turned, I could feel the shaft of light twanging almostaudibly against my huddled self. So I gave up, and shrugging into afleece-lined jacket and wriggling my bare feet into my sneakers, I duckedthrough the tent flap. The night caught at my heart. All the shadow and silverof a full moon plus the tumble and swell, the ivory and ebony of cloudswelling up over Baldy. No wonder the moonlight had twanged through the tent.It was that kind of night—taut, swift, far and unfettered.

  I sighed and tucked my knees up under the jacket as I sat on the stump.There are times when having a body is a big nuisance. Well, I thought, I'llstay out long enough to get thoroughly chilled, then I'll surely sleep when Icrawl back into my nice warm sleeping bag. My eyes followed the dark serratedtreetops along the far side of the creek to the velvety roll of the smallhills in the moonlight upstream, the thick silver-furredbeasts-who-slept-so-long. I smiled as I thought of Liesle.

  Then there she was—Liesle—just beyond the tent, her whole body taut withstaring, her arms stiffly flexed at the elbows, her fingers crooked, her wholeself bent forward as though readying for any sudden need for pursuit—orflight.

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  She made an abortive movement as though to go back into the tent, and thenshe was off, running towards the hills, her bare white feet flashing in themoonlight. I wanted to call after her, but something about the stillness ofthe night crowded the noise back into my throat, so I took after her, glad ofa good excuse to run, fleet-footed and free, through the crispness of thesilver night. A little farther, a little faster, a little lighter and Iwouldn't even have had to touch the ground.

  I lost sight of Liesle, so I leaned against a tree and waited for my breathto catch up with me. Then I saw her, a wisp of darkness in her worn flannelpajamas, moving from one small hill to another, softly tiptoeing away acrossthem until the shadow of the aspen grove on the slope above swallowed her up.There was a pause as I wondered if I should follow, then she reappeared withthe same soft, careful step. She stopped just a few feet from me and plumpedherself down between two rounded knolls. She shivered in the icy air andsnuggled down tight in the curving corner. I could hear her talking.

  "Move over, you. Keep me warm. There's eight of you. I counted. I like youin the night, but I'm scared of you in the day. You don't belong in the day."She yawned luxuriantly and I saw that she was sinking slowly between those twograssy hills. "You really don't belong in the night, either." Liesle went on."You better go back next time it's open." Only her head was visible now. Shewas all but swallowed up in the—in the what?

  "Liesle!" I hissed.

  She gasped and looked around. Suddenly she was sprawling out in the openagain on the sloping hillside, shivering. She glanced back quickly and thenbegan to cry. I gathered her up in my arms. "What's going on here, Liesle?"

  “I had a dream!” she wailed.

  I carried her back to the camp, sagging a little under her weight. Justbefore I dumped her down in front of her tent, I swear she waved over myshoulder, a furtive, quick little wave, back at the little sleeping hills.

  Next day I determinedly stayed in camp when everyone else galloped off intothe far distance toward Katatki to look for arrowheads. I had to make a noise like elderly and weary, and I know my children suspected that I was up to somemischief, but they finally left me alone. The dust had hardly settled on thecurve downcreek before I was picking my way among the beast-hills.

  I caught myself tiptoeing and breathing cautiously through my mouth,startled by the crunch of gravel and the sudden shriek of a blue jay. I satdown, as nearly as I could tell, between the same two hills where Liesle hadbeen. I pulled up a tuft of grass with a quick twinge of my thumb and fingers.Grass—that's all it was. Well, what had I expected? I unlimbered my shortprospector's pick and began to excavate. The sod peeled back. The sandy soilunderneath slithered a little. The pick clinked on small rocks. I unearthed abeer cap and a bent nail. I surveyed my handiwork, then shoved the dirt backwith the head of the pick. Sometimes it's fun to have too much imagination.Other times it gets you dirt under your fingernails.

  I trudged back toward camp. Halfway there I stopped in mid-stride. Had Iheard something? Or felt something? A movement as of air displacing? I turnedand walked slowly back to the hillside.

  Nowhere, nowhere, could I find the spot where I'd been digging. I kneltdown and picked up the only loose object around. A rusty beer cap.

  The Davidsons' vacation was nearly over. We had another week after theywere to leave. I don't know how it happened—things like that are alwayshappening to us— but we ended up with Liesle and Jinnie jumping up and downecstatically together as all grownups concerned slowly nodded their heads. AndI had an extra grandchild for the next week.

  Of course, Liesle was a little homesick the first night after her folksleft. After Jinnie had fallen asleep, she looked over at me in the glow of theColeman lantern, with such forlornness that I lifted the edge of my sleepingbag and she practically flung herself into it. It was a tight squeeze, butfinally she was snuggled on my shoulder, the crisp spray of her hair tickling

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  my chin.

  "I like you, Gramma," she said. "You're warm."

  "You're warm, too," I said, feeling heat radiating from the wiry little

  body. I don't know what prompted my next question. Maybe it was that I wanted

  there to be something in Liesle's play-pretend. "Am I as warm as the beasts?"

  I felt her startled withdrawal. It was like having a spring suddenly coil

  beside me.

  "What are they going to do when it starts snowing again?" I asked into the

  awkward silence.

  "I don't know," said Liesle slowly. "I don't know any beasts. Besides their

  fur would keep them warm."

  "It looks like just grass to me," I said. "Grass withers when cold weather

  comes."

  "It's 'sposed to look like grass," said Liesle. "So's no one will notice

  them."

  "What are they?" I asked. "Where did they come from?"

  "I don't know any beasts," said Liesle. "I'm going to sleep."

  And she did.

  Liesle might as well have gone on home for all the outdoor activity she got

  that week with us. Bad weather came pouring through the pass in the mountains,

  and we had rain and fog and thunder and hail and a horrible time trying to

  keep the kids amused. My idle words had stuck in Liesle's mind and festered in

  the inactivity. She peered incessantly out of the tent flap asking, "How long

  will it rain? Is it cold out there? It won't snow will it? Will there be ice?"

  And when we had a brief respite after a roaring hailstorm and went out to

  gather up the tapioca-sized stones by the buckets-full, Liesle filled both

  hands and, clutching the hail tightly, raced over to the small hills. I caught

  up with her as she skidded to a stop on the muddy trail.

  She was staring at the beast-hills, frosted lightly with the hail. She

  turned her deep eyes to me. "It's ice," she said tragically.

  "Yes," I said. "Little pieces of ice."

  She opened her hands and stared at her wet palms. "It's gone," she said.

  "Your hands are warm," I explained.

  "Warmness melts the ice," she said, her eyes glowing. "They're warm."
/>   'They could melt the little ice," I acknowledged. "But if it really froze—"

  "I told them to go back," said Liesle. "The next time it's open."

  "What's open?" I asked.

  "Well," said Liesle. "It's down the path to the Little House. It's the

  rock—it's a empty—it's to go through—" She slapped her hand back and forth

  across her pants legs, ridding them of the melted hail. Her bottom lip was

  pouted, her eyes hidden. "It doesn't go into any place," she said. "It only

  goes through." Anger flared suddenly and she kicked the nearest hill. "Stupid

  beasts!" she cried. "Why didn't you stay home!"

  We started packing the day before we were to leave. Liesle scurried around

  with Jinnie, getting under foot and messing things up generally. So I gave

  them a lot of leftover odds and ends of canned goods and a box to put them in

  and they spent hours packing and unpacking. I had dismissed them from my mind

  and submerged myself in the perennial problem of how to get back into the

  suitcases what they had originally contained. So I was startled to feel a cold

  hand on my elbow. I looked around into Liesle's worried face.