The Anything Box

by Зенна Гендерсон

  "What if they don't know the way back?" she asked.

  "Of course they know the way back," I said. "They've driven it a dozen

  times."

  "No, I mean the beasts." She clutched me again. "They'll die in the

  winter."

  "Winter's a long way off," I said. "They'll be all right."

  "They don't count like we do," said Liesle. "Winter's awful close."

  "Oh, Liesle, child," I said, exasperated. "Let's not play that now. I'm

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  much too busy."

  "I'm not playing," she said, her cheeks flushing faintly, her eyes refusing

  to leave mine. "The beasts—"

  "Please, honey lamb," I said. "You finish your packing and let me finish

  mine." And I slammed the suitcase on my hand.

  "But the beasts—"

  "Beasts!" I said indistinctly as I tried to suck the pain out of my

  fingers. "They're big enough to take care of themselves."

  "They're just baby ones!" she cried. "And they're lost, 'relse'n they'd

  have gone home when it was open."

  "Then go tell them the way," I said, surveying dismally the sweat shirt and

  slacks that should have been in the case I had just closed. She was out of

  sight by the time I got to the tent door. I shook my head. That should teach

  me to stick to Little Red Riding Hood or the Gingerbread Boy. Beasts, indeed!

  Late that evening came a whopper of a storm. It began with a sprinkle so

  light that it was almost a mist. And then, as though a lever were being

  steadily depressed, the downpour increased, minute by minute. In direct

  proportion, the light drained out of the world. Everyone was snugly under

  canvas by the time the rain had become a downpour—except Liesle.

  "I know where she is," I said with a sigh, and snatched my fleece-lined

  jacket and ducked out into the rain. I'd taken about two steps before my shoes

  were squelching water and the rain was flooding my face like a hose. I had

  sploshed just beyond the tents when a dripping wet object launched itself

  against me and knocked me staggering back against a pine tree.

  "They won't come!" sobbed Liesle, her hair straight and lank, streaming

  water down her neck. "I kept talking to them and talking to them, but they

  won't come. They say it isn't open and if it was they wouldn't know the way!"

  She was shaking with sobs and cold.

  "Come in out of the wet," I said, patting her back soggily. "Everything

  will be okay." I stuck my head into the cook tent. "I got 'er. Have to wring

  her out first" And we ducked into the sleep tent.

  "I told them right over this way and across the creek—" her voice was

  muffled as I stripped her T-shirt over her head. 'They can't see right over

  this way and they don't know what a creek is. They see on top of us."

  "On top?" I asked, fumbling for a dry towel.

  "Yes!" sobbed Liesle. "We're in the middle. They see mostly on top of us

  and then there's us and then there's an underneath. They're afraid they might

  fall into us or the underneath. We're all full of holes around here."

  "They're already in us," I said, guiding her icy feet into the flannel

  pajama legs. "We can see them."

  "Only part," she said. "Only the Here part. The There part is so'st we

  can't see it." I took her on my lap and surrounded her with my arms and she

  leaned against me, slowly warming, but with the chill still shaking her at

  intervals.

  "Oh, Gramma!" Her eyes were big and dark. "I saw some of the There part.

  It's like—like—like a Roman candle."

  "Those big heavy hills like Roman candles?" I asked.

  "Sure." Her voice was confident. "Roman candles have sticks on them, don't

  they?"

  "Look, Liesle." I sat her up and looked deep into her eyes. "I know you

  think this is all for true, but it really isn't. It's fun to pretend as long

  as you know it's pretend, but when you begin to believe it, it isn't good.

  Look at you, all wet and cold and unhappy because of this pretend."

  "But it isn't pretend!" protested Liesle. "When it was open—" She caught

  her breath and clutched me. I paused, feeling as though I had stepped off an

  unexpected curb, then swiftly I tucked that memory away with others, such as

  the rusty beer cap, the slow ingestion of Liesle by the hills—

  "Forget about that," I said. "Believe me, Liesle, it's all pretend. You

  don't have to worry."

  For a long rain-loud moment, Liesle searched my face, and then she relaxed.

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  "Okay, Gramma." She became a heavy, sleepy weight in my lap. "If you say so."

  We went to sleep that last night to the sound of rain. By then it hadbecome a heavy, all-pervading roar on the tent roof that made conversationalmost impossible. "Well," I thought drowsily, "this is a big, wet,close-quotes to our summer." Then, just as I slipped over into sleep, I wassurprised to hear myself think, "Swim well, little beasts, swim well."

  It may have been the silence that woke me, because I was suddenly wideawake in a rainless hush. It wasn't just an awakening, but an urgent push intoawareness. I raised up on one elbow. Liesle cried out and then was silent. Ilay back down again, but tensed as Liesle muttered and moved in the darkness.Then I heard her catch her breath and whimper a little. She crawled cautiouslyout of her sleeping bag and was fumbling at the tent flap. A pale watery lightcame through the opening. The sky must have partially cleared. Lieslewhispered something, then groped back across the tent. I heard a series ofrustles and whispers, then she was hesitating at the opening, jacket over herpajamas, her feet in lace-trailing sneakers.

  "It's open!" she whimpered, peering out. "It's open!" And was gone.

  I caught my foot in the sleeping bag, tried to put my jacket on upsidedown,and got the wrong foot in the right shoe, before I finally got straightened upand staggered out through an ankle-deep puddle to follow Liesle. I groped myway in the wet grayness halfway to the Little House before I realized therewas no one ahead of me in the path. I nearly died. Had she already been suckedinto that treacherous gray rock! And inside me a voice mockingly chanted, "Notfor true, only pretend—"

  "Shut up!" I muttered fiercely, then, turning, I sploshed at fullstaggering speed back past the tents. I leaned against my breathing tree tostop my frantic gulping of the cold wet air, and, for the dozenteenth time inmy life, reamed myself out good for going along with a gag too far. If I hadonly scotched Liesle's imagination the first—

  I heard a tiny, piercingly high noise, a coaxing, luring bird-like sound,and I saw Liesle standing in the road, intent on the little hills, her righthand outstretched, fingers curling, as though she were calling a puppy.

  Then I saw the little hills quiver and consolidate and Become. I saw themlift from the ground with a sucking sound. I heard the soft tear of turf andthe almost inaudible twang of parting roots. I saw the hills flow into motionand follow Liesle's piping call. I strained to see in the half light. Therewere no legs under the hills—there were dozens of legs under—there werewheels—squares —flickering, firefly glitters—

  I shut my eyes. The hills were going. How they were going, I couldn't say.Huge, awkward and lumbering, they followed Liesle like drowsy mastodons inclose order formation. I could see the pale scar below the aspen thicket wherethe hills had pulled away. It seemed familiar, even to the scraggly rootspoking out of the sandy crumble of the soil. Wasn't that the way it had alwayslooked?

  I stood and watched the beast-hills follow Liesle
. How could such a troopgo so noiselessly? Past the tents, through the underbrush, across thecreek—Liesle used the bridge—and on up the trail toward the Little House. Ilost sight of them as they rounded the bend in the trail. I permitted myself abrief sigh of relief before I started back toward the tents. Now to gatherLiesle up, purged of her compulsion, get her into bed and persuaded that ithad all been a dream. Mockingly, I needled myself. "A dream? A dream? Theywere there, weren't they? They are gone, aren't they? Without bending a bladeor breaking a branch. Gone into what? Gone into what?"

  "Gone into nothing," I retorted. "Gone through—"

  "Through into what?" I goaded. "Gone into what?"

  "Okay! You tell me!" I snapped. Both of us shut up and stumbled off downthe darkened path. For the unnum-beredth time I was catapulted into by Liesle.We met most unceremoniously at the bend in the trail.

  "Oh, Gramma!" she gasped. "One didn't come! The littlest one didn't come!

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  There were eight, but only seven went in. We gotta get the other one. It'sgonna close! Gramma!" She was towing me back past the tents.

  "Oh, yipes!" I thought dismally. "A few more of these shuttle runs and Iwill be an old woman!"

  We found the truant huddled at the base of the aspens, curled up in acomparatively tiny, grass-bristly little hillock. Liesle stretched out herhands and started piping at the beast-hill.

  "Where did you learn that sound?" I asked, my curiosity burning even in amad moment like this one.

  "That's the way you call a beast-hill!" she said, amazed at my ignorance,and piped again, coaxingly. I stood there in my clammy, wet sneakers, andpresumably in my right mind, and watched the tight little hillock unroll andmove slowly in Liesle's direction.

  "Make him hurry, Gramma!" cried Liesle. "Push!"

  So I pushed—and had the warm feeling of summer against my palms, the sharpfaint fragrance of bruised grass in my nostrils, and a vast astonishment in mymind. I’ll never get over it. Me! Pushing a beast-hill in the watery chill ofa night hour that had no number and seemed to go on and on.

  Well anyway, between Liesle's piping and my pushing, we got the Least-onepast the tents (encore!) across the creek and down the trail. Liesle ranahead. "Oh, Gramma! Gramma!" Her voice was tragedy. "It's closing! It'sclosing!"

  I hunched my shoulders and dug in with my toes and fairly scooted that dumbbeast down the path. I felt a protesting ripple under my hands and a recoillike a frightened child. I had a swift brief vision of me, scrabbling on thetrail with a beast-hill as Jerry had with Liesle, but my sudden rush pushed usaround the corner. There was Liesle, one arm tight around a tree trunk, theother outstretched across the big gray boulder. Her hand was lost somewhere inthe Anything that coalesced and writhed, Became and dissolved in the middle ofthe gray granite.

  "Hurry!" she gasped. "I'm holding it! Push!"

  I pushed! And felt some strength inside me expend the very last of itselfon the effort. I had spent the last of some youthful coinage that could neverbe replenished. There was a stubborn silent moment and then the beast-hillmust have perceived the opening, because against my fingers was a suddenthrob, a quick tingling and the beast-hill was gone—just like that. Theboulder loomed, still and stolid as it had been since the Dawn, probably—justas it always had been except—Liesle's hand was caught fast in it, clear uppast her wrist.

  "It's stuck." She looked quietly over her shoulder at me. "It won't comeout."

  "Sure it will," I said, dropping to my haunches and holding her close."Here, let me—" I grasped her elbow.

  "No." She hid her face against my shoulder. I could feel the sag of herwhole body. "It won't do any good to pull."

  "What shall we do then?" I asked, abandoning myself to her young wisdom.

  "Well have to wait till it opens again," she said.

  "How long?" I felt the tremble begin in her.

  "I don't know. Maybe never. Maybe—maybe it only happens once."

  "Oh, now!" I said and had nothing to add. What can you say to a child whosehand has disappeared into a granite boulder and won't come out?

  "Liesle," I said. "Can you wiggle your fingers?"

  Her whole face tightened as she tried. "Yes," she said. "It's just likehaving my hand in a hole but I can't get it out."

  "Push it in, then," I said.

  "In?" she asked faintly.

  "Yes," I said. "Push it in and wiggle it hard. Maybe they'll see it andopen up again."

  So she did. Slowly she pushed until her elbow disappeared. "I'm wavinghard!" We waited. Then— "Nobody comes," she said. And suddenly she was

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  fighting and sobbing, wrenching against the rock, but her arm was as

  tight-caught as her hand had been. I hugged her to me, brushing my hand

  against the rock as I quieted her thrashing legs. 'There, there, Liesle."

  Tears were wadding up in my throat. I rocked her consolingly.

  "O God in Heaven," I breathed, my eyes closed against her hair. "O God in

  Heaven!"

  A bird cried out in the silence that followed. The hour that had no number

  stretched and stretched. Suddenly Liesle stirred. "Gramma!" she whispered.

  "Something touched me! Gramma!" She straightened up and pressed her other hand

  against the boulder. "Gramma! Somebody put something in my hand! Look,

  Gramma!" And she withdrew her arm from the gray granite and held her hand out

  to me.

  It overflowed with a Something that Was for a split second, and then flaked

  and sparked away like the brilliance of a Roman candle, showering vividly and

  all around to the ground.

  Liesle looked at her hand, all glittering silver, and wiped it on her

  pajamas, leaving a shining smudge. "I'm tired, Gramma," she whimpered. She

  looked around her, half dazed. "I had a dream!" she cried. "I had a dream!"

  I carried her back to the tent. She was too exhausted to cry. She only made

  a weary moaning sound that jerked into syllables with the throb of my steps.

  She was asleep before I got her jacket off. I knelt beside her for a while,

  looking at her—wondering. I lifted her right hand. A last few flakes of

  brilliance sifted off her fingers and flickered out on the way to the floor.

  Her nails glowed faintly around the edges, her palm, where it was creased,

  bore an irregular M of fading silver. What had she held? What gift had been

  put into her hand? I looked around, dazed. I was too tired to think. I felt an

  odd throb, as though time had gone back into gear again and it was suddenly

  very late. I was asleep before I finished pulling the covers up.

  Well! It's episodes like that—though, thank Heaven, they're rather

  scarce—that make me feel the burden of age. I'm too set in the ways of the

  world to be able to accept such things as normal and casual, too sure of what

  is to be seen to really see what is. But events don't have to be this bizarre

  to make me realize that sometimes it's best just to take the hand of a child—a

  Seeing child—and let them do the leading.

  The Last Step

  I don't like children.

  I suppose that's a horrible confession for a teacher to make, but there's

  nothing in the scheme of things that says you have to love the components of

  your work to do it well. And that's all children are to me—components of my

  work. My work is teaching and teaching is my life and I know, especially in a

  job handling people, that they say it helps to like people, but love never

  made bricks build a better wall—loving never weeded a garden and liking never

  made glue stick harder. Children to me are merely
items to be handled in the

  course of earning my living and whether I like them or not has nothing to do

  with the matter. I loathe children outside of school. I avoid them, and they

  me. There's no need for school to lap over into other areas of living any more

  than a carpenter's tools should claim his emotions after he leaves work.

  And the pampering and soft handling the children receive—well, I suppose

  those who indulge in it have their justifications or think they have, but all

  it accomplishes as far as I can see is to pad their minds against what they

  have to learn—a kind of bandage before the wound, because educating children

  is a pushing forcibly of the raw materials of intelligence into an artificial

  mold. Society itself is nothing but a vast artificiality and all a teacher is

  for is to warp the child into the pattern society dictates. Left alone, he'd

  be a happy savage for what few brief years he could manage to survive—and I'd

  be out of a job. At any rate, I believe firmly in making sure each child I

  handle gets a firm grip on the fundamental tools society demands of him. If I

  do it bluntly and nakedly, that's my affair. Leave the ruffles and lace edging

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  to others. When I get through with a child he knows what he should know forhis level and knows it thoroughly and no love lost on either side. And if hecries when he finds he is to be in my class, he doesn't cry long. Tears arenot permitted in my room.

  I've been reading back over this. My tense is wrong. I used to teach. Iused to make sure. Because this is the fifth day.

  Well, when the inescapable arrives— But how was I to know? A person is whathe is. He acts as he acts because he acts that way. There's no profit inconsidering things out of the pattern because there's no armor againstdeviation. Or has there been a flaw in my philosophy all this time? Are thereother values I should have considered?

  Well, time, even to such an hour as today brings, has to be lived through,so I'm writing this down, letting the seconds be words and the minutesparagraphs. It will make a neat close-quote for the whole situation.

  I was in a somewhat worse mood on Monday than I usually was because I hadjust been through another utterly useless meeting with Major Junius. You'dthink, since he is military, that he wouldn't bother himself about suchfoolishness even if parents did complain.