A Ring of Endless Light: The Austin Family Chronicles, Book 4

by L'Engle, Madeleine;

  I was looking out to sea, at the sun sparkling on the water, and a great shadow of dark lying across the water from a heavy cloud, and I did not dare turn to look at Adam. But I felt close to him, much closer than touch could bring us.

  He said, “I guess it’s something poets are born thinking about.”

  “Well, yes. Death has always bothered me, as far back as I can remember.”

  We were both silent for a long time. I, too, began to let sand trickle through my fingers. I felt shivery and happy and frightened and alive.

  Adam said, “See, sweetie, if we think too much about what happens when we die, we’ll stop being able to live, to live right now in the very minute.”

  “Like when I’m with Basil, or Norberta and Njord.”—He called me ‘sweetie’ again …

  “Yah. That’s the way it should be all the time. You and the dolphins—Oh, Vicky, Vicky sweetie, after Joshua died I swore I’d never trust another female again, ever. I find myself trusting you, and that scares me. That’s why I cut you off when—”

  “No, you were right to,” I said. “I shouldn’t have done that, not without asking you first. And, Adam—I trust you.”

  To my surprise, because I didn’t think this was the mood or the day for it, he stood on his head. “I thought I could keep this scientific, just part of my project—” And then he flipped upright and turned a cartwheel. “Hey, I’ll race you along the beach to the big rock and then you can change into your bathing suit and we’ll go out and communicate with Basil and Co. And—each other.”

  “I’ll have to get my suit out of the bike basket.” I scrambled to my feet.

  “I’ll get it for you.”

  I padded along the beach, and then speeded up as Adam came along with my bathing suit.

  We swam out and I floated and thought: Njord.

  Njord.

  He came, but not alone.

  Norberta was with him, and as they approached she flapped her flukes at me, splashing me with great deliberation, as though to scold me for summoning Njord without her, telling me in no uncertain terms that Njord was not old enough to go off on his own.

  I burst into laughter.

  “What’s so funny about being splashed?” Adam asked.

  I told him.

  He laughed, too. “You’re absolutely right. That’s just what she was telling you.”

  Njord flicked toward me and nudged me. I caught hold of his dorsal fin and away we went, like a tachyon, toward the horizon.

  Speed.

  Much faster than Zachary with his foot down on the gas pedal.

  I was gloriously excited and frightened at the same time. A baby dolphin may be a lot smaller than a grown one, but it’s a lot bigger than I am, and Njord was stronger than he realized. He would never hurt me on purpose, but he might overestimate my strength.

  Norberta wouldn’t let him.

  If I trusted him to come when I called, I had to trust him all the way.

  He swung around so suddenly that I almost let go, but not quite, and we went racing back to Norberta. Njord dove and dumped me, and I came up to the surface, sputtering, and both Njord and Norberta began to splash me, making loud laughing noises.

  “Calm them down,” Adam said. “Tell them you want to ask them some serious questions.”

  What should I ask? What would be serious to both the dolphins and to me—and to Adam?

  Dearest Norberta and Njord. Do you live in the now, or do you project into the future, the way I do, far too often?

  I felt a gentle puzzlement coming from Njord.

  Maybe he’s too young to understand about the future. When Rob was a baby, everything was now for him. Now embraced both yesterday and tomorrow.

  Norberta?

  Again I felt puzzlement, not puzzlement about her understanding, but my own. Norberta wasn’t sure I’d be able to understand.

  Try me.

  I rolled over onto my back and floated and Norberta moved her great body toward me until we were touching, and I was pressed against the beautiful resiliency of dolphin skin. And a whole series of pictures came flashing across the back of my eyes, in the dream part of my head.

  The ocean.

  Rain.

  A rainbow, glittering with rain.

  Snow, falling in great white blossoms to disappear as it touched the sea.

  And then the snow turned to stars, stars in the daytime, drenched in sunlight, becoming sunlight.

  and the sunlight was the swirling movement of a galaxy

  and the ocean caught the light and was part of the galaxy

  and the stars of the galaxies lifted butterfly wings and flew together, dancing

  And then Norberta, with Njord echoing her, began making strange sounds, singing sounds, like the alleluia sounds Basil had made, and they did something to my understanding of time, so that I saw that it was quite different from the one-way road which was all I knew.

  Norberta was right. There was much she understood that was beyond anything I’d ever dreamed of.

  She and Njord slapped the water with their flukes in farewell and vanished over the horizon.

  I rolled over and began to tread water.

  “What did you ask them?” Adam swam to me.

  “About time. Adam, their time and ours is completely different.”

  “How?”

  “Norberta tried to tell me, but it was in a language I didn’t know, and it translated itself into images, not words.”

  Treading water, he held out his hands to me. “Hold. And try to tell me what she told you.”

  I held his hands tightly. Kept moving my legs slowly. Closed my eyes. Imaged again what Norberta had imaged me.

  I heard Adam sigh, and opened my eyes.

  “Non-linear time,” he said. “She was trying to tell you about non-linear time.”

  “What’s that?” I was still holding on to the beauty of Norberta’s images, so it didn’t quite hit me that Adam and I had communicated in the same way that I communicated with the dolphins.

  “Time is like a river for most of us, flowing in only one direction. Get John to explain it to you. Physics isn’t my strong point. But there’s a possibility that time is less like a river than a tree, a tree with large branches from which small branches grow, and where they touch each other it might be possible to get from one branch of time to another.” He let go my hands. “I’m not explaining it well.”

  “Do you mean, maybe for dolphins time is less—less restricted and limited than it is for us?”

  “Isn’t that what Norberta was trying to tell you?”

  “Yes. Adam, did you see the butterflies?”

  He nodded. “Like the one we saw at the cemetery.”

  “You saw it, too?”

  “And so did your grandfather.”

  “And Grandfather would know what Njord and Norberta were singing.”

  “Dolphins don’t sing.” Adam’s voice was flatly categorical. “Only humpbacked whales sing.”

  “Call it what you like,” I said. “To me it was singing.”

  He was staring out to the horizon, where they had vanished. “Granted I’ve never heard dolphins sound like that before. Hey, are you sure you don’t want to go in for marine biology?”

  “It’s a thought,” I said, “but somehow I have a hunch that if I went scientific about them I might not be able to talk with them.”

  “You may be right. Maybe that’s why I resisted you, because I’m too scientific.”

  “No,” I replied quickly. “I was wrong. I went at you without thinking what I was doing.”

  “And today?”

  My body felt as though the water had instantly dropped several degrees. “Did you really see what Norberta showed me?”

  “I think so. You’re cold, sweetie, and your lips are blue. Let’s swim in and have some tea and then we can check it out.”

  “Okay.” He’d called me ‘sweetie’ again. It was as beautiful as the dolphins singing.

  “Then
I have to spend the rest of the afternoon working on my report. Forgive my repetition, but you’ve thrown my project for a loop.”

  “Do you mind?”

  “Minding doesn’t have anything to do with it. I simply did not expect that John Austin’s kid sister would be thunder and lightning and electricity.”

  Cautiously, I asked, “Not—not like whoever it was last summer?”

  “Not like. Very definitely not like. Okay. I’ll come along back over to the stable in plenty of time for that moussie or mucksie—”

  “Moussaka.”

  “Yah. I’ll be there for it.” Imitating the dolphins, he dove down and swam underwater, emerging yards away.

  The song of Norberta and Njord echoed in my ears.

  And it was joy.

  And joy, Grandfather would remind me, joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God.

  But I couldn’t tell Adam that. Not yet.

  When I got home, Mrs. Rodney wasn’t there.

  Almost imperceptibly, we’d become used to having her around most of the time.

  Mother asked me to take a glass of iced tea in to Grandfather. He had the back of the hospital bed up high, and his Bible on his lap. I pushed the table tray close to him for the iced tea.

  His smile radiated sunshine, like Rob’s. “Thank you, dear my Caro.”

  “I’m Vicky, Grandfather.” Usually I just let him go on thinking I was whoever it was he thought he saw, but there was something about him this afternoon that made me feel I had to be Vicky, not my mother or grandmother.

  “Vicky—Caro—it doesn’t matter. I want you to do something for me, something only you can do.”

  Despite the heat, my hands felt cold. “What, Grandfather?”

  He put his hand up to his brow. “I get fuzzy. Sleepy. Not aware. I’m afraid—”

  “Of what, Grandfather?” If I kept on calling him Grandfather he might remember who I was.

  “That I won’t know when to let go. That through inertia I’ll hold on to these mortal coils when I should be shedding them. That I’ll hold on and be a burden. Caro.” He reached out for me and his grip was strong about my wrist. “When it comes time for me to let go, you must tell me. Promise me.”

  “Grandfather—”

  He dropped his hand. “This disease is affecting my mind. I didn’t expect that. No one told me that would happen. So, if I don’t know, if my time comes and my mind won’t—Caro, you’ll know when it’s time for me to let go.”

  “Grandfather, I’m only Vicky, please—”

  For a moment he looked at me with recognition. “Vicky. Yes. But you must ask Caro, then. She’ll tell you.”

  “Grandfather, she’s dead,” I said frantically. “I can’t ask her.”

  “You can, you can.” He stretched out his hand again and gripped mine tightly. “The line on the other side of time is very fine; it is easily crossed. We are not bound by linear time.” For a moment I was flashed a vision of Norberta sending me images. Did Grandfather somehow know what had happened?

  He reiterated, “Ask Caro. She’ll know. I’m not afraid of dying. I’m as eager as Paul.”

  “Paul?” Paul who? I was almost as confused as he was.

  “Of Tarsus. The tentmaker Paul. I’m ready. I’m just afraid that if my mind blurs I won’t be able to let go at the right moment.”

  “Oh, Grandfather, you will, you will.” Tears began sliding down my cheeks.

  “Don’t cry, Vicky.” Again for a moment he was himself, completely with me. “When you’re a little older you’ll write about it. But you must tell me. If you listen carefully, Caro will help you. Do you promise?” His eyes glittered as they held mine.

  “I’ll—I’ll try, Grandfather.”

  “Listen to the deep and dazzling darkness and you’ll know.”

  “I’ll try.”

  “Don’t be afraid. The ring of pure and endless light is coming closer, closer …” He closed his eyes. “Caro will help you listen.”

  What was I to do?

  He was asking something impossible.

  I couldn’t go to Mother with it. It would hurt her.

  The only person I could tell was Adam.

  He came at six and there wasn’t a moment to be alone with him. I called across the singing to him, and saw only that he was engrossed in the music, and his baritone was warm and rich and happy.

  Rob went up to bed, then Suzy. Adam rose. “I’d better be getting along. Vicky, walk me out to my bike, will you please? I want to ask you something.”

  When we got outdoors, the screen door shutting softly behind us, I asked, “What?”

  “You want to talk to me?”

  “Did you know?” Of course he knew, knew my need in the same way that the dolphins knew.

  “Can you come to the beach for a while now?”

  “It’s late—I’m not sure my parents—”

  He looked at his watch. “Can it wait till morning?”

  “Yes.” It could. Now that I knew I could talk to Adam, the burden did not feel quite as heavy. “I’ll have to come early, because of reading with Grandfather, and then I’m going out with Leo.”

  “How’s Leo doing?”

  “He’s hurting. But he’s growing, too. I’m getting really very fond of him. As a friend.”

  “Friends are what make the wheels go round, Vicky. See you tomorrow, early. Can you make it at six? Down on the beach by the big rock.”

  “I’ll be there.”

  He was waiting for me.

  The morning was cool and pearly.

  “What happened,” he asked, “to upset you so deeply?”

  I told him.

  He started walking along the beach. I walked beside him. Finally he said, “That’s a rough one.”

  I told him about Grandfather and the Eskimos, and how they knew when to say goodbye and let go.

  Adam looked down at the sand, scuffing it with his bare toes, and nodding. “We’re out of touch with death. I think the Eskimos are right. And your grandfather.”

  “But, Adam—for once I do feel like a child. I’m not old enough to know things like—like when it’s time for someone to die.”

  “I don’t think it has anything to do with age. And, Vic”—he reached for my hand and held it in a strong clasp—“I know it’s hard to face, but remember that your grandfather’s slipping in all kinds of ways. To tell him when it’s time to die is something he never should have asked you to do, and if he had been himself, he wouldn’t have asked it.”

  Grandfather—when he was himself—had quoted John Donne to me: Other men’s crosses are not my crosses. But that was about Zachary, warning me not to take on too much.

  Adam was right. This wasn’t my cross. It was something Grandfather would never have asked me to pick up and carry. Or—

  I said, slowly, “How do we know how much we’re to do for other people? Or for how long? I mean—like Simon of Cyrene carrying Jesus’ cross for a while, and then putting it down.”

  “I suppose that’s somewhere in the Bible?”

  “Yes. All I mean is, we are meant to help each other, but not to feel that we have to do it all, all by ourselves. I guess maybe dolphins are more like Eskimos than we are. Maybe they don’t think about death coming, the way we do. Maybe they just know. And maybe, when the time comes, Grandfather will know.”

  “Let’s hope,” Adam said. “I haven’t been much help.”

  “Yes, you have. I’m back in perspective again.”

  “Good. Can you stay there?”

  We both began to laugh. “For at least five minutes,” I promised.

  He turned a cartwheel. “I’ll call you tonight.”

  I went home, holding on to the promise of hearing his voice in not too many hours, and accepting just how much that voice meant to me. I went down to Grandfather’s cove and sat on my rock for a while. To meditate. To be. Like the dolphins. Like Grandfather when he was fully Grandfather.

  And what I knew was that when th
e time came, if I was meant to say anything to Grandfather, then I would know. It was like meditation. It wasn’t something I had to do.

  I packed a picnic lunch for Leo and me. We went in his launch to the mainland, borrowed Cor’s pickup, and went to the hospital to get blood for Grandfather. It was too soon for the two of us to give blood again, but Leo assured me that more than enough had been donated by the Islanders.

  This time he’d checked with his mother and we didn’t go in through the emergency room but by the main entrance.

  Leo had me sit in the lobby, on a deep leather sofa that nearly swallowed me in its embrace. I lay back and watched people coming and going. Visitors carrying flowers. Going into the gift shop. Coming out with packages. People being discharged, coming out of the elevators in wheelchairs, little suitcases or pots of flowers in their laps. People coming to be admitted, some carrying their own cases, some clinging to someone else. Some looked tired or pale, but they could all walk in.

  Suddenly I recognized the woman I had seen in the emergency room with the limp child, the child I’d been afraid might be dead. The child was holding her mother’s hand, pale, with deeply shadowed eyes, but very much alive. I think the woman recognized me, too, because she smiled at me and pushed the child toward me. “Sit there, hon, and wait. Momma’ll be right back.”

  The child sat down, almost disappearing into the soft cushions, and turned to smile at me. She wasn’t as much younger than Rob as I’d thought, and when she smiled she reminded me of my little brother.

  “Hi,” I said. “My name’s Vicky. What’s yours?”