A Great and Terrible Beauty
Page 31

The forest off to my right looks inviting, and I dart into its cool shelter. The sunlight leaks through the leaves in bits of warmth. I try to catch its sweetness in my fingers but it drips through them to the earth. There's a stillness here, broken only by the muffled calls of "buff" from the girls' game. Mary Dowd's diary sits quietly inside my cape, her secrets weighing the pocket down against my thigh.
If I can discover what she wants me to know, perhaps I'll find a way to understand what is happening to me. I open to a new page and read.
December 31, 1870
Today is my sixteenth birthday. Sarah was quite saucy with me. "Now you will know how it is," she said. When I pressed her to tell me more, she refused me I, who am like her very own sister! "I cannot tell you, my dearest, dearest friend. But you shall know soon enough. And it shall be as a door opening for you." I don't mind saying that I felt very cross with her. She is already sixteen and knows more than I, dear diary. But then she took both my hands in hers, and I cannot feel anything but fondness for her when she is so very kind with me .
What exactly is so glorious about being sixteen is beyond me. If I'd hoped Mary's diary would get more interesting or insightful, I was mistaken. But there's nothing else to do, so I find another passage.
January 7, 1871
Such frightful things are happening to me, dearest diary, that I am afraid to recount them here. I am afraid to speak of them all, even to Sarah. What will become of me?
There's a strange, knotting feeling in my stomach. What could be so terrible that she couldn't confide in her own diary? A breeze comes, bringing the sound of girls. Blind man. Buff . The next entry is dated February 12th. My heart beats faster as I read.
Dearest diary, such blessed relief at last! I am not mad, as I feared. No longer do my visions overtake me with their power, for I have begun to control them at last Oh, diary, they are not frightful, but beautiful! Sarah promised it would be so for me, but I confess I was too afraid of their glory to let myself enter fully. I could only be pulled along against my will, fighting it. But today, oh, it was glorious indeed! When I felt the fever coming on me, I asked it to come. I choose this, I said, and stuck my courage fast. I did not feel a great pressure pushing in on me. This time, it was no more than a gentle shudder, and there it was a beautiful door of light. Oh, diary, I walked through it into a realm of such beauty, a garden with a singing river and flowers that fall from trees like the softest rain. There, what you imagine can be yours. I ran, fast as a deer, my legs powerful and strong, and I was filled with a joy I cannot describe. It seemed I was there for hours, but when I came through the door again, it was as if I'd never left. I found myself again in my room, where Sarah was waiting to embrace me. "Darling Mary, you've done it! Tomorrow, we shall join hands and become one with our sisters. Then we shall know all the mysteries of the realms ."
I'm trembling. Mary and Sarah both had visions. I am not alone. Somewhere out there are two girlstwo women--who might be able to help me. Is this what she wants me to know? A door of light. I've never seen such a thingor a garden. There's been nothing beautiful at all. What if my visions aren't like theirs at all? Kartik told me they would put me in danger, and everything I've experienced seems to prove him right. Kartik, who could be watching me right now, here in these woods. But what if he's wrong? What if he's lying?
It's too much for my head to hold right now. I tuck the book away again and thread in and out between enormous trees, letting my fingers trail over rough bumps on ancient bark. The ground is littered with acorn shells, dead leaves, twigs, forest life.
I reach a clearing and there in front of me is a small, glass-smooth lake. A boathouse stands sentry on the far side. A battered blue rowboat with only one oar is anchored to a tree stump. It slides out and back with the breeze, wrinkling the surface slightly. There's no one around to see me, so I loose the boat from its mooring and climb in. The sun's a warm kiss on my face as my head rests against the bow. I'm thinking of Mary Dowd and her beautiful visions of a door of light, a fantastical garden. If I could control my visions, I'd want most to see my mother's face.
"I'd choose her," I whisper, blinking back tears. Might as well cry, Gem . With my arm across my face, I sob quietly, till I'm spent and my eyes scratch when I blink. The rhythmic lapping of the water against the side of the boat makes me go limp, and soon I'm under sleep's spell.
Dreams come. Running barefoot over forest floor in the night fog, my breath coming out in short white wisps. It's a deer I'm chasing, its milky brown flesh peeking through trees like the taunts of a will-o'-the-wisp. But I'm getting closer. My legs picking up speed till I'm nearly flying, hands reaching out for the deer's flank. Fingers graze the fur and it's no longer a deer but my mother's blue dress. It's my mother, my mother here in this place, the grain of her dress real on my fingers. She breaks into a smile.