A Swiftly Tilting Planet (20 page)

“He’s offered to marry your ma and take over the store.”

“But Pa—”

“The funeral baked meats are long cold. Duthbert Mortmain’s got a shrewd business head, and no one’s bought the store, nor likely to. Your ma’s not got much choice. And for all her hard work and heavy heart, she’s still a pretty woman. Not surprising Duthbert Mortmain should fall for her.”

“But she’s our
mother
,” Beezie protested.

“Not to Duthbert Mortmain. To him she’s a desirable woman. And to your mother, he’s a way out.”

“Out of what?” Chuck asked.

“Your mother’s about to lose the store and the roof over our heads. Another few weeks and we’ll be out on the street.”

Chuck’s face lit up. “We could go to Vespugia!”

“Going anywhere takes money, Chuck, and money’s
what we don’t have. You and Beezie’d be put in foster homes, and as to your ma and me …”

“Grandma!” Beezie clutched the old woman’s sleeve. “You don’t want Ma to marry him, do you?”

“I don’t know what I want. I’d like to know that she was taken care of, and you and Chuck, before I die.”

Beezie flung her arms about the old woman. “You’re not going to die, Grandma, not ever!”

Chuck’s nostrils twitched slightly. The scent of dandelion spore was strong.

The old woman untangled herself. “You’ve seen how death takes the ready and unready, my Beezie. Except for my concern about your future, and your mother’s, I’m ready to go home. It’s been a long time I’ve been separated from my Patrick. He’s waiting for me. The last few days I’ve kept looking over my shoulder, expecting to see him.”

“Grandma”—Beezie pushed her fingers through her curls—“Ma doesn’t
love
Duthbert Mortmain. She can’t! I hate him!”

“Hate hurts the hater more’n the hated.”

“Didn’t Branwen?”

“Branwen hated not. Branwen loved, and was betrayed, and cried the rune for help, and not for hate or revenge. And the sun melted the white snow so that she could sleep warm at night, and the fire in her little stove did not burn out but flickered merrily to keep her
toasty, and the lightning carried her message to her brother, Bran, and her Irish king fled to his ship and the wind blew him across the sea and his ship sank in its depths and Bran came to his sister Branwen and blessed the stark earth so that it turned green and flowering once more.”

Beezie asked, “Did she ever love anybody again, after the Irish king?”

“I’ve forgotten,” the old woman said.

“Grandma! Why don’t we use the rune? Then maybe Ma won’t have to marry Duthbert Mortmain.”

“The rune is not to be used lightly.”

“This wouldn’t be lightly.”

“I don’t know, my Beezie. Patterns have to be worked out, and only the very brash tamper with them. The rune is only for the most dire emergency.”

“Isn’t this an emergency?”

“Perhaps not the right one.” The old woman closed her eyes and rocked back and forth in silence, and when she spoke it was in a rhythmic singsong, much as when she intoned the words of the rune. “You will use the rune, my lamb, you will use the rune, but not before the time is ripe.” She opened her eyes and fixed Beezie with a piercing gaze which seemed to go right through her.

“But how will I know when the time is ripe? Why isn’t it ripe now?”

The old woman shook her head and closed her eyes
and rocked again. “This moment is not the moment. The night is coming and the clouds are gathering. We can do nothing before they are all assembled. When the time is ripe, Chuck will let you know. From the other side of darkness, Chuck will let you know, will let you know, will let …” Her words trailed off, and she opened her eyes and spoke in her natural voice. “To bed with both of you. It’s late.”

“Horrid old Duthbert Mortmain,” Beezie said to Chuck one fine summer’s day. “I won’t call him Pa.”

“Nor I.”

Duthbert Mortmain seemed quite content to have them call him Mr. Mortmain.

He ran the store with stern efficiency. With their mother he was gentle, occasionally caressing her soft hair. People remarked on how he doted on her.

A sign over the cash register read
NO CREDIT
. Beezie and Chuck helped out in the afternoons and on Saturdays as usual. And their mother still did not smile, not even when Duthbert Mortmain brought her a box of chocolates tied with a lavender ribbon.

She no longer smelled of fear, Chuck thought, but neither did she smell of the blue sky of early morning. Now it was the evening sky, with a thin covering of cloud dimming the blue.

Duthbert Mortmain saved his pleasantries for the customers.
He laughed and made jokes and gave every appearance of being a hearty, kindly fellow. But upstairs in the evenings his face was sour.

“Don’t be noisy, children,” their mother warned. “Your—my husband is tired.”

Beezie whispered to Chuck, “Pa was tired, too, but he liked to hear us laugh.”

“We were his own children,” Chuck replied. “We don’t belong to Duthbert Mortmain, and he doesn’t like what doesn’t belong to him.”

Duthbert Mortmain did not show his vicious temper until the following spring. There was never a sign of it in the store, even with the most difficult customers or salesmen, but upstairs he began to let it have its way. One morning his wife (“I hate it when people call her Mrs. Mortmain!” Beezie exploded) came to breakfast with a black eye, explaining that she had bumped into a door in the dark. The grandmother, Beezie, and Chuck looked at her, but said nothing.

And it became very clear that Duthbert Mortmain did not like children, even when they were quiet. Whenever Chuck did anything which displeased his stepfather, which was at least once a day, Mortmain boxed his ears, so that at last they rang constantly.

When Beezie sat at the cash register, her stepfather pinched her arm every time he passed, as though in affection.
But her arms were so full of black and blue marks that she kept her sweater on all the time to hide the bruises.

One day at recess in the schoolyard, Chuck saw Paddy O’Keefe come up to Beezie, and hurried over to them to hear Paddy asking, “Old Mortmain after you?”

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean.”

“No. I don’t.” But she shivered.

Chuck intervened, “You leave my sister alone.”

“Better tell old Mortmain to leave her alone, runt. You ever need any help, Beezie, you just let me know. Li’l ole Paddy’ll take care of you.”

That night Duthbert Mortmain’s temper flared totally out of control.

They had finished the evening meal, and when Beezie was clearing the table, her stepfather reached out and pinched her bottom, and Chuck saw the look of cold hatred she turned on him.

“Duthbert—” their mother protested.

“Duthbert Mortmain, take care.” The grandmother gave him a long, level gaze. She spoke not another word, but warning was clear in her eyes. She put cups and glasses on a tray, and started for the sink.

Mortmain, too, left the table, and as the old woman neared the stairway he raised his arm to strike her.

“No!” Beezie screamed.

Chuck thrust himself between his grandmother and stepfather and took the full force of Mortmain’s blow.

Again Beezie screamed, as Chuck fell, fell down the steep stairs in a shower of broken china and glass. Then she rushed after him.

Chuck lay in a distorted position at the foot of the stairs, looking up at her with eyes that did not see. “Gedder pushed me. He pushed me. Don’t let him marry Gwen. Zillah, don’t let Gedder, don’t let …”

TEN

The earth with its starkness

A field of dandelions. Yellow. Yellow. Exploding into white, into a blizzard of white, a terror of white. Green stems, sickly trickling ooze.

Grandma.

Grandma.

Grandma, you’re not going to die. Not ever.

Gedder.

Smell. Bad smell.

Gun. Gedder’s gun. Stop him

terrible fall

Gwen Zillah

head hurts

hurts

crystal horn heals

Matthew’s unicorn comes

tip touches head with light heals

Beezie! Grandma! Ma! Pa!

Two stones in the cemetery.

A fight at the edge of the cliff, like Gwydyr and Madoc at the edge of the lake. Bad. Bad.

Beezie, never let him touch you.

From inside himself Charles Wallace watched as the unicorn lowered his head and the blazing tip of the horn touched Chuck’s head, pouring light into it. He kept the horn there until the light had poured itself out, and the spasms of pain subsided and the boy stopped babbling and slept.

“Charles Wallace!”

He listened. The voice sounded like Gaudior, and yet it was not Gaudior, and he no longer saw the silver beauty of the unicorn nor the light of the horn. Nothing was visible, not even darkness. Something was happening, and he did not know what. He was still Within Chuck, and yet he was intensely conscious of himself as Charles Wallace, and something was pulling him.

Meg sat up, blinking and rubbing her hand against Ananda’s fur. The kitten had returned and was sleeping on the pillow. At first Meg did not know why there were tears on her cheeks, or why she was frightened.

She closed her eyes in sadness and saw the unicorn standing motionless by the star-watching rock. A pear-shaped drop of crystal slid from Gaudior’s eye and shattered into a thousand fragments on the stone. The unicorn looked up at the sky. The stars were sparkling brilliantly. Small wisps of starlit cloud moved in the rapid north wind. She thought she heard Gaudior saying, “The Old Music was in them once. That was a victory for the Echthroi.”

Meg thought of Mrs. O’Keefe waiting downstairs. Yes. That was a victory for the enemy, indeed. That Beezie, the golden child, should have become the old hag with missing teeth and resentful eyes was unbearable.

There’s more to her than meets the eye.

Infinitely more.

And what now? What’s going to happen?

To Chuck?

To Charles Wallace?

“Charles Wallace!”

He listened. Was it Gaudior? He could hear, but he could not see, and the voice echoed as though coming from a great distance.

“Charles Wallace.” The voice was compassionate. “You don’t have to stay Within Chuck now that this has happened. We did not expect this.”

Charles Wallace felt cold and confused and therefore cross. “But I
am
Within Chuck.”

“Yes. And Chuck is unconscious, and when he comes to, he will not be the same. His skull has been fractured. Although the healing of the horn has taken away the worst of the pain it could not repair the brain damage. And so there have been instructions that you are to be released now if you so desire.”

Charles Wallace felt weighed down by darkness and pain.

The almost-Gaudior voice continued. “Within Chuck as he is now, you will have no control over his actions. His brain is short-circuited. If there is a Might-Have-Been which you should alter in order to avert disaster, you will have no ability either to recognize it or to change it.”

“If you release me from Within Chuck, then what?”

“You will be sent Within someone else, and then you will be better able to accomplish your mission. Time is of the essence, as you understand. And we do not know what may happen while you are trapped Within this injured child.”

“Who are you?” Charles Wallace asked the invisible voice. “You sound like Gaudior, but you aren’t Gaudior.”

The voice laughed gently. “No, I am not Gaudior. All
the healing light went from his horn, but he could not cure Chuck, though he kept him from dying—and that may not have been a kindness. He has gone home to dip his horn in the pools of healing to replenish it.”

“Then who are you?”

Again the voice laughed. “You saw me when Gaudior took you home after you nearly drowned in the Ice Age sea. I am the unicorn you saw come forth from the shell.”

“Why can’t I see you? Why can’t I see anything?” The words of the voice had reassured him, and yet he still felt foreboding.

“While you are in Chuck, you see only what Chuck sees, and he is unconscious, and will be for several days. Come, Charles Wallace, there’s no time to be lost. Let us help you out of Chuck. If Mad Dog Branzillo is to be prevented from starting a holocaust you must not dally.”

“I have to think—” Something was wrong, and he did not know what.

“Charles Wallace. Gaudior will corroborate what I have told you. Chuck’s brain has been damaged. He’s little better than an idiot. Come out.”

“If I come out, will I see you?” There was something about the voice which was inconsistent with the visual image of the baby unicorn; but of course it would no longer be a baby.

“Of course you’ll see me. Hurry. There’s a terrible urgency about what you are to accomplish.”

“I?”

“Of course, you. You were selected, weren’t you?”

“No. Beezie—Mrs. O’Keefe—laid a charge on me.”

“Because you’re the only one who can prevent Branzillo.”

“But I can’t—”

“Of course you can.” The voice was tenderly patient. “Why do you think you were chosen?”

“Well—Gaudior seemed to think it was that I might be able to go Within people, because of the way Meg and I kythe.”

“Exactly. You were chosen because of your special gifts, and your unusual intelligence. You know that yourself, don’t you?”

“Well—I can kythe. And I know my I. Q.’s high, as far as that goes. But that’s not enough—”

“Of course it is. And you have the ability to see the difference between right and wrong, and to make the correct decisions. You were selected because you are an extraordinary young man and your gifts and your brains qualify you. You are the only one who can control the Might-Have-Been.”

Charles Wallace’s stomach was churning.

“Come, Charles Wallace. You have been chosen. You are in control of what is going to happen. You are needed. We must go.”

Charles Wallace began to throw up. Was it in reaction to
the tempting words, or because Chuck, with his bashed-in skull, was vomiting? But he knew that whatever the voice looked like, it was not a unicorn. When he had stopped retching he said, “I don’t know who you are, but you’re not like Gaudior. Gaudior would never say what you’ve just said. It was trying to use my high I. Q. and trying to control things that got us into trouble in the first place. I don’t know what I’m supposed to use, but it’s not my intellect or strength. For better or worse, I’m Within Chuck. And I’ve never come out of Within on my own. It’s always happened to me. I’m staying Within.”