For Love of Audrey Rose (28 page)

She saw the moist eyes, white and an annihilating blue. A stranger on whom her life depended.

“You’re the only man in the world he will believe anymore,” she said. “As long as he believes his daughter exists again…”

“Then what?”

“Then he lives inside his own black world. No one can reach him. He trusts no one. He just disintegrates more each day.”

A baboon laughed raucously among the dense black tropical forms far away. Hoover’s head turned, attuned to the signals of the forest. The branches creaked in a sudden breeze, lifting and falling. He watched them as though they communicated a secret, occult message.

“I can’t go to New York, Janice,” he said softly.

“Elliot, what about the belief in
ahimsa
—nonviolence to living beings?”

Suddenly he leaped forward, grabbed her arm, and hissed into her ear. “
Go home!
I need to be alone! I need to atone! I need isolation.”

His breath was hot, sweet-smelling. His body was crushed up against hers, and his eyes were wild.

“I need to be where there are no women!” he blurted.

Then he stormed out of the hut and across the compound. Through the open door she watched him run toward the edge of the
ashram,
pick something from the ground— a bedroll—and disappear like a wild beast into the forest.

“Elliot!” she shouted, her voice shocking the humming of the forest into silence. “Elliot!”

But he was gone. Janice hesitated, then returned to her hut. His last words buzzed angrily through her mind. What disturbed her most was how vulnerable Hoover turned out to be. It was he who was lost, utterly alone, fighting for his sanity as much as Bill.

Janice lay on the reed mat. She looked at the thatched roof. There were no answers for her. None.

16

E
lliot Hoover did not appear in the morning or in the afternoon. The monks ignored her. They did not object when she prepared a few tomatoes and peppers for herself, or drank from the well. Neither did they help her in any way. At nightfall only the two boys, Meti and Sunjay, acknowledged her existence. Though she looked she found no paths that led from the
ashram
into the jungle.

On the third day one of the monks bowed slightly to her and beckoned for her to follow. Janice rose from the doorway of her hut and followed the flapping crimson robe into the thickets.

As the monk led her away from the compound a weird gloom enveloped them, a perpetual twilight caused by the thickness of the vines and leaves overhead. Butterflies floated twenty feet over their heads like underwater fish, brilliant scarlet, yellow, and white. The monk never looked back. There were no posts, no notched trees, no signs that she could see, but he walked unerringly, rapidly into the depths of the forest.

They found Elliot Hoover at a small pool. A trickle of rainwater fell like a thin waterfall over a mossy ledge into the pool. Apparently pilgrims had used the site often, for one edge of the shore was worn smooth, and a tiny wooden shrine had been built, supported on posts. A painting of a many-armed deity was visible, and below it, Elliot Hoover, legs folded, aware of all things around him and within him. The monk spoke lightly to him, bowed slightly, and left. For a long time neither Janice nor Hoover moved. Then he opened his eyes and looked peacefully at the placid pool, where the jungle breeze created cross-patterns of ripples on the silvery green surface.

“This was the only peace I ever knew,” he said distantly.

“There are those who have never known peace,” she replied very quietly.

He closed his eyes.

Tall grasses shivered on the shore. Peculiar floating reeds moved in subtle currents just under the surface, making the water dense and green. Yellow fish darted through the reeds, gulping. Hoover seemed to be aware of them, smiling sadly in sympathy, listening to the movement of water, though his eyes remained closed.

“I have prayed to Lord Shiva,” he said. “And to Lord Krishna. And I must go to New York.” A gentle breeze stirred his nearly blond hair, as though caressing his sorrowful face. “One accumulates debts,” he said. “Spiritual debts. And one must repay them.”

“There is no way that I can thank you enough,” Janice whispered, afraid to say more, afraid of disturbing his unearthly tranquility.

For a long time he said nothing else. A branch floated like a spear, turning around slowly, end over end, as it reached the base of the waterfall. It glided like a living thing over the dense mass of submerged reeds, nosing its way toward Hoover, black and glistening.

“Whether or not your husband
has
found his daughter,” he said gently, “I must insure that he not commit the same crime that I did.”

He closed his eyes. His days of prayer seemed to have drained his physical strength. Once again his face looked drawn, as though he needed more than anything to sleep quietly again.

“Yes,” he concluded, to himself, “such is my duty.”

Hoover stood up painfully. Gently he dusted off his dark crumpled trousers. He looked defeated. He gazed at the pond in affection.

“It will take us a week to get out of the mountains,” he said. “Are you well enough for the journey?”

“Yes. I can make it.”

He laughed, a laugh that seemed to come from the far side of the ocean, not his at all, as though his soul had laughed and his soul was no longer in his slender body.

“Physical journeys wear out the body, but spiritual journeys are the most dangerous.”

“Believe me,” she said earnestly, “I do not underestimate the self-sacrifice.”

“No, but you underestimate the dangers.”

Hoover led her back into the forest. She had the intuition that he was frightened of her. More than that. As she followed his sure steps over the thick green vines, on the ever-damp jungle floor, she knew that his spirit found no peace in her presence. A woman knows what a man means when he holds her, even for a split second. And the passion that had pressed her against the darkness of the hut had nothing to do with religion.

That was why he avoided her eyes. Like a country pilgrim going to Benares, he shifted his glance away, afraid of himself in her presence. Afraid of her in his presence. For the body also speaks, and in the jungles of South India it speaks with authority.

The
ashram
compound was busy with new arrivals, on their way south. They had brought many orange flowers, wreaths, but were humble and silent. The
ashram
absorbed them easily. Nothing ever disturbed the compound. For a thousand years monks had modestly cleared a few square yards from the jungle, kept it beautiful, and attended to the rites. The
ashram
had survived scores of generations, and it might last until the end of history.

“Wait here,” he whispered.

Hoover ducked into a small hut, spoke for a long time with three of the monks. There was a short ritual, a prayer, and a long farewell. As they left, the monks did not watch their departure. Nor did Hoover expect them to.

They walked in unison on a rutted road, and the moon, nearly full, peeked over the edge of the jungle. Silhouettes of mountains were at their side, the air was warm and pleasant, and the moonlight was so strong they could easily see miles down the clay of the road.

They slept in a small thicket of low-hanging trees. Hoover unrolled his slender bedroll for Janice, and she got into it. He slept at the base of a thick white tree that gleamed in the shafts of moonlight. She sensed him aware of her, like a gravitational force in the darkness. Finally he stirred and moved farther into the jungle until he was out of sight.

When they woke he came back out of the woods, and after a sparse breakfast they continued on their journey.

As they walked, perspiring in the heat, their steps together, it seemed that they understood one another perfectly. When to rest, when to eat from his rucksack. Questions were answered before the questions were verbally uttered. They stopped simultaneously to watch a small herd of water buffalo cross the road, the heavy tread mashing the road into mud. Then they continued, ever downhill, toward the heat, until their clothes were indistinguishable from the mud and insects that clung to them.

The second night they slept in a small ravine that cut upward into a tangle of brilliant red roots. Hoover moaned in his sleep. Janice watched him, as the fading moon made his shape barely discernible against the matted jungle floor. She knew the meaning of his restlessness. She knew the meaning of the sleep-drowned moan. She was not afraid of him, though with each hour of walking in the hot sunlight he seemed to grow more turbulent inside, more distressed, and several times he stopped, meditating on something before continuing. Now, while he slept, she watched his face in fascination. It twitched as though avoiding the horrors of his tortured dreams.

When she woke, she found him watching her.

The third day they came to a fork in the road; they took the eastern fork, and continued down the slopes. A farmer gave them a lift on his manure-ridden cart. Janice did not object to the smell or the sight of the manure. Nothing mattered to her anymore but getting back to America. As the cart jostled slowly onward it threw Hoover against her side. She felt the heat of his body through his filthy shirt, and he was trembling, his muscles knotted with the effort of keeping his balance.

Then, as the clay road receded in slow bumps, as they both watched the hills change gradually into flatlands of tall grass, scattered farms and short canals, a strange idea came to her. It was an idea that came of its own accord, floating into her brain like one of those wild scarlet butterflies, driven by its own nature. Suppose Hoover embraced her? Suppose his weight covered hers, drowned her weary body with his hunger? Suppose he entered her, found satisfaction within her? The image came to her, clear as though it had happened, and it surprised her. It was as though her body— loveless now for over a year—had begun speaking its own language.

The cart stopped. They descended, Hoover helping her down. They took a different fork, and the cart bounced slowly away. Hoover stopped her and his hands gently pried the filth from her arms, her legs, and her soft, rounded breasts. She did not object, but only watched him work.

“Excuse me,” he said, smiling. “But they do not allow shit in the finer restaurants of Pondicherry.”

She laughed. But his hand hesitated at touching her more, and they caught the subtle tremble of their own bodies, and avoided looking into each other’s face. The body was taking over the mind, Janice realized in fear. More than anything else in the world she wanted the comfort of his strong arms around her—and yet she was taking him home to save her husband. The confusion made her dizzy, and the dizziness had a sensuous quality, a seductive vagueness, that altered every thought until it returned to Elliot Hoover.

Then, there was a small village. After a few questions Hoover found a tiny, unused shed. They slept the night there. Hoover paced the floor, and the moon fitfully illumined him through the juggling palm fronds. Janice did not sleep. He knew she was awake. Then his hand rested on her shoulder. Gently, as though he were touching a child. Her heart seemed to pause, then raced forward.

She did not move. The slender, trembling fingers stroked her shoulder. They came around to the front and slid softly under her dirty shirt. Her breasts expanded, her breathing became harder, as the soft fingers rounded under the fabric. Instinctively she pressed his hands into her breasts, until her whole chest was tight in his grasp. His face came closer, the heat of his cheek against the back of her neck, and she felt his desire through the back of her clothes.

“Elliot,” she whispered.

Something scampered across the floor of the hut—a tiny lizard—and darted toward the exterior. A child in the village cried, and its mother softly sang it back to sleep. The jungle stood only in small thickets around the tilled fields, but it still exuded the humid warmth of fetid growth.

“Elliot—please…”

“Janice,” he breathed hotly into the back of her neck.

His hand slid gently, firmly, down the inside of her shirt, over her belly, along her hip. She stirred, rolled over, until they were pressed close against one another. Suddenly a jackal laughed hideously in the darkness, and the echoes trailed slowly through the village. Hoover released his grasp as though stung. He went to the window and peered out. Still breathing heavily, Janice slowly buttoned her shirt, her breasts rising and falling; the darkness had become a moral darkness, and she felt herself falling into a whirlpool of hell because she wanted this man—and all his hard, hot strength, and an end to the torment that had been eating at her for an eternity, though she had tried to deny it.

“Forgive me,” he whispered.

“There’s nothing to forgive.”

“I’d better sleep outside.”

“Elliot…”

Abruptly he went outside, leaving her inside with his bedroll, and he slept at the edge of a tilled field. She saw his form vaguely, as it slithered downward, miserably, to the mound of hard earth that had been plowed up. Once again the jackal cried.

She wanted to go to him, to beg him for love, if necessary. She found herself a slave to something so deep inside her that it altered her, made her a creature she barely recognized. Dimly she realized how strong the passions were—like a storm that easily crushes any ship foolish enough to set sail on the sea—and it took nearly an hour before she knew she would not leave the shed to join Hoover.

In the morning he bought several eggs, some milk, tomatoes, and yogurt from village families. He prepared them swiftly at the side of the road, and he also boiled some water, knowing that Janice still had no immunity against the south country microbes.

“We must be very strong,” he said.

She blushed, turning her head. The day was different from the night. In the dark she was so different, so overmastered by her primitive instincts, but in the day she wanted to think clearly, to see clearly, to act correctly.

“The stakes are too high,” he said, trying to be matter-of-fact. “For both of us. In different ways.”