The Steampunk Trilogy (26 page)

12

“HOW ODD THE GIRL’S LIFE LOOKS BEHIND THIS SOFT ECLIPSE”

A
FIRE WOULD
have been pleasant. A fire would have kept away the fear. A fire would have dispelled the gloom.

A cheerful blaze it would have been, as on a winter’s night in The Homestead, when the entire Dickinson family would gather for a Bible reading, the three children still young, the Squire relaxed, Emily’s mother less indisposed than nowadays. Perhaps it would even have been one of those rare occasions when Emily had been invited to climb into her father’s lap, where he sat in his massive chair beneath that engraving of “The Forester’s Family,” a happy brood so unlike her own. And perhaps the Squire would have unbent enough actually to cosset his daughter, pet her hair and tell her she was a good girl, despite her being such a disappointment, too simple at age ten even to read a clock. . . .

But there was nothing to burn here in Summerland, lest it be their own equipage.

And if there had been, would they have dared to start a fire that would inevitably scorch and damage this miraculous grass, an entity apparently capable of giving birth?

And would the grass
have even let them
?

So the disconsolate travelers were forced to sit in a circle around the wan glow of a single whale-oil lamp—much diminished by the glory of the polychrome sky—discussing their next “day’s” moves in the light of recent events, prior to turning in.

Outside the range of the light, the huddled ostriches muttered petulantly, as if their dim brains were finally registering the abnormality of their surroundings.

Beyond the birds, Allen stood.

The strange, inscrutable child faced west, his long unchanging shadow reaching almost into the camp. Still as a jade statue, he appeared to be communing with someone or something the humans could not perceive. He had maintained this immobility for an hour, and seemed intent on continuing so for many more.

After confounding them with his response to Austin, the boy had made as if to leave.

“Please,” pleaded Crookes at the last minute, “you must stay and help us.”

“I will if
he
wants me to,” said Allen.

And the green child pointed to Walt.

“It amazes me how he has fixed on you,” said Crookes.

“It happened when we touched,” said Walt. “There was a flow of intelligence between us. I daresay it would have happened with anyone else as well.” Addressing the child solemnly, Walt said, “It would gladden my heart to hear your valved voice a while longer yet, my son.”

“Then I will stay,” said Allen.

It had seemed a major victory at the time.

But now their talk revealed how far from solving their problems they were.

Nervously twirling a bit of string around a finger, Crookes said, “Assuming Allen can help us reach the shore of this nameless sea, what do we gain? The
Thanatopsis
will be many miles away, so we will not be able to set sail—even if such a course should seem worthwhile. Granted, we might meet these other resurrectees, if Allen is to be believed. But if they are all as naive as he—”

“Maybe,” said Austin, “there will be elders among them who will be able to help us. . . .”

“What disappoints me most,” said Davis, “is that the dead apparently forget everything about their earthly lives. And I was so looking forward to discoursing with Alexander the Great. . . .”

“And I with my children,” Austin echoed.

“Bah!” spat Madame Selavy. “This
enfant vert
is not one of the real spirits! He is some kind of unhuman devil, bent on leading us astray! Why, imagine—he did not even react when I mentioned Princess Pink Cloud! No, you may rest assured that I will know the true ghosts when we meet them. Have I not spoken with them for years?”

Crookes threw down his bit of twine and stood. “Well, this talk is getting us nowhere. Let us retire, and perhaps things will look brighter in the morning.’”

They all betook themselves to their assigned tents.

Beneath the lowering canvas assigned to the ladies, Madame Selavy moved quickly to establish her dominance.

“I will not put up with any snortling or fidgeting,
Mam’selle
.
Watch your elbows, occupy only your half of the tent, do not snatch the blankets, and we will get along fine.”

So saying, Madame Selavy flopped down on their rude pallet, arrayed herself grandly in three-quarters of the coverings, and, shifting onto her side so that her hams overhung Emily’s portion of the mattress, began within thirty seconds to manufacture a mustache-fluttering snore.

Squeezing herself into the remaining space and trying to keep as much room between herself and the pungent seeress as possible, Emily lay sleepless on her back.

Neither she nor Walt had had much to say during the discussion just past. The miracle of Allen’s birth seemed to preclude ratiocination. Emily knew that the true meaning of the manifestation could only be apprehended poetically, and she longed to hear what glorious thickets of verbiage Walt might have effused from the miracle. . . .

After half an hour of such ruminations, Emily stealthily rose, and left the tent.

No one else stirred within the encampment, where the lamp still burned untended.

Emily approached Walt’s tent. Timidly, she lifted a flap.

Young Sutton slept alone, his cherubic face peaceful.

Dropping the flap, Emily moved beyond the bivouac’s fitful flame.

She found Walt sitting cross-legged beside Allen. The poet was as mesmerized as he had been aboard the
Thanatopsis
,
when he had first heard the grass speak.

Gingerly, Emily touched his shoulder.

Walt started, then turned his face upward.

“Emily,” he said, in the tones of one recognizing a childhood friend not seen for decades. “’Tis vigil strange I keep here this night. I am glad for human company. Come—sit here beside me.”

Awkwardly, Emily folded her legs beneath her skirts and sank down to the velvety turf.

Allen paid no attention to the actions of the humans, but continued to stare off in the direction of the ever-setting sun.

Walt took one of Emily’s hands in his. Her pulse raced like spring torrents.

“I am at peace now with my father,” said the man, “even though I have seen not seen his soul clothed in human form, as I foolishly longed to. I have realized what I always knew, but had forgotten. My father is all around me, in the mossy scabs of the worn fences, in the heap’d stones, in the elder, mullein and poke-weed. I need search no further.”

Emily felt ecstatic tears scald her cheeks. “Oh, Walt, I’m so happy for you.”

Walt transferred his hands to her waist. “Let me share my renewed joy and strength with you, Emily.”

And then he kissed her.

George Gould had kissed her once. But that was years ago. And he had been a smooth-faced youth, not a virile bearded
man
!

Walt broke away and whispered, “You villain touch! What are you doing? My breath is tight in its throat! Unclench your floodgates! You are too much for me. My sentries have deserted their posts. . . .”

“Mine also, . . .” said Emily.

And she drew him down with her onto the lawn.

Walt’s hands were busy beneath her clothing. “Urge and urge and urge, always the procreant urge of the world. Out of the dimness, opposite equals advance. Always substance and increase, always sex. Always a knit of identity, always a breed of life. Learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so. To elaborate is no avail—”

“Don’t, then!” hissed Emily.

Walt was atop her now, his face buried in her neck, his weight like a treetrunk splaying her legs. She smelled the scented herbage of his breast.

Emily clutched him tight, her mouth against his ear. “My river runs to thee, blue sea! Wilt welcome me? My river waits reply, oh sea—look graciously. I’ll fetch thee brooks from spotted nooks. Say, sea—take
me
!”

Walt said, “
Ma femme
—” then pressed with slow rude muscle against her.

Emily cried, and bit her lip.

In the sky, a cloud bled alizarin.

Walt was moving slowly. “Ebb stung by the flow, and flow stung by the ebb. Love-flesh swelling and deliciously aching. Limitless limpid jets of love, hot and enormous. Quivering jelly of love, white-blow and delirious juice. Bridegroom night of love working surely and softly into the prostrate dawn, undulating into the willing and yielding day. I am lost in the cleave of the clasping and sweet-flesh’d day!”

“Yes, Walt—I am the day, and you are my night!”

“And now comes the dawn!”

Walt howled a barbaric yawp, and sagged onto her, eclipsing the sky.

Emily didn’t see how the others could have failed to hear Walt’s climax. Surely they would be venturing out to see what the commotion was. But she made no move to escape Walt’s embrace. She was not scared of their censure, here on the edge of dying in this strange land. Let everyone see what a royal hoyden she was!

Title divine is mine! The Wife without the sign!

Twisting her head slightly, Emily realized that her limited field of vision included the small feet of the green child. Upon resolving them, she had the strangest feeling that he was the improbable son of their just consummated union.

She waited for the others. But they never came.

Enchanted or exhausted, they had slept through Emily’s coronation.

Finally, Walt stirred and removed his bulk from atop her.

“We should return, Emily, before we worry the others.”

“Whatever you say, Walt.”

As they walked back toward their separate tents, Emily felt a little sad and worried and tired, her exaltation fading.

“Walt?”

“Yes?”

“Did the Harebell loose her girdle to the lover Bee, would the Bee the Harebell
hallow
much as formerly?”

“I am for you, and you are for me, Emily. Not only for our own sake, but for other’s sakes. You awoke to no touch but mine.”

“Oh, Walt!”

13

“THERE WAS A LITTLE FIGURE PLUMP FOR EVERY LITTLE KNOLL”

W
HEN EMILY AWOKE
, this was how she felt.

If all the griefs I am to have

Would only come today,

I am so happy I believe

They’d laugh and run away!

Lost in an eerie borderland between life and death with no prospect of rescue, she should have felt as miserable as her unlucky companions.

But Walt’s attentions and embrace had allowed her to transcend her immediate condition.

At last she had captured her soul-mate, forging with him those immemorial carnal bonds which time could never snap. And what a catch! A tender yet rugged male deep enough to match her female needs, a wild poet with roots in the hidden wisdom of the universe.

Finally, Emily knew how her esteemed Elizabeth Barrett had felt when she had found her Robert. At that moment, Emily realized she had been secretly rather jealous of “the Portuguese” all these years.

Now she could easily let such juvenile emotions go.

As she stretched luxuriously in the otherwise empty tent, her long chestnut tresses undone and in rare disarray, Emily praised Walt for doing so much for her. She swore she would do as much for him. Whatever he wanted or needed, wherever he roamed, whatever he did, she would stand by him, as support and inspiration.

Great I’ll be, or Small—or any size at all—as long as
I’m the size that suits Thee
!

Suddenly Emily could wait no longer to see her beloved. Hurriedly, she left the tent.

The others were sitting around the extinguished lamp, partaking of a light breakfast.

Walt loafed on the grass, one arm resting on a bedroll, legs extended. His gaze was fixed on a single plucked blade held between thumb and forefinger.

“Ah, Miss Dickinson,” called out Crookes, “we thought you had sneaked into the ether, so soundly did you sleep! But you have awakened just in time, as we’re about to break camp. Walt, perhaps you’ll tell Miss Dickinson what you’ve learned.”

Now Walt looked up at Emily. His face betrayed none of what had passed between them last night, showing only his general benevolent and sunny impartiality, somewhat tempered by the stresses of their situation.

What a considerate lover,
thought Emily.
He seeks to hide our relationship and spare me any possible embarrassment. I will have to tell him in private that there is no such need. I would shout my love from the rooftops of Amherst . . .

Walt discarded the grass. “I have been speaking with Allen. During the ‘night,’ he learned more of what he has to do. He must find six of his peers to accompany him to the sea. Only as a unit will he and the others be able to achieve their destiny, and move on to the next plane of existence.”

“It makes excellent sense,” said Davis. “Seven is the mystic number supreme. Seven planets, seven days, seven metals and seven colors—As the properties of seven are powerful on earth, so must they be in Summerland.”

“In this sense, then,” Crookes extrapolated, “our own expeditionary force was incomplete and unbalanced until the late fortuitous addition of Miss Dickinson.”

Madame Selavy hurriedly disposed of a pickled egg so that she could declaim, “I myself would have preferred to be
un peu
discomboobled, rather than have along such an unsympathetic intellect.”

Even Madame could not fluster Emily this morning. She bestowed a gracious smile on the seeress and directed her words toward Crookes.

“I would not have missed this outing for the world, Professor.”

Now Austin spoke up gloomily. “Unless Allen and his compatriots can help us get home, dear sister, that exchange might be precisely what we’ve bartered.”

On this note of urgency, and without further delay, the exiles assembled their gear and were on their way, led today by the preternaturally obsessed and silent Allen, Walt in second place.

Somehow, Crookes had ended up with the reins of Emily’s mount, while Austin had taken a string of pack-ostriches. Finding themselves somewhat apart from the others, the Professor now engaged Emily in conversation.

“It seems to me that if we can project our first day’s experiences with any justification, then we should witness the rebirth of a new soul out of the grass every twenty-four hours or so. Reckoning thus, it should take approximately a week to assemble the company required by Allen. I believe our supplies will stretch that far, with just a little caution. Though much beyond that point, I cannot hold out hope.”

Emily appreciated Crookes talking so frankly and intelligently with her. He was really quite a nice man. Though of course not so splendid as Walt. She tried to reply in similar fashion.

“What astonishes me, Professor, is that we are not literally stumbling over one child-soul or another at every single step.

“Whatever do you mean?”

“Consider. How many millions and millions of dead have there been in the past, and how many millions more in the future? If Summerland is receiving any portion of them on a regular basis—though how the time disjuncture between the world’s figures, I cannot speculate—then the soil should be exploding with revenants every few feet. Ancient Romans and Greeks, Persians and Medes, not to mention future dwellers such as Allen.”

Crookes was plainly awestruck by Emily’s analysis. After a moment’s cogitation, he replied, “I see no flaw in your reasoning, Miss Dickinson, and only two possible answers. Perhaps most of eternity’s dead have already made the transition to Summerland. This would mean that we have arrived here at a special time, a unique moment in the history of the afterlife. As a scientist, however, I tend to regard every situation as representative, until proven unique. Therefore, I lean toward the second postulate.”

“Which is?”

“That Summerland is practically infinite in extant. The dead are indeed arriving moment by moment in their teeming myriad—but scattered across a billion billion hectares.”

“Then our meeting Allen so soon was sheer chance? And our prospects for meeting any of his necessary companions likewise dim?

“It appears so. Unless, of course—”

“What?”

“We are assuming that the dead manifest themselves randomly, much like dandelions popping up in The Squire’s front yard. There is another alternative—”

Emily supplied it. “That some Higher Principle ordains where they shall appear. That we were meant to meet Allen. And that our fate is in Unknown Hands.”

Crookes looked disgusted. “How I hate to imagine some bearded Jewish elder as big as Mont Blanc continually peering over my shoulder and nudging my elbow! But I suppose anything is possible.”

“Only events will prove which hypothesis is correct. After all, a rainbow convinces more than all philosophy.”

Crookes laughed. “Miss Dickinson, you’re quite a rare woman! Allow me to place my services at your complete disposal, should you ever need them.”

“Thank you, Mister Crookes, but I already have a protector.”

Crookes smiled slyly. “Ah, so that’s how it is. Well, I wish you and your beau the best of luck. You both may need it.”

Before Emily could completely decipher what Crookes implied, a shout rang out.

“Rebirth ho!” pealed Walt’s clear tones.

Emily glanced significantly at Crookes, who shrugged as if in mock defeat. Together, they hurried with the others to where Walt and Allen stood.

The grass had already finished its transformation when they arrived. Congealed out of the thrashing warp and weft of the chlorophyll, the figure of a girl-child lay. As the spectators watched, she opened her eyes.

“Don’t touch her,” warned Crookes. “Remember the adverse effect physical contact had on Allen—”

Emily bent over the sweet-faced child. “What was your name, dear?”

“Sill—Sill—Sylvia. . . .”

“Is that all?”

“All I remember.”

Emily wanted to hug the little girl, but refrained. “That’s fine, darling. Look, here’s a friend for you—”

Allen stepped forward and helped Sylvia up.

“The sea,” she said as soon as they touched.

Without any reference to the humans, the pair of naked toddlers resumed their determined westward progress.

“Is it possible,” asked Crookes, “for something to be both alluring and horrifying?”

“Have you never seen,” asked Walt, “a common prostitute in the city of orgies, with her charnel-house body of love?”

Austin blanched and said, “Sir!” Madame Selavy tittered. Davis dealt with a speck on his glasses. Young Sutton chuckled.

Crookes turned to Emily with a lifted eyebrow, as if to say,
Good luck indeed with this mad beau!