The Treasure Cave: sea tales of Tiptoes Lightly (11 page)

“Cowboys,”
said Tom. He was still excited about galloping on the beach with Jo.

“No,” said
June. “You’ve already had your turn. I want to hear more about Asherah and the
sun-seeds.”

“Okay,” said
Tiptoes. “There are thousands of tales I could tell, but since I have told you
about the trees I will tell you about the other kingdoms too,”—but hardly had
she opened her mouth when Farmer John’s head slowly sank to his chest as he
fell asleep.

“On the sun
lived Kalor the Hot, Vallor the Light, and Sister Vive the Living. Sister Vive
had a garden, and in the garden was the Tree of Life. It was like a pomegranate
tree, with slim branches, delicate leaves and large round fruit. But it was not
like any tree on earth for it was made of golden light. And not only that, this
tree had one, and only one, fruit in a season.

Sister Vive
sat in her garden underneath the pomegranate tree. She was waiting for the
pomegranate to ripen. It was taking a long time. She sighed and thought about
the pomegranates before it. The first had been the biggest when the baby earth
was nothing but a big ball of Kalor’s hotness. When she cast the pomegranate
seeds down to the earth they became the rocks of many kinds.

The second
pomegranate was a bit smaller. Sister Vive cast its seeds down on the earth
after Kalor and Vallor complained that the world looked too bald. These seeds
become the plants and trees.

In the third
season the pomegranate was even smaller. When Sister Vive cast the seeds upon
the earth they became the animals. If a seed landed on the plains it became a
buffalo or a giraffe or a lion. If it landed in the sea it became a fish or a
dolphin or a whale. If it sank into the ground it became a mole or a gopher or
a worm. And if it didn’t land at all it became a bird flying in the air.

That is what
had become of the pomegranate seeds in the other seasons, and they had all
ripened properly. This time Sister Vive waited and waited. She got impatient
and danced around the tree—but this made no difference. She sang songs and told
tales—but this made no difference. She made music with her wonderful lyre—but
even this did not make any difference. The fruit stayed small and grew slowly.

Finally
Asherah the Earth Mother called up from the earth: ‘Sister Vive, Sister Vive,
the season is passing! Where are the seeds?’

‘The fruit is
slow and small,’ Sister Vive called back. ‘It doesn’t look ripe.’

‘If you wait
any longer the season will pass and it will be too late,’ said Sister Asherah.
‘Cast them now or they will be lost.’

So Sister Vive
plucked the pomegranate and opened it.

‘These are
strange seeds,’ she declared when she saw them.

‘What are they
like?’ called Asherah from the earth. ‘What do you see?’

‘Oh, they are
strange indeed,’ said Vive. ‘Each seed is different: some are tiny, some are
big, some are bright and some are only sparks. This fruit didn’t ripen
properly.’

But it was too
late. She couldn’t close the pomegranate and hang it on the tree again. So she
scooped out the seeds and cast them down upon the earth in the dark of night.
Oh, what a night of falling stars that was, with big stars and little stars
shooting through the sky! Some were so bright they lit the world about them.
Others only glowed like fireflies. Down, down they fell through the night
sky—but they never touched the earth. In the air they floated, over water, over
land, and over ice.”

“What were
they?” asked Tom.

“Those were
the first human beings,” said Tiptoes, “or at least most of them. Some were too
big and too ripe to become human beings, and others were too small and unripe.

Asherah the
Earth Mother looked at her new children. She didn’t know whether to smile or
frown. ‘What is this that Sister Vive has sent me?’ she said, scratching her
head and wondering. But it was too late and Asherah knew it. She knew she had
no choice but to love all of them, big and small, bright and dim, slow or fast,
for they were now her children.”

“And this is
what she did,” said Tiptoes, “and still does—though sometimes she gets
impatient with human beings when they destroy nature without reason.”

Farmer John’s
head lifted and he woke up. “I dreamed I was a light,” he said. “Long, long ago
I was a light. I came from the sun and I was clothed in gold.”

“You were
dreaming the story,” said Tom, patting his arm. “You fell asleep again.”

“So I did, so
I did,” said Farmer John, stretching. He sat thinking about his dream. Then he
stood up, lifting Tom and June with him. “Now it’s your turn to sleep and dream
that you are made of light and clothed in gold,” he said, and took them to their
room.

How
the Pearls came to the Treasure Cave

After the
children had gone to sleep Tiptoes went out into the sea mist and down to the
shore. The tide was in and swirling around the sea stacks, and the almost full
moon had risen higher in the sky. A loon cried its lonely cry in the darkness
as Tiptoes slipped into the cave and called Obaro.

“Obaro,
Obaro,” she called, and he appeared, glimmering faintly in yellows and browns
in the dark.

“Yes, my
little Fairy-Full-Of-Questions-and-Questions,” said Obaro.

“Tell me about
the necklace of pearls,” said Tiptoes. “How did they come to be here?”

“Oh, you are
curious,” said Obaro, “so, so curious—but I will tell you. All this happened
long, long ages ago. Remember, little fairy, the King of the Sea is as old as
the oceans and seas and will remain with us until they are gone. Time passed
and time passed and the King’s fairest daughter must always wear the necklace.
She became known as the Mermaid with the Pearl Necklace. She grew to be a young
woman—for she was hardly out of willful childhood when she first went to the
beach. She grew more lovely every year and the necklace made her lovelier
still.

The Sea King’s
daughter never went back to the beach or the land of men. And even though,
often and often, she longed to feel the sun on her face and the wind in her
hair, the necklace reminded her of her shame and she put the thought out of her
mind.

As time went
by the Sea King’s daughter grew so lovely that she outshone all her sisters,
both younger and older. Many had no envy and loved her. They said the necklace
was her shame and took away from her beauty. They treated her kindly.

But others
grew jealous of her beauty and the pearl necklace she wore. ‘Let us ask to wear
the necklace for a moment,’ they said to each other. ‘Once we have it we will
flee and hide it away.’

So they went
to the Sea King’s favorite daughter. They flattered her, and told her how
beautiful she looked, and asked would she share, just for a moment, some of her
beauty by letting them try on her necklace. They spoke so sweetly and with such
innocence that the King’s daughter slipped the necklace from her neck and gave
it to them. In an instant they swam away. They took the necklace to an
underground river which flowed into the sea deep beneath the waves. Up the
river they swam, and there in a dark cave they hid the necklace.

The Sea King’s
daughter lived in fear. She dreaded meeting her father and stayed hidden and
out of sight.

‘Where is my
beautiful daughter?’ asked the Sea King after a while. ‘I have not seen her for
many tides.’

‘We have not
seen her,’ said all her sisters—and this was true, for she had told no one
where she was hiding.

More tides
passed and still the King’s daughter hid herself away for fear of meeting her
father.

‘Where is my
daughter, my beautiful one?’ the restless King asked again, and again he
received the same reply.

But one of the
jealous sisters whispered in his ear: ‘Perhaps she has taken off her royal
necklace and loves you no more. Perhaps she has gone to the land of men.’

The King
became furious. He raged and raised his voice: ‘May the necklace round her neck
find a deep place, a hidden place in the land of men.’

The earth
shook and shuddered. Mountains fell, mountains rose, and the river cave was
raised above the salty waters and lay buried deep inside a mountain.

“That’s how
this cave got here,” exclaimed Tiptoes. “I couldn’t understand why it was so
water-worn when there is no river near by.”

“Yes, yes,”
said Obaro. “Long ago this cave was under the sea, and then under the inland
mountains—but the sea is always hungry for its own and it eats at the coast.
Now at last the cave is uncovered and the pearls see the light of day, of day.”

“What happened
to the King’s daughter?” asked Tiptoes.

“That is a different
tale, a different tale entirely,” said Obaro. “And I, even I who have been here
so long, so long, don’t know the end of it, the end of it,” and he closed his
eyes and left the cave empty and dark.

~
Wednesday ~

The
Landwife, the Seals, and the Golden Chain

The next
morning the sea mist clung to the shoreline and mountains. The wind was gone
and the sound of the surf had fallen to a gentle hush.

“Why don’t you
check to see if there are any seals hauled out on the rocks,” said Farmer John
looking out the kitchen window. He was at the sink, cleaning a huge pile of
vegetables. “The mist is hanging about, but it should be sunny later on and we
can go to the beach.”

Tom and June
were eating granola in the living room where Farmer John had lit a fire to take
the chill off the air.

“Can we bring
Lucy?” asked Tom.

As soon as Tom
spoke Lucy came rushing in from the kitchen wagging his tail. He knew what
‘bring Lucy’ meant.

“He’ll love to
be out,” said Farmer John. “Just don’t let him off the leash; he could run onto
the rocks and chase the seals. Even worse, he might bite a yearling, they’re
still quite small.”

Tom and June
hiked along the trail that followed the bluffs. Mostly the land was flat and
covered with wild meadow grass and weeds. Here and there carpets of ice plants
dotted with late yellow or magenta flowers blanketed a sandy slope or spilled
over the bluff. Further from the bluff’s edge clumps of blackberry thickets
huddled bare and leafless. Beyond them grew windswept evergreen trees leaning
away from the shore. Lucy strained on his leash and Tom had to hold on tight.
When Lucy was excited, June Berry wasn’t strong enough to hold him back. He
sniffed at everything and whined and tugged when he saw the ground squirrels
poking their heads out of their burrows.

“Where are you
going?” asked Tiptoes, suddenly appearing.

“To see the
seals—and sea lions if we’re lucky,” said Tom.

“Oh, good.
I’ll come too,” said Tiptoes. “The tide is out and I bet we’ll be lucky. Maybe
we’ll see the merman’s landwife too—even the merman himself.”

“What’s a
merman?” asked June Berry.

“He’s like a
mermaid—except he’s a man,” said Tom.

“He’s a
merguy,” laughed June Berry. “Or a merbloke.”

“Or a
merchap,” said Tom.

“Even a
merfellow,” said Tiptoes.

“But what’s a
landwife?” asked Tom. “I’ve never heard of that.”

“That’s when a
merman marries a human woman,” said Tiptoes. “That’s where seals come from.”

“Huh?” said
Tom, frowning. “I don’t get it.”

“I just heard
the tale myself,” said Tiptoes. “I met a seal out at sea and she told me. She
said that right around here, in the days when the Pomo Indians lived on this
shore, a young woman was fishing off the rocks with her two dogs. She fell in
love with a merman and followed him into the water. Her dogs whined and ran about
the shore. They barked and howled pitifully, but the woman never came out of
the ocean. The tribe called the dogs away from the water, but they wouldn’t
come. They tied them up in the village, but they chewed through the rope and
ran back to the shore. They kept plunging into the sea and swimming under the
water, trying to find their mistress. Slowly they changed shape and became
seals. Now they can swim far from land and dive deep under the waves, but they
must always come back and rest on the shore. And when you hear them bark, they
are barking for the landwife that followed the merman into the sea.”

“Perhaps we’ll
hear them barking today,” said Tom. “The rocks are at the end of this meadow.”

They were
crossing a large, flat meadow that jutted into the sea. At the point were the
flat rocks where the seals and sea lions hauled out. Here the bluff was low,
but signs asked that everyone stay off the rocks, and all dogs had to be on a
leash. They stopped and looked down.

“There’s one,”
said June. “Far out, close to the crashing waves.”

Tom looked. It
took a while to see it because its fur was dappled.

“That’s a
harbor seal,” said Tom. “And there’s another just below him.”

They searched
and spotted more. Sometimes they didn’t see one until it moved or Tiptoes pointed
it out. Once in a while a seal would scoot into the waves or climb out of the
sea. When they were on land they looked so awkward, rocking and shuffling about
like fat sausages. The children looked for sea lions, but none were there.

Tiptoes left
to go exploring and Tom and June walked further until they came to the wide bay
where they galloped the day before. Here the tide was strong and swept along
the shore. Far out was the lighthouse on its rocky island. It was barely
visible through the mist.

“See, there’s
a boat leaving the lighthouse,” said Tom shielding his eyes. “Someone must live
there.”

The boat was
small and open, but it moved quickly over the waves. It headed southward,
disappearing and reappearing in the mist.