Ширли Мерфи - The Grass Tower

“And what he will become?” Bethany asked, her interest stirred.

“Yes. That’s the most exciting of all. We’ve evolved so much, but people tend to forget that we have.” Justin gave Bethany a clear, eager look. “Evolved not only in knowledge, but in civility and kindness to each other. There were times in the past when men were thrown into vats of boiling oil for being cowards, and murderers and traitors were drawn and quartered, alive. There were the most terrible atrocities in centuries past. And prisons and mad houses were unbelievable, with people stacked like cordwood almost, lying in human filth and fed on perhaps one bowl of thin gruel a day. And people who were tel—who had some special talent, or who appeared different, were treated as if they were possessed of the devil. So many people were accused of evil and witchcraft. As much as I disapprove of Selma’s church venture, I think I disapprove even more of the talk I hear about it. That old man with the baseball cap shouting scriptures in the street reminds me of the Dark Ages when people were mired in superstition. He came right up to me and shouted in my face, ‘Those who consort with wizards and mediums are doomed to the fires of hell!’ It was almost as if we were right back in the tenth century.”

“That was Reid’s grandfather,” Bethany said slowly. “He’s like that when he’s drunk.”

“Oh! Oh, I’m sorry,” Justin said, dismayed.

“No, don’t be. He—he’s just an old drunk, everyone knows it, Reid most of all. Don’t you remember him, though? John Krupp, he’s lived in the village all his life and people say he’s been like that ever since his son was killed, crazy like that and drinking.”

Justin looked surprised, then was silent for a long time. “Yes,” she said at last. “Yes, now I remember him. His son died in a boat fire.” She glanced at Bethany and seemed to draw into herself; then suddenly she put Juniper into a fast canter, pounding ahead down the beach. Bethany felt again that strength underneath, even when Justin was upset; she leaned over Danny and followed, galloping inland along the edge of a small bay where willows thrust their whipping branches across the trail.

Then, with a sudden decision, she reached out with her mind and tried to touch the thing in Justin’s mind that she thought, with clear conviction now, she must reach. The shadow of knowing— She could almost touch, almost see—

The images flashed at her sharp and vivid; the branches seen through Justin’s eyes came at her so vividly that she ducked with Justin, gasping, her own progress completely unheeded until she was slapped hard by a branch, almost falling.

At a bare stretch she tried again, and again it came, the images in Justin’s mind sharp in her own: she was crouched over Juniper’s brown and white mane instead of Danny’s bay neck.

But when she tried to go deeper, seeking the depths she sensed so clearly, she was stopped by a cool, waiting-to-see feeling: Justin knew what she was doing.

Justin was watching her. Shocked, Bethany pulled Danny up and turned to stare.

They sat regarding each other silently. The horses fidgeted. Bethany did not know what to say, she did not know how to handle this. Justin’s blue eyes were as clear as the sunlit sea. Not angry. Not even shocked.

Then slowly something began to pull away, to fold back as if a veil were being drawn aside, and a raw part of Justin’s mind began to show itself: something, Bethany perceived, that had lain long dormant. It began to take form, to open out and grow in depth until it seemed to fill Bethany’s own mind completely. It was like music, but music she could touch. There was great hurt in it. And sadness. But beneath these there was a many-faceted, comforting knowledge of something fundamental and huge, something so steady that it held the sadness back. This was what she had seen, this was what had shown itself behind Justin’s eyes, this was what she had probed in to find—

But now that she had found it, she felt only ashamed and dismayed, as if she had invaded Justin’s privacy quite beyond the boundaries of forgiving.

“I’m sorry,” she said at last, so inadequately. The horses pawed, and she pulled Danny’s head up.

“Could you see why the sadness is there?” Justin asked at last, very simply.

“No, I couldn’t. I don’t want to.” She wanted to turn and ride away, to get away. “Please, I—”

Justin settled her with a calm long look, so that Bethany became silent. “When we were small,” Justin said, “I stayed away from other children, except my sister Kathleen and your mother. I could not touch other people’s thoughts so easily as you do, but I would see things happen. I was hurt many times before I learned to hide this, and later to stifle it. When I was twenty, I was engaged to be married. You may have heard Marjory speak of it.” She gave Bethany only the bare facts, but the thoughts behind them, the emotions released, were overpowering. “I flew back to New York for the wedding, and Mark drove out to La Guardia to meet my plane.

“He was killed in a wreck five minutes before my plane landed.

“I saw it happen, Bethany. Sitting in that plane I saw it happen, and there was nothing I could do.

“I’ve never told anyone except Papa. After that the visions were stilled, for when they began again I stopped them. With pure, outraged will, I stopped them. I didn’t want to know, not anything, not ever again.”

Bethany sat staring at her, shocked, and cold with guilt. She had probed where she shouldn’t have, she had opened a wound that was not hers to touch. Her desire to comfort Justin was overshadowed by her feeling of having pried, having thrust herself in where she had no right to be. She put out her hand, wanting to say something but not knowing what to say, feeling terribly uncomfortable and inadequate.

“Maybe this was necessary,” Justin said at last. “Maybe you can’t go through life hiding part of yourself.” She looked at Bethany solemnly. “I had shut it out so completely that I knew nothing about it when my sister Kathleen died.” She studied Bethany with open curiosity. “But you must have hidden your own talent—only not so deeply. Not from yourself. But from others? Bett can’t know,” she said with absolute certainty.

“She does, though, sort of. I mean, she knows about when I was younger, though at the time I think she really didn’t want to know. When she asked me recently, I lied to her; I said I wasn’t like that any more. Maybe that was wrong of me, but she was very relieved.” Her eyes searched Justin’s. “She didn’t want to know, Justin. How could anyone want not to know something? Reid says people refuse to see what’s right in front of them, that they stick their heads in the ground like moles. I think he means his grandfather, though.”

“Reid seems like a bright boy, don’t underrate him. That remark could have more meaning than you imagine.”

They rode in silence for a while, the horses nudging each other, and Danny trying to snatch at passing bushes. Bethany looked at Justin with curiosity. “Did your sister Kathleen have—was she able to do what you can do?”

“No. Never. Perhaps if she had been, if we had had that kind of tie between us, I would have known more about what was going on in her life. Papa always blamed himself for Kathleen’s death, though he was not to blame. There was a young man she wanted very much to marry and Papa wouldn’t give his permission; he had done some criminal things, and Papa was torn up that Kathleen wanted him. She didn’t marry him, but months later she died of pneumonia, and Papa always felt that if he had permitted the marriage, well, that different things would have happened in her life, that somehow she might not have gotten sick.”