A Wrinkle in Time Quintet (61 page)

“But editors think they’re good, too, and so does my father.”

“I’m glad. I value Dr. Llawcae’s opinion as much as anybody’s in the world.”

“And he loves you and Bran and Gwen as though you were my brothers and sister. And your mother has been a second mother to me since my own dear mama died. As for our fathers—they may be only distant kin, but they’re like as two peas in a pod with their passion for Wales. Matt—have you said anything about Bran to Gwen
or your parents?”

“No. They don’t like the idea that Bran and I can communicate without speech or letters the way we do. They pretend it’s some kind of trick we’ve worked out, the way we used to change places with each other when we were little, to fool people. They think what we do isn’t real.”

“It’s real, I don’t doubt that.” Zillah smiled. “Dear Matt, I think I love you nearly as much as
Bran does.”

* * *

A week later, Mr. Maddox received official news that his son had been wounded in battle and would be invalided home. He called the family into the dark, book-lined library to inform them.

Mrs. Maddox fanned herself with her black lace fan. “Thank God.”

“You’re glad Bran’s been wounded!” Gwen cried indignantly.

Mrs. Maddox continued to fan herself. “Of course not, child.
But I’m grateful to God that he’s alive, and that he’s coming home before something worse than a bullet in the leg happens to him.”

—It
is
worse, Mama, Matthew thought silently.—Bran has been shutting me out of his thoughts and he’s never done that before. All I get from him is a dull, deadening pain. Gwen is more right than she knows, not to be glad.

He looked thoughtfully at his sister. She
was dark of hair and blue of eye like Zillah, making them appear more like sisters than distant cousins. But her face did not have Zillah’s openness, and her eyes were a colder blue and glittered when she was angry. After Matthew’s accident she had pitied him, but had not translated her pity into compassion. Matthew did not want pity.

Gwen returned his gaze. “And how do you feel about your twin’s
coming home, Matthew?”

“He’s been badly hurt, Gwen,” he said. “He’s not going to be the same debonair Bran who left us.”

“He’s still only a child.” Mrs. Maddox turned toward her husband, who was sitting behind the long oak library table.

“He’s a man, and when he comes home the store will become Maddox and Son,” her husband said.

—Maddox and Son, Matthew thought without bitterness—not Maddox
and Sons.

He turned his wheelchair slightly away. He was totally committed to his writing; he had no wish to be a partner in Maddox’s General Store, which was a large and prosperous establishment in the center of the village, and had the trade of the surrounding countryside for many miles. The first story of the rambling frame building was filled with all the foodstuffs needed for the village.
Upstairs were saddles and harnesses, guns, plows, and even a large quantity of oars, as though Mr. Maddox remembered a time when nearly all of the valley had been a great lake. A few ponds were all that remained of the original body of water. Matthew spent most mornings in the store, taking care of the ledgers and all the accounts.

Behind the store was the house, named Merioneth. The Llawcae
home, Madrun, stood beyond Merioneth, slightly more ostentatious, with white pillars and pinkbrick façade. Merioneth was the typical three-storied
white frame farmhouse with dark shutters which had replaced the original log cabins.

“People think we’re putting on airs, giving our houses names,” Bran had complained one day, before the accident, as he and Matthew were walking home from school.

Matthew did a cartwheel. “I like it,” he said as he came right side up. “Merioneth is named in honor of a distant cousin of ours in Wales.”

“Yah, I know, Michael Jones, a congregational minister of Bala in Merioneth.”

“Cousin Michael’s pleased that we’ve given the house that name. He mentions it almost every time he writes to Papa. Weren’t you listening yesterday when he was telling us about
Love Jones Parry, the squire of Madrun, and his plan to take a trip to Patagonia to inspect the land and see if it might be suitable for a colony from Wales?”

“That’s the only interesting bit,” Bran had said. “I love to travel, even just to go with Papa to get supplies. Maybe if the squire of Madrun really does take that trip, we could go with him.”

It was not long after this that the accident
happened, and Matthew remembered how Bran had tried to rouse him from despair by telling him that Love Jones Parry had actually gone to Patagonia, and reported that although the land was wild and desolate, he thought that the formation of a Welsh colony where the colonists
would be allowed to teach their native tongue in school might be possible. The Spanish government paid scant attention to
that section of Patagonia, where there were only a few Indians and a handful of Spaniards.

But Matthew refused to be roused. “Exciting for you. I’m not going to get very far from Merioneth ever again.”

Bran had scowled at him ferociously. “You cannot afford the luxury of self-pity.”

—It is still an expensive luxury, Matthew thought—and one I can ill afford.

“Matt!” It was Gwen. “A penny for
your thoughts.”

He had been writing when his father had summoned them, and still had his note pad on his lap. “Just thinking out the plot for another story.”

She smiled at him brightly. “You’re going to make the name of Maddox famous!”

“My brave baby,” Mrs. Maddox said. “How proud I am of you! That was the third story you’ve sold to
Harper’s Monthly
, wasn’t it?”

“The fourth—Mama, Papa, Gwen:
I think I must warn you that Bran is going to need all our love and help when he comes home.”

“Well, of course—” Gwen started indignantly. “No, Gwen,” he said quietly. “Bran is hurt much more than just the leg wound.”

“What are you talking about?” his father demanded. “You might call it Bran’s soul. It’s sick.”

* * *

Bran returned, limping and withdrawn. He shut Matthew out as effectively
as though he had slammed a door in his twin’s face.

Once again Matthew sent a note to Zillah to meet him at the flat rock. This time he did not ask Jack O’Keefe for help, but lying on the wagon, he pulled himself over the rough ground. It was arduous work, even with his powerful arms, and he was exhausted when he arrived. But he had allowed more than enough time. He heaved himself off the wagon
and dragged over to the rock, stretched out, and slept under the warm autumn sun.

“Matt—”

He woke up. Zillah was smiling down at him. “F’annwyl.” He pushed the fair hair back from his eyes and sat up. “Thanks for coming.”

“How is he today?”

Matthew shook his head. “No change. It’s hard on Papa to have another crippled son.”

“Hush. Bran’s not a cripple!”

“He’ll limp from that leg wound for
the rest of his life. And whether or not his spirit will heal is anybody’s guess.”

“Give him time, Matt …”

“Time!” Matthew pushed the word away impatiently. “That’s what Mama keeps saying. But we’ve given him time. It’s three months since he came home. He sleeps
half the day and reads half the night. And he’s still keeping himself closed to me. If he’d talk about his experiences it might help
him, but he won’t.”

“Not even to you?”

“He seems to feel he has to protect me,” Matthew said bitterly, “and one of the things I’ve always loved most in Bran was his refusal to protect or mollycoddle me in any way.”

“Bran, Bran,” Zillah murmured, “the knight in shining armor who went so bravely to join the cavalry and save the country and free the slaves …” She glanced at the ring on her finger.
“He asked me to return his ring. To set me free, he said.”

Matthew stretched out his hand to her, then drew it back.

“There has to be time for me as well as for Bran. When he gave me this ring I promised I’d be here for him when he returned, no matter what, and I intend to keep that promise. What can we do to bring him out of the slough of despond?”

Matthew ached to reach out to touch her fair
skin, to stroke her hair as black as the night and as beautiful. He spread his hand on the warm rock. “I tried to get him to take me riding. I haven’t ridden since he went away.”

“And?”

“He said it was too dangerous.”

“For you? Or for him?”

“That’s what I asked him. And he just said, ‘Leave me alone. My leg pains me.’ And I said, ‘You never used to let me talk about it when my legs and back
hurt.’ And he just looked at me and said, ‘I didn’t understand pain then.’ And I said, ‘I think you understood it better then than you do now.’ And we stopped talking because we weren’t getting anywhere, and he wouldn’t open an inch to let me near him.”

“Father says his pain should be tolerable by now, and the physical wound is not the problem.”

“That’s right. We’ve got to get him out of himself
somehow. And Zillah, something else happened that I need to talk to you about. Yesterday when I hoped I could get Bran to take me riding I wheeled out to the stable to check on my saddle, and when I pushed open the stable door there were Jack and—and—”

“Gwen?”

“How did you guess?”

“I’ve noticed him looking at her. And she’s looked right back.”

“They were doing more than looking. They were
kissing.”

“Merchant’s daughter and hired hand. Your parents would not approve. How about you?”

“Zillah, that’s not what I mind about Jack O’Keefe. He’s a big and powerful man and he has nothing but
scorn for me—or anything with a physical imperfection. I saw him take a homeless puppy and kill it by flinging it against the wall of the barn.”

She put her hands over her eyes. “Matt! Stop!”

“I
think it’s his enormous physical healthiness that attracts Gwen. I’m a total cripple, and Bran’s half a one, at least for now. And Jack is life. She doesn’t see the cruelty behind the wide smile and loud laugh.”

“What are you going to do about it?”

“Nothing. For now. Mama and Papa have enough on their minds, worrying their hearts out over Bran. And if I warn Gwen, she’ll just think I’m jealous
of all that Jack can do and all that I cannot. I’ll try to talk to Bran, but I doubt he’ll hear.”

“Dear Matt. It comforts me that you and I can talk like this.” Her voice was compassionate, but it held none of the pity he loathed. “My true and good friend.”

One night after dinner, while the men lingered over the port, Mr. Maddox looked at Bran over the ruby liquid in his glass. “Matthew and
Zillah would like you to join them in their Welsh lesson this week.”

“Not yet, Papa.”

“Not yet, not yet, that’s all you’ve been saying for the past three months. Will Llawcae says your wound is healed now, and there’s no reason for your malingering.”

To try to stop his father, Matthew said, “I was remarking today that Gwen looks more Indian than Welsh, with her high cheekbones.”

Mr. Maddox
poured himself a second glass of port, then stoppered the cut-glass decanter. “Your mother does not like to be reminded that I have Indian blood, though it’s generations back. The Llawcaes have it, too, through our common forebears, Brandon Llawcae and Maddok of the People of the Wind, whose children intermarried. Maddok was so named because he had the blue eyes of Welsh Madoc—but then, I don’t need
to repeat the story.”

“True,” Bran agreed.

“I like it.” Matthew sipped his wine.

“You’re a romanticizer,” Bran said. “Keep it for your writing.”

Mr. Maddox said stiffly, “As your mother has frequently pointed out, black hair and blue eyes are far more common in people of Welsh descent than Indian, and Welsh we indubitably are. And hard-working.” He looked pointedly at Bran.

Later in the evening
Matthew wheeled himself into Bran’s room. His twin was standing by the window, holding the velveteen curtains aside to look across the lawn to the woods. He turned on Matthew with a growl. “Go away.”

“No, Bran. When I was hurt I told you to go away, and you wouldn’t. Nor will I.” Matthew wheeled closer to his brother. “Gwen’s in love with Jack O’Keefe.”

“Not surprised. Jack’s a handsome brute.”

“He’s not the right man for Gwen.”

“Because he’s our hired hand? Don’t be such a snob.”

“No. Because he is, as you said, a brute.”

“Gwen can take care of herself. She always has. Anyhow, Papa would put his foot down.”

There was an empty silence which Matthew broke. “Don’t cut Zillah out of your life.”

“If I love Zillah, that’s the only thing to do. Free her.”

“She doesn’t want to be free.
She loves you.”

Bran walked over to his bed with the high oak bedstead and flung himself down. “I’m out of love with everything and everybody. Out of love with life.”

“Why?”

“Do you have to ask me?”

“Yes, I do. Because you aren’t telling me.”

“You used to know without my having to tell you.”

“I still would, if you weren’t shutting me out.”

Bran moved his head restlessly back and forth on
the pillow. “Don’t you be impatient with me, twin. Papa’s bad enough.”

Matthew wheeled over to the bed. “You know Papa.”

“I’m no more cut out to be a storekeeper than you are. Gwen’s the one who has Papa’s hard business sense. But I
don’t have a talent like yours to offer Papa as an alternative. And he’s always counted on me to take over the business. And I don’t want to. I never did.”

“What,
then?” Matthew asked.

“I’m not sure. The only positive thing the war did for me was confirm my enjoyment of travel. I like adventure—but not killing. And it seems the two are seldom separated.”

It was the nearest they had come to a conversation since Bran’s return, and Matthew felt hopeful.

Matthew was writing on his lap desk in a sunny corner of the seldom-used parlor.

There Bran found him.
“Twin, I need you.”

“I’m here,” Matthew said.

Bran straddled a small gilt chair and leaned his arms on the back. “Matt, nothing is the way I thought it was. I went to war thinking of myself as Galahad, out to free fellow human beings from the intolerable bondage of slavery. But it wasn’t as simple as that. There were other, less pure issues being fought over, with little concern for the souls
which would perish for nothing more grand than political greed, corruption, and conniving for power. Matt, I saw a man with his face blown off and no mouth to scream with, and yet he screamed and could not die. I saw two brothers, and one was in blue and one was in grey, and I will not tell you which one took his
saber and ran it through the other. Oh God, it was brother against brother, Cain
and Abel all over again. And I was turned into Cain. What would God have to do with a nation where brothers can turn against each other with such brutality?” Bran stopped speaking as his voice broke on a sob.