Gardens in the Dunes (50 page)

As they made their way up the steps from the lily tank to the gateway of the rain garden, Indigo wished she could stay in the black garden longer; she had so many questions about the figures, especially the snakes.

Laura stopped briefly to pull off dried blossoms, while Edward and Hattie walked ahead. Indigo's heart pounded as she worked up her nerve to ask Laura about the snakes. Were there any snakes here in the garden? A few small green snakes and black snakes, but they were very shy. Indigo looked here and there under the foliage and at the base of the stonework, where a snake might rest in the shade. Laura pushed back the tall stems of the flowers to search too, but they found no snakes.

Laura said when she was a girl her grandmother always kept a black snake in the storeroom to protect it from mice and rats. Indigo smiled; yes, Grandma Fleet always thanked the snakes for their protection—not just from rodents but from those who would do you harm. At the spring above the dunes lived the biggest snake, very old—the water was his.

Laura paused and smiled; they'd caught up with Edward and Hattie, who were waiting at the gateway seated on one of the stone benches that flanked the wall.

“We've been exchanging snake stories,” Laura said as she sat down. Indigo let Rainbow climb down her arm to investigate the edges of the stone bench with his beak. He examined the stone very carefully, touching the surface with his smooth, dry tongue to get additional information.

One of Laura's favorite stories was about a white princess who returned a lost child from the forest to the village. She helped the sick and gave gold coins to the poor. But she had to return to the forest at night.

A man fell in love with the princess and she loved him, but always she returned to the forest at sundown. She warned him never to follow her; others who did were always found asleep at the forest's edge the following morning.

He promised to honor her wishes, but after some time, her lover became curious. He took food to the blackbirds to ask for help. They told him to tie sprigs of mistletoe berries to his ankles and his wrists first. That night he followed her into the forest; as the twilight slipped into darkness, he feared he would lose sight of her, but the gleam of her fair hair, the white dress, and the pearls gave off a soft glow that seemed to increase with the darkness.

As they approached the middle of the forest, the glow became more luminous
and dazzled his eyes—in the center of the brightness she seemed almost to shimmer herself. Then, in a clearing at the edge of lake, she stopped and he heard strange music, a choir of voices, and she began dancing slowly as legions of green snakes and black snakes emerged dancing from the wood. The glow pulsed even brighter and her hair began to glow now with a blinding light. He rubbed his eyes and when he looked again, he realized her hair was a crown of gold, silver, and pearls. On she danced until her very features shimmered, and suddenly he saw the lake's edge as bright as day, where a giant white snake in a lustrous crown swayed gracefully, surrounded by legions of smaller snakes all dancing with her.

Laura paused to see if her guests wanted to hear more; Indigo nodded enthusiastically with Hattie. Edward deferred to them rather than seem rude; it was an interesting folktale, but he was concerned about how little time was left. He lifted his watch from its pocket by the chain; as departure time neared he could feel his blood stir; the palms of his hands were damp; and the scar on his hand itched. They'd never see the other garden if they sat here listening to fairy tales all afternoon!

After her lover confessed his disobedience, the white princess had to go. At the lake's edge they said farewell. She stepped into the water and the swirl of her blond hair on the water's surface became luminous, and then it was a shining crown. At that instant the white snake in her golden crown reared up gracefully out of the water and bowed to him before she disappeared under the water. In her footprints at the water's edge, her lover found coins of pure gold intended for the poor and sick, who became his life's work.

Hattie wanted to ask Laura about the luminous glow in the story—so similar to the glowing light she saw that night in Aunt Bronwyn's garden. She still regretted she had not asked her aunt more about the story of the luminous glow seen in the King's Bath. There must be other, similar stories Laura might know. But Edward was already on his feet and brushing the back of his trousers, clearly anxious to move on to the rain garden.

Along the walls stood treelike aloes on eight-foot stems, some bearded with dead leaves, others towering on scaly stems the diameter of a man's torso, while the tallest plants stood ten feet or more. Dozens of species of aloes—an amazing collection made during the time her husband was in Africa—filled the garden terraces.

African warriors, Hattie thought as she gazed at the spiked leaves and the clusters of tiny red-orange flowers that crowned them. Coarse sand the color of ivory replaced the dark Lucca soil in the terraces, and river-smoothed
pebbles and fist-size stones, pale yellow and gray, were scattered beneath them. But what caught Hattie's eyes were the giant clamshells nestled in the sand and pebbles to form shallow basins here and there at the feet of the giant plants. Here and there were conch shells so large Hattie thought they must be from the coast of Africa.

There were no trees even along the wall; the reflected light off the sand and shells was quite intense; here was a garden designed to be seen by the light of the moon or in the cool mist and overcast of an autumn rain. The scent of the first rain on the dry sandstones and aloes must be wonderful. She wanted an aloe garden for Riverside.

Now a breeze stirred; a cluster of fluffy clouds momentarily shaded the sun. Indigo didn't think this sun felt terribly hot—this sun was nothing like the fiery sun above the river back home. Indigo let Rainbow down from her arm to explore the pebbles and sand while she examined a big spiral seashell with long spines down its back at the edge of the path; when she held it up in both hands its inner layers of blue-violet glowed in the sunlight.

The gateway to the rain garden was guarded by two bare-breasted women of terra-cotta holding large basins in their laps to catch the rain. The small statues faced each other on oversize pedestals that flanked the gate. Laura spoke of the link the Old Europeans made between raindrops and drops of breast milk.

Edward felt his cheeks color at the mention of drops of breast milk. A scientist did not blush, but unaccountably his cheeks felt hot, and he quickly bent over to examine a bright red aloe flower—red was a rare color for aloe flowers; most species were yellow or coral.

The figure on the first niche also surprised Edward: it was a sandstone sculpture of what appeared to be a toad, the size of a bread loaf; but on closer examination he realized it was a fat woman on her belly, legs and arms curled close to the body. Big breasts again!

Edward began to feel uneasy about the other figures here, and considered asking Indigo to wait for them in the black garden right then, but he did not want to make a scene. Laura thought her statues posed no moral harm; perhaps not to an Italian child, but for American children, precautions must be taken.

He glanced around and was relieved this garden was smaller than the other gardens, with only four niches and no pedestals other than the two that held the rain catchers and their basins. Best not to take any chances; he went to whisper to Hattie that for modesty's sake the child should be sent
to wait in the black garden. But he was too late; just then Indigo hurried from the small stone figures in the shaded recess of the terrace wall and took Hattie's hand.

“Look,” she said, pointing at an odd stone figure. “What's this?” Hattie looked up from the leathery speckled leaves of the aloes along the path to the niche.

“What indeed!” Hattie approached for a better look. The strange stone figure had an elongated neck and head, but its large buttocks gave it the appearance of a large phallus. Suddenly Hattie had a stricken expression and quickly stepped back, and Indigo knew at once her guess was correct.

“That's what I thought it was,” Indigo said, as Hattie hurriedly guided her away. Edward took one look and insisted Indigo go wait in the black garden. Indigo looked to Hattie and Laura, but Edward was adamant.

Laura's expression was full of concern as the child with her parrot started up the terrace steps; she invited Edward and Hattie to take their time in the rain garden and join her and the child at the garden shed where she made the gladiolus hybrids.

Indigo was still surprised at the sights white people didn't want children to see. Edward's puffed-up concern about the male organ was so silly she had to laugh out loud as she reached the top of the rain garden steps; from the corner of her eye she saw Edward whisper to Hattie. By themselves among the tall spikes of black flowers, Indigo made up a song: “See you can't see what you see. See you can't see what you see. See, see, see!”

After Laura went ahead with Indigo, Hattie walked with Edward, who took a brisk pace to see the remaining niches, which held artifacts for rain invocations—shallow pottery bowls with painted or incised snakes coiled around the inside, and even more impressive were the pottery snakes sculpted on the shoulders of vases. The bowls were incised with holes that represented raindrops.

In the rain garden's center niche was a remarkable fired terra-cotta of a snake coiled into a ram's horn, incised with raindrops and the meandering zigzag representing flowing water. There were no other objectionable objects as Edward had feared but it was just as well Indigo missed the serpent figures. The child was from a culture of snake worshipers and there was no sense in confusing her with the impression the old Europeans were no better than red Indians or black Africans who prayed to snakes. Hattie agreed; they must help the child adjust to the world she was in now.

At the potting shed, they found Indigo at the table with her notebook; carefully she copied the hand-printed words off the envelopes while Laura
carefully poured gladiolus seed from the waxed paper envelopes. Laura explained how to prepare the florets of the mother plant for pollination; she let Indigo put the paper bonnet over the plant at the end of the procedure. Only two florets could be fertilized each day. Early morning was better than the heat of the day. Avoid damp or wet weather.

Edward was surprised at the varieties of hybrid colors Laura had developed. The
Gladiolus primulinus
grew on slender, flexible stems with pure yellow flowers. Laura's former husband, the army colonel, acquired the rare plants in Africa for her hybrids. Edward thought perhaps hybrid gladiolus might have a future in the southern California climate, where the corms did not have to be taken up each winter.

He found himself a bit irritated at the
professoressa
's attention to the child, especially her generous gifts of packets of seeds and corms from her hybrids, although he could see that she made an identical bundle for him and Hattie. It seemed a bit ludicrous for Laura to pretend the Indian child would ever plant the corms or seeds, much less perform the pollination process for hybrids, even if she did take notes on all the necessary steps. Of course Laura could not be expected to know anything about American Indians.

Edward knew all about the process, but Hattie and Indigo were fascinated by the
professoressa
's descriptions of the hybrid colors she got the first time she crossed the
Gladiolus primulinus
with the species
Gladiolus gladiolus:
she obtained flowers of yellow with a red throat mark, cream yellow, golden yellow with a red-brown splash. She moved on to the dark red and dark rose, at the same time experimenting with blue on light blue and creamy pink with a red spot and a ruffled dark pink with a cream throat. Lavender with purple, tan and brown, brown with a red splash. It was a number of years before she got the black-red and the black-rose flowers and some years of propagating enough corms for the terrace gardens. Currently she was trying to crossbreed the fragrant African species with the European species, but unfortunately the fragrant hybrids did not reproduce themselves.

That evening, newspaper reports of unrest near Rome and points south prompted Laura to insist they remain with her in Lucca at least until the end of the week. But Edward made light of the reports; Corsica could hardly be any more dangerous than southern California, where holdups of coaches and trains still occurred.

Edward fussed with packing long after Hattie was in bed, and it occurred to her he was waiting for her to fall asleep before he came to bed. She
hoped they might take up where they'd left off earlier, but when he got in bed beside her he began to talk about the anniversary of his father's death, which was a few days away. He usually marked that day with a visit to the grave under the orange trees. This year would be the first time he would be away.

Hattie shifted and turned a bit so she was closer to Edward, but he remained motionless as though his voice were coming out of the wall behind the bed. Perhaps the dead forgive the lapses of the living, Hattie suggested softly as she stroked the bedcovers lightly over his chest, but Edward seemed not to hear; he was preoccupied with their departure.

Hattie drifted off to sleep recalling the pictures and statues of the Blessed Virgin Mary standing on a snake. Catechism classes taught Mary was killing the snake, but after seeing the figures in the rain garden, she thought perhaps the Virgin with the snake was based on a figure from earlier times.

That night Indigo dreamed she was back home at the old gardens; but where the sunflowers and corn plants and squash once grew, tall gladiolus bloomed in all colors—red, purple, pink, yellow, orange, white, and black. A delightful fragrance and the hum of the bees filled the canyon. Rainbow flew from flower to flower as if he were a hummingbird, and Linnaeus sat beside her on the sand and picked tiny black seeds from a dried pod. She went to find Mama and Sister Salt at the spring but she found the big rattlesnake instead. “Where's my corn pollen?” Snake asked, and Indigo woke up.