Virginia Hamilton (18 page)

At a quarter past eight Mrs. Douglass walked by Thomas and Levi’s room and Thomas snagged her and woke his brother.

“Hey, Mom,” he called through the door, “what’s fer breakfast? Can ... I have ham … and eggs?”

There was a long silence on the other side of the door. The door opened; Levi jumped down from the top bunk. He stood next to his mom and they both stared at Thomas as though they’d never seen him before. Mr. Douglass came in behind them, having heard Thomas’ loud, unstuttered call.

Thomas kept his face straight for about five seconds; then he burst out laughing.

“It’s true!” he said, grabbing pants to put on. “I came back … with it. I mean, I came back … without it.… I don’t have to … stutter if I speak slowly and … relax myself.” He did not mention the conditions. He hadn’t lied or felt nasty toward anyone and his jaw didn’t lock.

“Somehow they fixed it?” Mr. Douglass said, looking alarmed.

“I think they did,” said Thomas. “Just the way … they gave that dog … Miacis her sight back.”

“Maybe you’d better sit down and tell us everything now,” Mr. Douglass said.

They started talking, thinking Justice was still asleep. Mrs. Douglass prepared ham and eggs. When she noticed the cake was gone, she knew that Justice was not in her room as she had thought all along. But she held off calling the Jeffersons in order to listen to the boys.

Thomas told about everything from the time they discovered Duster to the time they came back through the Crossover. It took him about fifteen minutes and he didn’t stutter once.

“You really are safe,” Mrs. Douglass said. Her eyes shone at them. “You don’t ever have to go back.”

“So it goes on and on over there right while we’re sitting here,” Mr. Douglass said. “It’s funny how I think of it as
over there,
like it was another town.”

“I think of it as beyond,” said Levi.

“So ... do I,” said Thomas.

“I wonder what will happen when the Watcher is fitted in,” said Mrs. Douglass.

Thomas was staring at Levi, for his brother had the oddest expression.

“You know, don’t you, Levi?” He didn’t take his eyes off his brother.

“I know some of it,” Levi said.

“Really!” said his dad. “Well, let’s hear it.”

“I can’t do that,” he said. “I mean, it’s not my way. See, Dad, you really have to ‘see’ the Slaker domity to appreciate it. You have to see the whole process of change. Hear Colossus explain by the displays how the large concentration of machines too close to the outer perimeter of the domity caused the magnetic roller storms and the heating up of the dust in Dustland.”

They waited for him to go on. He was clearly excited, even inspired by it. But he would not go on. “I’ll put it on paper.” He smiled. He felt peaceful.

“Is that what you want to do?” his mom said.

“It’s the only way I can really see it,” he said.

They finished breakfast and Thomas went back to his room. He felt like playing his drums before he got into the shower, and he did play them. Levi stayed with his mom and dad, helping in the kitchen. He told her when it was time to call Justice.

“There’s nothing to worry about. Mrs. Jefferson isn’t going to hurt her or anything,” he told them.

“Even so, I want her right here where I can see her,” Mrs. Douglass said, and picked up the phone.

Thomas played, feeling the rhythms clear to his toes, letting his mind roam free.

Later Levi could hardly contain his excitement. He was filling up with knowledge that Celester—Colossus—had said one of them would have on their return.

I suppose it’s just now all becoming conscious, Levi thought, although it sure feels as if my brain were filling up.

He went to the screened-in porch facing the front yard. It was a good place to sit and work out some things on paper.

Why did they want one of us to know things? he wondered. Maybe because they’re rather lonely, isolated there. I mean, supposing you had an experiment going that included what was left of a once teeming world and you had to protect the experiment at all cost. The domity. Maybe it would feel good just to know someone outside knew. I’m amazed they were actually friendly. Pretty darn open, considering how alone they are. Oh, but that Colossus. How great a system it is! Oh, bless it for making me well again!

His hand trembled slightly as he began drawing a crude sketch of things he was beginning to know. It was the first of many, many sketches. He drew the way the Watcher fitted and the way it looked inside the silver coiling that was Justice’s vision of Colossus, a true vision. The Watcher was a rod of fuzzy, soft-blue light. The light flowed into the coils, illuminating complex dimensions of Colossus. A beautiful, perfectly round diamond crystal larger than a basketball balanced at one end of the Watcher rod of light.

Levi sucked in his breath in stunned surprise. The crystal light pulsated on and off, generating perpetual energy. Levi knew it had been the round, dark ball of Mal before Watcher power had transformed it into Watcher treasure.

With all its parts, Colossus can do anything, Levi thought. Think of it! No more Mal to throw people out. All that live can be placed in domities—but slowly, so as not to upset the balance of things. And only if they want to come. Like Duster, many will stay in the open. So reclaim some of the open, why not?

Colossus had immediate transference through dimensions of time and space. Levi drew and drew. He drew Starters and amazing worlds. He drew Duster and Glass holding close, and a number of their offspring.

Puzzling aspects of future experiences became clear. He understood that because of the Watcher’s power, the unit had passed through the Crossover and arrived beyond the domity of Sona, where it should have phased in. Instead, the unit had entered Dustland.

That’s the reason Celester was so interested in us, he thought. We came from the wrong place!

He grinned in amazement as he realized that Celester had thought they were Starters! Then, with Colossus’ interest, the discovery of the Watcher, the gift, was made.

How did we get our bodies in Dustland when nobody knew we were there?

At once he knew. The machines at the edge of domity, close to Dustland, which had affected the dust, also produced bodies, just as they did in domity.

We were lucky, he thought. Lucky we found Sona. But the Watcher had to find its way. Nothing was chance. Justice had to go to the future, bring the Watcher.

He drew and drew and was satisfied with his beginning. But it would take much longer to put what he knew into words. It would be more difficult. He leaned back, resting. He didn’t have his strength back completely. He tired quickly, but he was well; he knew he was, and growing stronger by the hour. After a few minutes he bent forward again and carefully wrote notes to himself in the margins of his drawings.

It was lovely in the hedgerow this time of day. Full of shade. The smell of moss was pungent green and damp. Low limbs of the trees reached across the row, three feet above the ground, searching for sunlight. Justice sat on the limbs and made them bounce. She walked in the stillness; being in close contact with the osage trees took the heavy weight off her.

Why me? she wondered. Why is power forever mine? Chance, she answered herself. A roll of the dice. Power is my destiny. And my destiny is wherever power leads me.

That’s it, then, she thought, and felt a little more accepting of her fate.

Now she could see her house through the branches. All around her she sensed a presence. It was her own extrasensory she felt unsettling the air near her, and she toned down her thinking.

Once, not too long ago, she had hidden herself in this very same hedgerow from Thomas’ presence searching for her. But that was past, done with, before she had become aware of her own presence. Now what she sensed was only herself.

Accept it, she thought. And she began to walk in tune with her unusual energy.

She continued on home slowly, easily. Her mind felt natural again. She sat down on a limb one last time before going in. Made it bounce with her, up and down, up and down.

Oh, enjoy it. I do love everything! she thought.

She felt coolness seem to rise from within the weeds, deep in the fresh, dark ground. She waited, calm, breathing in the goodness of the day.

Then she went on inside the house. Heard her brother drumming. Found her mom and dad.

Virginia Hamilton (1934–2002) was the author of forty-one books for young readers and their older allies, including
M.C. Higgins, the Great
, which won the National Book Award, the Newbery Medal, and the Boston Globe-Horn Book Award, three of the most prestigious awards in youth literature. Hamilton’s many successful titles earned her numerous other awards, including the international Hans Christian Andersen Award, which honors authors who have made exceptional contributions to children’s literature, the Coretta Scott King Award, and a MacArthur Fellowship, or “Genius Award.”

Virginia Esther Hamilton was born in 1934 outside the college town of Yellow Springs, Ohio. She was the youngest of five children born to Kenneth James and Etta Belle Perry Hamilton. Her grandfather on her mother’s side, a man named Levi Perry, had been brought to the area as an infant probably through the Underground Railroad shortly before the Civil War. Hamilton grew up amid a large extended family in picturesque farmlands and forests. She loved her home and would end up spending much of her adult life in the area.

Hamilton excelled as a student and graduated at the top of her high school class, winning a full scholarship to Antioch College in Yellow Springs. Hamilton transferred to Ohio State University in nearby Columbus, Ohio, in order to study literature and creative writing. In 1958, she moved to New York City in hopes of publishing her fiction. During her early years in New York, she supported herself with jobs as an accountant, a museum receptionist, and even a nightclub singer. She took additional writing courses at the New School for Social Research and continued to meet other writers, including the poet Arnold Adoff, whom she married in 1960. The couple had two children, daughter Leigh in 1963 and son Jaime in 1967. In 1969, the family moved to Yellow Springs and built a new home on the old Perry-Hamilton farm. Here, Virginia and Arnold were able to devote more time to writing books.

Hamilton’s first published novel,
Zeely
, was published in 1967.
Zeely
was an instant success, winning a Nancy Bloch Award and earning recognition as an American Library Association Notable Children’s Book. After returning to Yellow Springs with her young family, Hamilton began to write and publish a book nearly every year. Though most of her writing targeted young adults or children, she experimented in a wide range of styles and genres. Her second book,
The House of Dies Drear
(1968), is a haunting mystery that won the Edgar Allan Poe Award.
The Planet of Junior Brown
(1971) and
Sweet Whispers, Brother Rush
(1982) rely on elements of fantasy and science fiction. Many of her titles focus on the importance of family, including
M.C. Higgins, the Great
(1974) and
Cousins
(1990). Much of Hamilton’s work explores African American history, such as her fictionalized account
Anthony Burns: The Defeat and Triumph of a Fugitive Slave
(1988).

Hamilton passed away in 2002 after a long battle with breast cancer. She is survived by her husband Arnold Adoff and their two children.

For further information, please visit Hamilton’s updated and comprehensive website:
www.virginiahamilton.com