Gardens in the Dunes

Part Seven

THE STEAMSHIP departed in the early evening with the tide; despite the rain, the sea was calm. A day away from the Canary Islands they woke to a bright sunlight and blue sky. The warm temperatures reminded Indigo of the desert; the peaks and troughs of the ocean waves made her think of odd barren mountains and hills of salt water. As they neared land the seagulls floated on the ocean’s surface and caused Indigo to mistake them for big sea flowers. Rainbow squawked and made no mistake of their identity — they’d kill him and eat him if they could, Hattie explained.

The voyage past Gibraltar was calm and quite lovely. Edward remained in the cabin with his hand in a basin of hot salts the cabin boy changed once an hour on doctor’s orders. Hattie and Indigo with her parrot enjoyed the fresh air and sun on walks on the deck. Edward joined them for the evening walk. He continuously squeezed a small latex rubber ball in the injured hand to limber the tendons as Hattie described the schools of flying fish they counted; Indigo had a good head for numbers.

The tedious daily regimen of the hand soaked in steaming water subdued the infection, and the wound was nearly healed. When they were not counting seabirds, Hattie and Indigo practiced spelling the words from the story of the Chinese monkey. Hattie felt relieved to be fulfilling at least a part of the agreement Edward made with the boarding school superintendent — to continue teaching her to read and write.

For geography they accepted the ship captain’s invitation to visit the bridge, where he showed them the maps and charts that guided them toward Gibraltar. On the wall chart of the Mediterranean, Hattie pointed out Italy and the town of Lucca, where they’d visit Aunt Bronwyn’s friend; here was the island of Corsica they were bound for. The captain expressed surprise Americans would risk a visit to such a lawless place (the mountains were full of bandits and revolutionists!), a place with so little to offer the traveler. Hattie stepped back from the chart at once; she regretted the mention of their final destination, but thanked the captain for his concern about their safety. She signaled Indigo to follow her, though they’d only just got there.

Was it her exhaustion that left her so enervated and short-tempered? She fully intended to discuss dangers in the hills of Corsica with Edward after they reached Lucca and she had time to rest.

Indigo’s spelling list for the week included words like “wicked,” “hundred,” “scriptures,” and “scoundrel” because the Chinese monkey was in a lot of trouble. She enjoyed the assignment to use each of the spelling words at lease once in a sentence she made up herself. Hattie was surprised at the sentence in which a policeman was called a “scoundrel” by the Messiah.

Edward locked the cabin doors at night because he feared Hattie might sleepwalk, but she slept soundly every night except the last night before they reached Genoa. That night she dreamed she was awakened in her berth by a soft glow in the corner of the cabin, a glow that seemed to spread even as she watched it. She recognized the glow as the light she saw in Aunt Bronwyn’s garden, and when she sat up in her berth she was shocked to see Edward’s empty berth.

Where could he be? As she leaned over to get a better look at the little antechamber where Indigo slept, she caught a glimpse of him that set her heart pounding. He was standing by the small writing desk in the dark with a bundle in both hands. She was shaking so badly she had difficulty finding her voice. She did not want to wake the child or disturb the other passengers, so she whispered his name loudly; but the figure in the shadow did not respond. Surely Edward did not sleepwalk! She watched transfixed by the luminous glow that emanated near the figure. Suddenly the radiance increased now as bright as a gas lamp and she saw it was the tin mask from the sacred spring.

She tried to call out to Edward but she could not seem to get the words out. The mask began to advance with the light through the darkness until suddenly it covered the face of the figure in shadow. “Edward!” she called out, and woke herself and Edward. She assured him it was nothing, a nightmare, and he turned in the upper berth to go back to sleep.

Hattie listened to the sounds of Edward’s breathing and the beat of her heart, and concentrated on slowing her heartbeat to match the rhythm of his breathing. Certain thoughts sent her heart racing and had to be locked out; all the old feelings swept over her if she permitted herself any thought of her thesis. Somehow the news of the authentication of Dr. Rhinehart’s old scrolls only made her feel worse about her rejection by the graduate school.

She concentrated her thoughts instead on the gardens of the Riverside house, aging and neglected, in need of a great deal of attention. She looked forward to the Italian gardens for ideas for plants and shrubs suited to the dry hot climate of Riverside. As she drifted off to sleep, she imagined a pink garden entirely of roses and bougainvillea set off with the rich jade greens of aloes and agaves and large cacti.

Just before dawn, Hattie awoke with a pounding headache and rising nausea; in her haste to the lavatory, she bumped into a chair. The startled parrot flew against the side of the cage and woke Edward and Indigo.

She had never seen Hattie’s face so white — poor woman! What was wrong? Indigo dampened a washcloth to wipe her face, then helped her walk back to her berth, while Edward rang for a steward, then rushed off to find a doctor.

Hot pulses of pain expanded behind her eyes until they filled with tears and even her nose dripped. She felt hot, then suddenly she shivered. If she opened her eyes, the room spun so fast she felt she had to grip the sides of the berth to keep from falling. Only the coolness of the damp cloth Indigo placed on her forehead gave any comfort.

Edward returned alone, anxiously rubbing the bandage on his injured finger. Through the pounding pain in her temples Hattie had difficulty understanding Edward. He said something about the ship’s doctor with a woman in childbirth, but not to worry. He’d met a good Austrian doctor the night before in the casino; his new acquaintance would be there at once.

Indigo retreated to her bed in the alcove to play with Rainbow, though she listened closely in case Hattie needed her again. She heard Hattie moan; Indigo wished she had Grandma Fleet’s little clay pipe and the crushed blossoms of the healing plants they smoked for nausea or headache. When she or Sister Salt got sick, Grandma Fleet used to recommend someone sit in the darkened room to sing softly or tell stories to the patient, but Hattie behaved as if she wanted to be left alone.

The drumming pain in her head did not permit sleep, but Hattie did not feel entirely awake either; part of her brain whispered the word “delirium.” Her thoughts raced out of her control. Over and over she saw the print of the newspaper page, but greatly enlarged — it was the London Times article about the authentication of the Coptic scrolls. Giant typeset words were printed in oily black ink on odd paper the texture of the old scrolls themselves. Instead of elation over the news, she felt a lingering sense of futility and loss. She had been right all along, but now it didn’t matter.

She did not know how much time passed, but it seemed hours before she heard a knock and Indigo call out, as they taught her, before she opened the cabin door to the doctor. For an instant the pounding in her head made it difficult to understand the doctor’s words; she strained to make out the English he spoke until suddenly she realized the doctor was Australian, not Austrian; she could scarcely understand his Australian accent. He introduced himself as Dr. Gates.

While the Australian doctor felt her pulse by gently placing his hands to her temples, he spoke in a soothing tone about the card games he and Edward enjoyed in the evening after she and the child were in bed.

He prescribed belladonna as needed for the pain and nausea; the bitter white syrup turned to heat in her mouth and throat and spread over her entire body like a gust of hot wind. All the while the doctor kept talking in his ridiculous Australian dialect she hardly understood; as she drifted further into the warm, warm sea of her own blood, his odd vocabulary mattered not at all. The pounding pain that enclosed her face and head like a mask receded, and Hattie was able to sleep.

The Australian doctor returned later to massage the veins in the back of her neck; his hands worked their way down and around to the insides of both her arms until suddenly she felt alarmed at his attention. She called Indigo from her game with the parrot in the alcove, and the doctor left off the massage.

Later she told Edward the Australian doctor made her feel uneasy; she feared he might be an imposter or one who touched women with license. But Edward laughed out loud at such a suggestion. He was confident Dr. Gates was no imposter because they had talked a good deal over late night toddies about their professional training. They talked about a great many things, including citrus horticulture, especially the effects of temperature and climate, and Edward was quite satisfied Dr. Gates was reliable. Undoubtedly she was suffering the combined effects of the migraine headache and the belladonna, Edward assured her.

At this Hattie felt a spark of anger at Edward because he had only a modest appetite for female anatomy, and he did not seem to realize other men were not so chaste or honorable. The Australian doctor’s fumbling with her bed clothes alarmed her because it recalled Mr. Hyslop’s fumbling attack on her breasts.

Dr. Gates came again while Edward was out with the child at breakfast. He entered the cabin without knocking and set off the parrot; for once she was grateful for the bird’s loud screeches. The deafening noise unnerved the doctor as he approached Hattie. He might have remained in the cabin alone with her longer but the parrot’s incessant noise cut short the doctor’s call, and Hattie was spared the ordeal of his groping hands.

After Hattie’s recovery, Edward continued to spend a good deal of time in the company of Dr. Gates, who was knowledgeable about a great many fascinating subjects. They discussed Edward’s citron scheme and the hot dry Riverside climate so similar to the deserts of Australia; oranges grown in the hot dry climes boasted the highest sugar content. The doctor’s face became animated as he contemplated the possibility of irrigated citrus groves in the outback. If he was able to procure suitable cuttings of the citron from Edward, then he was sure of success.

The doctor was about to develop a mine to obtain iron ore and cadmium from a meteor crater in northern Arizona. Perhaps they might come to an agreement for an exchange of live citron cuttings for shares of mining stock as well as premium meteorite specimens, which he could sell for a handsome price.

Edward was delighted at the opportunity to obtain meteorite specimens in large quantity because there was a growing interest in the objects by private collectors, and universities as well. The memory of the odd enclosure full of meteor irons near the market at Tampico returned to him again and again, and he regretted he had not persevered with the hideous blue-face woman; he might have had the lot of them — all quite different from one another, apparently from different locations. The increased interest in meteorites by collectors and researchers signaled a rise in the prices paid for specimens. The trade in meteorites had so many advantages over plants, which must be handled with great care or they were lost.

Edward and Dr. Gates made a tentative agreement to become partners once the citron was secured and they returned to the United States. The doctor generously lent Edward a catalogue of the meteorites in North America published a few years before by the American Academy of Science; it was the same reference the doctor used to locate his most exciting acquisition to date: the two-mile-wide meteor crater in northern Arizona. Edward packed the book for safekeeping until he had the leisure to read it on the return voyage. For now he immersed himself in books about methods of pruning and grafting citrus stock.

The ship docked in Genoa at half past eight in the morning and already Edward could feel a dramatic increase in the temperature, although the air was not as dry as he expected.

Genoa was a port and industrial city similar to Bristol in its congested streets and sweltering bad air, although its dust and soot could not conceal the bright sun or deep blue sky beyond the smoke.

Their arrival was overshadowed by the news of the assassination of the Italian king only three days before, in Milan, by anarchists, to avenge the executions of their comrades. Victor Emmanuel III took the throne, but there were rumors of clashes between dissidents and police.

Genoa appeared calm — no soldiers or barricades in the streets, at least not on the waterfront. While they waited on the pier for Edward to fetch a cab, Hattie and Indigo gazed at the piles of cargo, the pallets of polished granite and marble slabs in all colors, carefully crated for export. Indigo pointed them out to the parrot — a rainbow of colors just like you! she told him. On the pier, bundles of hardwood logs sat next to big clusters of bananas. Suddenly, over the noise of the passengers and street traffic, Indigo heard the unmistakable screeches of parrots from behind a pile of cargo on the pier. Instantly Rainbow gave a deafening screech in reply that left Indigo’s ears ringing. As a freight wagon pulled away from the pier, Indigo saw a large iron cage filled with parrots of all colors and sizes. The cries of his own kind were more than Rainbow could endure; he called back and flapped his wings frantically. As the wagon with the parrots passed, they saw sick and dying birds on the bottom of the cage. Indigo watched wide eyed, but the sight was too much for Hattie, who was overcome with nausea just as Edward returned with the cab.

Once Hattie was seated in the cab, out of the bright sun, the nausea subsided and she began to recover; the excitement of the new surroundings diminished her discomfort.

As the cab ascended the street into the hills, ruins of the old walls could be seen. As they passed the Piazza de Ferrari and the duke’s palace, Indigo pointed out the window and called out, “Look!” at the black-and-white striped facade of the cathedral. The stripes reminded Indigo of those unmistakable black-and-white stripes of the rattlesnake’s tail. To cheer up Rainbow after the upsetting encounter with the cage of new captives, Indigo lifted the travel cage closer to the window so he could see the stripes.

Hattie listened to the child play with the bird and realized Indigo believed the parrot understood everything she said. Indigo told the parrot they were much farther east now, near the villages where Christ’s Mother had been seen from time to time. Aunt Bronwyn told her about the frequent appearances in Italy, Spain, and France. The Messiah sent his Mother because the soldiers did not try to kill her, Indigo told the parrot.

Hattie and Edward discussed the problem the night before and determined the best course to take with Indigo’s exaggerations and fantasies about Jesus was to ignore them. Poor child, such harsh experiences and losses at an early age were bound to leave deep scars! Aunt Bronwyn and Indigo got along so beautifully Hattie didn’t interfere, although Edward and she were concerned all that talk about stones dancing and spirits living in stones misled the child. Hattie saw no real harm in the quaintly inaccurate version of Jesus Indigo learned from other Indians.

Hattie took a deep breath and exhaled slowly; then she remarked about the amazing Mediterranean light — the moist atmosphere filtered the light so it was luminous but not burning, as the sun’s rays were in Riverside. Hattie felt so much better now that they were on land again. The vibrant colors of the buildings delighted Hattie and Indigo, who made a game of the colors: umber, sienna, ocher, eggshell, sage, tea, mint — they made up names for the amazing new colors they saw. They saw gardens of every sort, even wild gardens of calla lilies and overgrown grapevines in vacant lots along the streets. Hattie was pleased they planned to visit the wonderful gardens of Aunt Bronwyn’s friend in Lucca before they boarded the boat for Bastia.

While Hattie and Indigo bathed and rested, Edward took a cab to the U.S. consulate for any messages or mail. Ordinarily the walk to the consulate would have been just the tonic he needed, but the old injury to his leg began to ache, though, oddly enough, the leg was not swollen or discolored.

He found a letter from his lawyer in Riverside, and two cablegrams. He tried to appear calm as he tucked the envelopes into his breast pocket and made small talk with the deputy consul about the hot weather. Edward commented that Riverside got much hotter, but it was dry desert heat. He regretted his idle comment, as the deputy consul seemed to welcome the opportunity to ask questions.

Edward smiled. He and his wife and her maid were on a tour of the Mediterranean area for his wife’s health; he thanked the consul again and turned to go before the man asked their destination. The deputy consul clearly relished an opportunity to talk with another American and continued the conversation all the way to the front door. Due to civil unrest since the assassination, U.S. citizens were advised to avoid travel outside of Rome, and certainly not to the south.

Edward felt he must stop and listen politely or his haste might be noticed, and suspicions aroused. The deputy consul remarked the assassinated king was scarcely cold in his grave before political tensions began to rise. Of course, they were quite safe in Genoa; Genoa was an international port of great mercantile importance that all parties to the dispute sought to protect. It almost sounded as if the deputy hoped they’d stay on in Genoa so he’d have Americans to talk to. At the door, Edward shook the deputy consul’s hand and assured him they had no intention of visiting the south.

He did not take the cablegrams from his pocket until he was a distance down the street from the U.S. consulate. He had an unsettling suspicion prying eyes at the consulate knew the contents of the cables. The heat on the sidewalk was crushing; the flimsy paper of the envelope stuck to the moisture of his fingers and left dark smudges. He found a bit of shade around a corner and stopped to rest his sore leg; there were no cabs in sight.

He wiped his hands and then his brow on his handkerchief before he opened the first cablegram, sent two days before the other. It was an odd message from Mr. Grabb, at the law firm that represented Lowe & Company: “Agriculture secretary refuses authorization. Do not proceed. Return at once. Company not liable for expenses after August 18.”

The second cablegram was also from Mr. Grabb; it urged him to contact Lowe & Company at once concerning a trek to the Himalayas to collect specimens of Asiatic lilies. Edward felt light-headed from the heat and the sore leg, and he feared he might not find a cab back to the hotel before he got sick.

Indigo fanned herself and the parrot with a fan of woven palm fiber she found in the room; the two of them played Keep Away with the fan on the floor of the suite, while Hattie wrote a note to Aunt Bronwyn’s friend, the professoressa in Lucca. Hattie realized she would prefer to stop in Lucca and let Edward go without her and the child — the English-language newspaper cited instances of suspected unrest. Her skin felt flushed and moist; her underclothing clung in the most annoying way; she was tired of traveling.

On the floor the child and the parrot were becoming more animated; Rainbow picked up the fan by its handle in his beak and flapped his wings before Indigo heard a loud crunch: Rainbow crushed the fan’s bamboo handle with his beak, and now he took half-moon bites out of the edge of the fan, leaving broken fibers he plucked out one by one. Indigo laughed so hard she dropped from her knees facedown on the rug. Hattie’s annoyance only made Indigo laugh harder because the parrot was able to anger human beings so easily.

Indigo ignored Hattie and invited Rainbow to ride on her shoulder to the maid’s alcove, where she already arranged the bedding on the floor the way she and Rainbow liked it at night. She whispered to Rainbow something was bothering Hattie but not to let that upset him because she was there to take care of him. She shut the door so their new game did not disturb Hattie. The fat feather pillows and bedding made a perfect soft landing for Indigo as she practiced flying off the end of the bed with Rainbow on her shoulder flapping his wings, making gusts of air behind them. She told him about all the crows in the bare branches of the trees along the river, the winter the Messiah came. The Messiah especially loved birds, Indigo told Rainbow. Maybe it was because he and his family and followers flew like birds to travel great distances — even across oceans.

Edward’s appearance alarmed Hattie; he was pale and complained of soreness in his leg, and the heat had left him queasy. He was about to go lie down when he remembered the letter in his pocket from their Riverside lawyer. Mr. Yetwin reported land values were rising rapidly now that the dam and the aqueduct from the Colorado River were under construction. Edward began to feel better as he read this; a new source of abundant cheap water would assure the success of his new citron groves even in dry years when the wells were undependable. But almost immediately the cablegrams came to mind and again Edward felt too warm and nauseous. He gave Hattie the letter and went to lie down.

Hattie skipped over the paragraphs about real estate prices and other business, to learn how Linnaeus and his cat were faring. Mr. Yetwin reported all was well with the house and gardens, though the cook complained the maid spent too much time playing with the monkey and the kitten. Indigo stopped her game to listen.

While he waited for the pills to take effect, Edward listened to Hattie and the child in the sitting room as they chattered excitedly about Linnaeus and the kitten. He did not wish to spoil their fun, so he did not mention it, but cats were known to harbor diseases dangerous to humans, and probably monkeys too. He was grateful to his new friend, Dr. Gates, for the extra supply of morphine pills he gave them in case Hattie suffered another headache or the pain in the leg flared up. Doctors and pharmacies were few and far between on Corsica.

He swallowed each pill with a generous amount of water, and experienced only a little nausea before a luminous glow rose inside him and all pain in the leg subsided. He lay back on his pillow and basked in the bliss; all anxious sensations in his stomach subsided, and his heartbeat and pulse steadied themselves. He heard footsteps and slipped the bottle of morphine tablets from the nightstand into the pocket of his robe; he did not want to worry Hattie.

But the footsteps passed by and no one came. He tried to keep his thoughts focused on the good news in the letter — abundant cheap water. He visualized the aqueduct snaking through the dry gravel flats and greasewood, and the glitter of the moving water in the sun. He had to keep his thoughts restricted to the water in the aqueduct; otherwise the unsettling message of the cablegram intruded and turned his stomach: Return at once. Do not proceed. Authorization canceled.

Though he could not sleep, still Edward experienced odd dreamlike reveries from the morphine. He followed his father through the groves of oranges and lemons in clouds of heavenly scents as his father plucked handfuls of blossoms into the tin pail he carried. Edward had been only nine years old but he remembered vividly how his father gathered pail after pail of waxy sweet blossoms and carried them upstairs to carefully spread them over the bed in his mother’s room.

Edward remembered that summer vividly because his father set up a separate laboratory for perfumery in one end of the library, where he sat for hours, sipping brandy as he pressed whole dried cloves into dainty Persian oranges to make spicy pomanders that might help capitalize his perfume venture after Edward’s mother refused to fund it further. She did not mind paying his gambling debts because she herself was quite successful at gambling. However, the experiments with citrus perfume were pointless, a waste of money.

Before they parted in Genoa, Dr. Gates prescribed laudanum drops in ginger tea for Hattie. The laudanum permitted her to sleep soundly; after her sleepwalking experience with the odd glowing light and loud knock, she often woke with her heart pounding in the middle of the night. She was reluctant to confide in Edward because it was his nature to demand a rational explanation; he’d call the light she saw in Aunt Bronwyn’s garden a hallucination, and the loud knocking noise hysteria. She feared there were no other rational explanations.

She tried to listen to the tiny voice she called conscience, but strangely she could hear nothing; she did not think she was experiencing a nervous collapse like the first one — she remembered that feeling. No, this time she felt quite different: not unpleasant, but she was concerned because she could not think or reason her way to any certainty about that night in the garden. What presence had she sensed? What presence had occupied her nightmare about the tin mask and Edward?

They were up at dawn for breakfast before the cab to the train station. From Genoa the train took them to Lucca, where Aunt Bronwyn’s dear friend the professoressa met them at the station and graciously invited them to stay with her. Aunt Bronwyn met the professoressa at a museum in Trieste, where their mutual interests in Old European artifacts and gardening persuaded them to travel together for the duration of Aunt Bronwyn’s time on the continent. Of course, they had only five days before they must leave for Livorno and the voyage to Corsica; but Edward agreed the rest would do them good, and Aunt Bronwyn urged them not to miss the professoressa’s gardens.

Hattie was surprised to discover a woman much younger than her aunt when the professoressa presented herself at the train station in Lucca. Hattie worried Edward might be reluctant, but he graciously accepted her invitation to visit her home in the hills overlooking the town. Hattie was eager to see the gardens the professoressa designed to celebrate her love of Old European artifacts. This would be their only opportunity to stop; once Edward obtained the citrus cuttings from Corsica, they must depart at once for the United States to ensure the survival of as many of the twig cuttings as possible.

Although Edward was anxious to reach Bastia, the stopover in Lucca would give them all a much-needed rest. He was not much interested in the crude stone and pottery figures of the Old European cultures, which he found quite ugly; however, he was interested in the old gardens of the villa. He was curious to see if any of the oldest varieties of Persian roses might be found in an out-of-the-way corner of a terrace or in the family cemetery. Of course he was always on the lookout for old pots of citrus trees on the chance he might see a specimen of the Citrus medica in Tuscany, though the mountainous regions of coastal Corsica suited C. medica best. Edward smiled. Riverside’s climate was ideal for citrus growing, as was the climate of northern Australia where Dr. Gates was from. One day their sweet oranges would outsell all others, and the doctor would produce candied citron for export to Asian markets. Before Dr. Gates parted from them in Genoa, he and Edward arranged to keep in touch to plan a visit in the winter to the site of the meteorite mine in Arizona.

The carriage ride from the station in Lucca to the old villa high in the hills required more than an hour, which passed quite pleasantly for the adults, who discussed archaeological excavations and the citrus known as bergamot, used to make orange water and other perfumes; but Indigo felt ill from the lurching vehicle on the narrow winding road, and she and Rainbow were greatly relieved when the coach stopped outside the golden yellow walls of the old villa.

As the professoressa said, the heat made the walled city unbearable in early August, but here in the hills they were cooled by the steady stream of cool air off the mountains. Though the professoressa was disappointed to learn their visit must be brief due to Edward’s business in Corsica, still there was ample time to show them the restoration of the gardens with her collection of Old European artifacts.

Their rooms had high ceilings richly adorned with frescoes of birds and flowers in lovely delicate colors. Indigo lay on the bed at once to study the painted figures of fluttering gray doves in blue clouds above cascades of white and pale pink roses. The windows were open wide to catch the cool breezes, and the professoressa’s housekeeper showed Indigo how to tug, tug, tug on the long cords to lower or raise the window cover to keep out insects or the sunlight.

Indigo opened Rainbow’s travel cage and he climbed out to the cage top and flapped his wings. She scratched the top of his head and he ruffled his feathers with pleasure. She looked out the window at the driveway gently ascending the meadow edged with groves of great trees. If this were her place, she would have herds of cattle and sheep graze there.

She opened her valise and took out the green silk notebook with the names of the medicinal plants written in English and in Latin. She took the little pencil that belonged with the notebook and practiced copying the Latin names and the English names on a blank page: monkshood, wolfs-bane, aconite, Aconitum napellus. Aunt Bronwyn had pointed out how the topmost petal on the dark purplish blue flower spike was shaped just like a helmet or a monk’s hood. Indigo drew the long stem of petals, but she had difficulty drawing the top petal so it did not look too large in proportion to the other petals. Below the picture she copied its medicinal uses from Aunt Bronwyn’s list: anodyne, febrifuge, and diuretic. Hattie added these words to her spelling list, so Indigo wrote their definitions right beside them. “Anodyne” is Greek for “no pain”; “febrifuge” she remembered as “refuge from fever.” Hattie told her the English word “febrile” came from the Latin febris, for “fever”; “diuretic” was from the Greek for “urine.” Indigo studied the pencil lines of her sketch before she carefully erased the monkshood petal that was too large, and tried again.

Hattie and Edward’s room was down the hall. Indigo was amazed to see the big bed with a roof and side curtains on a raised platform. The curtains kept out the cold draughts in the winter, Hattie explained. With a roof like that, one could sleep outdoors in that bed. They laughed together, and Edward joined in. He was seated comfortably in the plump armchair with his shirtsleeve rolled up, soaking his injured hand in a basin of warm water.

The professoressa’s house was full of good spirits; Indigo felt them at once. She could tell Laura was kind because her eyes did not shift away when she saw Indigo with the birdcage. Rainbow relaxed his grip and Indigo lifted him off her shoulder and set him gently on her lap, petting his head constantly until he allowed her to cradle him in her arms on his back like a baby. She watched his pale yellow eyes watch her anxiously as his body remained poised to spring away from trouble. She loved how he made her smile even when she was sad. She missed Sister and Mama; were they together now? Hattie was very kind to her but she missed her sister and mother so much.

Hattie opened the French doors to the balcony to show Indigo the Moorish fountain and garden below, enclosing the back of the villa entirely. In the afternoon light, the surfaces of the blue tile on the fountain and pool were instantly transformed. Indigo was amazed and called out her delight with the intense blue. Bright red bougainvillea crisscrossed the blue tiles of the garden wall. Could they go downstairs and walk through it? Oh wonderful!

Indigo leaned into the mist from the fountain and asked Rainbow how it felt; the parrot fluffed his feathers and opened his beak to catch the mist. The long narrow pool of blue tiles was too shallow for fish. Indigo was disappointed and a bit indignant; what were pools for if not goldfish? Hattie explained: In this instance, the pool’s purpose was refreshment and beauty for the benefit of people. Fish left the water smelly. Indigo frowned. She enjoyed the fishponds in Oyster Bay a great deal.

The terra-cotta pots of lemon trees around the pool’s edge perfumed the air. Indigo was delighted to see green and yellow lemons, and Laura invited her to pick lemons for the custard tomorrow. Great spiked agaves and great python-size cactus were separated from the Joshua trees and big yuccas by the smaller yuccas and aloes of all sorts including a yellow aloe and orange aloe and a red-flowered aloe Hattie had not seen before.

Edward’s attention was on dozens of potted lemon trees around the pool. He hoped he might see the thick scaly rind indicative of Citrus medica, though at a glance they all appeared to be lemons. The professoressa pointed out the old Persian rose he wanted to see; its root base was thick as a small tree but the branches were carefully pruned and small but fragrant red roses bloomed in profusion. Indigo called in a hushed voice for Hattie to see the hummingbird in the big red hibiscus blossom overhanging the pool. Tomorrow they would see the other old gardens in the woods below.

When Indigo was in her room again she took out the notebook and pencil and tried to draw the hummingbird in the big flower. Rainbow shelled sunflower seeds from his perch atop his cage. Indigo already explained to him what Hattie said: they were guests here, and although Aunt Bronwyn welcomed a parrot and told stories about dogs at the dinner table, it would not be polite to bring Rainbow to Laura’s table. When Hattie called her to dinner, Indigo put her face gently against the parrot and whispered for him to wait; she wouldn’t be gone for long.

That evening a wonderful display greeted them as they entered the dining room: a flock of white porcelain swans floated and preened amid white calla lilies and fragrant blue water lilies in the center of the dining table. Each place setting was guarded with smaller swan figures in vigilant postures on silvery white linen. Indigo loved the way her napkin was folded and tied with blue satin ribbon; she had not seen so many glasses and forks and spoons on a table before. She slipped the piece of ribbon into her pocket to give to Rainbow, while Hattie expressed her delight with the swans and Edward asked their age.

The dressing of the table must have required as much time as the preparation of the courses of vegetables and pasta. The professoressa was happy to hear about their visit to the excavations in Bath. She began her studies with Roman antiquities, but the earlier cultures won her over. Hattie described the tin mask, pre-Roman, crude, but quite powerful, which interested the professoressa a great deal because a number of pieces in her collection were figures in masks. Edward preferred to examine the exquisite old glass and porcelain of the place settings, especially the tiny gold cups atop carved marble faces. The professoressa and Hattie carried on a lively conversation about masks and terra-cotta figures of goddesses that were half snake or half bird. How clever the Italians were! Edward thought; if one happened to be bored with the topic of conversation, as he was, one had only to turn one’s attention to the table settings and the centerpiece and decorations for amusement.

After dinner Indigo brought out her color pencils and drawings; Laura asked Indigo if she might look, and Indigo shyly handed her the notebook. Laura nodded and smiled as she looked at Indigo’s drawings and notes on medicinal plants. She got up from her chair, the notebook still in her hand, and opened a drawer in the tall mahogany cabinet. Out came a flat wooden box with a brightly colored label on its top; Laura lifted the lid, and there Indigo saw dozens of pencils in all colors. Would she accept this gift? Indigo looked at Hattie hopefully, and Hattie nodded. Indigo was delighted; now she could draw the flowers with the right colors and make the hummingbird’s feathers purple and green. Laura reached deep into her dress pocket and brought out a small brass pencil sharpener. Edward looked at his watch and told Indigo it was time for bed — she could look over the pencils before the light was put out.

One of the pencils was the color of the dune sand at the old gardens — so pale that the first strokes on the white paper of the notebook were difficult to see. She made a low dune, the dune they called the Dog because it reminded Grandma Fleet of a sleeping dog. Runoff from above accumulated there when the big rains came, and the big sunflowers and biggest datura thrived there with the devil’s claws they used for decorating baskets. She drew the yellow flowers of the silvery blue brittlebushes after a rainstorm in late autumn, when the datura still bloomed but the sunflower petals dried to seeds.

As she washed her face and brushed her teeth, Indigo studied her dark face in the oval mirror of the washstand and laughed at herself because she realized she was forgetting how dark she was because all around her she saw only lighter faces. Grandma Fleet would really laugh and Sister Salt probably would pinch her and tease her for becoming a white girl, not a Sand Lizard girl. She didn’t care. Wait until they saw all the seeds she gathered and the notebook she brought back with the names and instructions and color sketches too.

Later, when they were alone in their room, Hattie remarked at the rapport she felt with the professoressa—she asked them please to call her Laura; she was only a bit older than Edward. She was such an interesting woman — not only a scholar and collector of Old European artifacts, she also hybridized gladiolus. Edward looked up from his newspaper; he would like to see the gladiolus hybrids — they were more interesting than crude artifacts from the fifth millennium.

The calls of three fat crows outside the window woke Indigo the next morning. Rainbow cocked his head to one side to get a better look at them in the top of the big linden tree in the garden. The Messiah and the others might have passed this way not too long before, though one could not be certain. She looked down into the garden at the rushing water of the fountain and all the shrubs for shade; probably the crows lived here.

Indigo did not think Laura would mind if she and her parrot walked about the house or went into the garden, but Hattie did not want Indigo to go alone; so she waited by the window with Rainbow in the room until she heard their voices from their room down the hall.

After breakfast Laura excused herself to find the rubber garden shoes for them; the garden restoration left a good deal of clayish mud that stuck to ordinary shoes. What a wonderful story Laura told as they changed to their garden shoes, about the first time she visited the abandoned villa among the great trees. Foreigners, relations of Napoleon’s sister, owned the property for more than a century, and the local people stayed away. Rumors told of monsters and strange sounds and lights coming from the old woods. The foreigners and their guests came every summer, then suddenly they came no more.

Later, Laura’s family received the property in the settlement of an old debt. The house was abandoned, and the gardens were in ruins by then; the bougainvilleas and red climbing roses had gone wild; the great mounds of yellow day lilies overgrew their parterres and spread into the lawn. The grottoes and formal gardens had been stripped of their marble figures and the terraces stripped of marble balustrades and marble vases.

The first time Laura and her brother came there, they had no idea what lay beyond, in the dense foliage in the dark woods. They ventured down the path to see where the water went. It wasn’t until they stopped at the first grotto and looked back that she caught a glimpse of something in the deep undergrowth, where an eroded embankment had collapsed to reveal the head and forelegs of a stone centaur. They found a minotaur spying from the shrubbery in the same area, and when a careful survey was made after the first discoveries, a Medusa head was discovered at the foot of an embankment. Hattie and Edward murmured appreciatively, but Edward was disappointed to learn the statues were only late eighteenth century; still, the pieces were quite fascinating. Only recently, after a fierce storm toppled a great many old trees in the sacro bosco, workmen discovered a stone grotto behind a wild thicket, tangled with fallen trees and debris from old landslides.

From the fountain and enclosed garden, four stone steps descended to the lawn of the formal garden, shaded by great trees. The morning light played through the canopy of leaves and Indigo saw more colors of green than she ever imagined — river green, mossy green, willow green, oak leaf green, juniper green, green-golden-green, and shades of grass green all around. She twirled herself around in the delicious green shade as the parrot squawked joyously; around and around she danced, as happy as she had been since she and Sister were parted.

The cries of the parrot attracted the blackbirds they’d seen the evening before. Hattie remarked on the size of the flock; in Bath she remembered only the two or three blackbirds in her aunt’s garden. Oh, this area was always known for its population of blackbirds; these hills were thick with hazels and oaks; the local people used to call the run-down old villa the blackbird palace even after she and her husband completed repairs and moved in.

How interesting, Hattie thought; her aunt hadn’t mentioned a husband. Was her husband abroad now? Almost as soon as she spoke, Hattie sensed something was wrong. Laura stopped on the path and smiled. She apologized for any confusion: she and her husband were no longer together. Hattie was so surprised at this remark she stammered inanely that she was sorry. Oh, there was nothing to apologize for; all was for the best.

Quickly Hattie turned her attention to the empty stone pedestals and empty niches in the graceful garden walls as Laura explained her reluctance to replace the missing figures with copies; new marble was too bright and would spoil the serenity of the greenery and its subtle shifts of light. When her husband’s military command was ordered to Eritrea, she hoped he might obtain interesting stone figures on his visits to Cairo. Hattie glanced about but saw no stone figures; the lichens and tiny ferns and mosses had taken hold on the niches and pedestals where they found just the shade and the sun to thrive. Their eyes met for an instant and Hattie realized the plan to obtain old stone figures from Cairo had gone astray with the husband.

Laura paused to watch Indigo and the parrot on the lawn as they played tag; the parrot waddled after the girl with his wings outstretched and flapping for speed; then the girl chased the parrot as he fled with squawks and ruffled feathers. Shaded by the great lindens and oaks, they played and played; from time to time the parrot flapped his wings fast enough to lift himself so that for a few seconds Indigo scarcely felt him on her shoulder except where he held fast with his feet.

What a sweet child — they were fortunate to have adopted her, Laura commented as they paused in the shade. Hattie felt her cheeks redden and she tried to choose her words carefully. Oh no, they were not so lucky as that. The child was only placed with them for the summer. Hattie could not stop herself — she felt she must explain how the school personnel mistreated the child, that as soon as they returned to the United States they would go to Arizona to search for Indigo’s family.

Edward turned back on the path to rejoin them, although the path continued through another stone archway. He wasn’t interested in any more old gardens stripped of their ornaments; he preferred to see the hybrid gladiolus; even the crude artifacts of the old Europeans would be more interesting.

Laura glanced up at the sun to judge the time; she had more to show them before lunch. A stream diverted from the hills behind the house fed a stone-paved rill that emptied into a long narrow pool of dwarf papyrus and yellow lotus flowers. The water flowed from the end of the pool into another stone rill that followed the driveway to the edge of the woods; here the waterway abruptly disappeared into heavy foliage.

Two weathered stone pillars dappled with lichens were visible in the lush foliage that marked the entrance to the old woods where the stone figures were found. Laura led the way down the overgrown path. Indigo followed with the parrot on her shoulder, and Hattie and Edward came along behind. As they went deeper into the woods, the parrot settled quietly on Indigo’s shoulder, alert for danger.

The path was overgrown with laurel and myrtle but the coolness and the shade were inviting, and Indigo found a variety of lovely ferns and mosses growing between the stones of the path that gradually descended as it went deeper into the dark green pines and cedars with their bowers of box elders, chestnuts, and great oaks. Rainbow clutched her shoulder tighter and leaned forward, flapping his wings, his feathers ruffled with excitement as he looked at the forest all around them. They played a game — Indigo walked slower and slower, which caused Rainbow to lean forward, eager to go faster, and he flapped his wings harder as if to make Indigo speed up. Then Indigo pretended the breeze from his wings was pushing her along with magical power to make her fly. As she walked faster and faster, Rainbow squawked with delight, and as they raced past Laura on the path, Indigo laughed out loud.

Now and then Hattie recognized azaleas and rhododendrons among the overgrown holly and brambles; otherwise Hattie would have believed they were in a primordial forest. The others walked ahead, but Hattie was content to take her time to appreciate what became of even the most elegant gardens over time. She stopped to appreciate the natural effect accomplished with the lindens and elms with the plane trees of a lighter green; as she turned, she was startled to see a creature gazing at her through the twisted branches of a holly tree.

The life-size stone face and bare chest were human, but legs and body were those of a horse. In the foliage so close to the path it appeared almost alive and gave her a terrible start that left her heart pounding. She stopped to catch her breath, face-to-face with the centaur, his hindquarters partially buried in the eroded hillside. Just then Laura came back to rejoin her, while the child and her parrot went ahead with Edward.

They sat on a shady, lichen-covered rock near the centaur as Laura explained the dilemma she had faced: to free the figure of the centaur from his stronghold of earth-slide debris would have required the sacrifice of a young chestnut tree and a bower of azaleas and rhododendrons. The centaur was nicely carved but he was only a copy and was more interesting just as he was, emerging out of the earth. Hattie agreed; this way he was quite dramatic.

They sat in silence awhile; Laura glanced around at the old forest and smiled, then in a soft voice she told Hattie: On the eve of the battle, her husband deserted his army command in Eritrea. The following day, Italian forces suffered terrible losses against the rebels; at first he was feared lost or taken prisoner. It was this confusion that brought such embarrassment later — early newspaper reports called him a “fallen hero,” but weeks later army intelligence learned the colonel had fled to Cairo.

They both were silent for a moment; Hattie kept her eyes to the ground, but Laura patted her arm cheerfully and smiled; it was for the best, she said.

Laura pointed at the chestnut and oak trees and the bowers of laurel and bay choked with brambles and holly that grew between the boulders and big rocks of the earth slide. The deadwood and debris were removed, but she did not have the heart to disturb the rest. The old wood remained as it was; fallen trees were left to nurture the earth for seedlings. Repairs were made only to the little canal that brought the stream from the hills to the woods; otherwise, they scarcely trimmed the paths enough to allow one to pass.

The path turned sharply at a stand of silver birches and suddenly there was a marble head of Medusa as big as a cookstove where it came to rest at the edge of the path after it rolled down the hillside. The head was dramatically tilted back to face the sky; she was a giant but no monster. The baby snakes that covered her head were dreamy eyed and gracefully arched above her brow, as unconcerned about the fall as their mistress, whose expression was serene, not furious.

Indigo rejoined them. Well, what did she think? Hattie asked. Indigo’s eyes were wide as she slowly shook her head; she wished Sister were there because Indigo knew that when she told her sister later, she’d never believe the head was this big! Wait until she told Mama and Sister! They would be amazed! They’d all heard the old-time people speculate about giants and the offspring of men who had sex with mares or cows.

Now the path began to level out in the dappled shade of the great trees towering above them. Laura described the most recent discovery: A storm with high winds and heavy rain lashed the hills and a number of the largest trees were lost. A lightning-struck oak crushed the rill, and the old woods were flooded; the embankments of the old landslide badly eroded. The morning after, as Laura accompanied the hired man to survey the damage, she noticed odd stonework protruding out of the side of the crumbled embankment a few feet away: it was a hidden grotto!

Edward walked a bit faster and asked what was found; Laura smiled but shook her head. She did not want to spoil the surprise. The stone archway of the grotto was outlined by velvet moss of bright emerald green; inside, splashing water reflected light on the rough stone walls. On a pedestal near the grotto center sat a nearly life-size marble figure of a bald fat man, naked and shamelessly astride a giant land tortoise. Hattie hurried to steer Indigo away from the vulgar marble, while Edward stopped with Laura to examine the figure.

In the stone niche at the back of the grotto Hattie noticed an egg-shaped sandstone that appeared to be far older than the marble fat man, and more proper for a young girl to see. As they approached it, Hattie noticed the stone was engraved with what appeared to be an eye on its end or the outline of a curled snake. She was about to reach out to touch its edge when suddenly she recognized it was a human vulva!

She stepped back so suddenly she bumped into Indigo. The dank odors of the grotto closed around her — she must get to fresh air at once! Outside, the fresh air restored her instantly but Edward and Laura were concerned; Hattie insisted she was all right. Food was all she needed; she only had tea and a biscuit for breakfast. After a short rest and something to eat, she would feel just fine. They could see the other gardens when it was cooler, later in the afternoon.

As they walked back to the house, Edward asked about the “female fertility figure”; Laura smiled at his choice of words. The incised egg was from the fourth millennium in Macedonia; it was the first piece of her collection to be installed in its new home, and the only piece sited in the old woods. All the other pieces of her collection were in the terraced gardens they’d see after lunch.

Edward asked if she worried about damage to the artifacts from the elements. Oh, Laura laughed, we bring them indoors in the winter. Edward nodded, though he did not approve of such a careless attitude toward rare artifacts. He reached into his pocket for his handkerchief and dabbed his forehead; he was feeling the heat now. He slowed his pace, conscious for the first time of a bit of soreness in the leg.

Now Hattie walked with Laura, who explained the meanings of the symbols found on Old European artifacts: The wavy lines symbolized rain; Vs and zigzags and chevrons symbolized river meanders as well as snakes and flocks of waterbirds; goddesses of the rivers transformed themselves to snakes and then waterbirds. The concentric circles were the all-seeing eyes of the Great Goddess; and the big triangles represented the pubic triangle, another emblem of the Great Goddess.

By the time they reached the house, Hattie felt completely restored. At lunch her appetite returned and she helped herself to the bread while the wine was poured. Before Edward could stop her, the maid filled Indigo’s glass with wine; immediately he moved the glass next to his wineglass. The discussion shifted to the question of serving wine to children; Hattie acknowledged the prohibition came directly from their puritan forefathers. The wine wasn’t strong! Let Indigo take a sip! But Edward was firm; Indigo must not have wine because she was an Indian; even the least amount might have a shocking effect.

Hattie tried to wash down the embarrassment she felt by drinking the wine. It was such lovely wine — it went down as gently as springwater. A sip would have been harmless, even educational, for the child. Hattie finished her glass of wine and the maid refilled it. She felt the wine begin to calm her, and her irritation at Edward diminished.

Indigo helped herself to the delicious fig bread in the basket on the table in front of her. She loved the feeling of the tiny seeds breaking between her teeth amid all the sweetness. The figs tasted as sweet as the dates she and Sister Salt gathered from the palm grove. The first course was spaghetti with tomato sauce and basil, followed with fried lamb cutlets and peas with ham. Indigo smiled at the cork’s squeak when the maid opened another bottle of wine. Then came a warm bowl of stewed sweet red peppers with yellow squash. Indigo’s eyes widened at the sight of food she knew, and as she tasted the peppers she thought of them grown so far from their original home; seeds must be among the greatest travelers of all!

They ate lemon ice cream later, while Laura talked about her hobby. The hybridizing procedures were simple enough for the amateur, which is how she began — an experiment that she did not expect to yield results; but she was delivered seed pods the first year. Beginner’s luck, she said, and a good deal of effort; for weeks she went into the garden before dawn with her tweezers and paper bags to cover the selected plants to protect them from accidental fertilization.

After lunch, while the sun was too bright and hot to walk comfortably in the gardens, they went to their rooms to rest. Indigo took her notebook and color pencils to her bedding on the floor and began to try to draw Rainbow perched on the cage top. She decided to put all his colors on the page first and then take a black pencil to draw his outline on the colors. The tiles were so cool she stopped from time to time to press her cheek against them, and before long she let go of the pencil in her fingers and stretched out on the bedsheet over the cool floor and fell asleep.

Hattie did not feel the full effects of the wine at lunch until she got up from the table to go upstairs. A sudden rush of well-being was followed by the sensation her body was weightless; each step was effortless but left her giddy. She paused at the top of the stairs for Edward, who seemed a bit unsteady himself. She stifled a smile and took his arm in hers; a nap would be just the cure for their wine-tipsy condition.

As they removed their shoes and loosened their clothes Hattie praised the people and gardens of Tuscany, then Edward gaily interrupted her to praise the wine above all. They laughed together and Hattie felt a sense of camaraderie with her husband that filled her heart with passion. As he sat on the edge of the bed, she leaned over and kissed him ardently on the back of the neck. In the the glow of the wine they forgot themselves and the awkward moments and embarrassments of their previous attempts at sexual intimacy. This session took them quite far indeed, although they stopped short of the act. They lay side by side holding hands in silence, their clothing all askew. Edward listened to Hattie’s breathing, slow as she fell asleep, but found himself wide awake, his heart pounding. It was the Indian girl who stirred Hattie’s maternal instincts and caused her to change her mind; now she wanted to conceive a child; that was quite clear.

Later, as they dressed to go downstairs, Edward was quite talkative about hybrid gladiolus, as if he wanted to avoid any discussion of the earlier flailing and groping. Hattie planted a kiss on his forehead as he sat on the edge of the bed to put on his shoes. She wanted to put him at ease, to let him know she was not embarrassed by their fling. It must have been the wine, she said with a smile; Edward nodded but did not look up as he tried to decide between a walking shoe and jodhpur boot for their tour of the terraced gardens.

He hoped to photograph the professoressa’s collection of artifacts, if she agreed; though why would she refuse? A few photographs could not matter when the artifacts were already exposed to the rain and the sun. He told Hattie he still found it difficult to believe. Was the entire collection displayed out of doors? Personally he found the Old European artifacts crude and unappealing; still, he was amazed their hostess, who called herself a scholar, risked rare archaeological artifacts simply to decorate a garden. Perhaps stone artifacts could survive display outdoors, but what about the ancient terra-cottas, exposed to the ravages of the sun and the weather?

Hattie smiled and sat down on the edge of the bed next to him; she put her arm through his. She felt so much affection for Edward at that moment — more strongly than ever before — and she wanted to savor the affection she felt.

But Edward went on: here truly was an affront to science and scholarship! Hattie began to be annoyed by Edward’s criticism of their generous hostess. Aunt Bronwyn said the professoressa took great care with the installation of each artifact. Shouldn’t they see the arrangements made for the artifacts in the gardens first, before they condemned her? No, it was the principle of the matter; artifacts of the early millennia belonged in the hands of scientists and scholars, not in gardens! Edward felt confident in the glow of the wine and continued: a connection must exist between the absent husband and the exposure of the artifacts. Poor Laura must have suffered a breakdown! Hattie frowned; Aunt Bronwyn said nothing of the sort.

Indigo woke from her nap to a snapping, splintering sound of dry wood; for an instant she wondered what it could be; then she jumped up, her heart pounding, just as Rainbow took another colored pencil into his beak from the box. The black pencil that she used to outline and to write words was broken in half, so she could still use it; but splinters and bits of the silver and gold pencils littered the floor around the travel cage, where the parrot was perched on top. She felt lucky to wake up before he destroyed all the color pencils; she did not think she would have much use for those colors anyway. The gold and silver pencils left heavy, greasy marks. Please don’t do that again, she told him as he watched her shut the pencil box.

As they came downstairs, Laura greeted them; Indigo and her parrot were already waiting in the green garden. Even the shadows and the shade were green in this lovely garden. Indigo and the parrot raced around to each of the empty niches and pedestals they’d seen earlier.

The afternoon light was a lovely chrome yellow filtered through the great trees. Laura explained as they walked she made her decision carefully, over a year or more, after visits abroad to the most eminent collections of museums in Eastern Europe. The museums, public or private, were dour and depressing, even suffocating; fortunately she met Aunt Bronwyn then, and only Aunt Bronwyn’s companionship and good cheer sustained her. The day she stepped out into the sunshine from a museum in Crakow, she made her decision: the figures of stone and terra-cotta must have fresh air and sunshine, not burial in a museum.

Edward set his jaw, determined not to betray his true feelings as their hostess explained how each winter when the first storm clouds gathered, the figures were wrapped in wool and placed in their boxes indoors. Birds of a feather, this woman and Hattie’s old aunt; this was what happened when irreplaceable scientific data fell into the wrong hands. What a frivolous woman! She seemed to have thrown over her study of the fourth- and fifth-millennium artifacts to take up gladiolus gardening. Little wonder that her husband was gone!

They stepped down four stone steps through an old stone gateway, and suddenly, everywhere Hattie looked, she saw tall spikes of black gladiolus flowers more densely planted than she ever imagined possible. Hundreds — maybe a thousand — of corms were planted, at heaven knew what cost, to crowd the entire garden with tall spikes of black blossoms — black-rose and black-red was even more amazing. Hattie thought gladiolus came only in pink, white, or yellow.

From the back wall by the gate, terrace after terrace, all the way to the lily tank in the center below, were tall spikes of black gladiolus flowers. Her first glimpse startled her because for an instant she thought something had burned or blackened the garden, before she realized it was a black garden. Here and there the garden of black was accented with scatterings of white, dove gray, and blossoms of mottled lavender and rose. Indigo looked up at Hattie and both their faces lit up with excitement and they exclaimed together: “Look!” Indigo’s eyes were wide and she did not gallop about with the parrot but remained next to Hattie. For just an instant when she first saw them, Indigo mistook the tall spikes of black flowers for a big flock of blackbirds sitting among green leaves, swaying ever so slightly in a current of air; in the afternoon light the blossoms seemed almost to glisten like black feathers. Indigo took a deep breath and exclaimed with delight. Smell them! These gladiolus are perfumed!

Edward stopped for an instant at the sight of hundreds, maybe thousands, of the tall black flower spikes, rising out of the terrace flower beds like battalions of black knights. He had never seen such a luxury of Dutch bulbs as this planting of unusual hybrid colors. A display like this cost a great deal, though at least in Lucca’s mild climate the bulbs did not have to be lifted in the winter.

The old stone terraces were carefully repaired but otherwise left untouched; the heavy rich Lucca soil had been leavened with the sandy loam favored by gladiolus. Edward had not seen or even read about such a display of gladiolus — tulips and narcissus, of course. He never cared for gladiolus; ordinarily, he found the tall spikes of flowers quite vulgar — tall upstarts and darlings of the florists that intruded here and there among other flowers in borders or in vases; but the grand scale of the old terraced garden displayed these black gladiolus to their best advantage.

Laura’s hybrids were quite colorful and of interest for their strong fragrance, though she said they did not reproduce their fragrance in their offspring, a common failing in hybrids.

The old lindens along the walls cast welcome shade; otherwise the terraced garden was open to the sky; the stone path was crowded by spikes of red-black and rose-black flowers as tall as Hattie’s shoulder. Hattie had never seen so many gladiolus planted together with not one other plant or flower, and no lawn to border them. Black flowering stems rose out of graceful arched leaves, from terrace to terrace — black gladiolus descending to the sunken stone lily tank. She could not take her eyes off the hundreds and hundreds of the black blossoms; on closer examination, Hattie noted here and there scatterings of mottled rose-gray and ivory-gray gladiolus accented the black. Pale pink and pale lavender flowers formed a narrow border between the frame of white gladiolus, which were shorter and branched; ah! what a fragrance these white gladiolus had! She closed her eyes for an instant and breathed in the perfume. If she felt tipsy earlier, now she felt drunk, surrounded, even embraced, by the profusion of flowers so tall that they shaded the edges of the garden path. Hattie sat a moment on a narrow ledge of the terrace wall to gaze about and fully realize the effect of the black garden.

Below the terraces of black gladiolus, at the center of the sunken garden, was a stone-paved oval with a shallow lily tank. Hattie saw a stone pedestal with a stone figure of some sort next to the lily tank, but first she wanted to see the artifacts on the other niches and pedestals on the upper terraces.

In a niche of the garden wall, nearly hidden by the tall black gladiolus, sat a white pottery pitcher with black designs. When Hattie got closer she saw the spout of the pitcher was formed by a waterbird’s head and beak; but most amazing yet, on the chest of the waterbird were women’s breasts! Hattie looked over the tops of the black flowers to see where her companions were; the buzz of the bees in the flowers seemed amplified by the sunken garden, though she could not make out what Indigo was saying to Laura as they examined a figure on the terrace below.

Edward stood in front of a niche in the wall of the terrace nearby and glanced up at the sun from time to time as if calculating film exposures for his camera. Hattie slipped her arm into his as she joined him in front of the stone pedestal. The small terra-cotta was a snake-headed figure with human arms and breasts that held a baby snake, but her legs were two snakes!

“How odd this black garden is!” Edward whispered to Hattie. The sight of the breasts on the waterbird pitcher recalled the designs incised on the egg-shaped rock yesterday. Perhaps it might be better if Indigo took her parrot back up to her room in case other figures were unfit for a young girl.

They joined Laura as Indigo, the parrot gripping her shoulder, began to walk the narrow stone ledge of the raised flower beds; she was careful to push aside the gladiolus as she went.

“I assume black is symbolic of night and death,” Edward said; Laura broke into a smile. To the Old Europeans, black was the color of fertility and birth, the color of the Great Mother. Thus the blackbirds belong to her as well as the waterbirds — cranes, herons, storks, and geese. Laura confided she imagined the ancient people as she looked at these figures of clay and stone. After a long brutal winter, how they must have watched the sky of the southern horizon for the return of the nourishment givers!

Edward felt a bit sheepish as he inquired about the modesty of the remaining figures displayed in the gardens, but Laura graciously assured them not to worry. She led the way to the niche, where Indigo stood with her parrot, apparently spellbound by the figure, no more than eight inches tall — another of the crude terra-cottas that Edward did not recognize at once. Whatever it was, it held the child’s attention, so he stepped closer to see.

The figure was a seated bear mother tenderly cradling her cub in her arms; Indigo could feel how much the bear mother loved her cub just from the curve of the clay. She stayed by the bear mother even after Hattie and Edward followed Laura to the next niche; Indigo felt embraced by the bear mother, loved and held by her even as she stood there. The bear mother’s affection made her smile for Mama and Grandma Fleet — they’d held Sister Salt and her just like that, even after they were big girls. They all used to laugh when Grandma pulled one of them onto her lap and pretended to cradle a big girl. The girls used to go along with Grandma’s joke and pretended to be huge babies that made baby sounds as they laughed even harder.

Rainbow became impatient with her for stopping so long and leaned off her shoulder to reach the black flowers with his claws and beak. She cautioned him to let the flowers be, and walked in the middle of the path, but the long flower spikes leaned toward them and the next thing she knew, the parrot clutched a blackish red blossom in his claws and held it to his beak for inspection. Indigo quickly looked to see if anyone witnessed the parrot’s damage.

“Hurry up and eat it if you are going to,” she told him; he shredded the petals in his beak but did not swallow them; then casually dropped the remains on the ground. Indigo took a last look at the bear mother with her cub; she wanted to stay with them longer, but she could see Hattie looking back at her and just then Edward gestured for her to come.

Indigo didn’t want to miss the figures in the other niches, so she took the long way around to join the others. The clay figure in the next niche was larger than the bear mother; it was also seated and appeared mostly human, but she was painted with black-and-white stripes and over her belly a snake curled in a spiral. She felt a chill of excitement when she realized that the figure had snakes for arms! She’d never seen or heard of anything like this before; she couldn’t wait to tell Sister.

Indigo rejoined the others on the terrace below, where they stood before a stone pedestal with a seated figure of carved sandstone that gazed at them with the round eyes of a snake. The snake-headed mother had human arms and in them she cradled her snake baby to human breasts; but instead of legs, she had two snakes for limbs. Indigo took a deep breath and the others looked at her. Well, what did she think? Indigo didn’t know what to say. Grandma Fleet used to talk to the big snake that lived at the spring above the old gardens; she always asked after the snake’s grandchildren and relatives and sent her best regards.

“It’s nothing like the minotaur, is it?” Edward said; he found the grotesque madonnas far more monstrous than the centaur or minotaur.

As they made their way to the niche on the terrace below, Laura described the remnants of snake devotion still found in rural villages of the Black and Adriatic Seas. There, people believed black or green snakes bore guardian spirits who protected their cattle and their homes. In her travels, Laura saw ornamental snakes carved to decorate the roofs and windows for protection. Great good fortune came to anyone who met a big white snake wearing a crown; the crowned snake was the sister of the waterbird goddess, owner and guardian of life water and life milk.

Edward hoped to quicken the pace of their tour as he led the way to the small lily tank; above the lilies was a deep niche that held the bird-snake woman. Fragrant red water lilies as big as dinner plates rocked back and forth when Indigo stirred the green water with her hand.

Previously Hattie agreed with Indigo the bear mother and her cub were the dearest figures they’d seen; but when Hattie saw the carved stone figure of a bird-masked woman holding a bird-masked baby in her arms, she could not take her eyes from them.

Edward called the sculpture primitive, but Hattie disagreed; although the clay figures were simple in form, the expression of the mother’s body as she cradled her baby in the arms touched Hattie deeply and she felt a surge of emotion that caught in her throat until tears filled her eyes. The bird goddess loved her baby as fiercely as any mother! Hattie wiped the tears away quickly with the back of her hand. Edward would not understand; he’d think she was ill again. How dare Edward call these Old European sculptures boring or ugly?

Hattie studied the terraces of black gladiolus all around her; the black-reds looked especially striking against the bright blue sky. She would never forget this black garden with its little madonnas, as Laura called them.

Edward knelt on the stone ledge of the pedestal. He examined the terra-cotta inch by inch to note any erosion of the surface or other damage of the slightest to the rare artifact. He noted one questionable spot on the clay of the right breast, but nothing more.

At first Rainbow was uncertain about so many tall black flowers all around, and he gripped Indigo’s shoulder tightly as a breeze caused the black faces of the flowers to bow forward and back, nodding at them. What did the flowers mean by their nods? she asked the parrot. She sat on the bottom step across from the lily tank with the parrot in her lap. She wanted to remember everything she could so she could properly describe the garden to Sister Salt and Mama. She watched Hattie and Edward walk ahead with Laura while she sat with the bird-mask mother holding her baby. I was a baby like that and my mother and my grandmother held me, she told Rainbow; that’s why she wanted to stay there a while longer, though there was another garden yet to see.

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.

The next day Laura put them on the train to Livorno, but only after she got promises from them to come stay with her again. She gave them a card with instructions how she might be reached in case they needed her assistance.

♦ ♦ ♦

By the time the train reached Livorno, Edward’s face appeared pale; was he ill? Oh no, he quickly answered, he was only a bit tired. He’d not slept well the night before, he said, but managed a smile for Hattie. Actually he’d barely slept at all; after he managed to fall asleep, he woke shaken and wet with fear from a nightmare about giant African snakes in their bed. Perhaps in her sleep Hattie flung her arm over his shoulder to set off the bad dream.

Of course, all the snake figures he’d seen in the rain garden the previous afternoon were bound to affect his dreams, though yesterday’s terra-cotta snakes were small and European. It seemed more likely the nightmare stemmed from an anecdote Laura told the evening of their arrival; as she showed them around the house, she repeated an old rumor — almost a local legend by now. The foreigners who previously owned the villa kept giant African snakes in the wine cellar, then later abandoned the snakes there. According to the story, the great pythons found their way into the foundations of the villa, where they subsisted on rodents and feral cats. Laura reiterated there were no pythons or any other large snakes on the premises; nonetheless Edward dreamed a giant snake embraced him around the shoulders.

The train’s arrival in Livorno stirred his blood, and the fatigue dissipated; he felt a tingle of anticipation and excitement; at last he was on the threshold to Corsica and the Citrus medica twigs that would free him entirely from debt and secure his share of the family estate. Financial improvements brought other changes as well; actually, the improvement already began on board the ship to Genoa with his acquaintance with Dr. William Gates of Melbourne and a possible investment partnership in meteor ore; the C. medica twigs were to be his collateral. It all would work out very nicely; he knew Hattie wanted to go to Arizona to determine if the child had any living relatives, and Dr. Gates’s meteor crater was only a few hours by train from Flagstaff.

As soon as they were settled in their hotel, Edward took a walk to reconfirm their reservations on the steamship to Bastia the next morning. He wanted no errors or delays; he double-checked to calm his nerves. He was careful to avoid the U.S. consulate lest he be noticed by the authorities there. He was counting on the inefficiency of the civil servants at the Agriculture Department and Mr. Grabb’s busy schedule to give him enough time to carry out his plan. They would assume his reply to their cables had been lost but he would turn back as they had directed; he’d never given them any reason to assume otherwise. Time was of the essence now.

Livorno was a port city, but the downtown area was somewhat low lying and did not always get the breezes off the sea in August. Edward was hot and little out of breath when he reached the steamship office, but an alert young clerk immediately brought him a chair and a glass of water. Edward complimented the clerk on his excellent English, and the young man bowed modestly, replying he had lived two years with an uncle in Chicago.

The reservations for tomorrow were all in order; the clerk carefully printed out receipts good for passage for the three of them. The old injury to the leg was acting up, and the clerk was so hospitable, he sat a while longer. The clerk said he was grateful to have this opportunity to practice his English with an American; British visitors usually declined. Perhaps it was the clerk’s friendliness or simply the heat that caused him to ask about the citron industry. He regretted his indiscretion almost as soon as he spoke, then decided he was silly to worry; the Italian clerk was harmless.

The clerk was quite knowledgeable about the citron since the export of pickled citron rind was primarily from Livorno. As it happened the clerk also knew a good bit about the processing of the Citrus medica from raw rind to candied spice. Edward was pleased to point out that in the United States, candied citron had become one of the most sought after spices for Christmas plum puddings and those rich wedding cakes guests took home to dream on.

Edward listened with great interest to the clerk’s description of the brine tanks used to rot the thick-skinned rinds before it was candied. All this information would be invaluable for Edward’s future work with the citron. He promised to send the clerk the recipe for Christmas fruitcake before he excused himself and thanked the clerk for all the information. The man expressed his regret Edward and his family were departing so soon; otherwise, he might have arranged a tour of a citron processing shed.

Edward felt the ticks of the clock drawing him closer and closer to his destiny; he had no appetite at dinner. Afterward, while Hattie wrote and the child and parrot played on the floor, he tried to concentrate on a review of cutting slips from twigs but found it nearly impossible to concentrate.

Hattie wrote Laura a note of thanks for her generous hospitality and for the wonderful opportunity to see the rare artifacts in their lovely garden settings. She regretted the haste that compelled them to depart so soon, but she hoped to return to Lucca soon.

The child and Hattie slept soundly, but he tossed and turned; a nauseous sensation and pounding of his heart continued until he got up and found the paregoric. He was about to possess the first slips of C. medica out of Corsica! His future depended on the rough-skinned citrons, those ugly little lemons! He tipped the brown glass bottle and tapped its bottom and managed to get a good dose without opening the last bottle. They must find a pharmacist as soon as they returned from Bastia. He lay back on his pillow and floated away in a glow.

The next morning, while the luggage was taken downstairs and Edward and Hattie completed last-minute details before checkout, Indigo played with Rainbow out on the balcony in the fresh air off the ocean and the bright sunshine. Her head over her shoulder, Indigo loved to watch him spread both wings above her like a mighty eagle; as she ran, she felt the weight of his strong little body lift off as his wings flapped harder, but he did not release his grip on her shoulder. Indigo knew he was too smart to let go because his clipped wing feathers wouldn’t carry him. They were having so much fun she did not want to stop although she could see Edward and Hattie were nearly ready to go. She didn’t want to put Rainbow in his travel cage until the last moment. She turned to make a last run with Rainbow up the long balcony when she felt the breeze off the ocean suddenly rise against her face, and an instant later, Rainbow lifted off her shoulder in the wind and landed in the top branches of the big chestnut tree in the hotel garden. Indigo could tell by his expression he was surprised, then delighted to find himself free in the top of the tree. Indigo called his name and he looked at her, but she could see he was much more interested in the tree. She watched him climb, rapidly using his feet and beak, and by the time she ran to tell Hattie, the parrot was no longer visible.

Down in the hotel garden, a small crowd of staff and a few curious gathered around the tree to crane their necks and point up. Hattie stood with her hand on Indigo’s shoulder and tried to reassure her the parrot could not go far with clipped wings; someone would find him and return him. The head gardener boosted one of his assistants into the lower branches and he disappeared up the center of the great tree. More people gathered to watch the man in the tree. Edward noticed even the cabdriver and the hotel porters stopped loading the luggage to look up at the tree.

For days Edward had not allowed himself to think about his mission to Corsica and the task that awaited him, but now that departure was imminent, anxious thoughts raced through his mind; if they were delayed, they’d miss the only boat to Bastia until the end of the week. The new pink skin of the scar on his fingers itched and tingled though he rubbed it vigorously. They must leave for the pier at once!

Edward held out his pocket watch to show Hattie how little time they had before the gangplank was pulled up, but she was attempting to console the child. Indigo began to cry at the sight of the concierge with the empty travel cage that must stay behind in case the parrot was found. Hattie tried to console her, but Indigo’s grief was alarming, far more than she ever expressed before. The hotel kitchen staff brought little trays of candies and sweets but Indigo ignored them. She huddled on the big armchair in the hotel lobby with her face buried in her hands.

“I loved him most of all,” she sobbed, and refused to move from the chair; she refused to go anywhere without the parrot.

Hattie was aware of Edward’s increasing annoyance at the possibility their departure might be delayed. Hattie assured Indigo someone would find the bird; she sat down on the divan across from the child and wrote a hurried note to Laura about the lost parrot and the generous reward offered for his return; the hotel employees would carry on the search while they were in Corsica, and notify their friend Laura when the parrot was found. Indigo mustn’t worry; a seaport like Livorno was bound to be familiar with pet parrots — sailors brought back parrots from their travels; someone would care for the lost bird. The weather there was mild; there were vegetable gardens and vines of ripe grapes when Rainbow got hungry. Now they must not delay any longer. Indigo closed her eyes and slowly shook her head; both her hands tightly gripped the arms of the chair; she refused to leave the hotel lobby. Only when Edward approached as if to carry her bodily did Indigo sullenly get to her feet and follow Hattie to the cab waiting outside the hotel.

Hattie pointed out the cab window at the fountain where pigeons drank and bathed while others scrambled for bread crusts the people threw to them, but Indigo refused to look. Instead she stared at a distant point straight ahead and refused to speak or acknowledge them.

Once on board the boat, Hattie tried to humor the grieving child, first by reading aloud from a guide to Corsica, but the child ignored her. She brought out the book of adventures of the stone monkey and began to read but Indigo covered both ears with her hands. Edward was angered by the child’s rejection of Hattie’s efforts; they really must come to an agreement about discipline for the girl. Each day she grew taller and the clothing that once hung loose now fit almost too closely. Far more alarming, however, were the child’s willfulness and absence of humility; her demeanor was that of a sultan, not a lady’s maid.

Indigo refused to touch the soup and bread brought to her. All day and tonight Rainbow had nothing to drink or eat where he was, so Indigo would not drink or eat either. The gust of wind caught him and he landed in the treetop by accident; he only wanted to explore a little. He would not understand why she left him after she promised to always love him and take care of him. Storks and seagulls would try to kill a small bird like him.

Hattie reassured her again someone would find the bird and bring him to the hotel for the reward, but Indigo shook her head angrily and refused to look at her.

The weather for the crossing was perfect — the ocean calm and the atmosphere so clear that off in the distance they saw Elba as they passed. Hattie explained the island’s history, which Indigo ignored except to peer hard into the distance to see some sign of the castle and the tiny kingdom Napoleon made after his first defeat; but the shimmer of the afternoon sunlight off the glassy sea created a glare that made it difficult to see much more than the island’s emerald outline against the turquoise sea.

It was dark when they reached their hotel, one of only four hotels in Bastia. Indigo went straight to the maid’s alcove, or closet, as she called it, and set down her valise next to the narrow bed. Then she defiantly pulled the bedding loose and rolled up in the sheet and blanket on the floor. The night was quite warm and the floor spotlessly clean, so Hattie did not stop the child. The tile floor felt cool to the touch — the child had the right idea on a night like that.

Hattie was relieved Edward was too engrossed in his book on twig grafts to notice Indigo’s display of temper. Otherwise the unpleasant discussion of Indigo’s manners and training might continue. Edward was satisfied Hattie was teaching the child geography and reading and writing on their journey, but a docile willingness to serve must also be cultivated. Hattie felt her pulse surge each time she recalled Edward’s assertion that she was too soft-hearted to discipline the child. Perhaps the task was more than Hattie wanted to take on, but of course it was their duty to educate the child to enable her to survive in the white man’s world.

Indigo dreamed she was flying with Rainbow on her back high over the earth. Below she could see the shimmering aquamarine of the Mediterranean; ahead on the curve of the horizon she saw the stormy dark blue edge of the Atlantic as they flew west. Before very long they were flying high above the Colorado River and then over the sand dunes, where Indigo looked down and saw the old gardens were no longer planted with corn or squash but something else. As Rainbow flew them lower to get a better look, she saw the garden terraces between the dunes were streaked with bright colors of the tall flowering spikes of gladiolus three feet tall. Rainbow landed among the gladiolus of all shades of yellow — from the palest white with only a blush of yellow to a yellow so bright it glowed. Rainbow climbed a tall spike of yellow blossoms speckled with red, and Indigo laughed with delight,

She woke just as the darkness was beginning to fade, and looked for the cage before she remembered he was lost. She hoped the dream of all the blossoming gladiolus meant he would come back to her. Indigo memorized the low green hills behind Livorno’s harbor; to escape the seagulls and storks, she imagined Rainbow flying to the hills where great trees shaded pale orange and pale yellow houses like Laura’s. She recalled too the number of food-bearing trees — olives, acorns, and chestnuts for Rainbow to eat if the grapes, apricots, and peaches were not enough. She felt better as she recalled the train ride from Lucca to Livorno, when she had watched out the train window until dark and saw no end to the fields of wheat, or the vineyards and vegetable gardens.

Italy was the best place to get lost in the summer if you were a parrot, she thought. To be lost in the sweltering dunes above the red muddy river of home might kill a parrot; she must teach him not to fly away before she took him to the old gardens. Great horned owl and redtail hawk and golden eagle all would love to taste a parrot.

♦ ♦ ♦

They checked out of the hotel before dawn to take the train to Cervione; Indigo moved like a sleepwalker and still refused food, though she did take water. Before they left the hotel Edward gave the concierge some coins and the man disappeared into the hotel kitchen; he returned with a burlap sack of potatoes, which Edward tucked into the shipping crate with the camera. Hattie wanted to ask him what he meant to do with the potatoes but decided to wait until he seemed less preoccupied.

The other private compartments on the train were unoccupied, and the conductor who came to take the tickets seemed surprised to see Americans. The only signs of civil unrest they’d seen were a few soldiers at the street corners. The newspapers that Laura consulted before their departure reported no incidents in Corsica. Hattie settled back in her seat and closed her eyes; the motion of the train and its rhythmic creak and clatter enveloped her and were oddly soothing. She was so pleased to have met the professoressa, as gracious and generous as she was interesting; Hattie wished they had had more time in Lucca; they barely got to see the artifacts in the gardens, much less discuss the significance of each figure. Hattie wished she had asked about the luminous glow of the white snake goddess. If she got to know Laura a little better, Hattie thought, she might confide about the strange light, the odd luminous glow she saw in Aunt Bronwyn’s garden.

Indigo was curled up in a ball on the seat next to the window; her pathetic state brought tears to Hattie’s eyes when she remembered how spirited the child had been only the day before; if only they had clipped the parrot’s wing feathers as they grew out. Hattie tried to comfort her with a pat on the back, but it was no use; Indigo seemed inconsolable. Hattie recalled the articles she’d read about people who died of broken hearts. She was concerned because the child refused to eat. If the child took the hunger strike too far she was liable to become seriously ill before they could find a doctor. She wanted to take the child and return to Livorno to search for the parrot while Edward completed his business with the citron cuttings.

Edward disagreed. The next boat to Livorno did not depart for three days; by then his business would be completed anyway. The parrot might already have been found; the child was only tired from travel; she’d spring up in no time after some rest. Hattie was reluctant to agree, and gave a deep sigh as she nodded her head. Edward felt his neck and face begin to redden; this was really too much, at such a critical juncture of the Corsica mission!

“When the child is thirsty and hungry enough she will eat!” he said; then the shocked expression on Hattie’s face caused him to soften his tone. “By the time we return to Livorno the parrot will be found and Indigo will be just fine.”

Indigo watched the world move around her but she was outside the world now; voices sounded distant, but no matter, because there was nothing she needed to hear from these people. She moved when she was told and sat silently until it was time to move again. She forgot her valise on the train when they got off in Cervione, but she could see Edward was in a rush and short tempered so she said nothing. The valise contained all the seeds she’d collected and the notebook and colored pencils Laura gave her, but none of it seemed important now that Rainbow was lost. She remembered Grandma Fleet said if you lost something, you should talk to it, apologize for your carelessness, and ask it to please return to you. She whispered to Rainbow almost constantly to let him know she would find him.

Just then, Hattie looked at Indigo and noticed the valise was missing. Passengers were boarding the train. Where was it? Indigo looked down and shrugged her shoulders. Hattie started to reboard the train but Edward was adamant: There was no time! They must be on their way. It was the child’s own fault, Edward pointed out, and she would never learn responsibility if she did not face the consequences.

“Good-bye, seeds. Good-bye, colored pencils,” Indigo whispered as their other luggage was loaded on the cab. Then the conductor hurried out of the train car with the little brown valise. The valise came back to her just like that! Rainbow would return too.

Edward tried to soften the tone of his voice because he did regret the child’s sadness. “You must learn to take better care of things, Indigo,” he said as he gave the conductor a coin. “You would not have lost the parrot if you were more careful.”

Dry mountain foothills the color of dust surrounded the small town and blocked the cooling winds off the sea. The town of Cervione was even smaller than Bastia, with few people on the streets in the heat. By the sun’s low angle Edward calculated that it was the dinner hour, half past six or thereabouts. Since his accident in Brazil when his pocket watch was smashed, he made it his practice to calculate the time by the position of the sun before he took out his watch to check his calculation. He felt reassured to know the time; one of the worst parts of the Brazilian ordeal had been the sensation time disappeared with the white men, or stopped when his watch was smashed by the same rock that shattered his leg. Without the watch, there was only the same night and the same day that repeated themselves until time itself became the scalding pain of the compound fractures. He had been slowly dragging himself toward the riverbank above the swift currents to let go of himself forever in the rushing water when the monkey and the mestizo brothers came along.

The only hotel open in Cervione during the month of August was named the Napoleon; of course, Hattie thought. The stairs and halls looked and smelled as if they were last scrubbed during Napoleon’s era. The hotel’s little restaurant was closed for renovations; the hotel clerk indicated that since the heat of the summer months discouraged all but the most hearty travelers, Cervione was a bit too far from the coast to benefit much from ocean breezes; Bastia was far nicer. Most summer visitors stayed there and hired carriages for day trips.

The hotel clerk was the brother of the town’s mayor, and before Edward could think of a polite refusal, the clerk sent a boy to bring the mayor to meet their American visitors.

Hattie and the child followed the porter to their rooms upstairs while Edward waited for the mayor to arrive. His brother broke out a dusty bottle of brandy from under the hotel reception desk and wiped three dusty glasses with his clean handkerchief. The mayor, a short heavy-set man in his early sixties, arrived out of breath and sweating. Years before, he lived in the United States, and he never grew tired of greeting visitors from his adopted country. What he missed most from America was baseball; otherwise the wine and the bread of Corsica were far superior. They drank a number of toasts to their countries and to themselves and to tourism before Edward managed to extricate himself with a promise to return as soon as his camera was unpacked, to make the mayor’s portrait. He was glad to have the excuse of Hattie and the child upstairs.

By the time the proper lighting was had and the mayor changed his frock coat for the photograph, an hour had passed, and another hour passed while he carefully arranged the mayor’s arms and hands on his lap and turned his head for a favorable effect of the flash powder. Then it was time for more brandy all around and big bowls of a savory vegetable soup with little curled pasta and long loaves of freshly baked bread. Finally he left his new companions with promises to send them their portraits once he completed the process of printing them. Both Hattie and Indigo were asleep — the child on the floor of the alcove, which made sense on such a warm night.

Edward closed his eyes but the heat made sleep difficult. His thoughts raced: so many decisions to be made, so many steps to go over to have healthy twig cuttings. The goodwill of the mayor and local officials was essential, especially during this time of civil unrest. One of the mayor’s deputies made remarks, in jest, of course, about spies and anarchist agents in disguise, which gave them all a good laugh. The mayor was kind enough to arrange for his younger brother to rent them a buggy with a shade for their tour of the farming villages in the mountains. Edward asked specifically to visit Borgo, the village reputed to have the best candied citron industry. Their appointment was for eight the next morning so they would have a little of the morning coolness for their trip.

His strategy was simple: he would find a grove of healthy-looking trees and pretend to make a landscape photograph that included the citron trees. Then as he set up the tripod and camera in front of the grove of citron trees, he would unpack the two sharpened twig knives from their small wooden box inside the camera case with the potatoes.

All night the bedding felt damp beneath him and no matter how he turned or arranged the pillow, he could not sleep. He listened to Hattie’s breathing next to him and the child’s soft snoring from the floor in the alcove until he dozed off, only to wake at the creak of the bedsprings when Hattie got up and walked to the window.

The coolness of the tile floor felt wonderful on Hattie’s bare feet — no wonder Indigo was able to sleep while she and Edward tossed and turned. For an instant she thought how easy it would be to take a sheet and pillow to the floor to sleep, but of course that was silly.

Hattie was less concerned about Indigo’s health after she finished her soup and bread earlier in the evening, but the child still refused to speak or make eye contact. Hattie missed the lively exchanges she and Indigo had, and the child’s vibrant reactions and questions about the places and people they saw. Surely someone would find that parrot for the reward! If only their schedule had permitted them another day in Livorno, they might have searched for the bird themselves. Hattie sighed; she was beginning to weary of travel. A day of rest from travel would benefit them all.

Edward got up a little after daybreak while Indigo was still asleep. To Hattie’s annoyance, Edward at once began to fuss with the camera case and bumped the floor hard with the tripod. Hattie expected the noise to wake Indigo, but she scarcely stirred in the alcove. The poor child was worn out!

“I think I’ll stay here today with Indigo and rest,” she said. Edward did not disagree, but as he went on with his repeated repacking of the camera case to ensure against breakage, he pointed out that the hotel dining room was closed for the summer; they’d have only soup and bread again. Moreover, the hotel had no garden for shady walks, only a paved courtyard with some pots of withered dahlias in full sun. The mountains would be much cooler and the mayor’s brother promised a home-cooked meal at his house in Borgo; the fresh air and exercise would be good for all of them.

When Hattie woke her, Indigo had just reached the Sea of Galilee, which looked like the river at home, only many times wider and surrounding everything; in her dream, Rainbow was on her shoulder and Linnaeus frolicked along the rocky seashore, whose stones and pebbles were the same colors of pale yellow and pale orange as the stones along the river at home. Up ahead in the distance she saw the white cloaks of the dancers as they lined up to get the sacred red clay dust. When Indigo woke to see that she was back in the hotel room with Hattie and Edward, she burst into tears.

“Why did you have to wake me right then?” she cried in anger. “I was almost to find them!” Hattie felt a surge of compassion in her heart for the child, followed by righteous anger at Edward. They had not argued with each other before, but Hattie was fed up; if he had not insisted on such a haste, the child would behave much better, and so would she!

Edward countered if Indigo were not so spoiled and so stubbornly convinced the parrot would never be found, she might be tolerable. He looked at the child. Pet parrots were lost and returned to their owners every day, all over the world, he said to the child; but Indigo covered her ears and refused to hear of it. An outing in the sunshine and fresh air was just the tonic Indigo needed.

Indigo sat motionless with her eyes closed as Hattie tugged off her nightgown and put on her cotton slip and blue gingham dress. With her eyes closed she could visualize the desert seashore of her dream that took her to Galilee, where Jesus and his family and followers were camped. She didn’t care what Edward or Hattie thought; she squeezed her eyes closed and went over the dream again and again until she was confident she could return to the same place in the dream tonight; then she opened her eyes and saw both Hattie and Edward were irritated by her behavior. Good, Indigo thought; maybe they’d find a train and send her back to Arizona.

They got a late start after the mayor’s brother had to shoe one of the horses, and the heat rose in waves from the dirt road ahead of the buggy while the dust swirled all around. The ragged buggy cover gave only a small area of shade that left the lower legs and feet in full sun. Hattie found the rolling hills with the terraced fields overlooking the sea strangely appealing in their solitude.

In the heat of the day, they were the only beings that moved along the road. The blazing full sun at midday was entirely too strong for good photographs, but they were passing into the first of the citron groves, so Edward asked the driver to stop. He got down from the buggy and approached the odd pole frame that enclosed the tree — to train it to grow in a vase form, to give the branches the right spread, the mayor’s brother explained in an odd mixture of Italian and French. Edward noted how the right spread of the branches enabled them to hold much more fruit without breaking. He restrained the urge he felt to pick one of the small thick-skinned “lemons” and pretended to study the vista of dry rocky hills in shades of umber and sienna streaked with olive and the citrus green of the orchards, framed by the cloudless azure sky. He easily could have taken all the cuttings he needed right here, but he hoped to find a more discreet opportunity.

The buggy passed more roadside orchards of citrons, and Edward saw no one about, not even a dog. Before long the driver stopped the buggy at the front gate of a large old farmhouse and quickly stepped around to help Hattie and Indigo step down. He showed them to the door, which he pushed open with a flourish. Welcome, welcome, came the voices from the next room, and there they found a great table set with many courses and what appeared to be the driver’s entire family seated, apparently waiting for their arrival.

Indigo noticed the children her age immediately because they stared at her every move; she saw old grandmas and old grandpas with little children and even a baby on their laps. They were sitting on benches that permitted them to crowd as many as they could around the table; Indigo was reminded of the time all the strangers came to dance for the Christ when they pressed closer together around the fire to make room for everyone. Indigo pretended not to notice their stares; she looked around and saw the farmhouse was one big room with the stove and kitchen in one end and beds of all sizes and shapes here and there along the walls, with boxes and chests of drawers forming little alcoves, some of which had curtains hung from the ceiling for privacy. The delicious odors of hot bread and cooking food made Indigo hungry for the first time since Rainbow’s escape.

They all live here in this one room, Hattie realized as she took her place at the end of the bench next to a shy young woman holding an infant. Indigo slid over closer to Hattie to make room on the bench for Edward, and they ate a wonderful meal that began with sweet peppers stewed with onions, followed by a spaghetti dish with tomatoes and little squids, which Indigo liked a great deal.

After wedges of cheese and ripe soft pears, their host announced that they would all walk together to the little schoolhouse at the edge of the village where the image of Jesus’ Blessed Mother recently began to appear on the front wall above the door.

Indigo was wide eyed as she whispered to Hattie; this was it! Indigo could hardly sit still while the others finished eating. Had the Mother of God come alone, or were the other family members and the dancers with the Messiah, camped higher in the mountains? Maybe the Blessed Mother could look across the sea and find Rainbow perched in a potted lemon tree on the ledge of a splashing fountain.

Hattie expected their host and perhaps his immediate family might accompany them to the site of the miraculous wall, but the entire family came in a long procession of sorts. The sun was still blazing hot as they set out. Edward refused offers from the young boys to carry the camera case and the tripod, although his leg was beginning to bother him.

Hattie felt an odd energy, a mood of excitement, among their host’s family as they walked along, despite the heat, and she assumed it was due to their visit. Their host explained the miraculous wall brought a steady stream of visitors to their village. The mayor’s brother tugged at the edge of his neatly trimmed beard as he explained that recently a disagreement between the townspeople and the church officials sprang up. Since the apparition of Our Lady on the schoolhouse wall, the visitors and pilgrims who used to visit the gold and silver portrait of Mary in the abbey shrine seldom went there anymore. Who could blame them? If they knelt or stood long enough in front of the schoolhouse wall, they might get to see the Blessed Mother herself!

Dawn and sunset were the best times to look for Our Lady’s image; you must close the eyes, pray, and then slowly open the eyes only a little as you focused on the rough stone wall, their host explained. While the group stood with their eyes closed in front of the schoolhouse, Edward set up the camera behind them. After he made the photograph of the group in front of the miraculous wall, he planned to politely excuse himself to make photographs near the citron groves that surrounded the village. He was relieved to have attention focused on the large group gathered at the schoolhouse wall shrine so he could go among the citron trees unnoticed. Then, he would watch for a moment when no one was watching him, to seize the twig knife and quick-quick-quick cut the best citron twig specimens.

The faithful watched the wall, lips moving in silent prayer as he completed preparations. He put his head under the camera cloth to begin to compose the picture when behind him a distance away he became aware of a low sound growing steadily louder, as if a giant swarm of flying insects were approaching, but soon he heard voices raised in anger. As he turned, he saw a strange sight down the road at the schoolhouse: their host with his family standing behind him was in a face-off with another, smaller group of villagers, led by what appeared to be Catholic monks who brandished large crucifixes.

Now the voices grew louder and arguments broke out between the two groups. Hattie became alarmed and took Indigo firmly by the arm to stay close to Edward in case violence erupted. Bloody Corsican feuds were regularly reported in American newspapers. Indigo did not take her eyes off the wall even as Hattie led her away, although the Blessed Mother probably would not come now that she heard the angry voices. Indigo tried to keep her head turned back at the wall as long as possible, until Hattie became impatient and pulled her along to a safe distance from the dispute.

Edward kept watch through the viewfinder and made one good exposure of their host arguing nose to nose with another man as the monks and the others formed a semicircle around them. Hattie tried to follow the argument as both men gestured at the old schoolhouse and then at the abbey on the hill beyond, but she couldn’t make out more than a few words.

Edward seemed unconcerned as he moved the camera and tripod to get another view of the altercation. When the second plate was exposed and safely stored, Edward looked up the road for the best grove of the citron trees, branches arched gracefully over the low rock walls easily within his reach. He carefully balanced the camera and tripod on his shoulder and carried the camera box up the road toward the orchard he’d chosen for its robust trees.

Hattie stayed with Indigo but at a safe distance from the dispute. She felt annoyed that Edward went on with his photographs, but their time there was short. After a time, a friendly woman, their host’s sister-in-law, who once traveled in the United States, joined Hattie and Indigo to explain. Recently, church officials contacted the town mayor to order him to put a stop to the devotions at the schoolhouse wall. The mayor replied there was nothing he could do; the image of the Blessed Virgin could not be washed off or painted over — the monks and other church authorities already tried to expose the apparition as a hoax. But the beautiful colored light that formed the image was only enhanced by the whitewash splashed over the wall. Truly this was a miracle, and the people who once went to the abbey for miracles now came here to the street in front of the schoolhouse, where no offerings were required to see the Mother of God.

The abbot alleged the image on the wall was the work of the devil because the miraculous appearance overshadowed the monks’ shrine to the portrait of Mary in silver on gold. Still, the people flocked to see the lovely image of Our Lady until the abbot contacted Rome and a monsignor came all the way from Rome and forbade its veneration on pain of excommunication.

By this time other women joined them, curious to hear what their kinswoman told the foreign tourist. Yes, it was true. The abbey was built to house the precious picture of hammered silver on gold. Pilgrims crawled on their knees up the abbey’s marble steps to leave offerings. The paralyzed walked; the deaf and blind heard and saw again. When the Greek king lay seriously ill, the abbot himself carried the precious picture to the bedside of the king, who kissed the picture; instantly the illness receded and in a few days the king was well again. Over time, however, the miraculous power of the picture slowly got used up; but now the Blessed Mother herself had come to them.

With Edward barely visible in the distance, bent over his camera, Hattie was grateful for the friendly conversation; at the time she thought his behavior a bit odd, even rude, but he did want to learn all he could about the citron groves while they were there.

Indigo gripped Hattie’s hand tightly as she felt the excitement all over her body. The farther east they traveled, the closer they came to the place the Messiah and his family and followers traveled when they left the mountains beyond Paiute country.

After some loud words were exchanged, the monks took up their big crucifixes in both hands and led their followers back to the abbey. Hattie and Indigo followed the other women back to the shrine at the wall, although there was no sign of the apparition with its colorful image of blue, green, yellow, and red. The Blessed Mother was not likely to appear so soon after ugly words were exchanged — Indigo remembered that winter the Paiute women warned the people must be kind to one another or the Messiah and his family would not come down from the mountains.

Indigo studied the surface of the schoolhouse wall intently and from time to time she glanced around at the faces of the others who were looking for the Holy Mother’s image in case they saw something she couldn’t see, but their expressions were wistful and uncertain. Indigo watched the wall long after Hattie turned to chat with their host’s friendly sister-in-law, who brought a pitcher and tin cups for water. As the light changed, Indigo began to see tiny reflections glitter on the surface of the whitewashed plaster that she recognized as the flakes of snow that swirled around the dancers the last night when the Messiah appeared with his family. She could make out the forms of the dancers wrapped in their white shawls and the Messiah and his Mother standing in the center of the circle — all were in a beautiful white light reflecting all the colors of the rainbow, lavender, blue, red, green, and yellow — and in that instant Indigo felt the joy and the love that had filled her that night long ago when she stood with Sister Salt, Mama, and Grandma to welcome the Messiah. In that instant joy swept away all her grief, and she felt their love embrace her.

A murmur rose from those closest to the wall, interrupting their conversation, and when Hattie and the others turned to look, the faithful were on their knees in the dirt. Was it an odd reflection off metal or glass nearby? A faint glow suffused the whitewashed wall and Hattie felt her heart beat faster as the glow grew brighter with a subtle iridescence that steadily intensified into a radiance of pure color that left her breathless, almost dizzy.

The strange light in Aunt Bronwyn’s garden might have been a dream, but here she was with dozens of witnesses! Where was Edward? He must see this! Hattie turned and saw him, a dark speck in the distance, too far to call; but when she looked back at the wall again the light was already growing faint. She was surprised to feel tears on her cheeks and saw that the others — men as well as women — wept though their faces were full of joy. Yes, yes, they all spoke excitedly with one another, they had seen her. Yes, Hattie nodded her head, yes! So this was what was called a miracle — she felt wonder and excitement, though she saw the glow of colored light on the wall for only an instant.

The rocky dry hills and their people were poor; their lives were a struggle here; that was why the Blessed Mother showed herself here; the people here needed her. Although she didn’t see the Messiah or the rest of the family or her mother with the dancers, Indigo was much heartened; all who are lost will be found, a voice inside her said; the voice came from the Messiah, Indigo was certain.

Edward rejoined them as the crowd began to disperse. He saw the women and even some of the men had been crying. He thought Hattie and the child were rather subdued but he chalked that up to fatigue. He was still a bit out of breath himself from the exertion of carrying the tripod and the camera case, heavy now with dozens of twig cuttings carefully rolled in oil cloth to sustain them until they returned to the hotel. There he would hollow out little receptacles in the potatoes to provide the moisture and nutrients that would sustain the cuttings on their long journey to California.

The buggy ride back to the hotel in Cervione was long, but the night air coolness was invigorating. Edward was in rare high spirits and talked excitedly about the joint venture with Dr. Gates — shares in the citron stock in exchange for shares in the meteor iron mine. Hattie let Edward talk while she considered how to describe what she had seen on the schoolhouse wall; she barely held her temper the first time Edward wisecracked about “religious hysteria.” Briefly she thought he might understand if only she explained it in the right words, but as he went on about drilling machines to mine the meteor crater in Arizona, she realized it was no use, not right now.

Fatigue overtook her, limb by limb, until she could not keep her eyes open; Indigo was already asleep, curled up on the buggy seat. As she drifted off to sleep, she recalled the light in Aunt Bronwyn’s garden that night — now she was certain it wasn’t a dream; it was true; she must write to her at once and tell her about that night and what they’d seen today. Indigo had seen it too, and now the child was so happy and excited before she fell asleep, she asked Hattie how far they were from Jerusalem. Far away, Hattie told her, but much closer than before. Tomorrow Hattie would bring out the atlas for the train ride back to Bastia, and they’d have a geography lesson on the Holy Land.

The ship departed Bastia for Livorno on the evening tide; the light breeze on deck was cool and invigorating as Hattie and Indigo watched the silhouette of the shore recede. A lovely half-moon floated above them in an ocean of stars, and when Hattie pointed to it Indigo smiled and nodded her head. Yes, the eye of the big snake was watching out for them — that’s what Grandma said. The wide band of bright stars was her belly and chest, though of course she was much too big to be seen from earth.

When they returned to the cabin Edward was busily wrapping the twig cuttings, their tips stuck in cubes of potato. Later she would be embarrassed she never questioned Edward’s authority to cut the twigs from the venerable orchards; it was for science, she thought.

No, she did not suspect anything was amiss until the customs officer on the pier in Livorno motioned for his two assistants to unload the hand trolley stacked with their luggage.

Hattie had walked ahead with Indigo, who was terribly anxious to get to the hotel, where she was sure they would find Rainbow safely in his brass cage waiting for her. She reassured the child the customs inspection would not take long, but when she glanced back to see if Edward was coming along yet, she was shocked to see Edward surrounded by customs officers. Hattie took Indigo’s hand firmly in hers and hurried back to find clothing and personal items deliberately scattered over the inspection table. The citron cuttings were in neat rows. They had also set aside the little sacks of gladiolus corms and seeds Laura gave them as well as the seeds Aunt Bronwyn gave Indigo.

Hattie tried to go to Edward’s side, but the customs officers politely blocked her path. It was not possible, they said, and motioned for her and the child to step back. Hattie assumed they would be reunited momentarily, so she did not insist. Seconds later she was shocked to see the customs officers lead Edward away; Hattie called out his name, and for an instant he turned his head, and their eyes met for an instant before the officers moved him along. She could not forget the expression in his eyes because its meaning eluded her, yet it remained just near enough to bother her. What expression had she expected to see?

Indigo took Edward’s arrest in stride; Mama and Grandma used to get arrested — it didn’t mean anything, she tried to reassure Hattie. She was more concerned about the delay; she wanted to get to the hotel to see if Rainbow was found. She sketched and colored a drawing of a green, blue, and yellow parrot while Hattie answered the officers’ questions.

Her husband had received a cablegram of authorization in Genoa only last week, Hattie told them. She had seen the two envelopes in his breast pocket when he returned from the consulate. It would be a simple matter, would it not, to ask the cable office to check their records. The customs officers asked no further questions but requested she remain at the American consulate until further notice; they brought around a cab that took her and the child to the consulate.

The deputy consul was on vacation and his assistant away in Rome; the clerk in charge, a dour American with dirty cuffs, announced, in any event, they could do nothing for Americans caught smuggling. Hattie protested; her husband had special authorization from the U.S. Agriculture secretary himself! The clerk stared at her for a moment, his eyes grotesquely magnified by his spectacles; then he rudely turned away and showed her and the child to the door of a sitting room set aside for American citizens in distress.

Hattie had not cried earlier when she saw all their belongings scattered; nor had she cried when the authorities marched Edward away, because then she still believed it was all a misunderstanding. But as she guided Indigo ahead of her into the small dingy room, furnished only with a dark leather sofa and a table and chair, Hattie began to cry.

She sat on the edge of sofa and stared straight ahead at the glass doors to the balcony. Indigo squeezed her hand and whispered, “Don’t worry, Hattie. Please don’t cry.” Indigo wasn’t afraid, because the police here did not shove or kick them the way the Indian police and soldiers did in Arizona, and they brought Hattie and Indigo to the consulate as soon as Hattie answered their questions.

To cheer her up, Indigo talked about the way the Indian police tied their ankles and wrists so she and Sister Salt couldn’t get away; she told Hattie the stories about the times Grandma Fleet was caught by soldiers or by the Indian police, only to escape later; Mama even escaped Fort Yuma, though it took her more than a year. Hattie mustn’t be sad — at home people got arrested for no reason all the time. There was nothing to be ashamed of; this wasn’t bad at all.

Hattie was quite touched by Indigo’s efforts to cheer her and she had to smile at Indigo’s confidence that the police here were not so bad; as she listened, she was shocked at the routine brutality the child described. Indigo was happy to be telling Hattie stories because the telling took her mind off Rainbow; she was certain he was waiting for her at the hotel. If they hadn’t arrested Edward, she and Rainbow would already be together again, playing with the quartz pebbles Indigo picked up near the schoolhouse with the miraculous wall.

Indigo sketched and colored gladiolus in her notebook. She recopied the pages of text that she’d copied from Laura’s gladiolus books because it helped her to remember the Latin names. One hour passed and then two; Hattie had no idea how long they would be detained there; both she and the child were hungry and exhausted. When she went downstairs with a ten-lire note to ask if they might get something to eat, the American clerk glared at her but snatched the ten lire from the counter and called a young Italian boy from the back to bring them the bread and milk Hattie requested.

Hattie began to fear they would be detained there until the deputy consul returned, and that might be days. The authorities seized all their bags but did return Hattie’s purse and Indigo’s valise. With a sheet of paper torn from Indigo’s notebook Hattie wrote a note to Laura. She apologized for the bother after all the hospitality Laura had extended to them, but there had been a misunderstanding with the customs officials and the American consul and staff were away. Could Laura recommend an attorney in Livorno who might help them?

Hattie consulted her little book of useful Italian phrases and when the boy brought the milk and bread upstairs, she told him to keep the change as a tip. The boy, who had avoided looking at her directly until then, broke into a big smile. His eyes widened when she gave him another ten lire and asked him to send the letter to Lucca the fastest way possible. The boy looked at the ten lire in his hand and at the address on the letter; if he hurried, he said, the letter might still go on the evening train to Lucca.

Hattie stood at the French doors of the balcony and watched the street as she waited, certain Edward would come or at least the clerk would bring her some news. But at closing time the American clerk informed her, for safety purposes, the building must be locked overnight, though they could move about inside until he returned the next morning at eight. Hattie was too shocked by his statement to think to ask him what they should do in case of fire.

The toilet facilities were downstairs, and there was a sink and running water, but no towels. The long leather sofa was large enough for both of them to curl up at each end; the night was quite warm, and while Indigo slept soundly, Hattie lay awake much of the night and wondered how Edward was faring. Was he in jail in Livorno, or did customs have their own detention facilities? Toward morning she did manage to fall asleep but woke with a start, her clothes damp and twisted under her; she dreamed she was in the old woods of Laura’s garden on the overgrown path to the hidden grotto but she could not find her way back to the house. In the gray light before dawn, the dream left her with a lingering sadness she had not felt since the incident with Mr. Hyslop; careful not to wake the child, she went to the table and wept.

The boy came again the next morning; this time Hattie asked for oranges and cheese to go with the milk and bread. She unfastened the latches and Indigo helped her open the doors to the balcony for fresh air; they might as well make themselves at home if they were going to be there long. Indigo went out on the balcony and searched the streets and skyline for the hotel with its big tree where Rainbow escaped. She stood very still and listened for a long time until Hattie asked her what was wrong; while the morning air was still cool, she hoped she might hear Rainbow’s call.

Indigo got discouraged after a while and came in to lie down on the couch. Hattie reminded her if the parrot was in its cage inside the hotel she would not be able to hear him call — she mustn’t give up hope. Hattie was confident, with the help of their friend Laura and perhaps an attorney, the misunderstanding would be cleared up. Hattie reached into her bag and brought out the book of adventures of the monkey king; his wild exploits were just the thing to cheer them up.

Indigo look up at Hattie. How much longer did they have to stay here? Hattie looked down at the book and shook her head. Indigo had been lying down on the couch, her stocking feet curled under her, but now she sat up and restlessly looked out the open doors to the balcony. Hattie went on reading.

Indigo gave a loud sigh; Hattie looked up from the page to see what was the matter. Indigo got up from the couch wiping her eyes on the back of her hand and went out on the balcony to listen again. While she listened for parrot sounds amid the street noise, Indigo watched the donkey carts and buggies in the street and the people come and go on the sidewalks below. Her hair itched because it was dirty; they had not been able to wash or change their clothes. This was beginning to remind Indigo of their captivity by the Indian police before Sister Salt was taken away and Indigo put on a train. If only they could get to the hotel, she was certain Rainbow was waiting there. She was so discouraged.

Edward never wanted Rainbow to come along. The tears came faster as she thought of the little parrot who loved her and trusted she’d come back for him. She set her chin on the balcony railing and didn’t even try to blink away the tears. Tears made everything blurry and she saw two or three of the same object when she looked without wiping her eyes; she didn’t care. Then she noticed a figure at the end of the street rapidly approaching, and recognized something familiar in the purposeful stride. She wiped her eyes and looked again, and sure enough it was their friend Laura, but what was it that she carried? “Rainbow! Rainbow!” Indigo shouted, and from the street below she heard the parrot screech and squawk in reply.

Laura brought more good news: they were free to go. Hattie wasted no time asking questions; she simply wanted to get to the hotel for a bath and a hot meal and bed. But what news did she have about Edward? Laura put her arm around Hattie’s shoulders and told her not to worry; she had posted the bond for Edward’s release and he would be along in an hour or two. Still, Hattie could not shake off the vague dread rising inside herself.

While Hattie poured Laura more tea, Indigo sat on the floor rolling pebbles to the parrot, who caught them in his beak, then let them bounce across the tile floor. Laura amused them with the story of Rainbow’s return and capture at the fountain in the hotel garden. Laura hoped they didn’t mind, but the gardener clipped the parrot’s wing feathers to prevent another escape. Indigo’s face was bright with happiness and again she thanked Laura, who smiled and told her to thank the gardener, not her.

“But it was so thoughtful of you to bring him along when you came to the consulate,” Hattie added. “You’ve been so kind — I don’t know if we could’ve endured another night on that couch!” They had been at the hotel for almost two hours, and still no Edward; Hattie began to have misgivings. A simple misunderstanding would not take so long to resolve; a sick feeling began to overtake her, from her stomach to her head; her toes and fingers tingled as if the supply of blood was cut off; she stood up abruptly but sank down again in the chair.

Laura helped Hattie to the bed and Indigo, the parrot on her shoulder, gently removed Hattie’s shoes as she lay back silently on the pillow with her eyes fixed on the ceiling as tears slid down her cheeks. Laura pulled a chair next to the bed while Indigo refilled the parrot’s pottery cups with fresh water and sunflower seeds.

“I am so sorry,” Laura said in a soft voice; she looked down at her hands in her lap, and Indigo saw she was almost in tears too.

“Goddamn police!” Indigo said to the parrot, and immediately felt better; both women heard her but neither corrected her. All police were the same, she told Rainbow; they worked for the devil, and the soldiers did too. She lined up the pebbles in a row and pretended they were policemen as she took aim and flicked them one by one across the floor with her fingers. Rainbow watched with great interest as the pebbles clattered across the floor tiles.

Hattie gave a loud sigh and dabbed at her eyes and nose with a handkerchief before she turned to Laura, who reached out to pat her hand and began to speak in a low even voice. Ordinarily, the customs officers did not bother to search the luggage of American tourists returning from Corsica, but the authorities were on the lookout for anarchist secret agents since the assassination of King Umberto. Hattie blinked her eyes but otherwise gave no sign she was listening, but Indigo’s ears perked up at the mention of secret agents. She was becoming accustomed to Laura’s voice and accent, which reminded her of the English the Mexican people spoke along the river.

Even so, it was the French customs officials — not the Italians — who guarded the citron industry of Corsica so closely. Laura paused, then in a soft voice asked if Hattie wanted to sleep.

“No,” she said quickly, “please, the sound of your voice is soothing.” Hattie glanced over at the child, who tried to draw in her notebook as the parrot waddled around her and persisted in reaching for the colored pencil between her fingers. Actually it was a game, and Indigo only pretended to draw as she listened to Laura and Hattie.

The killing of the king only four years after Italy’s shocking defeat in Abyssinia left the nation stunned. Indigo watched Laura’s hands — so graceful when she spoke — with the beautiful rings with their lovely glittering stones of purple, green, and blue.

Many felt there was a connection between the army’s humiliation in East Africa and the king’s assassination. The prime minister and his cabinet were forced to resign after the defeat at Aduwa. Nothing was the same after that. Laura’s voice was softer, and she slowly turned the rings on her fingers as she spoke. Many hundreds dead, and thousands held prisoner, forced Italy to acknowledge Abyssinia’s independence. A ransom of millions was paid to the Abyssinian emperor for the return of Italian prisoners.

Hattie sat up and adjusted the pillows to make sure she could hear her friend; Laura’s voice became softer as she described her disbelief and confusion when she learned her husband had been absent from his troops days before the battle. Intelligence reports out of Cairo detailed his comings and goings at the estate of a certain Egyptian munitions dealer a few miles outside of Cairo. Not only had he deserted his command; he had divorced her to start a new life, married to the munitions dealer’s daughter, with a dowry worth millions. Even now Laura’s tone of voice was of one still stunned.

Once the shock had passed, she realized the Egyptians had done her an immeasurable favor; she might have wasted years more of her life with that man in ignorance of his cowardice. This way it was mercifully ended.

They sat in silence for a moment; even the parrot remained motionless on Indigo’s arm. Then Laura excused herself; she knew they needed time to rest; Edward would be coming anytime, and she had to catch the train to Lucca.

After Laura left, all Hattie could think about was what to say to Edward; as his wife and life partner, surely she had a right to know the truth about their Corsican excursion! She distinctly remembered the two cablegrams he picked up at the consulate the day they arrived from Lucca — one was authorization from Washington, he said; but the customs officers found the cables and their messages were quite the opposite!

Tears filled Hattie’s eyes but she was determined to be strong. When Indigo finished with her bath, Hattie was next; she soaked in the delicious warm water with her eyes closed until the water began to cool. She tried to reconcile her hopes and affection for Edward with the facts before her, but it was impossible — she didn’t know where to begin. Instead she sank until only her nose was above the bathwater; in the warm strange silence underwater she recalled the glowing light in Aunt Bronwyn’s garden, and a feeling of peace filled her. As she rinsed the soap from her hair Hattie pushed all the doubt from her mind; she would make the best of it, whatever happened; what was most important was to reunite the child with her family.

Indigo had been sitting on the floor so long she lost the feeling in both legs; they tingled as she wiggled her feet to make the blood circulate again. She was tired of being indoors and asked Hattie if she and Rainbow could go downstairs to the hotel garden. The hotel staff all smiled and pointed at the parrot on her shoulder and seemed quite pleased to see them together again; the concierge smiled and said something to her in Italian — maybe a friendly reminder not to let the bird get away again.

The big tree in the hotel garden was full of blackbirds chirping and trilling; Indigo asked Rainbow what they were saying. The parrot tipped his head from side to side, then looked at Indigo and stretched both wings out over his back. It was time to go. The afternoon wasn’t as warm as previous days, and Indigo could already see a difference in the position of the sun as it began to move toward the south for winter. The Messiah and the others were probably already on their way home.

Edward did not appear until sundown, long after Laura left. Hattie threw her arms around him in spite of herself. They embraced only briefly; he explained he was exhausted after his ordeal. Fortunately they had allowed him to bathe and change his clothes while in custody. Hattie smiled and shook her head; she and the child had not been so lucky: at the American consulate they shared a couch and had no baths. Edward glanced over at Indigo and the parrot. So the bird was found just as he said it would be! Indigo nodded.

Hattie didn’t know what she expected Edward to say to her but he should have said something — given some expression of regret or sorrow over their detention, since his twig cuttings were the cause. Hattie was about to confront him, but just then there was a knock on the door. Customs authorities had released their luggage and the hotel staff brought it to their suite.

Hattie was shocked when she saw the damage done during the search by customs authorities. The interior linings and the panels behind them were ripped open to expose the wood frame, tin, and leather. Evidently the contents of the luggage were searched, then hastily repacked, because Hattie’s nightgowns, Indigo’s dress shoes, and Edward’s books on citrus horticulture were dumped together helter-skelter in the trunk that had been packed with Edward’s shirts and trousers. The drawers of the big steamer trunks were jammed into the wrong slots; lace edges of handkerchiefs and parts of stockings dangled out. Hattie’s underwear apparently got particular attention because it was wadded up and stuffed into the small leather valise Edward packed with his shoes and slippers. Hattie dropped the valise; she couldn’t touch those undergarments again until they’d been washed.

All of their clothing was wrinkled and soiled from the search. Hattie rescued Indigo’s underwear and dresses from the camera case, where they were stuffed on top of the photographic equipment. Indigo was more concerned with recovering the gladiolus corms and the seeds spilled from their packets into the bottom of the trunk that previously contained Hattie’s books and notes. They both cautioned her to be careful; although Hattie’s books and notes were no longer in the trunk, two square wooden boxes of Edward’s glass negatives were packed with a bathrobe and pair of Edward’s walking shoes. Indigo was worried about the envelopes and tiny boxes of flower and vegetable seeds she had been saving for the gardens in the dunes.

Rainbow was in his cage with the door shut to prevent any damage to the clothes and belongings, but he could see all of the objects, which intrigued him; he protested with a loud series of screeches that caused both Edward and Hattie to look sharply at her and the bird. Indigo could feel the trouble in the air despite the cool breeze from the balcony and windows. Off in the distance, over the evening sounds of the streets, Indigo heard loud laughter.

Hattie was relieved Laura missed the spectacle of the rifled luggage, by far the most humiliating part of their detention. Edward continued to pick through the mess of clothing and papers and books for a clean shirt to send downstairs to be pressed. Did Hattie have anything she wanted to send down for herself or Indigo? Hattie shook her head and sat down on the edge of the bed, suddenly too exhausted to look at another trunk, although Edward warned that if any items were missing, they must make a list to present to the American consulate.

Throughout the evening, during dinner and afterward, Edward talked about the beastly customs men — common thieves who pillaged private property — and about travel arrangements, but still Edward made no mention of her and Indigo’s detention. He expressed no regret, nor did he express any gratitude for the sizable bond which Laura pledged on his behalf.

He must be suffering shock from the ordeal, Hattie thought; he really wasn’t himself. Even his appearance seemed changed, though she could not say exactly how. He did not look directly at her but at a point beside her as if he were watching for something. His tone of voice had an uncharacteristic edge of bitterness as he blamed the Plant Industry Bureau and the Department of Agriculture. He had already sent cablegrams to Lowe & Company and to the company attorney, Mr. Grabb.

As Hattie listened a sinking feeling began to overtake her; he had been following a clandestine plan all along. She and the child were his dupes — his decoys! She watched him babble on without bothering to listen. Poor Edward, what a desperate creature you are, she thought. At last she shook her head; tears filled her eyes.

“Please,” she said, “don’t say any more.”

Later, after the lights were out, they lay awake side by side in the bed, careful not to touch each other, and talked in low voices so the child did not awaken. The marriage was over, she said. He gave a loud sigh, but did not reply. That was a sigh of relief, she thought angrily, but had to admit she felt a great deal of relief herself. Still, she cried when she recalled their engagement and the high hopes they’d both had; he patted her hand gently to comfort her. The marriage was doomed from the start, and they both shared the blame.

As the ship was towed away from the pier in Livorno, Indigo held up the cage so Rainbow could say good-bye to Italy. The color of the sea before sundown was so lovely — as clear and blue as the topaz of Laura’s ring. She would miss this color of blue — there was none like it anywhere in California or Arizona.