The Lake of Dreams - Kim Edwards [91]
Iris. Where are you at this moment? I named you for the flowers. They are the color of your father’s eyes. This is the story I want you to know. Your uncle cannot tell you, he doesn’t understand.
Also, he would begin with the comet, which is the wrong place to start.
The story begins earlier. An ordinary summer day. I was weeding in the vineyard. I paused to drink from the bucket. That’s when I saw the line of rising dust, the bright flashes of silver through the trees.
“What’s that?” I asked. My friend Ellen stood, too.
“I don’t know”.
“I think it’s an auto-mobile!” I was excited, I had never seen one before.
“It must belong to the Wyndhams”.
“It must”.
“Let’s go and see”.
So we left our work and ran to the village.
By the time we reached the commons people were coming from their shops and homes, shading their eyes to look. Mr. Marcus, the grocer, said it was a Rolls Royce—a Silver Ghost, he called it.
The vehicle drew closer. It made no sound at all, not even when it stopped at the village green, bright as a mirror. Everyone who looked at it saw something different reflected back—a dream of speed, of a factory job, the promise of change. Your uncle leaned over the engine. I stared at its silver hood where a small silver woman with silver wings stood about to leap, to soar.
“Do you like her?” Geoffrey Wyndham was next to me. I nodded, too shy to speak. His family owns most of the village. In the church graveyard you can see tombstones with their name all the way back to 1134. One winter we skated on the pond and Geoffrey chased me until the color of the ice changed suddenly, from opaque to clear, the darkness of the water visible. He shouted and grabbed my arm, pulled me away from that dangerous edge. Now he was tall. My chin only reached his shoulder.
“Go ahead”, he urged. “Touch her”.
So I ran my hand over her silver form.
At supper that night all we talked of was the auto-mobile. Our father sat in the middle of the conversation like a boulder in a current. Finally he dropped his fork and stood.
“There’s still work here to do, and plenty of it”, he said to Joseph. “Let’s go.”
“Ah—for what?” Joseph’s voice was rough. “Who will need wooden wheels for wagons when auto-mobiles travel twice the speed on rubber tires?”
It was as if the air left the room. Father turned without speaking and went into the shop. Joseph rose and followed him. A few minutes later the argument began. We cleared the table, not speaking, as the words rose and ebbed and rose again.
It is night now, I can hardly see to write. The young couple has gone to the dining car. The old woman took off her hat and ate a beef sandwich spread carefully on a cloth napkin she unfolded from her bag. The accountant next to me has begun to doze. For a time we passed endless rows of houses and flats, moving so slowly that I caught glimpses of people eating dinner at their kitchen tables, or reading in a chair, or reaching to close their curtains. Then we picked up speed as the flats ended and factories began. Then it was dark again. I ate a roll, trying not to notice the scent of roast meat.
Time is different when you travel. This night is less like last night, when I lay awake in our little room, listening to your soft breathing, than it is like the night years ago when Joseph and I were traveling to this new land. On that trip I woke each time we stopped, lights and voices from the stations drifting down the darkened aisles.
Joseph was sleeping, his eyelashes dark against his cheeks, his coat folded carefully beneath his head. He looked like the carefree brother I knew before our troubles, before he changed, and I changed, and everything we knew was lost. The train moved on then, into the night, taking us closer to our new lives. I closed