Keeping Holiday (6 page)

Another wave of despair tugged at Dylan’s mind and sucked him under. Nothing could be done. He was helpless to escape his prison. Nor could anyone else rescue him or even locate him. Dylan peered again into the darkness, but of course, he still could not see. (It was no consolation at all that there was nothing to be seen.) He strained to hear anything in the stillness—he
would even have been glad to hear the hideous moans again—but he could hear only a deathly silence. And that humming.

Humming? Dylan lifted his head to hear better. Yes, from somewhere, a faint hum penetrated his prison walls. How long had there been humming? He was certain that it had not just begun, that it had been going on for a while, but he distinctly remembered a time when he had not been able to hear it. He could hear it now, however, and whatever it was, he welcomed it. The sound delighted Dylan, because it meant there was at least one other thing in his world besides horror and despair.

Where had Dylan heard a sound like this before? Maybe it was like the sound of the surf at the beach, only softer. No, not quite that—it was the sound of wind in the forest. That was it! The hum sounded like a breeze in the top of pine trees, except for this: every now and then, in the hum, Dylan thought he heard a word. Dylan kept listening—after all, he had nothing else to do—and the longer he listened, the more certain he grew that the humming contained words. At first, the only words he could pick out were plant kinds of words, like “forest,” “ivy,” “wither,” “tree,” “grow,” and “evergreen.” As he continued to listen, though, he began to hear other kinds of words as well—“die” and “winter,” “life” and “everlasting.”

Dylan felt he could listen, content, to the humming forever. The relief at knowing something else
was,
even it if was outside his prison’s walls, was that great. Then came the voice. Dylan did not recognize it as belonging to anyone he knew. Yet, though he had never heard it before, it seemed somehow familiar. If Dylan had tried to describe it, he would have said the voice was
huge
, the biggest voice he’d ever heard. Indeed, the voice filled Dylan’s little black chamber, leaving no space for anything else. The voice called Dylan’s name, once, then fell silent.

Dylan jumped to his feet, heart pounding. Someone knew he was here after all. Someone had come to get him out. “I’m here! I’m in here!” Dylan called. The darkness and the stone dwarfed his own voice and swallowed it. He tried again, louder. “I’m here! I’m in here! It’s me! Dylan!” No answer. “It’s me, Dylan,” he called again, “the one you’re looking for!” He paused and listened. He heard only the humming with its occasional words—no voice, no approaching footsteps. He yelled and yelled without a response, then, finally, his despair deeper than ever, Dylan sank back down onto the floor, his back against the cave wall.

“Dylan!” came the huge voice again, and, again, Dylan jumped to his feet. He could not help it. It simply was not possible to remain sitting in the presence of that voice. “Come this way,” the voice commanded, then fell silent. From those few simple words, Dylan understood two things. He knew he must obey that voice. Nothing less than his complete and precise obedience would do. And he knew he must meet the one who had spoken.

Almost immediately, Dylan heard another little voice, from inside his own head. Dylan knew he had heard this voice before, although it was not until later that he realized where. “Come where?” this voice said quietly, but indignantly. “There’s nothing here but four solid stone walls. You can’t ‘come’ anywhere!” From experience, Dylan knew that this second voice told the truth, but it did not matter to him. He had to obey the huge voice, whether he could or not. He had no choice. He walked forward, feeling for the wall that he knew was right in front of his face—but it was not there. He took another step, then another, still feeling for a wall, but he never found one. He walked on in the direction from which the voice had called, the hum growing louder with each step he took. He had not walked very far at all when he saw bright daylight pouring in at an opening just ahead. He headed for that opening—the hum had become quite loud now—and stepped at last through a hole in the stone just his size and out into a forest clearing.

Nothing in Dylan’s life had ever smelled as wonderful as the fragrance of these pines. Nothing had ever felt so delicious as the warm breeze playing with the grass in the clearing. Nor had anything ever appeared so alive as this great, green, growing forest. For a moment, Dylan did nothing but soak up the richness of ordinary, everyday life. Then, suddenly, he realized how badly his legs were shaking, and he sank down onto the forest floor.

Reminded by his shaky legs of the danger he had just escaped, Dylan looked around for the possessor of the voice that had called his name and led him out. He saw no one. And as for the humming, he was sure that it was not just the wind in the trees he had been hearing, because the occasional words had become even more distinct. Who had called him and what was making the humming song? And most importantly—Dylan went cold all over as the thought came to him—where was Clare?

To Dylan’s credit, as soon as he remembered Clare, he jumped to his feet and headed back toward the hideous darkness he had just left. A voice something between a squeak and a loud whisper stopped him in his tracks. “Where you goin’?” the voice asked. “You can’t go back in, you know. And why would you want to anyway? People never want to go back in once they’re out.”

Dylan turned around. He could see no one. There were only the trees surrounding the small clearing in front of the cave’s opening. “Who are you? Where are you?” Dylan called loudly.

For a moment, a squeaky, breathy laugh was the only response. It reminded Dylan of the times when he and Clare would begin giggling at the dinner table, when they were younger, and find themselves unable to stop. Waiting for the laughter to subside gave Dylan time to look for its source. It really seemed to be coming from a small fir tree on the edge of the clearing, a tree not much taller than Dylan. No breeze of any kind blew any of the other trees at the moment, but this one little tree shook and rustled,
Just like a tree might do if
it were laughing
, Dylan thought to himself.

At last the tree (for by now Dylan felt sure that this was, indeed, who laughed) gave a long shudder and sighed. “Whew! Sorry,” it said, with the voice of someone who has finally pulled himself together enough to speak. “I didn’t mean to laugh at you. It was just so funny to see you yelling when I’m right in front of you.”

Dylan’s anxiety for Clare made him a bit sharp. “You can’t blame me for not expecting a
tree
to be the one talking.”

Completely serious now, the tree replied, “Really? Don’t they talk where you come from?”

“Of course not,” Dylan almost snapped, then, thoughtfully, “at least,
I’ve
never heard one.”

“Aha!” the tree crowed. “That’s not at all the same thing, is it? Is it that the trees don’t talk? Or is it that you don’t hear?”

A thought occurred to Dylan. “Then,
was
the song I heard coming from the trees?” Before the tree could reply, though, Dylan shook his head. “You know, I really don’t care right now,” he said. “My cousin’s back in there, lost, and I need to go find her.”

“Dad!” called the talking tree, and from behind it came another voice, larger, deeper, husky.

“
You
can’t find her,” this deeper voice said. “And if you could, you couldn’t get her out through
your
exit. She has to come out her own exit.”

“Her own exit?” Dylan looked, puzzled, at the tall fir tree who was speaking. It stood just behind and to the left of the younger, giggly tree. “How many exits to that cave are there?”

“Oh, there are as many exits as there are people who come out,” the tree replied. “Everyone has his or her own exit; there are no two alike. But every exit leads out into this forest, so you’re sure to meet up with her again. In fact, someone’s coming now. Down in my roots, I can feel footsteps coming this way.”

Dylan waited, holding his breath. Soon, he could hear the footsteps the
tree felt and, an instant later, he saw the person making them. “Clare!” he called, and ran to her. Dylan and Clare were not the kind of cousins that embraced every time they saw each other, but they hugged one another tightly now. Dylan thought he heard the young tree whisper, “I wish I could do that with
my
branches.”

“Have you been out of the cave long?” Dylan asked his cousin.

Clare nodded. “For a while. Oh, Dylan, I am
so
glad to see you! I was afraid you’d never come out. How did you get out?” she asked. Something must have been in her eye, because she had to rub at it for a moment.

Dylan told Clare about the steps that had led him deep into the dark hole and had then disappeared, preventing him from going back up again. He told her how hopeless and how helpless he had felt, sitting alone in his little space of darkness. He told how, first, he had heard the humming, and then a voice that had called him. “It was the strangest thing,” he tried to explain. “When that voice called, ‘Come,’ I had to do it, even though I knew I couldn’t. And as soon as I began moving toward it, there was nothing stopping me at all. I went just a little ways and then here I was, in this forest. Hey! Do you realize these trees can talk? At least some of them can.”

Clare laughed. “Yes, I’ve been talking with trees, too,” she said.

“Not to sound mushy,” Dylan said, “but it sure is good to hear you laugh! I didn’t know how I was going to find you in there. In fact, the tree here told me I wouldn’t be able to. He said you’d have your own exit and you wouldn’t be able to use mine. How did
you
get out?”

“Well, I heard the humming too,” Clare said, “only it wasn’t coming from outside anywhere; it was inside my own head. I noticed it just as soon as I couldn’t see you anymore, so I was never really afraid. I just stood there waiting—remember, it wasn’t as dark where I was—and I listened to the humming so I wouldn’t feel scared. And you know what I realized about the humming? I’ve been hearing it all my life, at least as far back as I can remember. I remember Mom and Dad humming it to me, when I was tiny. It’s one of the earliest memories I have. Anyway, I listened to the humming and didn’t worry. And I’m sure I heard the same voice you did, only for me, it wasn’t a separate loud voice. It was just mixed in with the humming—like it was part of the humming, but separate too. Pretty soon, I realized from the humming that I was supposed to walk straight ahead and that would lead me out. I didn’t want to go at first, because I was worried about you. But I felt really sure that I needed to go and that someone else would take care of you. There was nothing I could do for you. So I followed the path and came out into the forest.”

Dylan turned to the trees who had spoken with him earlier. “What about all the other people in the cave?” he wanted to know. “We heard all kinds of horrible moaning and wailing—will they all find their own exits and get out too?”

“In the first place,” the tree spoke patiently, as if explaining something to a little child, “no one
finds
his or her exit. People have to be
brought
to their exits. And then, no, not everyone will get out. Not everyone pays attention to the humming.”

Dylan found this hard to believe. “Why not?” he asked.

A breeze—or something—rustled through the tall tree’s upper branches, as though it had shrugged. “Some of the people in there don’t believe the humming is real. Other people don’t even notice it. Who knows what all the reasons are, but one thing’s certain—though many people go in, far fewer come out.”

Dylan turned to Clare. “That’s just what that man said—you know, the one who keeps trying to talk us out of seeing the real Holiday, Mr. Smith.” Dylan’s eyes widened as he realized something. “Clare!” he said. “It was
his
voice. When the big voice called me to come out, there was something in my head telling me I couldn’t, that there was no way out. I didn’t really pay much attention to it, because I was so focused on the big voice.
But it was that man’s voice
that was telling me it was impossible. It was inside my own head, but I know it was his voice!”