Range of Light (26 page)

“Yes,” Adele said absently.

Then, “How do you mean?”

“She got us back here. Together.”

We broke down sobbing.

The night was warm, still. Crickets hummed. We were surrounded by a wreath of minty pennyroyal.

“She had a great hunger, she kept trying,” Adele mused as she lay on the blanket, and searched the sky, “she was always reaching forward, wanting more.”

“So it's the wanting that counts?” I leaned on one elbow.

“That's all there is.” Her voice was soft, determined.

“Yes,” I said, because it would be a relief to believe this were true.

“Oh!” She pointed. “A shooting star.”

“Where?” I demanded. “Damn, I missed it.” She pulled me down on the blanket. “Here. You'll see them if you lie here and keep your eyes open.”

I studied the sky and thought how long it seemed since that first trip. Lifetimes. How long since Adele's lost night. Meanwhile, we had always been here, always, lying on this sweet wool blanket, tracking the stars.

“There!” Adele said.

I missed this one too.

Together we located Libra, Sagittarius, Scorpio.

The evening grew cooler and we moved closer for warmth.

“There!” Adele called again.

“Where?”

“Quick, by Mars.”

“Oh, yes, there. I see it now.”

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the Rockefeller Foundation Study Center at Bellagio, the Banff Center for the Arts, the Blue Mountain Center, the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts and the Heinz Foundation at Hawthornden Castle for providing me with residencies during the years I was writing this novel. Thanks, too, to the McKnight Foundation, the University of Minnesota and Arizona State University for grant support.

Over the years I've walked a lot of Sierra trails and studied many books about these mountains. I won't reproduce the entire biblio­graphy, but in particular I want to express admiration for
Meadow in the Sky
by Elizabeth Stone O'Neill. Also of special help were
The Mountains of California
by John Muir,
High Sierra Hiking Guide, 4
by Jeffrey P. Schaffer and Thomas Winnett,
Indians of the Yosemite
by Galen Clark,
Yosemite Wild-flower Trails
by Dana C. Morgenson and
Native Trees of the Sierra Nevada
by P. Victor Peterson and P. Victor Peterson, Jr.

I am very grateful to the people who read
Range of Light
in various drafts and provided valuable response: Paulette Bates Alden, Judith Barrington, Martha Boesing, Maria Damon, Janice Eidus, Pamela Fletcher, Jana Harris, Elizabeth Horan, Helen Hoy, Ruth-Ellen Joeres, Deborah Johnson, Amy Kaminsky, Myrna Kostash, Helen Longino, Victoria Nelson, Martha Roth, Karen Rust, Sue Schweik­, Gretchen Scherer, Peggy Webb and Susan Welch.

I owe much to the generous research assistance of Kristin Bolton, Nancy Hellner, Nancy Kool, Scott Muskin, Gretchen Scherer, Rebecca Pierre and Andrea Weiss.

Finally and most importantly, I thank Helen Longino for many years of loving partnership and adventure, including a decade hiking together over these glorious Sierra trails.

About the Author

Valerie Miner is the award-winning author of fourteen books, including novels, short fiction collections, and nonfiction. Miner's work has appeared in the Georgia Review, TriQuarterly, Salmagundi, New Letters, Ploughshares, the Village Voice, Prairie Schooner, the Gettysburg Review, the Times Literary Supplement, the Women's Review of Books, the Nation, and other journals. Her stories and essays have been published in more than sixty anthologies. A number of her pieces have been dramatized on BBC Radio 4. Her work has been translated into German, Turkish, Danish, Italian, Spanish, French, Swedish, and Dutch. She has won fellowships and awards from the Rockefeller Foundation, the McKnigh­t Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Jerome Foundation, the Heinz Foundation, the Bogliasco Foundation, Fundación Valparaiso, the Australia Council Literary Arts Board, and numerous other organizations. She has received Fulbright fellowships to Tunisia, India, and Indonesia. Winner of a Distinguished Teaching Award, she has taught for over twenty-five years and is now a professor and artist in residence at Stanford University. She travels i
nternationally giving readings, lectures, and workshops. Her website is 
www.valerieminer.com
.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this book or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written­ permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

“Dragonflies Mating” from
Sun Under Wood
by Robert Hass. Copyright © 1996 by Robert Hass. Reprinted by permission of the Ecco Press.

The John Muir quotation is from Elizabeth Stone O'Neill,
Meadow in the Sky
(Fresno: Panorama West Books, 1984). The Virginia Reed quotation is from “The Donner Party,” an
American Experience
film written and directed by Ric Burns, PBS, 1992.

Copyright © 1998 by Valerie Miner

Cover design by Julianna Lee

978-1-4976-2148-0

This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

345 Hudson Street

New York, NY 10014

www.openroadmedia.com