Authors: Madeleine L'engle
The Moon by Night (12 page)
“If I'd heard it I'd have recognized it from TV,” Suzy said, pulling out her notebook. “Do you think it's fair if I write it down if I didn't hear it?”
We didn't see Zachary that morning, and I didn't really expect to, the way he'd said good-bye the night before. John made a couple of cracks about losing my boy friend, but Mother shut him up.
When we left Mesa Verde we had to go back through a corner of New Mexico to get to Arizona. As we neared the New Mexico border we went into a Ute Indian reservation, and again the whole face of the earth changed completely and spectacularly. John has a
book,
The Conquest of Space,
with illustrations by Chesley Bonestell, of what scientists think other planets and satellites must look like, and this Ute reservation was like one of these illustrations. I began to feel that after we'd finished seeing America no land anywhere would have any surprises for us, even if we should go to Mars or the moon or the slushy frozen ammonia snows of Jupiter. The Ute Indians' land was dry and tan with dusty-looking grey vegetation. In the background were high cliffs with flat tops and eroded sides. As we drove along, strange, fairy-tale rock formations appeared out of nowhere. Daddy said they were volcanic monoliths. It gave me the feeling of absolutely tremendous age, as though this land had been made so long ago that the Pueblo civilization was only yesterday. It seemed that we could almost reach out and hold hands across time with the people in the cliff dwellings, but this Indian reservation reached so far back into the distant past that there was no way of bridging those hundreds of thousands of years. Were the Indians in the reservation part of that past? Zachary would probably know. How could they, how could
anybody
live there?
book,
The Conquest of Space,
with illustrations by Chesley Bonestell, of what scientists think other planets and satellites must look like, and this Ute reservation was like one of these illustrations. I began to feel that after we'd finished seeing America no land anywhere would have any surprises for us, even if we should go to Mars or the moon or the slushy frozen ammonia snows of Jupiter. The Ute Indians' land was dry and tan with dusty-looking grey vegetation. In the background were high cliffs with flat tops and eroded sides. As we drove along, strange, fairy-tale rock formations appeared out of nowhere. Daddy said they were volcanic monoliths. It gave me the feeling of absolutely tremendous age, as though this land had been made so long ago that the Pueblo civilization was only yesterday. It seemed that we could almost reach out and hold hands across time with the people in the cliff dwellings, but this Indian reservation reached so far back into the distant past that there was no way of bridging those hundreds of thousands of years. Were the Indians in the reservation part of that past? Zachary would probably know. How could they, how could
anybody
live there?
Arizona. Another state. (Rob finally did it first this time. “Two states!” he cried triumphantly.) A
nother
world.
nother
world.
It was really staggering. I mean, when your whole world has been a little village like Thornhill you can't help getting amazed when you see things you never realized even existed. I kept thinking that all these differences couldn't keep on, that we must have seen
everything
and the rest of it'd just be more of something we already knew, and then we'd round a bend and there'd be a kind of landscape I'd never even dreamed of before. How can
people
in all these places be the same when where they live is
so completely different? Well, Zachary lived in a different place, and
he
wasn't like anybody else I'd ever known before.
everything
and the rest of it'd just be more of something we already knew, and then we'd round a bend and there'd be a kind of landscape I'd never even dreamed of before. How can
people
in all these places be the same when where they live is
so completely different? Well, Zachary lived in a different place, and
he
wasn't like anybody else I'd ever known before.
“There should be Bug-Eyed Monsters here, or Little Blue Men,” John said as we drove into Painted Desert.
Hot, hot it was, and dry. We stopped at a filling station and bought a desert bag, a canvas bag that you fill with water and then hang outside the car. The water in the bag, even when you're driving in blistering sunlight, keeps cool because of evaporation. I don't understand this, even though Daddy and John and Suzy all tried to explain it to me. The main thing is, it works.
The desert was yellow, as though it had soaked up the color of the sun, with red, lava-like cones and pyramids that looked almost as though they had been made by people instead of being something nature dreamed up. The shadows were purple and blue and looked as though they were things in themselves, so that they'd be there, lying on the hot sand, even if there were nothing to cast them. There was a feeling of eternity about it, of being outside time, that must have affected even Rob, because suddenly he asked,
“Mother, do numbers have any end?”
“No, Rob.”
“If I counted all day and night would I come to an end?”
“No, Rob. You could go on counting forever.”
“But if
everybody
counted wouldn't there have to be an end?”
everybody
counted wouldn't there have to be an end?”
After a while the road started to get ugly and touristy again. We went across bridge after bridge over dry rivers, but now we knew how quickly those cracked river beds that looked as though they'd been empty for centuries could become raging torrents. Sometimes at the side of the road we would see Indians with
impassive, closed-in faces. They looked unfriendly. It was nothing as active as hate. It was just stolid dislike. I thought of the things Zachary'd said about Indians and I couldn't blame them. But it still made me uncomfortable.
impassive, closed-in faces. They looked unfriendly. It was nothing as active as hate. It was just stolid dislike. I thought of the things Zachary'd said about Indians and I couldn't blame them. But it still made me uncomfortable.
Every once in a while Daddy pointed out small dust twisters moving across the barren land. I leaned over the front seat towards Mother. “I don't think I want to live in Arizona.”
“We haven't seen much of it yet,” she said. “Some people think it's a paradise.”
Towards the end of the day's drive we began to climb. We'd been seeing hazy mountains in the distance for a long time, and as we finally reached them the blast of hot air began to get cooler, and at last we
did
see some green, the light green of grass and the darker green of pines, and then Daddy pulled in to Townsend Campsite, which is near Flagstaff, Arizona. It was by far the most primitive campsite we'd had, not much bigger than the roadside picnic areas at home. No lavatories. Only dirty, fly-inhabited privies. Suzy decided they were highly unsanitary and announced that she wasn't going to use them, but Daddy told her that she had no alternative, and when she had to go badly enough she'd use the privy, flies or no flies.
did
see some green, the light green of grass and the darker green of pines, and then Daddy pulled in to Townsend Campsite, which is near Flagstaff, Arizona. It was by far the most primitive campsite we'd had, not much bigger than the roadside picnic areas at home. No lavatories. Only dirty, fly-inhabited privies. Suzy decided they were highly unsanitary and announced that she wasn't going to use them, but Daddy told her that she had no alternative, and when she had to go badly enough she'd use the privy, flies or no flies.
The only thing to remember about Flagstaff, Arizona, is beautiful tall pines at the campgrounds, and strawberry jam.
There were a lot of kids there around Suzy's age, and while Mother and I were getting dinner everybody else played baseball, even Rob, who still isn't very good at it, but John pitched when he was at bat.
When Mother called out that dinner was ready Suzy came rushing back. The big green box of food was on the picnic bench
and she bumped against it and knocked it off the bench with a resounding crash.
and she bumped against it and knocked it off the bench with a resounding crash.
Mother just looked at Suzy, and Suzy cried, “I didn't mean to!”
Daddy picked up the box and set it on the table. Mother looked in and said, “Oh, no.”
I looked. We had just bought a brand new king size jar of strawberry jam. It was broken. Very broken. Jam was all over everything in the box.
Suzy offered quickly, “I'll clean it up.”
“No,” Mother said. “Thank you, Suzy. But no.” She pulled out the jar of mustard and it was covered with strawberry jam. Still holding the gooey mustard bottle Mother closed her mouth tight and walked around the table. Then she walked around the tent and the car. Then she came back to the table. “Suzy and Rob, get me water. Lots and lots of water.” She took a paper towel and wiped off the mustard jar. Then she reached in the box and pulled out a handful of broken glass and strawberry jam. “The sugar jar is broken, too.”
“Be careful of broken glass,” Daddy said, and took out the salt container, though you couldn't tell what was in the container for strawberry jam. The paper napkins were covered with strawberry jam. The English muffins for breakfast were covered with strawberry jam.
Mother moaned, “Why did I ever think I liked strawberry jam?” and then giggled.
Suzy and Rob came back with one small pot of water.
“What's this?” Daddy asked.
“The man wouldn't let us get any more,” Suzy said. “He says there's a water shortage.”
“He didn't like us,” Rob said. “He sounded mad.”
There wasn't a ranger at this campground, just an old and rather crochety man. Daddy said, “I'd better explain that we have a slight emergency. Come along, kids.”
We used up a whole roll of paper towels on the strawberry jam, putting the dirty towels in the fireplace until the fire smelled of burned sugar and strawberries.
Suzy, Rob, and Daddy came back with water, which, Daddy said, the man had been very loath to give them, even with explanations, and Suzy asked, and she wasn't being funny, “What are we going to have on the English muffins tomorrow morning?”
John said, “Suzy, people have lost their necks for less than that. If you'll take my advice you'll just be very, very quiet.”
The next day was Grand Canyon and we got there around noon. The only trouble with Grand Canyon was that we were already so saturated with beauty that we looked at it and said, “Oh. Pretty.” Which is hardly the word for Grand Canyon. But it just didn't mean to us what it would have meant if we'd come straight to it from Thornhill without all the other things in between.
Also, Grand Canyon was crowded and commercial, and it's a place you should see without any people at all.
Anybody can read all about Grand Canyon, so there's no point in describing it. We took a two night stopover there and had a lot of fun. There was a nuclear physicist and his family across from us so another baseball game got started and kept on going, on and off, for two days, with new kids joining in all the time till we had two full teams. John and I were the oldest. Not many teen-agers seem to go camping.
We went on some guided hikes, went to the campfire lectures, and took hot showers which you had to
pay
for at Grand Canyonâtwenty-five cents.
pay
for at Grand Canyonâtwenty-five cents.
We were there over Sunday so we went to the church service, and I'm sorry to say it was the dullest of all the ones we went to, held in a hall instead of outdoors like at lots of other parks. If there was ever a place to have church outdoors Grand Canyon was it. Suzy wriggled and Rob went to sleep and fell off his chair with a thud in the middle of the sermon. We had a terrible time not giggling, and I let out a loud, disgraceful snort, and that sent Suzy off, and it was a relief when it was over. Mother and Daddy were not pleased.
From Grand Canyon we went to Zion Canyon. Each day we kept thinking that we couldn't see anything more beautiful than the day before, but the drive to Zion was one of the most strange and beautiful of all. Along the roadside were high grey sand-dunes, only they weren't made of sand, they were solid and hard. John and I thought maybe they were petrified, but Daddy said no. The desert was spotted with sage and bounded by eroded red cliffs. It was terribly hot and Suzy was whiney and Rob's chest and back got spotted with heat rash, and Daddy let us have water from the desert bag quite often. Suddenly we climbed into a great and beautiful pine woods, and the air seemed to stretch out, so that it was light and clear. Then, climbing down, the desert lay spread out before us, every shade possible of rose and mauve and blue. This part of Arizona was wild and beautiful and
again
unlike anything we'd ever experienced or expected. I kept thinking of strange planets in distant solar systems.
again
unlike anything we'd ever experienced or expected. I kept thinking of strange planets in distant solar systems.
“Turn your space ship around and come down from the stars,” Mother said. “Don't you realize you're home?”
When Mother said “home” I had a vision of our white house with its orderly green lawn, of our elms and maples, of the tree house John built, and the rambler roses coming into bloom on the fence. “Home?” I asked stupidly.
“This is your country, Vicky,” Mother said. “This is America. A New England village isn't your only heritage. This is part of it, too.”
Daddy added, “Your great-great-grandparents came out this way in a covered wagon. They didn't have road maps or even roads, and they weren't sure that the desert would ever end or that they'd eventually reach green and fertile land again. When we send our astronauts up, every possible precaution is made to bring them safely home, and the whole nation watches and prays. Your great-great-grandparents were on their own. They lost one child on the way with fever. Their oldest boy was captured by Indians, and they never knew what happened to him. Crossing our own unchartered land took as much courage and imagination as a trip to the moon.”
I must have been listening with a rather set expression, and Daddy must have seen me in the rear-view mirror, because he laughed and said, “Vicky, I can just see you thinking, âMother and Daddy are sermonizing again.' Well, we're going to go on preaching, and,” Daddy's voice grew more serious, “I expect you to listen.”
“I'm listening,” I kind of muttered.
Mother turned around and grinned at me. “I think it was Mark Twain who said, âWhen I was seventeen I thought my father was
the stupidest man I'd ever met. When I was twenty-one it was amazing how much the old man had learned in those four years.'”
the stupidest man I'd ever met. When I was twenty-one it was amazing how much the old man had learned in those four years.'”
When we crossed into Utah the countryside
again
took on a character of its own. The earth was pinkish sand, with many more green things growing in it than in Arizona, and we saw river beds that actually had water in them. The rocks were eroded in graceful whorls and swirls, as though the wind had been dancing by, instead of blasting in from the Equator as it had seemed to do in the Arizona desert.
again
took on a character of its own. The earth was pinkish sand, with many more green things growing in it than in Arizona, and we saw river beds that actually had water in them. The rocks were eroded in graceful whorls and swirls, as though the wind had been dancing by, instead of blasting in from the Equator as it had seemed to do in the Arizona desert.
The campgrounds at Zion were down in the canyon, the way they were at Palo Duro, instead of up on the rim, like Grand Canyon, and it was very hot, up in the nineties. The campgrounds were in a grove of cottonwood trees, and around us we could see the great red cliffs with their strange formations rising up two thousand feet on each side. It was one of the nicest campsites we'd had, with good fireplaces with proper grates, and there were tiled bathrooms with cold showersâfree ones. The showers were icily, shiveringly cold, and on that blazing hot day they felt marvelous.
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