Mary shrugged. It was a highly adaptive arrangement. Still, she was relieved that she would be exempt from visitations by other men.
“Luke, how does the Flock resolve this mate-swapping with their religious beliefs? As I remember, Jesus had definite ideas about the sanctity of marriage.”
He stiffened, then said levelly, “In Romans, Saint Paul wrote that we are dead to the law, and that we must bring forth fruit unto the Lord. The Doctor says if we’re to bring forth fruit, we have to do it this way. He said we must bring new souls into the world for the Lord on Judgment Day.”
So that was how the Arkites rationalized the need to procreate in the face of Armageddon. Yet Luke still doubted. She knew if she questioned him, he would deny his doubt, but she heard it in his voice.
He went on firmly, “Our ways are not the old ways before Armageddon, Mary. But there is neither love nor lust in a visitation, and the vows of marriage are still sacred.”
That sounded like a direct quote.
Mary said softly, “Till death us do part.”
“Yes. Till death us do part. Mary, we must talk to Rachel. She’ll come with us. You’d never be happy without her, and she can’t stay here alone.”
Mary shook her head, and there was a chill in the wind now. “Rachel won’t go to the Ark with us, Luke.”
“But she must. I know the Flock will accept her. The Doctor will see her wisdom as I have. She’ll be revered there, she’ll be cared for. Mary, she’s an old woman, and she can’t—”
“She’s not old, Luke! She’s not… old.”
Luke put his arm around her. “I know what you mean, but… well, she’s not really young.”
Mary let his arm rest on her shoulders without recognizing its existence. “You don’t understand. Old or not, she won’t go with us, not until she finishes the books. And I won’t go until you finish the vault.”
“I intend to finish it. Then you and Rachel can put the books in the vault, and we’ll all—”
“You can’t just put them in the vault. They’d rot away to nothing. They have to be sealed, each one. Oh, Luke, we explained that to you.”
He took his arm away from her shoulder, leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. “That could take years, Mary. I don’t understand why… why it’s so important to her.”
Mary stared at his hawklike profile against the pale sand, and she wondered why she’d thought he did understand. His willingness to labor mightily on the vault had nothing to do with the books.
But he must understand—somehow, on some level.
“Luke, you said you made your journey because you had a vision.”
“Yes. I did.”
“Rachel had a vision, too.”
Luke straightened, sought in Mary’s eyes verification of that assertion, and she made sure he found it.
“Her vision came in a dream, Luke, like yours. In her dream she found a book lying on the beach as if it had been washed up there. She said it was bound in white leather and had pages of gold and letters of light. The message told her that she’d been allowed to live and her books had survived for one reason—so that she could preserve the knowledge of the past for future generations. It said: I have laid up a gift upon the shore from the children of yesterday for the children of tomorrow.”
Luke was enthralled, and Mary felt her stomach chum in recognition of a betrayal. Rachel would never sink to mythmaking to justify her intentions.
Yet she had declared she would play any role, would kill or die for the books.
Luke said, “Then it was the Lord who commanded her to preserve the books. I… didn’t realize….”
“I know. But she—don’t tell her I told you about her vision. She considers it… a private matter.”
“Between her and the Lord, yes.” He sighed. “I understand why she can’t come to the Ark now. The Lord will watch over her until her task is finished. But then, Mary, then she can come to the Ark.”
Mary felt her eyes hot with tears. “Then she must come to the Ark.”
“Oh, Mary.” He took her in his arms, held her gently like a frightened child. “We’ll come back to Amama next spring to visit her and make sure she’s all right. The Doctor will understand. And I’ll tell her how to find the Ark. I checked my map, and it’s only about four days from here. Mary, everything will be all right. The Lord is smiling on all of us. I know it.”
And Mary yielded into his embrace. “I know it, too, Luke.”
They walked back to Amama on sand soaked by the surging and ebbing waves, its surface transformed into an endless mirror reflecting the opalescent clouds, and it seemed they were walking on the sky.
After supper, when the lowering sun cast a ruby light into the house, Luke excused himself and went downstairs to the basement to his makeshift bedroom. Rachel wished him good night with a smile that faded as soon as he turned away, then she went out to the deck to watch the sunset. Mary followed her, stood at the railing beside her, blinking into the sun that hung above the horizon under orange clouds whose reflections made the sea molten, gave the breakers a blue cast. The wind had stopped, waiting to turn; the air was sweet with the vital scents of summer.
Rachel said, “There might be a green flash.”
They waited while the Earth moved, and the glowing disk of the sun touched the horizon, slowly slipped beyond it, and finally vanished with a brief, pinpoint flare of blue-green light.
“Ah!” They spoke almost in unison, laughed at the concurrence of their amazement, and in that moment Mary remembered all the sunsets they had watched together, hoping for that rare ah!
Rachel went to one of the cedar plank chairs Luke had built for them, waited for Mary to sit down in the other, then said, “I assume Luke finally got around to declaring his honorable intentions.”
Mary looked at her, saw her oblique smile. “Yes. Finally.”
A brief silence, then: “How soon will you be leaving?”
“Not until the vault is finished. I don’t know, exactly. Rachel…” Mary wanted to plead, to beg, but she only said, “You could go with us.”
“No, I can’t, Mary. You know that.”
“But when you’re finished with the books…”
“Maybe.” Her eyes narrowed, accentuating the web of lines surrounding them. “I’m not sure I’d be welcome in a place like the Ark.”
“But you would. Luke says you would.”
“Does he? Well, meanwhile, I have work to do here.”
Mary looked out at the horizon where the sun had vanished. “That was my work, too.”
“But you believe you have other work to do now, don’t you?”
“I must do it if I’m capable of it. What else can I do?”
“So, I don’t see that there’s a problem.”
“The problem is…” The muscles of her jaw were tense to the point of pain. “I don’t want to leave you here alone.”
“Why not? Don’t you think I can manage alone?”
“Of course, you can. Rachel, I… love you too much to leave you.”
Rachel reached out and rested her hand on Mary’s where it lay clenched on the arm of the chair. “But I must do what I believe is right, just as you must.”
Mary put her other hand over Rachel’s, felt the warmth and strength under the brown, parchment skin. “Luke said we can come back in the spring to see you. And it’s only four days to the Ark. He’ll tell you how to find it.”
“Well, I’ll be glad to know exactly where you are. But I’ll be all right. I’m more worried about you. Childbirth is always a risky undertaking. I’m glad the Doctor is actually a physician.”
Mary hadn’t considered the risks to herself in her decision, and she couldn’t muster a shred of fear now. She remembered lying naked to the sun in Luke’s arms, wondering if by some stroke of luck she might have been impregnated. She had counted the days and knew it wasn’t probable, only possible. But the day would come when it would not only be possible but inevitable.