When she emerges, it is teary-eyed Gelie who catches sight of her first; and, despite warnings from her siblings, she runs to her mother, who is already on the path that follows the stream through the garden.
“Mother!” Gelie cries, throwing her arms around her mother’s waist and placing her feet atop her Isadora’s, so that Lady Arnem’s strong legs lift and carry the girl as she herself walks along the path. “Mother, you must help!”
“Gelie—!” warns Golo forcefully; for, unlike the thoughtful, moody Dalin, Golo is every bit the youngest child’s equal in phrenetic† energy. He, too, runs to his mother’s side, but walks manfully beside her, staring hard at his sister. “Didn’t you hear what Dagobert just said?”
“I heard him, Golo,” Gelie says defiantly. “But Mother understands the poor creatures best, so we ought to tell her!”
“We didn’t want to keep it from you, Mother,” Golo explains. “But we know you’ve been worried about Father, and we thought …” At a loss as to how to continue, Golo looks (as the four younger siblings are accustomed to doing, in moments of difficulty) to Dagobert, who — possessed of both his mother’s fair coloring and his father’s handsome features — speaks with all the confidence of the admirable, resolute Broken youth he has in recent years become:
“We thought that we could solve the problem on our own, and we didn’t want you to have to worry any more than you have been.”
“We shouldn’t be ‘worrying’ at all,” mutters Dalin, who keeps his distance from the others and scowls at his mother. “Paying so much attention to those creatures is a sin — you’re acting like pagans!”
“Oh, don’t take on such airs, Dalin,” says the ever-practical Anje, throwing her long braid of golden hair behind her back. “You’re angry over being kept from the Inner City, and your anger makes you say things you don’t believe — you ought to put that anger aside and help, instead of assuming that your own family has been swept up by some strange desire to commit sacrilege …”
Although full of curiosity, Isadora takes a moment to nod in great and characteristic appreciation to her eldest daughter. “True, Anje,” she says; and looking at the faces assembled before her, she asks, “For what have I always told you about making assumptions?”
Dagobert smiles, knowing the answer, but too near to being a man to play childish games that are clearly intended for the others.
It is the decisive finger of impulsive little Gelie that shoots up from within her mother’s dress, as she cries, “Oh, I know!” Having brought her body out from her hiding place, the girl assumes a declamatory pose, and recites words that her mother originally learned at the feet of her own guardian and teacher, Gisa: “‘Assumption is the laziest variety of thought, which leads only to weakness and bad habits!’” Then, with the same rote quality to her words, and her triumphant little finger still in the air, she adds: “But please do not ask me what any of that means!”
Her anxiousness eased a little by this display, Isadora is able to laugh for a fleeting moment: “What it means,” she says, lifting Gelie up and groaning at the speed with which the ten-year-old is growing, “is that making assumptions before we have assembled all available facts, and before we have determined the reliability of those facts, is not only foolish, but mischievous.”
“But I don’t see why, Mother,” Gelie answers, folding her arms. “After all, when we visit the temples or do our religious studies, it seems that all we ever learn are more ways of making assumptions without facts.”
“Gelie.” Isadora’s voice becomes stern for an instant, although in her heart she is glad to see that even her youngest child can detect the superstitious essence of the Kafran religion; but, to keep her safe, she must warn her: “Those are matters of faith, not reason. Now — tell me what you’ve all been doing out here, other than getting yourselves filthy and squabbling.”
Dagobert, staring into the pool at the base of the woodland waterfall, says, “It’s strange, Mother — we had been trying to determine if the newts have mated yet, because we haven’t seen any eggs. And then we found …” His words drift, as he studies the water with real concern: “Well, we’re not really sure, Mother. They have come out, but they—”
“The poor things are dying, Mother!” Gelie blurts out.
“Gelie,” Golo scolds. “Let Dagobert tell it, you don’t understand—”
“Stop this bickering at once,” Isadora says, suddenly and inexplicably grave, “and show me what worries you all so.” Dagobert holds out his hand — and his mother is brought back to the true starkness of the dilemma facing her family when she sees:
Two dead newts, lying in the youth’s palm. Their skin is dark, near black, as it should be; but at various points on their bodies, as well as upon the crests that surmount their backs,† they exhibit raw, bright red sores. The insults are small, as befits the newts’ delicate bodies, but have a painful appearance no less shocking for their size.
Isadora is so plainly horrified that her children finally grow hushed.
“When did you find these, Dagobert?”
The youth is puzzled. “They’re not the first. And they’re not the only things that have died. Some fish, two or three frogs—”
“Dagobert,” Isadora insists, “when did you begin to find them?”
“The earliest were — a week ago, I suppose. What is it, Mother?”
“Yes, Mother,” Gelie says, her manner subdued by fear. “Tell us — what is wrong?”
Isadora only presses: “What did you do with the dead creatures?”
It is Anje who answers, “We burned them, and buried the ashes.” The maiden points at a patch of ground where there are as yet no plantings.
“Anje,” Isadora says, turning, “did you bury them deep?”
“Yes, Mother,” Anje answers; and Isadora gives silent thanks that she has trained her oldest daughter well. “They did appear sickly — and you’ve always said that such creatures, if they die of illness, must be burned, and their ashes buried — especially creatures such as newts. What you call salamanders, Mother.”
“Yes, Mother,” Gelie says. “Why do you call them that?”
Isadora’s body trembles, although her gown disguises the momentary quivering even from Gelie, who is moving into her usual hiding place amid her mother’s clothing. “Good,” Isadora says. “That’s wise thinking, Anje; I can always depend on you to be sensible. Now, mark me, all of you — I want you to keep a record, beginning with the first deaths you can recall, and keeping careful count, in the days to come, of how many of each type of dying or dead creature you find, with signs of this sickness. Do not touch or drink the water in the stream — I’ll have the servants fetch water from the wells in the Third and Fourth districts, for now, and we’ll use the rain barrels as well. In the meantime, fasten the small nets that your father brought you from Daurawah onto the ends of long sticks, and use them to fetch the creatures out. Do you hear, Gelie?”
“Yes, Mother,” the girl says, in whining protest. “But I didn’t touch the water, it was Golo who found the dead newts.”
“Golo, if you find any more, and a net isn’t at hand, use a shovel to take them out. They must be burned, and the ashes buried deep. Do it well; show respect for them, don’t play with the bodies or cut them up.”
“All right, Mother,” Golo says, his voice conceding that he has tampered with one or two of the dead creatures already.
“But are they dangerous?” Dagobert asks, all manly concern.