The Edge of the Light (22 page)

B
ecca began to understand that a quickening was happening, just as the book given to her by Diana Kinsale had explained. After the Mutt Strut, she pulled that book—
Seeing Beyond Sight
—from the bookshelf in Ralph Darrow's former bedroom that now was hers. She opened it, and she refreshed her memory with the words: “A verbal exploration and subsequent interpretation of the visions will lead the visionary to propel events forward to a safe, desired, or happy conclusion that might not otherwise occur should the visions not be explored completely and understood with a sharp degree of accuracy. This is what we call a quickening.”

The quickening appeared to be going on everywhere. It was as if everyone's life was geared up so that Becca could see exactly what was happening. How to propel events forward so that the conclusion would be a good one, though . . . ? That was trickier. And how the quickening applied to her own life was trickier still.

When she'd arrived back at Grand's house after seeing Mrs. Banks and her grandchildren, the first thing she'd done was to make certain that she was interpreting things correctly. She waited till she and Grand were alone on the porch, where he'd
indicated he wanted to sit and enjoy the sight of his garden. By his side on the bench beneath one of the windows, she said, “Banks is a person, isn't she? You didn't mean banks like in the places where people put their money. You meant banks as in So-and-so Banks. She was at the Mutt Strut today with her grandkids.”

Ralph was slightly slumped on the bench but as she spoke, his spine became straighter. He smiled lopsidedly and said, “Go banks.”

What at once accompanied these hesitant words was a vision: papers spread out, Ralph's hands on either side of them. Becca thought of a will. Grand was of an age when a will would be a crucial thing to have. But why this was important to him now when he was alive and kicking, she didn't know. Unless he wanted to change that will. Or unless he knew that he wasn't going to be alive and kicking very much longer, which was a thought she couldn't bear addressing. But say it
was
a will. Shouldn't there be a copy somewhere? In the house, maybe, locked in some kind of box that was fireproof? Except wouldn't it be smarter to have that box somewhere else,
beyond
the house? She thought of the possibilities for this, but there seemed to be only two: Ralph's workshop and his garden shed.

She said to him, “Did Mrs. Banks make a will for you, Grand? Is that what you've been trying to tell us?”

“Houch,” he said.

She said, “Houch?”

Ralph slapped his good hand against the building behind them. “Houch,” he said. “Banks. Houch.”

“Oh God, of course!” she cried. “
House
. Mrs. Banks did something about a house. Can you tell me what?”

“Pay,” was all he said. He sounded desperate to be understood.

Banks, a woman, a drive through the forest, a stairway up the side of a cedar-shingled building that clearly looked like a house. Those were the clues Becca had. She knew she needed to work upon them to bring events concerning Seth's grandfather to a conclusion that didn't destroy his family.

Mrs. Kinsale had told Becca that she couldn't do anything about her visions until the time when she was fully able to block whispers without aid of the AUD box. But what Becca told herself now was that desperate times called for desperate action, and these were desperate times, especially for Grand.

But they were also desperate times for Jenn, and Becca had known this the moment Jenn had brought up Mr. Sawyer's visit to Jenn's home. She'd also known what was coming before Jenn had made her request to couch surf at Mr. Darrow's. What she hadn't been able to tell her friend, though, was that she—Becca—could not bring more drama or even the potential for drama into Ralph Darrow's life. She couldn't risk it, not only because of his health and what stress could do to it but also because if Brenda Sloan found out that someone was couch surfing in her father's house, she would have yet another reason to plant incendiary devices along the path of Grand's recovery. Becca had intended to tell Jenn this, but her friend had walked off in anger before she could do so.

She'd realized soon enough that there was someone else who
might be able to help out, however. But because she didn't want to get Jenn's hopes up until she knew for sure, she had to talk to Diana Kinsale first.

• • •

JENN'S SITUATION, ALONG
with Becca's growing understanding of what Ralph Darrow was trying to tell her, was not the only sign that a quickening was fast approaching. The next day at school, Derric was waiting to talk to her at the end of her first class.

Wordlessly, he dropped his arm around her shoulder and they walked in the direction of her next class. She fastened her arm around his waist, and he kissed the side of her head and said, “I showed her the letters. She didn't want to look at them at first. But I wouldn't budge and I wouldn't get into it with her till she read them. It took, like, I don't know . . . it took a while.”

“And?”

“She cried. I cried.” Derric's face said he was reliving the moment and so did Becca, for she saw the vision of Rejoice sitting on the swinging bench on her family's front porch, and she held in her lap a stack of letters that Becca recognized only too well. Then the vision was gone because Derric went on. “I took the album with me when I went. You know which one?”

“The one your mom made that shows your adoption and coming to the island?”

“We went through it, and she saw how it was: how I met them, Mom and Dad; how Mom kept coming to Kampala as long as it
took for the adoption to go through; how everyone was at the airport when we finally got there; how I grew up. And the rest was there, too, pictures Mom took at the orphanage. Rejoice was in them, just one kid along with the rest of us. And I was . . . Becca, I was never looking at her. Never. She cried about that, too, and so did I. I told her how sorry I was. I said I hated myself for what I did, leaving her like that. But I think she could see—Rejoice could see—that I meant everything because what she said was . . .” A muscle worked in his jaw. “She said she could see it'd been way harder for me than it had been for her because she didn't remember she had a brother while I knew all the time I had a sister.”

“Whoa, that's nice,” Becca said. “Bet that helps her let it go, Der. Do her parents know? Did you guys tell them?”

“I got to tell my own parents first. I've been waiting for the moment, but I'll do it.”

She raised her eyebrows. This had always been the real issue for Derric: telling his parents. He caught her expression and said, “I'm ready. I want them to meet her. I just want things to be normal.”

Normal was the key, Becca thought. Wanting things to be normal seemed to be the theme of everything going on around her.

This was what she understood when she saw Diana Kinsale that afternoon. She'd phoned Prynne at Ralph's house and she'd asked if a couple of extra hours there would be asking too much, since Prynne had been there since seven that morning. Prynne said, “Oh . . . I was hoping . . . Before Seth gets home . . .”
But then she changed course with, “No problem. It's okay.”

She went to Diana. She found her kneeling in her front garden, planting primroses along the flagstone path to the front door. As Becca watched, she nearly tipped over as she got to her feet. Becca hurried forward to help her up.

Diana sighed. “I
hate
this damn business of getting old.” She was wearing her baseball cap and an old South Whidbey High School letterman's jacket. She had a scarf around her neck and heavy gloves on her hands, although the day didn't call for this much protection. “Is this a practice day? Have I forgotten?”

“Nope. I just wanted to talk to you. I can come back later if you're too busy.”

Oscar had been lying on the lawn, head on paws, watching Diana. He'd risen as Becca helped Diana to her feet and now he came to her.

Someday soon
came from Diana in perfect clarity as did
can't take something from a younger person
.

“What's there to take from a younger person?” Becca asked her.

Diana stopped walking on their route toward the mudroom door. “You weren't supposed to hear that.”

“Was I supposed to block you? You didn't say.”

“No, no,” Diana told her. “It's fine.”
Must be more careful
. “The power you have is growing. Let's do a little practice.”

“Shouldn't we go into the house for it? Shouldn't we be in your room?”

“Perhaps. But to block successfully, you must be able to do
it anywhere. Why don't you try it here and now and see what happens?”

So Becca began the mantra:
Empty of all there is, there is. Empty of all there is
. She glanced at Diana to see that she looked placid. They walked steadily toward the back of the house where the view was expansive and there was plenty to distract her and to disrupt her blocking. Becca kept with the mantra and then released it slowly to see what would happen.

Nothing. She held on to it. Again, nothing. She locked herself to the nothing. Blocking the whispers like this made her start to sweat. It made her heart pound. She began to feel like a runner near the end of a race.

Next to her Diana stumbled. The blocking was gone and
how much more
was what Becca heard. When she took Diana's elbow to keep her steady, what she saw was tubing going into an arm. This tubing ran from the arm to a large machine. A second or two, then the vision was gone. But it was enough to tell Becca what she'd known without wanting to know for at least a year.

She said at once before she could lose her courage, “Mrs. Kinsale, are you sick? Do you have cancer or something?”

Diana glanced at her. She smiled one of those fond relative-not-your-mom smiles. “Or something,” she said.

“Are you . . .” Becca didn't even want to say it.

Diana did so. “Dying? Not yet. But I will eventually. Just like everyone.”

“That's not what I meant.”

“I know that. But it's all I'll say for now. Let's get the dogs,
shall we? It's time they had a romp on the beach.”

Diana went to the run and released the four other dogs. She picked up two well-chewed balls and handed them to Becca. She said, “All dogs come,” and they did just that.

They made slow progress across the field next to Diana's house. A well-used path led through the lush springtime grasses, beaten down by Diana and the dogs over years so that nothing now grew upon it. The dogs knew where it led, though, and they began to gambol like lambs. They were a joyful sight, yipping and leaping on their way to the beach at Sandy Point. Here the tides met, where the waters of Saratoga Passage and the waters of Possession Sound carved to a depth of six hundred feet, allowing space and depth for orcas and gray whales to dive.

On their way, Becca told Diana about Mrs. Banks, about Derric and Rejoice, and about her thoughts on the quickening. She didn't bring up Jenn. She felt she couldn't yet, although she wasn't quite sure why. Diana was silent as she spoke. Then she released a thought,
Are the visions and the whisp
—

Becca blocked it at once. She felt a swirling of delight all over her body. She said, “I stopped you, Mrs. Kinsale! Before you finished the word
whisper
.”

Diana said, “Excellent. You've been practicing.”

“When I can.”

“Do you think they relate, then?”

“The visions and the whispers? Mr. Darrow's do.”

“What kind of understanding are they leading you toward?”

“Doing something. Mrs. Kinsale, I
got
to do something. I
think Mr. Darrow wants me to. He's telling me the best he can. And then there's Jenn. She . . . well, she
asked
me . . .”

“What?” Diana said when Becca hesitated. They were across the field now and following the lane that would take them down to the beach. The dogs were far ahead of them, snuffling the sand, all except Oscar, who maintained his pace at Diana's side.

“If the quickening is about propelling events to a good conclusion . . . if that's what I'm s'posed to do . . .”

“When everything's
mastered,
that's what you're supposed to do,” Diana said. “You've been given extraordinary power, Becca. I believe you're beginning to see that. But to be hasty in a situation when the ramification of any action you take could be serious . . . ? This is something over which you absolutely must maintain control.”

“Control over what?”

“Impetuosity in the face of something you don't yet clearly understand.”

They were silent for several minutes after that. Becca gnawed on this. She felt like a dog frustrated to get to the marrow of the bone. She and Diana descended the rest of the way to the beach, where Becca took the two balls and began to hurl them south as the dogs tore in that direction in anticipation. She tried to take in the beauty that surrounded them: far to the east the Cascade Mountains still topped with snow, closer to Whidbey the soaring cliffs at the south end of Camano Island, a bald eagle riding a current of air, the extraordinary calm of the water on this day, the cumulous clouds lazing in the sky.