Hapland," he shouted in a near falsetto.
He pulled so hard on my drapes they swept back from my windows like astage curtain--and I looked.
To the very limit of our grounds in the distance, but not beyond, thetrees, the shrubs, the drives and walkways, the lawns and ponds, allwere covered with a two foot thick blanket of glistening salt.
"And the monsters are gone," the butler was saying. "And I must go toyour aunt."
"So must I," I said, and grabbed up a robe.
As I ran, overtook him, passed him, from all over the house I couldhear excited outcries, wonder, amazement, anger, fear from theservants. I finished the length of my wing, sprinted through the mainbody of the house, and down the hallway of her wing to the door of hersuite. I didn't need to knock, someone had left it open.
Her own personal maid, I saw, as I ran past the little alcove into thesitting room. The maid was standing beside Aunt Mattie, wringing herhands and crying. The drapes here, too, were swept full back, andthrough the windows I could see the collection, the highly prized,wondrous collection of flora, all covered in salt.
Aunt Mattie stood there, without support, looking at it. When I cameup to her there were tears in her eyes and glistening streaks on herwrinkled cheeks.
"Why?" she asked. It was very quietly spoken.
By now the butler had made the trip, and came into the room. I turnedto him.
"If we hurry," I said. "A good deal of the collection is enclosedunder plastic domes. If we don't wet the salt, and if we hurry andhave it scraped away from the buildings it won't poison the groundinside them. We can save most of the collection that way."
"No, Master Hapland," he said, and shook his head. "The salt is insidethe buildings, just as much as here. A gardener shouted it at me as Ipassed."
Aunt Mattie's closed fist came up to her lips, and then dropped again.That was all.
"Why, Hapland?" she asked again. "Evil for good? Why?"
I motioned the maid and butler to leave--and take with them thecluster of servants around the door in the hall. I took Aunt Mattieover to her favorite chair, the one where she could sit and look outat her collection; no point in pretending the salt wasn't there. I satdown at her feet, the way I used to when I was ten years old. I lookedout at the salt, too. It was everywhere. Every inch of our grounds wascovered with it, to poison the earth so that nothing could grow in it.It would take years to restore the grounds, and many more years torestore the collection.
"Try to understand, Aunt Mattie," I said. "Not only what I say, butall the implications of it. They didn't return evil for good. Let'ssee it from what might have been their point of view. They live on aworld of salt, an antiseptic world. We went there, and you intendedgood. You told them that our code was to do unto others as we wouldhave them do unto us.
"They returned our visit, and what did they find? What kind of apestilent horror did we live in? Bare ground, teeming with life,billions of life forms in every cubic foot of ground beneath our feet.Above the ground, too. Raw, growing life all around us, towering overus.
"If they were doomed to live in such a world, they would want itcovered in salt, to kill all the life, make it antiseptic. They owednothing to the rest of Earth, but they owed this kindness to you. Theydid unto others, as they would have others do unto them."
"I never realized--I was sure I couldn't be.... I've built my lifearound it," she said.
"I know," I said with a regretful sigh. "So many people have."
And yet, I still wonder if it might not have happened at all--if Ihadn't winked. I wonder if that pesty psychiatrist has been right, allalong?
END
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