dead-ended a mile to the south at a T-intersection. Along the way, she passed the remnants of three farms: denuded fields where no one had bothered to plant for the last summer; century-old poplars lopped at the base and left like ancient monoliths where they lay; skeletons of homes and outbuildings rotting where they had fallen...or in one case, the blackened ash of the fire that had wiped out every other trace of the farm.
At the T-intersection, Lila turned left—east—and abandoned the main road for what seemed like little more than a cattle trail with an advanced degree. Bushes of yellow wild roses overhung the roadway on both sides, broken only here and there by even narrower driveways leading to abandoned farms. The roses were well past their prime flowering period, so even the remaining blooms seemed faded and despondent.
The road continued straight east for a mile or so before it began to meander, following the course of one of the larger streams that would ultimately be backed up to flood the valley. The roses, in such close proximity to moisture year round, grew thicker, denser. Where before Lila could catch occasional glimpses of pasturelands overgrown with thistles and runners from the hedges, all she could see now were dark green leaves, smudged petals, and occasional canes that, studded with wicked thorns, would shoot out across the road. She actually began to worry about whether or not the insurance on her rental would be good for scratches to the paint.
Even though the road itself had forced her to slow, she found herself almost stopping every time it twisted away to one side or the other, disappearing for the moment into the bushes. At times, it looked as if the road might simply dead-end at a hypertrophied mass that would finally deny her permission to drive further.
But each time, the turn revealed another bend in the road, another half-shaded passageway through the thorns.
At one of the turns, Lila angled the car just enough so that for an instant the sun behind her caught in her side-view mirror. It was as if the sun had exploded in her eyes. A sudden great flare of white-beyond-white, then a pain behind her eyelids. She almost brought both hands to her face to help shade her pupils from the unexpected glare but at the last moment gripped the wheel more firmly and kept the car from driving straight into one of the largest mounds of roses yet.
And straight into the woman standing there, mouth open in a cry of surprise, one hand held to her mouth as if to capture the cry and preserve it, the other clenched tightly on the bale of a small metal bucket.
“No!” Lila jammed on her brakes, still gripping the steering wheel. Mercifully, the sun chose that moment to slip beyond the mirror and the glare winked out as instantaneously as it had flashed.
Her eyes ached but Lila kept enough presence of mind to force the car to a halt, only a foot or so from the spot where the woman was standing. She had not moved a muscle. Her cry had died still-born.
When the car grated to a halt on the thin layer of gravel, Lila could hear nothing but silence around them. The engine had unaccountably died. Even Lila’s own breathing seemed to have stopped, her heart to have discontinued momentarily its thrum-ing rhythm.
She sat still for another moment, then threw the car door open and rushed out.
“Oh, I’m so sorry! Are you hurt? Are you all right?”
In answer the other woman—older than Lila, perhaps some years older even than Lila’s mother—lowered her hand from her mouth and smiled.
“Why, yes, dear. I’m perfectly fine. Just startled.”
“The car didn’t....”
“Oh, no, you missed me by inches.” Something playful glittered in the older woman’s eyes. “You’ll just have to try harder next time.”
“No,” Lila breathed, “I mean, it was...the sun blinded me just as...oh, that was a joke.”
“Yes. Ill-timed perhaps but well meant. I truly am just fine. And you were going so slowly anyway that there was never any real danger. We’re used to such meeting on these twisty old country roads.”
“I’m truly sorry. I was just looking for....”
“Not another word, my dear. Not to worry.” The older woman leaned slightly to place her bucket on the ground, then straightened and extended her hand.
Lila reached out and shook it. The grip was warm and firm. Friendly. A welcome change after the often frigid greetings she was used to in the Valley.
“I’m Lila. Lila Ellis.”
Again, Lila caught a glitter in the other woman’s eyes, less playful this time, more...well, Lila wasn’t quite certain, and it lasted for such a short time that, later, she couldn’t quite recall how it had looked.
“Lila.” The woman smiled even more broadly. “Such a lovely name. For a lovely girl.”
There was a brief pause. Lila felt as if she were being examined, if not under a microscope then at least under a high-power hand lens, the kind Sherlock Holmes might have carried tucked away in a deep pocket of his cloak for safe keeping.
“You may call me Ella,” the other woman said at last. She nodded slightly—to Lila, it felt as if the woman was giving her permission to be Lila Ellis...a kind of royal endorsement, as of Queen, or perhaps Queen Mother, to commoner. Still, the woman—Ella, Lila reminded herself—smiled widely enough to nearly eclipse the sun that was now threatening to slide beneath the rose hedges behind the car.
Lila felt herself blushing but before she could respond, Ella added, “And you must have been looking for the Stevenson place.”
“Uh...yes, yes I was. How did you...?”
“How did I know? Simple elimination. You passed the last farm—it used to belong to the Wards before the....before—anyway, you passed it a good quarter of a mile ago. And there is nowhere else to go on this road except the Stevenson’s. It’s around the next curve and over the top of that hill.”
Lila looked in the direction Ella had indicated and started to say something...to thank her, but Ella forestalled the effort. “I’d be glad to show you, if you don’t mind having a gabbing old fool sitting in that pretty new car of yours.”
“Oh, it’s not mine, it’s a....” Lila laughed, feeling rather like a giddy young fool at the moment. “Was that another joke,” she added, pointing to the rental agency’s prominent decal on the front window.
“Well, yes. You caught me again. But seriously, I would be happy to show you. The driveway’s a bit jungly and you might miss it. Then you would have to follow this bit of a creek”—she pronounced it crick, just as the others in the Valley had—“you might have to follow it for another five miles or so before you could turn around.”
“I would appreciate that. The last little while it’s been like nothing existed except me, the car, and these infernal roses, getting thicker and thicker with each turn.”
“I know how you feel,” Ella said as she walked around to the passenger door and opened it. She barely had room to get inside without being pricked by thorns. “I grew up over there”—she made a vague gesture back toward the area of Main Street with her free hand. “Even for us natives, the hedges can be a bit overwhelming in high summer. Especially when there’s no one around to prune the growth the way it should be.”
Lila nodded, opened her own door, and slid behind the wheel. Ella
