第53章 The Last Door

The front door would not close. Eli tried. He stood in the hallway with the deep's voice in his bones and the mold's glow on his face and the root's pulse in his feet, and he pulled the door, and the door moved, and the door stopped, and the door would not close. The frame was warped, the hinges were bent, the wood was covered with the green-gold mold, and the mold held the door open the way a hand holds a door open, a welcoming hand, a hospitable hand, the hand of a host inviting a guest to enter. The guest was the deep. The deep was entering. The deep had been entering for months, through the root, through the water, through the mold, through the trees, through the sound, through the light, and now the deep was entering through the front door, and the front door would not close, because the deep was the guest and the guest was the host, and the host does not close the door on itself. Nora came to the front door and stood beside Eli. She looked at the open door, at the night beyond, at the trees that pressed against the house, their branches touching the roof, their roots touching the foundation, their trunks standing in the hallway and the chamber and the east wing, and she said, "The door was never a door." "What was it?" "A gesture. A pretense. The door was the pretense that the house was separate from the deep, that the world above was separate from the world below, that the living were separate from the silent. The door was a line drawn in wood and paint and plaster, and the line was a lie, and the lie was the keeping, and the keeping was a pretense that we could keep the deep down, that we could keep the root sealed, that we could keep the water out, that we could keep the silence unbroken." "And now?" "Now the pretense is over. The door is open. The deep is here. The root is here. The trees are here. The mold is here. The water is here. The sound is here. Everything that was below is now above, and everything that was above is now below, and the line between them is gone, and the line was the door, and the door is open, and the deep is here." The deep was here. The deep was in the house, in the root, in the trees, in the mold, in the water, in the sound, in the light, in the ground, in the woods, in the sky, in the world. The deep was everything that was beneath the surface, and the surface was gone, and the deep was above, and the above was the deep, and the deep was the world, and the world was the deep. Eli stood at the open door and felt the deep's voice in his bones and the deep's warmth in his blood and the deep's patience in his heart, and he understood, with a clarity that was not his own but the deep's, that the keeping was not a wall. The keeping was a welcome. The keeping was the world above saying to the world below: come in. We have been keeping the door for you. We have been waiting. We have been listening. And now you are here, and the door is open, and the house is yours. And the deep spoke, and the speaking was the welcome, and the welcome was the keeping, and the keeping was the door, and the door was open. The front door had been the keeper's threshold. Every morning Eli opened it and checked the yard, the fence, the trees, the ground, and the checking was the keeping, and the keeping was the conversation, and the conversation was the deep's voice, and the voice was the deep, and the deep was here. But the door was more than a threshold. The door was a symbol, the way the symbols on the chamber walls were symbols, the way the circles and lines and concentric rings were symbols, and the symbol was the boundary, the line between the kept and the unkept, the tended and the wild, the known and the unknown. The door would not close because the boundary was gone. The deep had crossed the boundary, had moved through the root, through the water, through the mold, through the trees, through the house, and the house was the deep's body now, and the body was the deep's way of being in the world, and the being was the deep's way of saying: I am here, and I am in the house, and the house is mine, and the door is open because the door has always been open, and the keeping was a pretense, and the pretense was the line, and the line was the boundary, and the boundary was the great-grandfather's way of saying: this far, and no farther. But the deep did not recognize boundaries. The deep was the ground, and the ground did not stop at property lines or fence posts or the edges of a map drawn by a surveyor who thought he understood what lay beneath his feet. The ground was continuous, and the ground was the deep, and the deep was everywhere, and everywhere was the deep's home, and the home was the keeping, and the keeping was the door, and the door was open. Nora stood at the open door and looked out at the night. The trees were there, pressed against the house, their branches touching the roof, their roots breaking through the foundation. The mold covered everything, the green-gold growth pulsing with the deep's rhythm, and the rhythm was the deep's heartbeat, and the heartbeat was the sound, and the sound was the deep's voice, and the voice was saying: I am here. I am the house. I am the trees. I am the ground. I am the deep, and the deep is here. "The door was never a door," she said. "It was a gesture. A pretense. The door was the pretense that the house was separate from the deep." "And now?" "Now the pretense is over. The deep is here. The deep has always been here. The door was always open. The keeping was always a welcome. And the welcome was the conversation, and the conversation was the deep's voice, and the voice was the deep, and the deep is here." The deep was here. The door was open. And the keeping continued. ---