One Door Away From Heaven

Chapter 73

OLD YELLER SPRINTS past the open double doors of the study, gripping a brightly colored tug toy in her teeth. In close pursuit are a pair of golden retrievers named Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, or Rosie and Jilly for short.

Here in her study, Constance Veronica Tavenall, soon to be the former wife of Congressman Jonathan Sharmer, sits behind a wonderful Chinese Chippendale desk decorated with intricate chinoiserie. She is writing in her checkbook.

The lady reminds Curtis of Grace Kelly in movies like To Catch a Thief. She manages to be glamorous yet dignified, regal yet warm, with the gracefulness of a swan. She is not as immense, majestic, and magnificent as Donella, the truck-stop waitress, but then virtually no one is.

Noah stoops to pick up the cards that have been left on the floor near the sofa, but Ms. Tavenall says, "No, no. Leave them the way they are. Just the way they are for a while."

Earlier, operating under Curtis's direction, sister-become had separated from a shuffled deck all the cards in the suit of hearts. With nose and paws, she had ordered them from deuce to ace.

Rosie backs along the hall and through the study door, pulling on the tug toy — which is made of braided red and yellow ropes with a large tasseled knot at each end — and here comes Old Yeller, attached to the being-dragged end of the rope. They are growling at each other and trying to shake each other loose, but their tails wag, wag.

Ms. Tavenall tears a check out of the book and slides it across the desk to Curtis. Her handwriting is as precise and pleasing to the eye as calligraphy.

When Curtis reads the number on the check, he whistles softly. "Oh, Lord, Ms. Tavenall, are you sure you can afford this?"

"That's for the two motor homes," she says. "They should be top-of-the-line because, after all, you're going to be spending a lot of time in them."

The first motor home will be for Micky, Leilani, and Aunt Gen. The second will be for Noah, Curtis — and for Richard, whom he has not yet met.

Polly and Cass already have their wheels, courtesy of Hollywood divorces, which they had insisted upon after their producer husbands — Julian and Don Flackberg — had killed a screenwriter. The Flackberg brothers, renowned screamers, ruled their employees by terror — though they never screamed at movie stars, at critics, or at the twins. Cass says that the brothers were always sweet to her and Polly, while even Polly agrees they were Huggy Bears at home. Julian and Don had never killed a screenwriter previously, and in this case they resorted to violence only after the writer had successfully sued them for breach of contract. Over the years, Julian and Don had breached hundreds of contracts, perhaps thousands, always with impunity, and in their defense, they had tearfully claimed temporary insanity resulting from the shock of having their entire business model stood on its head.

Curtis wonders if the place to start saving the world might be in Hollywood.

At the doorway, Old Yeller finds new determination and, with the tug toy, drags Rosie away into the hall. The contract between them is one in which fun is given in return for fun, and neither would think of breaching it.

For several weeks, Curtis and his new family will be constantly on the move, until he has fully become the Curtis that he wants to be, until he can't any longer be identified by the unique biological-energy signature for which his extraterrestrial enemies — and possibly the FBI — are able to scan.

Thereafter, the worse scalawags will continue to search for him, though by less effective means. They have been at work on this world for a while, and they do not welcome interference with their plans, which are the antithesis of those that Curtis has inherited from his mother. The battle has been engaged.

He and his four new sisters, his aunt Gen, his brother Noah, his brother Richard yet unmet, and his sister-become will be Gypsies for a long time, because even when he's no longer detectable by scanners, he will be safest if he stays in motion and works in secret. Besides, the job requires extensive travel: You can't save the whole world from an office in Cleveland.

From time to time, not often but dependably, as he gives the Gift of a dog's dreams, he will encounter people who, once having received this power from him, will be able to pass it along, as he can. Each will go forth in a caravan of his or her own, sharing the Gift with still others all across the world, in every vale and peak of every continent.

The first of these is Leilani. She will not be going out on her own for many years, but the time will come. She shines.

Ms. Tavenall passes three more checks across the desk, and this time Noah whistles.

"I've postdated them at one-month intervals," Ms. Tavenall says. "Use them as you need the money for ongoing expenses."

She glances at the computer on her desk and smiles.

From where he sits, Curtis isn't able to see the screen, but he knows what's on it. Earlier, following the card trick, perched upon the lady's chair and holding a stylus in her teeth, Old Yeller, under Curtis's influence, had typed: I AM A GOOD DOG. I HAVE A PLAN, BUT I NEED FUNDING.

"By the time you've used those three checks," says Ms. Tavenall, "we'll have worked out an entire funding scheme for the long term."

"I don't know how to thank you," Noah says.

"I'm the one who needs to say thank you," Ms. Tavenall insists. "You've changed my life twice now. and this time in a way I never imagined it could be changed."

Her eyes fill with those beautiful human tears that express not anguish or grief, but joy. She blots her eyes, her cheeks, and blows her nose in a Kleenex.

Curtis is hoping for a huge funny horn-honk of a blow, like Meg Ryan cut loose with in When Harry Met Sally, but Ms. Tavenall hardly makes any sound. She's so discreet, genteel. He wonders if it would be good socializing if he asked for a Kleenex and then faked a huge funny horn-honk of a blow to amuse her.

Before Curtis can decide this thorny question, Ms. Tavenall throws her tissue in a waste can, rises from her chair, blinks back her tears as best she can, and says to Noah, "The other issue may be more difficult. It's not simply a matter of writing a check."

"His aunt and uncle have legal guardianship," Noah says, "but I'm pretty sure they'd be willing to relinquish it. They parked him in that care home after his parents died, and they never see him. He embarrasses them. I think the issue will be… financial."

"Bastards," she says.

This somewhat shocks Curtis because he has until now been under the impression that she is too much of a lady to know the meaning of such words.

"Well," she continues, "I've got good attorneys. And maybe I can pour a little charm on these people."

"You?" Curtis says. "Oh, Ms. Tavenall, call me a hog and butcher me for bacon if you couldn't drown them in charm anytime you wanted."

She laughs, if a little oddly, and tells him that he's a lovely boy, and he's just about to reply to the effect that he never was the sassy-assed, spit-in-the-eye malefactor that some have accused him of being, when Jilly races into the study with a white rag in his teeth, pursued by Rosie and Old Yeller.

Apparently, Jilly felt left out when the game was tug-rope-for-two. He's found this rag and has somehow convinced his playmates that it is a better toy. Now they must have it, must have it, must, must, must.

"Jilly, here!" Ms. Tavenhall commands, and Jilly at once obeys, wiggling with delight as he approaches his mistress. "Give me that, you silly pooch."

Denied their must-have, the three dogs plop onto the carpet, panting from their play, grinning at one another.

"Since the congressman proved to be what he proved to be," Ms.

Tavenall explains to Noah, "I've been throwing out a lot of things. I certainly don't want any mementos. Jilly must have snatched this from the trash."

The rag isn't a rag, after all, but a T-shirt. On it are printed four words and an exclamation point. The dot of the exclamation point is in the form of a small green heart.

Reading the words on the T-shirt, remembering the man from whom Old Yeller had stolen a sandal along the interstate highway in Utah, Curtis says, '"Love is the answer.'"

"It's true, I suppose," Ms. Tavenall says, "even when it's said by people who don't mean it."

Rising from his chair, Curtis Hammond shakes his head. "No, ma'am. If we're talking about the answer, then that's not it. The answer, the whole big enchilada, is a lot more complex than that. Love alone is an easy answer, and easy answers are what usually lead whole worlds into ruin. Love is part of the answer, sure, but just part. Hope is another part, and courage, and charity, and laughter, and really seeing things like how green pine trees look after a rain and how the setting sun can turn a prairie into molten gold glass. There are so many parts to the answer that you couldn't possibly squeeze them all onto a T-shirt."

TIME PASSES as always time does, and the caravan settles one late-spring afternoon in a campground near a lazy river, where willow trees stencil filigrees of shadow on the purling water.

As dinnertime approaches, they bring blankets, hampers loaded with delicious things, and numerous dog toys to a grassy bank, where frogs sing and butterflies dance in sunlight as ochery as old brass.

Polly brings her Diana, a beautiful black Labrador. Cass has her Apollo in tow; he's a handsome yellow Lab.

Here is Noah with a big old goofy mutt named Norman, and the cocker spaniel, Ladybug, is the sister-become of Richard Velnod, alias Rickster.

Aunt Gen, Micky, and Leilani are accompanied by Larry, Curly, and Moe. These three golden retrievers are actually female dogs, but Aunt Gen chose the names.

Larry, Curly, and Moe were all obtained through golden-retriever rescue organizations. In the past, all three were abused, neglected, abandoned, but they are happy dogs now, with lustrous coats and quick tails and soulful eyes.

The other dogs were all rescued from pounds, and their pasts are filled with suffering, too, though you wouldn't know it to watch them chase balls, leap for Frisbees, and wriggle-wriggle-wriggle on their backs in the grass with all four paws in the air in absolute joyous celebration of the playful Presence.

Curtis, of course, has sister-become. And though all these dogs could tell enthralling stories if they could talk, Old Yeller's story ' surely is and most likely always will be more enthralling than any of theirs.

Games without dogs are played, as well, though Leilani insists there will be no three-legged races. Rickster and Curtis play a few rounds of Who's the Gump? a game of their invention. The object is to reveal an act of supreme dumbness that you have committed; the winner is the player who, by the judgment of a third party, has done the dumbest thing. Sometimes Leilani and Curtis play Who's the Gump? and Rickster judges. Sometimes Micky and Curtis play, while Aunt Gen serves as judge. Everyone likes to play the game, but they seldom play with each other; they all want to go head-to-head with Curtis. What fascinates Rickster, not just as a contestant but also as co-inventor of the game, is that Curtis usually wins, even though he is an ET, has had the benefit of massive direct-to-brain megadata downloading, and is arguably smarter than all of them.

Here under the willows by the river, after dinner, when night has fallen, when butterflies have retired for the day and flickering fireflies have come on duty to replace them, the family gathers around a camp-fire to share their lives, as they do more nights than not, for every one of them has seen and done and felt so much that the others have not. This is in part also the point of Who's the Gump? — to better know one another. Curtis's mother always said that the better you know others, the better you will know yourself, and that in the fullest sharing of experience, we learn the wisdom of a world. More important still, from the sharing of experience, we learn that every life is unique and precious, that no one is expendable; and with this discovery, we acquire the humility that we must have to live our lives well, with grace, and with gratitude for the gift of breath.

He misses his mother terribly, and the loss of her will leave a hole in his heart for the rest of his time in this life, though she will be with him in memory all his days. When those days end and he joins her again. oh, Lord, will they have a lot to share.

Among others, Aunt Gen speaks this evening, looking as young as a girl in the firelight. On other evenings she has told stories about her life with her beloved husband, gone now nineteen years; but on this occasion, she tells them something of her childhood lived along a river not dissimilar to this willow-shaded, moonlit water slipping past them in the night. The story is quite dramatic, involving her evil stepfather, a preacher who killed her mother and tried also to kill Geneva and her brother, for their inheritance. Most of those gathered here soon realize that this is not anything that happened to Aunt Gen, but is the story line of The Night of the Hunter, starring Robert Mitchum. No one raises this point, because Aunt Gen tells the story so well and with such feeling. In time, when she realizes that this is a shot-in-the-head story, not a real one, she gets sly with them and, rather than correct the record, begins to layer in elements from The Rainmaker, starring Burt Lancaster, and then characters and plot twists from Kindergarten Cop, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. Soon they are having a grand good time.

Laughter and the presence of so many wonderful dogs inevitably encourages a visit now and then from other folks whose rigs and tents are tied down in this campground. After hard play, many of the dogs are sleeping. Although the family is not at work right now, they will always take advantage of an opportunity to pass along the Gift. And so before they all retire, long after midnight, the number of people who have gathered around the campfire has grown by seven, and there have been tears, though only tears of joy, and seven lives have been changed forever, but only for the better.

For the newcomers, after they have known the dreams of the dogs, Micky poses the riddle that she learned from Aunt Gen. What will you find behind the door that is one door away from Heaven?

To date, Curtis is the only one who has answered it correctly on the first try, and this evening, the seven newcomers eventually puzzle their way close to the true response, but none earns a cigar.

Leilani gives the answer according to Geneva, which everyone in the family can recite to the word. "If your heart is closed, then you will find behind that door nothing to light your way. But if your heart is open, you will find behind that door people who, like you, are searching, and you will find the right door together with them. None of us can ever save himself; we are the instruments of one another's salvation, and only by the hope that we give to others do we lift ourselves out of the darkness into light."

Time passes as time does, and the campfire subsides to a mound of glowing coals. People and dogs drift home to bed.

Other than Curtis, the last two to leave are Micky and Leilani. Larry, Curly, and Moe have gone home with Aunt Gen. The campsites are about two hundred yards from these picnic grounds, and Micky lights the way with a Coleman lantern, held high. Woman and girl walk hand in hand, into a darkness that holds no fear for them. The murmur of their voices and their gentle laughter drifts back to him, all the music anyone could ever need. If this were a movie, and if Curtis were a film director, he would make this the final scene: woman and girl, saviors of each other, walking away from the camera into a future that together they have redeemed. Indeed, the movie would be called Redemption. Having seen 9,658 films and then some, he knows that in this final scene, as they walk away, the screen would fade to black; however, this is reality, and neither Micky nor Leilani will ever fade to black but will go on forever.

Curtis remains behind to extinguish the hot coals with river water and to stir the ashes, although he doesn't do so at once. He sits with sister-become at his side, just the two of them enthralled by the mystery of the stars and by the pearl-perfect moon, together enjoying the rightness of all things.

He is no longer being Curtis Hammond, for he has become Curds Hammond. This world is his destiny, and he can't imagine a finer home or one more beautiful. Oh, Lord, he is a Gump, all right, but he's finding his way well enough in spite of that.

A sudden whirl of wind spins up a twist of fallen leaves, sends them dancing slowly, slowly around the perimeter of the smoldering campfire until they reach Curtis, whereupon the wind expires in a puff, casting the greenery in his face. Leaves stick in his hair, dangle from his ears. He spits one out of his mouth.

Dogs laugh. At least most of them do, and this one is always ready to be amused. The playful Presence must love her even more than He loves others of her kind, and He sees in Curtis not merely one who will save a world, but also a perfect foil for His jokes.

One door away from Heaven,

We live each day and hour.

One door away from Heaven,

But it lies beyond our power

To open the door to Heaven

And enter when we choose.

One door away from Heaven,

And the key is ours to lose.

One door away from Heaven,

But, oh, the entry dues.

— The Book of Counted Sorrows