The Signature of All Things

transforming every rock surface into a mythical, sleeping beast. Improbably, the deepest corners of the cave glittered the brightest; they were absolutely studded, Alma realized with a gasp, with the jewellike filigree of Schistotega pennata.
    Goblin’s gold, dragon’s gold, elfin gold— Schistotega pennata was that rarest of cave mosses, that false gem that gleams like a cat’s eye from within the permanent twilight of geologic shade, that unearthly sparkling plant that needs but the briefest sliver of light each day to sparkle like glory forever, that brilliant trickster whose shining facets have fooled so many travelers over the centuries into believing that they have stumbled upon hidden treasure. But to Alma, this was treasure, more stunning than actual riches, for it bedecked the entire cave in the uncanny, glistering, emerald light that she had only ever before seen in miniature, in glimpses of moss seen through a microscope . . . yet now she was standing fully within it.
    Her first reaction upon entering this miraculous place was to shut her eyes against the beauty. It was unendurable. She felt as though this were something she should not be allowed to see without permission, without some sort of religious dispensation. She felt undeserving. With her eyes closed, she relaxed and allowed herself to believe that she had dreamed this vision. When she dared open them again, however, it was all still there. The cave was so beautiful that it made her bones ache with longing. She had never before coveted anything as much as she coveted this glimmering spectacle of mosses. She wanted to be swallowed by it. Already—although she was standing right there—she began to miss this place. She knew she would miss it for the rest of her days.
    “Ambrose always thought you would like it here,” Tomorrow Morning said.
    Only then did she begin to sob. She sobbed so hard that she did not make a sound—she could not make a sound—and her face twisted into a mask of tragedy. Something in the center of her broke apart, splintering her heart and lungs. She fell forward into Tomorrow Morning, the way a soldier, shot, falls into the arms of his comrade. He held her up. She shook like arattling skeleton. Her sobbing did not subside. She clung to him with such force that it would have broken the ribs of a lesser man. She wanted to press straight through him and come out the other side—or, better still, be blotted out by him, absorbed into his guts, erased, negated.
    In her paroxysm of grief, she did not at first sense it, but at length she perceived that he, too, was weeping—not great gusting sobs, but slow tears. She was holding him up as much as he was holding her. And so they stood together in the tabernacle of mosses and wept out his name.
    Ambrose , they lamented. Ambrose.
    He was never coming back.
    In the end they dropped to the ground, like trees hacked down. Their clothing was soaked and their teeth chattered with cold and fatigue. Without discussion or discomfort, they removed their wet clothes. It had to be done, or they would die of the chill. Now they were not only exhausted and sodden, they were laid bare. They lay down on the moss and regarded each other. It was not an assessment. It was not a seduction. Tomorrow Morning’s form was beautiful—but this was evident, unsurprising, beyond argument, and unimportant. Alma Whittaker’s form was not beautiful—but this, too, was evident, unsurprising, beyond argument, and unimportant.
    She reached for his hand. She put his fingers in her mouth, like a child. He allowed it. He did not recoil from her. Then she reached for his penis, which had been—like the penis of every Tahitian boy—circumcised during youth with the tooth of a shark. She needed to touch him more intimately; he was the one person who had ever touched Ambrose. She did not ask permission of Tomorrow Morning for this touch; permission issued from the man, unspoken. All was understood. She moved down his large, warm body, and took his member into her mouth.
    This act was the one thing in her life she had ever really wanted to do. She had given up so much, and she had never complained—but could she not, at least once, have this? She did not need to be married. She did not need to be beautiful, or desired by men. She did not need to be surrounded by friends and frivolity. She did not need an estate, a library, a fortune. There was so much that she did not need. She did not even need to have