Lanmo tasted the air and knew that what she said was true, that all of it was true. ‘You would rather leave now?’ he asked her.
‘With my husband. Yes. I would rather not stay behind in a world with no colours and no music and no dancing any more. Which is the world it would become for me without him.’
The husband and wife looked at Lanmo. They held hands. And they waited.
And so the snake agreed they could leave together. But before that had to happen, Lanmo danced with them both until the sun set behind the hills and it was fully dark. Then, when the North Star was bright, he nodded to them, and everyone sat down on the grass, which remained warm with sunshine, love and dancing. And the snake let the wife and the husband meet him both together. While the couple held hands and looked up at the stars, the snake opened his mouth with his needle-sharp teeth that were as white as bones.
Afterwards, he slept in the hollow they had made for him in the grass, because this was the first home that had been built only for him. And when he woke he wept. This had never happened before and, because it was all so strange, Lanmo knew he must go and see Mary. He would ask her to explain.
When the snake returned to Mary’s city he saw that, once again, much more time had passed than he had realised. There were no longer any kites flying over the rooftops. The streets were almost silent, apart from the barking of thin yellow dogs. The luxurious towers that had thrown their shadows over more and more of the neighbourhoods had been abandoned and become tall, thin ruins, or had been reduced to no more than rubble and foundations. It seemed that the hands of giants had reached down and punished them. The snake, because he was wise, knew that the hands of humans and the machines and devices of humans had caused the damage. Usually, this would not have concerned him. He had seen many cities and nations rise and fall. But this time, as he rushed to Mary’s home, he discovered that he was terribly worried. He wished never to arrive but also to be in her garden already, pleasing her and making her laugh. He felt that he was being torn into two pieces and this made him think, love truly is a terrible thing. And yet it makes lovers never want to leave each other and hold hands while they look at stars and be happy all the way to their ending. And that is wonderful. Love is strange.
When he reached what had been Mary’s house – far slower than he usually would have, because he was distracted – the snake found that the building had no windows any more and that none of its humans were still there. The snake’s friend the kitten had also gone. The rooms in the tiny apartment were almost bare. Out in the garden the plants were growing as best they could without anybody to water and care for them. The roses looked tired and as if they missed Mary.
In Mary’s room her bed remained, but without her blankets and sheets, or pillows. Resting on the bed were the embellished slippers that Mary had once been forced to make in her sewing class. They were placed neatly together on top of a folded note with ‘FOR LANMO’ written on it. The snake could read all the languages that ever were or could be and so he unfolded the paper and saw:
Dear Lanmo,
We have had to leave here and we do not exactly know where we are going, so I cannot tell you where you can find us. Even so, I really would like you to find us, because you are my best friend in all the world. Mother, Father, Paul, Shade and I will start walking to the north tomorrow where things are meant to be better. (Except Shade will not be walking because he only has quite little paws for making a big journey. We are going to carry him. He doesn’t weigh very much, even though he has grown up since you saw him last.)
Please do come and visit me if you can. I know you are busy, but please do try.
And Paul says hello.
And thank you for the dreams.
And I am sending really all my love to you apart from the love that is for Paul and Mother and Father and the little bit I give to Shade who is very sweet.
Your friend,
Mary
The snake tasted the letter and, even though the paper and ink were quite old, they still held the flavour of love. He closed his eyes for a moment and remembered lying on this same bed and looking into his friend Mary’s eyes. The snake’s heart had always been still throughout his thousands upon thousands of years of existence, but now it began, for the first time, to beat. The sound of it puzzled him.
He flickered his clever tongue into the air, so that he could taste exactly where Mary had gone to and then, faster than sadness, he made his way there. He moved too swiftly for anyone to see, but those humans he passed on his journey shivered and cried, or felt they must find those they loved at once and hold them and look at their faces with great attention and tell them kind and important things.
When the snake stopped his journey he found that he was by the side of a small path through woods. It was evening, and all around him the dipping sun showed signs that many people had passed this way. There were abandoned suitcases and empty food cans lying about, along with worn-out shoes. Next to a little stream someone had left a piano, having pushed it for many miles. The instrument leaned at a strange angle against a willow tree’s trunk and when the wind blew the willow swayed and the piano’s strings played their own small tune to the tree.
In the shadows under the branches of an oak, the snake saw a young woman with twenty-one white hairs and eyes that showed she was brave and kind and honest. She was wearing sturdy boots and sensible clothes that were cleverly sewn with tiny, strong stitches. She looked like someone who had always prepared herself to go travelling and to have adventures. But she did not look as if she were enjoying a pleasant journey. She seemed thin and tired and her boots were worn and dusty, as were her patched canvas trousers, and her shirt and coat were threadbare.
But the snake hardly noticed how Mary looked. (For the young woman was, of course, his friend.) He was in too much of a rush and too happy. ‘Hello, Mary.’ Lanmo flickered through the grass and sat on Mary’s shoulder, resting his head against her cheek. He felt that his heart was beating very quickly and strangely inside him.
‘Ah, Lanmo.’ Mary stopped stirring a little pot of rice which she had hung over her cooking fire and began to tickle the snake’s belly. The snake allowed this, even though it was a little undignified for so wonderful a snake as he. The tickling made him smile his almost invisible snaky smile and he realised that he had not smiled since he last was with his friend.
Resting at Mary’s feet was Shade, who was now quite a grown-up cat. When he heard the snake’s voice, he flicked his ears and then stood up and began pouncing and capering about, as if he could recall being a kitten and playing with Lanmo’s tail.
‘I knew you would find me,’ said Mary. ‘Paul said you would not be able to, but I knew you would.’
‘And where is Paul?’ asked Lanmo, worried that Paul had not been helping Mary on the journey, as he should.
Mary smiled. ‘We passed a glade with mushrooms in it a while ago and I sent him to gather them now we have camped. I know from my books they are a kind that are good to eat. We can dry some for later and eat some now with this rice. He’ll be back soon. And then it is his turn to make us a bed in the trees.’
‘You sleep in the trees?’
‘Of course. Where there are big trees we can climb, we always camp high up in the branches and keep away from any danger. And while I sleep Paul watches me and while Paul sleeps I watch him – in case we fall out and hurt ourselves. No one has to watch Shade because he is already very good at sleeping in trees. In fact, he has taught us a great deal about that. He is extremely wise for a small cat.’