"Oh—look!" she exclaimed, walking around the procession. "Oh—they're
wonderful!"
She walked faster, flourishing an imaginary lance, and then began prancing
as if she were on horseback herself. Part of me wanted to join in; as I said,
I've always loved those knights myself, and besides, I'd been a King Arthur
nut when I was little. But the other part of me was stiff with embarrassment.
"Annie," I began, in the warning voice my mother used to use when my
brother and I got too exuberant as children.
But by then Annie had pretended to fall off her horse, dropping her lance.
She drew an imaginary sword so convincingly I knew I was admiring her
skill in spite of myself, and then when she cried, "En garde!
Stand and fight or I'll run you through!" I knew I wasn't going to be able to
keep from smiling much longer. "If you do not fight me, knight," she said,
"you will rue the day that ever you unhorsed me here in this green wood!" I
had to laugh then, her mood was so catching. Besides, by then I'd noticed
that the only other people around were a couple of little boys at the opposite
end of the Hall. In the next minute I completely stopped resisting. I imagined
a horse and leapt down from it, crying in my best King Arthur style, "I will
not fight an unhorsed knight and me mounted. But now that I am on the
ground, you will not live to tell the tale of this day's battle!" I pretended to
throw aside my lance and draw a sword, too.
"Nor you!" cried Annie with a lack of logic that we laughed about later.
"Have at you, then!" she shouted, swiping at me with her sword.
In another minute we were both hopping in and out of the procession of
knights, laying about with our imaginary swords and shouting chivalrous
insults at each other. After about the third insult, the little boys left the other
end of the Hall and came over to watch us. "I'm for the one in the cape!" one
of them shouted. "Go, Cape!"
"I'm not," said his friend. "Go, Raincoat!" Annie and I caught each other's
eyes and I realized that we were making a silent agreement to fight on till the
death for the benefit of our audience. The only trouble was, I wasn't sure how
we were going to signal each other which one of us was going to die andwhen. "Here—what's going on here? Stop that, you two, this instant—old
enough to know better, aren't you?" I felt a strong hand close around my
shoulder and I turned and saw the uniform of a museum guard topped by a
very red, very angry face. "We're terribly sorry, sir," Annie said, with a look
of such innocence I didn't see how anyone could possibly be angry at her.
"The knights are so—so splendid! I've never seen them before—I got carried
away."
"Harrumph!" the guard said, loosening his hold on my shoulder and saying
again, "Old enough to know better, both of you." He glared at the two little
boys, who by now were huddled together, mouths wide open. "Don't let this
give you any ideas," he roared after them as they scurried off like a pair of
frightened field mice. When they were gone, the guard scowled at us again—
he scowled, that is, but his eyes didn't look angry. "Darn good fight," he
grunted. "Ought to do Shakespeare in the Park, you two. But no more, he
said, shaking his finger. "Not here—understand?"
"Oh, yes, sir," Annie said contritely, and I nodded, and we stood there
practically holding our breaths as he lumbered away. The second he was
gone, we both burst out laughing. "Oh, Liza," Annie said, "I don't know
when I've had so much fun."
"Neither do I," I said truthfully. "And, hey, guess what? I wasn't even
embarrassed, except right at the beginning." Then a funny thing happened.
We looked at each other, really looked, I mean, for the first time, and for a
moment or two I don't think I could have told anyone my name, let alone
where I was. Nothing like that had ever happened to me before, and I think—
I know—it scared me. It was a bit longer before I could speak, and even then
all I could say was, "Come on—the temple's this way." We went silently
through the Egyptian section, and I watched Annie's face as we walked into
the Sackler Wing and she saw the Temple of Dendur, with the pool and open
space in front of it. It's a sight that stuns most people, and it still stuns me,
even though I've been there many times. It's the absence of shadows, I think,
and the brightness— stark and pure, even on a day as rainy as that one was.
Light streams in through glass panels that are as open as the sky and reflects
from the pool, making the temple's present setting seem as vast and
changeable as its original one on the river Nile must have been thousands of years ago. Annie gasped as soon as we walked in. "It's outdoors!" she said.
"Like it, I mean. But—but exactly like it." She threw out her arms as if
embracing all of it, and let out her breath in an exasperated sigh, as if she
were frustrated at not being able to find the right words. "I know," I said; I'd
never felt I'd found the right words, either—and Annie smiled. Then, her
back very straight, she walked slowly around the pool and up to the temple as
if she were the goddess Isis herself, inspecting it for the first time and
approving. When she came back, she stood so close to me our hands would
have touched if we'd moved them. "Thank you," she said softly, "for
showing me this. The choir screen, too." She stepped back a little. "This
room seems like you." She smiled. "Bright and clear. Not somber like me and
the choir screen."
"But you're …" I stopped, realizing I was about to say beautiful—surprised
at thinking it, and confused again. Annie's smile deepened as if she'd heard
my thought, but then she turned away. "I should go," she said. "It's getting
late."
"Where do you live?" The words slipped out before I could think much about
them. But there didn't seem any reason not to ask. "Way uptown," Annie
said, after hesitating a moment. "Here …" She pushed her cape back and
groped in a pocket, pulling out a pencil stub and a little notebook. She
scribbled her address and phone number, tore the page off, and handed it to
me. "Now you have to give me yours." I did, and then we just sort of chatted
as we walked back through the Egyptian section and outside into the rain. I
don't remember what we said; but I do remember feeling that something
important had happened, and that words didn't matter much. In a few more
minutes, Annie was on a cross town bus, and I was heading in the opposite
direction to get the IRT subway home to Brooklyn. I was halfway home
before I realized I hadn't done any thinking about my solar-house project at
all.