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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Extra Day, by Algernon Blackwood
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Extra Day
+
+Author: Algernon Blackwood
+
+Posting Date: June 4, 2012 [EBook #5894]
+Release Date: June, 2004
+First Posted: September 18, 2002
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE EXTRA DAY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks and the
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+THE EXTRA DAY
+
+BY
+
+ALGERNON BLACKWOOD
+
+AUTHOR OF "THE CENTAUR," "A PRISONER IN FAIRYLAND," "INCREDIBLE
+ADVENTURES," ETC.
+
+
+
+New York
+
+1915
+
+
+
+Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1915. Reprinted November,
+1915.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+CHAPTER
+
+I     THE MATERIAL
+
+II    FANCY--SEED OF WONDER
+
+III   DEATH OF A MERE FACT
+
+IV    FACT--EDGED WITH FANCY
+
+V     THE BIRTH OF WONDER
+
+VI    THE GROWTH OF WONDER
+
+VII   IMAGINATION WAKES
+
+VIII  WHERE WONDER HIDES
+
+IX    A PRIEST OF WONDER
+
+X     FACT AND WONDER--CLASH
+
+XI    JUDY'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE
+
+XII   TIM'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE
+
+XIII  TIME HESITATES
+
+XIV   MARIA STIRS
+
+XV    "A DAY WILL COME"
+
+XVI   TIME HALTS
+
+XVII  A DAY HAS COME
+
+XVIII TIME GOES ON AGAIN--
+
+XIX   --AS USUAL
+
+XX    --BUT DIFFERENTLY!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+THE MATERIAL
+
+
+Judy, Tim, and Maria were just little children. It was impossible to
+say exactly what their ages were, except that they were just the usual
+age, that Judy was the eldest, Maria the youngest, and that Tim,
+accordingly, came in between the two.
+
+Their father did his best for them; so did their mother; so did Aunt
+Emily, the latter's sister. It is impossible to say very much about
+these three either, except that they were just Father, Mother, and Aunt
+Emily. They were the Authorities-in-Chief, and they knew respectively
+everything there was to be known about such remote and difficult
+subjects as London and Money; Food, Health and Clothing; Conduct,
+Behaviour and Regulations, both general and particular. Into these
+three departments of activity the children, without realising that they
+did so, classed them neatly. Aunt Emily, besides the special duties
+assigned to her, was a living embodiment of No. While Father allowed
+and permitted, while Mother wobbled and hesitated, Aunt Emily shook her
+head with decision, and said distinctly No. She was too full of
+warnings, advice, and admonitions to get about much. She wore gold
+glasses, and had an elastic, pointed nose. From the children's point of
+view she must be classed as invalid. Somewhere, deep down inside them,
+they felt pity.
+
+The trio loved them according to their just deserts; they grasped that
+the Authorities did their best for them. This "best," moreover, was
+done in different ways. Father did it with love and tenderness, that
+is, he spoilt them; Mother with tenderness and love, that is, she felt
+them part of herself and did not like to hurt herself; Aunt Emily with
+affectionate and worthy desire to see them improve, that is, she
+trained them. Therefore they adored their father, loved their mother,
+and thought highly--from a distance preferably--of their aunt.
+
+This was the outward and visible household that an ordinary person,
+say, a visitor who came to lunch on Sunday after church, would have
+noticed. It was the upper layer; but there was an under layer too.
+There was Thompson, the old pompous family butler; they trusted him
+because he was silent and rarely smiled, winked at their mischief,
+pretended not to see them when he caught them in his pantry, and never
+once betrayed them. There was Mrs. Horton, the fat and hot-tempered
+family cook; they regarded her with excitement including dread, because
+she left juicy cakes (still wet) upon the dresser, yet denied them the
+entry into her kitchen. Her first name being Bridget, there was
+evidently an Irish strain in her, but there was probably a dash of
+French as well, for she was an excellent cook and _recipe_ was her
+master-word--she pronounced it "recipee." There was Jackman, the nurse,
+a mixture of Mother and Aunt Emily; and there was Weeden, the Head
+Gardener, an evasive and mysterious personality, who knew so much about
+flowers and vegetables and weather that he was half animal, half bird,
+and scarcely a human being at all--vaguely magnificent in a sombre way.
+His power in his own department was unquestioned. He said little, but
+it "meant an awful lot"--most of which, perhaps, was not intended.
+
+These four constituted the under layer of the household, concealed from
+visitors, and living their own lives apart behind the scenes. They were
+the Lesser Authorities.
+
+There were others too, of course, neighbours, friends, and visitors,
+who dwelt outside the big iron gates in the Open World, and who entered
+their lives from various angles, some to linger, some merely to show
+themselves and vanish into mist again. Occasionally they reappeared at
+intervals, occasionally they didn't. Among the former were Colonel
+William Stumper, C.B., a retired Indian soldier who lived in the Manor
+House beyond the church and had written a book on Scouting; a nameless
+Station-Master, whom they saw rarely when they accompanied Daddy to the
+London train; a Policeman, who walked endlessly up and down the muddy
+or dusty lanes, and came to the front door with a dirty little book in
+his big hands at Christmas-time; and a Tramp, who slept in barns and
+haystacks, and haunted the great London Road ever since they had once
+handed him a piece of Mrs. Horton's sticky cake in paper over the old
+grey fence. Him they regarded with a special awe and admiration, not
+unmixed with tenderness. He had smiled so nicely when he said "Thank
+you" that Judy, wondering if there was any one to mend his clothes, had
+always longed to know him better. It seemed so wonderful. How could he
+live without furniture, house, regular meals--without possessions, in a
+word? It made him so real. It was "real life," in fact, to live that
+way; and upon Judy especially the impression was a deep one.
+
+In addition to these occasional intruders, there was another person, an
+Authority, but the most wonderful Authority of all, who came into their
+lives a little later with a gradual and overwhelming effect, but who
+cannot be mentioned more definitely just now because he has not yet
+arrived. The world, in any case, speaking generally, was enormous; it
+was endless; it was always dropping things and people upon them without
+warning, as from a clear and cloudless sky. But this particular
+individual was still climbing the great curve below their horizon, and
+had not yet poked his amazing head above the edge.
+
+Yet, strange to say, they had always believed that some such person
+would arrive. A wonderful stranger was already on the way. They rarely
+spoke of it--it was just a great, passionate expectancy tucked away in
+the deepest corner of their hearts. Children possess this sense of
+anticipation all the world over; grown-ups have it too in the form of
+an unquenchable, though fading hope: the feeling that some day or other
+a Wonderful Stranger will come up the pathway, knock at the door, and
+enter their lives, making life worth living, full of wonder, beauty,
+and delight, because he will make all things new.
+
+This wonderful stranger, Judy had a vague idea, would be--be like at
+least--the Tramp; Tim, following another instinct, was of the opinion
+he would be a "soldier-explorer-hunter kind of man"; Maria, if she
+thought anything at all about him, kept her decision securely hidden in
+her tight, round body. But Judy qualified her choice by the hopeful
+assertion that he would "come from the air"; and Tim had a secret
+notion that he would emerge from a big, deep hole--pop out like a
+badger or a rabbit, as it were--and suddenly declare himself; while
+Maria, by her non-committal, universal attitude, perhaps believed that,
+if he came at all, he would "just come from everywhere at once." She
+believed everything, always, everywhere. But to assert that belief was
+to betray the existence of a doubt concerning it. She just lived it.
+
+For the three children belonged to three distinct classes, without
+knowing that they did so. Tim loved anything to do with the ground,
+with earth and soil, that is, things that made holes and lived in them,
+or that did not actually make holes but just grubbed about; mysterious,
+secret things, such as rabbits, badgers, hedgehogs, mice, rats, hares,
+and weasels. In all his games the "earth" was home.
+
+Judy, on the other hand, was indubitably an air person--birds amazed
+her, filling her hungry heart with high aspirations, longings, and
+desires. She looked, with her bright, eager face and spidery legs,
+distinctly bird-like. She flitted, darted, perched. She had what Tim
+called a "tweaky" nose, though whether he meant that it was beak-like
+or merely twitched, he never stated; it was just "tweaky," and Judy
+took it as a compliment. One could easily imagine her shining little
+face peeping over the edge of a nest, the rest of her sitting warmly
+upon half a dozen smooth, pink eggs. Her legs certainly seemed stuck
+into her like pencils, as with a robin or a seagull. She adored
+everything that had wings and flew; she was of the air; it was her
+element.
+
+Maria's passions were unknown. Though suspected of being universal,
+since she manifested no deliberate likes or dislikes, approving all
+things with a kind of majestic and indifferent omnipotence, they
+remained quiescent and undeclared. She probably just loved the
+universe. She felt at home in it. To Maria the entire universe
+belonged, because she sat still and with absolute conviction--claimed
+it.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+FANCY--SEED OF WONDER
+
+
+The country house, so ancient that it seemed part of the landscape,
+settled down secretively into the wintry darkness and watched the night
+with eyes of yellow flame. The thick December gloom hid it securely
+from attack. Nothing could find it out. Though crumbling in places, the
+mass of it was solid as a fortress, for the old oak beams had resisted
+Time so long that the tired years had resigned themselves to siege
+instead of assault, and the protective hills and woods rendered it
+impregnable against the centuries. The beleaguered inhabitants felt
+safe. It was a delightful, cosy feeling, yet excitement and surprise
+were in it too. Anything _might_ happen, and at any moment.
+
+This, at any rate, was how Judy and Tim felt the personality of the old
+Mill House, calling it Daddy's Castle. Maria expressed no opinion. She
+felt and knew too much to say a word. She was habitually non-committal.
+She shared the being of the ancient building, as the building shared
+the landscape out of which it grew so naturally. Having been born last,
+her inheritance of coming Time exceeded that of Tim and Judy, and she
+lived as though thoroughly aware of her prerogative. In quiet silence
+she claimed everything as her very own.
+
+The Mill House, like Maria, never moved; it existed comfortably; it
+seemed independent of busy, hurrying Time. So thickly covered was it
+with ivy and various creepers that the trees on the lawn wondered why
+it did not grow bigger like themselves. They remembered the time when
+they looked up to it, whereas now they looked over it easily, and even
+their lower branches stroked the stone tiles on the roof, patched with
+moss and lichen like their own great trunks. They had come to regard it
+as an elderly animal asleep, for its chimneys looked like horns, it
+possessed a capacious mouth that both swallowed and disgorged, and its
+eyes were as numerous as those of the forest to which they themselves
+properly belonged. And so they accepted the old Mill House as a thing
+of drowsy but persistent life; they protected and caressed it; they
+liked it exactly where it was; and if it moved they would have known an
+undeniable shock.
+
+They watched it now, this dark December evening, as one by one its
+gleaming eyes shone bright and yellow through the mist, then one by one
+let down their dark green lids. "It's going to sleep," they thought.
+"It's going to dream. Its life, like ours, is all inside. It sleeps the
+winter through as we do. All is well. Good-night, old house of grey!
+We'll also go to sleep."
+
+Unable to see into the brain of the sleepy monster, the trees resigned
+themselves to dream again, tucking the earth closely against their
+roots and withdrawing into the cloak of misty darkness. Like most other
+things in winter they also stayed indoors, leading an interior life of
+dim magnificence behind their warm, thick bark. Presently, when they
+were ready, something would happen, something they were preparing at
+their leisure, something so exquisite that all who saw it would dance
+and sing for gladness. They also believed in a Wonderful Stranger who
+was coming into their slow, steady lives. They fell to dreaming of the
+surprising pageant they would blazon forth upon the world a little
+later. And while they dreamed, the wind of night passed moaning through
+their leafless branches, and Time flew noiselessly above the turning
+Earth.
+
+Meanwhile, inside the old Mill House, the servants lit the lamps and
+drew the blinds and curtains. Behind the closing eyelids, however, like
+dream-chambers within a busy skull, there were rooms of various shapes
+and kinds, and in one of these on the ground-floor, called Daddy's
+Study, the three children stood, expectant and a little shy, waiting
+for something desirable to happen. In common with all other living
+things, they shared this enticing feeling--that Something Wonderful was
+going to happen. To be without this feeling, of course, is to be not
+alive; but, once alive, it cannot be escaped. At death it asserts
+itself most strongly of all--Something Too Wonderful is going to
+happen. For to die is quite different from being not alive. This
+feeling is the proof of eternal life--once alive, alive for ever. To
+live is to feel this yearning, huge expectancy.
+
+Daddy had taught them this, though, of course, they knew it
+instinctively already. And any moment now the door would open and his
+figure, familiar, yet each time more wonderful, would cross the
+threshold, close the door behind him, and ... something desirable would
+happen.
+
+"I wish he'd hurry," said Tim impatiently. "There won't be any time
+left." And he glanced at the cruel clock that stopped all their
+pleasure but never stopped itself. "The motor got here hours ago. He
+can't STILL be having tea." Judy, her brown hair in disorder, her belt
+sagging where it was of little actual use, sighed deeply. But there was
+patience and understanding in her big, dark eyes. "He's in with Mother
+doing finances," she said with resignation. "It's Saturday. Let's sit
+down and wait." Then, seeing that Maria already occupied the big
+armchair, and sat staring comfortably into the fire, she did not move.
+Maria was making a purring, grunting sound of great contentment; she
+felt no anxiety of any kind apparently.
+
+But Tim was less particular.
+
+"Alright," he said, squashing himself down beside Maria, whose podgy
+form accommodated itself to the intrusion like a cat, "as long as Aunt
+Emily doesn't catch him on the way and begin explaining."
+
+"She's in bed with a headache," mentioned Judy. "She's safe enough."
+For it was an established grievance against their mother's sister that
+she was always explaining things. She was a terrible explainer. She
+couldn't move without explaining. She explained everything in the
+world. She was a good soul, they knew, but she had to explain that she
+was a good soul. They rather dreaded her. Explanations took time for
+one thing, and for another they took away all wonder. In bed with a
+headache, she was safely accounted for, explained.
+
+"She thinks we miss her," reflected Tim. He did not say it; it just
+flashed through his mind, with a satisfaction that added vaguely to his
+pleasurable anticipation of what was coming. And this satisfaction
+increased his energy. "Shove over a bit," he added aloud to Maria, and
+though Maria did not move of her own volition, she was nevertheless
+shoved over. The pair of them settled down into the depths of the
+chair, but while Maria remained quite satisfied with her new position,
+her brother fussed and fidgeted with impatience born of repressed
+excitement. "Run out and knock at the door," he proposed to Judy.
+"He'll never get away from Mother unless we let him KNOW we're waiting."
+
+Judy, kneeling on a chair and trying to make it sea-saw, pulled up her
+belt, sprang down, then hesitated. "They'll only think it's Thompson
+and say come in," she decided. "That's no good."
+
+Tim jumped up, using Maria as a support to raise himself. "I know
+what!" he cried. "Go and bang the gong. He'll think it's
+dressing-time." The idea was magnificent. "I'll go if you funk it," he
+added, and had already slithered half way over the back of the chair
+when Judy forestalled him and had her hand upon the door-knob. He
+encouraged her with various instructions about the proper way to beat
+the gong, and was just beginning a scuffle with the inanimate Maria,
+who now managed to occupy the entire chair, when he was aware of a new
+phenomenon that made him stop abruptly. He saw Judy's face hanging in
+mid-air, six feet above the level of the floor. Her face was flushed
+and smiling; her hair hung over her eyes; and from somewhere behind or
+underneath her a gruff voice said sternly:
+
+"What are you doing in my Study at this time of night? Who asked you
+in?"
+
+The expected figure had entered, catching Judy in the act of opening
+the door. He was carrying her in his arms. She landed with a flop upon
+the carpet. The desired and desirable thing was about to happen. "Get
+out, you lump, it's Daddy." But Maria, accustomed to her brother's
+exaggerated language, and knowing it was only right and manly, merely
+raised her eyes and waited for him to help her out. Tim did help her
+out; half dragging and half lifting, he deposited her in a solid heap
+upon the floor, then ran to the figure that now dominated the dim,
+fire-lit room, and hugged it with all his force, making sounds in his
+throat like an excited animal: "Ugh! ugh! ugh!...!"
+
+The hug was returned with equal vigour, but without the curious sounds;
+Maria was hugged as well and set upon her feet; while Judy, having
+already been sufficiently hugged, pushed the arm-chair closer up to the
+fire and waited patiently for the proper business of the evening to
+begin.
+
+The figure, meanwhile, disentangled itself. It was tall and thin, with
+a mild, resigned expression upon a kindly face that years and care had
+lined before its time: old-fashioned rather, with soft, grey whiskers
+belonging to an earlier day. A black tail-coat adorned it, and the
+neck-tie was crooked in the turned-down collar. The watch-chain went
+from the waist-coat button to one pocket only, instead of right across,
+and one finger wore a heavy signet-ring that bore the family crest. It
+was obviously the figure of an overworked official in the Civil Service
+who had returned from its daily routine in London to the evening
+routine of its family in the country, the atmosphere of Government and
+the Underground still hanging round it. For sundry whiffs of the
+mysterious city reached the children's nostrils, bringing thrills of
+some strange, remote reality they had never known at first-hand. They
+busied themselves at once. While Tim unbuttoned the severe black coat
+and pulled it off, Judy brought a jacket of dingy tweed from behind a
+curtain in the corner, and stood on a chair to help the figure put it
+on. All knew their duties; the performance went like clockwork. And
+Maria sat and watched in helpful silence. There was a certain air about
+her as though she did it all.
+
+"How they do spoil me, to be sure," the figure murmured to itself; "yet
+Mother's always saying that _I_ spoil them. I wonder...!"
+
+"Now you look decent at last," said Judy. "You smell like a nice
+rabbit."
+
+"It's my shooting-coat." The figure cleared its throat, apparently on
+the defensive a little.
+
+Tim and Judy sniffed it. "Rabbits and squirrels and earth and things,"
+thought Tim.
+
+"And flowers and burning leaves," said Judy. "It's his old garden-coat
+as well." She sniffed very audibly. "Oh, I love that smoky smell."
+
+"It's the good old English smell," said the figure contentedly, while
+they put his neck-tie straight and arranged the pocket flaps for him.
+"It's English country--England."
+
+"Don't other countries smell, then?" inquired Tim. "I mean, could any
+one tell you were English by your smell?" He sniffed again, with
+satisfaction. "Weeden's the same," he went on, without waiting for an
+answer, "only much stronger, and so's the potting shed."
+
+"But yours is sweeter _much_," said Judy quickly. To share odours with
+an Authority like the Head Gardener was distinctly a compliment, but
+Daddy must come first, whatever happened. "How funny," she added, half
+to herself, "that England should have such a jolly smell. I wonder what
+it comes from?"
+
+"Where _does_ England come from?" asked Tim, pausing a moment to stare
+into the figure's face. "It's an island, of course--England--but--"
+
+"A piece of land surrounded by water," began the figure, but was not
+allowed to finish. A chorus of voices interrupted:
+
+"Make a story of it, please. There's just time. There's half an hour.
+It's nice and dark. Ugh! Something very awful or very silly, please...."
+
+There followed a general scuffle for seats, with bitter complaints that
+he only had two pointed knees. Maria was treated with scant respect.
+There was also criticism of life--that he had no lap, "no proper lap,"
+that it was too dark to see his face, that everybody in turn had got
+"the best place," but, chiefly, that there was "very little time." Time
+was a nuisance always: it either was time to go, or time to stop, or
+else there was not time enough. But at length quiet was established;
+the big arm-chair resembled a clot of bees upon a honeycomb; the fire
+burned dully, and the ceiling was thick with monstrous fluttering
+shadows, vaguely shaped.
+
+"Now, please. We've been ready for ages."
+
+A deep hush fell upon the room, and only a sound of confused breathing
+was audible. The figure heaved a long, deep sigh as though it suffered
+pain, paused, cleared its throat, then sighed again more heavily than
+before. For the moment of creation was at hand, and creation is not
+accomplished without much travail.
+
+But the children loved the pause, the sigh, the effort. Not realising
+with what difficulty the stories were ground out, nor that it was an
+effort against time--to make a story last till help came from
+outside--they believed that something immense and wonderful was on the
+way, and held their breath with beating hearts. Daddy's stories were
+always marvellous; this one would be no exception.
+
+Marvellous up to a point, that is: something in them failed. "He's
+trying," was their opinion of them; and it was the trying that they
+watched and listened to so eagerly. The results were unsatisfying, the
+effect incomplete; the climax of sensation they expected never came.
+Daddy, though they could not put this into words, possessed fancy only;
+imagination was not his. Fancy, however, is the seed of imagination, as
+imagination is the blossom of wonder. His stories prepared the soil in
+them at any rate. They felt him digging all round them.
+
+He began forthwith:
+
+"Once, very long ago--"
+
+"How long?"
+
+"So long ago that the chalk cliffs of England still lay beneath the
+sea--"
+
+"Was Aunt Emily alive then?"
+
+"Or Weeden?"
+
+"Oh, much longer ago than that," he comforted them; "so long, in fact,
+that neither your Aunt Emily nor Weeden were even thought of--there
+lived a man who--"
+
+"Where? What country, please?"
+
+"There lived a man in England--"
+
+"But you said England was beneath the sea with the chalk cliffs."
+
+"There lived a man in a very small, queer little island called Ingland,
+spelt 'Ing,' not 'Eng,' who--"
+
+"It wasn't _our_ England, then?"
+
+"On a tiny little island called Ingland, who was very lonely because he
+was the only human being on it--"
+
+"Weren't there animals and things too?"
+
+"And the only animals who lived on it with him were a squirrel who
+lived in the only tree, a rabbit who lived in the only hole, and a
+small grey mouse who made its nest in the pocket of his other coat."
+
+"Were they friendly? Did he love them awfully?"
+
+"At first he was very polite to them only, because he was a civil
+servant of his Government; but after a bit they became so friendly that
+he loved them even better than himself, and went to tea with the rabbit
+in its hole, and climbed the tree to share a nut-breakfast with the
+squirrel, and--and--"
+
+"He doesn't know what to do with the mouse," a loud whisper, meant to
+be inaudible, broke in upon the fatal hesitation.
+
+"And went out for walks with the mouse when the ground was damp and the
+mouse complained of chilly feet. In the pocket of his coat, all snug
+and warm, it stood on its hind legs and peered out upon the world with
+its pointed nose just above the pocket flap--"
+
+"Then he liked the mouse best?"
+
+"What sort of coat was it? An overcoat or just an ordinary one that
+smelt? Was that the only pocket in it?"
+
+"It was made of the best leaves from the squirrel's tree, and from the
+rabbit's last year's fur, and the mouse had fastened the edges together
+neatly with the sharpest of its own discarded whiskers. And so they
+walked about the tiny island and enjoyed the view together--"
+
+"The mouse couldn't have seen much!"
+
+"Until, one day, the mouse declared the ground was ALWAYS wet and was
+getting wetter and wetter. And the man got frightened."
+
+"Ugh! It's going to get awful in a minute!" And the children nestled
+closer. The voice sank lower. It became mysterious.
+
+"And the wetter it got the more the man got frightened; for the island
+was dreadfully tiny and--"
+
+"Why, please, did it get wetter and wetter?"
+
+"THAT," continued the man who earned his living in His Majesty's
+Stationery Office by day, and by night justified his existence offering
+the raw material of epics unto little children, "that was the
+extraordinary part of it. For no one could discover. The man stroked
+his beard and looked about him, the squirrel shook its bushy tail, the
+rabbit lifted its upper lip and thrust its teeth out, and the mouse
+jerked its head from side to side until its whiskers grew longer and
+sharper than ever--but none of them could discover why the island got
+wetter and wetter and wetter--"
+
+"Perhaps it just rained like here."
+
+"For the sky was always blue, it never rained, and there was so little
+dew at night that no one even mentioned it. Yet the tiny island got
+wetter every day, till it finally got so wet that the very floor of the
+man's hut turned spongy and splashed every time the man went to look
+out of the window at the view. And at last he got so frightened that he
+stayed indoors altogether, put on both his coats at once, and told
+stories to the mouse and squirrel about a country that was always dry--"
+
+"Didn't the rabbit know anything?"
+
+"For all this time the rabbit was too terrified to come out of its hole
+at all. The increasing size of its front teeth added to its uneasiness,
+for they thrust out so far that they hid the view and made the island
+seem even smaller than it was--"
+
+"I like rabbits, though."
+
+"Till one fine day--"
+
+"They were all fine, you said."
+
+"One finer day than usual the rabbit made a horrible discovery. The way
+it made the discovery was curious--may seem curious to us, at
+least--but the fact is, it suddenly noticed that the size of its front
+teeth had grown out of all proportion to the size of the island.
+Looking over its shoulder this fine day, it realised how absurdly small
+the island was in comparison with its teeth--and grasped the horrid
+truth. In a flash it understood what was happening. The island was
+getting wetter because it was also getting--_smaller_!"
+
+"Ugh! How beastly!"
+
+"Did it tell the others?"
+
+"It retired half-way down its hole and shouted out the news to the
+others in the hut."
+
+"Did they hear it?"
+
+"It warned them solemnly. But its teeth obstructed the sound, and the
+windings of its hole made it difficult to hear. The man, besides, was
+busy telling a story to the mouse, and the mouse, anyhow, was sound
+asleep at the bottom of his pocket, with the result that the only one
+who caught the words of warning was--the squirrel. For a squirrel's
+ears are so sharp that it can even hear the grub whistling to itself
+inside a rotten nut; and it instantly took action."
+
+"Ah! IT saved them, then?"
+
+"The squirrel flew from the man's shoulder where it was perched,
+balanced for a second on the top of his head, then clung to the ceiling
+and darted out of the window without a moment's delay. It crossed the
+island in a single leap, scuttled to the top of the tree, peered about
+over the diminishing landscape, and--"
+
+"Didn't it see the rabbit?"
+
+"And returned as quickly as it went. It bustled back into the hut,
+hopping nervously, and jerking its head with excitement. In a moment it
+was perched again on the man's shoulder. It carefully kept its bushy
+tail out of the way of his nose and eyes. And then it whispered what it
+had seen into his left ear."
+
+"Why into his left ear?"
+
+"Because it was the right one, and the other had cotton wool in it."
+
+"Like Aunt Emily!"
+
+"What did it whisper?"
+
+"The squirrel had made a discovery, too," continued the teller,
+solemnly.
+
+"Goodness! That's two discoveries!"
+
+"But what _did_ it whisper?"
+
+In the hush that followed, a coal was heard falling softly into the
+grate; the night-wind moaned against the outside walls; Judy scraped
+her stockinged foot slowly along the iron fender, making a faint
+twanging sound. Breathing was distinctly audible. For several moments
+the room was still as death. The figure, smothered beneath the clotted
+mass of children, heaved a sigh. But no one broke the pause. It was too
+precious and wonderful to break at once. All waited breathlessly, like
+birds poised in mid-air before they strike ... until a new sound stole
+faintly upon the listening silence, a faint and very distant sound,
+barely audible as yet, but of unmistakable character. It was far away
+in the upper reaches of the building, overhead, remote, a little
+stealthy. Like the ominous murmur of a muffled drum, it had approach in
+it. It was coming nearer and nearer. It was significant and threatening.
+
+For the first time that evening the ticking of the clock was also
+audible. But the new sound, though somewhat in league with the ticking,
+and equally remorseless, did not come from the clock. It was a human
+sound, the most awful known to childhood. It was footsteps on the
+stairs!
+
+Both the children and the story-teller heard it, but with different
+results. The latter stirred and looked about him, as though new hope
+and strength had come to him. The former, led by Tim and Judy, broke
+simultaneously into anxious speech. Maria, having slept profoundly
+since the first mention of the mouse in its cosy pocket, gave no sign
+at all.
+
+"Oh, quick! quick! What did the squirrel whisper in his good right ear?
+What was it? DO hurry, please!"
+
+"It whispered two simple words, each of one syllable," continued the
+reanimated figure, his voice lowered and impressive. "It said--_the
+sea_!"
+
+The announcement made by the squirrel was so entirely unexpected that
+the surprise of it buried all memory of the disagreeable sound. The
+children sat up and stared into the figure's face questioningly. Surely
+he had made a slight mistake. How could the sea have anything to do
+with it? But no word was spoken, no actual question asked. This
+overwhelming introduction of the sea left him poised far beyond their
+reach. His stories were invariably marvellous. He would somehow justify
+himself.
+
+"The Sea!" whispered Tim to Judy, and there was intense admiration in
+his voice and eyes.
+
+"From the top of its tree," resumed the figure triumphantly, "the
+squirrel had seen what was happening, and made its great discovery. It
+realised why the ground was wetter and wetter every day, and also why
+the island was small and growing smaller. For it understood the awful
+fact that--the sea was rising! A little longer and the entire island
+would be under water, and everybody on it would be drowned!" "Couldn't
+none of them swim or anything?" asked Judy with keen anxiety.
+
+"Hush!" put in Tim. "It's what did they _do?_ And who thought of it
+first?"
+
+The question last but one was chosen for solution.
+
+"The rabbit," announced the figure recklessly. "The rabbit saved them;
+and in saving them it saved the Island too. It founded Ingland, this
+very Ingland on which we live to-day. In fact, it started the British
+Empire by its action. The rabbit did it."
+
+"How? How?"
+
+"It heard the squirrel's whisper half-way down its hole. It forgot
+about its front teeth, and the moment it forgot them they, of course,
+stopped growing. It recovered all its courage. A grand idea had come to
+it. It came bustling out of its hiding-place, stood on its hind legs,
+poked its bright eyes over the window-ledge, and told them how to
+escape. It said, 'I'll dig my hole deeper and we'll empty the sea into
+it as it rises. We'll pour the water down my hole!'"
+
+The figure paused and fixed his eyes upon each listener in turn,
+challenging disapproval, yet eager for sympathy at the same time. In
+place of criticism, however, he met only silence and breathless
+admiration. Also--he heard that distant sound _they_ had forgotten, and
+realised it had come much nearer. It had reached the second floor. He
+made swift and desperate calculations. He decided that it was _just_
+possible ... with ordinary good luck ...
+
+"So they all went out and began to deepen the rabbit's hole. They dug
+and dug and dug. The man took off both his coats; the rabbit scraped
+with its four paws, using its tail as well--it had a nice long tail in
+those days; the mouse crept out of his pocket and made channels with
+its little pointed toes; and the squirrel brushed and swept the water
+in with its bushy, mop-like tail. The rising sea poured down the
+ever-deepening hole. They worked with a will together; there was no
+complaining, though the rabbit wore its tail down till it was nothing
+but a stump, and the mouse stood ankle-deep in water, and the
+squirrel's fluffy tail looked like a stable broom. They worked like
+heroes without stopping even to talk, and as the water went pouring
+down the hole, the level of the sea, of course, sank lower and lower
+and lower, the shores of the tiny island stretched farther and farther
+and farther, till there were reaches of golden sand like Margate at low
+tide, and as the level sank still lower there rose into view great
+white cliffs of chalk where before there had been only water--until, at
+last, the squirrel, scampering down from the tree where it had gone to
+see what had been accomplished, reported in a voice that chattered with
+stammering delight, 'We're saved! The sea's gone down! The land's come
+up!'"
+
+The steps were audible in the passage. A gentle knock was heard. But no
+one answered, for it seemed that no one was aware of it. The figure
+paused a moment to recover breath.
+
+"And then, and then? What happened next? Did they thank the rabbit?"
+
+"They all thanked each other then. The man thanked the rabbit, and the
+rabbit thanked the squirrel, and the mouse woke up, and--"
+
+No one noticed the slip, which proved that their attention was already
+painfully divided. For another knock, much louder than before, had
+interrupted the continuation of the story. The figure turned its head
+to listen. "It's nothing," said Tim quickly. "It's only a sound," said
+Judy. "What did the mouse do? Please tell us quickly."
+
+"I thought I heard a knock," the figure murmured. "Perhaps I was
+mistaken. The mouse--er--the mouse woke up--"
+
+"You told us that."
+
+The figure continued, speaking with greater rapidity even than before:
+
+"And looked about it, and found the view so lovely that it said it
+would never live in a pocket again, but would divide its time in future
+between the fields and houses. So it pricked its whiskers up, and the
+squirrel curled its tail over its back to avoid any places that still
+were damp, and the rabbit polished its big front teeth on the grass and
+said it was quite pleased to have a stump instead of a tail as a
+memento of a memorable occasion when they had all been nearly drowned
+together, and--they all skipped up to the top of the high chalk cliffs
+as dry as a bone and as happy as--"
+
+He broke off in the middle of the enormous sentence to say a most
+ridiculous and unnecessary thing. "Come in," he said, just as though
+there was some one knocking at the door. But no single head was turned.
+If there was an entry it was utterly ignored.
+
+"Happy as what?"
+
+"As you," the figure went on faster than ever. "And that's why England
+to-day is an island of quite a respectable size, and why everybody
+pretends it's dry and comfortable and cosy, and why people never leave
+it except to go away for holidays that cannot possibly be avoided."
+
+"I beg your pardon, sir," began an awful voice behind the chair.
+
+"And why to this day," he continued as though he had not heard, "a
+squirrel always curls its tail above its back, why a rabbit wears a
+stump like a pen wiper, and why a mouse lives sometimes in a house and
+sometimes in a field, and--"
+
+_"I beg your pardon, sir,"_ clanged the slow, awful voice in a tone
+that was meant to be heard distinctly, "but it's long gone 'arf-past
+six, and--"
+
+"Time for bed," added the figure with a sound that was like the falling
+of an executioner's axe. And, as if to emphasise the arrival of the
+remorseless moment, the clock just then struck loudly on the
+mantelpiece--seven times.
+
+But for several minutes no one stirred. Hope, even at such moments, was
+stronger than machinery of clocks and nurses. There was a general
+belief that somehow or other the moment that they dreaded, the moment
+that was always coming to block their happiness, could be evaded and
+shoved aside. Nothing mechanical like that was wholly true. Daddy had
+often used queer phrases that hinted at it: "Some day--A day is
+coming--A day will come"; and so forth. Their belief in a special Day
+when no one would say "Time" haunted them already. Yet, evidently this
+evening was not the momentous occasion; for when Tim mentioned that the
+clock was fast, the figure behind the chair replied that she was half
+an hour overdue already, and her tone was like Thompson's when he said,
+"Dinner's served." There was no escape this time.
+
+Accordingly the children slowly disentangled themselves; they rose and
+stretched like animals; though all still ignored the figure behind the
+chair. A ball of stuff unrolled and became Maria. "Thank you, Daddy,"
+she said. "It was just lovely," said Judy. "But it's only the
+beginning, isn't it?" Tim asked. "It'll go on to-morrow night?" And the
+figure, having escaped failure by the skin of its teeth, kissed each in
+turn and said, "Another time--yes, I'll go on with it." Whereupon the
+children deigned to notice the person behind the chair. "We're coming
+up to bed now, Jackman," they mentioned casually, and disappeared
+slowly from the room in a disappointed body, robbed, unsatisfied, but
+very sleepy. The clock had cheated them of something that properly was
+endless. Maria alone made no remark, for she was already asleep in
+Jackman's comfortable arms. Maria was always carried.
+
+"Time's up," Tim reflected when he lay in bed; "time's always up. I do
+wish we could stop it somehow," and fell asleep somewhat gratified
+because he had deliberately not wound up his alarum-clock. He had the
+delicious feeling--a touch of spite in it--that this would bother Time
+and muddle it.
+
+Yet Time, as a monster, chased him through a hundred dreams and thus
+revenged itself. It pursued him to the very edge of the daylight, then
+mocked him with a cold bath, lessons, and a windy sleet against the
+windows. It was "time to get up" again.
+
+Yet, meanwhile, Time helped and pleased the children by showing them
+its pleasanter side as well. It pushed them, gently but swiftly, up the
+long hill of months and landed them with growing excitement into the
+open country of another year. Since the rabbit, mouse, and squirrel
+first woke in their hearts the wonder of common things, they had all
+grown slightly bigger. Time tucked away another twelve months behind
+their backs: each of them was a year older; and that in itself was full
+of a curious and growing wonder.
+
+For the birth of wonder is a marvellous, sweet thing, but the
+recognition of it is sweeter and more marvellous still. Its growth,
+perhaps, shall measure the growth and increase of the soul to whom it
+is as eyes and hands and feet, searching the world for signs of hiding
+Reality. But its persistence--through the heavier years that would
+obliterate it--this persistence shall offer hints of something coming
+that is more than marvellous. The beginning of wisdom is surely--Wonder.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+DEATH OF A MERE FACT
+
+
+There was a man named Jinks. In him was neither fancy, imagination, nor
+a sign of wonder, and so he--died.
+
+But, though he appears in this chapter, he disappears again so quickly
+that his being mentioned in a sentence all by himself should not lead
+any one astray. Jinks made a false entry, as it were. The children
+crossed him out at once. He became illegible. For the trio had their
+likes and dislikes; they resented liberties being taken with them.
+Also, when there was no one to tell them stories, they were quite able
+to amuse themselves. It was the inactive yet omnipotent Maria who
+brought about indirectly the obliteration of Mr. Jinks.
+
+And it came about as follows:
+
+Maria was a podgy child of marked individuality. It was said that she
+was seven years old, but _she_ declared that eight was the figure,
+because some uncle or other had explained, "you're in your eighth
+year." Wandering uncles are troublesome in this kind of way. Every time
+her age was mentioned she corrected the informant. She had a trick of
+moving her eyes without moving her head, as though the round face was
+difficult to turn; but her big blue eyes slipped round without the
+least trouble, as though oiled. The performance gave her the sly and
+knowing aspect of a goblin, but she had no objection to that, for it
+saved her trouble, and to save herself trouble--according to nurses,
+Authorities, and the like--was her sole object in existence.
+
+Yet this seemed a mistaken view of the child. It was not so much that
+she did not move unnecessarily as that it was not necessary for her to
+move at all, since she invariably found herself in the middle of
+whatever was going on. While life bustled anxiously about her, hurrying
+to accomplish various ends, she remained calm and contented at the
+centre, completely satisfied, mistress of it all. And her face was
+symbolic of her entire being; whereas so many faces seem unfinished,
+hers was complete--globular like the heavenly bodies, circular like the
+sun, arms and legs unnecessary. The best of everything came to her
+_because_ she did not run after it. There was no hurry. Time did not
+worry her. Circular and self-sustaining, she already seemed to dwell in
+Eternity.
+
+"And this little person," one of these inquisitive, interfering
+visitors would ask, smiling fatuously; "how old is she, I wonder?"
+
+"Seven," was the answer of the Authority in charge.
+
+Maria's eyes rolled sideways, and a little upwards. She looked at the
+foolish questioner; the Authority who had answered was not worth a
+glance.
+
+"No," she said flatly, with sublime defiance, "I'm more. I'm in my
+eighth year, you see."
+
+And the visitor, smiling that pleasant smile that makes children
+distrust, even dislike them, and probably venturing to pinch her cheek
+or pat her on the shoulder into the bargain, accepted the situation
+with another type of smile--the Smile-that-children-expect. As a matter
+of fact, children hate it. They see through its artificial humbug
+easily. They prefer a solemn and unsmiling face invariably. It's the
+latter that produces chocolates and sudden presents; it's the
+stern-faced sort that play hide-and-seek or stand on their heads. The
+Smilers are bored at heart. They mean to escape at the first
+opportunity. And the children never catch their sleeves or coattails to
+prevent them going.
+
+"So you're in your eighth year, are you?" this Smiler chuckled with a
+foolish grin. He patted her cheek kindly. "Why, you're almost a
+grown-up person. You'll be going to dinner-parties soon." And he smiled
+again. Maria stood motionless and patient. Her eyes gazed straight
+before her. Her podgy face remained expressionless as dough.
+
+"Answer the kind gentleman," said the Authority reprovingly.
+
+Maria did not budge. A finger and thumb, both dirty, rolled a portion
+of her pinafore into a pointed thing like a string, distinctly black.
+She waited for the visitor to withdraw. But this particular visitor did
+not withdraw.
+
+"_I_ knew a little girl--" he began, with a condescending grin that
+meant that her rejection of his advances had offended him, "a little
+girl of about your age, who--"
+
+But the remainder of the rebuke-concealed-in-a-story was heard only by
+the Authority. For Maria, relentless and unhumbugged, merely walked
+away. In the hall she discovered Tim, discreetly hiding. "What's _he_
+come for?" the brother inquired promptly, jerking his thumb towards the
+hall.
+
+Maria's eyes just looked at him.
+
+"To see Mother, I suppose," he answered himself, accustomed to his
+sister's goblin manners, "and talk about missions and subshkiptions,
+and all that. Did he give you anything?"
+
+"No, nothing."
+
+"Did he call us bonny little ones?" His face mentioned that he could
+kill if necessary, or if his sister's honour required it.
+
+"He didn't _say_ it."
+
+"Lucky for him," exclaimed Tim gallantly, rubbing his nose with the
+palm of his hand and snorting loudly. "What _did_ he say, then--the old
+Smiler?"
+
+"He said," replied Maria, moving her head as well as her eyes, "that I
+wasn't really old, and that he knew another little girl who was nicer
+than me, and always told the truth, and--"
+
+"Oh, come on," cried Tim, impatiently interrupting. "My trains are
+going in the schoolroom, and I want a driver for an accident. We'll put
+the Smiler in the luggage van, and he'll get smashed in the collision,
+and _all_ the wheels will go over his head. Then he'll find out how old
+you really are. We'll fairly smash him."
+
+They disappeared. Judy, who was reading a book on the Apocalypse, in a
+corner of the room, looked up a moment as they entered.
+
+"What's up?" she asked, her mind a little dazed by the change of focus
+from stars, scarlet women, white horses, and mysterious "Voices," to
+dull practical details of everyday existence. "What's on?" she repeated.
+
+"Trains," replied Tim. "We're going to have an accident and kill a man
+dead."
+
+"What's he done?" she inquired.
+
+"Humbugged Maria with a lot of stuff--and gave her nothing--and didn't
+believe a single word she told him."
+
+Judy glanced without much interest at the railway laid out upon the
+floor, murmured "Oh, I see," and resumed her reading of the wonderful
+book she had purloined from the top shelf of a neglected bookcase
+outside the gun-room. It absorbed her. She loved the tremendous words,
+the atmosphere of marvel and disaster, and especially the constant
+suggestion that the end of the world was near. Antichrist she simply
+adored. No other hero in any book she knew came near him.
+
+"Come and help," urged Tim, picking up an engine that lay upon its
+side. "Come on."
+
+"No, thanks. I've got an Apocalypse. It's simply frightfully exciting."
+
+"Shall we break _both_ legs?" asked Maria blandly, "or just his neck?"
+
+"Neck," said Tim briefly. "Only they must find the heart beneath the
+rubbish of the luggage van."
+
+Judy looked up in spite of herself. "Who is it?" she inquired, with an
+air of weighing conflicting interests.
+
+"Mr. Jinks." It was Maria who supplied the information.
+
+"But he's Daddy's offiss-partner man," Judy objected, though without
+much vim or heat.
+
+Maria did not answer. Her eyes were glued upon the other engine.
+
+"All black and burnt and--full of the very horridest diseases," put in
+Tim, referring to the heart of the destroyed Mr. Jinks beneath the
+engine.
+
+He glanced up enticingly at his elder sister, whom he longed to draw
+into the vindictive holocaust.
+
+"He said things to Maria," he explained persuasively, "and it's not the
+first time either. Last Sunday he called me 'his little man,' and he's
+never given me a single thing since ever I can remember, years and
+years ago."
+
+Then Judy remembered that he invariably kissed her on both cheeks as
+though she was a silly little child.
+
+"Oh, _that_ man!" she exclaimed, realising fully now the enormities he
+had committed. She appeared to hesitate a moment. Then she flung down
+her Apocalypse suddenly. "Put him on a scarlet horse," she cried,
+"pretend he's the Beast, and I'll come."
+
+Maria's blue eyes wheeled half a circle towards Tim. She did not move
+her head. It signified agreement. Tim knew. Only her consent, as the
+insulted party, was necessary before he could approve.
+
+"All right," he cried to Judy. "We'll put him in a special carriage
+with his horse, and I'll make out a label for the window, so that every
+one will know." He went over to the table and wrote "BEAST" in capital
+letters on a half-sheet of paper. The cumbersome quill pen made two
+spongy blots.
+
+"It's the end of the world _really_ at the same time," decided Judy, to
+a chorus of general approval, "not only the end of Mr. Jinks." She
+liked her horrors on a proper scale.
+
+And the railway line was quickly laid across the room from the window
+to the wall. The lamps of oil on both engines were lit. The trains
+faced one another. Mr. Jinks and his scarlet horse thought themselves
+quite safe in their special carriage, unaware that it was labelled
+"Beast" with a label that overlapped the roof and hid all view of the
+landscape through the windows on one side. Apparently they slept in
+opposite corners, with full consciousness of complete security. Mr.
+Jinks was tucked up with woolly rugs, and a newspaper lay across his
+knee. The scarlet horse had its head in a bag of oats, and its bridle
+was fastened to the luggage rack above. Both were supplied with iron
+foot-warmers. There was a _fearful_ fog; and the train was going at a
+_TREMENDOUS_ pace.
+
+So was the other train. They approached, they banged, they smashed to
+atoms. It was the most appalling collision that had ever been heard of,
+and the Guard and Engine-Driver, as well as the Ticket-Collectors and
+Directors of the Company, were all executed by the Government the very
+next day from gallows that an angry London built in half an hour on the
+top of St. Paul's Cathedral dome.
+
+It took place between the footstool and the fireplace in the thickest
+fog that England had ever known. And the horrid black heart of Mr.
+Jinks was discovered beneath the wreckage of a special carriage next to
+the luggage van. It was simply black as coal and very nasty indeed. The
+little boy who found it was a porter's son, whose mother was so poor
+that she took in washing for members of Parliament, who paid their
+bills irregularly because they were very busy governing Ireland. He
+knew it was a cinder, but did not discover it was a heart until he
+showed it to his mother, and his mother said it was far too black to
+wash.
+
+The accident to Mr. Jinks, therefore, was a complete success. The
+butler helped with the mending of the engine, and Maria informed at
+least one Authority, "We do not know Mr. Jinks. We have other friends."
+
+"But, remember," said Judy, "we mustn't mention it to Daddy, because
+Mr. Jinks is his partner-in-the-offiss."
+
+"_Was_," said Tim. The remains they decided to send to what they called
+the "Hospital for Parilysed Ineebrits with Incurable Afflictions of the
+Heart."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+FACT--EDGED WITH FANCY
+
+
+But the children were not always so vindictive and blood-thirsty. All
+three could be very tender sometimes. Even Maria was not wholly
+implacable and merciless, she had a pretty side as well. Their
+neighbour at the Manor House, Colonel William Stumper, C.B.,
+experienced this gentler quality in the trio. He was Mother's cousin,
+too.
+
+They were inclined to like this Colonel Stumper, C.B. For one thing he
+limped, and that meant, they decided, that he had a wooden leg. They
+never called it such, of course, but indicated obliquely that the
+injured limb was made of oak or walnut, by referring to the other as
+"his living leg," "his good leg," and so forth. For another thing, he
+did not smile at them; and for a third, he did not ask foolish
+questions in an up-and-down voice (assumed for the moment), as though
+they were invalids, idiots, or tailless puppies who could not answer.
+He frowned at them. He said furiously, "How are you, creatures?"
+And--he gave usually at least a shilling to each.
+
+"That makes three shillings altogether," as Tim cleverly explained.
+
+"But not three shillings for each of us," Maria qualified the praise.
+"_I_ only got one." She took it out of her mouth and showed it by way
+of proof.
+
+"You'll swallow it," warned Judy, "and then you won't have none at all."
+
+If received early in the week, they reported their good fortune to the
+Authorities; but if Sunday was too near, they waited. Daddy had a queer
+idea of teasing sometimes. "Just in time for to-morrow's collection,"
+he would be apt to say; and though he did not really mean it perhaps,
+there was a hint of threat in the suggestion that quenched high spirits
+at the moment.
+
+"You see, he takes the plate round," Judy told them, "and so feels
+ashamed." She did not explain the feeling ashamed. It was just that her
+father, who always did things thoroughly, had to say something, and so
+picked on that. "Monday or Tuesday's safest," was her judgment.
+
+Maria rolled her eyes round like a gigantic German doll.
+
+"Never's best," she gave as her opinion.
+
+But that was sly. The others reproved her quickly.
+
+"Daddy likes to know," they told her. "Monday or Tuesday's all right."
+They agreed just to mention the matter only. There was no need to "say
+a lot."
+
+So they liked this Colonel Stumper, C.B. They liked his "title,"
+declaring that the letters stood for "Come Back," and referring to
+their owner as "Come Back Stumper." Some day, when he was gone for
+good, he was to be promoted to K.C.B., meaning "Kan't-Come-Back." But
+they preferred him as he was, plain C.B., because they did not want to
+lose him. They declared that "Companion to the Bath" was just nonsense
+invented by a Radical Government. For in politics, of course, they
+followed their father's lead, and their father had _distinctly_ stated
+more than once that "the policy of a Radical Government was
+some-funny-word-or-other nonsense," which statement helped them
+enormously in forming their own opinions on several other topics as
+well. In personal disagreements, for instance--they never
+"squabbled"--the final insult was to say, "My dear, you're as silly as
+a something-or-other Radical Govunment," for there was no answer to
+this anywhere in the world.
+
+Come-Back Stumper, therefore, though casual outsiders might never have
+guessed it, was a valuable ally. He was what Mother called "a
+character" as well, and if the children used this statement in praise
+of him, while adopting in their carelessness a revised version, "he has
+no character," this was not Come-Back Stumper's fault. He was also an
+"extinguished soldger," and had seen much service in foreign parts.
+India with its tigers, elephants, and jungles, was in his heated
+atmosphere deliciously, and his yellow tint, as of an unripe orange,
+was due to something they had learned from hearsay to describe as
+"curried liver trouble." All this, and especially his dead or wooden
+leg, was distinctly in his favour. Come-Back Stumper was real. Also, he
+was hard and angular in appearance, short, brisk in manner,
+square-shouldered, and talked like a General who was bothered about
+something in a battle. His opinions were most decided. His conversation
+consisted of negatives, refusals and blank denials. If Come-Back
+Stumper agreed with what was said, it meant that he was feeling unwell
+with an attack of curried-liver-trouble. The children understood him.
+He understood the children, too.
+
+"It's a jolly morning, William," from Daddy would be met with "Might be
+worse" and a snort like the sneeze of the nursery cat, but a direct
+invitation of any sort was simply declined point blank. "Care to see
+The Times, William?" ensured the answer, "Oh, _no_, thanks; there's
+never anything worth reading in it." This was as regular as breakfast
+when Cousin William was staying in the house. It was, in fact, Daddy's
+formula when he settled into his armchair for a quiet half-hour's read.
+Daddy's question was the mere politeness of a host. It was sham, but
+Cousin William's answer was as real as breakfast. The formula was a
+mechanical certainty, as certain as that pressing a button in the wall
+produced Thompson in the room.
+
+Accordingly, when Mother said, "Now, don't bother your Cousin William,
+children; he doesn't want you," this individual would instantly
+shoulder arms and state the exact contrary with fiery emphasis.
+
+"If you've no objection," came the testy answer, "and if it's all the
+same to you, Cecilia"--a shade sarcastically, this--"it's precisely
+what I _do_ want."
+
+And he would look at the children in a way that suggested the most
+intimate of secret understanding between himself and them. More, he
+would rise and leave the room with the impetus of a soldier going out
+to fight, and would play with Judy, Tim, and Maria in a fashion that
+upset the household routine and made the trio unmanageable for the
+Authorities for hours afterwards.
+
+"He's an honourable gentleman like the gentlemen in Parliament,"
+declared Judy, "and that's my opinion of why I think him nice."
+
+"And when I'm grown-up," was Tim's verdict, "I'll be a soldger just
+exactly the same, only not yellow, and taller, and not so thick in the
+middle, and much, much richer, and with C.B. in front of my name as
+well as at the end."
+
+Maria, not being present at the time, said nothing audible. But she
+liked him, too, unquestionably. Otherwise she would have announced the
+fact without delay. "He _is_ a lump rather," she had been heard to
+remark, referring to his actual bulk and slowness of movement when in
+play. But it was nicely, very nicely meant.
+
+"I am sure your Cousin William would rather be left alone to read
+quietly," said Mother, seeing the trio approach that individual
+stealthily after tea in the library one evening. He was deep in a big
+armchair, and deep in a book as well. The children were allowed
+downstairs after their schoolroom tea for an hour when nothing
+particular was on. "Wouldn't you, William?" she added. She went on
+knitting a sort of muffler thing she held up close to the lamp. She
+expected no reply, apparently.
+
+Cousin William made none. But he raised the level of his book so that
+it hid his face. A moment before, the eyes had been looking over the
+top at the advancing trio, watching their movements narrowly.
+
+The children did not answer either. They separated. They scouted. They
+executed a flank attack in open order. Three minutes later Colonel
+Stumper was surrounded. And no word was spoken; the scouts just perched
+and watched him. He was not actually reading, for he had not turned a
+page for about ten minutes, and it was _not_ a picture book. The
+difficulty was, however, to get him started. If only Mother would help
+them! Then Mother, unwittingly, did so. For she dropped her ball of
+wool, and finding no one at hand to recover it, she looked vaguely
+round the room--and saw them. And she shook her head at them.
+
+"Don't bother him just now," she whispered again, "he's got a cold.
+Here, Maria, pick up my wool, darling, will you?" But while Tim (for
+Maria only moved her eyes) picked up the wool obediently, Cousin
+William picked up himself with difficulty, tossed his book into the
+deep arm-chair, and stalked without a single word towards the door.
+Mother watched him with one eye, but the children did not stir a muscle.
+
+"William, you're not going to bed, are you?" she asked kindly, "or
+would you like to, perhaps? And have your dinner in your room, and a
+warm drink just before going to sleep? That's the best thing for a
+cold, I always think."
+
+He turned at the door and faced her. "Thank you very much," he said
+with savage emphasis, "but I am _not_ ill, and I am _not_ going to
+bed." The negatives sounded like pistol shots. "My cold is nothing to
+speak of." And he was gone, leaving a trail of fire in the air.
+
+The children, cunning in their generation, did not move. There were
+moments in life, and this was one of them, when "stir a finger and
+you're a dead man" was really true. No finger stirred, no muscle
+twitched; one pair of eyelids fluttered, nothing more. And Mother,
+happy with her recovered ball of wool, was presently lost in the
+muffler thing she knitted, forgetful of their presence, if not of their
+very existence. Signals meanwhile were made and answered by means of
+some secret code that birds and animals understand. The plan was
+matured in silence.
+
+"Good-night, Mother," said Judy innocently, a few moments later,
+stepping up and kissing her.
+
+"Good-night," said Tim gravely, doing likewise.
+
+Maria kissed, but said no word at all. They did not linger, as their
+custom was, to cuddle in or hear a fairy story. To-night they were good
+and businesslike.
+
+"Good-night, duckies," said Mother, glancing at the clock on the
+mantelpiece. "It's not _quite_ bed-time yet, but it's been a long day,
+and you're tired out. I shall be up presently to hear your prayers and
+tuck you up. And, Judy, you might tell Jackman--"
+
+But the room was empty, the children vanished. The door banged softly,
+cutting off the sentence in its middle, and Mother resumed her
+knitting, smiling quietly to herself. And in the hall outside Come-Back
+Stumper was discovered, warming his Army back before the open fire of
+blazing logs. He looked like a cart-horse, the shadows made him spread
+so. Maria pushed him to one side. She pushed, at least, but he did not
+move exactly. Yet somehow, by a kind of sidling process, he took up a
+new position in regard to the fire and themselves, the result of which
+was that they occupied the best places, while he stood at one corner in
+an attitude which resisted attack and yet invited it.
+
+"Good-evening," remarked Maria; "are you warm?"
+
+"Oh, no," exclaimed Tim, "that's not it at all. The thing is, shall we
+play hide-and-seek, or would you really rather go to bed, as Mother
+said, and have dinner and hot drinks?"
+
+"Nonsense," cried Judy with authority. "He's got an awful cold, and
+he's got to go to bed at once. He's shivering all over. It's Nindian
+fever."
+
+"No, really, really--" began Stumper, but was not allowed to finish.
+
+"Thin captain biscuits soaked in hot milk with ginger, nutmeg, lemon,
+and whisky," announced Judy, "would be best." And she shot towards the
+door, her hair untied and flying.
+
+"But, my dear, I assure you--"
+
+"Or Bath Olivers," she interrupted, "because they soak better. _You_
+know nothing," she added motheringly; "no man ever does." There was
+contempt in her voice as well as pity.
+
+"_Why_ do you know nothing?" inquired Maria, with a blaze of staring
+eyes, as the door slammed upon her vanishing sister.
+
+"_I_ think you know everything," said Tim with pride, decidedly, "only
+you've forgotten it in India. I think it's silly."
+
+"The milk and stuff?" agreed the soldier. "Yes, so do I. And I hate
+biscuits, and ginger makes me hot and ill--"
+
+"Iller than you are already?" asked Maria, "because that means bed."
+
+"Maria," he snapped angrily, "I'm not ill at all. If you go on saying
+I'm ill, of course I shall get ill. I never felt better in my life."
+
+Tim turned round like a top. "Then let's play hide-and-seek," he cried.
+"Let's hide before Judy gets back, and she can come and never find us!"
+
+Cousin William suggested they were not enough to play that game, and
+was of opinion that Aunt Emily might be invited too.
+
+"Oh, no," Tim gave his decided verdict, "not women. They can't hide
+properly. They bulge."
+
+And at that moment Judy appeared in the doorway across the hall.
+
+"It's coming," she cried. "I've ordered everything--hot milk and Bath
+Olivers and preserved ginger and--"
+
+Cousin William took the matter into his own hands then, for the
+situation was growing desperate. "Look here," he suggested gravely, yet
+without enthusiasm, "I'll take the milk and stuff upstairs when I've
+got into bed, and meanwhile we'll do something else. I'm--that is, my
+cold is too bad to play a game, but I'll tell you a story
+about--er--about a tiger--if you like?" The last three words were added
+as a question. An answer, however, was not immediately forthcoming. For
+the moment was a grave one. It was admitted that Come-Back Stumper
+could play a game with credit and success, even an active game like
+hide-and-seek; but it was not known yet that he could tell a story. The
+fate of the evening, therefore, hung upon the decision.
+
+"A tiger!" said Tim, doubtfully, weighing probabilities. "A tiger you
+shot, was it, or just--a tiger?" A sign, half shadow and half pout, was
+in his face. Maria and Judy waited upon their brother's decision with
+absolute confidence, meanwhile.
+
+Colonel Stumper moved artfully backwards towards a big horsehair sofa,
+beneath the deer heads and assegais from Zululand. He did it on tiptoe,
+aware that this mysterious and suggestive way of walking has a marked
+effect on children in the dark. "I did not shoot it," he said, "because
+I lived with it. It was the most extraordinary tiger that was ever
+known--"
+
+"In India?"
+
+"In the world. And I ought to know, because, as I say, I lived with it
+for days--"
+
+"Inside it?"
+
+"Nearly, but not quite. I lived in its cave with the cubs and other
+things, half-eaten deer and cows and the bones of Hindus--"
+
+"Were the bones black? However did you escape? Why didn't the tiger eat
+you?"
+
+He drew the children closely round him on the sofa. "I'll tell you," he
+said, "for this is an inaugural occasion, and I've never told the story
+before to any one in the world. The experience was incredible, and no
+one would believe it. But the proof that it really happened is that the
+tiger has left its mark upon me till I die--"
+
+"But you haven't died--yet, I mean," Maria observed.
+
+"He means teeth, silly," Tim squelched her.
+
+"Died in another sense than the one you mean," the great soldier and
+former administrator of a province continued, "dyed yellow--"
+
+"Oh-h-h! Is that why--?"
+
+"That is why," he replied pathetically. "For living with that tiger
+family so long, I almost turned into one myself. The tiger nature got
+into me. I snarl and growl, I use my teeth ferociously when hungry, I
+walk stealthily on tiptoe, I let my whiskers grow, and my colour has
+the tint of Indian tigers' skins."
+
+"Have you got a tail, too?"
+
+He glared into the blue eyes of Maria, sternly. "It's growing," he
+whispered horribly, "it's growing."
+
+There was a pause in which credulity shook hands with faith. Belief was
+in the air. If doubt did whisper, "Let me see, please," it was too low
+to be quite audible. Come-Back Stumper was surrounded by an atmosphere
+of black-edged glory suddenly; he wore a halo; his feet were dipped in
+mystery.
+
+"Then what's an orgully occasion?" somebody asked.
+
+"This!" replied Stumper. But he uttered it so savagely that no one
+cared to press for further details. Clearly it was a secret and
+confidential moment, and "inaugural occasion" had something to do with
+the glory of wearing an incipient tail. Glory and mystery clothed
+Stumper from that moment with Indian splendour. At least, _he_ thought
+so....
+
+"And the tiger?" came the whispering question.
+
+"Ugh-h-h-h!" he shuddered; "I'll tell you. But I must think a moment
+quietly first."
+
+"His tail hurts," Maria told Tim beneath her breath, while they waited
+for the story to begin.
+
+"So would yours," was the answer, "if you had a cold at the same time,
+too. A girl would simply cry." And he looked contempt at her, but
+unutterable respect at his soldier friend.
+
+"This tiger," began the traveller, in a heavy voice, "was a--a very
+unusual tiger. I met it, that is to say, most unexpectedly. It was in a
+tropical jungle, where the foliage was so thick that the sunlight
+hardly penetrated at all. It was dark as night even in the daytime.
+There were monkeys overhead and snakes beneath, and bananas were so
+plentiful that every time my elephant knocked against a tree a shower
+of fruit fell down like hail and tickled its skin."
+
+"You were on an elephant, then?"
+
+"We were all on elephants. On my particular elephant there was a man to
+load for me and a man to guide the beast. We moved slowly and
+cautiously. It was dark, as I said, but the showers of falling bananas
+made yellow streaks against the black that the elephant constantly
+mistook for tigers flying through the air as they leaped in silent fury
+against the howdah in which we crouched upon his back. The howdah, you
+know, is the saddle."
+
+"Was the elephant friendly?"
+
+"_Very_ friendly indeed; but he found it difficult to see, and all of a
+sudden he would give a hop and a jump that nearly flung me off his
+shoulders. For a long time--"
+
+"That was the bananas tickling him, I suppose?"
+
+"This continued without anything dangerous happening, but all at once
+he gave a tremendous leap into the air, lifted his trunk, trumpeted
+like an Army bugle, and then set off at full speed through the tangled
+jungle. He had stupidly stepped upon a cobra! And the cobra, before it
+was squashed to pulp, had stung him between the big and little toe."
+
+"On purpose?" Judy asked.
+
+"In an Indian jungle everything's done on purpose. My elephant raced
+away, trumpeting in agony, at twenty miles an hour. The driver lost his
+balance and fell off; the other man, scrambling along to take his place
+and steer the monster, fell off after him, taking both my guns with him
+as he went; and I myself, crouching in the swaying howdah, and holding
+on for grim death, continued to tear through the jungle on top of my
+terrified and angry elephant. Then, suddenly, the branch of a tree
+caught the howdah in the middle and swept it clear. The elephant rushed
+on. The howdah, with myself inside it, swung in mid-air like a caught
+balloon. But I saw it could not hold on long. There was just time to
+scramble out of it into safety upon the branch when there came a sound
+of ripping, and the thing fell smash upon the ground some twenty feet
+below, leaving me alone in an Indian jungle--up a tree."
+
+And he paused a moment to produce the right effect and reap the
+inevitable glory of applause.
+
+Out of the breathless silence sprang a voice at once: "Was the elephant
+badly hurt?" And then another: "I thought elephants were too big to
+feel a bite like that." Followed by a third--Maria's: "It wasn't fair
+to step on it and expect it to do nothing."
+
+But no single word about his own predicament--its horror, danger,
+loneliness, and risk. No single syllable. Even the Hindus, the driver,
+and the man who carried the guns, were left unmentioned. Bananas were
+equally ignored. The tiger itself had passed into oblivion.
+
+"Thanks most awfully," said Tim, politely, after an interval. "It must
+have been awful for you." It was said as spokesman for the other
+listeners. All were kind and grateful, but actual interest there was
+none. They took the pause to mean that the story was at an end; but
+they had not cared about it because they--did not believe it.
+
+"Simply awful," the boy added, as though, perhaps, he had not made it
+quite clear that he wished to thank yet could not honestly praise.
+"Wasn't it, Judy?" And he jerked his head round towards his elder
+sister.
+
+"Oh, _awful_--yes," agreed that lady.
+
+But neither of them risked inviting the opinion of Maria. Her
+uncompromising nature was too well known for that. Nevertheless,
+unasked, she offered her criticism too: "Awful," she said, her podgy
+face unmoved, her blue eyes fixed upon the ceiling. And the whole room
+seemed to give a long, deep sigh.
+
+Now, for the hero, this was decidedly an awkward moment; he had done
+his best and miserably failed. He was no story-teller, and they had
+found him out. None the less, however, he was a real hero. He faced the
+situation as a brave man should:
+
+      For his tale was mediocre,
+      And his face of yellow ochre
+      Took a tinge of saffron sorrow in his fright;
+      Yet he rose to the occasion,
+      Without anger or evasion,
+      And did his best to put the matter right.
+
+"Tell me how you knew," he asked at length, facing the situation. "What
+made you guess?"
+
+"Because, in the first place, you're not an atom _like_ a tiger,
+anyhow," explained Judy.
+
+"And you made the jungle so very dark," said Tim, "that you simply
+couldn't have seen the bananas falling."
+
+"And we _know_ you haven't got a tail at all," Maria added, clinchingly.
+
+"Of course," he agreed; "your discernment does you credit, very great
+credit indeed. Few of the officials under me in India had as much."
+
+Judy looked soothingly at him and stroked his sleeve. Somehow or other
+she divined, it seemed, he felt mortified and ashamed. He was a dear
+old thing, whatever happened.
+
+"Never mind," she whispered, "it really doesn't matter. It was very
+nice to hear about your tiger. Besides--it must hurt awfully, having a
+cold like this."
+
+"I knew," put in Tim sympathetically, "the moment you began about the
+bananas falling. But I didn't say anything, because I knew it couldn't
+last--anything that began like that."
+
+"But it got wonderful towards the end," insisted Judy.
+
+"Till he was in the tree," objected her brother. "He never could really
+have got along a branch like that."
+
+"No," agreed Judy, thoughtfully, "that _was_ rather silly."
+
+They continued discussing the story for some time as though its creator
+was elsewhere. He kept very still. Maria already slept in a soft and
+podgy ball on his lap....
+
+"I am a lonely old thing," he said suddenly, with a long sigh, for in
+reality he was deeply disappointed at his failure, and had aspired to
+be their story-teller as well as playmate. Ordinary life bored him
+dreadfully. He had melancholy yearnings after youth and laughter.
+"Let's do something else now. What do you say to a turn of
+hide-and-seek? Eh?"
+
+The miraculous Maria woke at this, yawned like a cat, and nearly rolled
+off on to the floor. "I dreamed of a real tiger," she informed every
+one. But no one was listening. Judy and Tim were prancing wildly.
+
+"If your cold isn't _too_ bad," cried Judy, "it would be lovely." No
+grown-up could have been more thoughtful of his welfare than she was.
+
+"I'll hide," he said, "and in five minutes you come and find me." He
+went towards the door into the passage.
+
+"Choose a warm place, and keep out of draughts," she cried after him.
+And he was gone. He nearly collided with a servant carrying a tray, but
+the servant, hearing his secret instructions, vanished again instantly
+in the direction of the kitchen. Five minutes later--an alleged five
+minutes--the children began their search. But they never found him.
+They hunted high and low, from attic to cellar, in gun-room, scullery,
+and pantry, even climbing up the ladder from the box-room to the roof,
+but without result. Colonel Stumper had disappeared. He was K.C.B.
+
+"D'you think he's offended?" suggested Judy, as they met at length in
+the hall to consider the situation.
+
+"Of course not," said Tim emphatically, "a man like that! He's written
+a book on Scouting!"
+
+"I've finished," Maria mentioned briefly, and sat down.
+
+On Judy's puzzled face there appeared an anxious expression then. His
+cold, she remembered, was very heavy. "I looked under every sofa and
+into every cupboard," she said, as though she feared he might have
+choked or suffocated. They stood in front of the fireplace and began to
+talk about other things. Their interest in the game was gone, they were
+tired of looking; but at the back of their minds was a secret
+annoyance, though at the same time a sense of great respect for the man
+who could conceal himself so utterly from sight. A touch of the
+marvellous was in it somehow.
+
+"There's no good hiding like _that_," they felt indignantly. Still it
+was rather wonderful, after all. A man "like that" could do anything.
+He might even be up a chimney somewhere. He might be anywhere! They
+felt a little creepy....
+
+"P'raps he _is_ a sort of tiger thing," whispered some one ... and they
+were rather relieved when the drawing-room door opened and Mother
+appeared, knitting her scarlet muffler as she walked. The scene of
+scolding, explanation, and excuses that followed--for it was half an
+hour after bed-time--was cut short by Maria informing the company that
+she was "awfully tired," with a sigh that meant she would like to be
+carried up to bed. She was carried. The procession moved slowly, Tim
+and Judy bringing up the rear. But while Tim talked about a water-rat
+he meant to kill next day with an air-gun, Judy used her eyes
+assiduously, still hoping to discover Cousin William crumpled up in
+some incredible hiding-place. They told their mother nothing. The
+matter was private. It was between themselves and him. It would have to
+be cleared up on the morrow--if they remembered. On the upper landing,
+however, there was a curious sound. Maria, half asleep in the maternal
+arms, did not hear it, apparently, but the other two children exchanged
+sudden, recriminating glances. A door stood ajar, and light came
+through it from the room within. This curious sound came with it. It
+was a sneeze--a regular Nindian sneeze.
+
+"We never thought of looking _there_," they said reproachfully.
+Come-Back Stumper had simply gone to bed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE BIRTH OF WONDER
+
+
+Meanwhile their father alone grew neither older nor larger. His
+appearance did not change. They could not imagine that he would ever
+change. He still went up to London in the morning, he still came down
+again, he still continued to grind out stories which they thought
+wonderful, and he still, on occasions, said mysteriously, "A day will
+come," or its variants, "Some day," and "A day is coming." Yet, though
+he had Fancy, he had not Imagination. He did not satisfy them. For
+while Fancy may attend the birth of Wonder, Imagination alone
+accompanies her growth. Daddy was too full of stationery and
+sealing-wax in his daily work to have got very far.
+
+Aunt Emily also still was there, explaining everything and saying No,
+shaking her head at them, or holding up a warning finger. Their outward
+life, indeed, showed little change, but it included one important
+novelty that affected all their present and all their subsequent
+existence, too. They made a new friend--their father's brother.
+
+When first his visit was announced, they had their doubts about
+him--"your Uncle Felix" had a very questionable sound indeed, but the
+fact that he lived in Paris and was a writer of sea-stories and
+historical novels counterbalanced the handicap of the unpleasant
+"Felix." For to their ears Felix was not a proper sort of name at all;
+it was all right for a horse or a dog or even for a town, but for a man
+who was also a relation it was a positive disaster. It would not
+shorten for one thing, and for another it reminded them of "a king, or
+some one in a history book," and thus did not predispose them in his
+favour. It was simply what Tim called a "beastly name." Aunt Emily,
+however, was responsible for their biggest prejudice against him: "You
+must remember not to bother him, children; you must never disturb him
+when he's working." And as Uncle Felix was coming to stay for several
+weeks in the Mill House, they regarded him in advance as some kind of
+horrible excitement they must put up with.
+
+However, as most things in life go by contraries, this Uncle Felix
+person turned out just the opposite. Within an hour of his arrival he
+was firmly established as friend and ally, yet so quickly and easily
+was this adjustment brought about that no one could say exactly how it
+happened. They themselves said nothing--just stood and stared at him;
+Daddy and Mother said the expected things, and Aunt Emily, critical and
+explanatory as usual, found it necessary to add: "You'll find it such a
+quiet house to work in, Felix, and the children will never interfere or
+get in your way." She was evidently proud of her relative and his
+famous books. "They'll be as good as gold--won't you, Judy?" by which
+name she referred to the trio as a whole.
+
+Whereupon Judy smiled and nodded shyly, Tim bent down and scratched his
+stocking, and Maria, her face expressionless, merely stared at her aunt
+as though she--Emily, that is--were a piece of inanimate furniture.
+
+"I see," said Uncle Felix carelessly, and glanced down at the trio.
+
+That was all he said. But it was the way he said it that instantly
+explained his position. He looked at them and said, "I see"; no more
+than that--and it was done. They knew, he knew, Aunt Emily also knew.
+Two little careless words--and then continued to talk of Paris, the
+Channel crossing, and the weather.
+
+"Didn't he squash her just!" remarked Tim, when they were alone
+together. "She expected him to thank her awfully and give her a kiss."
+And, accordingly, none of them were in the least surprised when he
+suddenly poked his head inside the door as they lay in bed and
+explained that he had just looked in to say good-night, and when he
+left them a moment later added gravely from the door: "Mind, you never
+disturb me, children; because, if you do--!" He shook a warning finger
+and was gone. He looked enormous in the doorway.
+
+From that moment Uncle Felix became an important factor in their lives.
+The mysterious compact between them all was signed and sealed, yet none
+could say who drew it up and worded it. His duties became considerable.
+He almost took Daddy's place. The Study, indeed, at certain hours of
+the evening, became their recognised nesting place, and Daddy was as
+pleased as they themselves were. He seemed relieved. He rarely ground
+out epics now when his brain was tired and full of Government
+stationery and sealing-wax. Uncle Felix held the wizard's wand, and
+what he did with it was this: he raised the sense of wonder in them to
+a higher level. Daddy had awakened it, and fed it with specimens they
+could understand. But Uncle Felix poked it into yet greater activity by
+giving them something that no one could ever possibly understand! He
+stimulated it so that it worked in them spontaneously and of its own
+accord. He made it _grow_. And no amount of Aunt Emilies in the world
+could stop him.
+
+Their father felt no jealousy. When the story-hour came round, he
+produced a set of sentences he kept slyly up his sleeve for the
+occasion. "Ask your Uncle Felix; he's better at stories and things than
+I am. It's his business." This was the model. A variation ran: "Oh,
+don't bother me just now, children. I've got a lot of figures to
+digest." But the shortest version was simply, "Run and plague your
+uncle. I'm too busy."
+
+"Try Mother" was used when Uncle Felix was in hiding. Only it had no
+result. Mother's mind was too diffuse to carry conviction. It was
+soaked in servants and things. In another sense it was too exact. The
+ingredients of her stories were like a cooking recipe. Besides, hers
+was the unpardonable fault of never forgetting the time. On the very
+stroke of the clock she broke off abruptly with "Now it's bed-time; you
+shall hear the rest another night." Daddy forgot, or pleaded for "ten
+minutes more." Uncle Felix, however, said flatly, "They can't go till
+it's finished"--and he meant it. His voice was deep and gruff--"like a
+dog's," according to Maria--and his laugh was like a horse's neigh; it
+made the china rattle. He was "frightfully strong," too, stronger than
+Weeden, for he could take a child under each arm and another on his
+back--and run! He never smiled when he told his stories, and, though
+this made them seem extra real, it also alarmed deliciously--in the
+terrible places. Perched on his gigantic knees, they felt "like up the
+cedar," and when he stretched an arm or leg it was the great cedar
+branch swaying in the wind.
+
+His manner, too, was stern to severity, and his voice was so deep
+sometimes that they could "feel it rumbling inside," as though he had
+"swallowed the dinner gong." He was a very important man somewhere;
+Daddy was just in the Stationery Office, but Uncle Felix was an author,
+and the very title necessarily included awe. He wrote
+"storical-novuls." His name was often in the newspapers. They connected
+him with the "Govunment." It had to do somewhere with the Police. No
+one trifled with Uncle Felix. Yet, strange to say, the children never
+could be properly afraid of him, although they tried very hard. Their
+audacity, their familiarity, their daring astonished everybody. The
+gardeners and coachmen, to say nothing of the indoor servants, treated
+him as though he was some awful emperor. But the children simply pushed
+him about. He might have been a friendly Newfoundland dog that wore
+tail-coats and walked on his hind legs, for all they feared reprisals.
+
+He gave them a taste of his quality soon after his arrival.
+
+"No, children, it's impossible now. I'm busy over a scene of my
+storicalnovul. Ask your father." He growled it at them, frowning darkly.
+
+The parental heels had just that instant vanished round the door.
+
+"Father's got the figures and says he can't."
+
+"Or your mother--" he said, gruffly.
+
+"Mother's doing servants in the housekeeper's room."
+
+"Take your foot out of my waistcoat pocket this instant," he roared.
+
+"Why?" enquired Maria. "How else can I climb up?"
+
+He shook and swayed like the cedar branch, but he did not shake her
+off. "Because," he thundered, "there's money in it, and you've got
+holes in your stockings, and toes with you are worse than fingers."
+
+And he strode across the floor, Tim clinging to one leg with both feet
+off the ground, and Judy pushing him behind as though he were a heavy
+door that wouldn't open. He was very angry indeed. He told them plainly
+what he thought about them. He explained the philosophy of authors to
+them in brutal sentences. "Leave me alone, you little botherations!" he
+cried. "I'm in the middle of a scene in a storicalnovul." It was
+disgraceful that a man could lose his temper so. "Leave me alone, or
+I'll ..."
+
+In the corner of the big nursery sofa there was sudden silence. It was
+a chilly evening in early spring. Between the bars across the windows
+the wisteria leaves sifted the setting sunlight. The railway train lay
+motionless upon the speckled carpet. A cat, so fat it couldn't unroll,
+lay in a ball of mystery against the high guard of wire netting before
+the fire. Outside the wind went moaning.
+
+And Time ran backwards, or else the clock stopped dead. Dusk slipped in
+between the window bars. The cedars on the lawn became gigantic. They
+heard the haystacks shuffling out of their tarpaulins. The whole house
+rose into the air and floated off. Mother, Daddy, Nurses, beds dropped
+from the windows as it sailed away. All were left behind, forgotten
+details of some stupid and uncomfortable life elsewhere.
+
+"Quite ready," sighed the top of one cedar to the other.
+
+"And waiting, too," an answer came from nowhere.
+
+And then the Universe paused and settled with a little fluttering sound
+of wonder. The onceuponatime Moment entered the room....
+
+"There was a thing that nobody could understand," began the deep, gruff
+voice. "And this thing that nobody could understand was something no
+one understood at all."
+
+"That's twice they couldn't understand it," observed Judy, in the
+slight pause he made for effect.
+
+"It was alive," he went on, "and very beautiful, so beautiful, in fact,
+that people were astonished and felt rather ashamed because they
+couldn't understand it. Some declared it wasn't worth understanding at
+all; others said it might be worth understanding if they had the time
+to think about it; and the rest decided that it was nothing much, and
+promptly forgot that it existed. Their lives grew rather dull in
+consequence. A few, however, set to work to discover what it was. For
+the beauty of it set something in them strangely burning."
+
+"It was a firework, I think," remarked Maria, then felt she had said
+quite an awful thing. For Tim just looked at her. "It's alive, Uncle
+Felix told you," he stated. She was obliterated--for the moment.
+
+"Yes," resumed the story-teller, "it was alive, and its beauty set the
+hearts of a few people on fire to know what it meant. It was difficult
+to find, however, and difficult to see properly when found.
+
+"These people tried to copy it, and couldn't. Though it looked so
+simple it was impossible to imitate. It went about so quickly, too,
+that they couldn't catch hold of it and--"
+
+"But have _you_ seen it?" asked Judy, her head bobbing up into his face
+with eager curiosity.
+
+It was a vital question. All waited anxiously for his reply.
+
+"I have," he answered convincingly. "I saw it first when I was about
+your age, and I've never forgotten it."
+
+"But you've seen it since, haven't you? It's still in the world, isn't
+it?"
+
+"I've seen it since, and it's still in the world. Only no one knows to
+this day why it's there. No one can explain it. No one can understand
+it. It's so beautiful that it makes you wonder, and it's so mysterious
+that it makes you--"
+
+"What?" asked Tim for the others, while he paused a moment and stared
+into their gazing faces.
+
+"Wonder still more," he added.
+
+Another pause followed.
+
+"Then is your heart still burning, Uncle Felix?" Judy enquired,
+prodding him softly. "And does it matter much?"
+
+"It matters a great deal, yes, because I want to find out, and cannot.
+And the burning goes on and on whenever I see the
+thing-that-nobody-can-understand, and even when I don't see it but just
+think about it--which is pretty often. Because, if I found out why it's
+there, I should know so much that I should give up writing
+storicalnovuls and become a sort of prophet instead."
+
+They stared in great bewilderment. Their curiosity was immense. They
+were dying to know what the thing was, but it was against the Rules to
+ask outright.
+
+"Were their lives _very_ dull?"--Maria set this problem, suddenly
+recalling something at the beginning of the story.
+
+"Oh, very dull indeed. They had no sense of wonder--those who forgot."
+
+"How awful for them!"
+
+"Awful," he agreed, in a long-drawn whisper, shuddering.
+
+And that shudder ran through every one. The children turned towards the
+darkening room. The gloomy cupboard was a blotch of shadow. The table
+frowned. The bookshelves listened. The white face of the cuckoo clock
+peered down upon them dimly from the opposite wall, and the chairs, it
+seemed, moved up a little closer. But through the windows the stars
+were beginning to peep, and they saw the crests of the friendly cedars
+waving against the fading sky.
+
+He pointed. High above the cedars, where the first stars twinkled, the
+blue was deep and exquisitely shaded from the golden streak below it
+into a colour almost purple.
+
+"The thing that nobody could understand was even more wonderful than
+_that_," he whispered. "But no one could tell why it was there; no one
+could guess; no one could find out. And to this day--no one _can_ find
+out."
+
+His voice grew lower and lower and lower still.
+
+"To-morrow I'll show it to you. You shall see it for yourselves."
+
+They hardly heard him now. The voice seemed far away. What could it
+be--this very, very wonderful thing?
+
+"We'll go out and find one...by the stream ...where the willows
+bend...and shake their pointed leaves.... We'll go to-morrow...."
+
+His voice died away inside his waistcoat. Not a sound was audible. The
+children were very close against him. In his big hands he took each
+face in turn and put his lips inside the rim of three small ears.
+
+He told the secret then, while wonder filled the room and hovered
+exquisitely above the crowded chair....
+
+Awakened by the silence, presently, the ball of black unrolled itself
+beside the wire fender, it stretched its four black legs. And the
+children, hushed, happy, and with a mysterious burning in their hearts,
+went off willingly to bed, to dream of wonder all night long, and to
+ask themselves in sleep, _"Why God has put blue dust upon the body of a
+dragon-fly?"_
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+THE GROWTH OF WONDER
+
+
+The story of the dragon-fly marked a turning-point in their lives; they
+realised that life was crammed with things that nobody could
+understand. Daddy's reign was over, and Uncle Felix had ascended the
+throne. Wonder--but a growing wonder--ruled the world. The great
+Stranger they had always been vaguely expecting had drawn nearer; it
+was not Uncle Felix, yet he seemed the forerunner somehow. That "Some
+Day" of Daddy's--they had almost forgotten its existence--became more
+and more a possibility. Life had two divisions now: Before Uncle Felix
+came--and Now. To Maria alone there seemed no interval. To her it was
+always Now. She had so much wonder in her that she _knew_.
+
+Outwardly the household ran along as usual, but inwardly this enormous
+change was registered in three human hearts. The adventures they had
+before Uncle Felix came were the ordinary kind all children know; they
+invented them themselves. Their new adventures were of a different
+order--impossible but true. Their uncle had brought a key that opened
+heaven and earth.
+
+He did not know that he had brought this key. It was just natural--he
+let himself in because it was his nature so to do; the others merely
+went in with him. He worked away in his room, covering reams of paper
+with nonsense out of his big head; and the trio never disturbed him or
+knocked at his door, or even looked for him: they knew that his real
+life ran with theirs, and the moment he had covered so many dozen
+sheets he would appear and join them. All people had their duties; his
+duty was to fill so many sheets a day for printers; but his important
+life belonged to them and they just lived it naturally together. He
+would never leave the Old Mill House. The funny thing was--whatever had
+he done with himself before he came there!
+
+Everything he said and did lit up the common things of daily life with
+this strange, big wonder that was his great possession. Yet his method
+was simple and instinctive; he never thought things out; he just--knew.
+
+And the effect of his presence upon the other Authorities was
+significant. Not that the Authorities admitted or even were aware of
+it, but that the children saw them differently. Aunt Emily, for
+instance, whom they used to dread, they now felt sorry for. She was so
+careful and particular that she was afraid of life, afraid of living.
+Prudence was slowly killing her. Everything must be done in a certain
+way that made it safe; only, by the time it was safe it was no longer
+interesting. They saw clearly how she missed everything owing to the
+excessive caution and preparation in her: by the time she was ready,
+the thing had simply left. Instead of coming into the hayfield at once
+and enjoying it, she uttered so many warnings and gave so much advice
+against disaster--"better take this," and "better not take that"--that
+by the time they got there the hayfield had lost all its wonder. It was
+just a damp, untidy hayfield.
+
+Daddy, however, gained in glory. He approved of his big brother. On his
+return from London every evening the first thing he asked was, "What
+have you all been up to to-day? Has Uncle Felix given you the moon or
+rolled the sun and stars into a coloured ball?" Weeden, too, had grown
+in mystery--he made the garden live, and understood the secret life of
+every growing thing; while Thompson and Mrs. Horton, each in their
+separate ways, led lives of strange activity in the lower regions of
+the house till the kitchen seemed the palace of an ogress and the
+pantry was its haunted vestibule. "Mrs. Horton's kitchen" was a phrase
+as powerful as "Open Sesame"; and "the butler's pantry" edged the world
+of mighty dream.
+
+Above all, Mother occupied a new relationship towards them that made
+her twice as splendid as before. Until Uncle Felix came, she was simply
+"Mother," who loved them whatever they did and made allowances for
+everything. That was her duty, and unless they provided her with
+something to make allowances for they had failed in what was expected
+of them. Her absorption in servants and ordering of meals, in choosing
+their clothes and warning Jackman about their boots--all this was a
+chief reason for her existence, and if they didn't eat too much
+sometimes and wear their boots out and tear their clothes, Mother would
+have been without her normal occupation. Whereas now they saw her in
+another light, touched with the wonder of the sun and stars. It was
+proper, of course, for her to have children, but they realised now that
+she contrived to make the whole world work somehow for their benefit.
+Mother not only managed the entire Household, from the dinner-ordering
+slate at breakfast-time to the secret whisperings with Jackman behind
+the screen at bedtime, or the long private interviews with Daddy in his
+study after tea: she led a magnificent and stupendous life that
+regulated every smallest detail of their happiness. She was for ever
+thinking of them and slaving for their welfare. The wonder of her
+enormous love stole into their discerning hearts. They loved her
+frightfully, and told her all sorts of little things that before they
+had kept concealed. There were heaps and heaps of mothers in the world,
+of course; they were knocking about all over the place; but there was
+only one single Mother, and that was theirs.
+
+Yet, in his own peculiar way, it was Uncle Felix who came first. Daddy
+believed in a lot of things; Mother believed in many things; Aunt Emily
+believed in certain things done at certain times and in a certain way.
+But Uncle Felix believed in everything, everywhere and always. To him
+nothing was ever impossible. He held, that is, their own eternal creed.
+He was akin to Maria, moreover, and Maria, though silent, was his
+spokesman often.
+
+"Why _does_ a butterfly fly so dodgy?" inquired Tim, having vainly
+tried to catch a Painted Lady on the lawn.
+
+Daddy made a grimace and shrugged his shoulders, yet left the insect
+quite as wonderful as it was before. Mother looked up from her knitting
+with a gentle smile and said, "Does it, darling? I hadn't noticed."
+Aunt Emily, balancing her parasol to keep the sun away, observed in an
+educational tone of voice, "My dear Tim, what foolish questions you
+ask! It's because its wings are so large compared to the rest of its
+body. It can't help itself, you see." She belittled the insect and took
+away its wonder. She explained.
+
+Tim, unsatisfied, moved over to the wicker chair where Uncle Felix sat
+drowsily smoking his big meerschaum pipe. He pointed to the vanishing
+Painted Lady and repeated his question in a lower voice, so that the
+others could not hear:
+
+"Why does it fly like that--all dodgy?" Whatever happened, the boy knew
+his Uncle would leave the butterfly twice as wonderful as he found it.
+
+But no immediate answer came. They watched it for a moment together in
+silence. It behaved in the amazing way peculiar to its kind. Nothing in
+the world flies like a butterfly. Birds and other things fly straight,
+or sweep in curves, or rise and drop in understandable straight lines.
+But the Painted Lady obeyed no such rules. It dodged and darted, it
+jerked and shot, it was everywhere and anywhere, least of all where it
+ought to have been. The swallows always missed it. It simply
+doubled--and disappeared round the corner of the building.
+
+Then, puffing at his pipe, Uncle Felix looked at Tim and said, "I
+couldn't tell you. It's one of the things nobody can understand, I
+think."
+
+"Yes," agreed Tim, "it must be."
+
+There was a considerable pause.
+
+"But there must be some way of finding out," the boy said presently. He
+had been thinking over it.
+
+"There is." The man rose slowly from his chair.
+
+"What is it?" came the eager question.
+
+"Try it ourselves, and see if we can do the same!"
+
+And they went off instantly, hand in hand, and vanished round the
+corner of the building.
+
+The adventures they had since Uncle Felix came were of this impossible
+and marvellous order. That strange and lovely cry, "There's some one
+coming," ran through the listening world. "I believe there is," said
+Uncle Felix. "Some day he'll come and a tremendous thing will happen,"
+was another form of it, to which the answer was, "I know it will."
+
+It was much nearer to them than before. It was just below the edge of
+the world, the edge of life. It was in the air. Any morning they might
+wake and find the great thing was there--arrived in the night while
+they were sound asleep. So many things gave hints. A book _might_ tell
+of it between the lines; each time a new book was opened a thrill
+slipped out from the pages in advance. Yet no book they knew had ever
+told it really. Out of doors, indeed, was the more likely place to
+expect it. The tinkling stream either ran towards it, or else came from
+it; that was its secret, the secret it was always singing about day and
+night. But it was impossible to find the end or beginning of any
+stream. Wind, moreover, announced it too, for wind didn't tear about
+and roar like that for nothing. Spring, however, with its immense hope
+and expectation, gave the clearest promise of all. In winter it hid
+inside something, or at least went further away; yet even in winter the
+marvellous something or some one lay waiting underneath the snow,
+behind the fog, above the clouds. One day, some day, next day, or the
+day after to-morrow--and it would suddenly be there beside them.
+
+Whence came this great Expectancy they never questioned, nor what it
+was exactly, nor who had planted it. This was a mystery, one of the
+things that no one can understand. They felt it: that was all they
+knew. It was more than Wonder, for Wonder was merely the sign and proof
+that they were seeking. It was faint and exquisite in them, like some
+far, sweet memory they could never quite account for, nor wholly, even
+once, recapture. They remembered almost--almost before they were born.
+
+"We'll have a look now," Uncle Felix would say every walk they took;
+but before they got very far it was always time to come in again.
+"That's the bother of everything," he agreed with them. "Time always
+prevents, doesn't it? If only we could make it stop--get behind time,
+as it were--we might have a chance. Some day, perhaps, we shall."
+
+He left the matter there, but they never forgot that pregnant remark
+about stopping time and getting in behind it. No, they never forgot
+about it. At Christmas, Easter, and the like, it came so near that they
+could almost smell it, but when these wonderful times were past they
+looked back and knew it had not really come. The holidays cheated them
+in a similar way. Yet, when it came, they knew it would be as natural
+and simple as eating honey, though at the same time with immense
+surprise in it. And all agreed that it was somehow connected with the
+Dawn, for the Dawn, the opening of a new day, was something they had
+heard about but never witnessed. Dawn must be exceedingly wonderful,
+because, while it happened daily, none of them had ever seen it happen.
+A hundred times they had agreed to wake and have a look, but the Dawn
+had always been too quick and quiet. It slipped in ahead of them each
+time. They had never seen the sun come up.
+
+In some such sudden, yet quite natural way, this stupendous thing they
+expected would come up. It would suddenly be there. Everybody,
+moreover, expected it. Grown-ups pretended they didn't, but they did.
+Catch a grown-up when he wasn't looking, and he _was_ looking. He
+didn't like to be caught, that's all, for as often as not he was
+smiling to himself, or just going to--cry.
+
+They shared, in other words, the great, common yearning of the world;
+only they knew they yearned, whereas the rest of the world forgets.
+
+"I think," announced Judy one day--then stopped, as though unsure of
+herself.
+
+"Yes?" said her Uncle encouragingly.
+
+"I think," she went on, "that the Night-Wind knows an awful lot, if
+only--" she stopped again.
+
+"If only," he helped her.
+
+"We," she continued.
+
+"Could," he added.
+
+"Catch it!" she finished with a gasp, then stared at him expectantly.
+
+And his answer formed the subject of conversation for fully half an
+hour in the bedroom later, and for a considerable time after Jackman
+had tucked them up and taken the candle away. They watched the shadows
+run across the ceiling as she went along the passage outside; they
+heard her steps go carefully downstairs; they waited till she had
+safely disappeared, for the door was ajar, and they could hear her
+rumbling down into the lower regions of Mrs. Horton's kitchen--and then
+they sat up in bed, hugged their knees, shuddered with excitement, and
+resumed the conversation exactly where it had been stopped.
+
+For Uncle Felix had given a marvellous double-barrelled answer. He had
+said, "We can." And then he had distinctly added, "We will!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+IMAGINATION WAKES
+
+
+For the Night-Wind already had a definite position in the mythology of
+the Old Mill House, and since Uncle Felix had taken to reading aloud
+certain fancy bits from the storicalnovul he was writing at the moment,
+it had acquired a new importance in their minds.
+
+These fancy bits were generally scenes of action in which the
+Night-Wind either dropped or rose unexpectedly. He used the children as
+a standard. "Thank you very much, Uncle," meant failure, the
+imagination was not touched; but questions were an indication of
+success, the audience wanted further details. For he knew it was the
+child in his audience that enjoyed such scenes, and if Tim and Judy
+felt no interest, neither would Mr. and Mrs. William Smith of Peckham.
+To squeeze a question out of Maria raised hopes of a second edition!
+
+A Duke, disguised as a woman or priest, landing at night; a dark man
+stealing documents from a tapestried chamber of some castle, where bats
+and cobwebs shared the draughty corridors--such scenes were incomplete
+unless a Night-Wind came in audibly at critical moments. It wailed,
+moaned, whistled, cried, sang, sighed, soughed or--sobbed. Keyholes and
+chimneys were its favourite places, but trees and rafters knew it too.
+The sea, of course, also played a large part in these adventures, for
+water above all was the element Uncle Felix loved and understood, but
+this Night-Wind, being born at sea, was also of distinct importance.
+The sea was terrible, the wind was sad.
+
+To the children it grew more and more distinct with each appearance. It
+had a personality, and led a curious and wild existence. It had
+privileges and prerogatives. Owing to its various means of vocal
+expression--singing, moaning, and the rest--a face belonged to it with
+lips and mouth; teeth too, since it whistled. It ran about the world,
+and so had feet; it flew, so wings pertained to it; it blew, and that
+meant cheeks of sorts. It was a large, swift, shadowy being whose ways
+were not the ordinary ways of daylight. It struck blows. It had
+gigantic hands. Moreover, it came out only after dark--an ominous and
+suspicious characteristic rather.
+
+"Why isn't there a day-wind too?" inquired Judy thoughtfully.
+
+"There is, but it's _quite_ a different thing," Uncle Felix answered.
+"You might as well ask why midday and midnight aren't the same because
+they both come at twelve o'clock. They're simply different things."
+
+"Of course," Tim helped him unexpectedly; "and a man can't be a woman,
+can it?"
+
+The Night-Wind's nature, accordingly, remained a mystery rather, and
+its sex was also undetermined. Whether it saw with eyes, or just felt
+its way about like a blind thing, wandering, was another secret matter
+undetermined. Each child visualised it differently. Its hiding-place in
+the daytime was equally unknown. Owls, bats, and burglars guessed its
+habits best, and that it came out of a hole in the sky was, perhaps,
+the only detail all unanimously agreed upon. It was a pathetic being
+rather.
+
+This Night-Wind used to come crying round the bedroom windows
+sometimes, and the children liked it, although they did not understand
+all its melancholy beauty. They heard the different voices in it,
+although they did not catch the meaning of the words it sang. They
+heard its footsteps too. Its way of moving awed them. Moreover, it was
+for ever trying to get in.
+
+"It's wings," said Judy, "big, dark wings, very soft and feathery."
+
+"It's a woman with sad, black eyes," thought Tim, "that's how I like
+it."
+
+"It's some one," declared Maria, who was asleep before it came, so
+rarely heard it at all. And they turned to Uncle Felix who knew all
+that sort of thing, or at any rate could describe it. He found the
+words. They lay hidden in his thick back hair apparently--there was
+little on the top!--for he always scratched his head a good deal when
+they asked him questions about such difficult matters. "What is it
+_really_--the Night-Wind?" they asked gravely; "and why does it sound
+so _very_ different from the wind in the morning or the afternoon?"
+
+"There _is_ a difference," he replied carefully. "It's a quick, dark,
+rushing thing, and it moves like--like anything."
+
+"We know _that_," they told him.
+
+"And it has long hair," he added hurriedly, looking into Tim's staring
+eyes. "That's what makes it swish. The swishing, rushing, hushing sound
+it makes--that's its hair against the walls and tiles, you see."
+
+"It _is_ a woman, then?" said Tim proudly. All looked up, wondering. An
+extraordinary thing was in the air. A mystery that had puzzled them for
+ages was about to be explained. They drew closer round the sofa, and
+Maria blundered against the table, knocking some books off with a
+resounding noise. It was their way of reminding him that he had
+promised. "Hush, hush!" said Uncle Felix, holding up a finger and
+glancing over his shoulder into the darkened room. "It may be coming
+now... Listen!"
+
+"Yes, but it is a woman, isn't it?" insisted Tim, in a hurried whisper.
+He had to justify himself before his sisters. Uncle Felix must see to
+that first.
+
+The big man opened his eyes very wide. He shuddered. "It's a--Thing,"
+was the answer, given in a whisper that increased the excitement of
+anticipation. "It certainly is a--Thing! Now hush! It's coming!"
+
+They listened then intently. And a sound _was_ heard. Out of the starry
+summer night it came, quite softly, and from very far away--upon
+discovery bent, upon adventure. Reconnoitering, as from some deep
+ambush in the shrubberies where the blackbirds hid and whistled, it
+flew down against the house, stared in at the nursery windows,
+fluttered up and down the glass with a marvellous, sweet humming--and
+was gone again.
+
+"Listen!" the man's voice whispered; "it will come back presently. It
+saw us. It's awfully shy--"
+
+"Why is it awfully shy?" asked Judy in an undertone.
+
+"Because people make it mean so much more than it means to mean," he
+replied darkly. "It never gets a chance to be just itself and play its
+own lonely game--"
+
+"We've called it things," she stated.
+
+"But we haven't written books about it and put it into poetry," Uncle
+Felix corrected her with an audacity that silenced them. "We play our
+game; it plays its."
+
+"It plays its," repeated Tim, amused by the sound of the words.
+
+"And that's why it's shy," the man held them to the main point, "and
+dislikes showing itself--"
+
+"But why is its game lonely?" some one asked, and there was a general
+feeling that Uncle Felix had been caught this time without an answer.
+For what explanation could there possibly be of that? Their faces were
+half triumphant, half disappointed already.
+
+He smiled quietly. He knew everything--everything in the world. "It's
+unhappy as well as shy," he sighed, "because nothing will play with it.
+Everything is asleep at night. It comes out just when other things are
+going in. Trees answer it, but they answer in their sleep. Birds,
+tucked away in nests and hiding-places, don't even answer at all. The
+butterflies are gone, the insects lost. Leaves and twigs don't care
+about being blown when there's no one there to see them. They hide too.
+If there are clouds, they're dark and sulky, keeping their jolly sides
+towards the stars and moon. Nothing will play with the Night-Wind. So
+it either plays with the tiles on the roof and the telegraph
+wires--dead things that make a lot of noise, but never leave their
+places for a proper game--or else just--plays with itself. Since the
+beginning of the world the Night-Wind has been shy and lonely and
+unhappy."
+
+It was unanswerable. They understood. Their sense of pity was greatly
+touched, their love as well.
+
+"Do pigs really see the wind, as Daddy says?" inquired Maria abruptly,
+feeling the conversation beyond her. She merely obeyed the laws of her
+nature. But no one answered her; no one even heard the question.
+Another sound absorbed their interest and attention. There was a low,
+faint tapping on the window-pane. A hush, like church, fell upon
+everybody.
+
+And Uncle Felix stood up to his full height suddenly, and opened his
+arms wide. He drew a long, deep breath.
+
+"Come in," he said splendidly.
+
+The tapping, however, grew fainter and fainter, till it finally ceased.
+Everybody waited expectantly, but it was not repeated. Nothing
+happened. Nobody came in. The tapper had retreated.
+
+"It was a twig," whispered Judy, after a pause. "The Virgin Creeper--"
+
+"But it was the wind that shook it," exclaimed Uncle Felix, still
+standing and waiting as though he expected something. "The
+Night-Wind--Look out!"
+
+A roaring sound over the roof drowned his words; it rose and fell like
+laughter, then like crying. It dropped closer, rushed headlong past the
+window, rattled and shook the sash, then dived away into the darkness.
+Its violence startled them. A deep lull followed instantly, and the
+little tapping of the twig was heard again. Odd! Just when the
+Night-Wind seemed furthest off it was all the time quite near. It had
+not really gone at all; it was hiding against the outside walls. It was
+watching them, trying to get in. The tapping continued for half a
+minute or more--a series of hurried, gentle little knocks as from a
+child's smallest finger-tip.
+
+"It wants to come in. It's trying," whispered some one.
+
+"It's awfully shy."
+
+"It's lonely and frightfully unhappy."
+
+"It likes us and wants to play."
+
+There was another pause and silence. No one knew quite what to do.
+"There's too much light. Let's put the lamp out," said a genius, using
+the voice of Judy.
+
+As though by way of answer there followed instantly a sudden burst of
+wind. The torrent of it drove against the house; it boomed down the
+chimney, puffing an odour of soot into the room; it shook the door into
+the passage; it lifted an edge of carpet, flapping it. It shouted,
+whistled, sang, using a dozen different voices all at once. The roar
+fell into syllables. It was amazing. A great throat uttered words. They
+could scarcely believe their ears.
+
+The wind was shouting with a joyful, boisterous shout: "Open the
+window! _I'll_ put out the light!"
+
+All heard the wonderful thing. Yet it seemed quite natural in a way.
+Uncle Felix, still standing and waiting as though he knew not exactly
+what was going to happen, moved forward at once and boldly opened the
+window's lower sash. In swept the mighty visitor, the stranger from the
+air. The lamp gave one quick flicker and went out. Deep stillness
+followed. There was a silence like the moon.
+
+The shy Night-Wind had come into the room.
+
+Ah, there was awe and wonder then! The silence was so unexpected. The
+whole wind, not merely part of it, was in. It had come so gently,
+softly, delicately too! In the darkness the outline of the window-frame
+was visible; Uncle Felix's big figure blocked against the stars. Judy's
+head could be seen in silhouette against the other window, but Tim and
+Maria, being smaller, were merged in the pool of shadow below the level
+of the sill. A large, spread thing passed flutteringly up and down the
+room a moment, then came the rest. It settled over everything at once.
+A rustle was audible as of trailing, floating hair.
+
+"It's hiding in the corners and behind the furniture," whispered Uncle
+Felix; "keep quiet. If you frighten it--whew!"--he whistled
+softly--"it'll be off above the tree-tops in a second!"
+
+A low soft whistle answered to his own; somewhere in the room it
+sounded; there was no mistaking it, though the exact direction was
+difficult to tell, for while Tim said it was through the keyhole, Judy
+declared positively that it came from the door of the big, broken
+cupboard opposite. Maria stated flatly, "Chimney."
+
+"Hush! It's talking." It was Uncle Felix's voice breathing very low.
+"It likes us. It feels we're friendly."
+
+A murmur as of leaves was audible, or as of a pine bough sighing in a
+breeze. Yet there were words as well--actual spoken words:
+
+"Don't look for me, please," they heard. "I do not want to be seen. But
+you may touch me. I like that."
+
+The children spread their hands out in the darkness, groping,
+searching, feeling.
+
+"Ah, your touch!" the sighing voice continued.
+
+"It's like my softest lawn. Your hair feels as my grass feels on the
+hill-tops, and the skin of your cheeks is smooth and cool as the
+water-surface of my lily ponds at midnight. I know you"--it raised its
+tones to singing. "You are children. I kiss you all!"
+
+"I feel you," Judy said in her clear, quiet voice. "But you're cold."
+
+"Not really," was the answer that seemed all over the room at once.
+"That's only the touch of space. I've come from very high up to-night.
+There's been a change. The lower wind was called away suddenly to the
+sea, and I dropped down with hardly a moment's warning to take its
+place. The sun has been very tiresome all day--overheating the
+currents."
+
+"Uncle, _you_ ask it everything," whispered Tim, "simply everything!"
+
+"Say how we love it, please," sighed Judy. "I feel it closing both my
+eyes."
+
+"It's over all my face," put in Maria, drawing her breath in loudly.
+
+"But my hair's lifting!" Judy exclaimed. "Oh, it's lovely, lovely!"
+
+Uncle Felix straightened himself up in the darkness. They could hear
+him breathing with the effort. "Please tell us what you do," he said.
+"We all can feel you touching us. Play with us as you play with trees
+and clouds and sleeping flowers along the hedgerows."
+
+A singing, whistling sound passed softly round the room; there was a
+whirr and a flutter as when a flight of bees or birds goes down the
+sky, and a voice, a plaintive yet happy voice, like the plover who cry
+to each other on the moors, was audible:
+
+  "I run about the world at night,
+     Yet cannot see;
+   My hair has grown so thick these millions years,
+     It covers me.
+   So, like a big, blind thing
+     I run about,
+   And know all things by touching them.
+     I touch them with my wings;
+       I know each one of you
+         By touching you;
+           I touch your _hearts_!"
+
+"I feel you!" cried Judy. "I feel you touching me!"
+
+"And I, and I!" the others cried. "It's simply wonderful!"
+
+An enormous sigh of happiness went through that darkened room.
+
+"Then play with me!" they heard. "Oh, children, play with me!"
+
+The wild, high sweetness in the windy voice was irresistible. The
+children rose with one accord. It was too dark to see, but they flew
+about the room without a fault or slip. There was no stumbling; they
+seemed guided, lifted, swept. The sound of happy, laughing voices
+filled the air. They caught the Wind, and let it go again; they chased
+it round the table and the sofa; they held it in their arms until it
+panted with delight, half smothered into silence, then marvellously
+escaping from them on the elastic, flying feet that tread on forests,
+clouds, and mountain tops. It rushed and darted, drove them, struck
+them lightly, pushed them suddenly from behind, then met their faces
+with a puff and shout of glee. It caught their feet; it blew their
+eyelids down. Just when they cried, "It's caught! I've got it in my
+hands!" it shot laughing up against the ceiling, boomed down the
+chimney, or whistled shrilly as it escaped beneath the crack of the
+door into the passage. The keyhole was its easiest escape. It grew
+boisterous, singing with delight, yet was never for a moment rough. It
+cushioned all its blows with feathers.
+
+"Where are you now? I felt your hair all over me. You've gone again!"
+It was Judy's voice as she tore across the floor.
+
+"You're whacking me on the head!" cried Tim. "Quick, quick! I've got
+you in my hands!" He flew headlong over the sofa where Maria sat
+clutching the bolster to prevent being blown on to the carpet.
+
+They felt its soft, gigantic hands all over them; its silky coils of
+hair entangled every movement; they heard its wings, its rushing,
+sighing voice, its velvet feet. The room was in a whirr and uproar.
+
+"Uncle! Can't _you_ help? You're the biggest!"
+
+"But it's blown me inside out," he answered, in a curiously muffled
+voice. "My fingers are blown off. It's taken all my breath away."
+
+The pictures rattled on the wall; loose bits of paper fluttered
+everywhere; the curtains flapped out horizontally into the air.
+
+"Catch it! Hold it! Stop it!" cried the breathless voices.
+
+"Join hands," he gasped. "We'll try." And, holding hands, they raced
+across the floor. They managed to encircle something with their spread
+arms and legs. Into the corner by the door they forced a great, loose,
+flowing thing against the wall. Wedged tight together like a fence,
+they stooped. They pounced upon it.
+
+"Caught!" shouted Tim. "We've got you!"
+
+There was a laughing whistle in the keyhole just behind them. It was
+gone.
+
+The window shook. They heard the wild, high laughter. It was out of the
+room. The next minute it passed shouting above the cedar tops and up
+into the open sky. And their own laughter went out to follow it across
+the night.
+
+The room became suddenly very still again. Some one had closed the
+window. The twig no longer tapped. The game was over. Uncle Felix
+collected them, an exhausted crew, upon the sofa by his side.
+
+"It was very wonderful," he whispered. "We've done what no one has ever
+done before. We've played with the Night-Wind, and the Night-Wind's
+played with us. It feels happier now. It will always be our friend."
+
+"It was awfully strong," said Tim in a tone of awe. "It fairly banged
+me."
+
+"But awfully gentle," Judy sighed. "It kissed me hundreds of times."
+
+"I felt it," announced Maria.
+
+"It's only a child, really," Uncle Felix added, half to himself, "a
+great wild child that plays with itself in space--"
+
+He went on murmuring for several minutes, but the children hardly heard
+the words he used. They had their own sensations. For the wind had
+touched their hearts and made them think. They heard it singing now
+above the cedars as they had never heard it sing before. It was alive
+and lovely, it meant a new thing to them. For they had their little
+aching sorrows too; it had taken them all away: they had their little
+passionate yearnings and desires; it had prophesied fulfilment. The
+dreamy melancholy of childhood, the long, long days, the haunted
+nights, the everlasting afternoons--all these were in its wild, great,
+windy voice, the sighing, the mystery, the laughter too. The joy of
+strange fulfilment woke in their wind-kissed hearts. The Night-Wind was
+their friend; they had played with it. Now everything could come true.
+
+And next day Maria, lost to the Authorities for over an hour, was at
+length discovered by the forbidden pigsties in a fearful state of mess,
+but very pleased and happy about something. She was watching the pigs
+with eyes brimful of questioning wonder and excitement. She was
+listening intently too. She wanted to find out for certain whether pigs
+really--really and truly--saw--anything unusual!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+WHERE WONDER HIDES
+
+
+The children had never been to London, but they knew the direction in
+which it lay--beyond the crumbling kitchen-garden wall, where the
+wall-flowers grew in a proud colony. The sky looked different there, a
+threatening quality in it. Both snow and thunderstorm came that way,
+and the dirty sign-post "London Road" outside the lodge-gates was
+tilted into the air significantly.
+
+They regarded London as a terrible place, though a necessity: Daddy's
+office was there; Christmas and Birthday presents came from London, but
+also it was where the Radical govunment lived--an enormous, evil,
+octopus kind of thing that made Daddy poor. Weeden, too, had been known
+to say dark things with regard to selling vegetables, hay, and stuff.
+"What can yer igspect when a Radical govunment's in?" And the fact that
+neither he nor Daddy did anything to move it away proved what a
+powerful thing it was, and made them feel something hostile to their
+happiness dwelt London-way beyond that crumbling wall.
+
+The composite picture grew steadily in their little minds. When ominous
+clouds piled up on that northern horizon, floating imperceptibly
+towards them, it was a fragment of London that had broken off and come
+rolling along to hover above the old Mill House. A very black cloud was
+the Seat of Govunment.
+
+London itself, however, remained as obstinately remote as Heaven, yet
+the two visibly connected; for while the massed vapours were part of
+London, the lanes and holes of blue were certainly the vestibule of
+Heaven. "His seat is in the Heavens" must mean something, they argued.
+They were quite sweetly reverent about it. They merely obeyed the
+symbolism of primitive age.
+
+"I shall go to Heaven," Tim said once, when they discussed dying as if
+it were a game. He wished to define his position, as it were.
+
+"But you haven't been to London yet," came the higher criticism from
+Judy. "London's a metropolis."
+
+Metropolis! It was an awful thing to say, though no one quite knew why.
+Part of their dread was traceable to this word. Ever since some one had
+called it "the metropolis" in their hearing, they had associated vague
+awe with the place. The ending "opolis" sounded to them like something
+that might come "ontopofus"--and that, again, brought "octopus" into
+the mind. It seemed reckless to mention London and Heaven together--yet
+was right and proper at the same time. Both must one day be seen and
+known, one inevitably as the other. Thus heavenly rights were included
+in their minds with a ticket to London, far, far away, when they were
+much, much older. And both trips were dreaded yet looked forward to.
+
+Maria, however, held no great opinion of either locality. She disliked
+the idea of long journeys to begin with. Having no objection to moving
+her eyes, she was opposed to moving her body--unless towards an
+approved certainty. Puddings, bonfires, and laps at story-time were
+approved certainties; Heaven and London apparently were not. She was
+contented where she was. "London's a bother," was her opinion: it meant
+a rush in the hall when the dog-cart was waiting for the train and
+Daddy was too late to hear about bringing back a new blue eye for a
+broken doll. And as for the other place--her ultimatum was hardly
+couched in diplomatic language, to say the least. An eternal Sunday was
+not her ideal of happiness. Aunt Emily, it was stated, would live in
+Heaven when she died, and the place had lost its attractiveness in
+consequence. For Aunt Emily used long words and heard their "Sunday
+Colics," and the clothes she wore on that seventh workless day reminded
+them of village funerals or unhappy women who came to see over the
+house when it was to be let, and asked mysterious questions about
+something called "the drains." Daddy's top-hat with a black band was
+another item in the Sunday and Metropolis picture. London and Heaven,
+as stated, were not looked forward to unreservedly.
+
+There were compensations, though. They knew the joy of deciding who
+would go there. Stumper, of course, for one: it was the only place he
+would not come back from: he would be K.C.B. Uncle Felix, too, because
+it was his original source of origin. Mother repeatedly called him
+"angel," and even if she hadn't, it was clear he knew all about both
+places by the way he talked. Stumper's India was not quite believed in
+owing to the way he described it, but Uncle Felix's London was real and
+living, while the other marvellous things he told them could only have
+happened in some kind of heavenly place. His position, therefore, was
+unshakable, and Mother and Daddy also had immemorial rights. Others of
+their circle, however, found themselves somewhat equivocally situated.
+Thompson and Mrs. Horton were uncertain, for since there was "no
+marriage" there, there could be no families to wait upon and cook for.
+Weeden, also, was doubtful. Having never been to London, the
+alternative happiness was not properly within his grasp, whereas the
+Postman might be transferred from the metropolis to the stars at any
+minute of the day or night. Those London letters he brought settled his
+case beyond all argument whatever.
+
+All of which needs mention because there was a place called the End of
+the World, and the title has of course to do with it. For the End of
+the World is the hiding-place of Wonder.
+
+Beyond that crumbling kitchen-garden wall was a very delightful bit of
+the universe. A battered grey fence kept out the road, but there were
+slits between the boards through which the Passers-by could be secretly
+observed. All Passers-by were criminals or heroes on their way to
+mysterious engagements; the majority were disguised; many of them could
+be heard talking darkly to themselves. They were a queer lot, those
+Passers-by. Those who came _from_ London were escaping, but those going
+north were intent upon awful business in the sinister
+metropolis--explosions, murders, enormous jewel robberies, and
+conspiracies against the Radicalgovunment. The solitary policeman who
+passed occasionally was in constant terror of his life. They longed to
+warn him. Yet he had his other side as well--his questionable side.
+
+This neglected patch of kitchen-garden, however, possessed other claims
+to charm as well as the tattered fence. It was uncultivated. Some rows
+of tangled currant bushes offered excellent cover; there was a fallen
+elm tree whose trunk was "home"; a pile of rubbish that included
+scrap-iron, old wheel-barrows, broken ladders, spades, and
+wire-netting, and, chief of all, there was the spot behind the currant
+bushes where Weeden, the Gardener, burnt dead leaves. It was sad, but
+mysterious and beautiful too, this burning of the leaves; though,
+according to Uncle Felix, who gave the Gardener's explanation, it was
+right and necessary. They loved the smoke, too, hanging in the air
+above the lawn, with its fragrant smell and shadowy distances:
+
+"Oh, Gardener! How can you let them burn?"
+
+"Because," he explained, "they've 'ad their turn, And nobody wants
+their shade.
+
+ These withered-up messes
+ Is worn-out old dresses
+ I tuck round the boots
+ Of the shiverin' roots
+ Till the Spring makes 'em over
+ Like roses and clover--
+ But nobody wants dead leaves, dead leaves,
+ Nor nobody wants their shade!"
+
+A deserted corner, yet crowded gloriously with life. Adventure lurked
+in every inch. There was danger, too, terror, wonder, and excitement.
+And since for them it was the beginning of all things, they called it,
+naturally, The End of the World. To escape to the End of the World,
+unaccompanied by grown-ups, and, if possible, their whereabouts unknown
+to anybody, was a daily duty second to no other. It was a duty, wet or
+fine, they seldom left, neglected.
+
+Besides themselves, two others alone held passes to this sanctuary:
+Uncle Felix, because he loved to go there (he wrote his adventure
+stories there, saying anything might happen in such a lonely place),
+and the Gardener, because he was obliged to. Come-Back Stumper was
+excluded. They had taken him once, and he had said such an abominable
+thing that he was never allowed to visit it again. "A messy hole," he
+called it. Mr. Jinks had never even seen it, but, after his death in
+the railway accident, his remains, recovered without charge from the
+Hospital, had been buried somewhere in the scrap-heap. From this point
+of view alone he knew the End of the World; he was worthy of no other.
+His epitaph was appalling--too horrible to mention really. Tim composed
+it, but Uncle Felix distinctly said that it never, _never_ must be
+referred to audibly again:
+
+               Here Matthew Jinks
+               Just lies and st--
+
+"It's _not_ nice," he said emphatically, "and you mustn't say it.
+Always speak well of the dead." And, as they couldn't honestly do that,
+they obeyed him and left Mr. Jinks in his unhonoured grave, with a
+broken wheel-barrow for a headstone and a mass of wire-netting to make
+resurrection difficult. In order to get the disagreeable epitaph out of
+their minds Uncle Felix substituted a kinder and gentler one, and made
+them learn it by heart:
+
+          Old Jinks lies here
+          Without a tear;
+          He meant no wrong,
+          But we didn't get along;
+          So Jinks lies here,
+          And we've nothing more to fear.
+          He's all right:
+               Jinks
+               Sinks
+          Out of sight!
+
+It was the proud colony of wallflowers that first made Uncle Felix like
+the place. Their loveliness fluttered in the winds, and their perfume
+stole down deliciously above the rubbish and neglect. They seemed to
+him the soul of ruins triumphing over outward destruction. Hence the
+delicate melancholy in their scent and hence their lofty chosen perch.
+Out of decay they grew, yet invariably above it. Both sun and stars
+were in their flaming colouring, and their boldness was true courage.
+They caught the wind, they held the sunset and the dawn; they turned
+the air into a shining garden. They stood somehow for a yearning beauty
+in his own heart that expressed itself in his stories.
+
+"If you pick them," he warned Tim, who climbed like a monkey, and was
+as destructive as his age, "the place will lose its charm. They grow
+for the End of the World, and the End of the World belongs to them.
+This wonderful spot will have no beauty when they're gone." To wear a
+blossom in the hair or buttonhole was to be protected against decay and
+ugliness.
+
+Most wonderful of all, however, was the door in the old grey fence; for
+it was a Gateway, and a Gateway, according to Uncle Felix, was a solemn
+thing. None knew where it led to, it was a threshold into an unknown
+world. Ordinary doors, doors in a house, for instance, were not
+Gateways; they merely opened into rooms and other familiar places.
+Dentists, governesses, and bedrooms existed behind ordinary, indoor
+doors; but out-of-doors opened straight into the sky, and in virtue of
+it were extraordinary. They were Gateways. At the End of the World
+stood a stupendous, towering door that was a Gateway. Another, even
+more majestic, rose at the end of life. This door in the grey fence was
+a solemn, mysterious, and enticing Gateway--into everything worth
+seeing.
+
+It was invariably kept locked; it led into the high-road that slithered
+along secretly and sedulously--to London. For the children it was out
+of bounds. Here the Policeman lived in constant terror of his life, and
+here went to and fro the strange world of Passers-by. The white road
+flowed past like a river. It moved. From the lower branches of the
+horse-chestnut tree they could just see it slide; also when the swing
+went extra high, and from the end of the prostrate elm. It went in both
+directions at once. It encircled the globe, going under the sea too.
+The door leading into it was a quay or port. But the brass knob never
+turned; the Gardener said there was no key; and from the outer side the
+handle had long since been removed, lest Passers-by might see it and
+come in. Even the keyhole had been carefully stuffed up with that
+stringy stuff the Gardener carried in his pockets.
+
+Till, finally, something happened that made the End of the World seem
+suddenly a new place. Tim noticed that the stringy stuff had been
+removed.
+
+The day had been oppressively hot, and tempers had been sorely tried.
+Mother had gone to lie down with a headache; Aunt Emily was visiting
+the poor with a basket; Daddy was inaccessible in his study; all
+Authorities were doing the dull things Authorities have to do. It was
+September, and the world stood lost in this golden haze of unexpected
+heat. Very still it stood, the yellow leaves quite motionless and the
+smoke from the kitchen chimney hanging stiff and upright in the air.
+There was no breath of wind.
+
+"There's simply _nothing_ to do," the children said--when suddenly
+Uncle Felix arrived, and their listlessness was turned to life and
+interest. He had gone up in the morning to London, and the suddenness
+of his return was part of his prerogative. Stumper, Jinks, and other
+folk were announced days and days beforehand, but Uncle Felix
+just--came.
+
+"We'll go to the End of the World," he decided gravely, the moment he
+had changed. "There's something going on there. Quick!" This meant, as
+all knew, that he had an idea. They stole out, and no one saw them go.
+Across the lawn and past the lime trees humming busily with tired bees,
+they crept beneath the shadow of the big horse-chestnut, where the
+staring windows of the house could no longer see them. They
+disappeared. The Authorities might look and call for ever without
+finding them.
+
+"Slower, please, a little," said Maria breathlessly, and was at once
+picked up and carried. Moving cautiously through the laurel shrubbery,
+they left the garden proper with its lawns and flower-beds, and entered
+the forbidden region at the End of the World. They stood upright. Uncle
+Felix dropped Maria like a bundle.
+
+"Look!" he said below his breath. "I told you so!"
+
+He pointed. The colony of wallflowers were fluttering in the windless
+air. Nothing stirred but these. The stillness was unbroken. Sunshine
+blazed on the rubbish-heap. The currant bushes watched. Deep silence
+reigned everywhere. But the flowers on the crumbling wall waved
+mysteriously their coloured banners of alarm.
+
+"It looks different," said Judy in a hushed aside.
+
+"Something's happened," whispered Tim, staring round him.
+
+Maria watched them from the ground, prepared to follow in any
+direction, but in no hurry until a plan was decided.
+
+"The keyhole!" cried Tim loudly, and at the same moment a huge
+blackbird flew out of the shrubberies behind them, and flashed across
+the open space toward the orchard on the other side. It whistled a
+long, shrill scream of warning. It was bigger by far than any ordinary
+blackbird.
+
+"Home! Quick! Run for your lives!" cried some one, as they dashed for
+the safety of the elm tree. Even Maria ran. They scrambled on to the
+slippery, fallen trunk and gasped for breath as they stood balancing in
+an uneasy row, all holding hands.
+
+"It was bigger than a hen," exclaimed Judy inconsequently. "It couldn't
+have come through any keyhole." She stared with inquiring, startled
+eyes at her brother. The bird and the keyhole were somehow lumped
+together in her mind.
+
+"They've stopped," observed Maria, and sat down in the comfortable
+niche between the lopped branch and the trunk. It was true. The
+wallflowers were as motionless now as painted outlines on a nursery
+saucer.
+
+"Because we're safe," said Uncle Felix. "It was a warning."
+
+And then all turned their attention to Tim's discovery of the keyhole.
+For the stuffing had been removed. The white, dusty road gleamed
+through the hole in a spot of shining white.
+
+"Hush!" whispered their guide. "There's something moving."
+
+"Perhaps it's Jinks in his cemetery," thought Judy after a pause to
+listen.
+
+"No," said Uncle Felix with decision. "It's outside. It's on the--road!"
+
+His earnestness on these occasions always thrilled them; his gravity
+and the calm way he kept his head invariably won their confidence.
+
+"The London Road!" they repeated. That meant the world.
+
+"Something going past," he added, listening intently. They listened
+intently with him. All four were still holding hands.
+
+"The great High Road outside," he repeated softly, while they moved
+instinctively to the highest part of the tree whence they could see
+over the fence. They craned their necks. The dusty road was flowing
+very swiftly, and like a river it had risen. Never before had it been
+so easily visible. They saw the ruts the carts had made, the hedge upon
+the opposite bank, the grassy ditch where the hemlock grew in feathery
+quantities. They even saw loose flints upon the edge. But the actual
+road was higher than before. It certainly was rising.
+
+"Metropolis!" cried Tim. "I see an eye!"
+
+Some one was looking through the keyhole at them.
+
+"An eye!" exclaimed several voices in a hushed, expectant tone.
+
+There was a pause, during which every one looked at every one else.
+
+"It's probably a tramp," said Uncle Felix gravely. "We'll let him in."
+
+The proposal, however, alarmed them, for they had expected something
+very different. To stuff the keyhole, run away and hide, or at least to
+barricade the fence was what he ought to have advised. Instead of this
+they heard the very opposite. The excitement became intense. For them a
+tramp meant danger, robbery with violence, intoxication, awful dirt,
+and an under-the-bed-at-midnight kind of terror. It was so long since
+they had seen the tramp--their own tramp--that they had forgotten his
+existence.
+
+"They'll kill us at once," said Maria, using the plural with the
+comprehensive and anticipatory vision of the child.
+
+"They're harmless as white mice," said her Uncle quickly, "once you
+know how to treat them, and full of adventures too. I do," he added
+with decision, referring to the treatment. And he stepped down to unbar
+the gate.
+
+The children, breathless with interest, watched him go. On the trunk,
+of course, they felt comparatively safe, for it was "home"; but none
+the less the "girls" drew up their skirts a little, and Tim felt
+premonitory thrills run up his spidery legs into his spine. The
+wallflowers shook their tawny heads as a sudden breath of wind swept
+past them across the End of the World. It seemed an age before the
+audacious thing was accomplished and the door swung wide into the road
+outside. Uncle Felix might so easily have been stabbed or poisoned or
+suffocated--but instead they saw a shabby, tangled figure come
+shuffling through that open gate upon a cloud of dust.
+
+"Quick! he's a perjured man!" cried Judy, remembering a newspaper
+article. "Shut the gate!" She sprang down to help. "He'll be arrested
+for a highway violence and be incarc-"
+
+There was confusion in her mind. She felt pity for this woebegone
+shadow of a human being, and terror lest the Policeman, who lived on
+the white, summery high road, would catch him and send him to the
+gallows before he was safe inside. Her love was ever with the under dog.
+
+There was a rush and a scramble, the gate was shut, and the Tramp stood
+gasping before them in the enchanted sanctuary of the End of the World.
+
+"He's ours!" exclaimed Judy. "It's our old tramp!"
+
+"Be very polite to him," Uncle Felix had time to whisper hurriedly,
+seeing that all three stood behind him. "He's a great Adventurer and a
+Wanderer too."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+A PRIEST OF WONDER
+
+
+He was a grey and nameless creature of shadowy outline and vague
+appearance. The eye focused him with difficulty. He had an air of a
+broken tombstone about him, with moss and lichen in wayward patches,
+for his face was split and cracked, and his beard seemed a continuation
+of his hair; but he had soft blue eyes that had got lost in the general
+tangle and seemed to stray about the place and peep out unexpectedly
+like flowers hiding in a thick-set hedge. The face might be anywhere;
+he might move suddenly in any direction; he was prepared, as it were,
+to move forward, sideways, or backwards according as the wind decided
+or the road appeared--a sort of universal scarecrow of a being
+altogether.
+
+Yet, for all his forlorn and scattered attitude, there hung about his
+rags an air of something noble and protective, something strangely
+inviting that welcomed without criticism all the day might bring.
+Homeless himself, and with no place to lay his extraordinary body, the
+birds might have built their nests in him without alarm, or the furry
+creatures of fields and woods have burrowed among his voluminous
+misfit-clothing to shelter themselves from rain and cold. He would
+gladly have carried them all with him, safely hidden from guns or traps
+or policemen, glad to be useful, and careless of himself. That, at any
+rate, was the mixed impression that he gave.
+
+"Thank you," he said in a comfortable sort of voice that sounded like
+wind among telegraph wires on a high road: then added "kindly all."
+
+And instantly the children felt delighted with him; their sympathy was
+gained; fear vanished; the Policeman, like a scape-goat, took all their
+sins away. They did not actually move closer to the Tramp but their
+eyes went nestling in and out among his tattered figure. Judy, however,
+it was noticeable, looked at him as though spell-bound. To her he was,
+perhaps, as her Uncle said, the Great Adventurer, the type of romantic
+Wanderer for ever on the quest of perilous things--a Knight.
+
+It was Uncle Felix who first broke the pause.
+
+"You've come a long way," he suggested.
+
+"Oh, about the same as usual," replied the Tramp, as though all
+distances and localities were one to him.
+
+"Which means--?"
+
+"From nowhere, and from everywhere."
+
+"And you are going on to--?"
+
+"Always the same place."
+
+"Which is--?"
+
+"The end." He said it in a rumbling voice that seemed to issue from a
+pocket of the torn old coat rather than from his bearded mouth.
+
+"Oh, dear," sighed Judy, "that is a _very_ long way indeed. But, of
+course, you never get tired out?" Her eyes were brimmed with admiration.
+
+He shrugged his great loose shoulders. It was odd how there seemed to
+be another thing within all that baggy clothing and behind the hair.
+The shaggy exterior covered a slimmer thing that was happy, laughing,
+dancing to break out. "Not tired out," he said, "a bit sleepy
+sometimes, p'r'aps." He glanced round him carelessly, his strange eyes
+resting finally on Judy's face. "But there's lots of beds about," he
+explained to her, "once you know how to make 'em."
+
+"Yes," the child murmured, with a kind of soft applause, "of course
+there must be."
+
+"And those wot sleeps in ditches dreams the sweetest--that _I_ know."
+
+"They must," agreed Judy, as though grass and dock leaves were familiar
+to her. "And you get up when you're ready, don't you?"
+
+"That's it," replied the wanderer. "Only you always _are_ ready."
+
+"But how do you know the time?" asked Tim.
+
+The Tramp turned round slowly and looked at his questioner.
+
+"Time!" he snorted. And he exchanged a mysterious glance of sympathy
+with Maria, who lifted her eyes in return, but otherwise made no sign
+whatever. "Sit quiet like," he added, "and everything worth 'aving
+comes of itself. That's living that is. The 'ole world belongs to you."
+
+"I've got a watch," said Tim, as though challenged. "I've got an alarum
+clock too. Only you have to wind them up, of course."
+
+"There you are!" the Tramp exclaimed, "you've got to wind 'em up. They
+don't go of theirselves, do they?"
+
+"Oh, no."
+
+"I never knew 'appiness until I chucked my watch away," continued the
+other.
+
+"_Your_ watch!" exclaimed Tim.
+
+"Well, not igsackly," laughed the Tramp.
+
+"Oh, he didn't mean _that_," Judy put in quickly.
+
+"I was usin' it at the time, any'ow," chuckled their guest, "and wot
+you're usin' at the time belongs to you. I never knew 'appiness while I
+kep' it. Watches and clocks only mean 'urry. It's an endless job,
+tryin' to keep up with 'em. You've got to go so fast for one thing--I
+never was a sprinter--bah!" he snorted--"there's nothing in it. Life
+isn't a 'undred yards race. You miss all the flowers on the way at that
+pace. And what's the prize?" He glanced down contemptuously at his
+feet. "Worn-out boots. Yer boots wear out--that's all."
+
+He looked round at the children, smiling wonderfully. Maria seemed to
+understand him best, perhaps. She looked up innocently into his tangled
+face. "That's it," he said, with another chuckle. "YOU know wot I mean,
+don't yer, missie?" But Maria made no reply. She merely beamed back at
+him till her face seemed nothing but a pair of wide blue eyes.
+
+"Stop yer clocks, go slow," the man murmured, half to himself, "and
+you'll see what I mean. There's twice as much time as before. You can
+do anything, everything,"--he spread his arms out--"because there's
+never any 'urry. You'd be surprised."
+
+"You're very hungry, aren't you?" inquired Tim, resenting the man's
+undue notice of Maria.
+
+The Tramp stared hard into the boy's unwavering eyes. "Always," he said
+briefly, "but, then, there's always folks to give."
+
+"Rather," exclaimed Judy with enthusiasm, and Tim added eagerly, "I
+should think so."
+
+They seemed to know all about him, then. Something had entered with him
+that made common stock of the five of them. It was wonderful of Uncle
+Felix to have known all this beforehand.
+
+"We're all alive together," murmured the Tramp below his breath, and
+then Uncle Felix showed another stroke of genius. "We'll make tea out
+here to-day," he said, "instead of having it indoors. Tim, you run and
+fetch a tea-pot, a bottle of milk, and some cups and a kettle full of
+water; put some sugar in your pockets and bring a loaf and butter and a
+pot of jam. A basket will hold the lot. And while you're gone we'll get
+the fire going."
+
+"A big knife and some spoons too," Judy cried after his disappearing
+figure, "and don't let Aunt Emily see you, mind."
+
+The Tramp looked up sharply. "I had an Aunt Emily once," he said behind
+his hedged-in face. Expecting more to follow, the others waited; but
+nothing came. There was a little pause.
+
+"Once?" asked Maria, wondering perhaps if there were two such beings in
+the world at the same time.
+
+The man of journeys nodded.
+
+"Did she mend your clothes and things--and love to care for you?" Judy
+wished to know.
+
+He shook his tangled head. "She visited the poor," he told them, "and
+had no time for the likes of me. And one day I fell out of a big hole
+in my second suit and took to tramping." He rubbed his hands vigorously
+together in the air. "And here I am."
+
+"Yes," said Maria kindly. "I'm glad."
+
+Meanwhile, Judy having decided to go and help her brother with the
+tea-things, the others set to work and made a fire. Maria helped with
+her eyes, picking up an occasional stick as well, but it was the Tramp
+who really did the difficult part. Only the way he did it made it
+appear quite easy somehow. He began with the tiniest fire in the world,
+and the next minute it seemed ready for the kettle, with a cross-bar
+arranged adroitly over it and a supply of fresh wood in a pile beside
+it.
+
+"What do _you_ think about it?" asked Tim of his sister, as they
+struggled back with the laden basket. Apparently a deep question of
+some kind asked for explanation in his mind.
+
+"It's awful that he has no one to care about him," was the girl's
+reply. "I think he's a very nice man. He looks magnificent and awfully
+brown."
+
+"That's dirt," said her brother.
+
+"It's travel," she replied indignantly.
+
+The Tramp, when they got back, looked tidier somehow, as though the
+effect of refined society had already done him good. His appearance was
+less uncouth, his hair and beard a shade less hay-fieldy. It was
+possible to imagine what he looked like when he was young--sure sign of
+being tidy; just as to be very untidy gives an odd hint of what old age
+will do eventually to face and figure. The Tramp looked younger.
+
+They all made friends in the simple, unaffected way of birds and
+animals, for at the End of the World there was no such thing as empty
+formality. The children, supported by the presence of their important
+uncle, asked questions, this being their natural prerogative; it came
+to them as instinctively as tapping the lawn for worms comes to birds,
+or scratching the earth for holes is a sign of health with rabbits. At
+first shyly--then in a ceaseless, yet not too inquisitive torrent.
+Questions are the sincerest form of flattery, and the Tramp, accustomed
+probably to severer questions from people in uniform, was quite
+delighted. He smiled quietly behind the scenery of his curious great
+face, but he answered all: where he lived, how he travelled, what
+friends he had, where he spent Christmas, what barns and ditches and
+haystacks felt like, anything and everything, even where he meant to be
+buried when he died. "'ere, where I've lived so 'appily," and he made a
+wide gesture with one tattered arm to include the earth and sky. He had
+no secrets apparently; he was glad they should know all. The children
+had never known such a delightful creature in their lives before.
+
+"And you eat anything?" inquired Tim, "anything you can, I mean?"
+
+"Anything you can _get_, he means," corrected Judy softly.
+
+He gave an unexpected answer. "I swallow sunsets, and I bite the moon;
+I nibble stars. I never need a spoon."
+
+He said it as naturally as a duchess describing her latest diet at a
+smart dinner-party, with an air, too, as of some great personage
+disguised on purpose so that he might enjoy the simple life.
+
+"That rhymes," stated Maria.
+
+"So does this," he replied; "I live on open hair and bits of bread; the
+sunlight clothes me, and I lay me 'ead--"
+
+The hissing of the kettle interrupted him. "Water's boiling," cried
+Uncle Felix; "hand round the cups and cut the loaf." A cup was given to
+each. The tea was made.
+
+"Do you take sugar, please?" asked Judy of the guest. The quietness of
+her voice made it almost tender. Such a man, moreover, might despise
+sweet things. But he said he did.
+
+"Two lumps?" she asked, "or one?"
+
+"Five, please," he said.
+
+She was far too polite to show surprise at this, nor at the fact that
+he stirred his tea with a little bit of stick instead of with a spoon.
+She remembered his remark that he had no use for spoons. Tim, saying
+nothing, imitated all he did as naturally as though he had never done
+otherwise in his life before. They enjoyed their picnic tea immensely
+in this way, seated in a row upon the comfortable elm tree, gobbling,
+munching, drinking, chattering. The Tramp, for all his outward
+roughness, had the manners of a king. He said what he thought, but
+without offence; he knew what he wanted, yet without greed or
+selfishness. He had that politeness which is due to alert perception of
+every one near him, their rights and claims, their likes and dislikes;
+for true politeness is practically an expansion of consciousness which
+involves seeing the point of view of every one else--at once. A tramp,
+accustomed to long journeys, big spaces, obliged ever to consider the
+demands of impetuous little winds, the tastes of flowers, the habits
+and natural preferences of animals, birds, and insects, develops this
+bigger sense of politeness that crowds in streets and drawing-rooms
+cannot learn. Unless a tramp takes note of _all_, he remains out of
+touch with all, and therefore is uncomfortable.
+
+"Is everything all right?" asked Uncle Felix presently, anxious to see
+that he was well provided for.
+
+"Everything, thank you," the wanderer replied, "and, if you don't mind,
+I'll 'ave my supper here later too. I've brought it with me." And out
+of one capacious pocket he produced--a bird. "It's a chickin," he
+informed them, as they stared with wide-opened eyes. Maria was the
+first to go on eating her slice of bread and jam. Unordinary things
+seemed to disturb her less than ordinary ones. Somehow it seemed quite
+natural that he should go about with a bird for supper in his pocket.
+
+"However did you get it--in there?" asked Tim, modifying his sentence
+just in time to avoid inquisitive rudeness.
+
+"It gave itself to me," he replied. "That kind of things 'appens
+sometimes when you're tramping. _They_ know," he added significantly.
+"You see, it's my birthday to-day, and something like this always
+'appens on my birthday. Last time it was a fish. I fell into the stream
+and went right under. When I got out on to the bank again I found a
+trout in my pocket. The time before I slept beside a haystack, and when
+I awoke at sunrise I felt something warm and soft against my face like
+feathers. It _was_ feathers. There was a 'en's nest two inches from my
+nose, and six nice eggs in it all ready for my birthday breakfast. I
+only ate four of them. You should never take all the heggs out of a
+nest." He looked round at the group and smiled. "But I think the
+chickin's best of all," he told them, "and next year I expect a turkey,
+or a bit of bacon maybe."
+
+"You never, never grow old, do you?" Judy asked. Her admiration was no
+longer concealed. It seemed she saw him differently a little from the
+others.
+
+"Oh, jest a nice age," he said.
+
+"You seem to know so much," she explained her question, "everything."
+
+He laughed behind his tea-cup as he fingered the chicken on his lap.
+
+"As to that," he murmured, "there's only a few things worth knowing. If
+you can just forget the rest, you're all right."
+
+"I see," she replied beneath her breath. "But--but it's got to be
+plucked and cleaned and cooked first, hasn't it?"
+
+"The chickin?" he laughed. "Oh, dear me, no! Cooked, yes, but not
+plucked or cleaned in the sense you mean. That's what they do in
+'ouses. Out here we have a better way. We just wrap it up in clay and
+dig a 'ole and light a fire on top, and in a 'arf hour it's ready to
+eat, tender, juicy, and sweet as a bit of 'oneycomb. Break open the
+ball of clay, and the feathers all come away wiv it." And then he
+produced from another pocket a fat, thick roll of yellow butter,
+freshly made apparently, for it was wrapped in a clean white cloth.
+
+They stared at that for a long time without a word.
+
+"They go together," he explained, and the explanation seemed sufficient
+as well as final. "And they come together too," he added with a smile.
+
+"Did the butter give itself to you as well as the chicken?" inquired
+Judy. The Tramp nodded in the affirmative as he placed it beside him on
+the trunk ready for use later. And everybody felt in the middle of a
+delightful mystery. All were the same age together. Bird and butter,
+sun and wind, flowers and children, tramp and animals--all seemed
+merged in a jolly company that shared one another's wants and could
+supply them. The wallflowers wagged their orange-bonneted heads, the
+wind slipped sighing with delicious perfumes from the trees, the bees
+were going home in single file, and the sun was sinking level with the
+paling top--when suddenly there came a disturbing element into the
+scene that made their hearts beat faster with one accord. It was a
+sound.
+
+A muffled, ominous beat was audible far away, but slowly coming nearer.
+As it approached it changed its character. It became sharper and more
+distinct. Something about the measured intervals between its tapping
+repetitions brought a threatening message of alarm. Every one felt the
+little warning and looked up. There was anxiety. The sound jarred
+unpleasantly upon the peace of the happy company. They listened. It was
+footsteps on the road outside.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+FACT AND WONDER--CLASH
+
+Uncle Felix paused over his last bit of bread and jam, Tim and Judy
+cocked their ears up. Maria's eyes stood still a moment in the heavens,
+and the Tramp stopped eating. He picked up the butter and replaced it
+carefully in his pocket.
+
+"I know those steps," he murmured half to himself and half to the
+others. "They're all over the world. They follow me wherever I go. I
+hear 'em even in me sleep." He sighed, and the tone of his voice was
+weary and ill at ease.
+
+"How horrid for you," said Judy very softly.
+
+"It keeps me moving," he muttered, trying to conceal all signs of face
+behind hair and beard, which he pulled over him like a veil. "It's the
+Perliceman."
+
+"The Policeman!" they echoed, staring.
+
+"But he can't find you here!"
+
+"He'll never see you!"
+
+"You're quite safe inside the fence with us, for this is the End of the
+World, you know."
+
+"He's not afraid--never!" exclaimed Judy proudly.
+
+"He goes everywhere and sees everything," whispered the Tramp. "He's
+been following me since time began. So far he has not caught me up, but
+his boots are so much bigger than my own--the biggest, strongest boots
+in the world--that in the hend he is bound to get me."
+
+"But you've done nothing," said Judy.
+
+The wanderer smiled. "That's why," he said, holding up a warning
+finger. "It's because I do nothing. 'ush!" he whispered. The steps came
+nearer, and he lowered his voice so that the end of the sentence was
+not audible.
+
+"'ide me," he said in a whisper. And he waved his arms imploringly,
+like the branches of some wind-hunted tree.
+
+There was a tarpaulin near the rubbish-heap, and some sacking used for
+keeping the vegetables warm at night. "That'll do," he said, pointing.
+"Quick!--Good-bye!" In a moment he was beneath the spread black
+covering, the children were sitting on its edges, quietly eating more
+bread and jam, and looking as innocent as stars. Uncle Felix poked the
+fire busily, a grave and anxious look upon his face.
+
+The steps came nearer, paused, came on again then finally stopped
+outside the gate. The flowing road that bore them ceased running past
+in its accustomed way. The evening stopped still too. The silence could
+be heard. The setting sun looked on. Upon the crumbling wall the orange
+flowers shook their little warning banners.
+
+And there came a tapping on the wooden gate.
+
+No one moved.
+
+The tapping was repeated. There was a sound of drums about it. The
+round brass handle turned. The door pushed open, and in the empty space
+appeared--the Policeman.
+
+"Good evening," he said in a heavy, uncompromising way. He looked
+enormous, framed there by the open gate, the white road behind him like
+a sheet. He looked very blue--a great towering shadow against the
+sunlight. It was very clear that he _knew_ he was a policeman and could
+think of nothing else. He was dressed up for the part, and received
+many shillings a week from a radculgovunment to look like that. It
+would have been a dereliction of duty to forget it. He was stuffed with
+duty. His brass buttons shone.
+
+"Good _evening_," he repeated, as no one spoke.
+
+"_Good_ evening," replied Uncle Felix calmly. The Policeman accentuated
+the word "evening," but Uncle Felix emphasised the adjective "good."
+From the very beginning the two men disagreed. "This is private
+property, very private indeed. We are having tea, in fact, privately,
+upon our own land."
+
+"No property is private," returned the Policeman, "and to the Law no
+thing nor person either."
+
+For a moment the children felt afraid. It seemed incredible that Uncle
+Felix could be arrested, and yet things had an appearance of it.
+
+"Kindly close the gate so that we cannot be overheard," he said firmly,
+"and then be good enough to state your business here." He did not offer
+him a seat; he did not suggest a cup of tea; he spoke like a brave man
+who expected danger but was prepared to meet it.
+
+The Policeman stepped back and closed the gate. He then stepped forward
+again a little nearer than before. From a pocket, hitherto invisible
+inside his belt, he drew forth a crumpled notebook and a stub of
+pencil. He was very dignified and very grave. He took a deep breath,
+held the paper and pencil ready to use, expanded his chest till it
+resembled a toy balloon in the Park, and said:
+
+"I am looking for a man." He paused, then added: "Have you seen a man
+about?"
+
+"About what?" asked Uncle Felix innocently.
+
+"About fifty or thereabouts," replied the other. "Disguised in rags and
+a wig of hair and a false beard."
+
+"What has he done?" It was like a game of chess, both opponents well
+matched. Uncle Felix was too big to be caught napping by clever
+questions that hid traps. The children felt the danger in the air, and
+watched their uncle with quivering admiration. Only their uncle stood
+alone, whereas behind the Policeman stretched a line of other policemen
+that reached to London and was in touch with the Government itself.
+
+"What has he done?" repeated their champion.
+
+"He's disappeared," came the deep-voiced answer.
+
+"There's no crime in that," was the comment, given flatly.
+
+"But he's disappeared with"--the Policeman consulted his notebook a
+moment--"a chicken and a roll of butter what don't belong to him--"
+
+"Roll _and_ butter, did you say?"
+
+"No, sir, roll _of_ butter was what I said." He spoke respectfully, but
+was grave and terrible. "He is a thief."
+
+"A thief!"
+
+"He lives nowhere and has no home. You see, sir, duty is duty, and
+we're expected to run in people who live nowhere and have no homes."
+
+"Which road did he take?" Uncle Felix clearly was pretending in order
+to gain time.
+
+The man of law looked puzzled. "It was a roll of butter and a bird,
+sir," he said, consulting his book again, "and my duty is to run him
+in--"
+
+"The moment you run into him."
+
+"Precisely," replied the blue giant. "And, having seen him come in here
+some time ago, I now ask you formally whether you have seen him too,
+and I call upon you to show me where he's hiding." He thrust one huge
+foot forward and held his notebook open with the pencil ready.
+"Anything you say will be used against you later, remember. You must
+all be witnesses."
+
+"_If_ you find him," put in Uncle Felix dryly.
+
+"_When_ I find him," said the other. And his eye wandered over to the
+tarpaulin that was spread out beside the rubbish-heap. For it had
+suddenly moved.
+
+Everybody had seen that movement. There was no disguising it. Feeling
+uncomfortable the Tramp had shifted his position. He probably wanted
+air.
+
+"I saw it move," the Policeman growled, moving a step towards the
+rubbish-heap. "He's under there all right enough, and the sooner he
+comes out the better for him. That's all I've got to say."
+
+It was a most disagreeable and awkward moment. No one knew quite what
+was best to do. Maria turned her eyes as innocently upon the tarpaulin
+as she could manage, but it was obvious what she was really looking at.
+Her brother held his breath and stared, expecting a pistol might appear
+and some one be shot dead with a marvellous aim, struck absolutely in
+the mathematical centre of the heart. Uncle Felix, upon whom fell the
+burden of rescue or defence, sat there with a curious look upon his
+face. For a moment it seemed he knew not what to do.
+
+The Policeman, approaching still nearer to the tarpaulin, glared at him.
+
+"You're an accessory," he said sternly, "both before and after the
+fact."
+
+"I didn't say he _wasn't_ there."
+
+"You didn't say he _was_," was the severe retort. It was unanswerable.
+
+"He'll hang by the neck till he's dead," thought Tim, "and afterwards
+they'll bury the body in a lime-kiln so that even his family can't
+visit the grave." He looked wildly about him, thinking of possible ways
+of escape he had read or heard about, and his eye fell upon his sister
+Judy.
+
+Now Judy was a queer, original maid. She believed everything in the
+world. She believed not only what was told her but also what she
+thought. And among other things she believed herself to be very
+beautiful, though in reality she was the ugly duckling of the brood.
+"All God has made is beautiful," Aunt Emily had once reproved her, and,
+since God had made everything, everything must be beautiful. It was.
+God had made her too, therefore she was simply lovely. She enjoyed
+numerous romances; one romance after another flamed into her puzzled
+life, each leaving her more lovely than it found her. She was also
+invariably good. To be asked if she was good was a blundering question
+to which the astonished answer was only an indignant "Of course." And,
+similarly, all she loved herself was beautiful. Her romances had
+included gardeners and postmen, stable-boys and curates, age of no
+particular consequence provided they stimulated her creative
+imagination. And the latest was--the Tramp.
+
+Something about the woebegone figure of adventure had set on fire her
+mother instinct _and_ her sense of passionate romance. She saw him
+young, without the tangled beard, without the rags, without the
+dilapidated boots. She saw him in her mind as a warrior hero, storming
+difficulty, despising danger, wandering beneath the stars, a being
+resplendent as a prince and fearless as a deity. He was a sun of the
+morning, and the dawn was in his glorious blue eyes.
+
+And Tim now saw that this sister of his, alone of all the party, was
+about to do something unexpected. She had left her place upon the
+fallen trunk and stepped up in front of the Policeman.
+
+"Stand aside, missy," this individual said, and his voice was rough,
+his gesture very decided. It was, in fact, his "arresting" manner. He
+was about to do his duty.
+
+"Just wait a moment," said Judy calmly; and she placed herself directly
+in his path, her legs apart, her arms akimbo on her hips. "You say the
+man you want to find is old and ragged and looks like a tramp?"
+
+"That's it," replied the Policeman, greatly astonished, and pausing a
+moment in spite of himself. "You'll see him in a moment. Jest help me
+to lift a corner o' this 'ere tarpaulin, and I'll show him to you." He
+pushed her deliberately aside.
+
+"All right," said Judy, her eyes shining brilliantly, her gestures
+touched with a confidence that surprised everybody into silence, "but
+first I want to tell you that the person underneath this old sheet
+thing is not a tramp at all--"
+
+"You don't say so," interrupted the other, half impudently, half
+sarcastically. "What is he then, I'd like to know?"
+
+The girl drew herself up and looked the great blue figure straight in
+the eyes.
+
+"He's my brother," she said, in a clear strong voice, "and he's not a
+thief."
+
+"Your brother!" repeated the man, a trifle taken aback. He guffawed.
+
+"He's young and noble," she went on, half singing the words in her
+excitement and belief, "and he's dressed all in gold. He walks like
+wind about the world, has curly hair, and wears a sword of silver. He's
+simply beautiful, and he's _got no beard at all!_"
+
+"And he's your brother, is he?" cried the Policeman, laughing rudely,
+"and he jest wears all that get-up for fun, don't he?" And he stooped
+down and pulled the tarpaulin violently to one side.
+
+"He is my brother, and I love him, and he is beautiful," she answered,
+dancing lightly round him and flinging her arms in the air to the
+complete amazement of policeman, Uncle Felix, and her brother and
+sister into the bargain. "There! You can see for yourself!"
+
+The Policeman stood aghast and stared. He drew a long, deep breath; he
+whistled softly; he pushed his big, spiked helmet back. He staggered.
+"Seems there's a mistake," he stammered stupidly, "a kind of mistake
+somewhere, as it were. I--" He stuck fast. He wiped his lips with his
+thick brown hand.
+
+"A mistake everywhere, I think," said Uncle Felix sternly. "Your
+mistake."
+
+The two men faced each other, for Uncle Felix had risen to his feet.
+The children held back and stared in silence. They were not quite sure
+what it was they saw. On Judy's face alone was a radiant confidence.
+
+For, in place of the bedraggled and unkempt figure that had crawled
+beneath the sheet ten minutes before, there rose before them all
+apparently a tall young stripling, clean and white and shining as a
+fair Greek god. His hair was curly, he was dressed in gold, a silver
+sword hung down beside him, and his beardless face and beauty in it
+that made it radiant as a glad spring day. The sunlight was very
+dazzling just at that moment.
+
+"You said," continued Uncle Felix, in a voice of deadly quiet, "that
+the man you wanted had a wig of hair and a beard--a false beard?"
+
+The Policeman stared as though his eyes would drop out upon the
+tarpaulin. But he said no word. He consulted his note-book in a dazed,
+flustered kind of way. Then he looked up nervously at the astonishing
+figure of the "Tramp." Then he looked back at his book again.
+
+"And old?" said Uncle Felix.
+
+"And old," repeated the officer thickly, poring over the page.
+
+"About fifty, I think, you mentioned?"
+
+"'Bout fifty--did I?" He said it faintly, like a man not sure of a
+lesson he ought to know by heart.
+
+"Disguised into the bargain!" Uncle Felix raised his voice till it
+seemed to thunder out the words.
+
+"Them was my instructions, sir," the man was heard to mumble sulkily.
+
+Uncle Felix, to the children's immense delight and admiration, took a
+step nearer to the man of law. The latter moved slowly backwards,
+glancing half fiercely, half suspiciously at the glorious figure of the
+person he had expected to arrest as a dangerous thief and tramp.
+
+"And, following what you stupidly call your instructions," cried Uncle
+Felix, looking sternly at him, "you have broken in our gate, trespassed
+on our private property, disturbed our guests, and removed forcibly our
+tarpaulin from its rightful place."
+
+The crestfallen and amazed Policeman gasped and raised his hands with a
+gesture of despair. He looked like a ruined man. Had there been a
+handkerchief in his bulging coat, he must have cried.
+
+"And you call yourself an Officer of the Law?" boomed the Defender of
+Personal Liberty. He went still nearer to him. His voice, to the
+children, sounded simply magnificent. "A uniformed and salaried
+representative of the Government of England!"
+
+"Oo calls me orl that?" asked the wretched man in a trembling tone. "I
+gets twenty-five shillings a week, and that's orl I know."
+
+There came a pause then, while the men faced each other.
+
+"Uncle, let him go, please," said Judy. "He couldn't help it, you know.
+And he's a married man with a family, I expect. Some day--"
+
+A forgiving smile softened the features of both men at these gentle
+words.
+
+"This time, then," said Uncle Felix slowly, "I won't report you; but
+don't let it occur again as long as you live. A day will come, perhaps,
+when you will understand. And here," he added, holding out his hand
+with something in it, "is another shilling to make it twenty-six. I
+advise you--if you're still open to friendly advice--to buy a pair of
+glasses with it."
+
+The discredited official took the shilling meekly and pocketed it with
+his note-book. He cast one last hurried glance of amazement and
+suspicion at the man who had been beneath the tarpaulin, and began to
+slink back ignominiously towards the gate. At the last minute he turned.
+
+"Good _evenin'_," he said, as he vanished into the road.
+
+"_Good_ evening," Uncle Felix answered him, as he closed the gate
+behind him.
+
+Then, how it happened no one knew exactly. Judy, walking up to the
+shining figure, took him by the hand and led him slowly through the
+gate on to the long white road. There was a blaze of sunset pouring
+through the trees and the shafts of slanting light made it difficult to
+see what every one was doing. In the general commotion he somehow
+vanished. The gate was closed. Judy stood smiling and triumphant just
+inside upon the mossy path.
+
+"You saved his life," said some one.
+
+"It's all right," she said--and burst into tears.
+
+But children are not much impressed by the tears of others, knowing too
+well how easily they are produced and stopped. Tim went burrowing to
+find the bird, and Maria just mentioned that the Tramp had taken the
+butter away in his pocket. By the time this fact was thoroughly
+established the group was ready to leave, the tea-things all collected,
+the fire put out, and the sun just dipping down below the top of the
+old grey fence.
+
+Then, and not till then, did the affair of the Tramp come under
+discussion. What seemed most puzzling was why the Policeman had not
+arrested him after all. They could not make it out at all; it seemed a
+mystery. There was something quite unusual about it altogether. Uncle
+Felix and Judy had been wonderful, but--
+
+"Did you see him blink," said Tim, "when Judy went up and gave it him
+hot?"
+
+"Yes," observed Maria, who had done nothing herself but stare. "I did."
+
+The brother, however, was not so sure. "I think he really believed
+her," he declared with assurance, proud of her achievement. "He really
+saw him young and with a sword and curly hair and all that."
+
+Judy looked at him with surprise. Her tears had ceased flowing by this
+time.
+
+"Of course," she said. "Didn't _you?_" There was pain in her voice in
+addition to blank astonishment.
+
+"Of course we did," said Uncle Felix quickly with decision. "Of course
+we did."
+
+As they went into the house, however, Uncle Felix lingered behind a
+moment as though he had forgotten something. His face wore a puzzled
+expression. He seemed a little bewildered. He walked into the hat-rack
+first, then into the umbrella-stand, then stopped abruptly and put his
+hand to his head.
+
+"Headache?" asked Tim, who had been watching him.
+
+His uncle did not hear the question, at least he did not answer.
+Instead he pulled something hurriedly out of his waistcoat pocket, held
+it to his ear, listened attentively a moment, and then gave a sudden
+start.
+
+"What is it, Uncle?"
+
+"Oh, nothing," was the reply; "my watch has stopped, that's all." He
+stood still a moment or two, reflecting deeply. His eyebrows went up
+and down. He pursed his lips. "Odd," he continued, half to himself;
+"I'm sure I wound it up last night...!" he added, "it's going again
+now. It stopped--only for a moment!"
+
+"Aha," said Tim significantly, and looked about him. He waited
+breathlessly for something more to happen. But nothing did happen--just
+then.
+
+Only, when at last Uncle Felix looked down, their eyes met and a flash
+of knowledge too enormous ever to be forgotten passed noiselessly
+between the two of them.
+
+"Perhaps...!" murmured his uncle.
+
+"I wonder...!"
+
+That was all.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+JUDY'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE
+
+
+Adventure means saying Yes, and being careless; children say Yes to
+everything and are very careless indeed: even their No is usually a
+Yes, inverted or deferred. "I won't play," parsed by a psychologist,
+means "I'll play when I'm ready." The adventurous spirit accepts what
+offers regardless of consequences; he who hesitates and thinks is but a
+Policeman who prevents adventure. Now everything offers itself to
+children, because they rightly think that everything belongs to them.
+Life is conditionless, if only people would let them accept it as it
+is. "Don't think; accept!" expresses the law of their swift and fluid
+being. They act on it. They take everything they can--get. But it is
+the Policeman who adds the "get," changing the whole significance of
+life with one ugly syllable.
+
+Each of the children treasured an adventure of its very own; an
+adventure-in-chief, that could not possibly have happened to anybody
+else in the world. These three survivals in an age when education
+considers childhood a disease to be cured as hurriedly as
+possible--took their adventure the instant that it came, and each with
+a complete assurance that it was unique. To no one else in the world
+could such a thing have happened, least of all to the other two. Each
+took it characteristically, according to his or her individual
+nature--Judy, with a sense of Romance called deathless; Tim, with a
+taste for Poetic Drama, a dash of the supernatural in it; and Maria,
+with a magnificent inactivity that ruled the world by waiting for
+things to happen, then claiming them as her own. Her masterly instinct
+for repose ran no risk of failure from misdirected energy. And to all
+three secrecy, of course, was essential: "Don't never tell the others,
+Uncle! Promise faithfully!"
+
+For to every adventure Uncle Felix acted as audience, atmosphere, and
+chorus. He watched whatever happened--audience; believed in its
+reality--atmosphere; and explained without explaining away--chorus. He
+had the unusual faculty of being ten years young as well as forty years
+old, and a real adventure was not possible without him.
+
+The secrecy, of course, was not preserved for long; sooner or later the
+glory must be shared so that "the others" knew and envied. For only
+then was the joy complete, the splendour properly fulfilled. And so the
+old tired world went round, and life grew more and more wonderful every
+day. For children are an epitome of life--a self-creating universe.
+
+That week was a memorable one for several reasons. Daddy, overworked
+among his sealing-wax, went for a change to Switzerland, taking Mother
+with him; Aunt Emily, in her black silk dress that crackled with
+disapproval, went to Tunbridge Wells--an awful place in another century
+somewhere; and Uncle Felix was left behind to "take charge of
+''em'"--"'em" being the children and himself. It was evidence of
+monumental trust and power, placing him in their imaginations even
+above the recognised Authorities. His sway was never for a moment
+questioned.
+
+"No lessons, then!" he had insisted as a condition of acceptance, and
+after much confabulation the point was yielded with reluctance. It was
+to be a fortnight's holiday all round. They had the house and grounds
+entirely to themselves, and with the departure of the elders a sheet
+was pulled by some one off the world, a curtain rolled away, another
+drop-scene fell, the word No disappeared. They saw invisible things.
+
+Another reason, however, made the week memorable--the daisies. It was
+extraordinary. The very day after the grown-ups left the daisies came.
+Like thousands of small white birds, with bright and steady eyes, they
+arrived and settled, thick and plentiful. They appeared in sheets and
+crowds upon the grass, all of their own accord and unexplained. In a
+night the lawns turned white. It seemed a prearranged invasion. Judy,
+first awake that morning, looked out of her window to watch a squirrel
+playing, and noticed them. Then she told the others, and Maria, one eye
+above the blankets, ejaculated "Ah!" She claimed the daisies too.
+
+Now, whereas a single daisy has no smell and seems a common,
+unimportant thing, a bunch of several hundred holds all the perfume of
+the spring. No flowers lie closer to the soil or bring the smell of
+earth more sweetly to the mind; upon the lips and cheeks they are as
+soft as a kitten's fur, and lie against the skin closer than tired
+eyelids. They are the common people of the flower world, yet have, in
+virtue of that fact, the beauty and simplicity of the common people.
+They own a subdued and unostentatious strength, are humble and ignored,
+are walked upon, unnoticed, rarely thought about and never praised;
+they are cut off in early youth by mowing machines; yet their pain in
+fading is unreported, their little sufferings unsung. They cling to
+earth, and never aspire to climb, but they hold the sweetest dew and
+nurse the tiniest little winds imaginable. Their patience is divine.
+They are proud to be the carpet for all walking, running things, and in
+their universal service is their strength. The rain stays longer with
+them than with grander flowers, and the best sunlight goes to sleep
+among them in great pools of fragrant and delicious heat. The daisies
+are a stalwart little people altogether.
+
+But they have another quality as well--something elfin, wayward,
+mischievous. They peep and whisper. It is said they can cast spells. To
+sleep upon a daisied lawn is to run a certain risk. There is this hint
+of impudence in their attitude, half audacity, half knavery, that shows
+itself a little in the way they stare unwinkingly all day at everything
+above them--at the stately things that tower proudly in the air--then
+just shut up at sunset without a word of explanation or apology. They
+see everything, but keep their opinions to themselves. Because people
+notice them so little, and even tread upon their tiny and inquiring
+faces, they are up to things all the time--undiscovered things. They
+know, it is said, the thoughts of Painted Ladies and Clouded
+Brimstones, as well as the intentions of the disappearing golden flies;
+why wind often runs close to the ground when the tree-tops are without
+a single breath; but, also, they know what is going on _below_ the
+surface. They live, moreover, in every country of the globe, and their
+system of intercommunication is so perfect that even birds and flying
+things can learn from it. They prove their breeding by their perfect
+taste in dress, the well-bred ever being inconspicuous; and their
+simplicity conceals enormous, undecipherable wonder. One daisy out of
+doors is worth a hundred shelves of text-books in the house. Their
+mischief, moreover, is not revenge, though some might think it so--but
+a natural desire to be recognised and thought and talked about a
+little. Daisies, in a word, are--daisies.
+
+And it was by way of the daisies that Judy's great adventure came to
+her, the particular adventure that was her very own. For she had deep
+sympathy with flowers, a sympathy lacking in her brother and sister,
+and it was natural that her adventure in chief should come that way.
+She could play with flowers for long periods at a time; she knew their
+names and habits; she picked them gently, without cruelty, and never
+merely for the "fun" of picking them; while the way she arranged them
+about the house proved that she understood their silent, inner natures,
+their likes and dislikes--in a word, their souls. For Judy connected
+them in her mind with birds. Born in the air, they seemed to her.
+
+As has been seen, she was the first to notice the arrival of the
+daisies. From the bedroom window she waved her arm to them, and showed
+plainly the pleasure that she felt. They arrived in troops and armies.
+Risen to the surface of the lawn like cream, she saw them staring with
+suspicious innocence at the sky. They stared at _her_.
+
+"Just when the others have gone away!" was her instant thought, though
+unexpressed in words. There was meaning somewhere in this calculated
+arrival.
+
+"They _are_ alive," she asked that afternoon, "aren't they? But why do
+they all shut up at night? Who--" she changed the word--"what closes
+them?"
+
+She was alone with Uncle Felix, and they had chosen with great
+difficulty a spot where they could lie down without crushing a single
+flower with their enormous bodies. After considerable difficulty they
+had found it. Having done a great many things since lunch--a feast
+involving several second helpings--they were feeling heavy and
+exhausted. So Judy chose this moment for her simple question. The world
+required explanation.
+
+"There's life in everything," he mumbled, with his face against the
+grass, "everything that grows, especially." And having said it, he
+settled down comfortably again to doze. His pipe was out. He felt
+rather like a log.
+
+"But stopping growing isn't dying," she informed him sharply.
+
+"Oh, no," he agreed lazily, "you're alive for a long time after that."
+
+"_You_ stopped growing before I was born."
+
+"And I'm not quite dead yet."
+
+"Exactly," she said, "so daisies _are_ alive."
+
+It was absurd to think of dozing at such a time. He rolled round
+heavily and gazed at her through half-closed eyelids. "A daisy
+breathes," he murmured, "and drinks and eats; sap circulates in its
+little body. Probably it feels as well. Delicate threads like nerves
+run through it everywhere. It knows when it is being picked or walked
+on. Oh, yes, a daisy is alive all right enough." He sighed like a big
+dog that has just shaken a fly off its nose and lies waiting for the
+next attack. It came at once.
+
+"But who knows it?" she asked. "I mean--there's no good in being alive
+unless some one else knows it too!"
+
+Then he sat up and stared at her. Judy, he remembered, knew a lot of
+things she could tell to no one, not even to herself--and this seemed
+one of them. The question was a startling one.
+
+"An intellectual mystic at twelve!" he gasped. "How on earth did you
+manage it?"
+
+"I may be a mystillectual insect," she replied, proud of the
+compliment. "But what's the good of being alive, even like a daisy,
+unless others know it--_us_, for instance?"
+
+He still stared at her, sitting up stiffly, and propped by his hands
+upon the grass behind him. After prolonged reflection, during which he
+closed his eyes and opened them several times in succession, sighing
+laboriously while he did so, low mumbled words became audible.
+
+"Forgive my apparent slowness," he said, "but I feel like a
+mowing-machine this afternoon. I want oiling and pushing. The answer to
+your inquiry, however, is as follows: We could--_if_ we took the
+trouble."
+
+"Could know that daisies are alive?" she cried.
+
+His great head nodded.
+
+"If we thought about them very hard indeed," he went on, "and for a
+very, very long time we could feel as they feel, and so understand
+them, and know exactly _how_ they are alive."
+
+And the way he said it, the grave, thoughtful, solemn way, convinced
+her, who already was convinced beforehand.
+
+"I do believe we could," she answered simply.
+
+"I'm sure of it," he said.
+
+"Let's try," she whispered breathlessly.
+
+For a minute and a half they stared into each other's eyes, knowing
+themselves balanced upon the verge of an immense discovery. She did not
+doubt or question; she did not tell him he was only humbugging. Her
+heart thrilled with the right conditions--expectation and delight. Her
+dark-brown eyes were burning.
+
+He murmured something that she did not properly understand:
+
+ Expect and delight
+ Is the way to invite;
+ Delight and expect,
+ And you'll know things direct!
+
+"Let's try!" she repeated, and her face proved that she fulfilled his
+conditions without knowing it; she was delighted, and she
+expected--everything.
+
+He scratched his head, wrinkling up his nose and pursing his lips for a
+moment. "There's a dodge about it," he explained. "To know a flower
+yourself you must feel exactly like it. Its life, you see, is different
+to ours. It doesn't move and hurry, it just lives. It feels sun and
+wind and dew; it feels the insects' tread; it lifts its skin to meet
+the rain-drops and the whispering butterflies. It doesn't run away. It
+has no fear of anything, because it has the whole green earth behind
+it, and it feels safe because millions of other daisies feel the same"--
+
+"And smells because it's happy," put in Judy. "Then what _is_ a daisy?
+What is it really?"
+
+She was "expecting" vividly. Her mind was hungry for essentials. This
+mere description told her nothing real. She wanted to feel "direct."
+
+What is a daisy? The little word already had a wonderful and living
+sound--soft, sweet, and beautiful. But to tell the truth about this
+ordinary masterpiece was no easy matter. An ostentatious lily, a
+blazing rose, a wayward hyacinth, a mass of showy wisteria--advertised,
+notorious flowers--presented fewer difficulties. A daisy seemed too
+simple to be told, its mystery and honour too humble for proud human
+minds to understand. So he answered gently, while a Marble White sailed
+past between their very faces: "Let's think about it hard; perhaps
+we'll get it that way."
+
+The butterfly sailed off across the lawn; another joined it, and then a
+third. They danced and flitted like winged marionettes on wires that
+the swallows tweaked; and, as they vanished, a breath of scented air
+stole round the trunk of the big lime tree and stirred the daisies'
+heads. A thousand small white faces turned towards them; a thousand
+steady eyes observed them; a thousand slender necks were bent. A wave
+of movement passed across the lawn as though the flowers pressed
+nearer, aware at last that they were being noticed. And both humans,
+the big one and the little one, felt a sudden thrill of happiness and
+beauty in their hearts. The rapture of the Spring slipped into them.
+They concentrated all their thoughts on daisies....
+
+"I'm beginning to feel it already," whispered the Little Human, turning
+to gaze at him as though that breath of air impelled her too.
+
+The wind blew her voice across his face like perfume; he looked, but
+could not see her clearly; she swayed a little; her eyes melted
+together into a single lovely circle, bright and steady within their
+fringe of feathery lashes. He tried to speak--"Delight and expect, and
+we'll know it direct"--but his voice spread across whole yards of lawn.
+It became a single word that rolled and floated everywhere about him,
+rising and falling like a wave upon a sea of green: "Daisy, daisy,
+daisy." On all sides, beneath, above his head as well, it passed with
+the music of the wandering wind, and he kept repeating it--"Daisy,
+daisy!" _She_ kept repeating it, too, till the sound multiplied, yet
+never grew louder than a murmur of air and grass and tiny
+leaves--"Daisy, daisy, daisy." It broke like a sea upon the coast-line
+of another world. It seemed to contain an entire language in itself,
+nothing more to be said but those two soft syllables. It was everywhere.
+
+But another vaster sound lay underneath. As the crest of a breaking
+wave utters its separate note of foam above the general booming of the
+sea that bears it, so the flying wave of daisy-tones rose out of this
+deeper sound beneath. Both humans became aware that it was but a
+surface-voice they imitated. They heard this other foundation-sound
+that bore it--deep, booming, thunderous, half lost and very far away.
+It was prodigious; yet there was safety and delight in it that brought
+no hint of fear. They swam upon the pulse of some enormous, gentle life
+that rose about and through them in a swelling tide. They felt the
+heave of something that was strong enough to draw the moon, yet soft
+enough to close a daisy's eyes. They heard the deep, lost roar of it,
+rising and coming nearer.
+
+"The Earth!" he whispered. "And the Spring is rising through it.
+Listen!"
+
+"We're growing together," replied the Little Human. "We're rising with
+the Spring!"
+
+Ah, it was exquisite. They were in the Daisy World.... He tried to move
+and reach her, but found that he could not take a step in any
+direction, and that his feet were imbedded in the soft, damp soil. The
+movement which he tried to make spread wide among a hundred others like
+himself. They rose on every side. All shared his movements as they had
+shared his voice. He heard his whole body murmuring "Daisy, daisy,
+daisy...." And she leaned over, bending towards him a slim form in a
+graceful line of green that formed the segment of a circle. A little
+shining face came close for a moment against his own, rimmed with
+delicate spears of pink and white. It sang as it shone. The Spring was
+in it. There were hundreds like it everywhere, yet he recognised it as
+one he knew. There were thousands, tens of thousands, yet this one he
+distinguished because he loved it.
+
+Their faces touched like the fringes of two clouds, and then withdrew.
+They remained very close together, side by side among thousands like
+themselves, slowly rising on the same great tide. The Earth's round
+body was beneath them. They felt quite safe--but different. Already
+they were otherwise than they had been. They felt the big world flying.
+
+"We're changing," he murmured, seizing some fragments of
+half-remembered speech. "We're marvellously changed!"
+
+"Daisies," he heard her vanishing reply, "we're two daisies on the
+lawn!"
+
+And then their voices went. That was the end of speech, the end of
+thinking too. They only felt....
+
+Long periods passed above their heads and then the air about them
+turned gorgeous as a sunset sky. It was a Clouded Yellow that sailed
+lazily past their faces with spreading wings as large as clouds. They
+shared that saffron glory. The draught of cool air fanned them. The
+splendid butterfly left its beauty in them before it sailed away. But
+that sunset sky had lasted for hours; that cool wind fanning them was a
+breeze that blew steadily from the hills, making "weather" for half an
+afternoon. Time and duration as humans measure them had passed away;
+there was existence without hurry; end and beginning had not been
+invented yet. They did not know things in the stupid sense of having
+names for them; all that there was they shared; that was enough. They
+knew by feeling.
+
+For everything was plentiful and inexhaustible--the heavens emptied
+light and warmth upon them without stint or measure; space poured about
+them freely, for they had no wish to move; they felt themselves
+everywhere, for all they needed came to them without the painful effort
+of busy things that hunt and search outside themselves; both food and
+drink slipped into them unawares from an abundant source below that
+equally supplied whole forests without a trace of lessening or loss.
+All life was theirs, full, free, and generous beyond conception. They
+owned the world, without even the trouble of knowing that they owned
+it. They lived, simply staring at the universe with eyes of exquisitely
+fashioned beauty. They knew joy and peace, and were content with that.
+
+They did communicate. Oh, yes, they shared each other's special
+happiness. There was, it is true, no sound of broken syllables, no
+speech which humans use to veil the very thing they would express; but
+there was that simpler language which all Nature knows, which cannot
+lie because it is unconscious, and by which constellations converse
+with buttercups, and cedars with the flying drops of rain--there was
+gesture. For gesture and attitude can convey all the important and
+necessary things, while speech in the human sense is but an invention
+of some sprite who wanted people to wonder what they really meant. In
+sublimest moments it is never used even in the best circles of
+intelligence; it drops away quite naturally; souls know one another
+face to face in dumb but eloquent--gesture.
+
+"The sun is out; I feel warm and happy; there is nothing in the world I
+need!"
+
+"You are beside me," he replied. "I love you, and we cannot go far
+apart. I smell you even when no wind stirs. You are sweetest when the
+dew has gone and left you moist and shiny."
+
+A little shiver of enjoyment quivered through her curving stem. His
+petals brushed her own. She answered:
+
+"Wet or fine, we stand together, and never stop staring at each other
+till we close our faces--"
+
+"In the long darkness. But even then we whisper as we grow--"
+
+"And open our eyes together at the same moment when the light comes
+back--"
+
+"And feel warm and soft, and smell more delicious than ever in the
+dawn."
+
+These two brave daisies, growing on the lawn, had lives of concentrated
+happiness, asking no pity for their humble station in the universe. All
+treated them with unadulterated respect, and everything made love to
+them because they were so tender and so easily pleased. They knew, for
+instance, that their splendid Earth was turning with them, for they
+felt the swerve of her, sharing from their roots upwards her gigantic
+curve through space; they knew the sun was part of them, because they
+felt it drawing their sweet-flavoured food up all their dainty length
+till it glowed in health upon their small, flushed faces; also they
+knew that streams of water made a tumbling fuss and sent them messages
+of laughter, because they caught the little rumble of it through miles
+of trembling ground. And some among them--though these were prophets
+and poets but half believed, and looked upon as partly mad and partly
+wonderful--affirmed that they felt the sea itself far leagues away,
+bending their heads this way and that for hours at a stretch, according
+to the thundering vibrations that the tide sent through the soil from
+distant shores.
+
+But all, from the tallest spread-head to the smallest button-face--all
+knew the pleasure of the uncertain winds; all knew the game of holding
+flying things just a moment longer, by fascinating them, by drowsing
+them into sleepiness, by nipping their probosces, or by puffing perfume
+into their nostrils while they caught their feet with the pressure of a
+hundred yellow rods....
+
+Enormous periods passed away. A cloud that for a man's "ten minutes"
+hid the sun, wearied them so that they simply closed their eyes and
+went to sleep. Showers of rain they loved, because it washed and cooled
+them, and they felt the huge satisfaction of the earth beneath them as
+it drank: the sweet sensation of wet soil that sponged their roots, the
+pleasant gush that sluiced their bodies and carried off the irritating
+dust. They also felt the heavier tumbling of the swollen streams in all
+directions. The drops from overhanging trees came down and played with
+them, bringing another set of perfumes altogether. A summer shower was,
+of course, "a month" to them, a day of rain like weeks of holiday by
+the sea.... But, most of all, they enjoyed the rough-and-tumble
+nonsense of the violent weather, when they were tied together by the
+ropes of running wind; for these were visiting days--all manner of
+strangers dropped in upon them from distant walks in life, and they
+never knew whether the next would be a fir-cone or one of those
+careless, irresponsible travellers, a bit of thistle-down....
+
+Yet, for all their steadiness, they knew incessant change--the variety
+of a daisy's existence was proverbial. Nor was the surprise of being
+walked upon too alarming--it did not come to all--for they knew a way
+of bending beneath enormous pressure so that nothing broke, while
+sometimes it brought a queer, delicious pleasure, as when the bare feet
+of some flying child passed lightly over them, leaving wild laughter
+upon a group of them. They knew, indeed, a thousand joys, proudest of
+all, however, that the big Earth loved them so that she carried
+millions of them everywhere she went.
+
+And all, without exception, communicated their knowledge by the
+movements, attitudes, and gestures they assumed; and since each stood
+close to each, the enjoyment spread quickly till the entire lawn felt
+one undivided sensation by itself. Anything passing across it at such a
+moment, whether insect, bird, loose leaf or even human being, would be
+aware of this, and thus, for a fleeting second, share another world.
+Poets, it is said, have received their sweetest inspirations upon a
+daisied lawn in the flush of spring. Nor is it always a sight of prey
+that makes the swallows dart so suddenly sideways and away, but some
+chance message of joy or warning intercepted from the hosts of flowers
+in the soil.
+
+And from this region of the flower-life comes, of course, the legend
+that fairies have emotions that last for ever, with eternal youth, and
+with loves that do not pass away to die. This, too, they understood.
+Because the measurement of existence is a mightier business than with
+over-developed humans-in-a-hurry. For knowledge comes chiefly through
+the eye, and the eye can perceive only six times in a second--things
+that happen more quickly or more slowly than six times a second are
+invisible. No man can see the movement of a growing daisy, just as no
+man can distinguish the separate beats of a sparrow's wing: one is too
+slow, and the other is too quick. But the daisy is practically all eye.
+It is aware of most delightful things. In its short life of months it
+lives through an eternity of unhurrying perceptions and of big
+sensations. Its youth, its loves, its pleasures are--to it--quite
+endless....
+
+"I can see the old sun moving," she murmured, "but you will love me for
+ever, won't you?"
+
+"Even till it sinks behind the hills," he answered, "I shall not
+change."
+
+"So long we have been friends already," she went on. "Do you remember
+when we first met each other, and you looked into my opening eyes?"
+
+He sighed with joy as he thought of the long, long stretch of time.
+
+"That was in our first reckless youth," he answered, catching the gold
+of passionate remembrance from an amber fly that hovered for an instant
+and was gone. "I remember well. You were half hidden by a drop of
+hanging dew, but I discovered you! That lilac bud across the world was
+just beginning to open." And, helped by the wind, he bent his shining
+head, taller than hers by the sixtieth part of an inch, towards the
+lilac trees beside the gravel path.
+
+"So long ago as that!" she murmured, happy with the exquisite belief in
+him. "But you will never change or leave me--promise, oh, promise that!"
+
+His stalk grew nearer to her own. He leaned protectively towards her
+eager face.
+
+"Until that bud shall open fully to the light and smell its sweetest,"
+he replied--the gesture of his petals told it plainly--"so long shall
+you and I enjoy our happy love."
+
+It was an eternity to them.
+
+"And longer still," she pleaded.
+
+"And longer still," he whispered in the wind. "Even until the blossom
+falls."
+
+Ah, it was good to be alive with such an age of happiness before them!
+
+He felt the tears in her voice, however; he knew there was something
+that she longed to tell.
+
+"What is your sadness?" he asked softly, "and why do you put such
+questions to me now? What is your little trouble?"
+
+A moment's hesitation, a moment's hanging of the graceful head the
+width of a petal's top nearer to his shoulder--and then she told him.
+
+"I was in darkness for a time," she faltered, "but it was a long, long
+time. It seemed that something came between us. I lost your face. I
+felt afraid."
+
+And his laughter--for just then a puff of wind passed by and shook his
+sides for him--ran across many feet of lawn.
+
+"It was a Bumble Bee," he comforted her. "It came between us for a bit,
+its shadow fell upon you, nothing more! Such things will happen; we
+must be prepared for them. It was nothing in myself that dimmed your
+world."
+
+"Another time I will be braver, then," she told him, "and even in the
+darkness I shall know you close, ah, very close to me...."
+
+For a long, long stretch of time, then, they stood joyfully together
+and watched the lilac growing. They also saw the movement of the sun
+across the sky. An eternity passed over them.... The vast disc of the
+sun went slowly gliding....
+
+But all the enormous things that happened in their lives cannot be
+told. Lives crammed with a succession of such grand and palpitating
+adventures lie beyond the reach of clumsy words. The sweetness
+sometimes was intolerable, and then they shared it with the entire lawn
+and so obtained relief--yet merely in order to begin again. The humming
+of the rising Spring continued with the thunderous droning of the
+turning Earth. Never uncared for, part of everything, full of the big,
+rich life that brims the world in May--ah, almost fuller than they
+could hold sometimes--they passed with existence along to their
+appointed end.
+
+"We began so long ago, I simply can't remember it," she sighed.
+
+Yet the sun they watched had not left half a degree behind him since
+they met.
+
+"There was no beginning," he reproved her, smiling, "and there will
+never be any end."
+
+And the wind spread their happiness like perfume everywhere until the
+whole white lawn of daisies lay singing their rapture to the
+sunshine....
+
+The minute underworld of grass and stalks seemed of a sudden to grow
+large; yet, till now, they had not realised it as "large"--but simply
+natural. A beetle, big and broad as a Newfoundland dog, went lumbering
+past them, brushing its polished back against their trembling necks;
+yet, till now, they had not thought of it as "big"--but simply normal.
+Its footsteps made a grating sound like the gardener's nailed boots
+upon the gravel paths. It was strange and startling. Something was
+different, something was changing. They realised dimly that there was
+another world somewhere, a world they had left behind long, long ago,
+forgotten. Something was slipping from them, as sleep slips from the
+skin and the eyes in the early morning when the bath comes "pinging"
+upon the floor. What did it mean?
+
+Big and little, far and near, above, below, inside and outside--all
+were mixed together in a falling rush.
+
+They themselves were changing.
+
+They looked up. They saw an enormous thing rising behind them with vast
+caverns of square outline opening in its sides--a house. They saw huge,
+towering shapes whose tops were in the clouds--the familiar lime trees.
+Big and tiny were inextricably mixed together.
+
+And that was wrong. For either the forest of grass was as big as
+themselves--in which case they still were daisies; or else it was tiny
+and far below them--in which case they were hurrying humans again.
+There was an odd confusion...while consciousness swung home to its
+appointed centre and Adventure brought them back towards the old,
+familiar starting-place again.
+
+There came an ominous and portentous sound that rushed towards them
+through the air, and through the solid ground as well. They heard it,
+and grew pale with terror. Across the entire lawn it rumbled nearer,
+growing in volume awfully. The very earth seemed breaking into bits
+about them. And then they knew.
+
+It was the End of the World that their prophets had long foretold.
+
+It crashed upon them before they had time to think. The roar was
+appalling. The whole lawn trembled. The daisies bowed their little
+faces in a crowd. They had no time even to close their innocent eyes.
+Before a quarter of their sweet and happy life was known, the End swept
+them from the world, unsung and unlamented. Two of them who had planned
+Eternity together fell side by side before one terrible stroke....
+
+"I do believe--" said Judy, brushing her tumbled hair out of her eyes.
+
+"Not possible!" exclaimed Uncle Felix, sitting up and stretching
+himself like a dog. "It's a thing I never do, _never_, _NEVER!_ I think
+my stupid watch has stopped again...."
+
+They stared at each other with suspiciously sleepy eyes.
+
+"Promise," she whispered presently, "promise never to tell the others!"
+
+"I promise faithfully," he answered. "But we'd better get up, or we
+shall have our heads cut off like--all the other daisies."
+
+He pulled her to her feet--out of the way of the heavy mowing machine
+which Weeden was pushing with a whirring, droning noise across the lawn.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+TIM'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE
+
+
+Tim's "particular adventure" was of another kind. It was a
+self-repeater--of some violence, moreover, when the smallness of the
+hero is considered. Whether in after-life he become an astronomer-poet
+or a "silver-and-mechanical engineer"--both dreams of his--he will ever
+be sharp upon rescuing something. A lost star or a burning mine will be
+his objective, but with the essential condition that it
+be--unattainable. Achievement would mean lost interest. For Tim's
+desire was, is, and ever will be insatiable. Profoundest mystery,
+insoluble difficulty, and endless searching were what his soul demanded
+of life. For him all ponds were bottomless, all gipsies older than the
+moon. He felt the universe within him, and was born to seek its
+inexplicable "explanation"--outside. The realisation of such passion,
+however, is not necessarily confined to writers of epics and lyrics.
+Tim was a man of action before he was a poet. "Forever questing" was
+his unacknowledged motto. Besides asking questions about stars and
+other inaccessible incidents of his Cosmos, he liked to "go busting
+about," as he called it--again with one essential condition that the
+thing should never come to an end by merely happening. Its mystery must
+remain its beauty.
+
+"I want to save something from an awful, horrible death," he announced
+one evening, looking up from _Half-hours with English Battles_ for a
+sign of beauty in distress.
+
+"Not so easy," his uncle warned him, equally weary of another overrated
+book--his own.
+
+"But I feel like it," he replied. "Come on."
+
+Uncle Felix still held back. "That you feel like it doesn't prove that
+there's anything that _wants_ rescuing," he objected.
+
+The boy stared at him with patient tolerance and surprise.
+
+"I promised," he said simply.
+
+It was the other's turn to stare. "And when, pray?" They had been alone
+for the last half hour. It seemed strange.
+
+"Oh--just now," replied the boy carelessly. "A few minutes ago--about."
+
+"Indeed!" It seemed stranger still. No one had come in. Yet Tim never
+prevaricated.
+
+"Yes," he said, "I gave my wordy honour." It was so gravely spoken
+that, while pledges involving life and death were obviously not new to
+him, this one was of exceptional kind.
+
+"Who, then, did you promise--whom, I mean?" the man demanded, fixing
+him with his stern blue eyes.
+
+And the answer came out pat: "Myself!"
+
+"Aha!" said the other, with a sigh and a raising of the eyebrows, by
+way of apology. "That settles it--"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"Because what you think and say, you must also act," the man continued.
+"If you promise yourself a thing, and then don't do it, you've simply
+told a lie." And he drew another sigh. He scented action coming.
+
+"Let's go at once and find it," said Tim, putting a text-book into
+seven words. He hitched his belt up, and looked round to make sure his
+sisters were not within reach of interference. There was a moment's
+pause, during which Uncle Felix hitched his will up. They rose, then,
+standing side by side. They left the room arm in arm on their way into
+the garden. The dusk was already laying its first net of shadows to
+catch the Night.
+
+"Hadn't you better change first?" asked Tim, thoughtfully, on his way
+down. He glanced at his companion's white flannel suit. "You're so
+awfully visible."
+
+"Visible!" It was not his bulk. Tim was never deliberately rude. Was it
+the risk of staining that he meant?
+
+"Any one can see you miles away like that."
+
+The other understood instantly. In an adventure everything sees,
+everything has eyes, everything watches. The world is alive and full of
+eyes. He hesitated a moment.
+
+"Oh, that's all right," he replied. "To be easily seen is the best way.
+It disarms curiosity at once. Tell all about yourself and nobody ever
+thinks anything. It's trying to hide that makes the world suspect you.
+Keep nothing back and show yourself is the best way to go about
+unnoticed. I've tried it."
+
+"Ah," exclaimed Tim, in an eager whisper, "same as walking into the
+strawberry-bed without asking--"
+
+"So my white clothes are just the thing," said the other, avoiding the
+pit laid for him.
+
+"Of course, yes." Tim still chased the big idea in his mind. "Besides,"
+he added, full of another splendid thought, "like that they won't
+expect you to do very much. They'll watch _you_ instead of me."
+
+There was confusion in the utterance, but things were rather crowding
+in upon him, to tell the truth, and imagination leaped ahead upon two
+trails at once. He looked at his big companion with more approval.
+"You'll do," he signified, pulling his cap over his eyes, thrusting
+both hands in his pockets, and slithering rapidly down the bannisters
+in advance.
+
+"Thanks," said Uncle Felix, following him, three steps at a time, with
+effort.
+
+In the hall they paused a moment--a question of doors.
+
+"Back," said Uncle Felix.
+
+"Front's better," decided the boy. "Then nobody'll think anything, you
+see." He was quick to put the new principle into practice.
+
+On the lawn there was another pause, this time a question of direction.
+
+"The wood, of course!" And they set off together at a steady trot. Few
+words were wasted when Tim went "busting about" in this way. Uncle
+Felix resigned himself and looked to him for guidance; there was some
+one to be rescued; there was danger to be run; the risk was bigger than
+either of them realised; but more than that he knew not.
+
+"Got a handkerchief with you?" the boy asked presently.
+
+"Yes, thanks; got everything," panted the other.
+
+"For signalling," was offered three minutes later by way of
+explanation, "in case we get lost--or anything like that."
+
+"Quite so."
+
+"Is it a clean one?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Good!"
+
+They climbed the swinging gate of iron, rushed the orchard, crossed the
+smaller hayfield in the open, heedless of the rabbits that rolled like
+fat balls into pockets made to fit them, slipped out of sight behind a
+stack of straw whose threatening lopsidedness seemed to support a
+ladder, and so eventually came to a breathless and perspiring halt upon
+the edges of a--wood.
+
+It was a very ordinary wood, small, inconspicuous, and unimposing. No
+big trees towered; there was no fence of thick, black trunks. It was
+not mysterious, like the dense evergreens on the other side of the
+grounds where the west wind shook half a mile of dripping branches in
+stormy weather:
+
+   Where the yew trees are gigantic,
+   And the yellow coast of "Spain,"
+   Breasting on the dim "Atlantic,"
+   Stores the undesired rain.
+
+It grew there in a kind of untidy muddle, on the very outskirts of the
+estate, meekly--rather disappointingly, Uncle Felix thought. There was
+no hint of anything haunted or terrible about it. Round rabbits fussed
+busily about its edges, darting as though pulled by wires, and the
+older wood-pigeons, no doubt, slept comfortably in its middle. But game
+despised it heartily, and traps were never laid. There was not even a
+trespassers' board, without which no wood is properly attractive.
+Indeed, for most people it was simply not worth the trouble of entering
+at all. Apparently no one ever bothered about it.
+
+Yet, precisely for these very reasons, it was real. Tim described it
+afterwards as a "naked" wood. It had no fence to hold it together, it
+was not dressed up by human beings, it just grew naturally. To this
+very openness and want of concealment it owed its deep security, its
+safety was due entirely to the air of innocence it wore. But in reality
+it was disguised. It was a forest--without a middle, without a heart.
+
+"This is our wood," announced Tim in a low voice, as they stood and
+mopped their faces. His tone suggested that they would enter at their
+peril.
+
+"And is it a big wood?" the other asked with caution, as though he had
+not noticed it before.
+
+"Much bigger than it looks," the boy replied. "You can easily get
+lost." Then added, with the first touch of awe about him, "It has no
+centre."
+
+"That's the worst kind," said his companion shivering slightly. "Like a
+pond that has no bottom."
+
+Tim nodded. His face had grown a trifle paler. He showed no immediate
+anxiety to make the first advance, reserving that privilege for his
+comrade. A breath of wind stole out and set the dry leaves rustling.
+
+"We must look out," he said at length. "There'll be a sign."
+
+Uncle Felix listened attentively to every word. The boy had moved up
+closer to him. "And if anything happens one of us must climb a tree and
+signal. _You've_ got the clean handkerchief. You see, it's at the
+centre that it gets rather nasty--because anybody who gets there simply
+disappears and is never heard of again. That's why there's no centre at
+all _really_. It's a terrible rescue we've got to do."
+
+The adventure fulfilled the desire of his heart, for, since there was
+no centre, the search would last for ever.
+
+"Keep a sharp look-out for the sign," replied the man, feeling a small
+hand steal into his own. "We'd better go in before it gets any darker."
+
+"Oh, that's nothing," was the whispered comment. "The great thing is
+not to lose our way. Just follow me!"
+
+They then went into this wood without a centre, without a middle,
+without a heart. Into this heartless wood they moved stealthily, Uncle
+Felix singing under his breath to keep his courage up:
+
+"A wood is a mysterious place,
+ It never looks you in the face,
+ But stares _behind_ you all the time.
+ Your safest plan is just to--climb!
+ For, otherwise you lose your way,
+ The week, the month, the time of day;
+ It turns you round, it makes you blind,
+ And in the end you lose your mind!
+ Avoid the centre,
+ If you enter!
+
+"It grows upon you--grows immense,
+ Its peace is _not_ indifference,
+ It sees you--and it takes offence,
+ It knows you're interfering.
+ Its sleepliness is all pretence,
+ With trunks and twigs and foliage dense
+ It's watching you, alert, intense,
+ It's furious; it's peering.
+
+"Upon the darkening paths below,
+ Whichever way you try to go
+ You'll meet with strange resistance.
+ So climb a tree and wave your hand,
+ The birds will see and understand,
+ And _may_ bring you assistance.
+ Avoid the centre,
+ If you enter,
+ For once you're there
+ You--disappear!
+ Smothered by depth and distance!"
+
+Tim listened without a sign of interest. Every one has his peculiarity,
+he supposed, and, provided his companion did not dance as well as sing,
+it was all right. The noise was unnecessary, perhaps, still--the sound
+of a human voice was not without its charm. The house was a very long
+way off; the gardeners never came this way. A wood _was_ a mysterious
+place! "Is that all?" he asked--but whether glad or sorry, no man could
+possibly have told.
+
+"For the present," came the reply, and the sound of both their voices
+fell a little dead, muffled by the density of the undergrowth. "Are we
+going right?"
+
+"There'll be a sign," Tim explained again. And the way he said it, the
+air of positive belief in tone and manner, stung the man's
+consciousness with a thrill of genuine adventure. It began to creep
+over him. He kept near to the comforting presence of the boy, aware in
+quite a novel way of the Presence of the Wood. This very ordinary wood,
+without claim to particular notice, much less to a notice-board,
+changed his normal feelings by arresting their customary flow. An
+unusual sensation replaced what he meant to feel, expected to feel. He
+was aware of strangeness. He felt included in the purpose of a crowd of
+growing trees. "But it's just a common little wood," he assured
+himself, realising as he said it that both adjectives were wrong. For
+nothing left to itself is ever common, and as for "little"--well, it
+had suddenly become enormous.
+
+Outside, in what was called the big world, things were going on with
+frantic hurry and change, but in here the leisured calm was huge,
+gigantic, so much so that the other dwindled into a kind of lost
+remoteness. "Smothered by depth and distance," he could almost forget
+it altogether. Out there nations were at war, republics fighting,
+empires tottering to ruin; great-hearted ladies were burning furniture
+and stabbing lovely pictures (not their own) to prove themselves
+intelligent enough to vote; and gallant gentlemen were flying across
+the Alps and hunting for the top and bottom of the earth instead of
+hurrying to help them. All manner of tremendous things were happening
+at a frightful pace--while this unnoticed wood just stood and grew,
+watching the sun and stars and listening to the brushing winds. Its
+unadvertised foliage concealed a busy universe of multitudinous, secret
+life.
+
+How still the trees were--far more imposing than in a storm! Still,
+quiet things are much more impressive than things that draw attention
+to themselves by making a noise. They are more articulate. The strength
+of all these trees emerged in their silence. Their steadiness might
+easily wear one down.
+
+And now, into its quiet presence, a man and a boy from that distressful
+outer world had entered. They moved with effort and difficulty into its
+untrodden depths. Uninvited and unasked, they sought its hidden and
+invisible centre, the mysterious heart of it which the younger of the
+adventurers could only describe by saying that "It isn't there, because
+when you get there, you disappear!" Two ways of expressing the same
+thing, of course! Moreover, entering involved getting out again. Escape
+and Rescue--the Wood always in opposition--took possession of the man's
+slow mind....
+
+It was already thick about them, and the trees stood very still. The
+branches drooped, motionless in the warm evening air. The twigs
+pointed. Each leaf had an eye, but a hidden, lidless eye. The saplings
+saw them, but the heavier trunks _observed_ them. It was known in what
+direction they were going, the direction, however, being chosen and
+insisted on by the Wood. Their very steps were counted. The whole
+business of the trees was suspended while they passed. They were being
+watched. And the stillness was so deep that it forced them, too, to
+make as little noise as possible. They moved with the utmost caution,
+pretending that a snapping twig might betray their presence, yet
+knowing quite well that each detail of their blundering advance was
+marked down with the accuracy of an instantaneous photograph. Tim,
+usually in advance, looked round from time to time, with a finger on
+his lips; and though he himself made far more noise than his companion,
+he stared with reproach when the latter snapped a stick or let a leafy
+branch swish through the air too loudly.
+
+"Oh, hush!" he whispered. "Please do hush!" and the same moment caught
+his own foot in a root, placed cunningly across the path, and sprawled
+forward with the noise of an explosion. But he made no reference to the
+matter. His own noises did no harm apparently. He was perfectly honest
+about it, not merely putting the blame elsewhere to draw attention from
+himself. His uncle's size and visibility were co-related in his mind.
+Being convinced that he moved as stealthily and soundlessly as a
+Redskin, it followed obviously that his companion _didn't_.
+
+The dusk had noticeably deepened when at length they reached a little
+clearing and stood upright, perspiring freely, and both a little
+flustered. The silence was really extraordinary. It seemed they had
+entered a private place, a secret chamber where they had no right, and
+were intruders. The clearing formed a circle, and from the open sky
+overhead a grey, mysterious light fell softly on the leafy walls. They
+paused and peered about them.
+
+"Hark! What's that?" asked Tim in a whisper.
+
+"Nothing," replied the other.
+
+"But I heard it," the boy insisted; "something rushing."
+
+"I'm rather out of breath, perhaps."
+
+The boy looked at him reproachfully. His expression suggested "Why
+_are_ you so noisy and enormous? It's hopeless, really!" But aloud he
+merely said, "It's got awfully dark all of a sudden."
+
+"It's the wood does that," replied Uncle Felix. "Outside it's only
+twilight. I think we'd better be getting on."
+
+"We're getting there," observed the boy.
+
+"But we shan't be able to see the sign if this darkness gets worse,"
+said the other apprehensively.
+
+The answer gave him quite a turn. "It's been--ages and ages ago!"
+
+The idea of rescue meanwhile had merged insensibly into escape, but
+neither remarked upon the change. It was only that the original emotion
+had spread a bit. Tim and Uncle Felix stood close together in this
+solemn clearing, waiting, peering about them, listening intently. But
+Tim had seen the sign; he knew what he was doing all the time; he was
+in more intimate relations with the Being of the Wood than his great
+floundering Uncle possibly could be.
+
+"Which way, do _you_ think?" asked the latter anxiously.
+
+There seemed no possible exit from the clearing, no break anywhere in
+the leafy walls; even the entrance was covered up and hidden. The Wood
+blocked further advance deliberately.
+
+"We're lost," said Tim bluntly, turning round and round. His eyes
+opened to their widest. "You've simply taken a wrong turning somewhere."
+
+And before Uncle Felix could expostulate or say a word in self-defence,
+the inevitable reward of his mistake was upon him.
+
+"_You've_ got the handkerchief!"
+
+Already the boy was looking about him for a suitable tree.
+
+"But _you_ saw the sign, Tim," he began excuses; "and it's _your_ wood;
+I've never been here before--"
+
+"That one looks the easiest," suggested Tim, pointing to a beech. It
+had one low branch, but the trunk was smooth and slippery as ice. He
+pushed aside the foliage with his hands to make an opening towards it.
+"I'll help you up." Tim spoke as though there was no time to lose.
+
+But help came just then unexpectedly from another quarter--there was a
+sudden battering sound. Something went past them through the branches
+with a crashing noise. It was terrific, the way it smashed and
+clattered overhead, making a clapping rattle that died away into the
+distance with strange swiftness. They jumped; their hearts stood still
+a moment. It was so horribly close. But the stillness that followed the
+uproar was far worse than the noise. It felt as though the Wood had
+stretched a hand and aimed a crafty blow at them from behind the shield
+of foliage. A quiver of visible silence ran across the leafy walls.
+They stood stock still, staring blankly into each other's eyes.
+
+"A wood-pigeon!" whispered Uncle Felix, recovering himself first.
+"We've been _seen_!"
+
+A faint smile passed over Tim's startled face. There was no other
+expression in it. The tension was distressingly acute. One sentence,
+however, came to the lips of both adventurers. They uttered it under
+their breath together:
+
+"It's--disappeared!"
+
+Instinctively they held hands then. Tim stood, rooted to the ground.
+
+"The _centre!_" They whispered it almost inaudibly. The horror of the
+spot where people vanished was upon them both. The power of the Wood
+had worn them down.
+
+"Yes, but don't _say_ it," cried Uncle Felix; "above all, don't say it
+aloud." And he clapped one hand upon his own mouth, and the other upon
+the boy's, as Tim came cuddling closer to his comforting expanse of
+side. "That only wakes it up, and--"
+
+He did not finish the sentence. Instead, his mind began to think
+tremendously. They were both badly frightened. What was the best thing
+to be done? At first he thought: "Keep perfectly still, and make no
+slightest movement; a quiet person is not noticed." But, the next
+instant, came the truer wisdom: "If anything unusual occurs, go on
+doing exactly what you were doing before. Hold the atmosphere, as it
+were." And on this latter inspiration he decided to act at once--
+
+Only to discover that Tim had realised it before him. The boy was
+pulling at him. "_Do_ come on, Uncle!" he was saying. "We shall go mad
+with fright if we keep on standing here--we shall be raving lunatics!"
+
+They set off wildly then, plunging helter-skelter into the silent,
+heartless wood. The trees miraculously opened up a way for them as they
+dived and stooped and wriggled forward. In which direction they were
+going neither of them had the least idea, but as neither one nor the
+other disappeared, it was clear they had not reached the actual centre.
+They gasped and spluttered, their breath grew shorter, the darkness
+increased. They came to all sorts of curious places that deceived them;
+ways opened invitingly, then closed down again and blocked advance;
+there were clearings that were obviously false, open places that were
+plainly sham; and a dozen times they came to spots that seemed
+familiar, but which really they had never seen before. Sense of
+direction left them, for they continually changed the angle, compelled
+by the undergrowth to do so. Twigs leaped at them and stung their
+faces, Tim's cheeks were splashed with mud, Uncle Felix's clean white
+flannels showed irregular lines of dirty water to his knees. It was
+altogether a tremendous affair in which rescue and escape were madly
+mingled with furious attack and terrified retreat. Everything was
+moving, and in all directions at once. They rushed headlong through the
+angry Wood. But the Wood itself rushed ever past them. It was roused.
+
+The confusion and bewilderment had got a little more than they could
+manage, indeed, when--quite marvellously and unexpectedly--the darkness
+lifted. They saw trees separately instead of in a whirling mass. The
+trunks stood more apart from one another. There were patches of faint
+light. More--there was a line of light. It shone, grey and welcome,
+some dozen yards in front of them.
+
+"Come on!" cried Tim. "Follow me!"
+
+And two minutes later they found themselves outside, torn, worn, and
+breathless, upon the edge--standing exactly at the place where they had
+entered three-quarters of an hour before. They had made an enormous
+circle. Panting and half collapsed, they stood side by side in an
+exhausted heap.
+
+"We're out," said Tim, with immense relief. Profoundly satisfied with
+himself, he looked round at his bedraggled Uncle. It was plain that he
+had rescued some one from "an awful-anorrible death."
+
+"At last!" replied the other gratefully, aware that he was the rescued
+one. "But only just in time!"
+
+And they moved away in the deepening dusk towards the house, whose
+welcome lights shone across the intervening hayfield.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+TIME HESITATES
+
+
+Meanwhile the coveted fortnight drew towards a close. It had begun on a
+Friday, and that left two full, clear weeks ahead. It had seemed an
+inexhaustible period--when it started. There was the feeling that it
+would draw out slowly, like an ordinary lesson-week; instead of which
+it shot downhill to Saturday with hardly a single stop. On looking
+back, the children almost felt unfairness; somebody had pushed it; they
+had been cheated.
+
+And, of course, they _had_ been cheated. Time had played his usual
+trick upon them. The beginning was so prodigal of reckless promises
+that they had really believed a week would last for ever. Childhood
+expects, quite rightly, to have its cake and eat it, for there is no
+true reason why anything should ever end at all. The devices are
+various: a titbit is set aside to enjoy later, thus deceiving Time and
+checking its ridiculous hurry. But in the long run Time invariably
+wins. After Thursday the week had shot into Saturday without a single
+pause. It whistled past. And the titbit, Saturday, had come.
+
+Yet without the usual titbit flavour; for Saturday, as a rule, wore
+splashes of gold and yellow upon its latter end, being a half-holiday
+associated with open air and sunshine, but now, Monday already in
+sight, with lessons and early bed and other prohibitions by the dozen,
+hearts sank a little, a shadow crept upon the sun. They had a
+grievance; some one had cheated them of a final joy. The collapse was
+unexpected, therefore wrong. And the arch-deceiver who had humbugged
+them, they knew quite well, was Time. He was in their thoughts. He
+mocked them all day long. Clocks grinned; _Saturday, June_ 3, flaunted
+itself insolently in their faces.
+
+"The day after to-morrow," remarked some one, noticing a calendar
+staring on the wall; and from the moment that phrase could be used it
+meant the day was within measurable distance.
+
+"Aunt Emily leaves Tunbridge Wells" was mentioned too, sounding less
+unpleasant than "Aunt Emily comes back." But the climax was reached
+when somebody stated bluntly without fear of contradiction:
+
+"To-morrow's Sunday."
+
+For Sunday had no particular colour. Monday was black, and Saturday was
+gold, but Sunday never had been painted anything. Though a buffer-day
+between a vanished week and a week of labour coming, it was of
+uncertain character. Queer, grave people came back to lunch. There were
+collects and a vague uneasiness about the heathen being unfed and
+naked. There was a collection, too--pennies emerged from stained
+leather purses and dropped clicking into a polished box with a slit in
+the top. Greenland's icy mountains also helped to put a chill into the
+sunshine. A pause came. Time went slower than usual--God rested, they
+remembered, on the seventh day--yet nothing happened much, and with
+their Sunday clothes they put on a sort of dreadful carefulness that
+made play seem stiff, unnatural, and out of place.
+
+Daddy, too, before the day was over, invariably looked worried, the
+servants bored, Mother drowsy, and Aunt Emily "like a clergyman's
+wife." Time sighed audibly on Sunday.
+
+"It's our last day, anyhow," they agreed, determined to live in the
+present and enjoy Saturday to the full.
+
+It was then Uncle Felix, having overheard their comments upon Time,
+looked round abruptly and made one of his startling remarks.
+"To-morrow," he said, "is one of the most wonderful days that was ever
+invented. You'll see."
+
+And the way he said it provided the very thrill that was needed to
+chase the shadow from the sun. For there was a hint of promise in his
+voice that almost meant he had some way of delaying the arrival of
+Black Monday.
+
+"You'll see," he repeated significantly, shading his eyes with both
+hands and peering up at the sun.
+
+Tim and Judy watched him with keen faces. They noticed that he said
+"to-morrow" instead of "Sunday." But before they could squeeze out a
+single question, there came a remarkable interruption from below. From
+somewhere near the ground it came. Maria, seated on a flower-pot whose
+flower didn't want to grow, opened her mouth and spoke. As is already
+known, this did not often happen. It was her characteristic to keep it
+closed. Even at the dentist's she never could be got to open her mouth,
+because he had once hurt her; she flatly refused to do so, and no
+amount of "Now open, please," ever had the least effect on her firm
+decision. She was taken in vain to see the dentist.
+
+This last Saturday of the week, however, she opened.
+
+"I've not had _my_ partickler adventure," was what she said.
+
+At the centre of that circle where she lived in a state of unalterable
+bliss, the fact had struck her, and she mentioned it accordingly.
+
+Tim and Judy turned upon her hungrily, but before they could relieve
+their feelings by a single word their Uncle had turned upon her too.
+Lowering his eyes from the great circular sun that moved in a circle
+through the sky, he let them fall upon the circular Maria who reposed
+calmly upon the circle of the earth, which itself swung in another
+circle round the sun.
+
+"Exactly," he said, "but it's coming. Your father told you a day would
+come. It is!"
+
+He said no more than that, but it was enough to fill the remainder of
+the day with the recurrent thrill of a tremendous promise. Each hour
+seemed pregnant with a hint of exceptional delivery. There were signs
+and whispers everywhere, and everybody was aware of it. Uncle Felix
+looked "bursting with it," as though he could hardly keep it in, and
+even the Lesser Authorities had as much as they could do to prevent it
+flying out of them in sudden sentences. Jackman wore a curious smile,
+which Judy declared was "just the face she made the day Maria was
+born"; Mrs. Horton left her kitchen and was seen upon the lawn actually
+picking daisies; and even Thompson--well, when Tim and his sister came
+upon him basking with a pipe against the laundry window, wearing a
+discarded tweed coat of their father's, and looking "exactly like the
+Pope asleep," he explained his position to Tim with the extraordinary
+remark that "even the Servants' Hall 'as dreams," and went on puffing
+his pipe precisely as before. But Weeden betrayed it most. They knew by
+the smell--"per fumigated," as they called it--that he was in the
+passages, watering the flowers or arranging new ones on the
+window-sills, and when Tim said, "Seen any more water-rats to pot at,
+Weeden?" the man just smiled and replied, "Good mornin', Master Tim;
+it's Saturday."
+
+The inflection of his tone was instantly noticed. "Oh, I say, Weeden,
+how do you know? _Do_ tell me. I won't say a word, I promise." But the
+Head Gardener kept his one eye--the other was of glass--upon the spout
+of his watering-can, and answered in a voice that issued from his
+boots--"Because to-morrow's Sunday, Master Tim, unless something
+'appens to prevent it." He then went quickly from the room, as though
+he feared more questions; he took the secret with him; he was nervous
+about betraying what he knew. But Judy agreed with Tim that "his answer
+proved it, because why should he have said it unless he knew!"
+
+Meanwhile, that fine morning in early June slipped along its sunny way;
+a heavy treacle-pudding luncheon was treated properly; Uncle Felix lit
+his great meerschaum pipe, and they all went out on the lawn beneath
+the lime trees. The undercurrent of excitement filled the air.
+Something was going to happen, something so wonderful that they could
+not speak about it. They did not dare to ask questions lest they should
+somehow stop it. It was a most delicately poised affair. The least
+mistake might send it racing in the opposite direction. But their
+imaginations were so actively at work inside that they could not help
+whispering among themselves about it. The silence of their Uncle piled
+up the coming wonder in an enormous heap.
+
+"Something _is_ coming," affirmed Judy in an undertone for the
+twentieth time, "but _I_ think it will be after tea, don't you?"
+
+"Prob'ly," assented her brother, very full of treacle pudding. He
+sighed.
+
+"Or p'r'aps it's _somebody_, d'you think?"
+
+Tim shrugged his shoulders carefully, conscious of insecurity within.
+
+"I shouldn't be surprised, would you?" Judy insisted. Of course she
+knew as much as he did, but she wanted to make him say something
+definite.
+
+"It's both," he said grandly. "Things like this always come together."
+
+"Yes, but it's _quite_ new. It's never happened before."
+
+He looked sideways at her with the pity of superior knowledge.
+
+"How could it?" So great was his private information that he almost
+added "stupid." But he kept back the word for later. He repeated
+instead: "However could it?"
+
+"Well, but--" she began.
+
+"Don't you see, it's what Daddy always told us," he reminded her with
+an air. And instantly, with overwhelming certainty, those Wonder
+Sentences of their father's, first spoken years ago, crashed in upon
+their minds: Some day; a day is coming; a day will come.
+
+Tim's assurance hurt her vanity a little, for it was only fair that she
+should know something too, however little. But the force of the
+discovery at once obliterated all lesser personal emotions.
+
+"Tim!" she gasped, overcome with admiration. "Is it really _that_?"
+
+Tim never forgot that moment of proud ascendancy. He felt like a king
+or something.
+
+"Look out," he whispered quickly. "You'll spoil it all if _he_ knows
+we've guessed." And he nodded his head towards Uncle Felix in his
+wicker-chair. "It's Maria's adventure, too, remember."
+
+Judy smiled and flushed a little.
+
+"He's not listening," she whispered back, ignoring Maria's claim. She
+was not quite so stupid as her brother thought her. "But how on earth
+did you know? It's too wonderful!" She flung the hair out of her eyes
+and wriggled away some of her suppressed excitement on the grass. Tim
+held his breath in agony while he watched her. But the smoke from his
+Uncle's pipe rose steadily into the sunny air, and his face was hidden
+by a paper that he held. The moment of danger passed. The boy leaned
+over towards his sister's ear.
+
+"Where it comes _from_," he whispered, "is what I want to know," and
+straightened up again with the air of having delivered an ultimatum
+that no girl could ever possibly reply to.
+
+"_From?_" she repeated. She seemed a little disappointed. "D'you mean
+that may stop it coming?"
+
+"Of course not," he said contemptuously. "But everything must come from
+somewhere, mustn't it?"
+
+Judy stared at him speechless, while he surveyed her with an air of
+calm omnipotence. To ask a thing no one could answer was the same as
+knowing the answer oneself.
+
+"Mustn't it?" he repeated with triumph.
+
+And, in the inevitable pause that followed, they both instinctively
+glanced up at Uncle Felix. The same idea had occurred to both of them.
+Although direct questions about what was coming were obviously
+impermissible, an indirect question seemed fairly within the rules. The
+fact was, neither of them could keep quiet about it any longer. The
+strain was more than human nature could stand. They simply _must_ find
+out. They would get at it that way.
+
+"Try him," whispered Judy. And Tim turned recklessly towards his Uncle
+and drew a long, deep breath.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+MARIA STIRS
+
+
+"Uncle," he began with a rush lest his courage should forsake him,
+"where does everything come from? Everything in the world, I
+mean?"--then waited for an answer that did not come.
+
+Uncle Felix neither moved nor spoke, and the question, like a bomb that
+fails to explode, produced no result after considerable effort and
+expense. The boy looked down again at the alarum clock he had been
+trying to mend, and turned the handle. It was too tightly wound to go.
+A stopped clock has the sulkiest face in the world. He stared at it;
+the handle clicked beneath the pressure of his hand. "It must come from
+somewhere," he added with decision, half to himself.
+
+"From the East, of course," advanced Judy, and tried to draw her Uncle
+by putting some buttercups against his cheek and mentioning loudly that
+he liked butter.
+
+Then, since neither sound nor movement issued from the man in the
+wicker-chair, the children continued the discussion among themselves,
+but _at_ the man, knowing that sooner or later he must become involved
+in it. Judy's answer, moreover, so far as it went, was excellent. The
+sun rose in the East, and the wind most frequently mentioned came also
+from that quarter. Easter, when everything rose again, was connected
+with the same point of the compass. The East was enormously far away
+with a kind of fairyland remoteness. The dragon-rugs in Daddy's study
+and the twisted weapons in the hall were "Easty" too. According to Tim,
+it was a "golden, yellow, crimson-sort-of, mysterious, blazing hole of
+a place" of which no adequate picture had ever been shown to them.
+China and Japan were too much photographed, but the East was vague and
+marvellous, the beginning of all things, "Camel-distant," as they
+phrased it, with Great Asia upon its magical frontiers. For Asia, being
+equally unphotographed, still shimmered with uncommon qualities.
+
+But, chiefly, it was a vast hole where travellers disappeared and left
+no trace; and to leave no trace was simply horrible.
+
+"The easier you go the less chance there is," maintained Judy. She said
+this straight into the paper that screened her uncle's face--without
+the smallest result of any kind whatsoever. Then Tim recalled something
+that Colonel Stumper had said once, and let fly with it, aiming his
+voice beneath the paper's edge.
+
+"East is east," he announced with considerable violence, but might as
+well have declared that it was south for all the response obtained. It
+was very odd, he thought; his Uncle's mind must be awfully full of
+something. For he remembered Come-Back Stumper saying the same thing
+once to Daddy at the end of a frightful argument about missionaries and
+idols, and Daddy had been unable to find any reply at all. Yet Uncle
+Felix did not stir a finger even. Accordingly, he made one more effort.
+He recited in a loud voice the song that Stumper had made up about it.
+If that had no effect, they must try other means altogether:
+
+   The East is just an endless place
+     That lies beyond discovery,
+   Where travellers who leave no trace
+     Are lost without recovery.
+   Both North and South have got a pole--
+     Men stand on the equator;
+   But the East is just an awful hole--
+     You're never heard of later!
+
+It had no effect. Goodness! he thought, the man must be ill. Or,
+perhaps, like the alarum clock, he was too tightly wound to go, and the
+burden of the secret he contained so wonderfully up his sleeve half
+choked him. The boy grew impatient; he nudged Judy and made an odd
+grimace, and Judy, belonging to the sex that took risks and thought
+little of personal safety when a big end was to be obtained, stood up
+and put the buttercups against her own cheek.
+
+"But I like it ever so much more than _you_ do," she said in a loud
+voice.
+
+The move was not a bad one; the paper wobbled, sank a quarter of an
+inch, revealed the bridge of the reader's nose, then held severely
+steady again. Whereupon Tim, noticing this sign of weakening, followed
+his sister's lead, rose, kicked the tired clock like a ball across the
+lawn, and exclaimed in a tone of challenge to the universe: "But where
+did everything come from before that--before the East, I mean?" And he
+glared at his immobile Uncle through the paper with an air of fearful
+accusation, as though he distinctly held he was to blame. If that
+didn't let the cat out of the bag, nothing would!
+
+The big man, however, rested heavily with his legs crossed, as though
+still he had not heard. Doubtless he felt as heavy as he looked, for
+the afternoon was warm, and luncheon--well, at any rate, he remained
+neutral and inactive. Something might happen to divert philosophical
+inquiry into other channels; a rat might poke its nose above the pond;
+a big fish might jump; an awfully rare butterfly come dancing; or
+Maria, as on rare occasions she had been known to do, might stop
+discussion with a word of power. The chances were in his favour on the
+whole. He waited.
+
+But nothing happened. No rat, nor fish, nor butterfly did the things
+expected of them; they were on the children's side. Maria sat blocked
+and motionless against the landscape; and the round world dozed.
+Yes--but the music of the world was humming. The bees droned by, there
+was a whisper among the unruffled leaves.
+
+Tim tapped him sharply on the knee. The man shuffled, then looked over
+the top of his illustrated paper with an air of shocked surprise.
+
+"Eh, Tim," he asked. "Where we all come from, did you say?"
+
+"Everything, not only us," was the clean reply.
+
+"That's it," Judy supported him.
+
+"Now, then," Maria added quietly, as if she had done all the work.
+
+Uncle Felix laid down his entertaining pictures of public men in
+misfit-clothing furiously hitting tiny balls over as much uncultivated
+land as possible--and sighed. Their violent attitudes had given him a
+delightful sensation of repose. They were the men who governed England,
+and this savage hitting was proof of their surplus energy. He resigned
+himself, but with an air.
+
+"Well," he said vaguely, "I suppose--it all just--began somehow--of
+itself." And he stole a sideways glance at a picture of a stage Beauty
+attired like a female Guy Fawkes.
+
+"It was created in six days, of course, us last," said Tim, regarding
+him with patient dignity. "We remember all that. But where it came
+_from_ is what we thought _you'd_ know." He closed the illustrated
+paper and moved it out of reach, while the man brushed from his beard
+the grass and stuff that Judy had arranged there cleverly in a
+decorative pattern.
+
+"From?" repeated Uncle Felix, as though the word were unfamiliar.
+
+"Your body and mind," the boy resumed, ignoring the pretence that
+laziness offered in place of information, "and all that kind of thing;
+trees and mountains, and birds and caterpillars and people like Aunt
+Emily, and clergymen and volcanoes and elephants--oh, everything in the
+world everywhere?"
+
+There was another sigh. And another pause dropped down upon creation,
+while they watched a looper caterpillar that clung to the edge of the
+illustrated paper and made futile circles in the air with the knob it
+called its head. Some one had forgotten to let down the ladder it
+expected, or perhaps it, too, was asking unanswerable questions of the
+sun.
+
+"I believe," announced Judy, still smarting under a sense of recent
+neglect, "it just came from nowhere. It's all in a great huge circle.
+And we go round and round and rounder," she went on, as no one met her
+challenge, "till we're finished!"
+
+She avoided her brother's eye, but glanced winningly at Uncle Felix,
+remembering that she had gained support from him before by a similar
+device. At Maria she looked down. "You know nothing anyhow," her
+expression said, "so you _must_ agree."
+
+"I don't finish," said Maria quietly, whereupon Tim, feeling that the
+original question was being shelved, made preparation to obliterate
+her--when Uncle Felix intervened with a longer observation of his own.
+
+"It's not such a bad idea," he said, glancing sideways at Maria with
+approval, "that circle business. Everything certainly goes _round_. The
+earth is round, and the sun is round, and, as Maria says, a circle
+never finishes." He paused, reflecting deeply.
+
+"But who made the circle," demanded Tim.
+
+"That _is_ the point," agreed Uncle Felix, nodding his head. "Some one
+must have made it--some day--mustn't they?"
+
+They stared at him, as probably the animals stared at Adam, wondering
+what their splendid names were going to be. The yearning in their eyes
+was enough to make a rock produce sweet-scented thyme. Even the looper
+steadied its pin-point head to listen. But nothing happened. Uncle
+Felix looked dumber than the clock. He looked hot, confused, and
+muddled too. He kept his eyes upon the grass. He fumbled in his pockets
+for a match. He spoke no word.
+
+"What?" asked Tim abruptly, by way of a hint that something further was
+expected of him.
+
+Uncle Felix looked up with a start. Like Proteus who changed his shape
+to save himself the trouble of prophesying, he swiftly changed the key
+to save himself providing accurate information that he didn't possess.
+
+"It wasn't a circle, exactly," he said slowly; "it was a thought, a
+great, white, wonderful, shining thought. That's what started the whole
+business first," and he looked round hopefully at the eager faces.
+"Somebody thought it all," he went on, recklessly, "and it all came
+true that way. See?"
+
+They waited in silence for particulars.
+
+"Somebody thought it all out first," he elaborated, "and so it simply
+_had_ to happen."
+
+There was an interval of some thirty seconds, and then Tim asked:
+
+"But who thought _him_?" He said it with much emphasis.
+
+Uncle Felix sat up with energy and lit his pipe. His listeners drew
+closer, with the exception of Maria, whose life seemed concentrated in
+her fixed and steady eyes.
+
+"It's like this, you see," the man explained between the puffs; "if you
+go into the schoolroom, you find a lot of things lying about
+everywhere--blocks, toys, engines, and all sorts of things--don't you?"
+
+"Yes," they agreed, without enthusiasm.
+
+"Well," he continued, "what's the good of them until you _think_
+something about them--think them into something--some game or meaning
+or other? They're nothing but a lot of useless stuff just lying
+untidily upon the floor. See what I mean?"
+
+They nodded, but again without enthusiasm.
+
+"With our End of the World place," he went on, seeing that they
+listened attentively, "it's the same again. It was nothing but a
+rubbish-heap until we thought it into something wonderful--which, of
+course, it is," he hastened to add. "But by thinking about it, we
+discovered--we _created_ it!"
+
+They nodded again. Somebody grunted. Maria watched the caterpillar
+crawling up his sleeve.
+
+"The things--the place and the toys," he resumed hopefully, "were there
+all the time, but they meant nothing--they weren't alive--until we
+thought about them." He blew a cloud of smoke. "So, you see," he
+continued with an effort, "if we could only _think out_ what everything
+meant, we could--er--find out what--what everything meant--and where it
+came from. Everything would be all right, don't you see?"
+
+Judy's expression was distraught and puzzled. Maria's eyes were closed
+so tightly that her entire face seemed closed. The pause drew out.
+
+"Yes, but where does everything come from?" inquired Tim calmly.
+
+He valued the lengthy explanation at just exactly--nothing!
+
+"Because there simply must be a beginning somewhere," added Judy.
+
+They were at the starting-point again. They had merely made a circle.
+
+And Uncle Felix found himself in difficulties of his own creating.
+Where everything came from puzzled him as much as it puzzled the
+children, or the looper caterpillar that was now crawling from his
+flannel collar to his neck and contemplating the thicket of his dense
+back hair. Why ask these terrible questions? he thought, as he looked
+around at the sunshine and the trees. Life would be no happier if he
+knew. Since everything was already here, going along quite pleasantly
+and usefully, it really couldn't help matters much to know precisely
+where it all came from. Possibly not. But it would have helped him
+enormously in his relations with the children--his particular world at
+the moment--if he could have provided them with a satisfactory
+explanation. And he knew quite well what they expected from him. That
+dreadful "Some Day" hung in the balance between success and failure.
+
+And it was then that assistance came from a most unlikely quarter--from
+Maria. There was no movement in the stolid head. The eyes merely rolled
+round like small blue moons upon the expanse of the expressionless
+face. But the lips parted and she spoke. She asked a question. And her
+question shifted the universe back upon its ultimate foundations. It
+set a problem deeper far than the mere origin of everything. It touched
+the _cause_.
+
+"Why?" she inquired blandly.
+
+It seemed a bomb-shell had fallen among them. Maria had closed her eyes
+again. Her face was calm as a cabbage, still as a mushroom in a storm.
+She claimed the entire discussion somehow as her own. Yet she had
+merely exercised her prerogative of being herself. Having gone into the
+root of the matter with a monosyllable, she retired again into her
+eternal centre. She had nothing more to offer--at the moment.
+
+_Why?_
+
+They had never thought of Why there should be anything. It was far more
+interesting than Where. Why was a deeper question than whence. It made
+them feel more important, for one thing. Somebody--but Somebody who was
+not there--owed them a proper explanation about it. The burden of
+apology or excuse was lifted instantly from Uncle Felix's shoulders,
+for, obviously, he had nothing to do with the reason for their being in
+the world.
+
+Without a moment's hesitation he flung his arms out, let the pipe fall
+from his lips, and--burst into song:
+
+ Why should there be anything?
+ Why should we be here?
+ It isn't where we come from,
+ But why should we appear?
+ It's really inexplicable,
+ Extr'ordinary, queer:
+ Why _should_ we come and talk a bit,
+ And then--just disappear?
+
+"Why, why, why?" shouted the two elder children. The air was filled
+with flying "whys." They tried to sing the verse.
+
+"Let's dance it," cried Judy, leaping to her feet. "Give us the words
+again, please." She picked up the clock and plumped it down into
+Maria's uncertain lap. "You beat time," she ordered. "It's the tune of
+'Onward Christian Soldiers.'"
+
+Maria, disinclined to budge unless obliged to, did nothing.
+
+"It's a beastly tune," Tim supported her. "I hate those Sunday hymn
+tunes. They're not real a bit."
+
+He watched Judy and his Uncle capering hand in hand among the
+flower-beds. He didn't feel like dancing himself. He looked at the
+clock that, like Maria and himself, refused to go. He looked at Maria,
+fastened immovably upon the lawn. The clock lay glittering in the
+sunshine. Maria sat like a shining ball beside it. He felt the
+afternoon was a failure somewhere. Things weren't going quite as he
+wanted, the clock wasn't going either. And when they did go they went
+of their own accord, independent of himself, of his direction,
+guidance, wishes. He was out of it. This was _not_ the time to dance.
+What was the meaning of it all? It had to do somehow with the clock
+that wouldn't go. It had to do with Maria, who wouldn't budge. The
+clock had stopped of its own accord. That lay at the bottom of it all,
+he felt. Some day things would be different, more satisfactory--more
+real.... Some day!
+
+And strange, new ideas, very vague and dim, very far away, very queer,
+and very wonderful, poured through his searching, questioning little
+mind.
+
+"Beat time!" shouted Judy to her motionless sister. "I told you to beat
+time. You're doing nothing. You never do!"
+
+Tim stood watching them, while the words rang on in his head: "You are
+doing nothing! You never do!" How wonderful it was! Maria never did
+anything, yet was always there _in_ everything. And the others--how
+funny they were, too! They looked like an elephant and a bird, he
+thought, for Judy hopped and fluttered, while his Uncle moved heavily,
+making holes in the soft lawn with his great feet. "Beat time, beat
+time!" cried Judy at intervals.
+
+What a queer phrase it was--to _beat_ time. Why beat it? It wasn't
+there unless it was beaten. Poor Time; and Maria refused to beat it.
+His eye wandered from Maria to the dancers, and a kind of reverie stole
+over him. What was the use of dancing unless there was something to
+dance round? Maria was round; why didn't they dance round her? His
+thoughts returned to Maria. How funny Maria was! She just sat there
+doing nothing at all. Maria was dull and unenterprising, yet somehow
+everything came round to her in the end. It was just because she
+waited, she never hurried. She was a sort of centre. Only it must be
+rather stupid just to be a centre. Then, suddenly, two ideas struck him
+at the same instant, scattering his dreamy state of reverie. The first
+was--Everything comes from a centre like Maria; _that's_ where
+everything comes from! The second, bearing no apparent relation to it,
+found expression in words:
+
+He cried out: "I know what! Let's go to the End of the World and make a
+fire and burn things!"
+
+And he looked at Maria as though he had discovered America.
+
+"Beat time, oh, _do_ beat time," cried Judy breathlessly.
+
+"We're going to make a fire," he shouted; "there's lots of things to
+burn." He looked about him as though to choose a place. But he couldn't
+find one. He pointed vaguely, first at Maria, as though she was the
+thing to burn, and then at the landscape generally. "Then you can dance
+_round_ it," he added convincingly to clinch the matter.
+
+But the bird and the elephant continued their gymnastic exercises on
+the lawn, while Maria turned her eyes without moving her head and
+watched them too.
+
+Then, while the tune of "Onward Christian Soldiers" filled the air, Tim
+and Maria began an irrelevant argument about things in general. Tim, at
+least, told her things, while she laid the clock down upon the grass
+and listened. But the flood of language rolled off her as minutes roll
+from the face of the sun, producing no effect. There was wonder in her
+big blue eyes, wonder that never seemed to end. But minutes don't
+decrease merely because the rising and setting of the sun sends them
+flying, and there are not fewer words in a boy's vocabulary merely
+because he uses up a lot in saying things. Both words and minutes
+seemed a circle without beginning or end. It was most odd and
+strange--this feeling of endlessness that was everywhere in the air.
+And, long before Tim had got even to the middle of his enormous speech,
+he had forgotten all about the fire, forgotten about dancing, about
+burning things, forgotten about everything everywhere, because his
+roving eye had fallen again upon the--clock. The clock absorbed his
+interest. It lay there glittering in the sunshine beside Maria. It
+wasn't going; Maria wasn't going either. It had stopped. He realised
+abruptly, realised it without rhyme or reason, that a stopped clock, a
+clock that isn't going, was a--mystery.
+
+And the tide of words dried up in him; he choked; something was wrong
+with the universe; for if the clock stopped--_his_ clock--time--time
+must--he was unable to think it out--but time must surely get muddled
+and go wrong too.
+
+And he moved over to Maria just as she was about to burst into tears.
+He sat down beside her. At the same moment Judy and Uncle Felix,
+thinking a quarrel was threatening, stopped their dancing, and joined
+the circle too. They stood with arms akimbo, panting, silent, waiting
+for something to happen so that they could interfere and set it right
+again.
+
+But nothing did happen. There was deep silence only. The slanting
+sunshine lay across the lawn, the wind passed sighing through the lime
+trees, and the clock stared up into their faces, motionless, a blank
+expression on it--stopped. They formed a circle round it. No one moved
+or spoke. There was a queer, deep pause. The sun watched them; the sky
+was listening; the entire afternoon stood still. Something else beside
+the clock, it seemed, was slowing up.
+
+"To-morrow's Sunday. Time's getting awfully short," was in the air
+inaudibly.
+
+"Let's sit down," whispered Tim, already seated himself, but anxious to
+feel the others close. Judy and Uncle Felix obeyed. They all sat round
+in a circle, staring at the shining disc of the motionless, stopped
+clock. It might have been a Lucky Bag by the way they watched it with
+expectant faces.
+
+But Maria also was in that circle, sitting calmly in its centre.
+
+Then Uncle Felix cautiously lifted the glittering round thing and held
+it in his hand. He put his ear down to listen. He shook his head.
+
+"It hasn't gone since this time yesterday," said Tim in a low tone.
+"That's twenty-four hours," he added, calculating it on the fingers of
+both hands.
+
+"A whole day," murmured Judy, as if taken by surprise somehow; "a day
+and a night, I mean."
+
+She exchanged a glance of significant expectation with her brother, but
+it was at their uncle they looked the moment after, because of the
+strange and sudden sound that issued from his lips. For it was like a
+cry, and his face wore a flushed and curious expression they could not
+fathom. The face and the cry were signs of something utterly unusual.
+He was startled--out of himself. A marvellous idea had evidently struck
+him. "It's either something," thought Judy, "or else he's got a pain."
+But Tim's mind was quicker. "He's got it," the boy decided, meaning,
+"We've got it out of him at last!" Their manoeuvres had taken so long
+of accomplishment that their original purpose had almost been forgotten.
+
+"A day, a whole day," Uncle Felix was mumbling to himself in a dazed
+kind of happy way, "an entire day, I do declare!" He looked round
+solemnly, yet with growing excitement, into the children's faces.
+"Twenty-four hours! An entire day," he went on, half beneath his breath.
+
+"_Some day;_ of course..." Tim said in a low voice, catching the mood
+of wonder, while Judy added, equally stirred up, "A day will come..."
+and then Uncle Felix, breaking out of his queer reverie with an effort,
+raised his voice and looked as if the end of the world had come.
+
+"But do you realise what it means?" he asked them sharply. "D'you
+understand what's happened?"
+
+He drew a long, deep breath that quivered with suppressed amazement,
+and waited several seconds for their answers--in vain. The children
+gazed at him without uttering a word; they made no movement either. The
+arresting tone of his voice and a certain huge expression in his eyes
+made everything in the world seem different. It was a moment of real
+life; he had discovered something stupendous. But, explanation being
+beyond them, they attempted no immediate answer to his question. The
+pressure of interest blocked every means of ordinary expression known
+to them.
+
+Then Uncle Felix spoke again; his big eyes fixed Tim piercingly like a
+pin. "When did it stop?" he inquired gravely. He meant to make quite
+sure of his discovery before revealing it. There must be no escape, no
+slip, no carelessness. "When did it stop, I ask you, Tim?" he repeated.
+
+Tim was a trifle vague. "I was asleep," he whispered. "When I woke
+up--it wasn't going."
+
+"You wound it?"
+
+"Oh, yes, I wound it right enough."
+
+"What time was it?"
+
+"The clock--or the day, Uncle?" He was confused a little; he wished to
+be awfully accurate.
+
+Uncle Felix explained that he desired to know what time the clock had
+stopped. The importance of the answer could be judged by the intentness
+of his expression while he waited.
+
+"The finger-hands were at four," said the boy at length.
+
+Uncle Felix gave a jump. "Ha, ha!" he exclaimed triumphantly, "then it
+stopped of its own accord!" They could have screamed with excitement,
+though without the least idea what they were excited about. You could
+have heard a butterfly breathing.
+
+"It stopped at dawn!" he continued, louder.
+
+"Dawn!" piped Tim, unable to think of anything else, but obliged to
+utter something.
+
+"Dawn, yes," cried Uncle Felix louder still. "It stopped of its own
+accord at dawn! Just at the beginning of a new day it stopped! It's
+marvellous! Don't you see? It's marvellous!"
+
+"Goodness!" cried Judy, her mind obfuscated, yet thrilled with a
+transport of inexplicable delight. "It's marvellous!"
+
+"I say!" Tim shouted, dropping his voice suddenly because he too was at
+a loss for any more intelligible relief in words.
+
+They sat and stared at their amazing uncle. There was a hush upon the
+entire universe; there was marvel, mystery, but at first there was also
+muddle. They waited, holding their breath with difficulty. Some one, it
+seemed, must either explode or--or something else, they knew not
+exactly what. It would hardly have surprised them if Judy had suddenly
+flown through the air, Tim vanished down a hole, or Maria gleamed at
+them from the inside of a quivering bubble of soap. There was this kind
+of intoxicating feeling, delicious and intense. Even To-morrow might
+_not_ be Sunday after all: it felt strange and wonderful enough for
+that!
+
+The possibility that _Some Day_ was coming--was close at hand--had in
+some mysterious way become a probability. It was clear at last why
+Uncle Felix had been so heavy and preoccupied.
+
+"You see what's happened?" he continued after the long pause. "You see
+what it all means--this strange stopping of the clock--at Dawn?"
+
+They admitted nothing; the least mistake on their part might prevent,
+might spoil or cripple it. The depth and softness of his tone warned
+them. They stared and waited. He gathered them closer to him with both
+arms. Even Maria wriggled slightly nearer--an inch or so.
+
+"It means," he said in still lower tones, "the calendar,"--then stopped
+abruptly to examine the effect upon them.
+
+Now, ordinarily, they knew quite well what a calendar was; but this
+new, strange emphasis he put upon it robbed the word suddenly of all
+its original meaning. Their minds went questioning at once:
+
+"What _is_ a calendar?" asked Judy carefully--"exactly?" she added, to
+make her meaning absolutely clear. It sounded almost like a nonsense
+word.
+
+"Exactly," he repeated cautiously, yet with some great emotion working
+in him, "what is a calendar? That's the whole question. I'll try and
+tell you what a calendar is." He drew a deeper breath, a great effort
+being evidently needed. "A calendar," he went on, while the word
+sounded less real each time it was uttered, "is an invention of clever,
+scientific men to note the days as they pass; it records the passing
+days. It's a plan to measure Time. It's made of paper and has the date
+and the name of the day stamped in ink on separate sheets. When a day
+has passed you tear off a sheet. That day is done with--gone. There are
+three hundred and sixty-five of these separate sheets in a year. It's
+just an invention of scientific men to measure the passing of--Time,
+you see?"
+
+They said they saw.
+
+"Another invention," he resumed, his face betraying more and more
+emotion, "is a clock. A clock is just a mechanical invention that ticks
+off the movements of the sun into seconds and minutes and hours. Both
+clocks and calendars, therefore, are mere measuring tricks. Time goes
+on, or does not go on, just the same, whether you possess these
+inventions or whether you do not possess them. Both clocks and
+calendars go at the same rate whether Time goes fast or slow. See?"
+
+A tremendous discovery began to poke its nose above the edge of their
+familiar world. But they could not pull it up far enough to "see" as
+yet. Uncle Felix continued to pull it up for them. That he, too, was
+muddled never once occurred to them.
+
+"Scientific men, like all other people, are not always to be relied
+upon," he went on. "They make mistakes like--you, or Thompson, or Mrs.
+Horton, or--or even me. Clocks, we all know, are full of mistakes, and
+for ever going wrong. But the same thing has happened to calendars as
+well. Calendars are notoriously inaccurate; they simply cannot be
+depended upon. No calendar has ever been entirely veracious, nor ever
+will be. Like elastic, they are sometimes too long and sometimes too
+short--imperfectly constructed."
+
+He paused and looked at them. "Yes," they said breathlessly, aware
+dimly that accustomed foundations were already sliding from beneath
+their feet.
+
+"Half the calendars of the world are simply wrong," he continued, more
+boldly still, "and the people who live by them are in a muddle
+consequently--a muddle about Time. England is no exception to the rest.
+Is it any wonder that Time bothers us in the way it does--always time
+to do this, or time to do that, or not time enough to finish, and so
+on?"
+
+"No," they said promptly, "it isn't."
+
+"Of course," he resumed. "Well, sometimes a nation finds out its
+mistake and alters its calendar. Russia has done this; the Russian New
+Year and Easter are not the same as ours. Pope Gregory, the thirteenth,
+ordered that the day after October 4, 1582, should be called October
+15. He called it the Gregorian Calendar; but there are lots of other
+calendars besides--there's the Jewish and Mohammedan, and a variety of
+calendars in the East. All of them can't be right. The result is that
+none of them are right, and the world is in confusion. Some calendars
+mark off too many days, others mark off too few. Half the world is
+ahead of Time, and the other half behind it. The Governments know this
+quite well, but they dare not say anything, because their officials are
+muddled enough as it is. There is everywhere this fearful rush and
+hurry to keep up with Time. All are terrified of being late--too late
+or too early."
+
+"Naturally."
+
+"And the extraordinary result of all these mistakes," he went on
+marvellously, "is simply this: that a considerable amount of Time has
+never been recorded at all by any of them. There are a lot of extra
+days, unused, unrecorded days, still at large--if only we could find
+them."
+
+"Extra Days!" they gasped. Tim and Judy's mouths were open now, and
+slowly opening wider every minute. Only Maria's mouth kept closed. Her
+great blue eyes were closed as well. She looked as if she could have
+told them all this in a couple of words!
+
+"Knocking about on the loose," he explained further, then paused and
+stared into the upturned faces; "sort of escaped days that have never
+been torn off calendars or ticked away by clocks--unused, unfilled,
+unlived--slipped out of Time, that is--"
+
+"Then when Daddy said, 'A day is coming,' and all that--?" Tim managed
+to squeeze out as though the pain of the excitement hurt his lips.
+
+"Of course," replied Uncle Felix, nodding his great head, "of course.
+Sooner or later one of these lost Extra Days is bound to crop up. And
+what's more--" he glanced down significantly at the stopped
+alarum-clock--"I think--"
+
+He broke off in the middle of the sentence. They all stood up. Tim
+picked up the clock and handed it to his uncle, who held it tightly
+against his chest a moment, then put it into his capacious pocket.
+
+"I think," he went on enormously, "it's come!"
+
+An entire minute passed without a sound.
+
+"We can fill it with anything we like?" asked Judy, overawed a little.
+
+"Anything we like," came the sublime reply.
+
+"And do things over and over again--sort of double--and no hurry?" Tim
+whispered.
+
+"Anything, anywhere, anyhow, and no end to it all," he answered
+gloriously. "No hurry either!" It was too much to think about all at
+once, too big to realise. They all sat down again beside Maria, who had
+not moved an inch in any direction at all. She was a picture of sublime
+repose.
+
+"We have only got to find it, then climb into it, then sail away,"
+murmured Uncle Felix, with a strange catch in his breath they readily
+understood.
+
+"When will it begin?" both children asked in the same breath.
+
+"At dawn," he said.
+
+"To-morrow morning?"
+
+"At dawn to-morrow morning."
+
+"But to-morrow's Sunday," they objected.
+
+"To-morrow's--an Extra Day," he said amazingly.
+
+They hesitated a moment, stared, frowned, smiled, then opened their
+eyes and mouths still wider than before.
+
+"Oh, like that!" they exclaimed.
+
+"Like that, yes," he said finally. "It means getting in behind Time,
+you see. There's no Time in an Extra Day because it's never been
+recorded by calendar or clock. And that means getting behind the great
+hurrying humbug of a thing that blinds and confuses everybody all the
+world over--it means getting closer to the big Reality that--"
+
+He broke off sharply, aware that his own emotion was carrying him out
+of his depth, and out of their depth likewise. He changed the sentence:
+"We shall be in Eternity," he whispered very softly, so softly that it
+was scarcely audible perhaps.
+
+And it was then that Maria, still seated solidly upon the lawn, looked
+up and asked another baffling and unexpected question. For this was
+_her_ private and particular adventure: and, living ever at the centre
+of the circle, Maria claimed even Eternity as especially her own. Her
+question was gigantic. It was infinitely bigger than her original
+question, "Why?" It was the greatest question in the universe, because
+it answered itself adequately at once. It was the question the undying
+gods have flung about the listening cosmos since Time first began its
+tricky cheating of delight--and still fling into the echoing hearts of
+men and children everywhere. The stars and insects, the animals and
+birds, even the stones and flowers, all keep the glorious echo flying.
+
+"Why not?" she asked.
+
+It was unanswerable.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+"A DAY WILL COME"
+
+
+They went into the house as though wafted--thus does a shining heart
+deduct bodily weight from life's obstructions; they had their tea;
+after tea they played games as usual, quite ordinary games; and in due
+course they went to bed. That is, they followed a customary routine,
+feeling it was safer. To do anything unusual just then might attract
+attention to their infinite Discovery and so disturb its delicate
+equilibrium. Its balance was precarious. Once an Authority got wind of
+anything, the Extra Day might change its course and sail into another
+port. Aunt Emily, even from a distance...! In any case, they behaved
+with this intuitive sagacity which obviated every risk--by taking none.
+
+Yet everything was different. Behind the routine lay the potent
+emphasis of some strange new factor, as though a lofty hope, a brave
+ideal, had the power of transmuting common duties into gold and
+crystal. This new factor pushed softly behind each little customary
+act, urging what was commonplace over the edge into the marvellous. The
+habitual became wonderful. It felt like Christmas Eve, like the last
+night of the Old Year, like the day before the family moved for the
+holidays to the sea--only more so. Even To-morrow-will-be-Sunday had
+entirely disappeared. A thrill of mysterious anticipation gilded
+everything with wonder and beauty that were impossible, yet true. Some
+Day, _the_ Thing that Nobody could Understand--Somebody--was coming at
+last.
+
+Uncle Felix was in an extraordinary state; his acts were normal enough,
+but his speech betrayed him shamefully; they had to warn him more than
+once about it. He seemed unable to talk ordinary prose, saying that
+"Everything _ought_ to rhyme, At such a time," and, instead of walking
+like other people, his feet tried to keep in time with his language.
+"But you don't understand," he replied to Tim's grave warnings; "you
+don't understand what a gigantic discovery it is. Why, the whole world
+will thank us! The whole world will get its breath back! The one thing
+it's always dreaded more than anything else--being too late--will come
+to an end! We ought to dance and sing--"
+
+"Oh, please hush!" warned Judy. "Aunt Emily, you know--" Even at
+Tunbridge Wells Aunt Emily might hear and send a telegram with No in it.
+
+"Has it lost its breath?" Tim asked, however. But, though it was in the
+middle of tea, Uncle Felix could not restrain himself, and burst into
+one of his ridiculous singing fits, instead of answering in a whisper
+as he should have done. "Burst" described it accurately. And his feet
+kept time beneath the table. It was the proper place for Time, he
+explained.
+
+The clocks are stopped, the calendars are wrong, Time holds gigantic
+finger-hands Before his guilty face. Listen a moment! I can hear the
+song That no one understands--
+
+"It's the blue dragon-fly," interrupted Tim, remembering the story of
+long ago.
+
+"It's the Night-Wind--out by day," cried Judy.
+
+"It's both and neither," sang the man,
+ "This song I hear. It first began
+  Before the hurrying race
+  Of ticking, and of tearing pages
+  Deafened the breathless ages:
+  It is the happy singing
+  Of wind among the rigging
+  Of our Extra Day!"
+
+"It's something anyhow," decided Judy, rather impressed by her uncle's
+fit of bursting.
+
+And, somehow, Dawn was the password and Tomorrow the key. No one knew
+more than that. It had to do with Time, for Uncle Felix had taken the
+stopped clock to his room and hidden it there lest somebody like
+Jackman or Thompson should wind it up. Later, however, he gave it for
+safer keeping to Maria, because she moved so rarely and did so little
+that was unnecessary that she seemed the best repository of all. Also,
+this was _her_ particular adventure, and what risk there was belonged
+properly to her. But beyond this they knew nothing, and they didn't
+want to know. In the immediate future, just before the gateway of
+To-morrow's dawn, a great gap lay waiting, a gap they had discovered
+alone of all the world. The scientists had made a mistake, the
+Government had been afraid to deal with it, the rest of the world lay
+in ignorance of its very existence even. It satisfied all the
+conditions of real adventure, since it was unique, impossible, and had
+never happened to any one before. They, with Uncle Felix, had
+discovered it. It belonged to them entirely--the most marvellous secret
+that anybody could possibly imagine. Maria, they took for granted,
+would share it with them. A hole in Time lay waiting to receive them. A
+_Day Will Come_ at last was actually coming.
+
+"We'd better pack up," said Judy after tea. She said it calmly, but the
+voice had a whisper of intense expectancy in it.
+
+"Pack up nothing," Uncle Felix reproved her quickly. "The important
+thing is--don't wind up. Just go on as usual. It will be best," he
+added significantly, "if you all hand over your timepieces to me at
+once." And, without a word, they recognised his wisdom and put their
+treasures into his waistcoat pockets--watches of silver, tin, and
+gunmetal. His use of the strange word "timepieces" was convincing. The
+unusual was in the air.
+
+"There's Thompson's and Jackman's and Mrs. Horton's," Judy reminded
+him, her eyes shining like polished door-knobs.
+
+"Too wrong to matter," decided Uncle Felix. "They're always slow or
+fast."
+
+"Then there's the kitchen clock," Tim mentioned; "the grandfather
+thing."
+
+Uncle Felix reflected a moment. His reply was satisfactory and
+conclusive:
+
+"I'll go down to-night," he explained in a low voice, "when the
+servants are in bed. I'll take the weights off."
+
+Judy and Tim appreciated the seriousness of the occasion more than ever.
+
+"Into Mrs. Horton's kitchen?" they whispered.
+
+"Into Mrs. Horton's kitchen," he agreed, beneath his breath.
+
+Maria, meanwhile, said nothing. Her eyes kept open very wide, but no
+audible remark got past her lips. She paid no attention to the singing
+nor to the whispered conversation; she ate an enormous tea, finishing
+up all the cakes that the others neglected in their excitement and
+preoccupation; but she appeared as calm and unconcerned as the tea-cosy
+that concealed the heated, stimulating teapot beneath it. She looked
+more circular and globular than ever. Even the knowledge that this was
+the eve of her own particular adventure did not rouse her. Her
+expression seemed to say, "I never _have_ believed in Time; at the
+centre where _I_ live, clocks and calendars are not recognised"; and
+later, when Judy blew the candle out and asked as usual, "Are you all
+right, Maria?" her reply came floating across the darkened room without
+the smallest alteration in tone or accent: "I'm alright." The stopped
+alarum-clock was underneath her pillow; Uncle Felix had tucked them up,
+each in turn; everything was all right. She fell asleep, the others
+fell asleep, Time also fell asleep.
+
+And above the Old Mill House that warm June night the darkness kept the
+secret faithfully, yet offered little signs and hints to those who did
+not sleep too heavily. The feeling that something or somebody was
+coming hung in the very air; there was a gentle haze beneath the stars;
+and a breeze that passed softly through the lime trees dropped
+semi-articulate warnings. There were curious, faint echoes flying
+between the walls and the Wood without a Centre; the daisies heard them
+and opened half an eyelid; the Night-Wind whispered and sighed as it
+bore them to and fro. Maria's question entered the dream of the entire
+garden: "Why not? Why not? Why not?"
+
+An owl in the barn beyond the stables heard the call and took it up,
+and told it to some swallows fast asleep below the eaves, who woke with
+sudden chattering and mentioned it to a robin in the laurel shrubberies
+below. The robin pretended not to be at all surprised, but felt it a
+duty to inform a coot who lived a quarter of a mile away among the
+reeds of the lower pond. When it returned from its five-minute flight,
+the swallows had gone to sleep again, and only the owl went on hooting
+softly through the summer darkness. "It really needn't go on so long
+about it," thought the robin, then fell asleep again with its head
+between exactly the same feathers as before. But the news had been
+distributed; the garden was aware; the birds, as natural guardians of
+the dawn, had delivered the message as their duty was. "Why not? Why
+not?" hummed all night long through the dreams of the Mill House
+garden. Weeden turned in his sleep and sighed with happiness.
+
+Nothing could now prevent it; a day was coming at last, an extra,
+unused, unrecorded day. The immemorial expectancy of childhood, the
+universal anticipation, the promise that something or somebody was
+coming--all this would be fulfilled. This promise is really but the
+prelude to creation. God felt it before the world appeared. And
+children have stolen it from heaven. Conceived of wonder, born of hope,
+and realised by belief, it is the prerogative of all properly-beating
+hearts. Everything living feels it, and--everything lives. The Postman;
+the Figure coming down the road; the Visitor on the pathway; the Knock
+upon the door; even the Stranger in the teacup--all are embodiments of
+this exquisite scrap of heaven, divine expectancy. It may be Christmas,
+it may be only To-morrow, but equally it may be the End of the World.
+Something is coming--into the heart--something satisfying. It is the
+eternal beginning. It is the--dawn.
+
+Long after the children had retired to bed Uncle Felix sat up alone in
+the big house thinking. He made himself cosy in the library, meaning to
+finish a chapter of the historical novel he had sadly neglected these
+past days, and he set himself to the work with a will. But, try as he
+would, the story would not run; he fixed his mind upon the scene in
+vain; he concentrated hard, visualised the place and characters as his
+habit was, reconstructed the incidents and conversation exactly as
+though he had seen them happen and remembered them--but the imagination
+that should have given them life failed to operate. It became a mere
+effort of invention. The characters would not talk of their own accord;
+the incidents did not flow in a stream as when he worked successfully;
+life was not in them. He began again, wrote and rewrote, but failed to
+seize the atmosphere of reality that alone could make them interesting.
+Interest--he suddenly realised it--had vanished. He felt no interest in
+the stupid chapter. He tore it up--and knew it was the right thing to
+do, because he heard the characters laughing.
+
+"I'm not in the mood," he reflected. "It's artificial. William Smith of
+Peckham would skip this chapter. There's something bigger in me. I
+wonder...!"
+
+He lit his pipe and sat by the open window, watching the stars and
+sniffing the scented summer night. He let his thoughts go wandering as
+they would, and the moment he relaxed attention a sense of pleasant
+relief stole over him. He discovered how great the effort had been. He
+also discovered the reason. It offered itself in a flash to his mind
+that was no longer blocked by the effort and therefore unreceptive.
+
+"A man can't live adventure and write it too," he, realised sharply.
+"He writes what he would like to live. I'm living adventure. The desire
+to live it vicariously by writing it has left me. Of course!"
+
+It was a sweet and rich discovery--that the adventures of the last ten
+days had been so real and meant so much to him. No man of action,
+leading a deep, full life of actual experience, felt the need of
+scribbling, painting, fiddling. "Glorious, by Jove!" he exclaimed
+between great puffs of smoke. "I've struck a fact!" He had been so
+busily creating these last days that he had lost the yearning to
+describe merely what others did. The children had caught him body and
+soul in their eternal world of wonder and belief. Judy and Tim had
+taught him this.
+
+Yet, somehow, it was the inactive, calm Maria who loomed up in his
+thoughts as the principal enchantress. Maria's apparent inactivity was
+a blind; she did not do very much in the sense of rushing
+helter-skelter after desirable things, but she obtained them
+nevertheless. She got in their way so that they ran into her--then she
+claimed them. She knew beforehand, as it were, the way they would take.
+She was always there when anything worth happening was about. And
+though she spoke so little--during a general conversation, for
+instance--she said so much. At the end of all the talk, it was always
+Maria who had said the important thing. Her "why" and "why not" that
+very afternoon were all that he remembered of the intricate and long
+discussion. It left the odd impression on his mind that talk, all the
+world over, said one thing only; that the millions of talkers on the
+teeming earth, eagerly chattering in many languages, said one and the
+same thing only. There _was_ only one thing to be said.
+
+That is--they were all trying to say it. Maria _had_ said it....
+
+A whirring moth flew busily past the open window and vanished into the
+night. He thought of his own books; for writers, painters, preachers,
+musicians, these were trying to say it too. "If I could describe that
+moth exactly," he murmured to himself, "give the sensation of its
+flight, its unconscious attraction to the light, its plunge back into
+the darkness, its precise purpose in the universe, its marvellous aim
+and balance--its life, I could--er--"
+
+The thought broke off with a jagged end. With a leap then it went on
+again:
+
+"Touch reality," and he heard his own voice saying it. He had uttered
+it aloud. The sound had an odd effect upon him. He realised the
+uselessness of words. No words touched reality. To be known, reality
+had to be lived, experienced. Maria managed this in some extraordinary
+way. She had reality.... Time did not humbug her. Nor did space....
+Goodness!
+
+The moth whirred into the room, softly banging itself against the
+ceiling, and through the smoke from his pipe he saw that a dozen more
+were doing the same thing with tireless energy. They felt or saw the
+light; all obeyed the one driving desire to get closer into it. He saw
+millions and millions of people, the whole world over, rushing about on
+two legs and behaving similarly. How they did run about and fuss, to be
+sure! What was it all about? What were they after? People had to earn
+their living, of course, but it seemed more than that, for all were
+after something, and the faster they went the better pleased they were.
+Apparently they thought speed was of chief importance--as though speed
+killed Time. They banged themselves into obstacles everywhere; they
+screamed and disagreed, and accused each other of lying and being
+blind, but the thing they were after either hid itself remarkably well,
+or went at incredible speed, for no one ever came up with it or found
+it. Time invariably blocked them. Only one or two--Maria sort of
+people--sat still and waited....
+
+He watched them all and wondered. One rushed up to an office in a
+train, while another built the train he rushed in; one wore black and
+preached a sermon, another wore blue and guarded a street, a third wore
+red and killed, a fourth wore very little and danced; all in the end
+were nothing and--disappeared. Some lived in a room and read hundreds
+of books; another wrote them; one spent his days examining the stars
+through a telescope, another hurried off to find the Poles; hundreds
+were digging into the ground, ferreting in the air or under the water.
+A large number fed animals, then killed and cooked them when they had
+been fed enough. Hens laid eggs and eggs produced hens that laid more
+eggs. There were always thousands hurrying along the roads, then coming
+back again. The millions of living beings were everywhere extremely
+busy after something, yet hardly any two of them agreed exactly what it
+was they sought. There were sects, societies, religions by the score,
+each one cocksure it knew and had found Reality, yet proving by the
+continuous busy searching that it had not found it. Yet all, oddly
+enough, fitted in together fairly well, as in a gigantic Dance, though
+obviously none knew exactly what the tune was, nor who played it. Would
+they never know? Would all die before they found it? Were they all
+after the same thing, or after a lot of different things? And why, in
+the name of goodness, couldn't they all agree about it? Wasn't it,
+perhaps, that they looked in different ways--all for the same thing?
+Surely the world had existed long enough for _that_ to be settled
+finally--Reality! Time prevented always....
+
+A moth fell with a soft and disconcerting plop upon the top of his
+head, cannonaded thence against the window-sill, and shot out into the
+night again. He came back with a start to _his_ reality: that he had
+promised the children an Extra Day, that for twenty-four hours, in
+spite of the paradox, Time should cease its driving hurry--and that,
+for the moment at any rate, he was very sleepy and must go upstairs to
+bed.
+
+He rose, shook himself free of the curious reverie with a mighty yawn,
+and looked at the gold watch from his waistcoat pocket. Out came a
+number of other timepieces with it! And it was then that the
+personality of Maria entered the room, and stood beside him, and said
+distinctly, "This is _my_ particular adventure, please remember."
+
+And he understood that whatever happened, it would happen according to
+the gospel of Maria. Getting behind Time meant getting a little nearer
+to Reality, one stage nearer at any rate. It meant entering the region
+where she dwelt so serenely. It was her doing, and not his. He realised
+in a flash that in her quiet way she was responsible and had drawn them
+in, seduced them. All gravitated to her and into her mysterious circle.
+Maria claimed them. It was certainly her particular adventure. Only she
+would share it with them all.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+TIME HALTS
+
+
+He looked at his watch a second time, and found that it was later than
+he had supposed--eleven o'clock. In the act of winding it, however, he
+paused; something he had forgotten came back to him, and a curious
+smile broke over his face. He stroked his beard, glanced at the ceiling
+where the moths still banged and buzzed, then strolled over to the open
+window, and said "Hm!" He put his head and shoulders out into the air.
+And then he again said "Hm--m--m"--only longer than the first time. It
+seemed as if some one answered him. That "Hm" floated off to some one
+who was listening for it. Perhaps it was an echo that came floating
+back. Perhaps it wasn't.
+
+But any grown-up person who hesitates in an empty room of a country
+house at eleven o'clock at night and murmurs "Hm" into the open air is
+not in an ordinary state of mind. The normal thing is to put the lights
+out and go up more or less briskly to bed. Uncle Felix was no exception
+to this rule. His emotions, evidently, were not quite normal.
+
+He listened. The night was very still. The stars, like a shower of
+golden rain arrested in full flight, paused in a flock and looked at
+him, but in so deliberate a way that he was conscious of being looked
+at. It was rather a delightful sensation, he thought; never before had
+they seemed so intimate, so interested in his life. He was aware that a
+friendly relationship existed between him and those far, bright,
+twinkling eyes. "Hm" he murmured softly once again, then heard a sound
+of wings rush whirring past his face, and next a chattering of birds
+somewhere overhead among the heavy eaves. "So I'm not the only one
+awake," he thought, and, for some odd reason, felt rather pleased about
+it. "Sounds like swallows. I wonder!"
+
+But he saw no movement anywhere; no wind stirred the ivy on the wall,
+the limes were motionless, the earth asleep. Even the stream beyond the
+laurel shrubberies ran silently. Dimly he made out the garden lying at
+attention, the flower-beds like folded hands upon its breast; and
+further off, the big untidy elms in pools of deeper shadow, their
+outlines blurred as dreams blur the mind. Yet, though he could detect
+no slightest movement, he was keenly aware that other things beside the
+stars were looking at him. The night was full of carefully-screened
+eyes, all fixed upon him. Framed in the lighted window, he was so
+easily visible. Night herself, calm and majestic, gazed down upon him
+through wide-open lids that filled the entire sky. He felt the
+intentness of her steadfast gaze, and paused. He stopped. It seemed
+that everything stopped too. So striking, indeed, was the sensation,
+that he gave expression to it half aloud:
+
+"It's slowing up," he murmured, "stopping!... I do believe! Hm!..."
+
+There was no answer this time, no sign of echo anywhere, but he heard
+an owl calling its muffled note from the Wood without a Centre.
+
+"It's probably seen me too," he thought, and then it also stopped.
+
+He waited a moment, hoping it would begin again, for he loved the
+atmosphere of childhood that the sound invoked in him. But the flutey
+call was not repeated. He drew his head in, closed and bolted the
+window, fastened the shutters carefully and pulled the curtains over;
+then he extinguished the lamps, lit his candle, and moved out softly
+into the hall on his way upstairs. And for the first time in his life
+he felt that in shutting the window he had not shut the beauty out. The
+beauty of that watching, listening night had not gone away from him by
+closing down the shutters. It was not lost. It stopped there. This
+novel realisation was very queer and very exquisite. Regret did not
+operate.
+
+And he went along the passage, murmuring "Hm" over and over to himself,
+for there seemed nothing more adequate that he could think of. The
+servants had long since gone to bed; he alone was awake in the whole
+big house. He moved cautiously down the long corridor towards the green
+baize doors, fully aware that it was not the proper way upstairs. He
+pushed them, and they swung behind him with a grunt that repeated
+itself several times, lessening and shortening until it ended in an
+abrupt puffing sound--and he found himself in a chilly corridor of
+stone. It was very dark; the candle threw the shadow of his hand down
+the gaping length in front of him. He went stealthily a few steps
+further, then stopped opposite a closed door of white. For a moment he
+held his breath, examining the panels by the light of the raised
+candle; then turned the knob of brass, threw it wide open, and found
+himself--in Mrs. Horton's kitchen.
+
+The room was very warm. There was the curious, familiar smell of brooms
+and aprons, of soap and soda, flavoured with brown sugar, treacle, and
+a dash of toast and roasted coffee. The ashes still glowed between the
+bars of the range like a grinning mouth. He put the candle down and
+looked about him nervously. There was an awful moment when he thought a
+great six-foot cook, with red visage and bare arms, would rise and
+strike him with a ladle or a rolling-pin. In the faint light he made
+out the white deal table in the centre, the rows of pots and pans
+gleaming in mid-air, dish-cloths hanging on a string to dry, layers of
+plates of various sizes on the shelves, and jugs suspended by their
+handles at an angle ready for pouring out. He saw the dresser with its
+huge, capacious drawers--the only drawers in the world that opened
+easily, and were deep enough to be of value.
+
+Also--there was a sound, the sound all kitchens have, steadily tapping,
+clicking, ticking. He turned; he saw the familiar object whence the
+sound proceeded. At the end of the great silent room, upright like a
+sentry placed against the wall, stiff and rigid, he saw a figure with a
+round and pallid face, staring solemnly at him through the gloom. He
+stiffened and stood rigid too, listening to the tapping noise that
+issued from its hollow interior of wood and iron. Watching him with
+remorseless mien, the kitchen clock asked him for the password. "Why
+not? Why not?" its ticking said distinctly.
+
+The warmth was comforting. He sat down on the white deal table, knowing
+himself an intruder, but boldly facing the tall monster that guarded
+the deserted room and challenged him. "_You_ haven't stopped," he
+answered in his beard. "Why not?" And as he said it, a new expression
+stole upon its hardened countenance, the challenge melted, the obdurate
+stare relaxed. The quaint, grandfatherly aspect of benevolence shone
+over it like a smile; it looked not only kind, but contrite. He saw it
+as it used to be, ages and ages ago, when he was a boy, sliding down
+the banisters towards it, or towards its counterpart in the hall. It
+winked.
+
+The ticking, too, became less aggressive and relentless, less sure of
+itself, almost as though it were slowing up. There was a plaintive note
+behind the metallic sharpness. The great kitchen clock also was aware
+of a conspiracy hatching against Time....
+
+And as he sat and listened to the machinery tapping away the seconds,
+he heard a similar tapping in his brain that swung gradually into
+rhythm with the clock. A pendulum in his mind was swinging, each swing
+a little shorter than the one before; and he remembered that a dozen
+pendulums in a room, starting at different lengths, ended by swinging
+all together. "We're slowing up together--stopping!" murmured the two
+pendulums. "Why not? Why not? Why not?..."
+
+Presently both would cease, yet ceasing would be the beginning, not the
+end. A state without end or beginning would supervene. Ticking meant
+time, and time meant becoming; but beyond becoming lay the bottomless
+sea of being, which was eternity. Maria floated there--calm, quiet,
+serene, little globular Maria, circular, the perfect form.
+
+The Kitchen Spell rolled in upon him, smothering mind and senses.
+
+It came at first so gradually he hardly noticed it, but it rose and
+rose and rose, till at length he sat dipped to the eyes in it, and then
+finally his eyes went under too. He was immersed, submerged. The
+parochial vanished; he swam in the universal. He felt drowsy, soothed,
+and very happy; his heart beat differently. Consciousness ran
+fluttering along the edge of something hard that hitherto had seemed an
+unsurpassable barrier. The barrier melted and let him through.
+
+He rubbed his eyes and started. "That's the clock in Mrs. Horton's
+kitchen," he tried to say, but the words had an empty and ridiculous
+sound, as if there was no meaning in them. They flew about him in the
+air like little butterflies trying to settle. They settled on one
+meaning, only to flit elsewhere the next minute and settle on another
+meaning. They could mean anything and everything. They did mean
+everything. They meant _one_ thing. Finally they settled back into his
+heart. And their meaning caught him by the throat in a most delicious
+way. The air was full of tiny fluttering wings; he heard pattering feet
+and little voices; hair tied with coloured ribbons brushed his cheeks;
+and laughing, mischievous eyes like stars floated loose about the
+ceiling. The Kitchen Spell grew mighty--irresistible... rising over him
+out of a timeless Long Ago.
+
+From the direction of the ghostly towel-horse it seemed to come. But
+beyond the towel-horse was the window, and beyond the window lay the
+open fields, and beyond the fields lay miles and miles of country
+asleep beneath the stars; and this country stretched without a break
+right up to the lonely wolds of distant Yorkshire where an old grey
+house contained another kitchen, silent and deserted in the night. All
+the empty kitchens of England were at this moment in league together,
+but this old Yorkshire kitchen was the parent of them all--and thence
+the Spell first issued. It was his own childhood kitchen.
+
+And Uncle Felix travelled backwards against the machinery of Time that
+cheats the majority so easily with its convention of moving hands and
+ticking voice and bullying, staring visage. He slid swiftly down the
+long banister-descent of years and reached in a flash that old sombre
+Yorkshire kitchen, and stood, four-foot nothing, face smudged and
+fingers sticky, beside the big deal table with the dying embers in the
+grate upon his right. His heart was beating. He could just reach the
+juicy cake without standing on a chair. He ate the very slice that he
+had eaten forty years ago. It _was_ possible to have your cake and eat
+it too!...
+
+He gulped it down and sucked the five fingers of each hand in
+turn--then turned to attack the staring monster that had tried to make
+him believe it was impossible. He crossed the stone floor on tiptoe,
+but with challenge in his heart, looked straight into its humbugging
+big face, opened its carefully buttoned jacket--and took off the
+weights.
+
+"Hm!" he murmured, with complacent satisfaction that included victory,
+"I've stopped you!"
+
+There was a curious, long-drawn sound as the machinery ran down; the
+chains quivered, then hung motionless. There was disaster in the sound,
+but laughter too--the laughter of the culprit caught in the act,
+unmasked, exposed at last. "But I've had a good time these last hundred
+years," he seemed to hear, with the obvious answer this insolence
+suggested: "Caught! You're It!"--in a tone that was not wholly unlike
+Maria's.
+
+He turned and left the kitchen as stealthily as he had entered it. He
+went along the cold stone corridor, through the green baize doors, and
+so up the softly carpeted stairs to his bedroom. He undressed and
+rolled solemnly between the sheets. He sighed deeply, but he did not
+move again. He fell instantly into the right position for sleep.
+
+But while he slept, the timeless night brought up its mystery. Moored
+outside against the walls an Extra Day lay swinging from the stars. The
+waves of Time washed past its sides, yet could not move it. The wind
+was in the rigging; it lay at anchor, filling the sky with a beauty of
+eternity. And above the old Mill House the darkness, led by the birds,
+flowed on to meet the quivering Dawn.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+A DAY HAS COME
+
+MARIA'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE
+
+
+The day was hardly born, and still unsure of itself, when a robin with
+its tail cocked up stood up alertly on the window-sill of Uncle Felix's
+bedroom, peeped in through the open sash, and noticed the objects in
+front of it with a certain deliberation.
+
+These objects were half in shadow, but, unlike those it was most
+familiar with, they did not move in the breeze that stirred the world
+outside. The robin had just swung up from a lilac branch below. Its
+toes were spread to their full extent for balancing purposes. It peeped
+busily in all directions. Then, suddenly, a big object at the far end
+of the darkened room moved slowly underneath a mass of white, as Uncle
+Felix, aware that some one was watching him, rolled over in his bed,
+opened his sleepy eyes, and stared. At the same moment the robin
+twitched, and fixed its brilliant glance upon him. It had found the
+particular object that it sought.
+
+Uncle Felix, somewhat dazed by sleep and dreams, saw the tight, fat
+body of the bird outlined against the open sky, but thought at first it
+was an eagle or a turkey, until perspective righted itself, and enabled
+him to decide that it was a robin only. He saw its scut tail pointing.
+And, from the attitude of the bird, of its cocked-up tail, the angle of
+its neck and head, to say nothing of the inquisitive way it peeped
+sideways at him over the furniture, he realised that it had come in
+with a definite purpose--a purpose that concerned himself. In a word,
+it had something to communicate.
+
+"Odd!" he thought drowsily, as he met its piercing eye. "A robin in my
+room at dawn! I wonder what it's up to?"
+
+Then, remembering vaguely that he expected somebody or something out of
+the ordinary, he made a peculiar noise that seemed to meet the case: he
+tried to whistle at it. But his lips, being rather dry, made instead a
+hissing sound that would have frightened most robins out of the room at
+once. On this particular bird, however, the effect was just the
+opposite. It hopped self-consciously on to the dressing-table,
+fluttered next to the arm-chair, and the same second dropped out of
+sight behind the end of the four-poster bed. It acted, that is, with
+decision; it was making distinct advances.
+
+He sat up then in order to see it better, and discovered it perched
+saucily upon the toe of his evening shoe, looking deliberately into his
+face as it rose above the bed-clothes.
+
+"Come along," he said, making his voice as soft as possible, "and tell
+me what you want."
+
+His expression tried to convey that he was harmless, and he smiled to
+counteract the effect of his bristling hair which stuck out at right
+angles as it only can stick out on waking. He felt complimented by the
+visit of the bird, and did not wish to frighten it. But the Robin,
+accustomed to seeing scarecrows in the dawn, showed not the slightest
+fear; on the contrary, it showed interest and a simple, innocent
+affection too. It fluttered up on to the rail between the bed-posts,
+almost within reach of his stretched-out hand; its flexible toes
+clutched the bar as though it were a twig; it moved first two inches to
+the right, then two inches to the left again, then held steady. It next
+flicked its tail, and cocked its small head sideways, as if about to
+deliver a speech or message it had learned by heart; stared intently
+into the bearded human visage close in front of it; abruptly opened its
+wings; whirred them with a rapidity that made a sound like a shower of
+peas striking a taut sheet; and then, with a single, exquisitely-chosen
+curve--vanished through the open window and was gone.
+
+"Well," murmured the confused and astonished man, "if anything means
+anything, that does. Only, I wonder what it _does_ mean!"
+
+He was a little startled, and he remained in a sitting position for
+some minutes, staring at the open window, and hoping the robin would
+return. Somehow he did not think it would, but he hoped it might. The
+robin, however, made no sign. And, meanwhile, the dawn slipped higher
+up the sky, showing the groups of trees with greater sharpness. A
+draught of morning air came in.
+
+"The dawn!" he thought; "how marvellous! Perhaps the robin came to show
+me that." He sniffed the fresh perfume of dew and leaves and earth that
+rise for a moment with the early light, then fade away. "Or that!" he
+added, pausing to enjoy the delicate fragrance. "But for the bird I
+should have slept, and missed them both. I wonder!"
+
+He wished he were dressed and out upon the lawn; but the bed was
+enticing, and it was no easy thing to get up and wash and put on eleven
+separate articles of clothing. What a pity he was not dressed like a
+bird in one garment only! What a pity he could not wash himself by
+flying through a rushing shower of sweet rain! By the time his clothes
+were on, and he had made his way downstairs, and unlocked the big
+chained doors, all this strange, wild emotion would have evaporated. If
+only he could have landed with a single curve among the flower-beds, as
+the robin did! Besides, he would feel hungry, and a worm...!
+
+The warmth of the bed crept upwards towards his eyes; the eyelids
+dropped of their own accord; his weight sank slowly downwards; the
+pillow was smooth as cream. He remembered Judy saying once that, if a
+war came, she would go out and "soothe pillows." A pillow was, indeed,
+a very soothing thing. His head sank backwards into a mass of feathery
+sensations like a flock of dreams. He drew a long, deep breath. He
+began to forget a number of things, and to remember a number of other
+things. They mingled together, they became indistinguishable. What were
+they? He could make a selection--choose those he liked best, and leave
+the others--couldn't he? Why not, indeed? Why not?
+
+One was that the clocks had stopped for twenty-four hours and that an
+extra, unused day was dawning; another, that To-day was Sunday. He
+could make his choice. Yet all days, surely, were unused till they
+came! True; but clocks decreed and regulated their length. _This_ Extra
+Day, having been overlooked long ago, was beyond the reach of measuring
+clocks. No clocks had ever ticked it into passing. It could never pass.
+Only the present passed. The Past, to which this day belonged, remained
+where it was, endless, beginningless, self-repeating. He chose it
+without more ado. And the robin had come to mention something about it.
+Its small round body was full, its head tight packed with what it had
+to tell. It was bursting with information. But what--?
+
+And then he realised abruptly another thing: It _had_ delivered its
+message.
+
+The presence of the bird had announced a change of conditions in the
+room, a change in his heart and brain as well. But how? He was too
+drowsy to decide quite; yet in some way the robin had brought in with
+it the dawn of an unusual day, a kind of bird-day, light as a feather,
+swift as a flashing wing, spontaneous--air, freedom, escape, sweet
+brilliance, a thing of flowers, winds, and beauty, a thing of innocence
+and captivating loveliness, a happy, dancing day. He felt a new sort of
+knowledge pass darting through him, a new point of view, almost a
+bird's-eye aspect of old familiar things--joy. That neat, sharp beak
+had pricked his imagination into swifter life. The meaning of the
+bird's announcement flowed with delicate power all through his drowsy
+body. It summed itself up in this:--Somebody, Something, long expected,
+at last was coming....
+
+And then he incontinently fell asleep. He lost consciousness. But,
+while he lay heavily upon his soothing pillow, the marvellous Dawn slid
+higher up the sky, and the robin popped up once upon the window-sill
+again, glanced sideways at him with approval, then flashed away so
+close above the soaking lawn that the dew-drops quivered as it passed.
+Apparently, it was satisfied.
+
+At the same moment, in another part of the old house, Tim found his
+sleep disturbed in a similar fashion; a shrill twittering beneath the
+eaves mingled with his dreams. He shook a toe and wrinkled up his nose.
+He woke. His bedroom, being on the top floor, was lighter than those
+below; there were no trees to cast shadows or obstruct the dawn.
+
+Tim rubbed his eyes, yawned, scratched, then pattered over to the
+window to see what all the noise was about. In his night-shirt he
+looked like a skinny bird with folded wings of white, as he leaned
+forward and stuck his head out into the morning air. Upon the strip of
+back-lawn below, the swallows, who had been chattering so loudly
+overhead, stood in an active group. Clutching the cold iron bars, and
+resting his chin upon the topmost one, he watched them. He had never
+before seen swallows on the ground like that; he associated them with
+the upper sky. It was odd to see them standing instead of flying; their
+behaviour seemed not quite normal; there was commotion of an unusual
+kind among them. A grey cat, stalking them warily down the stable path,
+came near yet did not trouble them; they felt no alarm. They strutted
+about like a lot of black-frocked parsons at a congress; they looked as
+if they had hands tucked behind their pointed coat-tails. They were
+talking among themselves--discussing something. And from time to time
+they shot upward glances at the window just above them--at himself.
+
+"I believe they want me to look at something or other," the boy thought
+vaguely. It seemed as if he had picked them out of a dream and put them
+there upon the lawn. He felt dazed and happy; he had been dreaming of
+curious wild things. Where was he? What had happened? "It feels just
+like something coming," he decided, "or somebody. Some one's about in
+the grounds, perhaps...!"
+
+It was very exciting to be awake at such an unearthly hour; the sun was
+still below the edge of the gigantic earth! A great, slow thrill stole
+up into his heart. He noticed the streaks of colour in the sky, and
+felt the chilly wind. "It's sunrise!" he exclaimed, rubbing one naked
+foot against the other; "that's what it is. And I'm up to see it!"
+
+The thrill merged into a deep, huge sense of wonder that enthralled
+him. At the same moment the swallows, disturbed by his voice, looked up
+with one accord, then rose in a single sweep and whirled off into the
+upper air, wings faintly tinged with gold. They scattered. Tim watched
+them for a little while, dimly aware that he watched something
+"perfectly magnificent." His eyes followed one bird after another,
+caught in a sudden little rapture he could not understand... then
+turned and saw his bed, flushed with early pink, across the room. With
+a running jump he landed among the sheets, rolled himself up into a
+ball, and promptly fell asleep again. It was not yet four o'clock.
+
+Across the landing, meanwhile, Judy, wakened by a brush of feathery
+wind, was at her window too. She felt very sure of something, although
+she didn't in the least know what. It was the same thing that Tim and
+Uncle Felix knew, only they knew they didn't know it, whereas she
+didn't know she knew it. Her knowledge, therefore, was greater than
+theirs.
+
+The room was touched with soft grey light; it was to the west, and the
+night still clung about the furniture. Like a ball in a saucer, Maria
+lay asleep in bed against the opposite wall, her neutrality to all that
+was going on absolute as usual. But Judy did not wake her, she
+preferred to live alone; she knew that she was alive in her night-gown
+between night and morning, and that was an unusual pleasure she wished
+to enjoy without interference. For months she had not waked before
+half-past seven. The excitement of the unfamiliar was in her heart. She
+had caught the earth asleep--surprised it. For the first time in her
+life she saw "the Earth." She discovered it.
+
+She knelt on a chair beside the open window, peering out, and as she
+did so, a strange, wild cry came sounding through the stillness. It was
+like a bugle-call, but she knew no human lips had made it. She glanced
+quickly in the direction whence it came--the pond--and the next instant
+the reeds about the edge parted and the thing that had emitted the
+curious wild cry emerged plainly into view. It was a pompous-looking
+creature. It came out waddling.
+
+"It's the up-and-under bird," exclaimed Judy in a whisper. "Something's
+happening!"
+
+It was a water-fowl, a creature whose mysterious habit of living upon
+the surface of the pond as well as underneath made the children's
+nick-name a necessity. And now it was attempting a raid on land as
+well. But land was not its natural place. Something certainly had
+happened, or was going to happen.
+
+"It's a snopportunity," decided Judy instantly. Far more than an
+opportunity, a snopportunity was something to be snapped up quickly,
+the sort of thing that ordinarily happened behind one's back, usually
+discovered too late to be made use of. "I've caught it!" She remembered
+that the clocks had stopped, yet not knowing why she remembered it. It
+was the thing she didn't know she knew. She knew it before it happened.
+That was a snopportunity.
+
+She watched the heavy bird for a considerable time as it slowly
+appropriated the land it had no right to. It moved, she thought, like a
+twisted drum on very short drumsticks. It had a water-logged
+appearance. It was bird and fish ordinarily, but now it was pretending
+to be animal as well--a thing that flew, swam, walked. Its webbed feet
+patted the ground complacently. It came laboriously towards the wall of
+the house, then halted. It paused a moment, then turned its eyes up,
+while Judy turned hers down. The pair of creatures looked at one
+another steadily for several seconds.
+
+"You're not out for nothing," exclaimed Judy audibly. "So now I know!"
+
+The reply was neither in the affirmative nor in the negative. The
+up-and-under bird said nothing. It made no sign. It just turned away,
+stalked heavily back across the lawn without once looking either to
+right or left, launched itself upon the water, uttered its queer
+bugle-call for the last and second time, and promptly disappeared
+below. The tilt of its vanishing tail expressed sublime indifference to
+everything on land. And Judy, reflecting vaguely that she, too, was
+something of an up-and-under creature, followed its example, though
+without the same dispatch or neatness of execution. She tumbled
+sideways into bed and disappeared beneath the sheets, aware that the
+bird had left her richer than it found her. It had communicated
+something that lay beyond all possible explanation. She had no tail,
+nor did she express indifference. On the contrary, she hugged herself,
+making sounds of pleasurable anticipation in her throat that lay
+plunged among depths of soothing pillows.
+
+It seems, then, that the entire household, the important portion of it,
+at any rate, had been duly notified that something unusual was afoot,
+and that the dawn of the day just breaking through a ghostly sky was
+distinctly out of the ordinary. The birds, always the first to wake,
+and provided with the most sensitive apparatus for recording changes,
+had caught the mysterious whisper from the fading night; they had
+instantly communicated it to the best of their ability to their
+established friends. The robin, the swallows, and the up-and-under
+bird, having accomplished their purpose, disappeared from view in order
+to attend to breakfast and the arrangement of their own subsequent
+adventures. Earth, air, and water had delivered messages. The news had
+been flashed. Those who deserved it had been warned. The day could now
+begin.
+
+Maria, alone, meanwhile, slept on soundly, secure in that stodgy
+immobility that takes no risks. Oblivious, apparently, of all secret
+warnings of excitement or alarm, she lay in a tight round ball,
+inactive, undisturbed. Even her breathing revealed her peculiar
+idiosyncrasy: no actual movement on her surface was discernible. Her
+breathing involved the least possible disturbance of the pink and white
+contours that bulged the sheets and counterpane. Her face was calm,
+expressionless, and even dull, yet wore a certain look as though she
+knew so much that she had no need to maintain her position by the least
+assertion. Exertion would have been a denial of her right to exist. And
+exist she certainly did. The weight of her personality lent balance to
+the quivering uncertainty of this mysterious dawn. Maria remained an
+unassailable reality, an immovable centre round which anything might
+happen, yet never end, and certainly no disaster come. And Judy,
+glancing at her as she disappeared below her own sheets, noted this
+fact without understanding that she did so. This was another aspect of
+the thing she didn't know she knew.
+
+"Maria's asleep," she felt, "so there's no need to get up yet. It's all
+right!" In spite of the marvellous thing she knew was coming, that is,
+she felt herself anchored safely to the firm reality of calm Maria,
+soundly, peacefully asleep. And five minutes later she was in the same
+desirable condition herself.
+
+But, hardly were they all asleep, than a figure none of them had
+noticed, yet all perhaps had vaguely felt, rose out of the little ditch
+this side of the laurel shrubberies, and advanced slowly towards the
+old Mill House. The shape was shadowy and indeterminate at first; it
+might have been a bush, a sheaf of straw, a clump of high-grown weeds,
+for birds fluttered just above it, and the swallows darted down without
+alarm. A shaggy thing, it seemed part of the natural landscape.
+
+Half-way across the lawn, however, it paused and stretched itself; it
+rubbed its eyes; it yawned; and, as it shook the sleep from face and
+body, the outline grew distinctly clearer. The thing that had looked
+like a bundle of hay or branches resolved itself into a human being;
+the loose untidiness gave place to definite shape, as leaves, grass,
+twigs, and wisps of straw fell fluttering from it to the ground. It was
+a pathetic and yet wonderful sight, beauty, happiness, and peace about
+it somewhere, together with a soft and tender sweetness that tempered
+the wildness of its aspect. Indescribably these qualities proclaimed
+themselves. It was a man.
+
+"They've seen me twice," he mentioned to the dipping swallows. "This is
+my third appearance. They'll recognise me without a word. The Day has
+come."
+
+He stood a moment, shaking the extras of the night from hair and
+clothing, then laughed with a sound like running water as the birds
+swooped down and carried the straws and twigs away with a great
+business of wings. Next, glancing up at the open windows of the house,
+he started forward with a light but steady step. "They will not be
+surprised," he said, "for they have always believed in me. They knew
+that some day I should come, and in the twinkling of an eye!" He paused
+and chuckled in his beard. "I'm not _the_ one thing they're expecting,
+but I'm next door to it, and I can show them how to look at any rate."
+
+And he began softly humming the words of a little song he had evidently
+made up himself, and therefore liked immensely. He neared the walls;
+the sunrise tipped a happy, glorious face; he disappeared from view as
+though he had melted through the old grey stone. And a flight of
+swallows, driven by the fresh dawn wind, passed high overhead across
+the heavens, leading the night away. They swung to the rhythm of his
+little song:
+
+ My secret's in the wind and open sky,
+   There is no longer any Time--to lose;
+ The world is young with laughter; we can fly
+   Among the imprisoned hours as we choose.
+
+ The rushing minutes pause; an unused day
+   Breaks into dawn and cheats the tired sun;
+ The birds are singing. Hark! Come out and play!
+   There is no hurry! Life has just begun!
+
+
+
+
+THE EXTRA DAY
+
+BEHIND _TIME_
+
+
+I
+
+
+The day broke. It broke literally. The sky gave way and burst asunder,
+scattering floods of radiant sunshine. This was the feeling in Uncle
+Felix's heart as he came downstairs to breakfast in the schoolroom. A
+sensation of feathery lightness was in him, of speed as well: he could
+rise above every obstacle in the world, only--there were no obstacles
+in the world to rise above. Boredom, despair, and pessimism, he
+suddenly realised, meant deficiency of energy merely. "Birds can rise
+above everything--and so can I!"--as though he possessed a robin's
+normal temperature of 110 degrees!
+
+Although it was Sunday morning, and a dark suit was his usual custom,
+he had slipped into flannels and a comfortable low collar, without
+thinking about it one way or the other. "It's a jolly day," he hummed
+to himself, "and I'm alive. We must do all kinds of things--everything!
+It's all one thing really!" It seemed there was a new, uplifting sense
+of joy in merely being alive. He repeated the word again and
+again--"alive, alive, alive!" Of course a robin sang: it was the
+natural thing to do.
+
+He looked out of the window while dressing, and caught the startling
+impression that this life emanated from the world of familiar trees and
+grass and flowers spread out before his eyes. Everything was singing.
+Beauty had dropped down upon the earth; the earth, moreover, knew that
+she was beautiful--she was obviously enjoying herself, both as a whole
+and in every tiniest nook and corner of her gigantic being. Yet without
+undue surprise he noted this; the marvel was there as always, but he
+did not pause to say, "How marvellous!" It was as natural as breathing,
+and as easily accepted. He was always breathing, but he never stopped
+and thought, "Good Lord, I'm breathing! How dreadful if it stopped!" He
+simply went on breathing. And so, with the beauty of this radiant
+morning, it never occurred to him "This will not last, the sun will
+set, the shadows fall, the marvel pass and die." That this particular
+day could end did not even suggest itself.
+
+On his way down the passage, Judy and Tim came dancing from their rooms
+to meet him. They, too, were dressed in their everyday-adventure
+things, no special sign of Sunday anywhere about them--slipped into
+their summery clothing as naturally as birds and flowers grow into the
+bright and feathery stuff that covers them. This notion struck him, but
+faintly; it was not a definite thought. He might as well have noticed,
+"Ah, the sky is dressed in light, or mist! The wind blows it into folds
+and creases!" Yet the notion did strike him with its little dream-like
+hammer, because with it came a second tiny blow, producing, it seemed,
+a soft blaze of light behind his eyes somewhere: "I've recovered the
+childhood sense of reality, the vivid certainty, the knowledge!...
+Somebody's coming.... Somebody's here--hiding still, perhaps, yet
+nearer..." It flashed like a gold-fish in some crystal summer
+fountain... and was gone again.
+
+In the passage Judy touched his hand, and said confidingly, "You will
+take me to the end of the world to-day, Uncle."
+
+It was true and possible. No special preparation was required for any
+journey whatsoever. They were already prepared for anything--like
+birds. And some one, it seemed, had taken his name away!
+
+"We'll do everything at once," said Tim, with the utmost assurance in
+tone and manner.
+
+"Of course," was his obvious and natural reply to each, no explanations
+or conditions necessary. Things would happen of themselves,
+spontaneously. There was only one thing to do! "We're alive," he added.
+They just looked at him as he said it, then pulled him down the passage
+a little faster than before. Yet the way they ran dancing along that
+oil-cloth passage held something of the joy and confidence with which
+birds launch themselves into flight across the earth. There was this
+sense of spontaneous excitement and delight about.
+
+"He's here already," Judy whispered, as they neared the breakfast room.
+"I can feel it."
+
+"Came in while we were asleep," her brother added. "I know it," and he
+clapped his hands.
+
+"At dawn, yes," agreed Uncle Felix, saying it on the spur of the
+moment. He was perplexed a little, perhaps, but did not hesitate. He
+had not _quite_ the assurance of the others. He meant to let himself
+go, however.
+
+There was not the slightest doubt or question anywhere; _they_ believed
+because they knew; what they had expected for so long had happened. The
+Stranger in the Tea-cup had arrived at last. They went down the long
+corridor of the Old Mill House, every window open to the sunshine that
+came pouring in. The very walls seemed made of transparent, shining
+paper. The world came flowing in. A happiness of the glowing earth sang
+in their veins. At the door they paused a second.
+
+"I know exactly who he is," breathed Judy softly.
+
+"I know what he looks like," whispered Tim.
+
+"There was never time to see him properly before," said Uncle Felix.
+"Things went by so fast. He whizzed and vanished. But now--of course-"
+
+They pushed the door open and went in.
+
+Breakfast was already laid upon the shining cloth; hot dishes steamed;
+there were flowers upon the table, and climbing roses peeped in round
+the grey walls of sun-baked stone. A bird or two hopped carelessly upon
+the window-sill, and a smell of earth and leaves was in the air.
+Sunshine, colour, and perfume filled the room to overflowing, yet not
+so full that there was not ample space for the "somebody" who had
+brought them. For somebody certainly was there--some one whom the
+children, moreover, took absolutely for granted.
+
+There had been surprise outside the door, but there was none when they
+were in. Something like a dream, it seemed, this absence of
+astonishment, though, of course, no one took it in that way. For, at
+first, no one spoke at all. The children went to their places, lifting
+the covers to see what there was to eat. They did the normal, natural
+thing; eyed and sniffed the porridge, cream, brown sugar, and
+especially approved the dish of comfortable, fat poached eggs on toast.
+They were satisfied with what they saw; everything was as it ought to
+be--plentiful, available, on hand. There was enough for everybody.
+
+But Uncle Felix paused a moment just inside the open door, and stared;
+he looked about him as though the incredible thing had really happened
+at last. A rapt expression passed over his face, and his eyes seemed
+fixed upon something radiant that hung upon the air. He sighed, and
+caught his breath. His heart grew amazingly light within him. Every
+thought and feeling that made up his personality--so it felt, at
+least--had wings of silver tipped with golden fire.
+
+"At last!" he murmured softly to himself, "at last!"
+
+He moved forward slowly into the room, his eyes still fixed on vacancy.
+The face showed exquisite delight, but the lips were otherwise dumb. He
+looked as if he had caught a glimpse of something he could not utter.
+
+"Porridge, please, Uncle," he heard a voice saying, as some one put a
+large silver spoon into his hand. "I like the hard lumps." And another
+voice added, "I like the soupy, slippery stuff, please." He pulled
+himself together with an effort.
+
+"Ah," he mumbled, peeping from the dishes at the children's faces, "the
+tea has stopped turning in the cup at last. He's come up to the
+surface."
+
+And they turned and looked at him, but without the least surprise
+again; it was perfectly natural, it seemed, that there should be this
+Presence in the room; their Uncle's remark was neither here nor there.
+He had a right to express his own ideas in his own way if he wanted to.
+Their own remarks outside the door they had apparently forgotten. That,
+indeed, was already a very long time ago now. In the full bliss of
+realisation, anticipation was naturally not remembered. The excitement
+in the passage belonged to some dim Yesterday--almost when they were
+little.
+
+They began immediately to talk _at_ the Stranger in the room.
+
+"I didn't _hear_ anybody come," remarked Tim, as he mixed cream and
+demerara sugar inside an artificial pool of porridge, "but it's all the
+same--now. Our Somebody's here all right." And then, between gulps, he
+added, "The swallows laid an awful lot of eggs in the night, I think."
+
+"On tiptoe just at dawn," remarked Judy casually, following her own
+train of thought, and intent upon chasing a slippery poached egg round
+and round her plate at the same time. "The birds were awake, of course."
+
+The birds! As she said it, a memory of some faint, exquisite dream, of
+years and years ago it seemed, fled also on tiptoe through the bright,
+still air, and through three listening hearts as well. The robin, the
+swallows, and the up-and-under bird made secret signs and vanished.
+
+"They know everything first, of course," said Uncle Felix aloud;
+"they're up so early, aren't they?" To himself he said, "I'm dreaming!
+This is a dream!" his reason still fluttering a little before it died.
+But he kept his secret about the robin tightly in its hiding-place.
+
+"Before they've happened--_really_," Tim mentioned. "They do a thing
+to-morrow long before to-morrow's come." He knew something the others
+could not possibly know.
+
+"Everything comes from the air, you see," advanced Judy, secure in the
+memory of her private morning interview. "But it can disappear
+under--underneath when it wants to."
+
+"Or into a hole," agreed Tim.
+
+And somebody in that breakfast-room, somebody besides themselves, heard
+every word they spoke, listened attentively, and understood the
+meanings they thought they hid so cleverly. They knew, moreover, that
+he did so.
+
+"Let's pretend," Tim suddenly exclaimed, catching his sister's eye just
+as it was wandering into the pot of home-made marmalade.
+
+"All right," she said at once, "same as usual, I suppose?"
+
+Tim nodded, glancing across the table. "Sitting next to _you_,
+Uncle"--he pointed to the unoccupied chair and unused plate--"in that
+empty place."
+
+"Thank you," murmured the man, still hovering between reality and
+dream. He said it shyly. It was all too marvellous to ask questions
+about, he felt.
+
+"It's a lovely morning," continued Judy politely, smiling at the empty
+place. "Will you have tea and coffee, or milkhotwaterandsugar?" She
+listened attentively for the answer, the smile of a duchess on her rosy
+face, then bowed and handed a lump of sugar to Tim, who set it
+carefully in the middle of the plate.
+
+"Butter or honey?" inquired the boy, "or butter and honey?" He, too,
+waited for the inaudible reply, then asked his Uncle to pass the pot of
+honey _and_ the butter-dish. The Stranger, apparently, liked sweet
+things best--at any rate, natural things.
+
+They went on with their breakfast then, eating as much as ever they
+could hold, talking about everything in the world as usual, and
+occasionally bowing to the empty chair, addressing remarks to it, and
+listening to--answers! Sometimes they passed things, too--another lump
+of sugar, more drops of honey, a thick blob of clotted cream as well.
+It was obvious to them that somebody occupied that chair, so real,
+indeed, that Uncle Felix found himself passing things and making
+observations about the weather and even arranging a few crumbs of bread
+in a row beside the other delicacies. It was the right thing to do
+evidently; acting spontaneously, he had performed an inspired action.
+And the odd thing was that the food, lying in the blaze of sunlight on
+the plate, slowly underwent a change: the sugar got smaller in size,
+the honey-drops diminished, the blob of cream lost its first
+circumference, and even the bread-crumbs seemed to dwindle visibly.
+
+"It's very hot this morning," said Judy after a bit. "The sun's
+hungrier than usual," and she pushed the plate into the shade. But it
+was clear that she referred to some one other than the sun, although
+the sun belonged to what was going on. "Thirsty, too," she added,
+"although there are bucketsful of dew about."
+
+"And extra bright into the bargain," declared Tim. "I love shiny stuff
+like that to wear and dress in. It fits so easily--no bothering
+buttons."
+
+"And doesn't wear out or stain, does it?" put in Uncle Felix, saying
+the first thing that came into his head--and again behaving in the
+appropriate, spontaneous manner. It was clear that the Stranger--to
+them, at least--was clothed in the gold and silver of the brilliant
+morning. There was a delicate perfume, too, as of wild flowers and
+sweet little roadside blossoms. The very air of the room was charged
+with some living light and beauty brought by the invisible guest. It
+was passing wonderful. The invading Presence seemed all about them like
+a spreading fire of loveliness and joy--yet natural as sunshine.
+
+Then, suddenly, Tim sprang up from his chair, and ran to the empty
+seat. His face shone with keen and eager expectancy, but wore a touch
+of shyness too.
+
+"I want to be like you," he said in a hushed voice that had all the
+yearning of childhood breaking through it. "Please put your hand on
+me." He lowered his head and closed his eyes. He made an odd grimace,
+half pleasure and half awe, like a boy about to plunge into a pool of
+water,--then stood upright, proud and delighted as any victorious king.
+He drew a long breath of relief. He seemed astonished that it had been
+so easily accomplished.
+
+"I'm full of it!" he cried. "I'm burning! He touched me on the head!"
+
+"Touched!" cried Judy, full herself of joy and happy envy.
+
+The boy nodded his head, as though he would nod it off on to the
+tablecloth. He looked as if any minute he might burst into flame with
+the sheer enjoyment of it. "Warm all over," he gasped. "I could strike
+a match on my trousers now like Weeden."
+
+Then, while Uncle Felix rubbed his eyes and did his best to see the
+invisible, Judy sprang lightly from her chair, ran up to the vacant
+place, put out her arms and bent her face down so that her falling
+torrent of hair concealed it for a moment. She certainly put her arms
+round--something. The next minute she straightened up again with
+triumph and tumult in her shining eyes.
+
+"I kissed him," she announced, flushed like any rose, "and he kissed me
+back. He blew the wind into my hair as well. I'm flying! I'm lighter
+than a feather!" And she went, dancing and flitting, round the table
+like a happy bird.
+
+Then Uncle Felix rose sedately from his seat. He did not mean to be
+left out of all this marvellous business merely because his body was a
+little older and more worn. He stretched his arm across the table,
+missing the cream-jug by a narrow margin, but knocking the toast-rack
+over in his eagerness. He held his hand out to the empty chair.
+
+"Please take my hand," he said, "and let me have something too."
+
+He went through the pantomime of shaking hands, but to his intense
+amazement it seemed that there was an answering clasp. A smooth, soft
+running touch closed gently on his own; it was cool and yielding,
+delicate as the down upon a robin's breast, yet firm as steel. And in
+that moment he knew that his glimpse on entering the room was not a
+trick, but had been a passing glimpse of what the children always
+believed in, hoped for--saw.
+
+"Thank you," he murmured, withdrawing his hand and examining it, "very
+much indeed. This _is_ a beautiful day."
+
+An extraordinary power came into him, a feeling of confidence and
+security and joy he had never known before. Yet all he could find to
+say was that it was a very beautiful day. The commonest speech
+expressed exactly what he felt. Ordinary words at last had meaning,
+small words could tell it.
+
+"It's all right?" remarked Tim, in an excited but quite natural tone.
+
+"It _is_," he answered.
+
+"Then let's go out now and do all sorts of things. There's simply heaps
+to do."
+
+"Out into the sun," cried Judy. "Come on. We'll get into our old garden
+boots." And she dragged her brother headlong out of the room.
+
+
+
+
+THE STRANGER WHO IS WONDER
+
+II
+
+
+And Uncle Felix moved forward into the pool of sunlight that blazed
+upon the faded carpet pattern. It was composed of round, fat trees,
+this pattern, with birds like goblin peacocks flying in mid-air between
+them. The sunshine somehow lifted them, so that they floated upon the
+quivering atmosphere; the pattern seemed to hover between him and the
+carpet. And he too felt himself lifted--in mid-air--part of the day and
+sunshine.
+
+He closed his eyes; he tried to realise who and where he was; all he
+could remember, however, went into a single sentence and kept repeating
+itself on the waves of his singing, dancing blood: "Clock's stopped,
+clock's stopped,--stopped clocks, stopped clocks...!" till it sounded
+like a puzzle sentence--then lost all meaning.
+
+He sat down in a chair, but the chair was next to the "empty" one, and
+from it something poured into him, over him, round him, as wind pours
+about a bird or tree. He became enveloped by it; his mind began to
+rush, yet rushed in a circle, so that he never entirely lost sight of
+it. Another set of words replaced the first ones: "Behind Time, behind
+Time," jostling on each other's heels, tearing round and round like a
+Catherine Wheel, shining and dancing as they spun.
+
+He opened his eyes and looked about him. The room was full of wonder.
+It glistened, sparkled, shone. A million things, screened hitherto from
+sight by thick clouds of rushing minutes, paused and offered
+themselves; things that were commonplace before stood still, revealed
+in startling glory. They no longer raced past at headlong speed.
+Visible at last, unmasked, they showed themselves as they really were,
+in naked beauty. This beauty settled on everything in golden rain, it
+settled on himself as well. All that his eyes rested on
+looked--distinguished....
+
+And, like snow-flakes, words and thoughts came thickly crowding, like
+flakes of fire too. He snatched at them, caught them in bunches, tried
+to sort them into sentences. They were everywhere about him, showering
+down as from a box of cardboard letters overturned in the sky. The
+reality he sought hid among them as a whole--he knew that--but no mere
+sequence of words and letters could quite capture this reality.
+
+He plunged his hands among the flying symbols....
+
+In a flash a number of things--an enormous number of things--became
+extraordinarily clear and simple; they became one single thing. Then,
+while reason and vision still fluttered to and fro, like a pair of
+butterflies, first one and then the other leading, he dashed in between
+them. He seized handfuls of the flying letters and made the queerest
+sentences out of them, longer and faster-moving than the first ones.
+
+"Time _is_ the arch-deceiver. It drives things past us in a hurrying
+flock. We snatch at them. And those we miss seem lost for ever because
+some one calls out, in a foolish voice of terror and regret, 'Too
+late!' Yet, in reality, _we_ stand still; the rush of the hours is a
+sham. We see things out of proportion, like trees from the window of a
+train, their beauty hidden in a long, thick smudge. _We_ do not move;
+it is the train that hurries us along: the trees are always steadily
+there--and beautiful. There is enough of everything for everybody--no
+need to try and get there first. To hurry is to chase your tail, which
+some one has suggested does not belong to you. It can never be captured
+by pursuit. But pause--stand still--it instantly presents itself,
+twitches its tip, and laughs: 'I've been here all the time. I'm part of
+you!'"
+
+He turned towards the empty chair and smiled. The smile, he felt, came
+marvellously back to him from the sunshine and the open world of sky
+and trees beyond. There was some one there who smiled--invisibly.
+
+"You're real, quite real," the letters danced instantly into new
+sentences. "But you are so awfully close to me--so close I cannot see
+you."
+
+He felt the invisible Stranger suddenly as real as that. There was only
+one thing to see--only one thing everywhere. The beauty of the
+discovery put reason utterly and finally to flight. But that one thing
+was hiding. The Stranger concealed himself--he hid on purpose. He
+wanted to be looked for--found. And the heart grew "warm" or "cold"
+accordingly: when it was warm that mysterious anticipation
+stirred--"Some one is coming!"
+
+And Uncle Felix, sitting in the sunlight of that breakfast-room,
+understood that the entire universe formed a conspiracy to hide "him."
+Some one, indeed, had come, slipped into the gorgeous and detailed
+clothing of the entire world as easily as birds and trees slip into
+their own particular clothing, planning with Time to hide him, wanting
+to play a little--to play at Hide-and-Seek. "Let them all look for me!
+I'm hiding!..."
+
+Yet so few would play! Instead of coming out to find him where he hid
+so simply in the open, they built severe and gloomy edifices; invented
+Rules of the game by which each could prove himself right and all the
+others wrong.... Oh, dear!... And all the time, _he_ hid there in the
+open before their very eyes--in the wind, the stream, the grass, in the
+sunlight and the song of birds, and especially behind little careless
+things that took no thought ... waiting to play and let himself be
+found... while songs and poems and fairy-tales, even religious too,
+cried endlessly across the world, "Look and you'll find him." There
+_was_ only one thing to say: "Search in the open; he hides there!"
+
+Everything became clear and simple--one thing, Life was a game of
+Hide-and-Seek. There were obstacles placed in the way on purpose to
+make it more interesting. One of them was Time. But everything was one
+thing, and one thing only; a peacock and a policeman were the same, so
+were an elephant and a violet, an uncle and a bee, a Purple Emperor and
+a child like Tim or Judy: all did, said, lived one and the same thing
+only. They looked different--because one looked _at_ them differently.
+
+Smiling happily to himself again as the letters grouped themselves
+swiftly into these curious sentences, he heard the birds singing in the
+clean, great sky... and it seemed to him that the Stranger blew softly
+upon his eyes and hair. The sentences instantly telescoped: "Come, look
+for me! There is no hurry; life has just begun...." And he barely had
+time to realise that the entire complicated mass of them had, after
+all, only this one thing to say... when the returning children bursting
+into the room scattered his long reverie, and the last cardboard letter
+disappeared like magic into empty space.
+
+"Where is he?" cried Tim at once, staring impatiently about him. There
+was rebuke and disappointment in his eyes. "Uncle, you've been arguing.
+He's gone!"
+
+Judy was equally quick to seize the position of affairs. "You've
+frightened him away!" she declared with energy. "Quick! We must go out
+and look!"
+
+"Yes," muttered their uncle a little guiltily, and was about to add
+something by way of explanation when he felt Judy pull his sleeve.
+"Look!" she whispered. "He can't have gone so _very_ far!"
+
+She pointed to the plate with the sugar, honey, cream, and crumbs upon
+it; a bird was picking up the crumbs, a wasp was on the lump of sugar,
+a bee beside it, standing on its head, was drinking at the drop of
+honey; all were unafraid, and very leisurely about it; there seemed no
+hurry; there was enough for every one. Then, as the trio of humans
+stared with delight, they saw another guest arrive and dance up gaily
+to the feast. A gorgeous butterfly sailed in, hovered above the crowded
+plate a moment, then settled comfortably beside its companions and
+examined the blob of cream. The others moved a little to make room for
+it. It was a Purple Emperor, the rarest butterfly in all England, whose
+home was normally high above the trees.
+
+"Of course," Judy whispered to her brother, as she watched the bee make
+room for its larger neighbour; "they belong to him--"
+
+"He sent them," replied Tim below his breath, "just to let us know--"
+
+"Yes," mumbled Uncle Felix for the second time, a soft amazement
+stealing over him. "He brought them. And they're all the same thing
+really."
+
+There was the perfume of a thousand flowers in the room. A faint breeze
+floated through the open window and touched his eyes. He heard the
+world outside singing in the sunshine. "Come along," he said in a low,
+hushed whisper; "let's go and look." And he moved eagerly--over the
+tree-and-peacock pattern.
+
+They tiptoed out together, while the bird cocked up its head to watch
+them go; the bee, still drinking, raised its eyes; and all four
+fluttered their wings as though they laughed. They seemed to say "There
+is no hurry! We're all alive together! There's enough for all; no need
+to get there first!" _They_ knew. The golden day lay waiting outside
+with overflowing beauty, and he who had brought them in stood just
+behind this beauty that hid and covered them. When they had eaten and
+drunk, they, too, would come and join the search. Exceedingly beautiful
+they were--the shy grace of the dainty bird, the brilliant wasp in
+black and gold, the soft brown bee, the magnificent Purple Emperor,
+fresh from the open spaces above the windy forest: all said the same
+big, joyful thing, "We are alive!... No hurry!..."
+
+The trio flew down the passage, took the stairs in leaps and bounds,
+raced across the hall where the back-door, standing open, framed the
+lawn and garden in a blaze of sunshine.
+
+And as Uncle Felix followed, half dancing like the other two, he saw a
+little thing that vaguely reminded him of--another little thing. The
+memory was vague and far away; there was a curious distance in it, like
+the distance of a dream recalled in the day-light, no longer what is
+called quite real. For his eye caught something gleaming on the
+side-table below the presentation clock, and the odd, ridiculous word
+that sprang into his mind was "salver." It was the silver salver on
+which Thompson brought in visitors' cards. But it was a plate as well;
+and, being a plate, he remembered vaguely something about a collection.
+The association of ideas worked itself out in a remote and dreamlike
+way; he felt in his pocket for a shilling, a sixpence, or a threepenny
+bit, and wondered for a second where the big, dark building was to
+which all this belonged. Something was changed, it seemed. His clothes,
+this dancing sunshine, joy and laughter. The world was new. What did it
+mean?...
+
+"No bells are ringing," flashed back the flying letters in a spray.
+
+He was on the point of catching something by the tail... when he saw
+the children waiting for him on the sunny lawn outside. He ran out
+instantly to join them. They had noticed nothing odd, apparently. It
+had never even occurred to them. And in himself the memory dived away,
+its very trail obliterated as though it had not been.
+
+For this was Sunday morning, yet Sunday had not--happened.
+
+
+
+
+HIDE-AND-SEEK
+
+III
+
+
+The garden clung close and soft about the Old Mill House as a mood
+clings about the emotion that has summoned it. Uncle Felix, Tim, and
+Judy were as much a part of it as the lilac, hyacinths, and tulips. Any
+minute, it seemed, the butterflies and bees and birds might settle on
+them too.
+
+For a bloom of exquisite, fresh wonder lay upon the earth, lay softly
+and secure as though it need never pass away. No fading of daylight
+could dim the glory of all the promises of joy the day contained, no
+hint of waning anywhere. "There is no hurry," seemed written on the
+very leaves and blades of grass. "We're all alive together! Come
+and--look!" The garden, lying there so gently in its beauty, hid a
+secret.
+
+Yet, though all was so calm and peaceful, there was nowhere the dulness
+of stagnation. Life brimmed the old-world garden with incessant
+movement that flashed dancing and rhythm even into things called
+stationary. The joy of existence ran riot everywhere without check or
+hindrance; there was no time--to pause and die. For the sunlight did
+not merely lie upon the air--it poured; wind did not blow--it breathed,
+ambushed one minute among the rose-trees just above the ground, and
+cantering next through the crests of the busy limes. The elms and
+horse-chestnuts that ordinarily grew now leaped--leaped upwards to the
+sun; while all flying things--birds, insects, bees, and
+butterflies--passed in and out like darting threads of colour, pinning
+the beauty into a patterned tapestry for all to see. The entire day was
+charged with the natural delight of endless, sheer existence. It was
+visible.
+
+Each detail, moreover, claimed attention, as though never seen properly
+before; no longer dulled by familiarity, but shaking off its "ordinary"
+appearance, proud to be looked at, naked and alive. The rivulet ran on,
+but did not run away; the gravel paths, soft as rolled brown sugar, led
+somewhere, but led in both directions, each of them inviting; the blue
+of the sky did not stay "up there and far away," but dropped down close
+in myriad flakes, lifting the green carpet of the lawn to meet it. The
+day seemed like a turning circle that changed every moment to show
+another aspect of its gorgeous pattern, yet, while changing, only
+turned, unable to grow older or to pass away. There was something real
+at last, something that could be known, enjoyed--something of eternity
+about it. It was real.
+
+"Wherever has he got to?" exclaimed Judy, trying to pierce the
+distances of earth and sky with distended eyes. "He can't be very far
+away, because--I kissed him."
+
+Tim, sitting beside her on the grass, felt the exquisite mystery of it
+too. It was marvellous that any one could vanish in such a way. But he
+hesitated too. He felt uncertain about something. His thoughts flew off
+to that strange wood he loved to play in. He remembered the warning:
+"Beware the centre, if you enter; For once you're _there_, you
+disappear!" But this explanation did not appeal to him as likely now.
+He stared at Judy and his uncle. Some one _had_ touched him, making him
+warm and happy. He remembered that distinctly. He had caught a
+glimpse--though a glimpse too marvellous to be seen for long, even to
+be remembered properly. "But there's no good looking unless we know
+where to look," he remarked. "Is there?"
+
+"He's just gone out like a candle," whispered Judy.
+
+"Extror'nary," declared her brother, hugging the excitement that
+thrilled his heart. "But he can't be really lost. I'm sure of that!"
+
+And a great hush fell upon them all. Some one, it seemed, was
+listening; some one was watching; some one was waiting for them to move.
+
+"Uncle?" they said in the same breath together, then hung upon his
+answer.
+
+This authority hesitated a moment, looking about him expectantly as
+though for help.
+
+"I think," he stated shyly, "I think--he's--hiding."
+
+Nothing more wonderful ever fell from grown-up lips. They had heard it
+said before--but only said. Now they realised it.
+
+"Hiding!" They stood up; they could see further that way. But they
+waited for more detail before showing their last approval.
+
+"Out here," he added.
+
+They were not quite sure. They expected a disclosure more out of the
+ordinary. It _might_ be true, but--
+
+"Hide-and-seek?" they repeated doubtfully. "But that's just a game."
+They were unsettled in their minds.
+
+"Not _that_ kind," he replied significantly. "I mean the kind the rain
+plays with the wind and leaves, the stream with the stones and roots
+along its bank, the rivers with the sea. That's the kind of
+hide-and-seek I mean!"
+
+He chose instinctively watery symbols. And his tone conveyed something
+so splendid and mysterious that it was impossible to doubt or hesitate
+a moment longer.
+
+"Oh," they exclaimed. "It never ends, you mean?"
+
+"Goes on for ever and ever," he murmured. "The moment the river finds
+the sea it disappears and the sea begins to look. The wind never really
+finds the clouds, and the sun and the stars--"
+
+"_We_ know!" they shouted, cutting his explanations short.
+
+"Come on then!" he cried. "We've got the hunt of our lives before us."
+And he began to run about in a circle like an animal trying to catch
+its tail.
+
+"But are we to look for him, or he for us?" inquired the boy, after a
+preliminary canter over the flower-beds.
+
+"We for him." They sprang to attention and clapped their hands.
+
+"It's an enormous hide," said Tim. "We may get lost ourselves. Better
+look out!"
+
+And then they waited for instructions. But the odd thing was that their
+uncle waited too. There was this moment's hesitation. They looked to
+him. The old fixed habit asserted itself: a grown-up must surely know
+more than they did. How could it be otherwise? In this case, however,
+the grown-up seemed in doubt. He looked at them. It _was_ otherwise.
+
+"It's so long since I played this kind of hide-and-seek," he murmured.
+"I've rather forgotten--"
+
+He stopped short. There certainly was a difficulty. Nobody knew in what
+direction to begin.
+
+"It's a snopportunity," exclaimed Judy. "I'm sure of that!"
+
+"We just look--everywhere!" cried Tim.
+
+A light broke over their uncle's face as if a ray of sunshine touched
+it. His mind cleared. Some old, forgotten joy, wonderful as the dawn,
+burst into his heart, rose to fire in his eyes, flooded his whole
+being. A glory long eclipsed, a dream interrupted years ago, an
+uncompleted game of earliest youth--all these rose from their
+hiding-place and recaptured him, soul and body. He glanced at the
+children. These things he had recaptured, they, of course, had never
+lost; this state and attitude of wonder was their natural prerogative;
+he had recovered the ownership of the world, but they had possessed it
+always. They knew the whole business from beginning to end--only they
+liked to hear it stated. That was obviously his duty as a grown-up: to
+stick the label on.
+
+"Of course," he whispered, deliciously enchanted. "You've got it. It's
+_the_ snopportunity! The great thing is to--look."
+
+And, as if to prove him right, a flock of birds passed sweeping through
+the air above their heads, paused in mid-flight, wheeled, fluttered
+noisily a second, then scattered in all directions like leaves whirled
+by an eddy of loose, autumn wind.
+
+"Come on," cried Tim, remembering perhaps the "dodgy" butterfly and
+trying to imitate it with his arms and legs. "I know where to go first.
+Just follow me!"
+
+"And there'll be signs, remember," Uncle Felix shouted as he followed.
+"Whoever finds a sign must let the others know at once."
+
+They began with the feeling that they would discover the Stranger in a
+moment, sure of the places where he had tried cleverly to conceal
+himself, but soon began to realise that this was no ordinary game, and
+that he certainly knew of mysterious spots and corners they had never
+dreamed about. It was as Tim declared, "an enormous hide." Come-Back
+Stumper's cunning dive into bed was nothing compared to the skill with
+which this hider eluded their keen searching. There was another
+difference too. In Stumper's case their interest had waned, they felt
+they had been cheated somehow, they knew themselves defeated and had
+given up the search. But here the interest was unfailing; it increased
+rather than diminished; they were ever on the very edge of finding him,
+and more than once they shrieked with joy, "I've got him!"--only to
+find they had been "very hot" but not quite hot enough. It was, like
+everything else upon this happy morning, endless.
+
+It continued and continued, as naturally as the rivulet that ran for
+ever downhill to find the sea, that nothing, it seemed, could put a
+stop to, much less an end. The feeling that time was passing utterly
+disappeared; weeks, months, and years lay waiting somewhere near, but
+could be left or taken, used or not used, as they pleased. To take a
+week and use it was like picking a flower that looked much prettier
+growing sweetly in the sunny earth. Why pick it? It came to an end that
+way! The minutes, the hours and days, morning, noon and night as well,
+the very seasons too, offered themselves, and--vanished. They did not
+come and go, they were just "there"; and to steal into one or other of
+them at will was like stealing into one mood after another as the heart
+decreed. They were mere counters in the gorgeous and unending game.
+They helped to hide the mysterious Stranger who was evidently in the
+centre round which all life lay grouped so marvellously. They hid and
+covered him as moods hide and cover the heart that wears
+them--temporarily. Uncle Felix and the children used them somewhat in
+this way, it seems, for while they looked and hunted in and out among
+them, any minute, day or season was recoverable at will. They did not
+pass away. It was the seekers who passed through them. To Uncle Felix,
+at any rate, it seemed a fact--this joyous sensation of immense
+duration, yet of nothing passing away: the bliss of utter freedom. He
+gasped to realise it. But the children did not gasp. They had always
+known that nothing ever really came to an end. "The weather's still
+here," he heard Judy calling across the lawn to Tim--as though she had
+just been looking among December snowdrifts and had popped back again
+into the fragrance of midsummer hayfields. "The Equator's made of
+golden butterflies, all shining," the boy called back, having evidently
+just been round the world and seen its gleaming waist....
+
+But none of them had found what they were looking for....
+
+They had looked in all the difficult places where a clever player would
+be most likely to conceal himself, yet in vain; there was no definite
+sign of him, no footprints on the flower-beds or along the edge of the
+shrubberies. The garden proper had been searched from end to end
+without result. The children had been to the particular hiding-places
+each knew best, Tim to the dirty nook between the ilex and the larder
+window, and Judy to the scooped-out trunk of the rotten elm, and both
+together to the somewhat smelly channel between the yew trees and a
+disused outhouse--all equally untenanted.
+
+In the latter gloomy place, in fact, they met. No sunlight pierced the
+dense canopy of branches; it was barely light enough to see. Judy and
+Tim advanced towards each other on tiptoe, confident of discovery at
+last. They only realised their mistake at five yards' distance.
+
+"You!" exclaimed Tim, in a disappointed whisper. "I thought it was
+going to be a sign." "I felt positive he'd be in here somewhere," said
+Judy.
+
+"Perhaps we're both signs," they declared together, then paused, and
+held a secret discussion about it all.
+
+"He's got a splendid hide," was the boy's opinion. "D'you think Uncle
+Felix knows anything? You heard what he said about signs...!"
+
+They decided without argument that he didn't. He just went "thumping
+about" in the usual places. He'd never find him. They agreed it was
+very wonderful. Tim advanced his pet idea--it had been growing on him:
+"I think _he_ knows some special place we'd never look in--a hole or
+something." But Judy met the suggestion with superior knowledge: "He
+moves about," she announced. "He doesn't stop in a hole. He flies at an
+awful rate--from place to place. That's--signs, I expect."
+
+"Wings?" suggested Tim.
+
+Judy hesitated. "You remember--at breakfast, wasn't it?--ages and ages
+ago--all had wings--those things--"
+
+She broke off and pointed significantly at the figure of Uncle Felix
+who was standing with his head cocked up at an awkward angle, staring
+into the sky. Shading his eyes with one hand, he was apparently
+examining the topmost branches of the tall horse-chestnuts.
+
+"He couldn't have got up a tree, could he, or into a bird's nest?" said
+the girl. She offered the suggestion timidly, yet her brother did not
+laugh at her. There was this strange feeling that the hider might be
+anywhere--simply anywhere. This was no ordinary game.
+
+"There's such a lot," Tim answered vaguely.
+
+She looked at him with intense admiration. The wonder of this
+marvellous game was in their hearts. The moment when they would find
+him was simply too extraordinary to think about.
+
+Judy moved a step closer in the darkness. "Can he get small, then--like
+that?" she whispered.
+
+But the question was too much for Tim.
+
+"Anyhow he gets about, doesn't he?" was the reply, the vagueness of
+uncertain knowledge covering the disappointment. "There are simply
+millions of trees and nests and--and rabbit-holes all over the place."
+
+They were silent for a moment. Then Judy asked, still more timidly:
+
+"I say, Tim?"
+
+"Well."
+
+"What does he really look like? I can't remember quite. I mean--shall
+we recognise him?"
+
+Tim stared at her. "My dear!" he gasped, as though the question almost
+shocked him. "Why, he touched me--on the head! I felt it!"
+
+Judy laughed softly; it was only that she wanted to remind herself of
+something too precious to be forgotten.
+
+"_I_ kissed him!" she whispered, a hint of triumph in her voice and
+eyes.
+
+They stood staring at one another for a little while, weighing the
+proofs thus given; then Tim broke the silence with a question of his
+own. It was the result of this interval of reflection. It was an
+unexpected sort of question:
+
+"Do you know what it is we want?" he asked. "I do," he added hurriedly,
+lest she should answer first.
+
+"What?" she said, seeing from his tone and manner that it was important.
+
+"We shall never, never find him this way," he said decisively.
+
+"What?" she repeated with impatience.
+
+Tim lowered his voice. "What we want," he said with the emphasis of
+true conviction, "is--a Leader."
+
+Judy repeated the word after him immediately; it was obvious; why
+hadn't she thought of it herself? "Of course," she agreed. "That's it
+exactly."
+
+"We're looking wrong somewhere," her brother added, and they both
+turned their heads in the direction of Uncle Felix who was still
+standing on the lawn in a state of bewilderment, examining the
+treetops. He expected something from the air, it seemed. Perhaps he was
+looking for rain--he loved water so. But evidently he was not a proper
+leader; he was even more bewildered than themselves; he, too, was
+looking wrong somewhere, somehow. They needed some one to show them how
+and where to look. Instinctively they felt their uncle was no better at
+this mighty game than they were. If only somebody who knew and
+understood--a leader--would turn up!
+
+And it was just then that Judy clutched her brother by the arm and said
+in a startled whisper, "Hark!"
+
+They harked. Through the hum of leaves and insects that filled the air
+this sweet June morning they heard another sound--a voice that reached
+them even here beneath the dense roof of shrubbery. They heard words
+distinctly, though from far away, rising, falling, floating across the
+lawn as though some one as yet invisible were singing to himself.
+
+For it was the voice of a man, and it certainly was a song. Moreover,
+without being able to explain it exactly, they felt that it was just
+the kind of singing that belonged to the kind of day: it was right and
+natural, a fresh and windy sound in the careless notes, almost as
+though it was a bird that sang. So exquisite was it, indeed, that they
+listened spellbound without moving, standing hand in hand beneath the
+dark bushes. And Uncle Felix evidently heard it too, for he turned his
+head; instead of examining the tree-tops he peered into the rose trees
+just behind him, both hands held to his ears to catch the happy song.
+There was both joy and laughter in the very sound of it:
+
+     My secret's in the wind and open sky;
+     There is no longer any Time--to lose;
+     The world is young with laughter; we can fly
+     Among the imprisoned hours as we choose.
+     The rushing minutes pause; an unused day
+     Breaks into dawn and cheats the tired sun.
+     The birds are singing. Hark! Come out and play!
+     There is no hurry; life has just begun.
+
+The voice died away among the rose trees, and the birds burst into a
+chorus of singing everywhere, as if they carried on the song among
+themselves. Then, in its turn, their chorus also died away. Tim looked
+at his sister. He seemed about to burst--if not into song, then into a
+thousand pieces.
+
+"A leader!" he exclaimed, scarcely able to get the word out in his
+excitement. "Did you hear it?"
+
+"Tim!" she gasped--and they flew out, hand in hand still, to join their
+uncle in the sunshine.
+
+"Found anything?" he greeted them before they could say a word. "I
+heard some one singing--a man, or something--over there among the rose
+trees--"
+
+"And the birds," interrupted Judy. "Did you hear them?"
+
+"Uncle," cried Tim with intense conviction, "it's a sign. I do believe
+it's a sign--"
+
+"That's exactly what it is," a deep voice broke in behind them "--a
+sign; and no mistake about it either."
+
+All three turned with a start. The utterance was curiously slow; there
+was a little dragging pause between each word. The rose trees parted,
+and they found themselves face to face with some one whom they had seen
+twice before in their lives, and who now made his appearance for the
+third time therefore--the man from the End of the World: the Tramp.
+
+
+
+
+THE LEADER
+
+IV
+
+
+He was a ragged-looking being, yet his loose, untidy clothing became
+him so well that his appearance seemed almost neat--it was certainly
+natural: he was dressed in the day, the garden, the open air. Judy and
+Tim ran up fearlessly and began fingering the bits of stuff that clung
+to him from the fields and ditches. In his beard were some stray rose
+leaves and the feather of a little bird. The children had an air of
+sheltering against a tree trunk--woodland creatures--mice or squirrels
+chattering among the roots, or birds flown in to settle on a hedge.
+They were not one whit afraid. For nothing surprised them on this
+marvellous morning; everything that happened they--accepted.
+
+"He's shining underneath," Judy whispered in Tim's ear, cocking her
+head sideways so that she could catch her brother's eye and at the same
+time feel the great comfort of the new arrival against her cheek.
+
+"And awfully strong," was the admiring reply.
+
+"So soft, too," she declared--though whether of mind or body was not
+itemized--"like feathers."
+
+"And smells delicious," affirmed Tim, "like hay and rabbits."
+
+Each child picked out the quality the heart desired and approved;
+almost, it seemed, each felt him differently. Yet, although not one
+whit afraid, they whispered. Perhaps the wonder of it choked their
+utterance a little.
+
+The Tramp smiled at them. All four smiled. The way he had emerged from
+among the rose trees made them smile. It was as natural as though he
+had been there all the time, growing out of the earth, waving in the
+morning air and sunlight. There was something simple and very beautiful
+about him, perhaps, that made them smile like this. Then Uncle Felix,
+whom the first shock of surprise had apparently deprived of speech,
+found his voice and observed, "Good-morning to you, good-morning." The
+little familiar phrase said everything in a quite astonishing way. It
+was like a song.
+
+"_Good_-morning," replied the Tramp. "It is. I was wondering how long
+it would be before you saw me."
+
+"Ah!" said Judy and Tim in the same breath, "of course."
+
+"The fact is," stammered Uncle Felix, "you're so like the rest of the
+garden--so like a bit of the garden, I mean--that we didn't notice you
+at first. But we heard--" he broke off in the middle of the
+sentence--"That _was_ you singing, wasn't it?" he asked with a note of
+hushed admiration in his voice.
+
+The smile upon the great woodland face broadened perceptibly. It was as
+though the sun burst through a cloud. "That's hard to say," he replied,
+"when the whole place is singing. I'm just like everything else--alive.
+It's natural to sing, and natural to dance--when you're alive and
+looking--and know it."
+
+He spoke with a sound as though he had swallowed the entire morning, a
+forest rustling in his chest, singing water just behind the lips.
+
+_"Looking!"_ exclaimed Uncle Felix, picking out the word. He moved
+closer; the children caught his hands; the three of them sheltered
+against the spreading figure till the four together seemed like a
+single item of the landscape. "Looking!" he repeated, "that's odd.
+We've lost something too. You said too,--just now--something about--a
+sign, I think?" Uncle Felix added shyly.
+
+All waited, but the Tramp gave no direct reply. He smiled again and
+folded two mighty arms about them. Two big feathery wings seemed round
+them. Judy thought of a nest, Tim of a cozy rabbit hole, Uncle Felix
+had the amazing impression that there were wild flowers growing in his
+heart, or that a flock of robins had hopped in and began to sing.
+
+"Lost something, have you?" the Tramp enquired genially at length; and
+the slow, leisurely way he said it, the curious half-singing utterance
+he used, the words falling from his great beard with this sound as of
+wind through leaves or water over sand and pebbles--somehow included
+them in the rhythm of existence to which he himself naturally belonged.
+They all seemed part of the garden, part of the day, part of the sun
+and earth and flowers together, marvellously linked and caught within
+some common purpose. Question and answer in the ordinary sense were
+wrong and useless. They must _feel_--feel as he did--to find what they
+sought.
+
+It was Uncle Felix who presently replied: "Something--we've--mis-laid,"
+he said hesitatingly, as though a little ashamed that he expressed the
+truth so lamely.
+
+"Mis-laid?" asked the Tramp. "Mis-laid, eh?"
+
+"Forgotten," put in Tim.
+
+"Mis-laid or forgotten," repeated the other. "That all?"
+
+"Some_body_, I should have said," explained Uncle Felix yet still
+falteringly, "somebody we've lost, that is."
+
+"Hiding," Tim said quickly.
+
+"About," added Judy. There was a hush in all their voices.
+
+The Tramp picked the small feather from his beard--apparently a
+water-wagtail's--and appeared to reflect a moment. He held the soft
+feather tenderly between a thumb and finger that were thick as a
+walking-stick and stained with roadside mud and yellow with
+flower-pollen too.
+
+"Hiding, is he?" He held up the feather as if to see which way it
+fluttered in the wind. "Hiding?" he repeated, with a distinct
+broadening of the smile that was already big enough to cover half the
+lawn. It shone out of him almost like rays of light, of sunshine, of
+fire. "Aha! That's his way, maybe, just a little way he has--of playing
+with you."
+
+"You know him, then! You know who it is?" two eager voices asked
+instantly. "Tell us at once. You're leader now!" The children, in their
+excitement, almost burrowed into him; Uncle Felix drew a deep breath
+and stared. His whole body listened.
+
+And slowly the Tramp turned round his shaggy head and gazed into their
+faces, each in turn. He answered in his leisurely, laborious way as
+though each word were a bank-note that he dealt out carefully, fixing
+attention upon its enormous value. There was certainly a tremor in his
+rumbling voice. But there was no hurry.
+
+"I've--seen him," he said with feeling, "seen him--once or twice. My
+life's thick with memories--"
+
+"Seen him!" sprang from three mouths simultaneously.
+
+"Once or twice, I said." He paused and sighed. Wind stirred the rose
+trees just behind him. He went on murmuring in a lower tone; and as he
+spoke a sense of exquisite new beauty stole across the old-world
+garden. "It was--in the morning--very early," he said below his breath.
+
+"At dawn!" Uncle Felix whispered.
+
+"When the birds begin," from Judy very softly.
+
+"To sing," Tim added, a single shiver of joy running through all three
+of them at once. The enchantment of their own dim memories of the
+dawn--of a robin, of swallows, and of an up-and-under bird flashed
+magically back.
+
+The Tramp nodded his great head slowly; he bowed it to the sunlight, as
+it were. There was a great light flaming in his eyes. He seemed to give
+out heat.
+
+"Just seen him--and no more," he went on marvellously, as though
+speaking of a wonderful secret of his own. "Seen him a-stealing past
+me--in the dawn. Just looked at me--and went--went back again behind
+the rushing minutes!"
+
+"Was it long ago? How long?" asked Judy with eager impatience
+impossible to suppress. They did not notice the reference to Time,
+apparently.
+
+The wanderer scratched his tangled crop of hair and seemed to calculate
+a moment. He gazed down at the small white feather in his hand. But the
+feather held quite still. No breath of wind was stirring. "When I was
+young," he said, with an expression half quizzical, half yearning.
+"When I first took to the road--as a boy--and began to look."
+
+"As long ago as that!" Tim murmured breathlessly. It was like a stretch
+of history.
+
+The Tramp put his hand on the boy's shoulder. "I was about your age,"
+he said, "when I got tired of the ordinary life, and started wandering.
+And I've been wandering and looking ever since. Wandering--and
+wondering--and looking--ever since," he repeated in the same slow way,
+while the feather between his great fingers began to wave a little in
+time with the dragging speech.
+
+The wonder of it enveloped them all three like a perfume rising from
+the entire earth.
+
+"We've been looking for ages too," cried Judy.
+
+"And we've seen him," exclaimed her brother quickly.
+
+"Somebody," added Uncle Felix, more to himself than to the others.
+
+The Tramp combed his splendid beard, as if he hoped to find more
+feathers in it.
+
+"This morning, wasn't it?" he asked gently, "very early?"
+
+They reflected a moment, but the reflection did not help them much.
+"Ages and ages ago," they answered. "So long that we've forgotten
+rather--"
+
+"Forgotten what he looks like. That's it. Same trouble here," and he
+tapped his breast. "We're all together, doing the same old thing. The
+whole world's doing it. It's the only thing to do." And he looked so
+wise and knowing that their wonder increased to a kind of climax; they
+were tapping their own breasts before they knew it.
+
+"Doing it everywhere," he went on, weighing his speech as usual; "only
+some don't know they're doing it." He looked significantly into their
+shining eyes, then finished with a note of triumph in his voice. "We
+do!"
+
+"Hooray!" cried Tim. "We can all start looking together now."
+
+"Maybe," agreed the wanderer, very sweetly for a tramp, they thought.
+
+They glanced at their Uncle first for his approval; the Tramp glanced
+at him too; his face was flushed and happy, the eyes very bright. But
+there was an air of bewilderment about him too. He nodded his head, and
+repeated in a shy, contented voice--as though he surrendered himself to
+some enchantment too great to understand--"I think so; I hope so;
+I--wonder!"
+
+"We've looked everywhere already," Tim shouted by way of
+explanation--when the Tramp cut him short with a burst of rolling
+laughter:
+
+"But in the wrong kind of places, maybe," he suggested, moving forward
+like a hedge or bit of hayfield the wind pretends to shift.
+
+"Oh, well--perhaps," the boy admitted.
+
+"Probly," said Judy, keeping close beside him.
+
+"Of course," decided Uncle Felix; "but we've been pretty warm once or
+twice all the same." He lumbered after the other three, yet something
+frisky about him, as about a pony released into a field and still
+uncertain of its bounding strength.
+
+"Have you really?" remarked their leader, good-humouredly, but with a
+touch of sarcasm. "Good and right, so far as it goes; only 'warm' is
+not enough; we want to be hot, burning hot and steaming all the time.
+That's the way to find him." He paused and turned towards them; he
+gathered them nearer to him with his smiling eyes somehow. "It's like
+this," he went on more slowly than ever: "A good hider doesn't choose
+the difficult places; he chooses the common ordinary places where
+nobody would ever think of looking." He kept his eyes upon them to make
+sure they understood him. "The little, common places," he continued
+with emphasis, "that no one thinks worth while. He hides in the
+open--bang out in the open!"
+
+"In the open!" cried the children. "The open air!"
+
+"In the open!" gasped Uncle Felix. "The open sea!"
+
+The Tramp almost winked at them. He looked like a lot of ordinary
+people. He looked like everybody. He looked like the whole world
+somehow. He smiled just like a multitude. He spoke, as it were, for all
+the world--said the one simple thing that everybody everywhere was
+trying to say in millions of muddled words and sentences. The wind and
+trees and sunshine said it with him, for him, after him, before him. He
+said the thing--so Uncle Felix felt, at any rate,--that was always
+saying itself, that was everywhere heard, though rarely listened to;
+but, according to the children, the thing they knew and believed
+already. Only it was nice to hear it stated definitely--_they_ felt.
+
+And the tide of enchantment rose higher and higher; in a tide of
+flowing gold it poured about all three.
+
+"That's it," the Tramp continued, as though he had not noticed the
+rapture his very ordinary words had caused. "Sea and land and air
+together. But more than that--he hides deep and beautiful."
+
+"Deeply and beautifully," murmured the writer of historical novels, all
+of them entirely forgotten now.
+
+"Deep and beautiful," repeated the other, as though he preferred the
+rhythm of his own expression. He drew himself up and swallowed a long
+and satisfying draught of air and sunshine. He waved the little
+wagtail's feather before their eyes. He touched their faces with its
+tip. "Deep, tender, kind, and beautiful," he elaborated. "Those are the
+signs--signs that he's been along--just passed that way. The whole
+world's looking, and the whole world's full of signs!"
+
+For a moment all stood still together like a group of leafy things a
+passing wind has shaken, then left motionless; a wild rose-bush, a
+climbing vine, a clinging ivy branch--all three kept close to the
+stalwart figure of their big, incomparable leader.
+
+And Judy knew at last the thing she didn't know; Tim felt himself
+finally in the eternal centre of his haunted wood; in the eyes of Uncle
+Felix there was a glistening moisture that caught the sunlight like dew
+upon the early lawn. He staggered a little as though he were on a deck
+and the sea was rolling underneath him.
+
+"How ever did you find it out?" he asked, after an interval that no one
+had cared to interrupt. "What in the world made you first think of it?"
+And though his voice was very soft and clear, it was just a little
+shaky.
+
+"Well," drawled the Tramp, "maybe it was just because I thought of
+nothing else. On the road we live sort of simply. There's never any
+hurry; the wind's a-blowing free; everything's sweet and careless--and
+so am I." And he chuckled happily to himself.
+
+"Let's begin at once!" cried Tim impatiently. "I feel warm already--hot
+all over--simply burning."
+
+The Tramp signified his agreement. "But you must each get a feather
+first," he told them, "a feather that a bird has dropped. It's a sign
+that we belong together. Birds know everything first. They go
+everywhere and see everything all at once. They're in the air, and on
+the ground, and on the water, and under it as well. They live in the
+open--sea or land. And if you have a feather in your hand--well, it
+means keeping in touch with everything that's going. They go light and
+easy; we must go light and easy too."
+
+They stared at him with wonder at the breaking point. It all seemed so
+obviously and marvellously true. How had they missed it up till now?
+
+"So get a feather," he went on quietly, "and then we can begin to look
+at once."
+
+No one objected, no one criticised, no one hesitated. Tim knew where
+all the feathers were because he knew every nest in the garden. He led
+the way. In less than two minutes all had small, soft feathers in their
+hands.
+
+"Now, we'll begin to look," the Tramp announced. "It's the loveliest
+game on earth, and the only one. It's Hide-and-Seek behind the rushing
+minutes. And, remember," he added, holding up a finger and chuckling
+happily, "there's no hurry, the wind's a-blowing free, the sun is warm,
+everything's sweet and careless--and so are we."
+
+
+
+
+THE COMMON SIGNS
+
+V
+
+
+"But has he called yet?" asked Tim, remembering suddenly that it wasn't
+fair to begin till the hider announced that he was ready. "He's got to
+hoot first, you know. Hasn't he?" he added doubtfully.
+
+"Listen!" replied the man of the long white roads. And he held his
+feather close against his ear, while the others copied him. Fixing
+their eyes upon a distant point, they listened, and as they listened,
+their lips relaxed, their mouths opened slowly, their eyebrows
+lifted--they heard, apparently, something too wonderful to be believed.
+
+To Uncle Felix, still fumbling in his mind among unnecessary questions,
+it seemed that the power of hearing had awakened for the first time, or
+else had grown of a sudden extraordinarily acute. The children merely
+listened and said "Oh, oh, oh!"; the sound they heard was familiar,
+though never fully understood till now. For him, it was, perhaps, the
+recovery of a power he had long forgotten. At any rate he--heard. For
+the air passed through the tiny fronds of the feather--through the
+veined web of its delicate resistance--round the hollow stem and across
+the fluffy breadth of it--with a humming music as of wind among the
+telegraph wires, only infinitely sweet and far away. There were several
+notes in it, a chord--the music that accompanies all flying things,
+even a butterfly or settling leaf, and ever fills the air with
+unguessed melody.
+
+It opened their power of hearing to a degree as yet undreamed of even
+by the all-believing children. Their feathers became wee, accurate,
+tuning-forks for all existence. They understood that everything in the
+whole world sang; that no rose leaf fluttered to the earth, no rabbit
+twitched its ears, no mouse its tail, no single bluebell waved a head
+towards its bluer neighbour, without this exquisite accompaniment of
+fairy music.
+
+"Listen, listen!" the Tramp repeated softly from time to time, watching
+their faces keenly. "Listen, and you'll hear him calling...!"
+
+And this fairy humming, having so marvellously attuned their hearing,
+then led them on to the larger, louder sounds; they pricked their ears
+up, as the saying goes; they noticed the deeper music everywhere. For
+the morning breeze was rustling and whispering among the leaves and
+blades of grass with a thousand happy voices. It was the ordinary
+summer sound of moving air that no one pays attention to.
+
+"Oh, that!" exclaimed Uncle Felix. "I hadn't noticed it." He felt
+ashamed. He who had taught them the beauty of the self-advertising
+Night-Wind, had somehow missed and overlooked the wonder--the
+searching, yearning beauty--of this meek, incomparable music: because
+it was so usual. For the first time in his life he heard the wind as it
+slipped between the leaves, shaking them into rapture.
+
+"And that," laughed the Tramp, cocking his great head to catch the
+murmur of the stream beyond the lawn, "if the dust of furniture and
+houses ain't blocked your ears too thickly." They stooped to listen.
+"Like laughter, isn't it?" he observed, "singing and laughing mixed
+together?"
+
+They straightened up again, too full of wonder to squeeze out any words.
+
+"It's everywhere," said Uncle Felix, "this calling--these calling
+voices. Is that where you got _your_ song from?"
+
+"It's everywhere and always," replied the other evasively. "The birds
+get their singing from it. They get everything first, of course, then
+pass it on. The whole world's music comes from that, though there's
+nothing--_nothing_," he added with emphasis, "to touch the singing of a
+bird. He's calling everywhere and always," he went on as no one
+contradicted him or ventured upon any question; "only you've got to
+listen close. He calls soft and beautiful. He doesn't shout and yell at
+you."
+
+"Soft and beautiful, yes," repeated Uncle Felix below his breath, "the
+small, still voices of the air and sea and earth." And, as he said it,
+they caught the murmur of the little stream; they heard singing in the
+air as well. The blackbirds whistled in one direction, the thrushes
+trilled and gurgled in another, and overhead, both among the covering
+leaves and from the open sky, a chorus of twittering and piping filled
+the chambers of the day. Judy recalled, as of long ago, the warning
+bugle-call of an up-and-under bird; Tim faintly remembered having
+overheard some swallows "discussing" together; Uncle Felix saw a robin
+perched against a sky of pearly grey at the end of an interminable
+corridor that stretched across whole centuries.... Then, close beside
+the three of them, a bumble-bee, a golden fly, and a company of summer
+gnats went by--booming, trumpeting, singing like a tiny carillon of
+bells respectively.
+
+"Hark and listen," exclaimed the Tramp with triumph in his voice, and
+looking down at Tim particularly. "He's calling all the time. It's the
+little ordinary sounds that give the hints."
+
+"It's an enormous hide; I mean to look for ever and ever," cried the
+delighted boy.
+
+"I can hear everything in the world now," cried Judy.
+
+"Signs," said Uncle Felix, after a pause. This time he did not make a
+question of his thought, but merely dropped the word out like a note of
+music into the air. His feather answered it and took it further.
+
+The Tramp caught the word flying before it reached the ground:
+
+"Deep, tender, kind and beautiful," he said, "but above
+all--beautiful." He turned his shaggy head and looked about him
+carelessly. "There's one of them, for instance," he added, pointing
+across the lawn. "There's a sign. It means he's passed that way! He
+ain't too far away--may-be."
+
+They followed the direction of his eyes. A dragon-fly paused hovering
+above the stream, its reflection mirrored in the clear running water
+underneath. Against the green palisade of reeds its veined and crystal
+wings scattered the sunlight into shining flakes. The blue upon its
+body burned--a patch of flaming beauty in mid-air. They watched it for
+a moment. Then, suddenly--it was gone, the spot was empty. But the
+speed, the poise, the perfect movement, the flashing wings, above all
+the flaming blue upon its tail still held them spellbound. Somehow, it
+seemed, they had borrowed that speed, that flashing beauty, making the
+loveliness part and parcel of themselves. Swiftly they turned and
+stared up at the Tramp. There was a rapt look upon his tangled face.
+
+"A sign," he was saying softly. "He's passed this way. He can't be
+hiding very far from here." And, drawing a long, deep breath, he gazed
+about him into endless space as though about to sing again.
+
+The dragon-fly had vanished, none knew whither, gone doubtless into
+some new hiding-place; it just gave the hint, then slipped away upon
+its business. But the wonder and the beauty it had brought remained
+behind, crept into every heart. The mystery of life, the reality that
+lay hiding at the core of things, the marvel and the dream--all these
+were growing clearer. All lovely things were "signs." And there fell a
+sudden hush upon the group, for the Thing that Nobody could Understand
+crept up and touched them.
+
+Abruptly, then, lest the wonder of it should prove more than they could
+bear perhaps, a blackbird whistled with a burst of flying laughter at
+them from the shrubberies. Laughter and dancing both were part of
+wonder. The Tramp at once moved forward, chuckling in his beard; he
+waved his arms; his step was lighter, quicker; he was singing softly to
+himself: they only caught stray sentences, but they loved the windy
+ringing of his voice. They knew not where he borrowed words and tune:
+"The world is young with laughter; we can fly.... Among the imprisoned
+hours as we choose.... The birds are singing.... Hark! Come out and
+play.... There is no hurry.... Life has just begun...."
+
+"Come on!" cried Tim. "Let's follow him; we're getting frightfully
+warm!"
+
+He seized Judy and his uncle by the hands and cleared the rivulet with
+a running leap. The Tramp, however, preferred to wade across. "Get into
+everything you can," he explained in mid-stream with a laugh. "It keeps
+you in touch; it's all part of the looking."
+
+He led them into the field where the blackbird still went on whistling
+its heart out into the endless summer morning. But to them it seemed
+that he led them out across the open world for ever and ever....
+
+It grew very marvellous, this game of hide and seek. Sometimes they
+forgot it was a game at all, forgot what they were looking for, forgot
+that they were looking for anything or any one at all. Yet the mighty
+search continued subconsciously, even when passing incidents drew their
+attention from their chief desire. Always, at the back of thought, lay
+this exquisite, sweet memory in their hearts, something they half
+remembered, half forgot, but very dear, very marvellous. Some one was
+hiding somewhere, waiting, longing to play with them, expecting to be
+found.
+
+It may be that intervals went by, those intervals called years and
+months; yet no one noticed them, and certainly no one named them. They
+knew one feeling only--the joy of endless search. Some one was hiding,
+some one was near, and signs lay scattered everywhere. This some one
+lay in his wonderful hiding-place and watched their search with
+laughter in his eyes. He remained invisible; perhaps they would never
+see him actually; but they felt his presence everywhere, in every
+object, every tree and flower and stone, in sun and wind, in water and
+in earth. The power and loveliness of common things became insistent.
+They were aware of them. It seemed they brushed against this shining
+presence, pushing for ever against a secret door of exit that led into
+the final hiding-place. Eager to play with them, yet more eager still
+to be discovered, the wonderful hider kept just beyond their sight and
+touch, while covering the playground with endless signs that he was
+near enough for them to know for certain he was--there. For among the
+four of them there was no heart that doubted. None explained. None said
+No.... Nor was there any hurry.
+
+"_I_ believe," announced Tim at length, with the air of a sage about
+him, "the best way is to sit still and wait; then he'll just come out
+like a rabbit and show himself." And, as no one contradicted, he added
+confidently, "that's _my_ idea." His love was evidently among the
+things of the soil, rabbits, rats and hedgehogs, both hunter and
+adventurer strong in him.
+
+"A hole!" cried Judy with indignation. "Never! He's in the air. I heard
+a bird just now that--"
+
+"Whew!" whistled Uncle Felix, interrupting her excitedly. "He's been
+along here. Look! I'm sure of it." And he said it with such conviction
+that they ran up, expecting actual footprints.
+
+"How do you know?" Tim asked dubiously, seeing no immediate proof
+himself. All paused for the reply; but Uncle Felix also paused. He had
+said a thing it seemed he could not justify.
+
+"Don't hesitate," said the Tramp, watching him with amusement. "Don't
+think before you speak. There's nothing to think about until you've
+spoken."
+
+Uncle Felix wore an expression of bewilderment. "I meant the flowers,"
+he stammered, still unsure of his new powers.
+
+"Of course," the other chuckled. "Didn't I tell you 'tender and
+beautiful,' and 'bang out in the open'?"
+
+"Then you're right, Uncle; they _are_ signs," cried Judy, "and you _do_
+like butter," and she danced away to pick the dandelions that smothered
+the field with gold. But the Tramp held out his feather like a wand.
+
+"They're our best signs, remember," he cried. "You might as well pick a
+feather out of a living bird."
+
+"Oh!"--and she pulled herself up sharply, a little flush running across
+her face and the wind catching at her flying hair. She swayed a moment,
+nearly overbalancing owing to the interrupted movement, and looking for
+all the world like a wild young rose tree, her eyes two shining
+blossoms in the air. Then she dropped down and buried her nose among
+the crowd of yellow flowers. She smelt them audibly, drawing her breath
+in and letting it out again as though she could almost taste and eat
+the perfume.
+
+"That's better," said the Tramp approvingly. "Smell, then follow," and
+he moved forward again with his dancing, happy step. "All the wild,
+natural things do it," he cried, looking back over his shoulder at the
+three who were on their knees with faces pressed down against the
+yellow carpet. "It's the way to keep on the trail. Smell--then follow."
+
+Something flashed through the clearing mind of the older man, though
+where it came from he had less idea than the dandelions: a mood of
+forgotten beauty rushed upon him--
+
+      "O, follow, follow!
+      Through the caverns hollow,
+      As the song floats thou pursue,
+      Where the wild bee never flew--"
+
+and he ran dancing forward after the great Tramp, singing the words as
+though they were his own.
+
+Yet the flowers spread so thickly that the trail soon lost itself; it
+seemed like a paper-chase where the hare had scattered coloured petals
+instead of torn white copy-books. Each searcher followed the sign of
+his or her own favourite flower; like a Jack-in-the-Box each one bobbed
+up and down, smelling, panting, darting hither and thither as in the
+mazes of some gnat--or animal-dance, till knees and hands were stained
+with sweet brown earth, and lips and noses gleamed with the dust of
+orange-tinted pollen.
+
+"Anyhow, I'd rather look than find," cried Tim, turning a somersault
+over a sandy rabbit-mound.
+
+The swallows flashed towards Judy, a twittering song sprinkling itself
+like liquid silver behind them as they swooped away again.
+
+"I expect," the girl confessed breathlessly, "that when we do find
+him--we shall just die--!"
+
+"Of happiness, and wonder," ventured Uncle Felix, watching a common
+Meadow Brown that perched, opening and closing its wings, upon his
+sleeve. And the Tramp, almost invisible among high standing grass and
+thistles, laughed and called in his curious, singing voice, "There is
+no hurry! Life has just begun!"
+
+"Then we might as well sit down," suggested Uncle Felix, and suiting
+the action to the word, chose a nice soft spot upon the mossy bank and
+made himself comfortable as though he meant to stay; the Tramp did
+likewise, gathering the children close about his tangled figure. For
+one thing a big ditch faced them, its opposite bank overgrown with
+bramble bushes, and for another the sloping moss offered itself
+invitingly, like a cushioned sofa. So they lay side by side, watching
+the empty ditch, listening to the faint trickle of water tinkling down
+it. Slender reeds and tall straight grasses fringed the nearer edge,
+and, as the wind passed through them with a hush and whisper, they bent
+over in a wave of flowing green.
+
+"He's certainly gone that way," Judy whispered, following with her eyes
+the direction of the bending reeds. She was getting expert now.
+
+"Along the ditch, I do believe," agreed Tim. There were no flowers in
+it, and few, perhaps, would have found beauty there, yet the pointing
+of the reeds was unmistakable. "It's chock full of stuff," he added,
+"but a rat could get along, so I suppose--"
+
+"The signs are very slight sometimes," murmured the Tramp, his head
+half buried in the moss, "and sometimes difficult as well. You'd be
+surprised." He flung out his arms and legs and continued laughingly.
+"When things are contrary you may be sure you're getting
+somewhere--getting warm, that is."
+
+The children heard this outburst, but they did not listen. They were
+absorbed in something else already, for the movements of the reeds were
+fascinating. They began to imitate them, swaying their heads and bodies
+to and fro in time, and crooning to themselves in an attempt to copy
+the sound made by the wind among the crowded stalks.
+
+"Don't," objected Uncle Felix, half in fun, "it makes me dizzy." He was
+tempted to copy them, however, and made an effort, but the movement
+caught him in the ribs a little. His body, like his mind, was not as
+supple as theirs. An oak tree or an elm, perhaps, was more his model.
+
+"Do," the Tramp corrected him, swaying as he said it. "Swing with a
+thing if you want to understand it. Copy it, and you catch its meaning.
+That's rhythm!" He made an astonishing mouthful of the word. The
+children overheard it.
+
+"How do you spell it?" Judy asked.
+
+"I don't," he replied; "I do it. Once you get into the"--he took a
+great breath--"rhythm of a thing, you begin to like it. See?"
+
+And he went on swaying his big shoulders in imitation of the rustling
+reeds. All four swayed together then, holding their feathers before
+them like little flying banners. More than ever, they seemed things
+growing out of the earth, out of the very ditch. The movement brought a
+delicious, soothing sense of peace and safety over them; earth, air,
+and sunshine all belonged to them, plenty for everybody, no need to get
+there first and snatch at the best places. There was no hurry, life had
+just begun. They seemed to have dug a hole in space and curled up
+cosily inside it. They whispered curious natural things to one another.
+"A wren is settling on my hair," said Judy: "a butterfly on my neck,"
+said Uncle Felix: "a mouse," Tim mentioned, "is making its nest in my
+trousers pocket." And the Tramp kept murmuring in his voice of wind and
+water, "I'm full of air and sunlight, floating in them, floating
+away... my secret's in the wind and open sky... there is no longer any
+Time--to lose...."
+
+A bright green lizard darted up the sun-baked bank, vanishing down a
+crack without a sound; it left a streak of fire in the air. A golden
+fly hovered about the tallest reed, then darted into another world,
+invisibly. A second followed it, a third, a fourth--points of gold that
+pinned the day fast against the moving wall of green. A wren shot at
+full speed along the bed of the ditch, threading its winding length
+together as upon a woven pattern. All were busy and intent upon some
+purpose common to the whole of them, and to everything else as well;
+even the things that did not move were doing something.
+
+"I say," cried Tim suddenly, "they're covering him up. They're hiding
+him better so that we shan't find him. We've got too warm."
+
+How long they had been in that ditch when the boy exclaimed no one
+could tell; perhaps a lifetime, or perhaps an age only. It was long
+enough, at any rate, for the Tramp to have changed visibly in
+appearance--he looked younger, thinner, sprightlier, more shining. He
+seemed to have shed a number of outward things that made him
+bulky--bits of beard and clothing, several extra waistcoats, and every
+scrap of straw and stuff from the hedges that he wore at first. More
+and more he looked as Judy had seen him, ages and ages ago, emerging
+from the tarpaulin on the rubbish-heap at the End of the World.
+
+He sprang alertly to his feet at the sound of Tim's exclamation. The
+sunlit morning seemed to spring up with him.
+
+"We have been very warm indeed," he sang, "but we shall get warmer
+still before we find him. Besides, those things aren't hiding
+him--they're looking. Everything and everybody in the whole wide world
+is looking, but the signs are different for everybody, don't you see?
+Each knows and follows their own particular sign. Come on!" he cried,
+"come on and look! We shall find him in the end."
+
+
+
+
+COME-BACK STUMPER'S SIGN
+
+VI
+
+
+The steep bank was easily managed. They were up it in a twinkling, a
+line of dancing figures, all holding hands.
+
+First went the Tramp, shining and glowing like a mirror in the
+sunshine--fire surely in him; next Judy, almost flying with the joy and
+lightness in her--as of air; Tim barely able to keep tight hold of her
+hand, so busily did his feet love the roots and rabbit-holes of--earth;
+and finally, Uncle Felix, rolling to and fro, now sideways, now
+toppling headlong, roaring as he followed like a heavy wave. Fire, air,
+earth, and water--they summarised existence; owned and possessed the
+endless day; lived it, were one with it. Their leader, who apparently
+had swallowed the sun, fused and unified them in this amazing way
+with--fire.
+
+And hardly had they passed the line of shy forget-me-nots on the top of
+the bank, than they ran against a curious looking object that at first
+appeared to be an animated bundle of some kind, but on closer
+inspection proved to be a human figure stooping. It was somebody very
+busy about the edges of a great clump of bramble bushes. At the sound
+of their impetuous approach it straightened up. It had the face of a
+man--yellowish, patched with red, breathless and very hot. It was
+Come-back Stumper.
+
+He glared at them, furious at being disturbed, yet with an uneasy air,
+half comical, half ashamed, as of being--caught. He took on a
+truculent, aggressive attitude, as though he knew he would have to
+explain himself and did not want to do so. He turned and faced them.
+
+"Mornin'," he grunted fiercely. "It's a lovely day."
+
+But they all agreed so promptly with him that he dropped the offensive
+at once. His face was _very_ hot. It dripped.
+
+"Energetic as usual," observed Uncle Felix, while Tim poked among the
+bushes to see what he had been after, and Judy offered him a very dirty
+handkerchief to mop his forehead with. His bald head shone and
+glistened. Wisps of dark hair lay here and there upon it like the
+feathers of a crow's torn wing.
+
+"Thanks, dear," he said stiffly, using the few inches of ragged cambric
+and then tucking the article absent-mindedly into a pocket of his
+shooting coat. "I've been up very early--since dawn. Since dawn," he
+repeated in a much louder voice, "got up, in fact, with the sun." He
+meant to justify his extreme and violent activity. He glanced at the
+Tramp with a curious air of respect. Tim thought he saluted him, but
+Judy declared afterwards he was only wiping "the hot stuff off the side
+of his dear old head."
+
+"Wonderful moment,--dawn, ain't it, General?" said the Tramp. "Best in
+the whole day when you come to think of it."
+
+"It is, sir," replied Stumper, as proud as though a Field-Marshal had
+addressed him, "and the first." He looked more closely at the Tramp; he
+rubbed his eyes, and then produced the scrap of cambric and rubbed them
+again more carefully than before. Perhaps he, too, had been hoping for
+a leader! Something very proud and happy stole upon his perspiring face
+of ochre. He moved a step nearer. "Did you notice it this morning?" he
+asked in a whisper, "the dawn, I mean? Never saw anything like it in me
+life before. Thought I was in the Himalayas or the Caucasus again.
+Astonishin', upon me word--the beauty of it! And the birds! Did you
+hear 'em? Expect you usually do, though," he added with a touch of
+unmistakable envy and admiration in his tone.
+
+"Uncommon," agreed the Tramp, "and no mistake about it. _They_ knew,
+you see." They no longer called each other "Sir" and "General"; they
+had come to an understanding apparently.
+
+"Umph!" said Stumper, and looked round shyly at the others.
+
+Stumper was evidently under the stress of some divine emotion he was
+half ashamed of. An unwonted passion stirred him. He seemed a prey to
+an unusual and irrepressible curiosity. Only the obvious fact that his
+listeners shared the same feelings with him loosened his sticky tongue
+and stole self-consciousness away. He had expected to be laughed at.
+Instead the group admired him. The Tramp--his manner proved it--thought
+of him very highly indeed.
+
+"Never knew such a day in all me life before," Stumper admitted
+frankly. "Couldn't--simply couldn't stay indoors."
+
+He still retained a trace of challenge in his tone. But no one
+challenged. Judy took his arm. "So you came out?" she said softly.
+
+"Like us," said Uncle Felix.
+
+"Of course," Tim added. But it was the Tramp who supplied the
+significant words they had all been waiting for, Stumper himself more
+eagerly than any one else. "To look," he remarked quite naturally.
+
+Stumper might have just won a great world-victory, judging by the
+expression that danced upon his face. He dropped all pretence at
+further concealment. He put his other arm round Tim's shoulder, partly
+to balance himself better against Judy's pushing, and partly because he
+realised the companionship of both children as very dear just then. He
+had a great deal to say, and wanted to say it all at once, but words
+never came to him too easily; he had missed many an opportunity in life
+for the want of fluent and spontaneous address. He stammered and halted
+somewhat in his delivery. A new language with but a single word in it
+would have suited him admirably.
+
+"Yes," he growled, "I came out--to look. But when I got out--I clean
+forgot what it was--who, I mean--no, _what_," he corrected himself
+again, "I'd come out to look for. Can't make it out at all." He broke
+off in a troubled way.
+
+"No?" agreed Judy sympathetically, as though _she_ knew.
+
+"But you want to find it awfully," Tim stated as a fact.
+
+"Awfully," admitted Stumper with a kind of fierceness.
+
+"Only you can't remember what it looks like quite?" put in Uncle Felix.
+
+Stumper hesitated a moment. "Too wonderful to remember properly," he
+said more quietly; something like that. "But the odd thing is," he went
+on in a lower tone, "I've seen it. I _know_ I've seen it. Saw it this
+mornin'--very early--when the pigeon woke me up--at dawn."
+
+"Pigeon!" exclaimed Tim and Judy simultaneously. "Dawn!"
+
+"Carrier-pigeon--flew in at my open window--woke me," continued the
+soldier in his gruff old voice. "I've used 'em--carrier-pigeons, you
+know. Sent messages--years ago. I understand the birds a bit.
+Extraordinary thing, I thought. Got up and looked at it." He blocked
+again.
+
+"Ah!" said some one, by way of encouragement.
+
+"And it looked back at me." By the way he said it, it was clear he
+hardly expected to be believed.
+
+"Of course," said Uncle Felix.
+
+"Naturally," added Tim.
+
+"And what d'you think?" Stumper went on, a note of yearning and even
+passion in his voice. "What d'you think?" he whispered: "I felt it had
+a message for me--brought _me_ a message--something to tell me--"
+
+"Round its neck or foot?" asked Tim.
+
+Stumper drew the boy closer and looked down into his face. "Eyes," he
+mumbled, "in its small bright eyes. There was a flash, I saw it
+plainly--something strange and marvellous, something I've been looking
+for all my life."
+
+No one said a single word, but the old soldier felt the understanding
+sympathy rising like steam from all of them.
+
+"Then, suddenly, it was gone--out into the open sky--bang into the
+sunrise. And I saw the dawn all over everything. I dressed--rushed
+out--and--"
+
+"Had it laid an egg?" Tim asked, remembering another kind of hunting
+somewhere, long ago.
+
+"How could it?" Judy corrected him quickly. "There was--no time--" then
+stopped abruptly. She turned towards Come-Back Stumper; she gave him a
+hurried and affectionate hug. "And then," she asked, "what happened
+next?"
+
+Stumper returned the hug, including Tim in it too. "I found
+_this_--fluttering in my hand," he said, and held up a small grey
+feather for them to admire. "It's the only clue I've got. The pigeon
+left it."
+
+While they admired the feather and exhibited their own, Tim crying,
+"We've got five now, nearly a whole wing!" Stumper was heard to murmur
+above their heads, "And since I--came out to look--I've felt--quite
+different."
+
+"Your secret's in the wind and open sky!" cried Judy, dancing round him
+with excitement. Her voice came flying from the air.
+
+"You're awfully warm--you're hot--you're burning!" shouted Tim,
+clapping his hands. His voice seemed to rise out of the earth.
+
+"We've all seen it, all had a glimpse," roared Uncle Felix with a sound
+of falling water, rolling up nearer as he spoke. "It's too wonderful to
+see for long, too wonderful to remember quite. But we shall find it in
+the end. We're all looking!" He began a sort of dancing step. "And when
+we find it--" he went on.
+
+"We'll change the world," shouted Stumper, as though he uttered a final
+word of command.
+
+"It's a he, remember," interrupted Tim. "Come along!"
+
+And then the Tramp, who had been standing quietly by, smiling to
+himself but saying nothing, came nearer, opened his great arms and drew
+the four of them together. His voice, his shining presence, the warm
+brilliance that glowed about him, seemed to envelop them like a flame
+of fire and a fire of--love.
+
+"We're thinking and arguing too much," he drawled in his leisurely, big
+voice, "we lose the trail that way, we lose the rhythm. Just love and
+look and wonder--then we'll find him. There is no hurry, life has just
+begun. But keep on looking all the time." He turned to Stumper with a
+chuckle. "You said you had a flash," he reminded him. "What's become of
+it? You can't have lost it--with that pigeon's feather in your hand!"
+
+"It's waggling," announced Tim, holding up his own, while the others
+followed suit. The little feathers all bent one way--towards the
+bramble clump. Their tiny, singing music was just audible in the pause.
+
+"Yes," replied Come-Back Stumper at length. "I've had a flash--flashes,
+in fact! What's more," he added proudly, "I was after a couple of
+them--just when you arrived."
+
+Everybody talked at once then. Uncle Felix and the children fell to
+explaining the signs and traces they had already discovered, each
+affirming vehemently that their own particular sign was the
+loveliest--the dragon-fly, the flowers, the wind, the bending reeds,
+even the lizard and the bumble-bee. The chorus of sound was like the
+chattering of rooks among the tree-tops; in fact, though the quality of
+tone of course was different, the resemblance to a concert of birds,
+all singing together in a summer garden, was quite striking. Out of the
+hubbub single words emerged occasionally--a "robin," "swallows," an
+"up-and-under bird"--yet, strange to say, so far as Stumper was
+concerned, only one thing was said; all said the same one thing; he
+heard this one thing only--as though the words and sentences they used
+were but different ways of pronouncing it, of spelling it, of uttering
+it. Moreover, the wind in the feather said it too, for the sound and
+intonation were similar. It was the thing that wind and running water
+said, that flame roared in the fireplace, that rain-drops pattered on
+the leaves, even house-flies, buzzing across the
+window-panes--everything everywhere, the whole earth, said it.
+
+He stood still, listening in amazement. His face had dried by now; he
+passed his hand across it; he tugged at his fierce military moustache.
+
+"Hiding--near us--in the open--everywhere," he muttered, though no one
+heard him; "I've had my flashes too."
+
+"Different people get different signs, of course," the Tramp made
+himself heard at length, "but they're all the same. All lie along the
+trail. The earth's a globe and circle, so everything leads to the same
+place--in the end."
+
+"Yes," said Stumper; "thank you"--as though he knew it already, but
+felt that it was neatly put.
+
+"Follow up your flash," added the Tramp. "Smell--then follow. That
+is--keep on looking."
+
+Stumper turned, pirouetting on what the children called his "living
+leg." "I will," he cried, with an air of self-abandonment, and promptly
+diving by a clever manoeuvre out of their hands, he fell heavily upon
+all fours, and disappeared beneath the dense bramble bushes just behind
+them. Panting, and certainly perspiring afresh, he forced his way in
+among the network of thick leaves and prickly branches. They heard him
+puffing; it seemed they heard him singing too, as he reached forward
+with both arms into the dark interior. Caught by his whole-hearted
+energy, they tried to help; they pushed behind; they did their best to
+open a way for his head between the entwining brambles.
+
+"Don't!" he roared inside. "You'll scratch my eyes out. I shan't
+see--anything!" His mouth apparently was full of earth. They watched
+the retreating soles of his heavy shooting-boots. Slowly the feet were
+dragged in after him. They disappeared from sight. Stumper was gone.
+
+"He'll come back, though," mentioned Judy. The performance had been so
+interesting that she almost forgot its object, however. Tim reminded
+her. "But he won't find anything in a smelly place like that," he
+declared. "I mean," he added, "it can't be a beetle or a grub that
+we're--looking for." Yet there was doubt and wonder in his voice.
+Stumper, a "man like that," and a soldier, a hunter too, who had done
+scouting in an Indian jungle, and met tigers face to face--a chap like
+that could hardly disappear on all fours into a clump of bramble bushes
+without an excellent reason!
+
+An interval of comparative silence followed, broken only by the faint
+murmur of the wind that stirred their humming feathers. They stood in a
+row and listened intently. Hardly a sound came from the interior of the
+bramble bushes. The soldier had justified his title. He had retired
+pletely. To Judy it occurred that he might be suffocated, to Tim that
+he might have been eaten by some animal, to Uncle Felix that he might
+have slipped out at the other side and made his escape. But no one
+expressed these idle thoughts in words. They believed in Stumper
+really. He invariably came back. This time would be no exception to the
+rule.
+
+And, presently, as usual, Stumper did come back. They heard him
+grunting and panting long before a sign of him was visible. They heard
+his voice, "Got him! Knew I was right! Bah! Ugh!" as he spluttered
+earth and leaves from his mouth apparently. He emerged by degrees and
+backwards; backed out, indeed, like an enormous rabbit. His boots, his
+legs, his hands planted on the ground, his neck and then his face,
+looking out over his shoulder, appeared successively. "Just the kind of
+place he _would_ choose!" he exclaimed triumphantly, collapsing back
+upon his haunches and taking a long, deep breath. Beside the triumph in
+his voice there was a touch of indescribable, gruff sweetness the
+children knew was always in his heart--no amount of curried-liver
+trouble could smother _that_. Just now it was more marked than usual.
+
+"Show us!" they cried, gathering round him. Judy helped him to his
+feet; he seemed a little unsteady. Purple with the exertion of the
+search, both cheeks smeared with earth, neck-tie crooked, and old grey
+shooting-coat half-way up his back, Come-Back Stumper stood upright,
+and looked at them with shining eyes. He was the picture of a happy and
+successful man.
+
+"There!" he growled, and held out a hand, palm upwards, still trembling
+with his recent exertions. "Didn't I tell you?"
+
+They crowded round to examine a small object that lay between two
+smears of earth in the centre of the upturned palm. It was round and
+had a neat little opening on its under side. It was pretty, certainly.
+Their heads pressed forward in a bunch, like cabbages heaped for
+market. But no one spoke.
+
+"See it?" said Stumper impatiently; "see what it is?" He bent forward
+till his head mixed with theirs, his big aquiline nose in everybody's
+way.
+
+"We see it--yes," said Uncle Felix without enthusiasm. "It's a snail
+shell--er--I believe?" The shade of disappointment in his voice was
+reflected in the children's faces too, as they all straightened up and
+gazed expectantly at the panting soldier. "Is that all?" was the
+sentence no one liked to utter.
+
+But Stumper roared at them. "A snail shell!" he boomed; "of course it's
+a snail shell! But did you ever see such a snail shell in your lives
+before? Look at the colour! Look at the shape! Put it against your ears
+and hear it singing!" He was furious with their lack of appreciation.
+
+"It's the common sort," said Uncle Felix, braver than the others,
+"something or other vulgaris--"
+
+"Hundreds of them everywhere," mentioned Tim beneath his breath to Judy.
+
+But Stumper overheard them.
+
+"Common sort! Hundreds everywhere!" he shouted, his voice almost
+choking in his throat; "look at the colour! Look at the shape, I tell
+you! Listen to it!" He said the last words with a sudden softness.
+
+They lowered their heads again for a new examination.
+
+"What more d'you want, I'd like to know? There's colour for you!
+There's wonder! There's a sheer bit of living beauty!" and he lowered
+his head again so eagerly that it knocked audibly against Tim's skull.
+
+"Please move your nose away," said Tim, "I can't see."
+
+"Common indeed!" growled the soldier, making room willingly enough,
+while they obeyed his booming orders. They felt a little ashamed of
+themselves for being so obtuse, for now that they looked closer they
+saw that the shell was certainly very beautiful. "Common indeed!" he
+muttered again. "Why, you don't know a sign when it's straight before
+your noses!"
+
+Judy pulled the fingers apart to make it roll towards her; she felt it
+all over, stroking the smooth beauty of its delicate curves. It was
+exquisitely tinted. It shone and glistened in the morning sunlight. She
+put it against her ear and listened. "Oh!" she exclaimed. "It _is_
+singing," as the murmur of the wind explored its hollow windings.
+
+"That's the Ganges," explained Stumper in a softer voice. "The waves of
+the Ganges breaking on the yellow sands of India. Wind in the jungle
+too." His face looked happy as he watched her; his explosions never
+lasted long.
+
+She passed it over to her brother, who crammed it against his ear and
+listened with incredible grimaces as though it hurt him. "I can hear
+the tigers' footsteps," he declared, screwing up his eyes, "and birds
+of paradise and all sorts of things." He handed it on reluctantly to
+his uncle, who listened so deeply in his turn that he had to shut both
+eyes. "I hear calling voices," he murmured to himself, "voices calling,
+calling everywhere....it's wonderful... like a sea of voices from the
+other side of the world... the whole world's singing...!"
+
+"And look at the colour, will you?" urged Stumper, snatching it away
+from the listener, who, seemed in danger of becoming entranced. "Why,
+he's not only passed this way--he's actually touched it. That's his
+touch, I tell you!"
+
+"That's right," mumbled the Tramp, watching the whole performance with
+approval. "Folks without something are always sharper than the others."
+But this reference to a wooden leg was also too low for any one to hear
+it.
+
+Besides Stumper was saying something wonderful just then; he lowered
+his voice to say it; there was suppressed excitement in him; he frowned
+and looked half savagely at them all:
+
+"I found other signs as well," he whispered darkly. "Two other signs.
+In the darkness of those bushes I saw--another flash--two of 'em!" And
+he slowly extended his other hand which till now he had kept behind his
+back. It was tightly clenched. He unloosed the fingers gradually.
+"Look!" he whispered mysteriously. And the hand lay open before their
+eyes. "He's been hiding in those very bushes, I tell you. A moment
+sooner and we might have caught him."
+
+His enthusiasm ran all over them as they pressed forward to examine the
+second grimy hand. There were two things visible in it, and both were
+moving. One, indeed, moved so fast that they hardly saw it. There was a
+shining glimpse--a flash of lovely golden bronze shot through with
+blue--and it was gone. Like a wee veiled torch it scuttled across the
+palm, climbed the thumb, popped down the other side and dropped upon
+the ground. Vanished as soon as seen!
+
+"A beetle!" exclaimed Uncle Felix. "A tiny beetle!"
+
+"But dipped in colour," said Stumper with enthusiasm, "the colour of
+the dawn!"
+
+"Another sign! I never!" He was envious of the soldier's triumph.
+
+"He looks in the unlikely places," muttered the Tramp again,
+approvingly. "You've been pretty warm this time." But, again, he said
+it too low to be audible. Besides, Stumper's other "find" engrossed
+everybody's attention. All were absorbed in the long, dainty object
+that clung cautiously to his hand and showed no desire to hurry out of
+sight after the brilliant beetle. It was familiar enough to all of
+them, yet marvellous. It presented itself in a new, original light.
+
+They watched it spellbound; its tiny legs moved carefully over the
+wrinkles of the soldier's skin, feeling its way most delicately, and
+turning its head this way and that to sniff the unaccustomed odour.
+Sometimes it looked back to admire its own painted back, and to let its
+distant tail know that all was going well. The coloured hairs upon the
+graceful body were all a-quiver. It fairly shone. There was obviously
+no fear in it; it had perfect control of all its length and legs. Yet,
+fully aware that it was exploring a new country, it sometimes raised
+its head in a hesitating way and looked questioningly about it and even
+into the great faces so close against its eyes.
+
+"A caterpillar! A common Woolly Bear!" observed Tim, yet with a touch
+of awe.
+
+"It tickles," observed Stumper.
+
+"I'll get a leaf," Judy whispered. "It doesn't understand your smell,
+probly." She turned and picked the biggest she could find, and the
+caterpillar, after careful observation, moved forward on to it, turning
+to inform its following tail that all was safe. Gently and cleverly
+they restored it to the bush whence Stumper had removed it. It went to
+join the snail-shell and the beetle. They stood a moment in silence and
+watched the quiet way it hid itself among the waves of green the wind
+stirred to and fro. It seemed to melt away. It hid itself. It left
+them. It was gone.
+
+And Stumper turned and looked at them with the air of a man who has
+justified himself. He had certainly discovered definite signs.
+
+But there was bewilderment among the group as well as pleasure. For
+signs, they began to realise now, were everywhere indeed. The world was
+smothered with them. There was no one clear track that they could
+follow. All Nature seemed organised to hide the thing they looked for.
+It was a conspiracy. It was, indeed, an "enormous hide," an endless
+game of hide-and-seek. The interest and the wonder increased sensibly
+in their hearts. The thing they sought to find, the Stranger, "It," by
+whatever name each chose to call the mysterious and evasive "hider,"
+was so marvellously hidden. The glimpse they once had known seemed
+long, long ago, and very far away. It lay like a sweet memory in each
+heart, half forgotten, half remembered, but always entirely believed
+in, very dear and very exquisite. The precious memory urged them
+forward. They would search and search until they re-discovered it, even
+though their whole lives were spent in the looking. They were quite
+positive they would find him in the end.
+
+All this lay somehow in the expression on Stumper's face as he glared
+at them and ejaculated a triumphant "There! I told you so!" And at that
+moment, as though to emphasize the thrill of excited bewilderment they
+felt, a gorgeous brimstone butterfly sailed carelessly past before
+their eyes and vanished among the pools of sunlight by the forest edge.
+Its presence added somehow to the elusive and difficult nature of their
+search. Its flamboyant beauty was a kind of challenge.
+
+"That's what the caterpillar gets into," observed Tim dreamily.
+
+"Let's follow it," said Judy. "_I_ believe the flying signs are best."
+
+"Puzzlin' though," put in the Tramp behind them. They had quite
+forgotten his existence. "Let's ask the gardener what _he_ thinks."
+
+He pointed to a spot a little further along the edge of the wood where
+the figure of a man was visible. It seemed a good idea. Led by the
+Tramp, Uncle Felix and Stumper following slowly in the rear, they moved
+forward in a group. Weeden might have seen something. They would ask
+him.
+
+
+
+
+WEEDEN'S SIGN
+
+VII
+
+
+John WEEDEN--the children always saw his surname in capitals--was
+probably the most competent Head Gardener of his age, or of any other
+age: he supplied the household with fruit and vegetables without
+grumbling or making excuses. When asked to furnish flowers at short
+notice for a dinner-party he made no difficulty, but just produced
+them. Neither did he complain about the weather; wet or dry, it was
+always exactly what his garden needed. All weather to him was Fine
+Weather. He believed in his garden, loved it, lived in it, was almost
+part of it. To make excuses for it was to make excuses for himself.
+WEEDEN was a genius.
+
+But he was mysterious too. He was one-eyed, and the loss endeared him
+to the children, relating him also, once or twice removed, to Come-Back
+Stumper; it touched their imaginations. Being an artist, too, he never
+told them how he lost it, a pitchfork and a sigh were all he vouchsafed
+upon the exciting subject. He understood the value of restraint, and
+left their minds to supply what details they liked best. But this wink
+of pregnant suggestion, while leaving them divinely unsatisfied, sent
+them busily on the search. They imagined the lost optic roaming the
+universe without even an attendant eyelid, able to see things on its
+own account--invisible things. "Weeden's lost eye's about," was a
+delightful and mysterious threat; while "I can see with the Gardener's
+lost eye," was a claim to glory no one could dispute, for no one could
+deny it. Its chief duty, however, was to watch the "froot and vegebles"
+at night and to keep all robbers--two-foot, four-foot, winged, or
+wriggling robbers--from what Aunt Emily called "destroying everything."
+
+A source of wonder to the children, this competent official was at the
+same time something of an enigma to the elders. His appearance, to
+begin with, was questionable, and visitors, being shown round the
+garden, had been known to remark upon it derogatively sometimes. It was
+both in his favour and against him. For, either he looked like an
+untidy parcel of brown paper, loose ends of string straggling out of
+him, or else--in his Sunday best--was indistinguishable from a
+rose-bush wrapped up carefully in matting against the frost. Yet, in
+either aspect, no one could pretend that he looked like anything but a
+genuine Head Gardener, the spirit of the kitchen-garden and the
+potting-shed incarnate.
+
+It was the way he answered questions that earned for him the title of
+enigma--he avoided a direct reply. (He was so cautious that he would
+hesitate even when he came to die.) He would think twice about it. The
+decision to draw the final breath would incapacitate him. He would feel
+worse--and probably continue alive instead, from sheer inability to
+make his mind up. In all circumstances, owing to his calling doubtless,
+he preferred to hedge. If Mrs. Horton asked for celery, he would
+intimate "I'll have a look." When Daddy enquired how the asparagus was
+doing, he obtained for reply, "Won't you come and see it for yourself,
+sir?" Upon Mother's anxious enquiry if there would be enough
+strawberries for the School Treat, WEEDEN stated "It's been a grand
+year for the berries, mum." Then, just when she felt relieved, he
+added, "on the 'ole."
+
+For the children, therefore, the Gardener was a man of mystery and
+power, and when they saw his figure in the distance, their imagination
+leaped forward with their bodies, and WEEDEN stood wrapped in a glory
+he little guessed. He was bent double, digging (as usual in his spare
+time) for truffles beneath the beech trees. These mysterious delicacies
+with the awkward name he never found, but he liked looking for them.
+
+At first he was so intent upon his endless quest that he did not hear
+the approach of footsteps.
+
+"No hurry," said the Tramp, as they collected round the stooping figure
+and held their feathers up to warn his back. For the wandering eye had
+a way of seeing what went on behind him. An empty sack, waiting for the
+truffles, lay beside him. He looked like an untidy parcel, so he was
+_not_ in his Sunday clothes.
+
+At the sound of voices he straightened slowly and looked round. He
+seemed pleased with everything, judging by the expression of his eye,
+yet doubtful of immediate success.
+
+"Good mornin'," he said, touching his speckled cap to the authorities.
+
+"Found any?" enquired Uncle Felix, sympathetically.
+
+"It seems a likely spot, maybe," was the reply. "I'm looking." And he
+closed the mouth of the sack with his foot lest they should see its
+emptiness.
+
+But the use of the verb set the children off at once.
+
+"I say," Tim exploded eagerly, "we're looking too--for somebody who's
+hiding. Have you seen any one?"
+
+"Some one very wonderful?" said Judy. "Has he passed this way? It's
+Hide-and-Seek, you know."
+
+WEEDEN looked more mysterious at once. It was strange how a one-eyed
+face could express so big a meaning. He scratched his head and smiled.
+
+"All my flowers and vegitubles is a-growin' nicely," he said at length.
+"It is a lovely mornin' for a game." His eye closed and opened. The
+answer was more direct than usual. It meant volumes. WEEDEN was in the
+know. They felt him somehow related to their leader--a kind of
+organised and regulated tramp.
+
+"You _have_ seen him, then?" cried Judy.
+
+"With your gone eye!" exclaimed Tim. "Which way? And what signs have
+you got?"
+
+"Flowers, beetles, snail-shells, caterpillars--anything beautiful is a
+sign, you know," went on Judy, breathlessly.
+
+"Deep, tender, kind and beautiful," interposed the Tramp, laying the
+accent significantly on the first adjective, as if for Weeden's special
+benefit.
+
+WEEDEN looked up. "Sounds like my garden things," he said darkly, more
+to himself than to the others. He gazed down into the hole he had been
+digging. The moist earth glistened in the sunlight. He sniffed the
+sweet, rich odour of it, and scratched his head in the same spot as
+before--just beneath the peak of his speckled cap. His nose wrinkled
+up. Then he looked again into the faces, turning his single eye slowly
+upon each in turn. The Tramp's remark had reached his cautious brain.
+
+"There's no sayin' where anybody sich as you describe him to be might
+hide hisself a day like this," he observed deliberately, his optic
+ranging the sunny landscape with approval. "I never saw sich a
+beautiful day before--not like to-day. It's endless sort of. Seems to
+me as if I'd been at this 'ole for weeks."
+
+He paused. The others waited. WEEDEN was going to say something real
+any moment now, they felt.
+
+"No hurry," the Tramp reminded him. "Everything's light and careless,
+and so are we. There is no longer any Time--to lose."
+
+His voice half sang, half chanted in the slow, windy way he had, and
+the Gardener looked up as if a falling apple had struck him on the
+head. He shifted from one leg to the other; he seemed excited, moved.
+His single eye was opened--to the sun. He looked as if his body was
+full of light.
+
+"_You_ was the singer, was you?" he asked wonderingly, the tone low and
+quiet. "It was you I heard a-singin'--jest as dawn broke!" He scratched
+his head again. "And me thinkin' all the time it was a bird!" he added
+to himself.
+
+The Tramp said nothing.
+
+WEEDEN then resumed his ordinary manner; he went on speaking as before.
+But obviously--somewhere deep down inside himself--he had come to a big
+decision.
+
+"Gettin' nearer and nearer," he resumed his former conversation exactly
+where he had left it off, "but never near enough to get
+disappointed--ain't it? When you gets to the end of anything, you see,
+it's over. And that's a pity."
+
+Uncle Felix glanced at Stumper; Stumper glanced down at the end of his
+"wooden" leg; the Tramp still said nothing, smiling in his beard, now
+combed out much smoother than before.
+
+"It comes to this," said Weeden, "my way of thinkin' at least." He
+scratched wisdom from another corner of his head. "There's a lot of
+'iding goin' on, no question about _that_; and the great thing is--my
+way of thinkin' at any rate--is--jest to keep on lookin'."
+
+The children met him eagerly at this point, using two favourite words
+that Aunt Emily strongly disapproved of: "deslidedly," said one;
+"distinkly," exclaimed the other.
+
+"That's it," continued WEEDEN, pulling down his cap to hide, perhaps,
+the spot where wisdom would leak out. "And, talking of signs, I
+say--find out yer own pertickler sign, then follow it blindly--till the
+end."
+
+He straightened up and looked with an air of respectful candour at the
+others. The decision of his statement delighted them. The children felt
+something of awe in it. Something of their Leader's knowledge evidently
+was in him.
+
+"Miss Judy, she gets 'er signs from the air," he said, as no one spoke.
+"Master Tim goes poking along the ground, looking for something with
+his feet. He feels best that way, feels the earth--things a-growin' up
+or things wot go down into 'oles. Colonel Stumper--and no offence to
+you, sir--chooses dark places where the sun forgets to shine--"
+
+"Dangerous, jungly places," whispered Tim, admiringly.
+
+"And Mr. Felix--" he hesitated. Uncle Felix's easiest way of searching
+seemed to puzzle him. "Mr. Felix," he went on at length, "jest messes
+about all over the place at once, because 'e sees signs everywhere and
+don't know what to foller in partickler for fear of losin' hisself."
+
+Come-Back Stumper chuckled audibly, but Uncle Felix asked at once--"And
+you, WEEDEN? What about yourself, I wonder?"
+
+The Gardener replied without his usual hesitation. It was probably the
+most direct reply he had ever made. No one could guess how much it cost
+him. "Underground," he said. "My signs lies underground, sir. Where the
+rain-drops 'ides theirselves on getting down and the grubs keeps secret
+till they feel their wings. Where the potatoes and the reddishes is,"
+he added, touching his cap with a respectful finger. He went on with a
+hint of yearning in his tone that made it tremble slightly: "If I could
+find igsackly where and 'ow the potatoes gets big down there"--he
+pointed to the earth--"or how my roses get colour out of the dirt--I'd
+know it, wouldn't I, sir? I'd--'ave him, fair!"
+
+The effort exhausted him, it seemed. So deeply was he moved that he had
+almost gone contrary to his own nature in making such an explicit
+statement. But he had said something very real at last. It was clear
+that he was distinctly in the know. Living among natural growing
+things, he was in touch with life in a deeper sense than they were.
+
+"And me?" the Tramp mentioned lightly, smiling at his companion of the
+outdoor life. "Don't leave me out, please. I'm looking like the rest of
+you."
+
+WEEDEN turned round and gazed at him. He wore a strange expression that
+had respect in it, but something more than mere respect. There was a
+touch of wonder in his eye, a hint of worship almost. But he did not
+answer; no word escaped his lips. Instead of speaking he moved up
+nearer; he took three cautious steps, then halted close beside the
+great burly figure that formed the centre of the little group.
+
+And then he did a curious and significant little act; he held out both
+his hands against him as a man might hold out his hands to warm them
+before a warm and comforting grate of blazing coals.
+
+"Fire," he said; then added, "and I'm much obliged to you."
+
+He wore a proud and satisfied air, grateful and happy too. He put his
+cap straight, picked up his spade, and prepared without another word to
+go on digging for truffles where apparently none existed. He seemed
+quite content with--looking.
+
+A pause followed, broken presently by Tim: a whisper addressed to all.
+
+"He never finds any. That shows how real it is."
+
+"They're somewhere, though," observed Judy.
+
+They stood and watched the spade; it went in with a crunching sound; it
+came out slowly with a sort of "pouf," and a load of rich, black earth
+slid off it into the world of sunshine. It went in again, it came out
+again; the rhythm of the movement caught them. How long they watched it
+no one knew, and no one cared to know: it might have been a moment, it
+may have been a year or two; so utterly had hurry vanished out of life
+it seemed to them they stood and watched for ever...when they became
+aware of a curious sensation, as though they felt the whole earth
+turning with them. They were moving, surely. Something to which they
+belonged, of which they formed a part--was moving. A windy voice was
+singing just in front of them. They looked up. The words were
+inaudible, but they knew it was a bit of the same old song that every
+one seemed singing everywhere as though the Day itself were singing.
+
+The Tramp was going on.
+
+"Hark!" said Tim. "The birds are singing. Let's go on and look."
+
+"The world is wild with laughter," Judy cried, snatching the words from
+the air about her. "We can fly--" She darted after him.
+
+"Among the imprisoned hours as we choose," boomed the voice of Uncle
+Felix, as he followed, rolling in behind her.
+
+"We can play," growled Stumper, hobbling next in the line. "_My_ life
+has just begun."
+
+Their Leader waited till they all came up with him. They caught him up,
+gathering about him like things that settled on a sunny bush. It almost
+seemed they were one single person growing from the earth and air and
+water. The Tramp glowed there between them like a heart of burning fire.
+
+"_He_ ought to be with us, too," said Judy, looking back.
+
+"No hurry," replied the Tramp. "Let him be; he's following _his_ sign.
+When he's ready, he'll come along. It's a lovely day."
+
+They moved with the rhythm of a flock of happy birds across the field
+of yellow flowers, singing in chorus something or other about an "extra
+day." A hundred years flowed over them, or else a single instant. It
+mattered not. They took no heed, at any rate. It was so enormous that
+they lost themselves, and yet so tiny that they held it between a
+finger and a thumb. The important thing was--that they were getting
+warmer.
+
+Then Judy suddenly nudged Tim, and Tim nudged Uncle Felix, and Uncle
+Felix dug his elbow into Come-Back Stumper, and Stumper somehow or
+other caught the attention of the Tramp--a sort of panting sound,
+half-whistle and half-gasp. They paused and looked behind them.
+
+"He's ready," remarked their Leader, with a laughing chuckle in his
+beard. "He's coming on!"
+
+WEEDEN, sure enough, had quietly shouldered his shovel and empty sack,
+and was making after them, singing as he came. Judy was on the point of
+saying to her brother, "Good thing Aunt Emily isn't here!" when she
+caught a look in his eyes that stopped her dead.
+
+
+
+
+AUNT EMILY FINDS--HERSELF
+
+VIII
+
+
+"My dear!" he exclaimed in his tone of big discovery.
+
+Judy made a movement like a swan that inspects the world behind its
+back. She tried to look everywhere at once. It seemed she did so.
+
+"Gracious me!" she cried. She instinctively chose prohibited words.
+"_My_ gracious me!"
+
+For the places of the world had marvellously shifted and run into one
+another somehow. A place called "Somewhere Else" was close about her;
+and standing in the middle of it was--a figure. Both place and figure
+ought to have been somewhere else by rights. Judy's surprise, however,
+was quite momentary; swift, bird-like understanding followed it. Place
+was a sham and humbug really; already, without leaving the schoolroom
+carpet, she and Tim had been to the Metropolis and even to the East.
+This was merely another of these things she didn't know she knew; she
+understood another thing she didn't understand. She believed.
+
+The rest of the party had disappeared inside the wood; only Tim
+remained--pointing at this figure outlined against the trees. But these
+trees belonged to a place her physical eyes had never seen. Perhaps
+they were part of her mental picture of it. The figure, anyhow, barred
+the way.
+
+It was a woman, the last person in the world they wished to see just
+then. The face, wearing an expression as though it tried to be happy
+when it felt it ought not to be, was pointed; chin, ears, and eye-brows
+pointed; nose pointed too--round doors and into corners--an elastic
+nose; there was a look of struggling sweetness about the thin, tight
+lips; the entire expression, from the colourless eyes down to the tip
+of the decided chin, was one of marked reproach and disapproval that at
+the same time fought with an effort to be understanding, gentle, wise.
+The face wanted to be very nice, but was prevented by itself. It was
+pathetic. Its owner was dressed in black, a small, neat bonnet fastened
+carefully on the head, an umbrella in one hand, and big goloshes on
+both feet. There were gold glasses balanced on the nose. She smiled at
+them, but with a smile that prophesied rebuke. Before she spoke a word,
+her entire person said distinctly NO.
+
+"Bother!" Tim muttered beneath his breath, then added, "It's her!"
+Already he felt guilty--of something he had not done, but might do
+presently. The figure's mere presence invited him to break all rules.
+
+"We thought," exclaimed Judy, trying to remember what rules she had
+just disobeyed, and almost saying "hoped,"--"we thought you were at
+Tunbridge Wells." Then with an effort she put in "Aunty."
+
+Yet about the new arrival was a certain flustered and uneasy air, as
+though she were caught in something that she wished to hide--at any
+rate something she would not willingly confess to. One hand, it was
+noticed, she kept stiffly behind her back.
+
+"Children," she uttered in an emphatic voice, half-surprised
+remonstrance, half-automatic rebuke; "I am astonished!" She looked it.
+She pursed her lips more tightly, and gazed at the pair of culprits as
+though she had hoped better things of them and _again_ had been
+disappointed. "You know quite well that this is out of bounds." It came
+out like an arrow, darting.
+
+"We were looking for some one," began Tim, but in a tone that added
+plainly enough "it wasn't you."
+
+"Who's hiding, you see," quoth Judy, "but expecting us--at once." The
+delay annoyed her.
+
+"You are both well aware," Aunt Emily went on, ignoring their excuses
+as in duty bound, "that your parents would not approve. At this hour of
+the morning too! You ought to be fast asleep in bed. If your father
+knew--!"
+
+Yet, strange to say, the children felt that they loved her suddenly;
+for the first time in their lives they thought her lovable. A kind of
+understanding sympathy woke in them; there was something pitiable about
+her. For, obviously, she was looking just as they were, but looking in
+such a silly way and in such hopelessly stupid places. All her life she
+had been looking like this, dressed in crackling black, wearing a
+prickly bonnet and heavy goloshes, and carrying a useless umbrella that
+of course must bother her. It was disappointment that made her talk as
+she did. But it was natural she should feel disappointment, for it
+never rained when she had her umbrella, and her goloshes were always
+coming off.
+
+"She's stuck in a hole," thought Tim, "and so she just says things at
+us. She hurts herself somewhere. She's tired."
+
+"She has to be like that," thought Judy. "It's really all pretending.
+Poor old thing!"
+
+But Aunt Emily was not aware of what they felt. They were out of bed,
+and it was her duty to find fault; they were out of bounds, and she
+must take note of it. So she prepared to scold a little. Her bonnet
+waggled ominously. She gripped her umbrella. She spoke as though it was
+very early in the morning, almost dawn--as though the sun were rising.
+There was confusion in her as to the time of day, it seemed. But the
+children did not notice this. They were so accustomed to being rebuked
+by her that the actual words made small impression. She was just
+"saying things"; they were often very muddled things; the attitude, not
+the meaning, counted. And her attitude, they divined, was subtly
+different.
+
+"You know this is forbidden," she said. "It is damp and chilly. It's
+sure to rain presently. You'll get your feet wet. You should keep to
+the gravel paths. They're plain enough, are they not?" She looked about
+her, sniffing--a sniff that usually summoned disasters in a flock.
+
+"Oh, yes," said Tim; "and they look like brown sugar, _we_ thought."
+
+"It does not matter what you thought, Timothy. The paths are made on
+purpose to be walked upon and used--"
+
+"They're beautifully made," interrupted Judy, unable to keep silent
+longer. "WEEDEN made them for us."
+
+"And we've used them all," exclaimed Tim, "only we came to an end of
+them. We've done with them--paths!" The way he uttered the substantives
+made it instantly sound ridiculous.
+
+Aunt Emily opened her mouth to say something, then closed it again
+without saying it. She stared at them instead. They watched her. All
+fear of her had left their hearts. A new expression rose struggling
+upon her pointed features. She fidgeted from one foot to the other.
+They felt her as "Aunty," a poor old muddled thing, always looking in
+ridiculous places without the smallest notion she was wrong. Tim saw
+her suddenly "all dressed up on purpose" as for a game. Judy thought
+"She's bubbling inside--really."
+
+"There's WEEDEN in there," Tim mentioned, pointing to the wood behind
+her.
+
+Something uncommonly like a smile passed into Aunt Emily's eyes, then
+vanished as suddenly as it came. Judy thought it was like a bubble that
+burst the instant it reached the sunlight on the surface of a pond.
+
+"And how often," came the rebuke, automatically rather, "has your
+Mother told you _not_ to be familiar with the Gardener? Play if you
+want to, but do not play with your inferiors. Play with your Uncle
+Felix, with Colonel Stumper, or with me--"
+
+Another bubble had risen, caught the sunshine, reflected all the
+colours of the prism, then burst and vanished into airy spray.
+
+"But they're looking with us," Tim insisted eagerly. "We're all looking
+together for something--Uncle Felix, Come-Back Stumper, everybody. It's
+wonderful. It never ends."
+
+Aunt Emily's hand, still clutching the umbrella, stole up and put her
+bonnet straight. It was done to gain a little time apparently. There
+was a certain hesitation in her. She seemed puzzled. She betrayed
+excitement too.
+
+"Looking, are you?" she exclaimed, and her voice held a touch of
+mellowness that was new. "Looking!"
+
+She stopped. She tried to hide the mellowness by swallowing it.
+
+"Yes," said Tim. "There's some one hiding. It's Hide-and-Seek, you see.
+We're the seekers. It's enormous."
+
+"Will you come with us and look too?" suggested Judy simply. Then while
+Aunt Emily's lips framed themselves as from long habit into a negative
+or a reprimand, the child continued before either reached delivery:
+"There are heaps of signs about; anything lovely or beautiful is a
+sign--a sign that we're getting warm. We've each got ours. Mine's air.
+What's yours, Aunty?"
+
+Aunt Emily stared at them; her bewilderment increased apparently; she
+swallowed hard again. The children returned her stare, gazing
+innocently into her questioning eyes as if she were some strange bird
+at the Zoo. The new feeling of kinship with her grew stronger in their
+hearts. They knew quite well she was looking just as they were;
+_really_ she longed to play their game of Hide-and-Seek. She was very
+ignorant, of course, they saw, but they were ready and willing to teach
+her how to play, and would make it easy for her into the bargain.
+
+"Signs!" she repeated, in a voice that was gentler than they had ever
+known it. There was almost a sound of youth in it. Judy suddenly
+realised that Aunt Emily had once been a girl. A softer look shone in
+the colourless eyes. The lips relaxed. In a hat she might have been
+even pretty. No one in a bonnet could be jolly. "Signs!" she repeated;
+"deep and beautiful! Whatever in the world--?"
+
+She stopped abruptly, started by the exquisite trilling of a bird that
+was perched upon a branch quite close behind her. The liquid notes
+poured out in a stream of music, so rich, so lovely that it seemed as
+if no bird had ever sung before and that they were the first persons in
+the world who had ever heard it.
+
+"My sign!" cried Judy, dancing round her disconcerted and bewildered
+relative. "One of my signs--that!"
+
+"Mine is rabbits and rats and badgers," Tim called out with
+ungrammatical emphasis. "Anything that likes the earth are mine." He
+looked about him as if to point one out to her. "They're everywhere,
+all over the place," he added, seeing none at the moment. "Aunty,
+what's yours? Do tell us, because then we can go and look together."
+
+"It's _much_ more fun than looking alone," declared Judy.
+
+No answer came. But, caught by the astounding magic of the singing
+bird, Aunt Emily had turned, and in doing so the hand behind her back
+became visible for the first time since their meeting. The children saw
+it simultaneously. They nudged each other, but they said no word. The
+same moment, having failed to discover the bird, Aunt Emily turned back
+again. She looked caught, they thought. But, also she looked as if she
+had found something herself. The secret joy she tried to hide from them
+by swallowing it, rose to her wrinkled cheeks and shone in both her
+eyes, then overflowed and rippled down towards her trembling mouth. The
+lips were trembling. She smiled, but so softly, sweetly, that ten years
+dropped from her like a dissolving shadow. And the hand she had so long
+kept hidden behind her back stole forth slowly into view.
+
+"How did you guess that I was looking for anything?" she inquired
+plaintively in an excited yet tremulous tone. "I thought no one knew
+it." She seemed genuinely surprised, yet unbelievably happy too. A
+great sigh of relief escaped her.
+
+"We're all the same," one of them informed her; "so you are too!
+Everybody's looking." And they crowded round to examine the objects in
+her hand--a dirty earth-stained trowel and a fern. They knew she
+collected ferns on the sly, but never before had they seen her bring
+home such a prize. Usually she found only crumpled things like old bits
+of wrinkled brown paper which she called "specimens." This one was
+marvellously beautiful. It had a dainty, slender stalk of ebony black,
+and its hundred tiny leaves quivered like a shower of green water-drops
+in the air. There was actual joy in every trembling bit of it.
+
+"That's my sign," announced Aunt Emily with pride: "Maidenhair! It'll
+grow again. I've got the roots." And she said it as triumphantly as
+Stumper had said "snail-shell."
+
+"Of course, Aunty," Judy cried, yet doubtfully. "_You_ ought to know."
+She twiddled it round in her fingers till the quivering fronds emitted
+a tiny sound. "And you can use it as a feather too." She lowered her
+head to listen.
+
+"We've each got a feather," mentioned Tim. "It's a compass. Shows the
+way, you know. You hear him calling--that way."
+
+"The Tramp explained that," Judy added. "He's Leader. Come on, Aunty.
+We ought to be off; the others went ages ago. We're going to the End of
+the World, and they've already started."
+
+For a moment Aunt Emily looked as rigid as the post beside a
+five-barred gate. The old unbending attitude took possession of her
+once again. Her eyes took on the tint of soapy water. Her elastic nose
+looked round the corner. She frowned. Her black dress crackled. The
+mention of a tramp and the End of the World woke all her savage
+educational instincts visibly.
+
+"He's a singing tramp and shines like a Christmas Tree," explained
+Judy, "and he looks like everybody in the world. He's extror'iny." She
+turned to her brother. "Doesn't he, Tim?"
+
+Tim ran up and caught his Aunt by the umbrella hand. He saw her
+stiffening. He meant to prevent it if he could.
+
+"Everybody rolled into one," he agreed eagerly; "Daddy and Mother and
+the Clergyman and you."
+
+"And me?" she asked tremulously.
+
+"Rather!" the boy said vehemently; "as you are now, all rabbity and
+nice."
+
+Aunt Emily slowly removed one big golosh, then waited.
+
+"Cleaned up and young," cried Judy, "and smells delicious--like flowers
+and hay--"
+
+"And soft and warm--"
+
+"And sings and dances--"
+
+"And is positive that if we go on looking we shall find--exactly what
+we're looking for."
+
+Aunt Emily removed the other golosh--a shade more quickly than the
+first one. She kicked it off. The stiffness melted out of her; she
+smiled again.
+
+"Well," she began--when Judy stood on tip-toe and whispered in her ear
+some magic sentence.
+
+"Dawn!" Aunt Emily whispered back. "At dawn--when the birds begin to
+sing!"
+
+Something had caught her heart and squeezed it.
+
+Tim and Judy nodded vehemently in agreement. Aunt Emily dropped her
+umbrella then. And at the same moment a singing voice became audible in
+the trees behind them. The song came floating to them through the
+sunlight with a sound of wind and birds. It had a marvellous quality,
+very sweet and very moving. There was a lilt in it, a laughing, happy
+lilt, as though the Earth herself were singing of the Spring.
+
+And Aunt Emily made one last vain attempt: she struggled to put her
+fingers in her ears. But the children held her hands. She crackled and
+made various oppressive and objecting sounds, but the song poured into
+her in spite of all her efforts. Her feet began to move upon the grass.
+It was awful, it was shocking, it was forbidden and against all rules
+and regulations: yet--Aunt Emily danced!
+
+And a thin, plaintive voice, like the voice of her long-forgotten
+youth, slipped out between her faded lips--and positively sang:
+
+     "The world is young with laughter; we can fly
+      Among the imprisoned hours as we choose...."
+
+But to Tim and Judy it all seemed merely right and natural.
+
+"Come on," cried the boy, pulling his Aunt towards the wood.
+
+"We can look together now. You've got your sign," exclaimed Judy,
+tugging at her other hand. "Everything's free and careless, and so are
+we."
+
+"Aim for a path," Tim shouted by way of a concession. "Aunty'll go
+quicker on a path."
+
+But Aunty was nothing if not decided. "I know a short-cut," she sang.
+"Paths are for people who don't know the way. There's no time--to lose.
+Dear me! I'm warm already!" She dropped her umbrella.
+
+And, actually dancing and singing, she led the way into the wood,
+holding the fern before her like a wand, and happy as a girl let out of
+school.
+
+But as they went, Judy, knowing suddenly another thing she didn't know,
+made a discovery of her own, an immense discovery. It was bigger than
+anything Tim had ever found. She felt so light and swift and winged by
+it that she seemed almost to melt into the air herself.
+
+"I say, Tim," she said.
+
+"Yes."
+
+She took her eyes from the sky to see what her feet were doing; Tim
+lifted his from the earth to see what was going on above him in the air.
+
+Judy went on: "I know what," she announced.
+
+"What?" He was not particularly interested, it seemed.
+
+Judy paused. She dropped a little behind her dancing Aunt. Tim joined
+her. It all happened as quickly as a man might snap his fingers; Aunt
+Emily, her heart full of growing ferns, noticed nothing.
+
+"We've found her out!" whispered Judy, communicating her immense
+discovery. "What she really is, I mean!"
+
+He agreed and nodded. It did not strike him as anything wonderful or
+special. "Oh, yes," he answered; "rather!" He did not grasp her
+meaning, perhaps.
+
+But his sister was bursting with excitement, radiant, shivering almost
+with the wonder of it.
+
+"But don't you see? It's--a sign!" she exclaimed so loud that Aunt
+Emily almost heard it. "She's found herself! She was hiding--from
+herself. That's part of it all--the game. It's the biggest sign of all!"
+
+She was so "warm" that she burned all over.
+
+"Oh, yes," repeated Tim. "I see!" But he was not particularly
+impressed. He merely wanted his Aunt to find an enormous fern whose
+roots were growing in the sweet, sticky earth _he_ loved. Her sign was
+a fern; his was the ground. It made him understand Aunt Emily at last,
+and therefore love her; he saw no further than that.
+
+Judy, however, _knew_. She suddenly understood what the Tramp meant by
+"deep." She also knew now why Stumper, WEEDEN, Uncle Felix too, looked
+at him so strangely, with wonder, with respect, with love. Something
+about the Tramp explained each one to himself. Each one found--himself.
+And she--without realising it before, had acquired this power too,
+though only in a small degree as yet. The Tramp believed in everybody;
+she, without knowing it, believed in her Aunt. It was another thing she
+didn't know she knew.
+
+And the real, long-buried, deeply-hidden Aunt Emily had emerged
+accordingly. All her life she had been hiding--from herself. She had
+found herself at last. It was the biggest sign of all.
+
+Tim caught her hand and dragged her after him. "Come on," he cried,
+"we're getting frightfully warm. Look at Aunty! Listen, will you?"
+
+Aunt Emily, a little way in front of them, was digging busily with her
+dirty trowel. Her bonnet was crooked, her skirts tucked up, her white
+worsted stockings splashed with mud, her elastic-sided boots scratched
+and plastered. And she was singing to herself in a thin but happy voice
+that was not unlike an old and throaty corncrake: "The birds are
+singing....Hark! Come out and play....Life is an endless
+search...._I've_ just begun...!"
+
+They listened for a little while, and then ran headlong up to join her.
+
+
+
+
+SIGNS EVERYWHERE!
+
+IX
+
+
+And it was somewhere about here and now--the exact spot impossible to
+determine, since it was obviously a circular experience without
+beginning, middle or end--that the gigantic character of the Day
+declared itself in all its marvellous simplicity. For as they dived
+deeper and deeper towards its centre, they discovered that its centre,
+being everywhere at once, existed--nowhere. The sun was always
+rising--somewhere.
+
+In other words, each seeker grasped, in his or her own separate way,
+that the Splendour hiding from them lay actually both too near and far
+away for any individual eye to see it with completeness. Someone,
+indeed, had come; but this Someone, as Judy told herself, was "simply
+all over the place." To see him "distinkly is an awful job," according
+to Uncle Felix; or as Come-Back Stumper realised in the middle of
+another clump of bramble bushes, "Perspective is necessary to proper
+vision." "He" lay too close before their eyes to be discovered fully.
+Tim had long ago described it instinctively as "an enormous hide," but
+it was more than that; it was a universal hide.
+
+Alone, perhaps, Weeden's lost optic, wandering ubiquitously and
+enjoying the bird's-eye view, possessed the coveted power. But, like
+the stars, though somewhat about, it was invisible. WEEDEN made no
+reference to it. He attended to one thing at a time, he lived in the
+present; one eye was gone; he just looked for truffles--with the other.
+
+Yet this did not damp their ardour in the least; increased it rather:
+the gathering of the clues became more and more absorbing. Though not
+seen, the hider was both known and felt; his presence was a certainty.
+There was no real contradiction.
+
+For signs grew and multiplied till the entire world seemed overflowing
+with them, and hardly could the earth contain them. They brimmed the
+sunny air, flooded the ponds and streams, lay thick upon the fields,
+and almost choked the woods to stillness. They trickled out, leaked
+through, dripped over everywhere in colour, shape, and sound. The hider
+had passed everywhere, and upon everything had left his exquisite and
+deathless traces. The inanimate, as well as the animate world had known
+the various touch of his great passing. His trail had blazed the entire
+earth about them. For the very clouds were dipped in snow and gold, and
+the meanest pebble in the lane wore a self-conscious gleam of shining
+silver. So-called domestic creatures also seemed aware that a
+stupendous hiding-place was somewhere near--the browsing cow, contented
+and at ease, the horse that nuzzled their hands across the gate, the
+very pigs, grubbing eternally for food, yet eternally unsatisfied; all
+these, this endless morning, wore an unaccustomed look as though they
+knew, and so were glad to be alive. Some knew more than others, of
+course. The cat, for instance, defending its kittens single-pawed
+against the stable-dog who pretended to be ferocious; the busy
+father-blackbird, passing worms to his mate for the featherless mites,
+all beak and clamour in the nest; the Clouded Yellow, sharing a spray
+of honeysuckle with a Bumble-bee, and the honeysuckle offering no
+resistance--one and all, they also were aware in their differing
+degrees. And the seekers, noting the signs, grew warmer and ever
+warmer. An ordinary day these signs, owing to their generous profusion,
+might have called for no remark. They would, probably, have drawn no
+attention to themselves, merely lying about unnoticed, undiscovered
+because familiar. But this was not an ordinary day. It was unused,
+unspoilt and unrecorded. It was the Some Day of humanity's long
+dream--an Extra Day. Time could not carry it away; it could not end;
+all it contained was of eternity. The great hider at the heart of it
+was real. These signs--deep, tender, kind and beautiful--were part of
+him, and in knowing, recognising them, they knew and recognised him
+too. They drew near, that is, brushed up closer, to his hiding-place
+from which _he_ saw them. They approached within knowing distance of a
+Reality that each in his or her particular way had always yearned for.
+They held--oh, distinkly held--that they were winning. They won the
+marvellous game as soon as it began. They never had a doubt about the
+end.
+
+But their supreme, superb discovery was this: They had always secretly
+longed to find the elusive hider; they now realised that _he_--wanted
+them to find him, and that from his hiding-place he saw them easily.
+That was the most wonderful thing of all....
+
+To describe the separate adventures of each seeker would involve a
+series of bulky trilogies no bookshelves in the world could carry; they
+can, besides, be adequately told in three simple words that Tim
+used--shouted with intense enthusiasm when he tripped over a
+rabbit-hole and tumbled headlong against that everlasting Tramp: "I'm
+still looking!" He dived away into another hole. "I'm looking still."
+"So am I," the Tramp answered, also in three words. "I'm _very_ warm,"
+growled Stumper; "I'm getting on," Aunt Emily piped; and while Judy was
+for ever shouting out "I've found him!" Uncle Felix, puffing and
+panting, could only repeat with rapture each time he met another
+seeker: "A lovely day! A _lovely_ day!" They said so
+little--experienced and felt so much!
+
+From time to time, too, others joined them in the tremendous game. It
+seemed the personality of the Tramp attracted them. Something about
+him--his sincerity, perhaps, or his simplicity--made them realise
+suddenly what they were about: as though they had not noticed it
+before, not understood it quite, at any rate. They found themselves. He
+did and said so little. But he possessed the unique quality of a
+Leader--natural persuasion.
+
+Thompson, for instance, cleaning the silver at the pantry window,
+looked up and saw them pass. They caught him unawares. His pompous
+manner hung like a discarded mask on a nail beside his livery. He wore
+his black and white striped waistcoat, and an apron. Of course he
+looked proper, as an old family servant ought to look, but he looked
+cheerful too. He was humming to himself as he polished up the covers
+and the candelabra.
+
+"Well, I never!" he exclaimed, as the line of them filed by. "I never
+did. And Mr. Weeden with 'em too!"
+
+The Tramp passed singing and looked through the open window at the
+butler. No more than that. Their eyes met between the bars. They
+exchanged glances. But something incalculable happened in that instant,
+just as it had happened to Stumper, Aunt Emily, and the rest of them.
+Thompson put several questions into his look of sheer astonishment.
+
+"Why not?" the Tramp replied, chuckling as he caught the butler's eye.
+"It's a lovely morning. We're just looking!"
+
+Thompson was flabbergasted--as if all the old-fashioned families of the
+world had suddenly praised him. All his life he had never done anything
+but his ordinary duty.
+
+"It's 'oliday time," said Weeden, coming next, "and all my flowers and
+vegitubles is a-growin' nicely." He too seemed singing, dancing.
+Something had happened. The whole world seemed out and playing.
+
+Thompson forgot himself in a most unusual way, forgot that he was an
+old family servant, that the apron-string met round his middle with
+difficulty, that the Authorities were away and his responsibilities
+increased thereby; forgot too, that for twenty years he had been
+answering bells, over-hearing conversations without pretending to do
+so, and that visitors wanted hot water and early tea at "7:30 sharp."
+He remembered suddenly that he was a man--and that he was very fond of
+some one. The birds were singing, the sun was shining, the flowers were
+out upon the lawn, and it was Spring.
+
+An amazing longing in him woke and stirred to life. There was a
+singular itching in his feet. Something in his butler-heart began to
+purr. "Looking, eh!" he thought. "There's something I've been looking
+for too. I'd forgot about it."
+
+"No one can make the silver shine as I can," he mumbled, watching the
+retreating figures, "but it is about finished now,"--he glanced down at
+it with pride--"and fit to set on the table. Why shouldn't I take a
+turn in the garden too?"
+
+He looked out a moment. The magic of the spring came upon him suddenly
+like a revelation. He knew he was alive, that there was something he
+wanted somewhere, something real and satisfying--if only he could find
+it--find out what it was. For twenty years he had been living
+automatically. Alfred Thompson suddenly felt free and careless. The
+butler--yearned!
+
+He hesitated, gave the dish-cover an extra polish, then called through
+the door to Mrs. Horton:
+
+"There's a tramp in the garden, Bridget, and Mr. Weeden's with him. Mr.
+Felix is halso taking the air, and Master Tim--"
+
+He stopped, hearing a step in the pantry. Mrs. Horton stood behind him
+with a shawl about her shoulders. Her red face was smiling.
+
+"Alfred, let's go out and take a look," she said. "Mary can see to the
+shepherd's-pie. I've been as quick as I could," she added, as if
+excusing herself. Moreover, she said distinctly, "shepherd's-_poie_."
+
+"_I_ haven't been 'calling,'" replied the butler, "except only just
+now--just this minute." He spoke as though he was being scolded for not
+answering a bell. But he cast an admiring glance, half wild, half
+reckless, at the cook.
+
+"An' you shouting to me to come this last 'arf hour and more!" cried
+Mrs. Horton. She, too, apparently, was in a "state."
+
+"You are mistaken, Bridget, I have been singing, as I often do when
+attending to the silver, but as for--"
+
+"You can do without a hat," she interrupted. "Come on! I want to go and
+look for--for--" She broke off, taking his arm as though they were
+going down the Strand or Oxford Street. Her red face beamed. She looked
+very proud and happy. She wanted to look for something too, but she
+could not believe the moment had really come. She had put it away so
+long--like a special dish in a cupboard.
+
+"I don't know what's come over me," she went on very confidentially, as
+she moved beside him through the scullery door, "but--but I don't feel
+satisfied--not satisfied with meself as I used to be."
+
+"No, Bridget?" It was in his best "7:30" manner. There was a struggle
+in him.
+
+"No," said Mrs. Horton, with decision. "I give satisfaction--that I
+know--"
+
+"We both do that," said Thompson proudly. "And no one can do a suet
+pudding to a turn as you can. Only the other day I heard Sir William
+a-speaking of it--"
+
+She held his arm more tightly. They were on the lawn by now. The flood
+of sunlight caught them, showed up the worn and shabby places in his
+suit of broadcloth, gleamed on her bursting shoes she "fancied" for her
+kitchen work. They heard the birds, they smelt the flowers, the air
+bathed them all over like a sea.
+
+"And the silver, Alfred," she said in a lower tone. "Who in the world
+can make it look as you do? But what I've been feeling lately--since
+this morning, that is to say--and feeling for the first time in me
+life, so to speak--"
+
+"Bridget, dear, you've got it!" he interrupted with excitement, "I've
+felt it too. Felt it this morning first, when I woke up and remembered
+that nobody wanted hot-water nor early tea, and I said to myself,
+'There's more than that in it. I'm not doing all this just only for a
+salary. I'm doing it for something else. What is it?'"
+
+He spoke very rapidly for a butler. He looked down at her red and
+smiling face.
+
+"What is it?" he repeated, curiously moved.
+
+She looked up at him without a word.
+
+"It's something 'idden," he said, after a pause. "That's what it is."
+
+"That's it," agreed Mrs. Horton. "Like a recipe."
+
+There was another pause. The butler broke it. They stood together in
+the middle of the field, flowers and birds and sunshine all about them.
+
+"A mystery--inside of us," he said, "I think--"
+
+"Yes, Alfred," the cook murmured softly.
+
+"_I_ think," he continued, "it's a song and dance we want. A little
+life." He broke off abruptly, noticing the sudden movement of her
+bursting shoes. She took a long step forwards, then sideways. She
+opened her arms to the air and sun. She almost pirouetted.
+
+"Life!" she cried, "'ot and fiery. Life! That's it. Hark, Alfred, d'ye
+hear that singing far away?" She felt the Irish break out of her.
+"Listen!" she cried, trying to drag him faster. "Listen, will ye? It
+makes me wild entirely! Give me yer hand! Come on and dance wid me!
+It's in me hearrt I feel it, in me blood. To the devil with me suet
+puddings and shepherd-poies--that singing's real, that's loife, that's
+lovely as a dhream! It's what I've been looking for iver since I can
+remember. I've got it!"
+
+And Thompson felt himself spinning through the air. Old families were
+forgotten. The world was young with laughter. They could fly. They did.
+
+The silver was beautifully cleaned. He had earned his holiday.
+
+"That singing!" he gasped, feeling his heart grow big. He followed her
+across the flowered world. "I believe it is a bird! It would not
+surprise me to be told--"
+
+"A birrd!" cried Mrs. Horton, turning him round and round. "It's a
+birrd from Heaven then! I've heard it all the morning. It's been
+singing in me heart for ages. Now it's out! Come follow it wid me!
+We'll go to the end of the wurrld to foinde it."
+
+Her kitchen energy--some called it temper--had discovered a greater
+scope than puddings.
+
+"There is no hurry," the butler panted, moving along with her, and
+trying hard to keep his balance. "We'll look together. We'll find it!"
+And as they raced across the field among the flowers after the line of
+disappearing figures, the Tramp looked back at them and waved his hand.
+
+"It's a lovely morning," he said, as they came up with the rest of the
+party. "So you're looking too?"
+
+Too much out of breath to answer, they just nodded, and the group
+accepted them without more to-do. Their object evidently was the same.
+Aunt Emily glanced up from her ferns, nodded and said, "Good morning,
+it's a lovely day"--and resumed her digging again. It was like shaking
+hands! They all went forward happily, eagerly, across the wide, wide
+world together.
+
+The absence of surprise the children knew had now become a
+characteristic everybody shared. All were in the same state together.
+The whole day flowed, there were no limitations or conditions, least of
+all surprise. Even WEEDEN had forgotten hedges and artificial
+boundaries. No one, therefore, ejaculated nor exclaimed when they ran
+across the Policeman. He, too, was looking for some one, but, having
+mislaid his notebook and pencil stub, was unable to mention any names,
+and was easily persuaded to join the body of eager seekers. Being a
+policeman, he was naturally a seeker by profession; he was always
+looking for somebody somewhere--somebody who was going in the wrong
+direction.
+
+"That's just it," he said, the moment he saw the Tramp, taking his
+helmet off as though an odd respect was in him. "That's just what I've
+always felt," he went on vaguely. "I'm looking for some one wot's
+a'looking for something else--only looking wrong."
+
+"In the wrong places," suggested Stumper, remembering his Indian
+scouting days.
+
+"In the wrong way," put in Uncle Felix, full of experience by now.
+
+The Policeman listened attentively, as though by rights he ought to
+enter these sentences laboriously in his notebook.
+
+"That's it, per'aps," he stated. "It takes 'em longer, but they finds
+out in the end. If I was to show 'em the right way of looking instead
+of arresting 'em--I'd be _reel_!" And then he added, as if he were
+giving evidence in a Court of Justice and before a County Magistrate,
+"There's no good looking for anything where it ain't, now is there?"
+
+"Precisely," agreed Colonel Stumper, remembering happily that his
+pockets were full of snail-shells. He knew _his_ sign.
+
+Thompson, Mrs. Horton, Weeden, and the Policeman glanced at him
+gratefully. But it was the last mentioned who replied:
+
+"Because every one," he said with conviction at last, "has his own way
+of looking, and even the burgular is only looking wrong." He, too, it
+seemed, had found himself.
+
+Their search, their endless hunt, their conversation and adventures
+thus might be reported endlessly, if only the book-shelves of the world
+were built more stoutly, and everybody could find an Extra Day lying
+about in which to read it all. Each seeker held true to his or her
+first love, obeying an infallible instinct. The adventure and romance
+that hid in Tim and Judy, respectively, sent them headlong after
+anything that offered signs of these two common but seductive
+qualities. Judy lived literally in the air, her feet, her heart, her
+eyes all off the ground; Tim, filled with an equally insatiable
+curiosity, found adorable danger in every rabbit-run, and rescued
+things innumerable. Off the ground he felt unsafe, unsure, and lost
+himself. Stumper, faithful to his scouting passion, disappeared into
+all kinds of undesirable places no one else would have dreamed of
+looking in, yet invariably--came back; and while Uncle Felix tried a
+little of everything and found "copy" in a puddle or a dandelion,
+Weeden carried his empty sack without a murmur, knowing it would be
+filled with truffles at the end. Aunt Emily, exceedingly particular,
+but no longer interfering with the others, was equally sure of herself.
+A touch of fluid youth ran in her veins again, and in her heart grew a
+fern that presently she would find everywhere outside as well--a
+maiden-hair.
+
+Each, however, in some marvellous way, shared the adventures of the
+others, as though the Tramp merged all seven of them into one single
+being, unified them, at any rate, into this one harmonious, common
+purpose with himself. For, while everybody had a different way of
+looking, everybody's way--for that particular individual--was exactly
+right.
+
+"Smell, then follow," was the secret. "Find your own sign and stick to
+it," the clue. Each sign, though by different routes, led straight
+towards the marvellous hiding-place. To urge one's own sign upon
+another was merely to delay that other; but to point out better signs
+of his own particular kind was to send him on faster than before. Thus
+there was harmony among them all, for every seeker, knowing this,
+had--found himself.
+
+
+
+
+REALITY
+
+X
+
+
+But, while there was no hurry, no passing, and, most certainly of all,
+no passing away, there was a sense of enormous interval. There were
+epochs, there were interludes, there was--duration.
+
+Though everything had only just begun, it was yet complete, if not
+completed.
+
+At any point of an adventure that adventure could be taken over from
+the very start, the experience holding all the thrill and wonder of the
+first time.
+
+Cake could be had and eaten too. Tim, half-way down a rabbit-hole,
+could instantly find himself at the opening again, bursting with all
+the original excitement of trembling calculations. With the others it
+was similar.
+
+There was no end to anything. Yet--there was this general consciousness
+of gigantic interval. It turned in a circle round them--everywhere....
+
+They came together, then, all eight of them, into that place of
+singular enchantment known as the End of the World, sitting in a group
+about the prostrate elm that on ordinary days was Home. What they had
+been doing each one knew assuredly, even if no one mentioned it. Tim,
+who had been to India with Come-Back Stumper, had a feeling in his
+heart that expressed itself in one word, "everywhere," accompanied by a
+sigh of happy satisfaction; Judy felt what she knew as "Neverness"; she
+had seen the Metropolis inside out, with Uncle Felix apparently. And
+these two couples now sat side by side upon the tree, gazing
+contentedly at the colony of wallflowers that flamed in the sunshine
+just above their heads. WEEDEN, cleaning his spade with a great nailed
+boot, turned his good eye affectionately upon the sack that lay beside
+him, full now to bursting. Aunt Emily breathed on her gold-rimmed
+glasses, rubbed them, and put them on her elastic nose, then looked
+about her peacefully yet expectantly, ready, it seemed, to start again
+at any moment--anywhere. She guarded carefully a mossy bundle in her
+black silk lap. A little distance from her Thompson was fastening a
+flower into Mrs. Horton's dress, and close to the gate stood the
+Policeman, smoking a pipe and watching everybody with obvious
+contentment. His belt was loose; both hands stuck into it; he leaned
+against the wooden fence.
+
+On the ground, between the tree and the fence, the Tramp had made a
+fire. He lay crouched about it. He and the fire belonged to one
+another. It seemed that he was dozing.
+
+And this sense of lying in the heart of an enormous circular interval
+touched everybody with delicious peace; each had apparently found
+something real, and was content merely to lie and--be with it. All came
+gradually to sitting or reclining postures. Yet there was no sense of
+fatigue; any instant they would be up again and looking.
+
+Occasionally one or other of them spoke, but it was not the kind of
+speech that struggled to express difficult ideas with tedious sentences
+of many words. There was very little to _say_: mere statements of
+indubitable reality could be so easily and briefly made.
+
+"Now," said Tim, unafraid of contradiction.
+
+"Then," said Judy, equally certain of herself.
+
+"Now then," declared Uncle Felix, positive at last of something.
+
+"Naturally," affirmed Aunt Emily.
+
+"Of course," growled Come-Back Stumper. And while WEEDEN, looking
+contentedly at his bursting sack, put in "Always," the Policeman,
+without referring to his notebook, added from the fence, "That's
+right." The remarks of Thompson and Mrs. Horton were not audible, for
+they were talking to one another some little distance away beside the
+Rubbish Heap, but their conversation seemed equally condensed and
+eloquent, judging by the satisfied expression on their faces. Thompson
+probably said, "Well," the cook adding, "I never!"
+
+The Tramp, stretched out beside his little fire of burning sticks,
+however, said more than any of them. He also said it shortly--as
+shortly as the children. There was never any question who was Leader.
+
+"Yes," he mentioned in a whisper that flowed about them with a sound
+like singing wind.
+
+It summed up everything in a single word. It made them warm, as though
+a little flame had touched them. All the languages of the world, using
+all their sentences at once, could have said no more than that
+consummate syllable--in the way _he_ said it: _"Yes!"_ It was the word
+the whole Day uttered.
+
+For this was perfectly plain: Each of the group, having followed his or
+her particular sign to the end of the world, now knew exactly where the
+hider lay. The supreme discovery was within reach at last. They were
+merely waiting, waiting in order to enjoy the revelation all the more,
+and--waiting in an ecstasy of joy and wonder. Seven or eight of them
+were gathered together; the hiding-place was found. It was now, and
+then, and natural, and always, and right: it was Yes, and life had just
+begun....
+
+There happened, then, a vivid and amazing thing--all rose as one being
+and stood up. The Tramp alone remained lying beside his little fire.
+But the others stood--and listened.
+
+The precise nature of what had happened none of them, perhaps, could
+explain. It was too marvellous; it was possibly the thing that nobody
+understands, and possibly the thing they didn't know they knew; yet
+_they_ both knew and understood it. To each, apparently, the
+hiding-place was simultaneously revealed. Their Signs summoned them.
+The hider called!
+
+Yet all they heard was the singing of a little bird. Invisible
+somewhere above them in the sea of blazing sunshine, it poured its
+heart out rapturously with a joy and a passion of life that seemed
+utterly careless as to whether it was heard or not. It merely sang
+because it was--alive.
+
+To Judy, at any rate, this seemed what they heard. To the others it
+came, apparently--otherwise. Their interpretations, at any rate, were
+various.
+
+Thompson and Mrs. Horton were the first to act. The latter looked about
+her, sniffing the air. "It's burning," she said. "Mary don't know
+enough. That's my job, anyhow!" and moved off in the direction of the
+house with an energy that had nothing of displeasure nor of temper in
+it. It was apparently crackling that she heard. Thompson went after
+her, a willing alacrity in his movements that yet showed no sign of
+undignified hurry. "I'll be at the door in no time," he was heard to
+say, "before it's stopped ringing, I should not wonder!" There was a
+solemn joy in him, he spoke as though he heard a bell. WEEDEN turned
+very quietly and watched their disappearing figures. He shouldered his
+heavy sack of truffles and his spade. No one asked him anything aloud,
+but, in answer to several questioning faces, he mumbled cautiously,
+though in a satisfied and pleasant voice, "My garden wants me--maybe;
+I'll have a look"--obviously going off to water the apricots and rose
+trees. He heard the dry leaves rustling possibly.
+
+"Keep to the gravel paths," began Aunt Emily, adjusting her gold
+glasses; "they're dry"--then changed her sentence, smiling to herself:
+"They're so beautifully made, I mean." And gathering up her bundle of
+living ferns, she walked briskly over the broken ground, then straight
+across the lawn, waving her trowel at them as she vanished in the shade
+below the lime trees. The shade, however, seemed deeper than before. It
+concealed her quickly.
+
+"I'll be moving on now," came the deep voice of the Policeman. He
+opened the gate in the fence and consulted a notebook as he did so. He
+passed slowly out of sight, closing the gate behind him carefully. His
+heavy tramp became audible on the road outside, the road leading to the
+Metropolis. "There's some one asking the way--" his voice was audible a
+moment, before it died into the distance. The road, the gateway, the
+fence were not so clear as hitherto--a trifle dim.
+
+These various movements took place so quickly, it seemed they all took
+place at once; Judy still heard the bird, however. She heard nothing
+else. It was singing everywhere, the sky full of its tender and
+delicious song. But the notes were a little--just a little--further
+away she thought, nor could she see it anywhere.
+
+And it was then that Come-Back Stumper, limping a trifle as usual,
+approached them. He looked troubled rather, and though his manner was
+full of confidence still, his mind had mild confusion in it somewhere.
+He joined Uncle Felix and the children, standing in front of them.
+
+"Listen!" he said in low, gruff voice. He held out an open palm, three
+snail-shells in it, signifying that they should take one each.
+"Listen!" he repeated, and put the smallest shell against his own ear.
+"D'you hear that curious sound?" His head was cocked sideways, one ear
+pressed tight against the shell, the other open to the sky. "The
+Ganges..." he mumbled to himself after an interval, "but the stones are
+moving--moving in the river bed.... That long, withdrawing roar!" He
+was just about to add "down the naked shingles of the world," when
+Uncle Felix interrupted him.
+
+"Grating," he said, listening intently to his shell; "a metallic,
+grating sound. What is it?" There was apprehension in his tone, a touch
+of sadness. "It's getting louder too!"
+
+"Footsteps," exclaimed Tim. "Two feet, not four. It's _not_ a badger or
+a rabbit." He went on with sudden conviction--"and it's coming nearer."
+There was disappointment and alarm in him. "Though it might be a
+badger, p'r'aps," he added hopefully.
+
+"But I hear singing," cried Judy breathlessly, "nothing but singing.
+It's a bird." Her face was radiant. "It _is_ a long way off, though,"
+she mentioned.
+
+They put their shells down then, and listened without them. They
+glanced from one another to the sky, all four heads cocked sideways.
+And they heard the sound distinctly, somewhere in the air about them.
+It had changed a little. It was louder. It _was_ coming nearer.
+
+"Metallic," repeated Uncle Felix, with an ominous inflection.
+
+"Machinery," growled Stumper, a fury rising in his throat.
+
+"Clicking," agreed Tim. He looked uneasy.
+
+"I only hear a bird," Judy whispered. "But it comes and goes--rather."
+And then the Tramp, still lying beside his little fire of burning
+sticks, put in a word.
+
+"It's _we_ who are going," he said in his singing voice. "We're moving
+on again."
+
+They heard him well enough, but they did not understand quite what he
+meant, and his voice died into the distance oddly, far away already,
+almost on the other side of the fence. And as he spoke they noticed
+another change in the world about them. Three of the party noticed
+it--the males, Uncle Felix, Tim, and Come-Back Stumper.
+
+For the light was fading; it was getting darker; there was a slight
+sense of chill, a growing dimness in the air. They realised vaguely
+that the Tramp was leaving them, and that with him went the light, the
+heat, the brilliance out of their happy day.
+
+They turned with one accord towards him. He still lay there beside his
+little fire, but he seemed further off; both his figure and the burning
+sticks looked like a picture seen at the end of a corridor, an
+interminable corridor, edged and framed by gathering shadows that were
+about to cover it. They stretched their hands out; they called to him;
+they moved their feet; for the first time this wonderful day, there was
+hurry in them. But the receding figure of the Tramp withdrew still
+further and further, until an inaccessible distance intervened. They
+heard him singing faintly "There is no hurry, Life has just begun...The
+world is young with laughter...We can fly..." but the words came
+sighing towards them from the inaccessible region where he lay,
+thousands of years ago, millions of miles away, millions of miles....
+
+"You won't forget," were the last words they caught. "You know now.
+You'll never forget...!"
+
+When a sudden cry of joy and laughter sounded close behind them, and
+they turned to see Judy standing on tiptoe, stretching her thin, slim
+body as if trying to reach the moon. The light was dim; it seemed the
+sun had set and moonlight lay upon the world; but her figure, bright
+and shining, stood in a patch of radiant brilliance by herself. She
+looked like a white flame of fire ascending.
+
+"I've got it!" she was crying rapturously, "I've got it!" Her voice was
+wild with happiness, almost like the singing of a bird.
+
+The others stared--then came up close. But, while Tim ran, Stumper and
+Uncle Felix moved more slowly. For something in them hesitated; their
+attitudes betrayed them; there was a certain confusion in the minds of
+the older two, a touch of doubt. The contrast between the surrounding
+twilight and the brilliant patch of glory in which Judy stood
+bewildered them. The long, slim body of the child, every line of her
+figure, from her toes to the crown of her flying hair, pointing upwards
+in a stream of shining aspiration, was irresistible, however. She
+looked like a lily growing, nay rushing, upwards to the sun.
+
+They followed the direction of her outstretched arms and hands. But it
+was Tim who spoke first. He did not doubt as they did:
+
+"Oh, Judy, where?" he cried out passionately. "Show me! Show me!"
+
+The child raised herself even higher, stretching her toes and arms and
+hands; her fingers lengthened; she panted; she made a tremendous effort.
+
+"There!" she said, without looking down. Her face was towards the sky,
+her throat stretched till the muscles showed and her hair fell
+backwards in a stream.
+
+Then, following the direction of her eyes and pointing fingers, the
+others saw for the first time what Judy saw--a small wild rose hung
+shining in the air, dangling at the end of a little bending branch. The
+bush grew out of the rubbish-heap, clambering up the wall. No one had
+noticed it before. At the end of the branch hung this single shining
+blossom, swinging a little in the wind. But it was out of reach--just a
+shade too high for her eager fingers to take hold of it. Beyond it grew
+the colony of wall-flowers, also in the curious light that seemed the
+last glory of the fading day. But it was the rose that Judy wanted. And
+from somewhere near it came the sweet singing of the unseen bird.
+
+"Too high," whispered Uncle Felix, watching in amazement. "You can't
+manage it. You'll crick your back! oh--oh!" The sight of that blossom
+drew his heart out.
+
+"Impossible," growled Stumper, yet wondering why he said it. "It's out
+of reach."
+
+"Go it!" cried Tim. "You'll have it in a second. Half an inch more!
+There--you touched it that time!"
+
+For an interval no one could measure they watched her spellbound; in
+each of them stirred the similar instinct--that they could reach it,
+but that she could not. A deep, secret desire hid in all of them to
+pick that gleaming wild rose that swung above them in the air. And,
+meanwhile, the darkness deepened perceptibly, only Judy and the blossom
+framed still in shining light.
+
+Then, suddenly, the child's voice broke forth again like a burst of
+music.
+
+"I've got it! I've got it!"
+
+There was a breathless pause. Her finger did not stretch a fraction of
+an inch--but the rose was nearer. For the bird that still sang
+invisibly had fluttered into view and perched itself deliberately upon
+the prickly branch. It lowered the rose towards the human hands. It
+hopped upon the twig. Its weight dropped the prize--almost into Judy's
+fingers. She touched it.
+
+"I've found him!" gasped the child.
+
+She touched it--and sank with the final effort in a heap upon the
+ground. The bird fluttered an instant, and was gone into the darkness.
+The twig, released, flew back. But at the end of it, swinging out of
+reach, still hung the lovely blossom in mid-air--unpicked.
+
+There was confusion then about the four of them, for the light faded
+very quickly and darkness blotted out the world; the rose was no longer
+visible, the bush, the wall, the rubbish-heap, all were shrouded. The
+singing-bird had gone, the Tramp beside his little fire was hidden,
+they could hardly see one another's faces even. Voices rose on every
+side. "She missed it!" "It was too lovely to be picked!" "It's still
+there, growing....I can smell it!"
+
+Yet above them all was heard Judy's voice that sang, rose out of the
+darkness like a bird that sings at midnight: "I touched it! My airy
+signs came true! I know the hiding-place! I've--found him!"
+
+The voice had something in it of the Tramp's careless, windy singing as
+well.
+
+"Look! He's touched me...! Look...!"
+
+For in that instant when the rose swung out of reach again, in that
+instant when she touched it, and before the fading light hid
+everything--all saw the petal floating down to earth. It settled
+slowly, with a zigzag, butterfly course, fluttering close in front of
+their enchanted eyes. And it was this petal, perhaps, that brought the
+darkness, for, as it sank, it grew vast and spread until it covered the
+entire sky. Like a fairy silken sheet of softest coloured velvet it lay
+on everything, as though the heavens lowered and folded over them. They
+felt it press softly on their faces. A curtain, it seemed--some one had
+let the curtain down.
+
+Beneath it, then, the confusion became extraordinary. There was tumult
+of various kinds. Every one cried at once "I've found him! Now _I_
+know!" At the touch of the petal, grown so vast, upon their eyelids,
+each knew his "sign" had led him to the supreme discovery. This flower
+was born of the travail of a universe. Child of the elements, or at
+least blessed by them, this petal of a small wild-rose made all things
+clear, for upon its velvet skin still lay the morning dew, air kissed
+it, its root and origin was earth, and the fire of the sun blazed in
+its perfect colouring.... Yet in the tumult and confusion such curious
+behaviour followed. For Come-Back Stumper, crying that he saw a purple
+beetle pass across the world, proceeded to curl up as though he crawled
+into a spiral snail-shell and meant to go to sleep in it; Tim shouted
+in the darkness that he was riding a huge badger down a hole that led
+to the centre of the earth; and Uncle Felix begged every one to look
+and see what he saw, darkness or no darkness--"the splash of misty blue
+upon the body of a dragon-fly!"
+
+They might almost have been telling their dreams at breakfast-time....
+
+But while the clamour of their excited voices stirred the world beneath
+the marvellous covering, there rose that other sound--increasing until
+it overpowered every word they uttered. In the world outside there was
+a clicking, grating, hard, metallic sound--as though machinery was
+starting somewhere....
+
+And Judy, managing somehow or other to lift a corner and peer out, saw
+that the dawn was breaking in the eastern sky, and that a new day was
+just beginning. The sun was rising.... She went back again to tell the
+others, but she could not find them. She did not try very hard; she did
+not look for them. She just closed her eyes.... The swallows were
+chattering in the eaves, a robin sang a few marvellous bars, then
+ceased, and an up-and-under bird sent forth its wild, high bugle-call,
+then dived out of sight below the surface of the pond.
+
+Judy did likewise--dived down and under, drawing the soft covering
+against her cheek, and although her eyes were already closed she closed
+them somehow a second time. "Everything's all right," she had a
+butterfly sort of thought; "there's no hurry. It's not time...
+yet...!"--and the petal covered her again from head to foot. She had
+noticed, a little further off, a globular, round object lying
+motionless beneath another corner of the covering. It gave her a
+feeling of comfort and security. She slid away to find the others. It
+seemed she floated, rather. "Everything's free and careless...and so
+are--so am I...for we shall never...never forget...!" she remembered
+sweetly--and was gone, fluttering after the up-and-under bird ...into
+some hidden world she had discovered....
+
+The old Mill House lay dreaming in the dawn. Transparent shades of pink
+and gold stole slowly up the eastern sky. A stream of amber diffused
+itself below the paling stars. Rising from a furnace below the horizon
+it reached across and touched the zenith, painting mid-heaven with a
+mystery none could understand; then sank downwards and dipped the
+crests of the trees, the lawn, the moss-grown tiles upon the roof in
+that sea of everlasting wonder which is light.
+
+Dawn caught the old sleeping world once more in its breathless beauty.
+The earth turned over in her sleep, gasped with delight--and woke.
+There was a murmur and a movement everywhere. The spacious, stately
+life that breathes o'er ancient trees came forth from the wood without
+a centre; from the lines emanated that gracious, almost tender force
+they harvest in the spring. There was a little shiver of joy among the
+rose trees. The daisies blinked and stared. And the earth broke into
+singing.
+
+Then, in this chorus, came a pause; the thousand voices hushed a
+moment; the robin ceased its passionate solo in the shrubbery. All
+listened--listened to another and far sweeter song that stirred with
+the morning wind among the rose trees. It was very soft and tender, it
+died away and returned with a faint, mysterious murmur, it rose and
+fell so gently that it may have been only the rustling of their
+thousand leaves that guard the opening blossoms.
+
+Yet it ran with power across the entire waking earth:
+
+   My secret's in the wind and open sky,
+     There is no longer any Time--to lose;
+   The world is young with laughter; we can fly
+     Among the imprisoned hours as we choose.
+   The rushing minutes pause; an unused day
+     Breaks into dawn and cheats the tired sun.
+   The birds are singing: Hark! Come out and play!
+     There is no hurry; life has just begun.
+
+And as it died away the sun itself came up and shouted it aloud as with
+a million golden trumpets.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+TIME GOES ON AGAIN---
+
+
+Hardly had Judy closed her eyes for the second time, however, than the
+globular object she had noticed in the corner stirred. It turned, but
+turned all over, as though it were a ball. It made a sideways movement
+too, a movement best described as budging. And, accompanying the
+movements, was a comfortable, contented, satisfied sound that some
+people call deep breathing, and others call a sigh.
+
+The globular outline then grew slightly longer; one portion of it left
+the central mass, but left it slowly. The lower part prolonged itself.
+Slight cracks were audible like sharp reports, muffled but quite
+distinct. Next, the other end of the ball extended itself, twisted in a
+leisurely fashion sideways, rose above the general surface and plainly
+showed itself. It, too, was round. It emerged. Upon its surface shone
+two small pools of blue. It was a face. Even in the grey, uncertain
+light this was beyond dispute. It was Maria's face.
+
+Maria awoke. She looked about her calmly. Her mind, ever unclouded
+because it thought of one thing only, took in the situation at a
+glance. It was dawn, she was in bed and sleepy, it was not time to get
+up. Dawn, sleep, bed and time belonged to her. There certainly was no
+hurry.
+
+The pools of blue then disappeared together, the smaller ball sank down
+into the pillow to join the larger one, the lower portion that had
+stretched itself drew in again, and a peaceful sigh informed the
+universe that Maria intended to resume her interrupted slumbers. She
+became once more a mere globular outline, self-contained, at rest.
+
+But, in accepting life as it really was by lying down again, the lesser
+ball had imperceptibly occupied a new position. Maria's head had
+shifted. Her ear now pressed against another portion of the pillow. And
+this pressure, communicating itself to an object that lay beneath the
+pillow, touched a small brass handle, jerked it forward, released a bit
+of quivering wire connected with a set of wheels, and set in motion the
+entire insides of this hidden object. There was a sound of grating.
+This hard, metallic sound rose through the feathers, a clicking,
+thudding noise that reached her brain. It was--she knew instantly--the
+stopped alarum clock. It had been overwound. The weight of her head had
+started it again.
+
+Maria, as usual, by doing nothing in particular, had accomplished much.
+By yielding herself to her surroundings, she united her insignificant
+personal forces with the gigantic purposes of Life. She swung
+contentedly in rhythm with the universe. Maria had set the clock going
+again!
+
+There was excitement in her then, but certainly no hurry. Disturbing
+herself as little as possible, she pushed one hand beneath the pillow,
+drew out the ticking clock, looked at it quietly, remembered sleepily
+that it had stopped at dawn--Uncle Felix had said so--put it on the
+chair beside her bed, and promptly retired again into her eternal
+centre.
+
+"Tim's clock," she realised, "but I've got it." There was no expression
+on her face whatever. Another child might have taken the trouble--felt
+interested, at any rate--to try and see what time it was. But Maria,
+aware that the dim light would make this a difficult and tedious
+operation, did nothing of the sort. It could make no difference anyhow
+to any one, anywhere! She was content to know that it was some time or
+other, and that the clock was going again. Her plan of life was:
+interfere with nothing. She did not know, therefore, that the hands
+pointed with accuracy to 4 A. M., because she merely did not care to
+know. But, not caring to know placed her on a loftier platform of
+intelligence than the rest of the world--certainly above that of her
+sister, Judy, who was snoring softly among the shadows just across the
+room. Maria didn't know that she didn't know. No one could rebuke her
+with "You might have known," much less "You didn't know,"--because she
+didn't know she didn't know! It was the biggest kind of knowledge in
+the world. Maria had it.
+
+But before she actually regained her absolute centre, and long before
+she lost sight of herself within its depths, dim thoughts came floating
+through her mind like pictures that moonlight paints upon high summer
+clouds. She saw these pictures; that is, she looked at them and
+recognised their existence; but she asked no questions. They reached
+her through the ticking of the busy clock beside the bed; the ticking
+brought them; but it brought them back. Maria remembered things. And
+chief among them were the following: That Uncle Felix had promised
+everybody an Extra Day, that he had stopped all the clocks to let it
+come, that this Extra Day was to be her own particular adventure, that
+last night was Saturday, and that this was, therefore, Sunday morning,
+very early.
+
+And the instant she remembered these things, they were real--for her.
+She accepted them, one and all, even the contradictions in them. If
+this was actually an Extra Day it could not be Sunday morning too, and
+_vice versa_. But yet she knew it was. Both were. The confusion was a
+confusion of words only. There were too many words about.
+
+"Why not?" expressed her attitude. The clock might tick itself to death
+for all she cared. The Extra Day was her adventure and she claimed it.
+But she did not bother about it.
+
+Above all, she asked no questions. Nothing really meant anything in
+particular, because everything meant everything. To ask questions, even
+of herself, involved hearing a lot of answers and listening to them.
+But answers were explanations, and explanations muddled and obscured.
+Explanations were a new set of questions merely. People who didn't know
+asked questions, and people who didn't understand gave explanations.
+Aunt Emily explained--because she didn't understand. Also, because she
+didn't understand, she didn't know. To ask a question was the same
+thing as to explain it. Everything was one thing. She, Maria, both knew
+and understood.
+
+She did not say all this, she did not think it even; she just felt it
+all: it was her feeling. Believing in her particular adventure of an
+Extra Day, she had already experienced it. She had shared it with the
+others too. It was _her_ Extra Day, so she could do with it what she
+pleased. "They can have it," she gave the clock to understand. "I'm
+going to sleep again." All life was an extra day to her.
+
+She went to sleep; sleep, rather, came to her. Happy dreams amused and
+comforted her. And, while she dreamed, the dawn slid higher up the sky,
+ushering in--Sunday Morning.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+--AS USUAL
+
+
+Consciousness was first--unconsciousness; the biggest changes are
+unconscious before they are conscious. They have been long preparing.
+They fall with a clap; and people call them sudden and exclaim, "How
+strange!" But it is only the discovery and recognition that are sudden.
+It all has happened already long ago--happened before. The faint sense
+of familiarity betrays it. It is there the strangeness lies.
+
+And it was this delicate fragrance of an uncommunicable strangeness
+that floated in the air when Uncle Felix and the children came down to
+breakfast that Sunday morning and heard the sound of bells in the wind
+across the fields. They came down punctually for a wonder, too; Maria,
+last but not actually late, brought the alarum clock with her. "It's
+going," she stated quietly, and handed it to her brother.
+
+Tim took it without a word, looked at it, shook it, listened to its
+ticking against his ear, then set it on the mantelpiece where it
+belonged. He seemed pleased to have it in his possession again, yet
+something puzzled him. An expression of wonder flitted across his face;
+the eyes turned upwards; he frowned; there was an effort in him--to
+remember something. He turned to Maria who was already deep in porridge.
+
+"Did _you_ wind it up?" he asked. "I thought it'd stopped--last night."
+
+"It's going," she said, thinking of her porridge chiefly.
+
+"It wasn't, though," insisted Tim. He reflected a moment, evidently
+perplexed. "I wound it and forgot," he added to himself, "or else it
+wound itself." He went to his place and began his breakfast.
+
+"Wound itself," mentioned Maria, and then the subject dropped.
+
+It was Sunday morning, and everybody was dressed in Sunday things. The
+excitement of the evening before, the promise of an Extra Day, the
+detailed preparation--all this had disappeared. Being of yesterday, it
+was no longer vital: certainly there was no necessity to consult it.
+They looked forward rather than backward; the mystery of life lay ever
+just in front of them, what lay behind was already done with. They had
+lived it, lived it out. It was in their possession therefore, part of
+themselves.
+
+No one of the four devouring porridge round that breakfast table had
+forgotten about the promise, any more than they had forgotten giving up
+their time-pieces, the conversation, and all the rest of it. It was not
+forgetfulness. It was not loss of interest either that led no one to
+refer to it, least of all, to clamour for fulfilment. It was quite
+another motive that kept them silent, and that, even when Uncle Felix
+handed back the watches, prevented them saying anything more than
+"Thank you, Uncle," then hanging them on to belt and waistcoat.
+
+Expectation--an eternal Expectation--was established in them.
+
+But there was also this sense of elusive strangeness in their hearts,
+the certainty that an enormous interval had passed, almost the
+conviction that an Extra Day--had been. Somewhere, somehow, they had
+experienced its fulfilment: It was now inside them. A strange
+familiarity hung about this Sunday morning.
+
+Yet there were still a million things to do and endless time in which
+to do them. Expectation was stronger than ever before, but the sense of
+Interval brought a happy feeling of completion too. There was no hurry.
+They felt something of what Maria felt, living at the centre of a
+circle that turned unceasingly but never finished. It was Maria's
+particular adventure, and Maria had shared it with them. Wonder and
+expectation made them feel more than usually--alive.
+
+They talked normally while eating and drinking. If things were said
+that skirted a mystery, no one tried to find its name or label it. It
+was just hiding. Let it hide! To find it was to lose the mystery, and
+life without mystery was unthinkable.
+
+"That's bells," said Tim, "it's church this morning"; but he did not
+sigh, there was no sinking of the heart, it seemed. He spoke as if it
+was an adventure he looked forward to. "I've decided what I'm going to
+be," he went on--"an engineer, but a mining engineer. Finding things in
+the earth, valuable things like coal and gold." Why he said it was not
+clear exactly; it had no apparent connection with church bells. He just
+thought of life as a whole, perhaps, and what he meant to do with it.
+He looked forward across the years to come. He distinctly knew himself
+alive.
+
+"I shall put sixpence in, I think," observed Judy presently. "It's a
+lot. And I shall wear my blue hat with the pheasant's feather--"
+
+"Pheasants feather," repeated Tim in a single word, amused as usual by
+a curious sound.
+
+"And a wild rose _here_," she added, pointing to the place on her
+dress, though nobody felt interested enough to look. Her remark about
+the Collection was more vital than the other. Collections in church
+were made, they believed, to "feed the clergyman." And Sunday was the
+clergyman's day.
+
+"I've got sixpence," Tim hastened to remind everybody. "I've got a
+threepenny bit as well."
+
+"It's sixpence to-day, I think," Judy decided almost tenderly. Behind
+her thought was a caring, generous impulse; the motherly instinct sent
+her mind to the collection for the clergyman's comfort. But romance
+stirred too; she wanted to look her best. Her two main tendencies
+seemed very much alive this Sunday morning. The hat and the
+sixpence--both were real.
+
+Maria, as usual, had little or nothing to say. She spoke once, however.
+
+"I dreamed," she informed the company. She did not look up, keeping her
+head bent over the bread and marmalade upon her plate; her blue eyes
+rolled round the table once, then dropped again. No one asked for
+details of her dream, she had no desire to supply them. She announced
+her position comfortably, as it were, set herself right with life, and
+quietly went on with the business of the moment, which was bread and
+marmalade.
+
+Uncle Felix looked up, however, as she said it.
+
+"That reminds me," he observed, "I dreamed too. I dreamed that you
+dreamed."
+
+"Yes," Maria replied briefly, moving her eyes in his direction, but not
+her head. No other remarks were made; the statement was too muddled to
+stimulate interest particularly.
+
+When breakfast was over they went to the open window and threw crumbs
+to a robin that was obviously expecting to be fed. They all leaned out
+with their heads in the sunlight, watching it. It hopped from a twig on
+to the ground, its body already tight to bursting. It looked like a toy
+balloon--as though it wore a dress of red elastic stretched to such a
+point that the merest pinprick must explode it with a sharp report; and
+it hopped as though springs were in its feet. The earth, like a taut
+sheet, made it bounce. Tim aimed missiles of bread rolled into pellets
+at its head, but never hit it.
+
+"It's a lovely morning," remarked Uncle Felix, looking across the
+garden to the yellow fields beyond. "A perfect day. We'll walk to
+church." He brushed the breakfast crumbs from the waistcoat of his neat
+blue suit, lit his pipe, sniffed the air contentedly, and had an air
+generally of a sailor on shore-leave.
+
+Judy sprang up. "There's button-holes to get," she mentioned, and flew
+out of the room like a flash of sunlight or a bird.
+
+Tim raced after her. "Wallflower for me!" he cried, while Judy's answer
+floated back from halfway down the passage: "I'll have a wild
+rosebud--it'll match my hat!"
+
+Uncle Felix and Maria were left alone, gazing out of the window side by
+side upon the "lovely morning." She was just high enough to see above
+the edge, and her two hands lay sprawled, fingers extended, upon the
+shining sill.
+
+"Yes," she mentioned quietly, as to herself, "and I'll have a
+forget-me-not." Her eyes rolled up sideways, meeting those of her uncle
+as he turned and noticed her.
+
+For quite suddenly he "noticed" her, became aware that she was there,
+discovered her. He stared a moment, as though reflecting. That "yes"
+had a queer, familiar sound about it, surely.
+
+"Maria," he said, "I believe you will. Everything comes to you of its
+own accord somehow."
+
+She nodded.
+
+"And there's another thing. You've got a secret--haven't you?" It
+occurred to him that Maria was rather wonderful.
+
+"I expect so," she answered, after a moment's pause. She looked wiser
+than an owl, he thought.
+
+"What is it? What _is_ your secret? Can't you tell me?"
+
+For it came over him that Maria, for all her inactivity, was really
+more truly alive than both the other children put together. Their
+tireless, incessant energy was nothing compared to some deep well of
+life Maria's outer calm concealed.
+
+He continued to stare at her, reflecting while he did so. Through her
+globular exterior, standing here beside him, rose this quiet tide whose
+profound and inexhaustible source was nothing less than the entire
+universe. Finding himself thus alone with her, he knew his imagination
+singularly stirred. The full stream of this imagination--usually turned
+into sea--and history-stories--poured now into Maria. It was the way
+she had delivered herself of the monosyllable, "Yes," that first
+enflamed him.
+
+The child, obviously, was quite innocent that her uncle's imagination
+clothed her in such wonder; she was entirely unselfconscious, and
+remained so; but, as she kept silent as well, there was nothing to
+interrupt the natural process of his thought. "You're a circle, a
+mystery, a globe of wonder," his mind addressed her, gazing downwards
+half in play and half in earnest. "You're always going it. Though you
+seem so still--you're turning furiously like a little planet!"
+
+For this abruptly struck him, flashing the symbol into his
+imagination--that Maria lived so close to the universe that her life
+and movements were akin to those of the heavenly bodies. He saw her as
+an epitome of the earth. Fat, peaceful, little, calm, rotund Maria--a
+miniature earth! She had no call to hurry nor rush after things. Like
+the earth she contained all things within herself. It made him smile;
+he smiled as he looked down into her face; she smiled as she rolled her
+blue eyes upwards into his.
+
+Yet her calm was not the calm of sloth. In that mysterious centre where
+she lived he felt her as tremendously alive.
+
+For the earth, apparently so calm and steady, knows no pause. She moves
+round her axis without stopping. She rushes with immense rapidity round
+the sun. Simultaneously with these two movements she combines a third;
+the sun, carrying her and all his other planets with him, hurries at a
+prodigious rate through interstellar space, adventuring new regions
+never seen before. Calm outwardly, and without apparent motion, the
+earth--at this very moment, as he leaned across the window-sill--was
+making these three gigantic, endless movements. This peaceful summer
+morning, like any other peaceful summer morning, she was actually
+spinning, rushing, rising. And in Maria--it came to him--in Maria,
+outwardly so calm, something also--spun--rushed--rose! This amazing
+life that brimmed her full to bursting, even as it brimmed the robin
+and the earth, overflowed and dripped out of her very eyes in shining
+blue. There was no need for her to dash about. She, like the earth,
+was--carried.
+
+All this flashed upon him while the alarum clock ticked off a second
+merely, for imagination telescopes time, of course, and knows things
+all at once.
+
+"What _is_ your secret, Maria?" he asked again. "I believe it's about
+that Extra Day we meant to steal. Is that it?"
+
+Her eyes gazed straight before her across the lawn where Tim and Judy
+were now visible, searching busily for button-holes.
+
+"It was to be your particular adventure, wasn't it?"
+
+"Yes," she told him at length, without changing her expression of
+serene contentment.
+
+His imagination warned him he was getting "at her" gradually. He
+possibly read into her a thousand things that were not there.
+Certainly, Maria was not aware of them. But, though Uncle Felix knew
+this perfectly well, he persisted, hoping for a sudden disclosure that
+would justify his search--even expecting it, perhaps.
+
+"And what sort of a day would it be, then, this Extra Day of yours?" he
+went on. "It would never end, of course, for one thing, would it?
+There'd be no time?"
+
+She nodded quietly by way of effortless agreement and consent.
+
+"So that, in a sense, you'd have it always," he said, aware of distinct
+encouragement. He felt obliged to help her. This was her peculiar
+power--that everything was done for her while she seemed to do it all
+herself. "You would live it over and over again, for ever and ever.
+_That's_ your secret, I expect, isn't it?"
+
+"I expect so," the child answered quietly. "I've always got it." She
+moved in a little closer to his side as she said it. The disclosure he
+expected seemed so near now that excitement grew in him. Across the
+lawn he saw the hurrying figures of Tim and Judy, racing back with
+their button-holes. There was no time to lose.
+
+He put his arm about her, tilting her face upwards with one hand to see
+it plainly. The blue dyes came up with it.
+
+"Then, what kind of a day _would_ you choose, Maria? Tell me--in a
+whisper."
+
+And then the disclosure came. But it was not whispered. Uncle Felix
+heard the secret in a very clear, decided voice and in a single word:
+
+"Birthday."
+
+At the same moment the others poured into the room; they came like a
+cataract; it seemed that a dozen children rushed upon them in a
+torrent. The air was full of voices and flowers suddenly. A smell of
+the open world came in with them. Button-holes were fastened into
+everybody, accompanied by a breathless chorus of where and how they had
+been found, who got the best, who got it first, and all the rest. From
+the End of the World they came, apparently, but while Tim had climbed
+the wall for his, Judy picked hers because a bird had lowered the
+branch into her very hand. For Uncle Felix she brought a spray of
+lilac; Tim brought a bit of mignonette. Eventually he had to wear them
+both.
+
+"And here's a forget-me-not, Maria," cried Judy, stooping down to poke
+it into her sister's blue and white striped dress. "That suits you
+best, I thought."
+
+"Thank you," said Maria, moving her eyes the smallest possible fraction
+of an inch.
+
+And they scampered out of the room again, Maria ambling slowly in the
+rear, to prepare for church. There were prayer-books and things to
+find, threepenny bits and sixpences for the collection. There was
+simply heaps to do, as they expressed it, and not a moment to lose
+either. Uncle Felix listened to the sound of voices and footsteps as
+they flew down the passage, dying rapidly away into the distance, and
+finally ceasing altogether. He puffed his pipe a little longer before
+going to his room upon a similar errand. He watched the smoke curl up
+and melt into the outer air; he felt the pleasant sunshine warm upon
+his face; he smelt the perfume rising from his enormous button-hole.
+But of these things he did not think. He thought of what Maria said.
+The way she uttered that single word remained with him: "Birthday."
+
+He had half divined her secret. For a birthday was the opening of life;
+it was the beginning. Maria had "got it always." All days for her were
+birthdays, Extra Days.
+
+And while they walked along the lane to church he still was thinking
+about it.
+
+The conversation proved that he was absent-minded rather; yet not that
+his mind was absent so much as intent upon other things. The children
+found him heavy; he seemed ponderous to them. And pondering he
+certainly was--pondering the meaning of existence. The children, he
+realised, were such brilliant comments upon existence; their
+unconscious way of living, all they said and thought and did, but
+especially all they believed, offered such bright interpretations, such
+simple solutions of a million things. They lived so really, were so
+really--alive. They never explained, they just accepted; and the
+explanations given they placed at their true value, still asking, "Yes,
+but what is the meaning of all that?" So close to Reality they
+lived--before reason, cloaked and confused it with a million complex
+explanations. That "Yes" and "Birthday" of Maria's were illuminating
+examples.
+
+Of this he was vaguely pondering as they walked along the sunny lanes
+to church, and his conversation proved it. For conversation with
+children meant answering endless questions merely, and the questions
+were prompted by anything and everything they saw. Reality poked them;
+they gave expression to it by a question. And nothing real was trivial;
+the most careless detail was important, all being but a single
+question--an affirmation: "We're alive, so everything else is too!"
+
+His conversation proved that he had almost reached that state of
+time-less reality in which they lived. He felt it this morning very
+vividly. It seemed familiar somehow--like his own childhood recovered
+almost.
+
+He answered them accordingly. It didn't matter what was said, because
+all the words in the world said one thing only. Whether the words,
+therefore, made sense or not, was of no importance.
+
+"Have you ever seen a rabbit come _out_ of its hole?" asked Tim. "They
+do that for safety," he added; and if there was confusion in his
+language, there was none in his thought. "Then no one can tell which
+its hole is, you see. Because each rabbit--"
+
+He broke off and glanced expectantly at his uncle. At junctures like
+this his uncle usually cleared things up with an easy word or two. He
+would not fail him now.
+
+"Come _out_, no," was the reply; "no one ever sees a rabbit come out.
+But I've seen them go _in_; and that's the same thing in the end. They
+go down the wrong hole on purpose. _They_ know right enough. Rabbits
+are rabbits."
+
+"Of course," exclaimed Judy, "everything's itself and knows its own
+sign--er--business, I mean."
+
+"Yes," Maria repeated.
+
+And before anything further could be mentioned--if there _was_ anything
+to mention--they arrived at the porch of the church, passed under it
+without speaking, walked up the aisle and took their places in the
+family pew, Maria occupying the comfortable corner against the inner
+wall.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+--BUT DIFFERENTLY!
+
+
+Church was very--that is, they enjoyed the service very much, without
+knowing precisely why they liked it. They joined in the hymns with more
+energy than usual, because they felt "singy" and knew the tunes as
+well. Colonel Stumper handed round one of the bags at the end of a long
+pole--and, though the clergyman didn't look at all as if he required
+feeding, the threepenny bits dropped in without the least regret on the
+part of the contributors. Tim's coin, however, having been squeezed for
+several minutes before the bag came round, stuck to his moist finger,
+and Stumper, thinking he had nothing to put in, drove the long handle
+past him towards Maria. That same instant the coin came un-stuck, and
+dropped with a rattle into the aisle. Come-Back Stumper stooped to
+recover it. Whereupon, to Judy, Tim and Uncle Felix, watching him, came
+a sudden feeling of familiarity, as though all this had happened
+before. The bent figure, groping after the hidden coin, seemed
+irresistibly familiar. It was very odd, they thought, very odd indeed.
+Where--when--had they seen him groping before like that, almost on all
+fours? But no one, of course, could remark upon it, and it was only Tim
+and Judy who exchanged a brief, significant glance. Maria, being
+asleep, did not witness it, nor did she contribute to the feeding of
+the clergyman either.
+
+There followed a short sermon, of which they heard only the beginning,
+the end, and certain patches in the middle when the preacher raised his
+voice abruptly, but the text, they all agreed, was "Seek and ye shall
+find." During the delivery of the portions that escaped them, Tim
+scratched his head and thought about rabbits, while Judy's mind
+hesitated between various costumes in the pews in front of her, unable
+to decide which she would wear when she reached the age of its
+respective owner.
+
+And so, in due course, feeling somehow that something very real had
+been accomplished, they streamed out with the rest of the congregation
+into the blazing summer sunshine. Expectant, inquisitive and hungry,
+they stood between the yew trees and the porch, yawning and fidgeting
+until Uncle Felix gave the signal to start. The sunlight made them
+blink. There was something of pleasurable excitement in knowing
+themselves part of a "Congregation," for a Congregation was distantly
+connected with "metropolis" and "govunment," and an important kind of
+thing at any time.
+
+They stood and watched it. It scattered slowly, loth to separate and
+go. There was no hurry certainly. People talked in lowered voices, as
+if conversation after service was against the rules, and the church and
+graves might overhear; they smiled, but not too gaily; they seemed
+subdued; yet really they wanted to sing and dance--once safely out of
+hearing and sight, they would run and jump and stand on their heads.
+The children, that is, attributed their own feelings to them.
+
+Several--all "Members" of the Congregation--approached and asked unreal
+questions, to which Judy, as the eldest, gave unreal answers:
+
+"Your parents will soon be back again?"
+
+"Yes; Father comes to-morrow, Mother too."
+
+"I hope they have enjoyed their little change."
+
+"I think so--thank you."
+
+Gradually the Congregation melted away, broughams and victorias drove
+off sedately down the road, the horses making as little sound as
+possible with their hoofs. The Choir-boys emerged from a side-door and
+vanished into a field; a series of Old Ladies and Invalids felt their
+way down the gravel path with sticks; the "Neighbours," looking clean
+and dressed-up, went off in various directions--gravely, voices hushed,
+manners circumspect. Tim, feeling as usual "awfully empty after
+church," was sure they ran as fast as ever they could the moment they
+were out of sight. A Congregation was a wonderful thing altogether. It
+was a puzzle how the little church could hold so many people. They
+watched the whole familiar business with suppressed excitement,
+forgetting they were hungry and impatient. It was both real and unreal,
+something better beckoned beyond all the time; but there was no hurry.
+It was a deep childhood mystery--wonder filled them to the brim.
+
+"Come on, children; we'll be off now," sounded their uncle's voice, and
+at the same moment Come-Back Stumper joined them. He had been counting
+over the money with the clergyman, of course, all this time. He was
+very slow. They hoped their contributions had been noticed.
+
+"You'll come back with us?" suggested Uncle Felix. And Stumper,
+growling his acceptance, walked home to lunch with them in the old Mill
+House. In his short black coat, trousers of shepherd's plaid, and
+knotted white tie bearing a neat horseshoe pin, he looked smart yet
+soldierly. Tim apologised for his moist finger and the threepenny bit.
+"I thought it had got down a hole," he said, "but you found it
+wonderfully." "It simply flew!" cried Judy. "Clever old thing!" she
+added with admiration.
+
+"I've found harder things than that," said Stumper. "It hid itself
+well, though--bang in the open like a lost collar-stud. Thought I'd
+never look _there!"_
+
+They glanced at one another with a curious, half-expectant air, and Tim
+suddenly took the soldier's hand. But no one said anything more about
+it; the sin was forgiven and forgotten. Uncle Felix put in a vague
+remark concerning Indian life, and Stumper mentioned proudly that a new
+edition of his scouting book was coming out and he had just finished
+revising the last sheets. "All yesterday I spent working on it," he
+informed them with a satisfied air, whereupon Tim said "Fancy that!"
+and Judy exclaimed "Did you really?" They seemed to have an idea that
+he was doing something else "all yesterday"; but no one knew exactly
+what it was. Then Judy planted herself in the road before him, made him
+stop, and picked something off his shoulder. "A tiny caterpillar!" she
+explained. "Another minute and you'd have had it down your neck." "It
+would have come back though," he said with a gruff laugh. "It might'nt
+have," returned Judy. "But look; it's awfully beautiful!" They examined
+it for a moment, all five of them, and then Judy set it down carefully
+in the ditch and watched it march away towards the safer hedge.
+
+It was a pleasant walk home, all together; they took the short cut
+across the fields; the world was covered with flowers, birds were
+singing, the air was fresh and sweet and the delicious sunlight not
+uncomfortably hot. Tim ran everywhere, exploring eagerly like a dog,
+and, also like a dog, doubling the journey's length. He whistled to
+himself; from time to time he came back to report results of his
+discoveries. He was full of energy. Judy behaved in a similar manner,
+dancing in circles to make her hair and dress fly out; she sang bits of
+the hymn-tunes that she liked, taking the tune but fitting words of her
+own upon it. Maria was carried over two fields and a half; the
+down-hill parts she walked, however. She kept everybody waiting. They
+could not leave her. She contrived to make herself the centre of the
+party. Stumper and Uncle Felix brought up the rear, talking together
+"about things," and whirling their sticks in the air as though it
+helped them forward somehow.
+
+On the slippery plank-bridge across the mill stream all paused a moment
+to watch the dragon-flies that set the air on fire with their coloured
+tails.
+
+"The things that nobody can understand!" cried Judy.
+
+"Nobody else," Tim corrected her. "We do!"
+
+They leaned over the rail and saw their own reflections in the running
+water.
+
+"Why, Come-Back hasn't got a button-hole!" exclaimed Judy--and flew off
+to find one for him, Tim fast upon her heels like a collie after a
+dipping swallow. They raced down the banks where the golden king-cups
+grew in spendthrift patches and disappeared among the colonies of
+reeds. Between some hanging willow branches further down they were
+visible a moment, like dryad figures peering and flitting through the
+cataract of waving green. They searched as though their lives depended
+on success. It was absurd that Stumper had no button-hole!
+
+Maria, seated comfortably on the lower rail, watched their efforts and
+listened to the bursts of laughing voices that came up-stream--then,
+with a leisurely movement, took the flower from her own button-hole and
+handed it to Stumper. The eyes rolled upwards with the
+flower--solemnly. And Come-Back saw the action reflected in the stream
+below.
+
+"Aw--thank you, my dear," he said, fastening the forget-me-not into his
+Sunday coat, "but I ought not to take it all. It's yours." The voice
+had a quiet, almost distant sound in it.
+
+"Ours," Maria murmured to herself, addressing the faces in the water.
+She took the fragment Stumper handed back to her. All three, forgetting
+it was time for lunch, forgetting they were hungry, forgetting that
+there was still half a mile of lane between them and the house, gazed
+down at their reflections in the stream as though fascinated. Uncle
+Felix certainly felt the watery-enchantment in his soul. The
+reflections trembled and quivered, yet did not pass away. The stream
+flowed hurrying by them, yet still was always there. It gave him a
+strange, familiar feeling--something he knew, but had forgotten.
+Everything in life was passing, yet nothing went--there was no hurry.
+The rippling music, as the water washed the banks and made the grasses
+swish, was audible, and there was a deeper sound of swirling round the
+wooden posts that held the bridge secure. Bubbles rose and burst in
+spray. A lark, hanging like a cross in the blue sky, overhead, dropped
+suddenly as though it was a stone, but in the reflection it rushed up
+into their faces. It seemed to rise at them from the pebbly bed of the
+stream. Both movements seemed one and the same--both were true--the
+direction depended upon the point of view.
+
+It startled them and broke the water-spell. For the singing stopped
+abruptly too. At the same moment Judy and Tim arrived, their arms full
+of flowers, hemlock, ferns, and bulrushes. They were breathless and
+exhausted; both talked at once; they had quite forgotten, apparently,
+what they had gone to find. Judy had seen a king-fisher, Tim had
+discovered tracks of an otter; in the excitement they forgot about the
+button-hole. But, somehow, the bird, the animal, and the flowers were
+the same thing really--one big simple thing. Only the point of view was
+different.
+
+"We've looked simply everywhere!" cried Judy.
+
+"Just look what we found!" Tim echoed.
+
+To Uncle Felix it seemed they said one and the same thing merely--using
+_one_ word in many syllables.
+
+"Beautiful!" agreed Stumper, as they emptied their arms at his feet in
+wild profusion; "and enough for everybody too!"
+
+Stumper also said the thing they had just said. Uncle Felix watched him
+move forward, where Maria was already using the heaped-up greenery as a
+cushion for her back, and pick something off the stem of a giant
+bulrush.
+
+"But that's what I like best," he exclaimed. "Look at the colour, will
+you--blue and cream and yellow! You can hear the Ganges in it, if you
+listen close enough." He held a small, coloured snail-shell between his
+sinewy fingers, then placed it against his ear, while the others,
+caught by a strange enveloping sense of wonder, stared and listened,
+swept for a moment into another world.
+
+"How marvellous!" whispered some one.
+
+"Extrornary!" another murmured.
+
+"Yes," said Maria. Her voice made a sound like a thin stone falling
+from a height into water. But Maria had said the same thing as the
+others, only said it shorter. An entire language lay in that
+mono-syllable. Again, it was the point of view of doing, saying one
+enormous thing. And Maria's point of view was everywhere at once--the
+centre.
+
+"Listen!" she added the next minute.
+
+Perhaps the sunlight quivering on the surface of the stream confused
+them, or perhaps it was the murmur and movement of the leaves upon the
+banks that brought the sense of sweet, queer bewilderment upon all
+five. A new sound there certainly was--footsteps, as though some one
+came dancing--voices, as though some one sang. Figures were seen in the
+distance among the waving world of green; they moved behind the
+cataract of falling willow branches; and their distance was as the
+distance of a half-remembered dream.
+
+"They're coming," gasped Judy below her breath.
+
+"They're coming back," Tim whispered, the tone muffled, underground.
+
+"Eh?" ejaculated Stumper. "Coming back?" His voice, too, had distance
+in it.
+
+Whether they saw it in the reflections on the running water, or whether
+the maze of shadow and sunshine in the wooded banks produced it, no one
+knew exactly. The figures, at any rate, were plainly visible, moving
+along with singing and dancing through the summery noontide of the
+brilliant day. No one spoke while they went by, no one except Maria who
+at intervals murmured "Yes." There was no other audible comment or
+remark. They afterwards agreed that Weeden was seen clearest, but
+Thompson and Mrs. Horton were fairly distinct as well, and bringing up
+the rear was a figure in blue that could only have been the Policeman
+who lived usually upon the high road to London. They carried flowers in
+their arms, they moved lightly and quickly--it was uncommonly like
+dancing--and their voices floated through the woodland spaces with a
+sound that, if it was not singing, was at least an excellent
+imitation--an attempt to sing!
+
+"They're not lost," said Tim, as they disappeared from view. "They're
+just looking--for the way."
+
+"The way home," said Judy. "And they're following some one--who knows
+it."
+
+"Yes," added Maria. For another figure, more like a tree moving in the
+wind than anything else, and certainly looking differently to each of
+them--another figure was seen in advance of the group, seen in flashes,
+as it were, and only glimpses of it discernible among the world of
+moving green. This other figure was singing too; snatches of wild sweet
+music floated through the quiet wood--one said the singing of a bird,
+another, the wind, a third, the rippling murmur of the stream--but, to
+one and all, an enchanting and enticing sound. And, to one and all,
+familiar too, with the familiarity of a half-remembered dream.
+
+And a flood of memory rose about them as they watched and listened, a
+tide that carried them away with it into the heart of something they
+knew, yet had forgotten. In the few moments' interval an eternity might
+have passed. Their hearts opened curiously, they saw wonder growing
+like a flower inside--the exquisite wonder of common things. There was
+something they were looking for, but they had found it. The flower of
+wonder blossomed there before their very eyes, explaining the world,
+but not explaining it away, explaining simply that it was wonderful
+beyond all telling. They all knew suddenly what they didn't know they
+knew; they understood what nobody understands. None knew why it came
+just at this particular moment, and none knew where it came from
+either. It was there, so what else mattered. It broke upon them out of
+the heart of the summer's day, out of this very ordinary Sunday
+morning, out of the brimming life all about them that was passing but
+could never pass away. The familiar figures of the gardener, the
+butler, the policeman and the cook brought back to them the memory of
+something they had forgotten, yet brought it back in the form of
+endless and inexhaustible enticement rather than of complete recovery.
+There had been long preparation somewhere, growth, development; but
+that was past and they gave no thought to it; Expectancy and Wonder
+rushed them off their feet. The world hid something. Every one was
+looking for it. _They_ must go on looking, looking, looking too!
+
+_What_ it was they had forgotten--they entirely forgot. Only the
+marvellous hint remained, and the certainty that it could be found.
+For, to each of them it seemed, came this fairy reminder, stealing
+deliciously upon the senses: somewhere, somehow, they had known an
+experience that had enriched their lives. It had become part of them.
+It had always been in them, but they had found it now. They felt quite
+positive about it. They believed. To Tim came messages from the solid
+earth about him, secrets from creatures that lived in it and knew;
+Judy, catching a thousand kisses from the air upon her cheeks, divined
+the mystery of all flying life--that brought the stars within her
+reach; Maria, possessing all within herself, remained steady and calm
+at the eternal centre of the circle--a clearing-house for messages from
+everywhere at once. Asking nothing for herself, she merely wanted to
+give away, give out. She said "Yes" to all that came her way; and all
+did come her way. To every one of them, to Stumper and Uncle Felix too,
+came a great conviction that they had passed nearer, somehow, to an
+everlasting joy. There was no hurry, life had just begun--seemed
+singing everywhere about them. There was Unity.
+
+"It's a lovely day," remarked Uncle Felix presently. "I want my
+luncheon."
+
+He picked up Maria and moved on across the bridge.
+
+"It's the Extra Day," Maria whispered in his ear. "It's my adventure,
+but you all can have it."
+
+The others followed with Come-Back Stumper, and in the lane they saw
+the figures of Weeden, Thompson and Mrs. Horton in front of them,
+coming home from church. They were walking quietly enough.
+
+"We're not late, then," Tim remarked. "There's lots of time!"
+
+Crossing the field in the direction of the London road a policeman was
+moving steadily. They saw him stoop and pick a yellow flower as he
+went. He was off to take charge of the world upon his Sunday beat. He
+disappeared behind a hedge. The butler and the cook vanished through a
+side-door into the old Mill House about the same time.
+
+In due course, they also arrived at the porch, and Uncle Felix set his
+burden down. As they scraped their muddy boots and rubbed them on the
+mat, their backs were turned to the outside world; but Maria, whose
+boots required no scraping, happened to face it still. As usual she
+faced in all directions like a circle.
+
+"Look," she said. "There's some one coming!"
+
+And they saw the figure of a tramp go past the opening of the drive
+where the London road was just visible. He paused a moment and looked
+towards the house. He did not come in. He just looked--and waved his
+hand at them. The next minute he was gone. But not before Maria had
+returned his wave.
+
+"He'll come back," suggested Stumper, as they went inside.
+
+"Yes," said Maria. "He's mine--but you can have him too."
+
+Ten minutes later, when they all sat down to lunch, the big blue figure
+of the policeman passed the opening of the drive. Being occupied with
+hot roast beef, they did not see him. He paused a moment, looked
+towards the house, and then went slowly out of sight again along the
+London road, following the tramp....
+
+THE END
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Extra Day, by Algernon Blackwood
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