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The Extra Day, a novel by Algernon Blackwood |
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Chapter 17. A Day Has Come - Part 3 |
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_ CHAPTER XVII. A DAY HAS COME - PART 3 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:
"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.
IX
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.
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:
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