The Algernon Blackwood Collection

by Algernon Blackwood

  “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.