Wrinkle in Time

by Madeleine L'engle

  ‘Come, children,’ Mrs Whatsit said. ‘We don’t have far to go, and we might as well walk. It will do you good to stretch your legs a little.’

  As they moved through the greyness Meg caught an occasional glimpse of slaglike rocks, but there were no traces of trees or bushes, nothing but flat ground under their feet, no sign of any vegetation at all.

  Finally, ahead of them there loomed what seemed to be a hill of stone. As they approached it Meg could see that there was an entrance that led into a deep, dark cavern. ‘Are we going in there?’ she asked nervously.

  ‘Don’t be afraid,’ Mrs Whatsit said. ‘It’s easier for the Happy Medium to work within. Oh, you’ll like her, children. She’s very jolly. If ever I saw her looking unhappy I would be very depressed myself. As long as she can laugh I’m sure everything is going to come out right in the end.’

  ‘Whattsitt,’ came Mrs Which’s voice severely, ‘jusstt beccause yyou arre verry youngg iss nno exxcuse forr tallkingg tooo muchh.’

  Mrs Whatsit looked hurt, but she subsided.

  ‘Just how old are you?’ Calvin asked her.

  ‘Just a moment,’ Mrs Whatsit murmured, and appeared to calculate rapidly upon her fingers. She nodded triumphantly. ‘Exactly 2,379,152,497 years, 8 months and 3 days. That is according to your calendar, of course, which even you know isn’t very accurate.’ She leant closer to Meg and Calvin and whispered, ‘It was really a very great honour for me to be chosen for this mission. It’s just because of my verbalizing and materializing so well, you know. But of course we can’t take any credit for our talents. It’s how we use them that counts. And I make far too many mistakes. That’s why Mrs Who and I enjoyed seeing Mrs Which make a mistake when she tried to land you on a two-dimensional planet. It was that we were laughing at, not at you. She was laughing at herself, you see. She’s really terribly nice to us younger ones.’

  Meg was listening with such interest to what Mrs Whatsit was saying that she hardly noticed when they went into the cave; the transition from the greyness of outside to the greyness of inside was almost unnoticeable. She saw a flickering light ahead of them, ahead and down, and it was towards this that they went. As they drew closer she realized that it was a fire.

  ‘It gets very cold in here,’ Mrs Whatsit said, ‘so we asked her to have a good bonfire going for you.’

  As they approached the fire they could see a dark shadow against it, and as they went closer still they could see that the shadow was a woman. She wore a turban of pale mauve silk, and a flowing, purple satin gown. In her hands was a crystal ball into which she was gazing raptly. She did not appear to see the children, Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who and Mrs Which, but continued to stare into the crystal ball; as she stared she began to laugh; and she laughed and laughed at whatever it was that she was seeing.

  Mrs Which’s voice rang out clear and strong, echoing against the walls of the cavern, and the words fell with a sonorous clang.

  ‘WWEE ARRE HHERRE!’

  The woman looked up from the ball, and when she saw them she got up and curtsied deeply. Mrs Whatsit and Mrs Who dropped small curtsies in return, and the shimmer seemed to bow slightly.

  ‘Oh, Medium, dear,’ Mrs Whatsit said, ‘these are the children. Charles Wallace Murry.’ Charles Wallace bowed. ‘Margaret Murry.’ Meg felt that if Mrs Whatsit and Mrs Who had curtsied, she ought to; so she did, rather awkwardly. ‘And Calvin O’Keefe.’ Calvin bobbed his head. ‘We want them to see their home planet,’ Mrs Whatsit said.

  The Medium lost the delighted smile she had worn till then. ‘Oh, why must you make me look at unpleasant things when there are so many delightful ones to see?’

  Again Mrs Which’s voice reverberated through the cave. ‘Therre willl nno llonggerr bee sso manyy pplleasanntt thinggss too llookk att iff rressponssible ppeoplle ddo nnott ddoo ssomethingg abboutt thee unnppleassanntt oness.’

  The Medium sighed and held the ball high.

  ‘Look, children,’ Mrs Whatsit said. ‘Look into it well.’

  ‘ Que la terre est petite à qui la voit des cieux! Delille. Howsmall is the earth to him who looks from heaven,’ Mrs Who intoned musically.

  Meg looked into the crystal ball, at first with caution, then with increasing eagerness, as she seemed to see an enormous sweep of dark and empty space, and then galaxies swinging across it. Finally they seemed to move in closer on one of the galaxies.

  ‘Your own Milky Way,’ Mrs Whatsit whispered to Meg.

  They were headed directly towards the centre of the galaxy; then they moved off to one side; stars seemed to be rushing at them. Meg flung her arm up over her face as though to ward off the blow.

  ‘Llookk!’Mrs Which commanded.

  Meg dropped her arm. They seemed to be moving in towards a planet. She thought she could make out polar ice caps. Everything seemed sparkling clear.

  ‘No, no, Medium dear, that’s Mars,’ Mrs Whatsit reproved gently.

  ‘Do I have to?’ the Medium asked.

  ‘NNOWW!’Mrs Which commanded.

  The bright planet moved out of their vision. For a moment there was the darkness of space; then another planet. The outlines of this planet were not clean and clear. It seemed to be covered with a smoky haze. Through the haze Meg thought she could make out the familiar outlines of continents like pictures in her social studies books.

  ‘Is it because of our atmosphere that we can’t see properly?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘Nno, Mmegg, yyou knnoww thatt itt iss nnott tthee attmosspheeere,’ Mrs Which said. ‘Yyou mmusstt bee brrave.’

  ‘It’s the Thing!’ Charles Wallace cried. ‘It’s the Dark Thing we saw from the mountain peak on Uriel when we were riding on Mrs Whatsit s back!’

  ‘Did it just come?’ Meg asked in agony, unable to take her eyes from the shadow which darkened the beauty of the earth. ‘Did it just come while we’ve been gone?’

  Mrs Which’s voice seemed very tired. ‘Ttell herr,’ she said to Mrs Whatsit.

  Mrs Whatsit sighed. ‘No, Meg. It hasn’t just come. It has been there for a great many years. That is why your planet is such a troubled one.’

  ‘But why —’ Calvin started to ask, his voice croaking hoarsely.

  Mrs Whatsit raised her hand to silence him. ‘We showed you the Dark Thing on Uriel first — oh, for many reasons. First, because the atmosphere on the mountain peaks there is so clear and thin you could see it for what it is. And we thought it would be easier for you to understand it if you saw it — well, someplace else first, not your own earth.’

  ‘I hate it!’ Charles Wallace cried passionately. ‘I hate the Dark Thing.’

  Mrs Whatsit nodded. ‘Yes, Charles. We all do. That’s another reason we wanted to prepare you on Uriel. We thought it would be too frightening for you to see it first of all about your own, beloved world.’

  ‘But what is it?’ Calvin demanded. ‘We know that it’s evil, but what is it?’

  ‘Yyouu hhave ssaidd itt!’ Mrs Which’s voice rang out. ‘Itt iss Eevill. Itt iss thee Ppowers of Ddarrkknesss!’

  ‘But what’s going to happen?’ Meg’s voice trembled. ‘Oh, please, Mrs Which, tell us what’s going to happen!’

  ‘Wee wwill cconnttinnue tto ffightt!’

  Something in Mrs Which’s voice made all three of the children stand straighter, throwing back their shoulders with determination, looking at the glimmer that was Mrs Which with pride and confidence.

  ‘And we’re not alone, you know, children,’ came Mrs Whatsit, the comforter. ‘All through the universe it’s being fought, all through the cosmos, and my, but it’s a grand and exciting battle. I know it’s hard for you to understand about size, how there’s very little difference in the size of the tiniest microbe and the greatest galaxy. You think about that, and maybe it won’t seem strange to you that some of our very best fighters have come right from your own planet, and it’s a little planet, dears, out on the edge of a little galaxy. You can be proud that it’s done so well.’

 
‘Who have our fighters been?’ Calvin asked.

  ‘Oh, you must know them, dear,’ Mrs Whatsit said.

  Mrs Who’s spectacles shone out at them triumphantly, ‘And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.’

  ‘Jesus!’ Charles Wallace said. ‘Why of course, Jesus!’

  ‘Of course!’ Mrs Whatsit said. ‘Go on, Charles, love. There were others. All your great artists. They’ve been lights for us to see by’

  ‘Leonardo da Vinci?’ Calvin suggested tentatively. ‘And Michelangelo?’

  ‘And Shakespeare,’ Charles Wallace called out, ‘and Bach! And Pasteur and Madame Curie and Einstein!’

  Now Calvin’s voice rang with confidence. ‘And Schweitzer and Gandhi and Buddha and Beethoven and Rembrandt and St Francis!’

  ‘Now you, Meg,’ Mrs Whatsit ordered.

  ‘Oh, Euclid, I suppose.’ Meg was in such an agony of impatience that her voice grated irritably. ‘And Copernicus. But what about father? Please, what about father?’

  ‘Wee aarre ggoingg tto yourr ffatherr,’ Mrs Which said.

  ‘But where is he?’ Meg went over to Mrs Which and stamped as though she were as young as Charles Wallace.

  Mrs Whatsit answered in a voice that was low but quite firm. ‘On a planet that has given in. So you must prepare to be very strong.’

  All traces of cheer had left the Happy Medium’s face. She sat holding the great ball, looking down at the shadowed earth, and a slow tear coursed down her cheek. ‘I can’t stand it any longer,’ she sobbed. ‘Watch now, children, watch!’

  6

  The Happy Medium

  Again they focused their eyes on the crystal ball. The earth with its fearful covering of dark shadow swam out of view and they moved rapidly through the Milky Way. And there was the Thing again.

  ‘Watch!’ the Medium told them.

  The Darkness seemed to seethe and writhe. Was this meant to comfort them?

  Suddenly there was a great burst of light through the Darkness. The light spread out and where it touched the Darkness the Darkness disappeared. The light spread until the patch of Dark Thing had vanished, and there was only a gentle shining, and through the shining came the stars, clear and pure. Then, slowly, the shining dwindled until it, too, was gone, and there was nothing but stars and starlight. No shadows. No fear. Only the stars and the clear darkness of space, quite different from the fearful darkness of the Thing.

  ‘You see!’ the Medium cried, smiling happily. ‘It can be overcome! It is being overcome all the time!’

  Mrs Whatsit sighed, a sigh so sad that Meg wanted to put her arms round her and comfort her.

  ‘Tell us exactly what happened, then, please,’ Charles Wallace said in a small voice.

  ‘It was a star,’ Mrs Whatsit said sadly. ‘A star giving up its life in battle with the Thing. It won, oh, yes, my children, it won. But it lost its life in the winning.’

  Mrs Which spoke again. Her voice sounded tired, and they knew that speaking was a tremendous effort for her.

  ‘Itt wass nnott sso llongg aggo fforr yyou, wwass itt?’ she asked gently.

  Mrs Whatsit shook her head.

  Charles Wallace went up to Mrs Whatsit. ‘I see. Now I understand. You were a star, once, weren’t you?’

  Mrs Whatsit covered her face with her hands as though she were embarrassed, and nodded.

  ‘And you did — you did what that star just did?’

  With her face still covered, Mrs Whatsit nodded again.

  Charles Wallace looked at her, very solemnly. ‘I should like to kiss you.’

  Mrs Whatsit took her hands down from her face and pulled Charles Wallace to her in a quick embrace. He put his arms about her neck, pressed his cheek against hers, and then kissed her.

  Meg felt that she would have liked to kiss Mrs Whatsit, too, but that after Charles Wallace, anything that she or Calvin did or said would be an anticlimax. She contented herself with looking at Mrs Whatsit. Even though she was used to Mrs Whatsit’s odd getup (and the very oddness of it was what made her seem so comforting), she realized with a fresh shock that it was not Mrs Whatsit herself that she was seeing at all. The complete, the true Mrs Whatsit, Meg realized, was beyond human understanding. What she saw was only the game Mrs Whatsit was playing; it was an amusing and charming game, a game full of both laughter and comfort, but it was only the tiniest facet of all the things Mrs Whatsit could be.

  ‘I didn’t mean to tell you,’ Mrs Whatsit faltered. ‘I didn’t mean ever to let you know. But, oh, my dears, I did so love being a star!’

  ‘Yyouu arre sstill verry yyoungg,’ Mrs Which said, her voice faintly chiding.

  The Medium sat looking happily at the star-filled sky in her ball, smiling and nodding and chuckling gently. But Meg noticed that her eyes were drooping, and suddenly her head fell forward and she gave a faint snore.

  ‘Poor thing,’ Mrs Whatsit said, ‘we’ve worn her out. It’s very hard work for her.’

  ‘Please, Mrs Whatsit,’ Meg asked, ‘what happens now? Why are we here? What do we do next? Where is father? When are we going to him?’ She clasped her hands pleadingly.

  ‘One thing at a time, love!’ Mrs Whatsit said.

  Mrs Who cut in. ‘As paredes tem ouvidos. That’s Portuguese. Walls have ears.’

  ‘Yes, let us go outside,’ Mrs Whatsit said. ‘Come, we’ll let her sleep.’

  But as they turned to go, the Medium jerked her head up and smiled at them radiantly. ‘You weren’t going to go without saying goodbye to me, were you?’ she asked.

  ‘We thought we’d just let you sleep, dear,’ Mrs Whatsit patted the Medium’s shoulder. ‘We worked you terribly hard and we know you must be very tired.’

  ‘But I was going to give you some ambrosia or nectar or at least some tea —’

  At this Meg realized that she was hungry. How much time had passed since they had had their bowls of stew? she wondered.

  But Mrs Whatsit said, ‘Oh, thank you, dear, but I think we’d better be going.’

  ‘They don’t need to eat, you know,’ Charles Wallace whispered to Meg. ‘At least not food, the way we do. Eating’s just a game with them. As soon as we get organized again I’d better remind them that they’ll have to feed us sooner or later.’

  ‘Let’s go!’ Meg cried harshly. ‘Let’s do something!’

  ‘Well, kiss me goodbye for good luck,’ the Medium said.

  Meg went over to her and gave her a quick kiss, and so did Charles Wallace. The Medium looked smilingly at Calvin, and winked. ‘I want the young man to kiss me, too. I always did love red hair. And it’ll give you good luck, Laddie-me-love.’

  Calvin bent down, blushing, and awkwardly kissed her cheek.

  The Medium tweaked his nose. ‘You’ve got a lot to learn, my boy,’ she told him.

  ‘Now, goodbye Medium dear, and many thanks,’ Mrs Whatsit said. ‘I dare say we’ll see you in an aeon or two.’

  ‘Where are you going in case I want to tune in?’ the Medium asked.

  ‘Camazotz,’ Mrs Whatsit told her. (Where and what was Camazotz? Meg did not like the sound of the word or the way in which Mrs Whatsit pronounced it.) ‘But please don’t distress yourself on our behalf. You know you don’t like looking in on the dark and it’s very upsetting to us when you aren’t happy.’

  ‘But I must know what happens to the children,’ the Medium said. ‘It’s my worst trouble, getting fond. If I didn’t get fond I could be happy all the time. Oh, well, ho hum, I manage to keep pretty jolly, and a little snooze will do wonders for me right now. Goodbye everyb—’ and her word got lost in the general b-b-bz-z of a snore.

  ‘Ccome,’ Mrs Which ordered, and they followed her out of the darkness of the cave to the impersonal greyness of the Medium’s planet.

  ‘Nnoww, cchilldrenn, yyouu musstt nott bee frrightennedd att whatt iss ggoingg tto hhappenn,’ Mrs Which warned.

  ‘Be angry, little Meg,’ Mrs Whatsit whispered. ‘You will need all yo
ur anger now.’

  Without warning Meg was swept into nothingness again. This time the nothingness was interrupted by a feeling of clammy coldness such as she had never felt before. The coldness deepened and swirled all about her and through her, and was filled with a new and strange kind of darkness that was a completely tangible thing, a thing that wanted to eat and digest her like some enormous malignant beast of prey.

  Then the darkness was gone. Had it been the shadow, the Black Thing? Had they had to travel through it to get to her father?

  There was the by-now-familiar tingling in her hands and feet and the push through hardness, and she was on her feet, breathless but unharmed, standing beside Calvin and Charles Wallace.

  ‘Is this Camazotz?’ Charles Wallace asked as Mrs Whatsit materialized in front of him.

  ‘Yes,’ she answered. ‘Now let us just stand and get our breath and look around.’

  They were standing on a hill and as Meg looked about her she felt that it could easily be a hill on earth. There were the familiar trees she knew so well at home: birches, pines, maples. And though it was warmer than it had been when they so precipitously left the apple orchard, there was a faintly autumnal touch to the air; near them were several small trees with reddened leaves very like sumac, and a big patch of goldenrod-like flowers. As she looked down the hill she could see the smokestacks of a town, and it might have been one of any number of familiar towns. There seemed to be nothing strange, or different, or frightening, in the landscape.

  But Mrs Whatsit came to her and put an arm around her comfortingly. ‘I can’t stay with you here, you know, love,’ she said. ‘You three children will be on your own. We will be near you; we will be watching you. But you will not be able to see us or to ask us for help, and we will not be able to come to you.’