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Progress of Stories Page 24

by Laura (Riding) Jackson


  Or, if this new world of hers had come about entirely through deception, she herself was the deceived one. And how could she deceive herself? Only invalids deceived themselves; and she had always enjoyed perfect health. And was it, indeed, a new world? There could be no doubt about its being a different world, but who but herself was responsible for the difference, the changing over from that world to this? And wasn't it a changing back rather than a changing over? The question was, which was the original world, her original world, the right world, the real world? She had certainly lived in that world ever since she could remember, but was she any the less alive now, and what was memory? Memory was fear. Yes, it was quite true: in that world she had been afraid of something—death. That is why she had lived. Was she dead now? In a way she was. What was death? It was being what one really was. What was life? It was running away from oneself. It was being not quite oneself—merely humouring certain whims. Well, what had been the result of her merely humouring certain whims—what had she been when she was being not quite herself? Had she had any whims of her own to humour? Well, perhaps she had had just one: a whim to put things off. And the result had been—it now seemed to her that she had been—a cat!

  Oh, dear, what nonsense! Far greater nonsense than the little ball of light, and the weather grains, and the left window, and the right window, and the mirror that was not really a mirror, and the bits of coloured paper that were also insects and chocolates and what-not. For these had been nothing but thoughts; and thoughts, no matter how nonsensical, or whose they were, exercised the mind. And thoughts passed. The little ball of light, and the weather-grains, and the left window, and the right window, and so on, and so on—these had quite disappeared now; and her mind was all the better for them. But to have been a cat! That was a fact, not a thought. How could one be all the better for having been a cat? Did facts exercise the mind? Did facts pass like thoughts? No, no. Facts weighed on the mind, and facts stayed. But had it been such a burden to be a cat? Why, no; it had been a very lazy life. And was she still a cat? Why, no; she certainly had no whim now to put things off. Had she, in fact, ever been a cat? Why, no; it had merely been a state of mind—a not wanting to think. Or, rather, she had merely been saving up her mind until she could be sure that she was really she. It was foolish to use your mind until you were sure that you were really you. If you used it before you were really you it was bound to be a tired mind by the time you were really you: there was bound to be very little of yourself left for yourself. There was a great difference between exercise and hysteria, between having thoughts and imagining things.

  Oh, dear, what a complicated business it all was! But better complicated than simple. For example, she would never—if she could help it—be Frances Cat again: it was too simple. When things were too simple they did not last. Of course, when things were too complicated there was another danger: they lasted, but one was inclined to be irritated with them. Thus, while it was obviously more satisfactory to be what she really was than to be idiotic Frances Cat, since in any case she would sooner or later have had to work things out, it was nevertheless irritating to be what she really was and yet not be able to describe herself in so many words. To describe herself as a charming but imperious lady of independent means who didn't mind losing her purse was better than calling herself a little girl wiser than her years. And it was still closer to the truth to say that she was a poor woman sitting contentedly by her fire—because what else could she do? But it wasn't the truth; it was only a manner of speaking. Oh, the Devil!

  But there was the Devil himself. Having accepted her invitation to sit down and warm himself, he was obviously waiting for her to say something. So she said, "Now what do you want?" "My dear," he answered with a confidential slant of his head, "I want nothing but your happiness." "Hmph!" she snapped at him, "you can't have it." "Now don't be alarmed," he said soothingly. "I have been sent to you by the Indescribable Witch to see if there's anything I can do for you." "That's a lie," she answered. "I am the Indescribable Witch!" "Why didn't you say so before?" he asked, bowing to the ground so that his tail stuck up like a broom. "And is there anything I can do for you?" This made her realize that he was teasing her; so she jumped at him and jerked his tail off. "There, that will teach you," she said. "Any more impudence, and I'll have your tongue out. Now sweep the floor." She gave him his tail to sweep the floor with, and it made a very good broom. But meanwhile the fire had burned itself down and her supper had cooked itself to nothing. "Very good," she said, "that will save me the trouble of eating it." She was in a very lively mood now. In her opinion the Devil was not sweeping the floor half fast enough. "Perhaps he is not well," she said— not at all sympathetically. "Perhaps he will die." How nice it would be if the Devil would die! What was the Devil? Only a trial of one's seriousness. Could she be any more in earnest than she was now? Hadn't she just deliberately let the cat out of the bag? Hadn't she declared that she was the Indescribable Witch herself?

  She could see that the Devil was poking his tongue into his cheek. "What's the matter?" she asked peevishly. "Don't you believe that I am the Indescribable Witch?" "And are you absolutely sure that you are?" he whispered, leaning forward on his broom and shooting his long rubbery tongue in and out of his mouth in a most exasperating way. "I am I, and there's an end to all argument," she said. And with that she jerked out his long rubbery tongue and trampled on it until there was no life left in it; it would make a nice smooth pouch for keeping keys in. And then she broke his broom in two across her knee; the stalk would do for a staff, the brush she stuck in her hair like a plume. She felt, indeed, that she had good cause to rejoice. For what was left of the Devil? Nothing but a burning sensation in herself of being not merely the central character of the story, but the very story itself. "Ha!" she cried like a knight who has escaped a fatal conflict by treating the enemy as if he were someone not worth fighting with—much to the latter's mortification. This was certainly the right way to treat the Devil, who respected insults. "Ha!" she cried. "I have disposed of the author of the story." No one had the right to handle her story but herself. She might be the Indescribable Witch, or she might not; but if she was not, nobody else was. And if there was anyone else present besides herself and the Indescribable Witch, that person was the Devil, and the story was a lie. Well, she had purposely let the story be a sort of lie, until she had got all the details right. And at the proper moment, when she felt really at home, as only the poor and humble can feel at home, she had treated the Devil as he deserved to be treated—good-bye and no thanks.

  And since she was the very story itself, it could no longer be called a story. "A humble character like myself has no need of a story about her," she said. "I'll just remove myself from everybody's attention." She did not go upstairs—who was she to have an upstairs? But there was nothing inconsistent in her having a cellar; and down into her cellar she went, making her way determinedly with her staff, and bristling her plume—a hat with a feather in it, really, such as self-respecting poor women always put on at least an hour before they go out— against the low, sloping ceiling of the staircase. The door at the bottom was locked and she found the key to it in the Devil's tongue, or, more exactly, in her key-pouch. That left still another key in the pouch, "Oh, yes," she said to herself, "that'll be the key to the glory-hole." A poor woman always had a glory-hole, of course—in the darkest corner of her cellar. And now she did a funny thing, for someone who considered herself not only the central character of the story, but the very story itself and, further, the solitary reader of the story: she turned round, before locking the door behind her, and called up the stairs in a voice that made it plain that no one was even to try to follow her, "Good-bye, and thank you for your interest." If people had been attending to the story, they were now to consider her off their minds. They had been sufficiently rewarded for their patience by the mental exercise that they must have got out of it; it was as good as their own story up to the point where she declared it hers, and hers
only. In fact, it was only the end that she insisted on keeping to herself. And they could keep whatever end they put to it to themselves. Everyone's soul was her own. Everyone was a poor woman who had a right to a hat with a feather in it, and a stick to hobble along on when she went out—perhaps for the last time —on business which was nobody's business but her own.

  And certainly, with the door locked behind her and the key in the pool—she had heard it splash when she threw it away—the story could be of no possible interest to anyone but herself; and she knew exactly what was going to happen. She knew that out of the pool into which the key had fallen would come a serpent with friendly fangs. She knew that the cellar was really a forest; the dampness was the dampness of a forest. She knew that the glory-hole, which the other key would open to her, was really a room in the centre of the forest where accounts would be settled once and for all between herself and the Indescribable Witch. A sharp wind came up and blew off her hat; in trying to catch it she let her stick drop. Then the wind quieted down suddenly. She had lost her hat and her stick and was feeling very, very poor indeed in the dark, and all the more resolved to have her rights. The burning sensation (of being the very story itself) glowed out of her like a thin phosphorescence, just baring the huddled trunks of the trees, which were nearly sweating with fright and embarrassment at being there at all. And the black pool glinted, green and angry. And the serpent with the friendly fangs darted out of it, the leaves of the trees quivering with excitement.

  By this time she had opened the door into the little room where the scales that could not cheat would weigh out her rights. And no one must know the outcome—except the serpent, which was justice. It was playing on the scales already, tipping them up and down. Least of all must Frances Cat know the outcome. She locked the door quickly behind her, just in time, for she could hear an insistent scratching on the door, then a loud purring, as if to say, "You know you'll let me in." Nothing of the sort! The serpent with the friendly fangs broke exactly in two, and the scales balanced to a stop. The friendly fangs flew up, changing into many, many birds, or rather into songs. Or rather into such a chatter. Or rather into an explanation of everything in a language that no one could possibly understand but herself. The truth at last! No more need of the scales, then. They began swinging round and round, scattering the serpent's body flakily all over the room in fine grains like grains of weather.

  "Why," she cried, "it is the beginning of the story again!" And just to keep outsiders from coming any further in case anyone had, in spite of all her precautions, followed her right back to the beginning, she said, "The Indescribable Witch and I, having carefully divided our world between us, the poor world of two poor Nothings, thank you for your interest and hope that you are satisfied that everything has been honourable and above board." "Nothings indeed!" laughed the Indescribable Witch. "I should like you to understand that she has absolutely no authority to speak for us. She was only a story about my cat, which had got lost. I only made her up to distract your attention while I went out looking for my cat, for no one must see me. I didn't find my cat, but she'll be here in a moment. Cats always turn up the moment after you have stopped looking for them. You know what cats are—just like minds. You die and wake up thinking, 'Oh to have at least my mind back.' And then, a moment after you have given up hope, back comes your mind to keep you company. Now I am always dying. Whenever somebody dies, I die; and somebody is always dying. But my cat always comes back. My cat is, as you know, the law of inevitability, and I am, as you know, that famous poor woman, the truth." And then there was a small, strong ticking: the world was going round again! And Frances, who had of course been let in, was happily stroking her black fur into place with her tongue—she had been in and out everywhere. "I hope you are satisfied," said the Indescribable Witch, "that everything has been honourable and above board?" Frances, in reply, slanted her ears back, tucked her long rubbery tongue into her mouth, waved her friendly serpentine tail, and leaped on to the Indescribable Witch's shoulder. Her eyes were on a level with the Indescribable Witch's eyes. Who could say whose eyes they were—since one couldn't really see the Indescribable Witch? Poor woman! No, poverty did not become women. Who ever noticed a poor woman? Who ever noticed anything about a poor woman but her cat, and who really noticed a cat? Ah, she needn't worry: she was safe from description.

  Every time her cat got lost she knew that there would be a death, and when it came back she knew that somebody had died. When people died they became a poor woman—a Nothing; they became the poor truth; they stopped imagining things. At first they thought, "Oh, to have at least my mind back." Indeed they had their minds back—they had not really lost them; they had only lost their imaginations. Each of them became a poor woman with no future before her. Instead of a future, there was only a cat. There had really been a cat all along—a whim to put things off. But now they had to admit to themselves that the imaginings out of which they had made their lives were only things that they had had to put off indefinitely because they would never be. This is what every poor woman says to herself, looking at her cat: "It can never be." If she forgets to say to herself, "It can never be," allowing her mind to wander, sure as life her cat gets lost. And sure as life there is life; and naturally, a little later there is death, when her cat comes home. Cats always come home.

  Oh, dear, what nonsense! Will the nonsense never end? And the small, strong ticking—will the world always go round again? I'm afraid so. For, though when people die they become poor women, and every poor woman keeps her business —which is nobody's business but her own—all to herself, so that you might think that there was an end of that, still, there remains the whole problem of the Indescribable Witch. For every poor woman is the poor woman. And the poor woman is the poor truth—a Something. And a Something is what the Indescribable Witch is. When people die they become the Indescribable Witch. They become, that is, her cat, since in becoming poor women they become poor women's cats, since there is really only one poor woman but any number of cats. The Indescribable Witch is one poor woman and a cat that is any number of cats. A poor woman with only one cat is a Nothing. For one cat is as good as none; cats are always getting lost. True, they always come home. But what are you while they are not at home? Just a poor woman out on business which is nobody's business but your own—out looking for your cat. But the Indescribable Witch never goes out. She stays at home waiting for all the cats to come home—it is really only the poor women who go out looking for them. And the cats come home, but the poor women never. She, in fact, is the poor woman: there is only one poor woman and any number of cats.

  Perhaps you can't make head or tail out of all this. Well, you're not supposed to, any more than, when Frances leaped on to the Indescribable Witch's shoulders, you were supposed to be able to tell whose eyes were whose. The trouble is that you insisted on following the story: that's why there's not an end of that. For no matter how far you follow, there remains the whole problem of the Indescribable Witch, and what a Something is. You insist on knowing, do you? Well, why don't you know? Does anyone stop you? Haven't you followed the story as far as you liked? There you are! You have forgotten to say to yourselves, "It can never be," and allowed your mind to wander. Sure as life your cat has got lost, and so sure as life there is life. And that is why there's not an end of that. And that is why there remains the whole problem of the Indescribable Witch, and what a Something is. For the whole problem of the Indescribable Witch, and what a Something is, is really the whole problem: "What happens in the end?" You can't get it into your heads that in the end nothing happens— nothing more. You keep waiting for a Something, forgetting over and over again that it can never be. You die, well enough; you become a Nothing. But you can't help hoping that a Nothing is really a Something. And so you become a Something, since if you are a Nothing you can be whatever you like. You become the Indescribable Witch—she who knew from the very beginning that in the end nothing more happens. Yes, in spite of yourselves you will litt
le by little get it into your heads. And so, in a way, there is an end of that.

  A LAST LESSON IN GEOGRAPHY

  THEY say that the earth is round, but we know that it is not. And yet, if we tried to prove that the earth was not round, we should be forced to admit that it was, though we knew with absolute certainty that it was not. It is always a great mistake to try to prove anything, for then it is only what we do not know that counts, not what we know. If we know a part of the truth, but not the whole truth, people who know nothing at all are able to prove that we are wrong and they are right—in whatever they choose to call right.

  Fortunately, we shall soon know the whole truth; in the meantime it is best not to try to prove anything or to let ourselves be drawn into an argument. We know now that the earth is not round; but soon we shall know with absolute certainty what is round. That the sky is round and that there can be no question, therefore, of the earth's being round, we shall know with absolute certainty, when we have had our last lesson in geography. We are about to have our last lesson in geography.

  Following the sky we could never do more than get back to where we started from, for the sky is round. It falls in, having no strength of its own. It falls in upon the earth—but that is no reason for calling the earth round. What is the sky? The sky is the minds of the weak people, those who don't want to go anywhere. And the earth is the minds of the strong people. And surely it is an odd circumstance that the strong people should give in to the weak people. What can possibly have made the strong people give in to the weak people? Only that the strong people are not so strong as they pretend to be. This is how it came about that the strong people agreed with the weak people that the earth was round. But the strong people did not mean, in agreeing with the weak people that the earth was round, to give up their right for ever and ever to go anywhere. They were only saying to the weak people, "Very well, we are not so strong as we pretend to be and will give in to you—for the time being. We are still very young and not fit to travel very far. We will not leave you yet." And so the world— that is, the earth and the sky together, or the strong people mixed with the weak people—went on. Or you might call the world the mixture of the young people with the old people; for the weak people are the old people, and the strong people who are not so strong as they pretend to be are the young people.

 

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