by Forrest Reid
The last words were a disappointment; in fact they left Tom distinctly annoyed, for he had been on the point of accepting these conclusions. But Pascoe was always giving you surprises like this, and he looked at him reproachfully. “You’ve just said that the Bible is absolutely true,” he grumbled.
“I didn’t,” Pascoe returned. “I said people told you that it was absolutely true; and I said that if it was, then it must be mathematically true. In my opinion it’s neither one nor the other.”
“Then you’re an agnostic,” Tom declared. “Or an atheist,” he added more thoughtfully, struck by what would ultimately happen to Pascoe. “Daddy, I don’t think, believes at all,” he presently admitted, “though he won’t argue about it. But Mother does: she told me so.
“A lot of it’s nonsense,” Pascoe replied. “Just as much nonsense as the story of Saint Columba learning to read by swallowing a cake with the letters of the alphabet printed on it. You don’t believe that, do you?”
“No, I don’t,” said Tom, “and I never heard of Saint Columba.”
“Well, a lot of the Bible stories are just as silly.”
“Who told you about Saint Columba?” Tom asked suspiciously.
“Aunt Rhoda told me. And she says the lives of the saints are crammed with things like that.”
“The lives of the saints aren’t in the Bible,” Tom pointed out. “And anyhow I don’t think the Tree of Life is silly at all.”
Pascoe looked at him. “Why are you fixing so specially on the Tree of Life?” he said. There are two trees.”
“I don’t know,” Tom confessed. “Except that I saw it and not the other one. I mean I saw it for a minute when you were speaking about it.” He paused to pursue a private cogitation. “Can you see a thing if it isn’t real?” he wondered aloud. “I mean, could you see an oak tree in your thoughts if there never had been an oak tree? Where would the thought come from? Not that this was like an oak tree. It had flat leaves of a kind of silvery grey, and nearly white on the under side. They were big leaves too, for the size of the tree, which wasn’t really a big tree; and they moved very easily—not with the wind, but as if they wanted to move. The trunk was smooth, and like the trunk of a birch, only thicker, and——”
“Oh, stop!” cried Pascoe, almost choking. “You’re about the biggest little——” He left the rest unspoken, but Tom had no difficulty in supplying the word “liar”.
“It’s queer that we should always call each other ‘little’ when it comes to disputes,” he thought, pulling the bedclothes up under his chin. “And it’s queer the way Chrysanthemum dug in the sand. . . . I wonder how Henry would like it if I brought Chrysanthemum home with me? Not at all, I suppose. I wonder what Henry’s doing at this moment, and if the clock has stopped yet? . . . I wonder if I could really bring Gamelyn again?”
But this was a proposition he could test, and it brought him up abruptly. “He said three times,” Tom pondered. “Or anyway I thought he did. . . . Which means of course now only twice. . . . He had fair hair, but not so fair as Pascoe’s, which is practically white.
“Fair hair,” he murmured sleepily. “I like fair hair best.” And then, somehow, there was a window open to the dawn—a garden, and birds singing endlessly. Another voice, a human voice, but not really Tom’s voice, though he was making it come out of him and it sang—sang ever so much better than Tom could sing. . . .
Suddenly he was wide awake.
“I think I will try,” he determined, sitting up in bed. “Just where that streak of moonshine is.”
And even as he said so, the moonlight quivered and Gamelyn was there.
Like and unlike the boy in the lane; but this time not in any disguise, really an angel.
He certainly had altered. He looked even nicer than before, though he was now such a big boy that Tom felt qualms about having called him. He had better explain how it had happened, find an excuse. “I’m afraid I didn’t really need you,” he apologized. “I was just trying——” And then he was silent.
The angel waited: he did not seem to understand. For all that, Tom still felt that he had done wrong. The angel was a guardian angel and at present Tom had nothing to be guarded from, in fact he had brought him for no reason whatever—at least no serious reason. If only he were a real boy! He looked so like one, and Tom so wished he was one! The angel watched him with bright steadfast eyes, like pools with the sky mirrored in them: his body was silvered by the moonlight, and he had no wings. “This is the second time,” he said. “Let us go.”
“Go where?” Tom answered.
He slid out of bed nevertheless, and stood in his pink striped pyjamas on the floor. The angel had opened the door, and now beckoned to him before passing on down the stone staircase. It was very like a picture Tom had seen of Saint Peter escaping from prison, and next moment they were out on the grass.
The angel climbed on to the ramparts and Tom climbed up beside him. The ruins of the castle were clear in the moonlight—everything was marvellously clear. Down in the ravine he could see the rabbits playing.
And if anybody should happen to be awake, he suddenly remembered, and should happen to glance out of a window, both he and his naked companion would be plainly visible. But at that moment Gamelyn caught his hand and their flight began.
It was so swift that Tom felt and saw nothing—so swift that he seemed only to have drawn his breath once before they were standing in a hollow misty land between mountains. Or at least he thought they were mountains, though they might only be gigantic clouds, for it was very dark, and through the darkness there leapt streaks of scarlet flame. Presently his eyes grew more accustomed to the gloom, and peering through it, he could make out two immense shadowy forms moving rapidly and soundlessly backward and forward. In the right hand of each was a long thin scarlet flame that wheeled and darted, cleaving the mist this way and that; and Tom knew that these were the flaming swords, and that those grey shadowy forms were the sentinel cherubim; but they were of colossal proportions, and in the dim light he could not see their faces.
A voice whispered in his ear: “Not much chance of getting in that way!”
Tom answered “No,” for he felt scared, and also surprised. The voice somehow did not sound right—sounded far less like the voice of an angel than the voice of a boy.
“Don’t be frightened,” the voice went on. “They don’t see us, and even if they did we could get away. They never leave the garden and They’re not nearly so close as you think.”
This was a comfort at any rate, though Tom would gladly have been further off still, and presently he said as much.
“I thought you wanted to get in,” the voice answered. “It can be done.”
“I don’t think we ought to try,” Tom murmured uneasily. “I don’t think they want us to try.”
He had never, indeed, felt surer of anything in his life, and the boldness of Gamelyn implanted another misgiving, and this time one which awakened not only opposition but reproach. “It’s very strange,” he said, “that you should talk like that—seeing that you’re supposed to be my guardian angel. I’d have thought you’d have tried to keep me out of mischief—especially dangerous mischief like this. Are you sure you’re an angel at all?” And he turned to Gamelyn suspiciously.
But there was no reply: no Gamelyn.
And this was natural, because for a second or two he was sitting on the bank of the river at home, though he had hardly time to realize it before he was back again in the hollow misty land; and it was not the river at home that was rushing in an inky blackness beneath him.
“That is the way,” Gamelyn pointed, “if you have the courage and will trust me.”
Tom sighed. He hadn’t much courage, he thought; but he had a great deal of trust, so perhaps it came to the same in the end.
“Put your arms round my neck and hold tight,” Gamelyn whispered, and Tom obeyed him. He gave just one tiny cry, barely audible, but which he couldn’t quite repress, as they plunged
down. . . .
Down—down—down—through the soft black rushing water. They sank like stones, and Tom held his breath. But if you know how to hold your breath it is quite easy, he found, and he felt no discomfort at all. He simply didn’t breathe out any of the breath he had drawn in, and therefore everything remained just as before, and he could have gone on for hours. Actually, they weren’t a very long time under water, and it wasn’t cold—perhaps because they were moving so quickly. For when he came to the surface again no mountains or cherubim were in sight, and he was in broad sunshine. Gamelyn, too, had disappeared, so Tom scrambled out on to the bank—alone in Eden.
But if it was a garden, it was a garden grown wild, and was far more like a wood, though there were plenty of flowers. And birds and butterflies and bees. Animals, too, for that was a giraffe over there, nibbling the tops of some shrubs. Tom sat down to collect his thoughts, and it was not till he felt his seat gently rising and sinking beneath him that he found he had sat down on a hippopotamus. The hippopotamus was reclining on his side in a bed of purple irises, and seemed so comfortable, that though Tom scratched him under his ear—always the best place—and scratched his hardest—he only opened one small eye and closed it again.
So this was where Adam had lived! Tom stood up to take stock of his surroundings. But here on the river bank, even when he stood on the hippopotamus, he was too low down to see much. The right spot would be that hill, or mound, about two hundred yards away—and there was something else about the mound which caught and riveted Tom’s attention.
It rose in grassy smoothness to a height of some fifty feet—green sward all the way up till you reached the very top; but on the top, in conspicuous isolation, stood a tree. Tom gazed at this tree with round and ever more credulous eyes. No tempter was there to beguile him; he had no such excuse as had been found by his greatest grandmother; the dire result of the Fall can never have been more convincingly illustrated than by his instantaneous resolve: “If there are any apples on that tree, I’m going to have one.” And he had no sooner reached this determination than he set off at a run.
Climbing the mound did not take long, and in another minute or two he was standing under the dark-green spreading branches, peering up eagerly between them. Yes, there were apples, early as the season was. But before he could take a further step, with a loud whirring noise, ten times more startling than the rising of a pheasant, a great white bird, surely some kind of albatross, flew out, uttering a strident metallic cry. Tom got a terrible fright, which was only natural. “It’s so silly for a big bird like that to build in a tree!” he exclaimed half angrily. And it was a nuisance too, for now if he were to climb the tree, the albatross would very likely think he was going after her nest, and might attack him. What was he to do? For though he could see that there were lots of apples, they were all on the upper branches where he could not reach them. And they looked small and unripe. The tree itself, he felt sure, was not the Tree of Life, but the Tree of Knowledge. Still——
There! She had come back, and was standing watching him, not more than five yards away. “I’d better not climb, but throw a stick,” said the prudent Tom. “She can’t very well object to that!” Luckily there were several good-sized sticks lying about.
So he chose the largest, and taking careful aim—and trying not to think of the albatross—he flung it as hard as he could at the nearest clump of apples. Instantly there was a commotion in the brushwood below, and a large shaggy dog—the born image of Chrysanthemum—came tearing up the hill to retrieve it.
But not before a shower of little apples had come pattering down on Tom’s head and shoulders, rebounding thence on to the grass. The dog, having brought back the stick, dropped it at Tom’s feet, and then backed a few paces, where he stood, with his red tongue lolling out and his eyes rolling affectionately. The albatross also watched, but she made no movement. It was really not a bit like the Bible—or at least not very.
Tom picked up an apple. “Hard as a board!” he muttered; and indeed it was. It had a thick wrinkled rind, too, and when he forced his teeth through this, he found the inside very dry and bitter. He screwed up his face, for the apple tasted worse than the worst medicine, and he could hardly keep from spitting it out. But he got it down at last, and then stood waiting for some mysterious change to take place within him.
Nothing happened. Once he had actually swallowed the apple its bitterness vanished, but that was all. No fresh knowledge dawned upon him; nothing new about either good or evil; his mind was precisely what it had been before. “I’d better test it,” Tom decided, only it was difficult to think of a satisfactory test. “I wish I had an algebra here,” he whispered to himself; “then I could have tried a sum and I’d soon have known.”
As he stood puzzling his brains the shaggy dog came sidling up to him. He caught a flap of Tom’s pyjama jacket between his teeth and gave it a little shake to attract attention. After which he said shyly: “I’m the first dog. I’m Dog.”
Tom instantly remembered his theory about Chrysanthemum. Pascoe had thought it clever at the time, and now it was confirmed—Dog’s words confirmed it—and it occurred to him that perhaps everything in the Garden was the first of its kind.
“I’m the first dog,” Dog said again. “My name’s Dog.”
“I know—I heard you,” Tom replied.
“You wouldn’t have heard me if you hadn’t eaten the apple,” Dog reminded him; and from the sound of his voice Tom was afraid his feelings were a little hurt.
Hastily he patted Dog’s head. “That’s quite true,” he told him. “At least, I’d have heard you, of course, but I wouldn’t have understood you.”
Now I’ll be able to understand Henry too,” he thought, “and not just pretend I do.”
Meanwhile the albatross had waddled over to them. “Here he comes!” she scolded, and in so pugnacious a tone that Tom instinctively stepped back a pace. But it wasn’t with Tom she was angry. “Look!” she cried, giving him a nudge with her wing, so that the top of a feather narrowly escaped his eye.
“Don’t,” said Tom peevishly.
The albatross apologized, but at the same time she stretched her right wing out to its full extent, till it almost covered him. It was the first time Tom had ever been taken under a wing—literally at all events—and he struggled to free himself. “I can’t see anything when you do that,” he muttered in excuse.
“Well, keep close to me, and don’t let him fascinate you,” the albatross said. “Keep as close as you can.”
Tom did as he was told—partly because the albatross seemed to be really uneasy, and partly because he felt a little nervous himself. For a large and beautiful serpent, his long sinuous body burning in the sun, was leisurely climbing the mound. His colour, except for some jet-black markings, was more brightly green than the grass, and his raised, flattened head was swaying slowly from side to side as he advanced, with jewelled lidless eyes fixed upon them.
Neither Dog nor the albatross spoke a word, but Tom could feel them, one on each side of him, quivering with disapproval. Yet the serpent showed no sign of hostility, nor did he seem embarrassed by the marked silence in which he was received: “Well, Adam,” he said softly, in a low pleasant voice, “so you’ve come back at last, and without Eva.”
Tom felt very absurd. Really it was ridiculous! He had always pictured Adam as at least middle-aged even thousands of years ago; and now to find himself actually mistaken for him!
“I’m not Adam,” he answered, turning away.
“Not in the least like him,” snapped the albatross. “Quite different in colour, shape, and size. No more like him than a wren is like me.”
She drew nearer to Tom, and so did Dog, though goodness knows they had been near enough before. All three were now as firmly united as the ace of clubs, but the serpent merely coiled himself round them, and with his head raised to the level of Tom’s face, gazed straight into his eyes.
“I didn’t really think he was,” he
murmured in a voice that had a kind of sleepy music in it. Tom had never before heard a voice so beautiful—so caressing and persuasive. “I didn’t think he was—in spite of those ridiculous things he’s got on.” He touched the ridiculous things with the tip of his forked tongue for only a second, yet the albatross ruffled all her feathers. “If he’s not Adam,” he went on, “why is he wearing them?”
“They’re my pyjamas,” Tom answered, blushing; while the albatross muttered “Manners!” loud enough for everybody to hear.
But the serpent paid no attention to her. Take them off,” he said to Tom, and seemed to expect him to do so.
“I won’t,” Tom replied, astonished at his own boldness.
“Why not?” said the serpent. “They’re very ugly.”
Tom looked down at them with diminishing confidence. They certainly weren’t particularly beautiful. Mother had bought them at a cheap sale, and compared with the albatross’s soft plumage, and the serpent’s enamelled skin, and even Dog’s rough fur, they looked both gaudy and common. “Do you really want me to?” he asked in a wavering tone. “I mean if you——”
“Of course,” said the serpent. What are they for? Why shouldn’t you look nice?”
“Why indeed!” Tom thought. But aloud he said: “I don’t know that I will look nice. . . . It’s not that I mind taking them off. Only——” He proceeded to do so, however, and felt that they were all watching him with the liveliest interest, not excepting the albatross, in spite of her remark about manners.
He pulled off the jacket slowly, and then the trousers, and there followed a pause in which nobody expressed admiration. It was just as he had anticipated; he was a disappointment; and he sat down on the grass, resigned but sad.
“You’re far too thin, poor child!” cried the albatross fussily; and now that Tom was naked she appeared more than ever bent upon mothering him.
This seemed to arouse a latent jealousy in the serpent. “Don’t coddle him,” he sneered. “He’s a boy not an egg.”