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The Extra Day

A >> Algernon Blackwood >> The Extra Day



Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Charles Franks
and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team.




THE EXTRA DAY

BY

ALGERNON BLACKWOOD

AUTHOR OF "THE CENTAUR," "A PRISONER IN FAIRYLAND,"
"INCREDIBLE ADVENTURES," ETC.

New York
1915

Set up and electrotyped. Published September, 1915.
Reprinted November, 1915.




CONTENTS


CHAPTER

I THE MATERIAL

II FANCY--SEED OF WONDER

III DEATH OF A MERE FACT

IV FACT--EDGED WITH FANCY

V THE BIRTH OF WONDER

VI THE GROWTH OF WONDER

VII IMAGINATION WAKES

VIII WHERE WONDER HIDES

IX A PRIEST OF WONDER

X FACT AND WONDER--CLASH

XI JUDY'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE

XII TIM'S PARTICULAR ADVENTURE

XIII TIME HESITATES

XIV MARIA STIRS

XV "A DAY WILL COME"

XVI TIME HALTS

XVII A DAY HAS COME

XVIII TIME GOES ON AGAIN--

XIX --AS USUAL

XX --BUT DIFFERENTLY!




CHAPTER I

THE MATERIAL


Judy, Tim, and Maria were just little children. It was impossible to
say exactly what their ages were, except that they were just the usual
age, that Judy was the eldest, Maria the youngest, and that Tim,
accordingly, came in between the two.

Their father did his best for them; so did their mother; so did Aunt
Emily, the latter's sister. It is impossible to say very much about
these three either, except that they were just Father, Mother, and
Aunt Emily. They were the Authorities-in-Chief, and they knew
respectively everything there was to be known about such remote and
difficult subjects as London and Money; Food, Health and Clothing;
Conduct, Behaviour and Regulations, both general and particular. Into
these three departments of activity the children, without realising
that they did so, classed them neatly. Aunt Emily, besides the special
duties assigned to her, was a living embodiment of No. While Father
allowed and permitted, while Mother wobbled and hesitated, Aunt Emily
shook her head with decision, and said distinctly No. She was too full
of warnings, advice, and admonitions to get about much. She wore gold
glasses, and had an elastic, pointed nose. From the children's point
of view she must be classed as invalid. Somewhere, deep down inside
them, they felt pity.

The trio loved them according to their just deserts; they grasped that
the Authorities did their best for them. This "best," moreover, was
done in different ways. Father did it with love and tenderness, that
is, he spoilt them; Mother with tenderness and love, that is, she felt
them part of herself and did not like to hurt herself; Aunt Emily with
affectionate and worthy desire to see them improve, that is, she
trained them. Therefore they adored their father, loved their mother,
and thought highly--from a distance preferably--of their aunt.

This was the outward and visible household that an ordinary person,
say, a visitor who came to lunch on Sunday after church, would have
noticed. It was the upper layer; but there was an under layer too.
There was Thompson, the old pompous family butler; they trusted him
because he was silent and rarely smiled, winked at their mischief,
pretended not to see them when he caught them in his pantry, and never
once betrayed them. There was Mrs. Horton, the fat and hot-tempered
family cook; they regarded her with excitement including dread,
because she left juicy cakes (still wet) upon the dresser, yet denied
them the entry into her kitchen. Her first name being Bridget, there
was evidently an Irish strain in her, but there was probably a dash of
French as well, for she was an excellent cook and _recipe_ was her
master-word--she pronounced it "recipee." There was Jackman, the
nurse, a mixture of Mother and Aunt Emily; and there was Weeden, the
Head Gardener, an evasive and mysterious personality, who knew so much
about flowers and vegetables and weather that he was half animal, half
bird, and scarcely a human being at all--vaguely magnificent in a
sombre way. His power in his own department was unquestioned. He said
little, but it "meant an awful lot"--most of which, perhaps, was not
intended.

These four constituted the under layer of the household, concealed
from visitors, and living their own lives apart behind the scenes.
They were the Lesser Authorities.

There were others too, of course, neighbours, friends, and visitors,
who dwelt outside the big iron gates in the Open World, and who
entered their lives from various angles, some to linger, some merely
to show themselves and vanish into mist again. Occasionally they
reappeared at intervals, occasionally they didn't. Among the former
were Colonel William Stumper, C.B., a retired Indian soldier who lived
in the Manor House beyond the church and had written a book on
Scouting; a nameless Station-Master, whom they saw rarely when they
accompanied Daddy to the London train; a Policeman, who walked
endlessly up and down the muddy or dusty lanes, and came to the front
door with a dirty little book in his big hands at Christmas-time; and
a Tramp, who slept in barns and haystacks, and haunted the great
London Road ever since they had once handed him a piece of Mrs.
Horton's sticky cake in paper over the old grey fence. Him they
regarded with a special awe and admiration, not unmixed with
tenderness. He had smiled so nicely when he said "Thank you" that
Judy, wondering if there was any one to mend his clothes, had always
longed to know him better. It seemed so wonderful. How could he live
without furniture, house, regular meals--without possessions, in a
word? It made him so real. It was "real life," in fact, to live that
way; and upon Judy especially the impression was a deep one.

In addition to these occasional intruders, there was another person,
an Authority, but the most wonderful Authority of all, who came into
their lives a little later with a gradual and overwhelming effect, but
who cannot be mentioned more definitely just now because he has not
yet arrived. The world, in any case, speaking generally, was enormous;
it was endless; it was always dropping things and people upon them
without warning, as from a clear and cloudless sky. But this
particular individual was still climbing the great curve below their
horizon, and had not yet poked his amazing head above the edge.

Yet, strange to say, they had always believed that some such person
would arrive. A wonderful stranger was already on the way. They rarely
spoke of it--it was just a great, passionate expectancy tucked away in
the deepest corner of their hearts. Children possess this sense of
anticipation all the world over; grown-ups have it too in the form of
an unquenchable, though fading hope: the feeling that some day or
other a Wonderful Stranger will come up the pathway, knock at the
door, and enter their lives, making life worth living, full of wonder,
beauty, and delight, because he will make all things new.

This wonderful stranger, Judy had a vague idea, would be--be like at
least--the Tramp; Tim, following another instinct, was of the opinion
he would be a "soldier-explorer-hunter kind of man"; Maria, if she
thought anything at all about him, kept her decision securely hidden
in her tight, round body. But Judy qualified her choice by the hopeful
assertion that he would "come from the air"; and Tim had a secret
notion that he would emerge from a big, deep hole--pop out like a
badger or a rabbit, as it were--and suddenly declare himself; while
Maria, by her non-committal, universal attitude, perhaps believed
that, if he came at all, he would "just come from everywhere at once."
She believed everything, always, everywhere. But to assert that belief
was to betray the existence of a doubt concerning it. She just lived
it.

For the three children belonged to three distinct classes, without
knowing that they did so. Tim loved anything to do with the ground,
with earth and soil, that is, things that made holes and lived in
them, or that did not actually make holes but just grubbed about;
mysterious, secret things, such as rabbits, badgers, hedgehogs, mice,
rats, hares, and weasels. In all his games the "earth" was home.

Judy, on the other hand, was indubitably an air person--birds amazed
her, filling her hungry heart with high aspirations, longings, and
desires. She looked, with her bright, eager face and spidery legs,
distinctly bird-like. She flitted, darted, perched. She had what Tim
called a "tweaky" nose, though whether he meant that it was beak-like
or merely twitched, he never stated; it was just "tweaky," and Judy
took it as a compliment. One could easily imagine her shining little
face peeping over the edge of a nest, the rest of her sitting warmly
upon half a dozen smooth, pink eggs. Her legs certainly seemed stuck
into her like pencils, as with a robin or a seagull. She adored
everything that had wings and flew; she was of the air; it was her
element.

Maria's passions were unknown. Though suspected of being universal,
since she manifested no deliberate likes or dislikes, approving all
things with a kind of majestic and indifferent omnipotence, they
remained quiescent and undeclared. She probably just loved the
universe. She felt at home in it. To Maria the entire universe
belonged, because she sat still and with absolute conviction--claimed
it.




CHAPTER II

FANCY--SEED OF WONDER


The country house, so ancient that it seemed part of the landscape,
settled down secretively into the wintry darkness and watched the
night with eyes of yellow flame. The thick December gloom hid it
securely from attack. Nothing could find it out. Though crumbling in
places, the mass of it was solid as a fortress, for the old oak beams
had resisted Time so long that the tired years had resigned themselves
to siege instead of assault, and the protective hills and woods
rendered it impregnable against the centuries. The beleaguered
inhabitants felt safe. It was a delightful, cosy feeling, yet
excitement and surprise were in it too. Anything _might_ happen, and
at any moment.

This, at any rate, was how Judy and Tim felt the personality of the
old Mill House, calling it Daddy's Castle. Maria expressed no opinion.
She felt and knew too much to say a word. She was habitually non-
committal. She shared the being of the ancient building, as the
building shared the landscape out of which it grew so naturally.
Having been born last, her inheritance of coming Time exceeded that of
Tim and Judy, and she lived as though thoroughly aware of her
prerogative. In quiet silence she claimed everything as her very own.

The Mill House, like Maria, never moved; it existed comfortably; it
seemed independent of busy, hurrying Time. So thickly covered was it
with ivy and various creepers that the trees on the lawn wondered why
it did not grow bigger like themselves. They remembered the time when
they looked up to it, whereas now they looked over it easily, and even
their lower branches stroked the stone tiles on the roof, patched with
moss and lichen like their own great trunks. They had come to regard
it as an elderly animal asleep, for its chimneys looked like horns, it
possessed a capacious mouth that both swallowed and disgorged, and its
eyes were as numerous as those of the forest to which they themselves
properly belonged. And so they accepted the old Mill House as a thing
of drowsy but persistent life; they protected and caressed it; they
liked it exactly where it was; and if it moved they would have known
an undeniable shock.

They watched it now, this dark December evening, as one by one its
gleaming eyes shone bright and yellow through the mist, then one by
one let down their dark green lids. "It's going to sleep," they
thought. "It's going to dream. Its life, like ours, is all inside. It
sleeps the winter through as we do. All is well. Good-night, old house
of grey! We'll also go to sleep."

Unable to see into the brain of the sleepy monster, the trees resigned
themselves to dream again, tucking the earth closely against their
roots and withdrawing into the cloak of misty darkness. Like most
other things in winter they also stayed indoors, leading an interior
life of dim magnificence behind their warm, thick bark. Presently,
when they were ready, something would happen, something they were
preparing at their leisure, something so exquisite that all who saw it
would dance and sing for gladness. They also believed in a Wonderful
Stranger who was coming into their slow, steady lives. They fell to
dreaming of the surprising pageant they would blazon forth upon the
world a little later. And while they dreamed, the wind of night passed
moaning through their leafless branches, and Time flew noiselessly
above the turning Earth.

Meanwhile, inside the old Mill House, the servants lit the lamps and
drew the blinds and curtains. Behind the closing eyelids, however,
like dream-chambers within a busy skull, there were rooms of various
shapes and kinds, and in one of these on the ground-floor, called
Daddy's Study, the three children stood, expectant and a little shy,
waiting for something desirable to happen. In common with all other
living things, they shared this enticing feeling--that Something
Wonderful was going to happen. To be without this feeling, of course,
is to be not alive; but, once alive, it cannot be escaped. At death it
asserts itself most strongly of all--Something Too Wonderful is going
to happen. For to die is quite different from being not alive. This
feeling is the proof of eternal life--once alive, alive for ever. To
live is to feel this yearning, huge expectancy.

Daddy had taught them this, though, of course, they knew it
instinctively already. And any moment now the door would open and his
figure, familiar, yet each time more wonderful, would cross the
threshold, close the door behind him, and ... something desirable
would happen.

"I wish he'd hurry," said Tim impatiently. "There won't be any time
left." And he glanced at the cruel clock that stopped all their
pleasure but never stopped itself. "The motor got here hours ago. He
can't STILL be having tea." Judy, her brown hair in disorder, her belt
sagging where it was of little actual use, sighed deeply. But there
was patience and understanding in her big, dark eyes. "He's in with
Mother doing finances," she said with resignation. "It's Saturday.
Let's sit down and wait." Then, seeing that Maria already occupied the
big armchair, and sat staring comfortably into the fire, she did not
move. Maria was making a purring, grunting sound of great contentment;
she felt no anxiety of any kind apparently.

But Tim was less particular.

"Alright," he said, squashing himself down beside Maria, whose podgy
form accommodated itself to the intrusion like a cat, "as long as Aunt
Emily doesn't catch him on the way and begin explaining."

"She's in bed with a headache," mentioned Judy. "She's safe enough."
For it was an established grievance against their mother's sister that
she was always explaining things. She was a terrible explainer. She
couldn't move without explaining. She explained everything in the
world. She was a good soul, they knew, but she had to explain that she
was a good soul. They rather dreaded her. Explanations took time for
one thing, and for another they took away all wonder. In bed with a
headache, she was safely accounted for, explained.

"She thinks we miss her," reflected Tim. He did not say it; it just
flashed through his mind, with a satisfaction that added vaguely to
his pleasurable anticipation of what was coming. And this satisfaction
increased his energy. "Shove over a bit," he added aloud to Maria, and
though Maria did not move of her own volition, she was nevertheless
shoved over. The pair of them settled down into the depths of the
chair, but while Maria remained quite satisfied with her new position,
her brother fussed and fidgeted with impatience born of repressed
excitement. "Run out and knock at the door," he proposed to Judy.
"He'll never get away from Mother unless we let him KNOW we're
waiting."

Judy, kneeling on a chair and trying to make it sea-saw, pulled up her
belt, sprang down, then hesitated. "They'll only think it's Thompson
and say come in," she decided. "That's no good."

Tim jumped up, using Maria as a support to raise himself. "I know
what!" he cried. "Go and bang the gong. He'll think it's dressing-
time." The idea was magnificent. "I'll go if you funk it," he added,
and had already slithered half way over the back of the chair when
Judy forestalled him and had her hand upon the door-knob. He
encouraged her with various instructions about the proper way to beat
the gong, and was just beginning a scuffle with the inanimate Maria,
who now managed to occupy the entire chair, when he was aware of a new
phenomenon that made him stop abruptly. He saw Judy's face hanging in
mid-air, six feet above the level of the floor. Her face was flushed
and smiling; her hair hung over her eyes; and from somewhere behind or
underneath her a gruff voice said sternly:

"What are you doing in my Study at this time of night? Who asked you
in?"

The expected figure had entered, catching Judy in the act of opening
the door. He was carrying her in his arms. She landed with a flop upon
the carpet. The desired and desirable thing was about to happen. "Get
out, you lump, it's Daddy." But Maria, accustomed to her brother's
exaggerated language, and knowing it was only right and manly, merely
raised her eyes and waited for him to help her out. Tim did help her
out; half dragging and half lifting, he deposited her in a solid heap
upon the floor, then ran to the figure that now dominated the dim,
fire-lit room, and hugged it with all his force, making sounds in his
throat like an excited animal: "Ugh! ugh! ugh!...!"

The hug was returned with equal vigour, but without the curious
sounds; Maria was hugged as well and set upon her feet; while Judy,
having already been sufficiently hugged, pushed the arm-chair closer
up to the fire and waited patiently for the proper business of the
evening to begin.

The figure, meanwhile, disentangled itself. It was tall and thin, with
a mild, resigned expression upon a kindly face that years and care had
lined before its time: old-fashioned rather, with soft, grey whiskers
belonging to an earlier day. A black tail-coat adorned it, and the
neck-tie was crooked in the turned-down collar. The watch-chain went
from the waist-coat button to one pocket only, instead of right
across, and one finger wore a heavy signet-ring that bore the family
crest. It was obviously the figure of an overworked official in the
Civil Service who had returned from its daily routine in London to the
evening routine of its family in the country, the atmosphere of
Government and the Underground still hanging round it. For sundry
whiffs of the mysterious city reached the children's nostrils,
bringing thrills of some strange, remote reality they had never known
at first-hand. They busied themselves at once. While Tim unbuttoned
the severe black coat and pulled it off, Judy brought a jacket of
dingy tweed from behind a curtain in the corner, and stood on a chair
to help the figure put it on. All knew their duties; the performance
went like clockwork. And Maria sat and watched in helpful silence.
There was a certain air about her as though she did it all.

"How they do spoil me, to be sure," the figure murmured to itself;
"yet Mother's always saying that _I_ spoil them. I wonder...!"

"Now you look decent at last," said Judy. "You smell like a nice
rabbit."

"It's my shooting-coat." The figure cleared its throat, apparently on
the defensive a little.

Tim and Judy sniffed it. "Rabbits and squirrels and earth and things,"
thought Tim.

"And flowers and burning leaves," said Judy. "It's his old garden-coat
as well." She sniffed very audibly. "Oh, I love that smoky smell."

"It's the good old English smell," said the figure contentedly, while
they put his neck-tie straight and arranged the pocket flaps for him.
"It's English country--England."

"Don't other countries smell, then?" inquired Tim. "I mean, could any
one tell you were English by your smell?" He sniffed again, with
satisfaction. "Weeden's the same," he went on, without waiting for an
answer, "only much stronger, and so's the potting shed."

"But yours is sweeter _much_," said Judy quickly. To share odours with
an Authority like the Head Gardener was distinctly a compliment, but
Daddy must come first, whatever happened. "How funny," she added, half
to herself, "that England should have such a jolly smell. I wonder
what it comes from?"

"Where _does_ England come from?" asked Tim, pausing a moment to stare
into the figure's face. "It's an island, of course--England--but--"

"A piece of land surrounded by water," began the figure, but was not
allowed to finish. A chorus of voices interrupted:

"Make a story of it, please. There's just time. There's half an hour.
It's nice and dark. Ugh! Something very awful or very silly,
please...."

There followed a general scuffle for seats, with bitter complaints
that he only had two pointed knees. Maria was treated with scant
respect. There was also criticism of life--that he had no lap, "no
proper lap," that it was too dark to see his face, that everybody in
turn had got "the best place," but, chiefly, that there was "very
little time." Time was a nuisance always: it either was time to go, or
time to stop, or else there was not time enough. But at length quiet
was established; the big arm-chair resembled a clot of bees upon a
honeycomb; the fire burned dully, and the ceiling was thick with
monstrous fluttering shadows, vaguely shaped.

"Now, please. We've been ready for ages."

A deep hush fell upon the room, and only a sound of confused breathing
was audible. The figure heaved a long, deep sigh as though it suffered
pain, paused, cleared its throat, then sighed again more heavily than
before. For the moment of creation was at hand, and creation is not
accomplished without much travail.

But the children loved the pause, the sigh, the effort. Not realising
with what difficulty the stories were ground out, nor that it was an
effort against time--to make a story last till help came from outside
--they believed that something immense and wonderful was on the way,
and held their breath with beating hearts. Daddy's stories were always
marvellous; this one would be no exception.

Marvellous up to a point, that is: something in them failed. "He's
trying," was their opinion of them; and it was the trying that they
watched and listened to so eagerly. The results were unsatisfying, the
effect incomplete; the climax of sensation they expected never came.
Daddy, though they could not put this into words, possessed fancy
only; imagination was not his. Fancy, however, is the seed of
imagination, as imagination is the blossom of wonder. His stories
prepared the soil in them at any rate. They felt him digging all round
them.

He began forthwith:

"Once, very long ago--"

"How long?"

"So long ago that the chalk cliffs of England still lay beneath the
sea--"

"Was Aunt Emily alive then?"

"Or Weeden?"

"Oh, much longer ago than that," he comforted them; "so long, in fact,
that neither your Aunt Emily nor Weeden were even thought of--there
lived a man who--"

"Where? What country, please?"

"There lived a man in England--"

"But you said England was beneath the sea with the chalk cliffs."

"There lived a man in a very small, queer little island called
Ingland, spelt 'Ing,' not 'Eng,' who--"

"It wasn't _our_ England, then?"

"On a tiny little island called Ingland, who was very lonely because
he was the only human being on it--"

"Weren't there animals and things too?"

"And the only animals who lived on it with him were a squirrel who
lived in the only tree, a rabbit who lived in the only hole, and a
small grey mouse who made its nest in the pocket of his other coat."

"Were they friendly? Did he love them awfully?"

"At first he was very polite to them only, because he was a civil
servant of his Government; but after a bit they became so friendly
that he loved them even better than himself, and went to tea with the
rabbit in its hole, and climbed the tree to share a nut-breakfast with
the squirrel, and--and--"

"He doesn't know what to do with the mouse," a loud whisper, meant to
be inaudible, broke in upon the fatal hesitation.

"And went out for walks with the mouse when the ground was damp and
the mouse complained of chilly feet. In the pocket of his coat, all
snug and warm, it stood on its hind legs and peered out upon the world
with its pointed nose just above the pocket flap--"

"Then he liked the mouse best?"

"What sort of coat was it? An overcoat or just an ordinary one that
smelt? Was that the only pocket in it?"

"It was made of the best leaves from the squirrel's tree, and from the
rabbit's last year's fur, and the mouse had fastened the edges
together neatly with the sharpest of its own discarded whiskers. And
so they walked about the tiny island and enjoyed the view together--"

"The mouse couldn't have seen much!"

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