Gerold K. Rohner - "Frau und Kindern auf der Spur"

Carl Becker - "The Eve of the Revolution,"

Robert Louis Stevenson - "The Sea Fogs"

Frederick Philip Grove - "Over Prairie Trails"

The Extra Day

A >> Algernon Blackwood >> The Extra Day




"Until, one day, the mouse declared the ground was ALWAYS wet and was
getting wetter and wetter. And the man got frightened."

"Ugh! It's going to get awful in a minute!" And the children nestled
closer. The voice sank lower. It became mysterious.

"And the wetter it got the more the man got frightened; for the island
was dreadfully tiny and--"

"Why, please, did it get wetter and wetter?"

"THAT," continued the man who earned his living in His Majesty's
Stationery Office by day, and by night justified his existence
offering the raw material of epics unto little children, "that was the
extraordinary part of it. For no one could discover. The man stroked
his beard and looked about him, the squirrel shook its bushy tail, the
rabbit lifted its upper lip and thrust its teeth out, and the mouse
jerked its head from side to side until its whiskers grew longer and
sharper than ever--but none of them could discover why the island got
wetter and wetter and wetter--"

"Perhaps it just rained like here."

"For the sky was always blue, it never rained, and there was so little
dew at night that no one even mentioned it. Yet the tiny island got
wetter every day, till it finally got so wet that the very floor of
the man's hut turned spongy and splashed every time the man went to
look out of the window at the view. And at last he got so frightened
that he stayed indoors altogether, put on both his coats at once, and
told stories to the mouse and squirrel about a country that was always
dry--"

"Didn't the rabbit know anything?"

"For all this time the rabbit was too terrified to come out of its
hole at all. The increasing size of its front teeth added to its
uneasiness, for they thrust out so far that they hid the view and made
the island seem even smaller than it was--"

"I like rabbits, though."

"Till one fine day--"

"They were all fine, you said."

"One finer day than usual the rabbit made a horrible discovery. The
way it made the discovery was curious--may seem curious to us, at
least--but the fact is, it suddenly noticed that the size of its front
teeth had grown out of all proportion to the size of the island.
Looking over its shoulder this fine day, it realised how absurdly
small the island was in comparison with its teeth--and grasped the
horrid truth. In a flash it understood what was happening. The island
was getting wetter because it was also getting--_smaller_!"

"Ugh! How beastly!"

"Did it tell the others?"

"It retired half-way down its hole and shouted out the news to the
others in the hut."

"Did they hear it?"

"It warned them solemnly. But its teeth obstructed the sound, and the
windings of its hole made it difficult to hear. The man, besides, was
busy telling a story to the mouse, and the mouse, anyhow, was sound
asleep at the bottom of his pocket, with the result that the only one
who caught the words of warning was--the squirrel. For a squirrel's
ears are so sharp that it can even hear the grub whistling to itself
inside a rotten nut; and it instantly took action."

"Ah! IT saved them, then?"

"The squirrel flew from the man's shoulder where it was perched,
balanced for a second on the top of his head, then clung to the
ceiling and darted out of the window without a moment's delay. It
crossed the island in a single leap, scuttled to the top of the tree,
peered about over the diminishing landscape, and--"

"Didn't it see the rabbit?"

"And returned as quickly as it went. It bustled back into the hut,
hopping nervously, and jerking its head with excitement. In a moment
it was perched again on the man's shoulder. It carefully kept its
bushy tail out of the way of his nose and eyes. And then it whispered
what it had seen into his left ear."

"Why into his left ear?"

"Because it was the right one, and the other had cotton wool in it."

"Like Aunt Emily!"

"What did it whisper?"

"The squirrel had made a discovery, too," continued the teller,
solemnly.

"Goodness! That's two discoveries!"

"But what _did_ it whisper?"

In the hush that followed, a coal was heard falling softly into the
grate; the night-wind moaned against the outside walls; Judy scraped
her stockinged foot slowly along the iron fender, making a faint
twanging sound. Breathing was distinctly audible. For several moments
the room was still as death. The figure, smothered beneath the clotted
mass of children, heaved a sigh. But no one broke the pause. It was
too precious and wonderful to break at once. All waited breathlessly,
like birds poised in mid-air before they strike ... until a new sound
stole faintly upon the listening silence, a faint and very distant
sound, barely audible as yet, but of unmistakable character. It was
far away in the upper reaches of the building, overhead, remote, a
little stealthy. Like the ominous murmur of a muffled drum, it had
approach in it. It was coming nearer and nearer. It was significant
and threatening.

For the first time that evening the ticking of the clock was also
audible. But the new sound, though somewhat in league with the
ticking, and equally remorseless, did not come from the clock. It was
a human sound, the most awful known to childhood. It was footsteps on
the stairs!

Both the children and the story-teller heard it, but with different
results. The latter stirred and looked about him, as though new hope
and strength had come to him. The former, led by Tim and Judy, broke
simultaneously into anxious speech. Maria, having slept profoundly
since the first mention of the mouse in its cosy pocket, gave no sign
at all.

"Oh, quick! quick! What did the squirrel whisper in his good right
ear? What was it? DO hurry, please!"

"It whispered two simple words, each of one syllable," continued the
reanimated figure, his voice lowered and impressive. "It said--_the
sea_!"

The announcement made by the squirrel was so entirely unexpected that
the surprise of it buried all memory of the disagreeable sound. The
children sat up and stared into the figure's face questioningly.
Surely he had made a slight mistake. How could the sea have anything
to do with it? But no word was spoken, no actual question asked. This
overwhelming introduction of the sea left him poised far beyond their
reach. His stories were invariably marvellous. He would somehow
justify himself.

"The Sea!" whispered Tim to Judy, and there was intense admiration in
his voice and eyes.

"From the top of its tree," resumed the figure triumphantly, "the
squirrel had seen what was happening, and made its great discovery. It
realised why the ground was wetter and wetter every day, and also why
the island was small and growing smaller. For it understood the awful
fact that--the sea was rising! A little longer and the entire island
would be under water, and everybody on it would be drowned!" "Couldn't
none of them swim or anything?" asked Judy with keen anxiety.

"Hush!" put in Tim. "It's what did they _do?_ And who thought of it
first?"

The question last but one was chosen for solution.

"The rabbit," announced the figure recklessly. "The rabbit saved them;
and in saving them it saved the Island too. It founded Ingland, this
very Ingland on which we live to-day. In fact, it started the British
Empire by its action. The rabbit did it."

"How? How?"

"It heard the squirrel's whisper half-way down its hole. It forgot
about its front teeth, and the moment it forgot them they, of course,
stopped growing. It recovered all its courage. A grand idea had come
to it. It came bustling out of its hiding-place, stood on its hind
legs, poked its bright eyes over the window-ledge, and told them how
to escape. It said, 'I'll dig my hole deeper and we'll empty the sea
into it as it rises. We'll pour the water down my hole!'"

The figure paused and fixed his eyes upon each listener in turn,
challenging disapproval, yet eager for sympathy at the same time. In
place of criticism, however, he met only silence and breathless
admiration. Also--he heard that distant sound _they_ had forgotten,
and realised it had come much nearer. It had reached the second floor.
He made swift and desperate calculations. He decided that it was
_just_ possible ... with ordinary good luck ...

"So they all went out and began to deepen the rabbit's hole. They dug
and dug and dug. The man took off both his coats; the rabbit scraped
with its four paws, using its tail as well--it had a nice long tail in
those days; the mouse crept out of his pocket and made channels with
its little pointed toes; and the squirrel brushed and swept the water
in with its bushy, mop-like tail. The rising sea poured down the ever-
deepening hole. They worked with a will together; there was no
complaining, though the rabbit wore its tail down till it was nothing
but a stump, and the mouse stood ankle-deep in water, and the
squirrel's fluffy tail looked like a stable broom. They worked like
heroes without stopping even to talk, and as the water went pouring
down the hole, the level of the sea, of course, sank lower and lower
and lower, the shores of the tiny island stretched farther and farther
and farther, till there were reaches of golden sand like Margate at
low tide, and as the level sank still lower there rose into view great
white cliffs of chalk where before there had been only water--until,
at last, the squirrel, scampering down from the tree where it had gone
to see what had been accomplished, reported in a voice that chattered
with stammering delight, 'We're saved! The sea's gone down! The land's
come up!'"

The steps were audible in the passage. A gentle knock was heard. But
no one answered, for it seemed that no one was aware of it. The figure
paused a moment to recover breath.

"And then, and then? What happened next? Did they thank the rabbit?"

"They all thanked each other then. The man thanked the rabbit, and the
rabbit thanked the squirrel, and the mouse woke up, and--"

No one noticed the slip, which proved that their attention was already
painfully divided. For another knock, much louder than before, had
interrupted the continuation of the story. The figure turned its head
to listen. "It's nothing," said Tim quickly. "It's only a sound," said
Judy. "What did the mouse do? Please tell us quickly."

"I thought I heard a knock," the figure murmured. "Perhaps I was
mistaken. The mouse--er--the mouse woke up--"

"You told us that."

The figure continued, speaking with greater rapidity even than before:

"And looked about it, and found the view so lovely that it said it
would never live in a pocket again, but would divide its time in
future between the fields and houses. So it pricked its whiskers up,
and the squirrel curled its tail over its back to avoid any places
that still were damp, and the rabbit polished its big front teeth on
the grass and said it was quite pleased to have a stump instead of a
tail as a memento of a memorable occasion when they had all been
nearly drowned together, and--they all skipped up to the top of the
high chalk cliffs as dry as a bone and as happy as--"

He broke off in the middle of the enormous sentence to say a most
ridiculous and unnecessary thing. "Come in," he said, just as though
there was some one knocking at the door. But no single head was
turned. If there was an entry it was utterly ignored.

"Happy as what?"

"As you," the figure went on faster than ever. "And that's why England
to-day is an island of quite a respectable size, and why everybody
pretends it's dry and comfortable and cosy, and why people never leave
it except to go away for holidays that cannot possibly be avoided."

"I beg your pardon, sir," began an awful voice behind the chair.

"And why to this day," he continued as though he had not heard, "a
squirrel always curls its tail above its back, why a rabbit wears a
stump like a pen wiper, and why a mouse lives sometimes in a house and
sometimes in a field, and--"

_"I beg your pardon, sir,"_ clanged the slow, awful voice in a tone
that was meant to be heard distinctly, "but it's long gone 'arf-past
six, and--"

"Time for bed," added the figure with a sound that was like the
falling of an executioner's axe. And, as if to emphasise the arrival
of the remorseless moment, the clock just then struck loudly on the
mantelpiece--seven times.

But for several minutes no one stirred. Hope, even at such moments,
was stronger than machinery of clocks and nurses. There was a general
belief that somehow or other the moment that they dreaded, the moment
that was always coming to block their happiness, could be evaded and
shoved aside. Nothing mechanical like that was wholly true. Daddy had
often used queer phrases that hinted at it: "Some day--A day is
coming--A day will come"; and so forth. Their belief in a special Day
when no one would say "Time" haunted them already. Yet, evidently this
evening was not the momentous occasion; for when Tim mentioned that
the clock was fast, the figure behind the chair replied that she was
half an hour overdue already, and her tone was like Thompson's when he
said, "Dinner's served." There was no escape this time.

Accordingly the children slowly disentangled themselves; they rose and
stretched like animals; though all still ignored the figure behind the
chair. A ball of stuff unrolled and became Maria. "Thank you, Daddy,"
she said. "It was just lovely," said Judy. "But it's only the
beginning, isn't it?" Tim asked. "It'll go on to-morrow night?" And
the figure, having escaped failure by the skin of its teeth, kissed
each in turn and said, "Another time--yes, I'll go on with it."
Whereupon the children deigned to notice the person behind the chair.
"We're coming up to bed now, Jackman," they mentioned casually, and
disappeared slowly from the room in a disappointed body, robbed,
unsatisfied, but very sleepy. The clock had cheated them of something
that properly was endless. Maria alone made no remark, for she was
already asleep in Jackman's comfortable arms. Maria was always
carried.

"Time's up," Tim reflected when he lay in bed; "time's always up. I do
wish we could stop it somehow," and fell asleep somewhat gratified
because he had deliberately not wound up his alarum-clock. He had the
delicious feeling--a touch of spite in it--that this would bother Time
and muddle it.

Yet Time, as a monster, chased him through a hundred dreams and thus
revenged itself. It pursued him to the very edge of the daylight, then
mocked him with a cold bath, lessons, and a windy sleet against the
windows. It was "time to get up" again.

Yet, meanwhile, Time helped and pleased the children by showing them
its pleasanter side as well. It pushed them, gently but swiftly, up
the long hill of months and landed them with growing excitement into
the open country of another year. Since the rabbit, mouse, and
squirrel first woke in their hearts the wonder of common things, they
had all grown slightly bigger. Time tucked away another twelve months
behind their backs: each of them was a year older; and that in itself
was full of a curious and growing wonder.

For the birth of wonder is a marvellous, sweet thing, but the
recognition of it is sweeter and more marvellous still. Its growth,
perhaps, shall measure the growth and increase of the soul to whom it
is as eyes and hands and feet, searching the world for signs of hiding
Reality. But its persistence--through the heavier years that would
obliterate it--this persistence shall offer hints of something coming
that is more than marvellous. The beginning of wisdom is surely--
Wonder.




CHAPTER III

DEATH OF A MERE FACT


There was a man named Jinks. In him was neither fancy, imagination,
nor a sign of wonder, and so he--died.

But, though he appears in this chapter, he disappears again so quickly
that his being mentioned in a sentence all by himself should not lead
any one astray. Jinks made a false entry, as it were. The children
crossed him out at once. He became illegible. For the trio had their
likes and dislikes; they resented liberties being taken with them.
Also, when there was no one to tell them stories, they were quite able
to amuse themselves. It was the inactive yet omnipotent Maria who
brought about indirectly the obliteration of Mr. Jinks.

And it came about as follows:

Maria was a podgy child of marked individuality. It was said that she
was seven years old, but _she_ declared that eight was the figure,
because some uncle or other had explained, "you're in your eighth
year." Wandering uncles are troublesome in this kind of way. Every
time her age was mentioned she corrected the informant. She had a
trick of moving her eyes without moving her head, as though the round
face was difficult to turn; but her big blue eyes slipped round
without the least trouble, as though oiled. The performance gave her
the sly and knowing aspect of a goblin, but she had no objection to
that, for it saved her trouble, and to save herself trouble--according
to nurses, Authorities, and the like--was her sole object in
existence.

Yet this seemed a mistaken view of the child. It was not so much that
she did not move unnecessarily as that it was not necessary for her to
move at all, since she invariably found herself in the middle of
whatever was going on. While life bustled anxiously about her,
hurrying to accomplish various ends, she remained calm and contented
at the centre, completely satisfied, mistress of it all. And her face
was symbolic of her entire being; whereas so many faces seem
unfinished, hers was complete--globular like the heavenly bodies,
circular like the sun, arms and legs unnecessary. The best of
everything came to her _because_ she did not run after it. There was
no hurry. Time did not worry her. Circular and self-sustaining, she
already seemed to dwell in Eternity.

"And this little person," one of these inquisitive, interfering
visitors would ask, smiling fatuously; "how old is she, I wonder?"

"Seven," was the answer of the Authority in charge.

Maria's eyes rolled sideways, and a little upwards. She looked at the
foolish questioner; the Authority who had answered was not worth a
glance.

"No," she said flatly, with sublime defiance, "I'm more. I'm in my
eighth year, you see."

And the visitor, smiling that pleasant smile that makes children
distrust, even dislike them, and probably venturing to pinch her cheek
or pat her on the shoulder into the bargain, accepted the situation
with another type of smile--the Smile-that-children-expect. As a
matter of fact, children hate it. They see through its artificial
humbug easily. They prefer a solemn and unsmiling face invariably.
It's the latter that produces chocolates and sudden presents; it's the
stern-faced sort that play hide-and-seek or stand on their heads. The
Smilers are bored at heart. They mean to escape at the first
opportunity. And the children never catch their sleeves or coattails
to prevent them going.

"So you're in your eighth year, are you?" this Smiler chuckled with a
foolish grin. He patted her cheek kindly. "Why, you're almost a grown-
up person. You'll be going to dinner-parties soon." And he smiled
again. Maria stood motionless and patient. Her eyes gazed straight
before her. Her podgy face remained expressionless as dough.

"Answer the kind gentleman," said the Authority reprovingly.

Maria did not budge. A finger and thumb, both dirty, rolled a portion
of her pinafore into a pointed thing like a string, distinctly black.
She waited for the visitor to withdraw. But this particular visitor
did not withdraw.

"_I_ knew a little girl--" he began, with a condescending grin that
meant that her rejection of his advances had offended him, "a little
girl of about your age, who--"

But the remainder of the rebuke-concealed-in-a-story was heard only by
the Authority. For Maria, relentless and unhumbugged, merely walked
away. In the hall she discovered Tim, discreetly hiding. "What's _he_
come for?" the brother inquired promptly, jerking his thumb towards
the hall.

Maria's eyes just looked at him.

"To see Mother, I suppose," he answered himself, accustomed to his
sister's goblin manners, "and talk about missions and subshkiptions,
and all that. Did he give you anything?"

"No, nothing."

"Did he call us bonny little ones?" His face mentioned that he could
kill if necessary, or if his sister's honour required it.

"He didn't _say_ it."

"Lucky for him," exclaimed Tim gallantly, rubbing his nose with the
palm of his hand and snorting loudly. "What _did_ he say, then--the
old Smiler?"

"He said," replied Maria, moving her head as well as her eyes, "that I
wasn't really old, and that he knew another little girl who was nicer
than me, and always told the truth, and--"

"Oh, come on," cried Tim, impatiently interrupting. "My trains are
going in the schoolroom, and I want a driver for an accident. We'll
put the Smiler in the luggage van, and he'll get smashed in the
collision, and _all_ the wheels will go over his head. Then he'll find
out how old you really are. We'll fairly smash him."

They disappeared. Judy, who was reading a book on the Apocalypse, in a
corner of the room, looked up a moment as they entered.

"What's up?" she asked, her mind a little dazed by the change of focus
from stars, scarlet women, white horses, and mysterious "Voices," to
dull practical details of everyday existence. "What's on?" she
repeated.

"Trains," replied Tim. "We're going to have an accident and kill a man
dead."

"What's he done?" she inquired.

"Humbugged Maria with a lot of stuff--and gave her nothing--and didn't
believe a single word she told him."

Judy glanced without much interest at the railway laid out upon the
floor, murmured "Oh, I see," and resumed her reading of the wonderful
book she had purloined from the top shelf of a neglected bookcase
outside the gun-room. It absorbed her. She loved the tremendous words,
the atmosphere of marvel and disaster, and especially the constant
suggestion that the end of the world was near. Antichrist she simply
adored. No other hero in any book she knew came near him.

"Come and help," urged Tim, picking up an engine that lay upon its
side. "Come on."

"No, thanks. I've got an Apocalypse. It's simply frightfully
exciting."

"Shall we break _both_ legs?" asked Maria blandly, "or just his neck?"

"Neck," said Tim briefly. "Only they must find the heart beneath the
rubbish of the luggage van."

Judy looked up in spite of herself. "Who is it?" she inquired, with an
air of weighing conflicting interests.

"Mr. Jinks." It was Maria who supplied the information.

"But he's Daddy's offiss-partner man," Judy objected, though without
much vim or heat.

Maria did not answer. Her eyes were glued upon the other engine.

"All black and burnt and--full of the very horridest diseases," put in
Tim, referring to the heart of the destroyed Mr. Jinks beneath the
engine.

He glanced up enticingly at his elder sister, whom he longed to draw
into the vindictive holocaust.

"He said things to Maria," he explained persuasively, "and it's not
the first time either. Last Sunday he called me 'his little man,' and
he's never given me a single thing since ever I can remember, years
and years ago."

Then Judy remembered that he invariably kissed her on both cheeks as
though she was a silly little child.

"Oh, _that_ man!" she exclaimed, realising fully now the enormities he
had committed. She appeared to hesitate a moment. Then she flung down
her Apocalypse suddenly. "Put him on a scarlet horse," she cried,
"pretend he's the Beast, and I'll come."

Maria's blue eyes wheeled half a circle towards Tim. She did not move
her head. It signified agreement. Tim knew. Only her consent, as the
insulted party, was necessary before he could approve.

"All right," he cried to Judy. "We'll put him in a special carriage
with his horse, and I'll make out a label for the window, so that
every one will know." He went over to the table and wrote "BEAST" in
capital letters on a half-sheet of paper. The cumbersome quill pen
made two spongy blots.

"It's the end of the world _really_ at the same time," decided Judy,
to a chorus of general approval, "not only the end of Mr. Jinks." She
liked her horrors on a proper scale.

And the railway line was quickly laid across the room from the window
to the wall. The lamps of oil on both engines were lit. The trains
faced one another. Mr. Jinks and his scarlet horse thought themselves
quite safe in their special carriage, unaware that it was labelled
"Beast" with a label that overlapped the roof and hid all view of the
landscape through the windows on one side. Apparently they slept in
opposite corners, with full consciousness of complete security. Mr.
Jinks was tucked up with woolly rugs, and a newspaper lay across his
knee. The scarlet horse had its head in a bag of oats, and its bridle
was fastened to the luggage rack above. Both were supplied with iron
foot-warmers. There was a _fearful_ fog; and the train was going at a
_TREMENDOUS_ pace.

So was the other train. They approached, they banged, they smashed to
atoms. It was the most appalling collision that had ever been heard
of, and the Guard and Engine-Driver, as well as the Ticket-Collectors
and Directors of the Company, were all executed by the Government the
very next day from gallows that an angry London built in half an hour
on the top of St. Paul's Cathedral dome.

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