The House of Souls Read online

  The White People

  PROLOGUE

  'Sorcery and sanctity,' said Ambrose, 'these are the only realities.Each is an ecstasy, a withdrawal from the common life.'

  Cotgrave listened, interested. He had been brought by a friend to thismouldering house in a northern suburb, through an old garden to the roomwhere Ambrose the recluse dozed and dreamed over his books.

  'Yes,' he went on, 'magic is justified of her children. There are many,I think, who eat dry crusts and drink water, with a joy infinitelysharper than anything within the experience of the "practical" epicure.'

  'You are speaking of the saints?'

  'Yes, and of the sinners, too. I think you are falling into the verygeneral error of confining the spiritual world to the supremely good;but the supremely wicked, necessarily, have their portion in it. Themerely carnal, sensual man can no more be a great sinner than he can bea great saint. Most of us are just indifferent, mixed-up creatures; wemuddle through the world without realizing the meaning and the innersense of things, and, consequently, our wickedness and our goodness arealike second-rate, unimportant.'

  'And you think the great sinner, then, will be an ascetic, as well asthe great saint?'

  'Great people of all kinds forsake the imperfect copies and go to theperfect originals. I have no doubt but that many of the very highestamong the saints have never done a "good action" (using the words intheir ordinary sense). And, on the other hand, there have been those whohave sounded the very depths of sin, who all their lives have never donean "ill deed."'

  He went out of the room for a moment, and Cotgrave, in high delight,turned to his friend and thanked him for the introduction.

  'He's grand,' he said. 'I never saw that kind of lunatic before.'

  Ambrose returned with more whisky and helped the two men in a liberalmanner. He abused the teetotal sect with ferocity, as he handed theseltzer, and pouring out a glass of water for himself, was about toresume his monologue, when Cotgrave broke in--

  'I can't stand it, you know,' he said, 'your paradoxes are toomonstrous. A man may be a great sinner and yet never do anything sinful!Come!'

  'You're quite wrong,' said Ambrose. 'I never make paradoxes; I wish Icould. I merely said that a man may have an exquisite taste in RomaneeConti, and yet never have even smelt four ale. That's all, and it's morelike a truism than a paradox, isn't it? Your surprise at my remark isdue to the fact that you haven't realized what sin is. Oh, yes, there isa sort of connexion between Sin with the capital letter, and actionswhich are commonly called sinful: with murder, theft, adultery, and soforth. Much the same connexion that there is between the A, B, C andfine literature. But I believe that the misconception--it is all butuniversal--arises in great measure from our looking at the matterthrough social spectacles. We think that a man who does evil to _us_ andto his neighbours must be very evil. So he is, from a social standpoint;but can't you realize that Evil in its essence is a lonely thing, apassion of the solitary, individual soul? Really, the average murderer,_qua_ murderer, is not by any means a sinner in the true sense of theword. He is simply a wild beast that we have to get rid of to save ourown necks from his knife. I should class him rather with tigers thanwith sinners.'

  'It seems a little strange.'

  'I think not. The murderer murders not from positive qualities, but fromnegative ones; he lacks something which non-murderers possess. Evil, ofcourse, is wholly positive--only it is on the wrong side. You maybelieve me that sin in its proper sense is very rare; it is probablethat there have been far fewer sinners than saints. Yes, your standpointis all very well for practical, social purposes; we are naturallyinclined to think that a person who is very disagreeable to us must be avery great sinner! It is very disagreeable to have one's pocket picked,and we pronounce the thief to be a very great sinner. In truth, he ismerely an undeveloped man. He cannot be a saint, of course; but he maybe, and often is, an infinitely better creature than thousands who havenever broken a single commandment. He is a great nuisance to _us_, Iadmit, and we very properly lock him up if we catch him; but between histroublesome and unsocial action and evil--Oh, the connexion is of theweakest.'

  It was getting very late. The man who had brought Cotgrave had probablyheard all this before, since he assisted with a bland and judicioussmile, but Cotgrave began to think that his 'lunatic' was turning into asage.

  'Do you know,' he said, 'you interest me immensely? You think, then,that we do not understand the real nature of evil?'

  'No, I don't think we do. We over-estimate it and we under-estimate it.We take the very numerous infractions of our social "bye-laws"--the verynecessary and very proper regulations which keep the human companytogether--and we get frightened at the prevalence of "sin" and "evil."But this is really nonsense. Take theft, for example. Have you any_horror_ at the thought of Robin Hood, of the Highland caterans of theseventeenth century, of the moss-troopers, of the company promoters ofour day?

  'Then, on the other hand, we underrate evil. We attach such an enormousimportance to the "sin" of meddling with our pockets (and our wives)that we have quite forgotten the awfulness of real sin.'

  'And what is sin?' said Cotgrave.

  'I think I must reply to your question by another. What would yourfeelings be, seriously, if your cat or your dog began to talk to you,and to dispute with you in human accents? You would be overwhelmed withhorror. I am sure of it. And if the roses in your garden sang a weirdsong, you would go mad. And suppose the stones in the road began toswell and grow before your eyes, and if the pebble that you noticed atnight had shot out stony blossoms in the morning?

  'Well, these examples may give you some notion of what sin really is.'

  'Look here,' said the third man, hitherto placid, 'you two seem prettywell wound up. But I'm going home. I've missed my tram, and I shall haveto walk.'

  Ambrose and Cotgrave seemed to settle down more profoundly when theother had gone out into the early misty morning and the pale light ofthe lamps.

  'You astonish me,' said Cotgrave. 'I had never thought of that. If thatis really so, one must turn everything upside down. Then the essence ofsin really is----'

  'In the taking of heaven by storm, it seems to me,' said Ambrose. 'Itappears to me that it is simply an attempt to penetrate into another andhigher sphere in a forbidden manner. You can understand why it is sorare. There are few, indeed, who wish to penetrate into other spheres,higher or lower, in ways allowed or forbidden. Men, in the mass, areamply content with life as they find it. Therefore there are few saints,and sinners (in the proper sense) are fewer still, and men of genius,who partake sometimes of each character, are rare also. Yes; on thewhole, it is, perhaps, harder to be a great sinner than a great saint.'

  'There is something profoundly unnatural about sin? Is that what youmean?'

  'Exactly. Holiness requires as great, or almost as great, an effort; butholiness works on lines that _were_ natural once; it is an effort torecover the ecstasy that was before the Fall. But sin is an effort togain the ecstasy and the knowledge that pertain alone to angels, and inmaking this effort man becomes a demon. I told you that the meremurderer is not _therefore_ a sinner; that is true, but the sinner issometimes a murderer. Gilles de Raiz is an instance. So you see thatwhile the good and the evil are unnatural to man as he now is--to manthe social, civilized being--evil is unnatural in a much deeper sensethan good. The saint endeavours to recover a gift which he has lost; thesinner tries to obtain something which was never his. In brief, herepeats the Fall.'

  'But are you a Catholic?' said Cotgrave.

  'Yes; I am a member of the persecuted Anglican Church.'

  'Then, how about those texts which seem to reckon as sin that which youwould set down as a mere trivial dereliction?'

  'Yes; but in one place the word "sorcerers" comes in the same sentence,doesn't it? That seems to me to give the key-note. Consider: can youimagine for a moment that a false statement which saves an innocentman's life is a sin? No; very good, then, it is not the mere
liar who isexcluded by those words; it is, above all, the "sorcerers" who use thematerial life, who use the failings incidental to material life asinstruments to obtain their infinitely wicked ends. And let me tell youthis: our higher senses are so blunted, we are so drenched withmaterialism, that we should probably fail to recognize real wickednessif we encountered it.'

  'But shouldn't we experience a certain horror--a terror such as youhinted we would experience if a rose tree sang--in the mere presence ofan evil man?'

  'We should if we were natural: children and women feel this horror youspeak of, even animals experience it. But with most of us convention andcivilization and education have blinded and deafened and obscured thenatural reason. No, sometimes we may recognize evil by its hatred of thegood--one doesn't need much penetration to guess at the influence whichdictated, quite unconsciously, the "Blackwood" review of Keats--but thisis purely incidental; and, as a rule, I suspect that the Hierarchs ofTophet pass quite unnoticed, or, perhaps, in certain cases, as good butmistaken men.'

  'But you used the word "unconscious" just now, of Keats' reviewers. Iswickedness ever unconscious?'

  'Always. It must be so. It is like holiness and genius in this as inother points; it is a certain rapture or ecstasy of the soul; atranscendent effort to surpass the ordinary bounds. So, surpassingthese, it surpasses also the understanding, the faculty that takes noteof that which comes before it. No, a man may be infinitely and horriblywicked and never suspect it. But I tell you, evil in this, its certainand true sense, is rare, and I think it is growing rarer.'

  'I am trying to get hold of it all,' said Cotgrave. 'From what you say,I gather that the true evil differs generically from that which we callevil?'

  'Quite so. There is, no doubt, an analogy between the two; a resemblancesuch as enables us to use, quite legitimately, such terms as the "footof the mountain" and the "leg of the table." And, sometimes, of course,the two speak, as it were, in the same language. The rough miner, or"puddler," the untrained, undeveloped "tiger-man," heated by a quart ortwo above his usual measure, comes home and kicks his irritating andinjudicious wife to death. He is a murderer. And Gilles de Raiz was amurderer. But you see the gulf that separates the two? The "word," if Imay so speak, is accidentally the same in each case, but the "meaning"is utterly different. It is flagrant "Hobson Jobson" to confuse the two,or rather, it is as if one supposed that Juggernaut and the Argonautshad something to do etymologically with one another. And no doubt thesame weak likeness, or analogy, runs between all the "social" sins andthe real spiritual sins, and in some cases, perhaps, the lesser may be"schoolmasters" to lead one on to the greater--from the shadow to thereality. If you are anything of a Theologian, you will see theimportance of all this.'

  'I am sorry to say,' remarked Cotgrave, 'that I have devoted very littleof my time to theology. Indeed, I have often wondered on what groundstheologians have claimed the title of Science of Sciences for theirfavourite study; since the "theological" books I have looked into havealways seemed to me to be concerned with feeble and obvious pieties, orwith the kings of Israel and Judah. I do not care to hear about thosekings.'

  Ambrose grinned.

  'We must try to avoid theological discussion,' he said. 'I perceive thatyou would be a bitter disputant. But perhaps the "dates of the kings"have as much to do with theology as the hobnails of the murderouspuddler with evil.'

  'Then, to return to our main subject, you think that sin is an esoteric,occult thing?'

  'Yes. It is the infernal miracle as holiness is the supernal. Now andthen it is raised to such a pitch that we entirely fail to suspect itsexistence; it is like the note of the great pedal pipes of the organ,which is so deep that we cannot hear it. In other cases it may lead tothe lunatic asylum, or to still stranger issues. But you must neverconfuse it with mere social misdoing. Remember how the Apostle, speakingof the "other side," distinguishes between "charitable" actions andcharity. And as one may give all one's goods to the poor, and yet lackcharity; so, remember, one may avoid every crime and yet be a sinner.'

  'Your psychology is very strange to me,' said Cotgrave, 'but I confess Ilike it, and I suppose that one might fairly deduce from your premissesthe conclusion that the real sinner might very possibly strike theobserver as a harmless personage enough?'

  'Certainly; because the true evil has nothing to do with social life orsocial laws, or if it has, only incidentally and accidentally. It is alonely passion of the soul--or a passion of the lonely soul--whicheveryou like. If, by chance, we understand it, and grasp its fullsignificance, then, indeed, it will fill us with horror and with awe.But this emotion is widely distinguished from the fear and the disgustwith which we regard the ordinary criminal, since this latter is largelyor entirely founded on the regard which we have for our own skins orpurses. We hate a murderer, because we know that we should hate to bemurdered, or to have any one that we like murdered. So, on the "otherside," we venerate the saints, but we don't "like" them as we like ourfriends. Can you persuade yourself that you would have "enjoyed" St.Paul's company? Do you think that you and I would have "got on" with SirGalahad?

  'So with the sinners, as with the saints. If you met a very evil man,and recognized his evil; he would, no doubt, fill you with horror andawe; but there is no reason why you should "dislike" him. On thecontrary, it is quite possible that if you could succeed in putting thesin out of your mind you might find the sinner capital company, and in alittle while you might have to reason yourself back into horror. Still,how awful it is. If the roses and the lilies suddenly sang on thiscoming morning; if the furniture began to move in procession, as in DeMaupassant's tale!'

  'I am glad you have come back to that comparison,' said Cotgrave,'because I wanted to ask you what it is that corresponds in humanity tothese imaginary feats of inanimate things. In a word--what is sin? Youhave given me, I know, an abstract definition, but I should like aconcrete example.'

  'I told you it was very rare,' said Ambrose, who appeared willing toavoid the giving of a direct answer. 'The materialism of the age, whichhas done a good deal to suppress sanctity, has done perhaps more tosuppress evil. We find the earth so very comfortable that we have noinclination either for ascents or descents. It would seem as if thescholar who decided to "specialize" in Tophet, would be reduced topurely antiquarian researches. No palaeontologist could show you a _live_pterodactyl.'

  'And yet you, I think, have "specialized," and I believe that yourresearches have descended to our modern times.'

  'You are really interested, I see. Well, I confess, that I have dabbleda little, and if you like I can show you something that bears on thevery curious subject we have been discussing.'

  Ambrose took a candle and went away to a far, dim corner of the room.Cotgrave saw him open a venerable bureau that stood there, and from somesecret recess he drew out a parcel, and came back to the window wherethey had been sitting.

  Ambrose undid a wrapping of paper, and produced a green pocket-book.

  'You will take care of it?' he said. 'Don't leave it lying about. It isone of the choicer pieces in my collection, and I should be very sorryif it were lost.'

  He fondled the faded binding.

  'I knew the girl who wrote this,' he said. 'When you read it, you willsee how it illustrates the talk we have had to-night. There is a sequel,too, but I won't talk of that.'

  'There was an odd article in one of the reviews some months ago,' hebegan again, with the air of a man who changes the subject. 'It waswritten by a doctor--Dr. Coryn, I think, was the name. He says that alady, watching her little girl playing at the drawing-room window,suddenly saw the heavy sash give way and fall on the child's fingers.The lady fainted, I think, but at any rate the doctor was summoned, andwhen he had dressed the child's wounded and maimed fingers he wassummoned to the mother. She was groaning with pain, and it was foundthat three fingers of her hand, corresponding with those that had beeninjured on the child's hand, were swollen and inflamed, and later, inthe doctor's language, purulent sloughin
g set in.'

  Ambrose still handled delicately the green volume.

  'Well, here it is,' he said at last, parting with difficulty, it seemed,from his treasure.

  'You will bring it back as soon as you have read it,' he said, as theywent out into the hall, into the old garden, faint with the odour ofwhite lilies.

  There was a broad red band in the east as Cotgrave turned to go, andfrom the high ground where he stood he saw that awful spectacle ofLondon in a dream.

  THE GREEN BOOK

  The morocco binding of the book was faded, and the colour had grownfaint, but there were no stains nor bruises nor marks of usage. The booklooked as if it had been bought 'on a visit to London' some seventy oreighty years ago, and had somehow been forgotten and suffered to lieaway out of sight. There was an old, delicate, lingering odour about it,such an odour as sometimes haunts an ancient piece of furniture for acentury or more. The end-papers, inside the binding, were oddlydecorated with coloured patterns and faded gold. It looked small, butthe paper was fine, and there were many leaves, closely covered withminute, painfully formed characters.

  I found this book (the manuscript began) in a drawer in the old bureauthat stands on the landing. It was a very rainy day and I could not goout, so in the afternoon I got a candle and rummaged in the bureau.Nearly all the drawers were full of old dresses, but one of the smallones looked empty, and I found this book hidden right at the back. Iwanted a book like this, so I took it to write in. It is full ofsecrets. I have a great many other books of secrets I have written,hidden in a safe place, and I am going to write here many of the oldsecrets and some new ones; but there are some I shall not put down atall. I must not write down the real names of the days and months which Ifound out a year ago, nor the way to make the Aklo letters, or the Chianlanguage, or the great beautiful Circles, nor the Mao Games, nor thechief songs. I may write something about all these things but not theway to do them, for peculiar reasons. And I must not say who the Nymphsare, or the Dols, or Jeelo, or what voolas mean. All these are mostsecret secrets, and I am glad when I remember what they are, and howmany wonderful languages I know, but there are some things that I callthe secrets of the secrets of the secrets that I dare not think ofunless I am quite alone, and then I shut my eyes, and put my hands overthem and whisper the word, and the Alala comes. I only do this at nightin my room or in certain woods that I know, but I must not describethem, as they are secret woods. Then there are the Ceremonies, which areall of them important, but some are more delightful than others--thereare the White Ceremonies, and the Green Ceremonies, and the ScarletCeremonies. The Scarlet Ceremonies are the best, but there is only oneplace where they can be performed properly, though there is a very niceimitation which I have done in other places. Besides these, I have thedances, and the Comedy, and I have done the Comedy sometimes when theothers were looking, and they didn't understand anything about it. Iwas very little when I first knew about these things.

  When I was very small, and mother was alive, I can remember rememberingthings before that, only it has all got confused. But I remember when Iwas five or six I heard them talking about me when they thought I wasnot noticing. They were saying how queer I was a year or two before, andhow nurse had called my mother to come and listen to me talking all tomyself, and I was saying words that nobody could understand. I wasspeaking the Xu language, but I only remember a very few of the words,as it was about the little white faces that used to look at me when Iwas lying in my cradle. They used to talk to me, and I learnt theirlanguage and talked to them in it about some great white place wherethey lived, where the trees and the grass were all white, and there werewhite hills as high up as the moon, and a cold wind. I have oftendreamed of it afterwards, but the faces went away when I was verylittle. But a wonderful thing happened when I was about five. My nursewas carrying me on her shoulder; there was a field of yellow corn, andwe went through it, it was very hot. Then we came to a path through awood, and a tall man came after us, and went with us till we came to aplace where there was a deep pool, and it was very dark and shady. Nurseput me down on the soft moss under a tree, and she said: 'She can't getto the pond now.' So they left me there, and I sat quite still andwatched, and out of the water and out of the wood came two wonderfulwhite people, and they began to play and dance and sing. They were akind of creamy white like the old ivory figure in the drawing-room; onewas a beautiful lady with kind dark eyes, and a grave face, and longblack hair, and she smiled such a strange sad smile at the other, wholaughed and came to her. They played together, and danced round andround the pool, and they sang a song till I fell asleep. Nurse woke meup when she came back, and she was looking something like the lady hadlooked, so I told her all about it, and asked her why she looked likethat. At first she cried, and then she looked very frightened, andturned quite pale. She put me down on the grass and stared at me, and Icould see she was shaking all over. Then she said I had been dreaming,but I knew I hadn't. Then she made me promise not to say a word about itto anybody, and if I did I should be thrown into the black pit. I wasnot frightened at all, though nurse was, and I never forgot about it,because when I shut my eyes and it was quite quiet, and I was all alone,I could see them again, very faint and far away, but very splendid; andlittle bits of the song they sang came into my head, but I couldn't singit.

  I was thirteen, nearly fourteen, when I had a very singular adventure,so strange that the day on which it happened is always called the WhiteDay. My mother had been dead for more than a year, and in the morning Ihad lessons, but they let me go out for walks in the afternoon. And thisafternoon I walked a new way, and a little brook led me into a newcountry, but I tore my frock getting through some of the difficultplaces, as the way was through many bushes, and beneath the low branchesof trees, and up thorny thickets on the hills, and by dark woods full ofcreeping thorns. And it was a long, long way. It seemed as if I wasgoing on for ever and ever, and I had to creep by a place like a tunnelwhere a brook must have been, but all the water had dried up, and thefloor was rocky, and the bushes had grown overhead till they met, sothat it was quite dark. And I went on and on through that dark place; itwas a long, long way. And I came to a hill that I never saw before. Iwas in a dismal thicket full of black twisted boughs that tore me as Iwent through them, and I cried out because I was smarting all over, andthen I found that I was climbing, and I went up and up a long way, tillat last the thicket stopped and I came out crying just under the top ofa big bare place, where there were ugly grey stones lying all about onthe grass, and here and there a little twisted, stunted tree came outfrom under a stone, like a snake. And I went up, right to the top, along way. I never saw such big ugly stones before; they came out of theearth some of them, and some looked as if they had been rolled to wherethey were, and they went on and on as far as I could see, a long, longway. I looked out from them and saw the country, but it was strange. Itwas winter time, and there were black terrible woods hanging from thehills all round; it was like seeing a large room hung with blackcurtains, and the shape of the trees seemed quite different from any Ihad ever seen before. I was afraid. Then beyond the woods there wereother hills round in a great ring, but I had never seen any of them; itall looked black, and everything had a voor over it. It was all so stilland silent, and the sky was heavy and grey and sad, like a wickedvoorish dome in Deep Dendo. I went on into the dreadful rocks. Therewere hundreds and hundreds of them. Some were like horrid-grinning men;I could see their faces as if they would jump at me out of the stone,and catch hold of me, and drag me with them back into the rock, so thatI should always be there. And there were other rocks that were likeanimals, creeping, horrible animals, putting out their tongues, andothers were like words that I could not say, and others like dead peoplelying on the grass. I went on among them, though they frightened me, andmy heart was full of wicked songs that they put into it; and I wanted tomake faces and twist myself about in the way they did, and I went on andon a long way till at last I liked the rocks, and they didn't frightenme any m
ore. I sang the songs I thought of; songs full of words thatmust not be spoken or written down. Then I made faces like the faces onthe rocks, and I twisted myself about like the twisted ones, and I laydown flat on the ground like the dead ones, and I went up to one thatwas grinning, and put my arms round him and hugged him. And so I went onand on through the rocks till I came to a round mound in the middle ofthem. It was higher than a mound, it was nearly as high as our house,and it was like a great basin turned upside down, all smooth and roundand green, with one stone, like a post, sticking up at the top. Iclimbed up the sides, but they were so steep I had to stop or I shouldhave rolled all the way down again, and I should have knocked againstthe stones at the bottom, and perhaps been killed. But I wanted to getup to the very top of the big round mound, so I lay down flat on myface, and took hold of the grass with my hands and drew myself up, bitby bit, till I was at the top. Then I sat down on the stone in themiddle, and looked all round about. I felt I had come such a long, longway, just as if I were a hundred miles from home, or in some othercountry, or in one of the strange places I had read about in the 'Talesof the Genie' and the 'Arabian Nights,' or as if I had gone across thesea, far away, for years and I had found another world that nobody hadever seen or heard of before, or as if I had somehow flown through thesky and fallen on one of the stars I had read about where everything isdead and cold and grey, and there is no air, and the wind doesn't blow.I sat on the stone and looked all round and down and round about me. Itwas just as if I was sitting on a tower in the middle of a great emptytown, because I could see nothing all around but the grey rocks on theground. I couldn't make out their shapes any more, but I could see themon and on for a long way, and I looked at them, and they seemed as ifthey had been arranged into patterns, and shapes, and figures. I knewthey couldn't be, because I had seen a lot of them coming right out ofthe earth, joined to the deep rocks below, so I looked again, but stillI saw nothing but circles, and small circles inside big ones, andpyramids, and domes, and spires, and they seemed all to go round andround the place where I was sitting, and the more I looked, the more Isaw great big rings of rocks, getting bigger and bigger, and I stared solong that it felt as if they were all moving and turning, like a greatwheel, and I was turning, too, in the middle. I got quite dizzy andqueer in the head, and everything began to be hazy and not clear, and Isaw little sparks of blue light, and the stones looked as if they werespringing and dancing and twisting as they went round and round andround. I was frightened again, and I cried out loud, and jumped up fromthe stone I was sitting on, and fell down. When I got up I was so gladthey all looked still, and I sat down on the top and slid down themound, and went on again. I danced as I went in the peculiar way therocks had danced when I got giddy, and I was so glad I could do it quitewell, and I danced and danced along, and sang extraordinary songs thatcame into my head. At last I came to the edge of that great flat hill,and there were no more rocks, and the way went again through a darkthicket in a hollow. It was just as bad as the other one I went throughclimbing up, but I didn't mind this one, because I was so glad I hadseen those singular dances and could imitate them. I went down, creepingthrough the bushes, and a tall nettle stung me on my leg, and made meburn, but I didn't mind it, and I tingled with the boughs and thethorns, but I only laughed and sang. Then I got out of the thicket intoa close valley, a little secret place like a dark passage that nobodyever knows of, because it was so narrow and deep and the woods were sothick round it. There is a steep bank with trees hanging over it, andthere the ferns keep green all through the winter, when they are deadand brown upon the hill, and the ferns there have a sweet, rich smelllike what oozes out of fir trees. There was a little stream of waterrunning down this valley, so small that I could easily step across it. Idrank the water with my hand, and it tasted like bright, yellow wine,and it sparkled and bubbled as it ran down over beautiful red and yellowand green stones, so that it seemed alive and all colours at once. Idrank it, and I drank more with my hand, but I couldn't drink enough,so I lay down and bent my head and sucked the water up with my lips. Ittasted much better, drinking it that way, and a ripple would come up tomy mouth and give me a kiss, and I laughed, and drank again, andpretended there was a nymph, like the one in the old picture at home,who lived in the water and was kissing me. So I bent low down to thewater, and put my lips softly to it, and whispered to the nymph that Iwould come again. I felt sure it could not be common water, I was soglad when I got up and went on; and I danced again and went up and upthe valley, under hanging hills. And when I came to the top, the groundrose up in front of me, tall and steep as a wall, and there was nothingbut the green wall and the sky. I thought of 'for ever and for ever,world without end, Amen'; and I thought I must have really found the endof the world, because it was like the end of everything, as if therecould be nothing at all beyond, except the kingdom of Voor, where thelight goes when it is put out, and the water goes when the sun takes itaway. I began to think of all the long, long way I had journeyed, how Ihad found a brook and followed it, and followed it on, and gone throughbushes and thorny thickets, and dark woods full of creeping thorns. ThenI had crept up a tunnel under trees, and climbed a thicket, and seen allthe grey rocks, and sat in the middle of them when they turned round,and then I had gone on through the grey rocks and come down the hillthrough the stinging thicket and up the dark valley, all a long, longway. I wondered how I should get home again, if I could ever find theway, and if my home was there any more, or if it were turned andeverybody in it into grey rocks, as in the 'Arabian Nights.' So I satdown on the grass and thought what I should do next. I was tired, and myfeet were hot with walking, and as I looked about I saw there was awonderful well just under the high, steep wall of grass. All the groundround it was covered with bright, green, dripping moss; there was everykind of moss there, moss like beautiful little ferns, and like palms andfir trees, and it was all green as jewellery, and drops of water hung onit like diamonds. And in the middle was the great well, deep and shiningand beautiful, so clear that it looked as if I could touch the red sandat the bottom, but it was far below. I stood by it and looked in, as ifI were looking in a glass. At the bottom of the well, in the middle ofit, the red grains of sand were moving and stirring all the time, and Isaw how the water bubbled up, but at the top it was quite smooth, andfull and brimming. It was a great well, large like a bath, and with theshining, glittering green moss about it, it looked like a great whitejewel, with green jewels all round. My feet were so hot and tired that Itook off my boots and stockings, and let my feet down into the water,and the water was soft and cold, and when I got up I wasn't tired anymore, and I felt I must go on, farther and farther, and see what was onthe other side of the wall. I climbed up it very slowly, going sidewaysall the time, and when I got to the top and looked over, I was in thequeerest country I had seen, stranger even than the hill of the greyrocks. It looked as if earth-children had been playing there with theirspades, as it was all hills and hollows, and castles and walls made ofearth and covered with grass. There were two mounds like big beehives,round and great and solemn, and then hollow basins, and then a steepmounting wall like the ones I saw once by the seaside where the big gunsand the soldiers were. I nearly fell into one of the round hollows, itwent away from under my feet so suddenly, and I ran fast down the sideand stood at the bottom and looked up. It was strange and solemn to lookup. There was nothing but the grey, heavy sky and the sides of thehollow; everything else had gone away, and the hollow was the wholeworld, and I thought that at night it must be full of ghosts and movingshadows and pale things when the moon shone down to the bottom at thedead of the night, and the wind wailed up above. It was so strange andsolemn and lonely, like a hollow temple of dead heathen gods. Itreminded me of a tale my nurse had told me when I was quite little; itwas the same nurse that took me into the wood where I saw the beautifulwhite people. And I remembered how nurse had told me the story onewinter night, when the wind was beating the trees against the wall, andcrying and moaning in the nursery chi
mney. She said there was, somewhereor other, a hollow pit, just like the one I was standing in, everybodywas afraid to go into it or near it, it was such a bad place. But onceupon a time there was a poor girl who said she would go into the hollowpit, and everybody tried to stop her, but she would go. And she wentdown into the pit and came back laughing, and said there was nothingthere at all, except green grass and red stones, and white stones andyellow flowers. And soon after people saw she had most beautiful emeraldearrings, and they asked how she got them, as she and her mother werequite poor. But she laughed, and said her earrings were not made ofemeralds at all, but only of green grass. Then, one day, she wore on herbreast the reddest ruby that any one had ever seen, and it was as big asa hen's egg, and glowed and sparkled like a hot burning coal of fire.And they asked how she got it, as she and her mother were quite poor.But she laughed, and said it was not a ruby at all, but only a redstone. Then one day she wore round her neck the loveliest necklace thatany one had ever seen, much finer than the queen's finest, and it wasmade of great bright diamonds, hundreds of them, and they shone like allthe stars on a night in June. So they asked her how she got it, as sheand her mother were quite poor. But she laughed, and said they were notdiamonds at all, but only white stones. And one day she went to theCourt, and she wore on her head a crown of pure angel-gold, so nursesaid, and it shone like the sun, and it was much more splendid than thecrown the king was wearing himself, and in her ears she wore theemeralds, and the big ruby was the brooch on her breast, and the greatdiamond necklace was sparkling on her neck. And the king and queenthought she was some great princess from a long way off, and got downfrom their thrones and went to meet her, but somebody told the king andqueen who she was, and that she was quite poor. So the king asked whyshe wore a gold crown, and how she got it, as she and her mother were sopoor. And she laughed, and said it wasn't a gold crown at all, but onlysome yellow flowers she had put in her hair. And the king thought it wasvery strange, and said she should stay at the Court, and they would seewhat would happen next. And she was so lovely that everybody said thather eyes were greener than the emeralds, that her lips were redder thanthe ruby, that her skin was whiter than the diamonds, and that her hairwas brighter than the golden crown. So the king's son said he wouldmarry her, and the king said he might. And the bishop married them, andthere was a great supper, and afterwards the king's son went to hiswife's room. But just when he had his hand on the door, he saw a tall,black man, with a dreadful face, standing in front of the door, and avoice said--

  Venture not upon your life, This is mine own wedded wife.

  Then the king's son fell down on the ground in a fit. And they came andtried to get into the room, but they couldn't, and they hacked at thedoor with hatchets, but the wood had turned hard as iron, and at lasteverybody ran away, they were so frightened at the screaming andlaughing and shrieking and crying that came out of the room. But nextday they went in, and found there was nothing in the room but thickblack smoke, because the black man had come and taken her away. And onthe bed there were two knots of faded grass and a red stone, and somewhite stones, and some faded yellow flowers. I remembered this tale ofnurse's while I was standing at the bottom of the deep hollow; it was sostrange and solitary there, and I felt afraid. I could not see anystones or flowers, but I was afraid of bringing them away withoutknowing, and I thought I would do a charm that came into my head tokeep the black man away. So I stood right in the very middle of thehollow, and I made sure that I had none of those things on me, and thenI walked round the place, and touched my eyes, and my lips, and my hairin a peculiar manner, and whispered some queer words that nurse taughtme to keep bad things away. Then I felt safe and climbed up out of thehollow, and went on through all those mounds and hollows and walls, tillI came to the end, which was high above all the rest, and I could seethat all the different shapes of the earth were arranged in patterns,something like the grey rocks, only the pattern was different. It wasgetting late, and the air was indistinct, but it looked from where I wasstanding something like two great figures of people lying on the grass.And I went on, and at last I found a certain wood, which is too secretto be described, and nobody knows of the passage into it, which I foundout in a very curious manner, by seeing some little animal run into thewood through it. So I went after the animal by a very narrow dark way,under thorns and bushes, and it was almost dark when I came to a kind ofopen place in the middle. And there I saw the most wonderful sight Ihave ever seen, but it was only for a minute, as I ran away directly,and crept out of the wood by the passage I had come by, and ran and ranas fast as ever I could, because I was afraid, what I had seen was sowonderful and so strange and beautiful. But I wanted to get home andthink of it, and I did not know what might not happen if I stayed by thewood. I was hot all over and trembling, and my heart was beating, andstrange cries that I could not help came from me as I ran from thewood. I was glad that a great white moon came up from over a round hilland showed me the way, so I went back through the mounds and hollows anddown the close valley, and up through the thicket over the place of thegrey rocks, and so at last I got home again. My father was busy in hisstudy, and the servants had not told about my not coming home, thoughthey were frightened, and wondered what they ought to do, so I told themI had lost my way, but I did not let them find out the real way I hadbeen. I went to bed and lay awake all through the night, thinking ofwhat I had seen. When I came out of the narrow way, and it looked allshining, though the air was dark, it seemed so certain, and all the wayhome I was quite sure that I had seen it, and I wanted to be alone in myroom, and be glad over it all to myself, and shut my eyes and pretend itwas there, and do all the things I would have done if I had not been soafraid. But when I shut my eyes the sight would not come, and I began tothink about my adventures all over again, and I remembered how dusky andqueer it was at the end, and I was afraid it must be all a mistake,because it seemed impossible it could happen. It seemed like one ofnurse's tales, which I didn't really believe in, though I was frightenedat the bottom of the hollow; and the stories she told me when I waslittle came back into my head, and I wondered whether it was reallythere what I thought I had seen, or whether any of her tales could havehappened a long time ago. It was so queer; I lay awake there in my roomat the back of the house, and the moon was shining on the other sidetowards the river, so the bright light did not fall upon the wall. Andthe house was quite still. I had heard my father come upstairs, and justafter the clock struck twelve, and after the house was still and empty,as if there was nobody alive in it. And though it was all dark andindistinct in my room, a pale glimmering kind of light shone in throughthe white blind, and once I got up and looked out, and there was a greatblack shadow of the house covering the garden, looking like a prisonwhere men are hanged; and then beyond it was all white; and the woodshone white with black gulfs between the trees. It was still and clear,and there were no clouds on the sky. I wanted to think of what I hadseen but I couldn't, and I began to think of all the tales that nursehad told me so long ago that I thought I had forgotten, but they allcame back, and mixed up with the thickets and the grey rocks and thehollows in the earth and the secret wood, till I hardly knew what wasnew and what was old, or whether it was not all dreaming. And then Iremembered that hot summer afternoon, so long ago, when nurse left me bymyself in the shade, and the white people came out of the water and outof the wood, and played, and danced, and sang, and I began to fancy thatnurse told me about something like it before I saw them, only I couldn'trecollect exactly what she told me. Then I wondered whether she had beenthe white lady, as I remembered she was just as white and beautiful, andhad the same dark eyes and black hair; and sometimes she smiled andlooked like the lady had looked, when she was telling me some of herstories, beginning with 'Once on a time,' or 'In the time of thefairies.' But I thought she couldn't be the lady, as she seemed to havegone a different way into the wood, and I didn't think the man who cameafter us could be the other, or I couldn't have seen that wonderfulsecret in the
secret wood. I thought of the moon: but it was afterwardswhen I was in the middle of the wild land, where the earth was made intothe shape of great figures, and it was all walls, and mysterioushollows, and smooth round mounds, that I saw the great white moon comeup over a round hill. I was wondering about all these things, till atlast I got quite frightened, because I was afraid something had happenedto me, and I remembered nurse's tale of the poor girl who went into thehollow pit, and was carried away at last by the black man. I knew I hadgone into a hollow pit too, and perhaps it was the same, and I had donesomething dreadful. So I did the charm over again, and touched my eyesand my lips and my hair in a peculiar manner, and said the old wordsfrom the fairy language, so that I might be sure I had not been carriedaway. I tried again to see the secret wood, and to creep up the passageand see what I had seen there, but somehow I couldn't, and I kept onthinking of nurse's stories. There was one I remembered about a youngman who once upon a time went hunting, and all the day he and his houndshunted everywhere, and they crossed the rivers and went into all thewoods, and went round the marshes, but they couldn't find anything atall, and they hunted all day till the sun sank down and began to setbehind the mountain. And the young man was angry because he couldn'tfind anything, and he was going to turn back, when just as the suntouched the mountain, he saw come out of a brake in front of him abeautiful white stag. And he cheered to his hounds, but they whined andwould not follow, and he cheered to his horse, but it shivered and stoodstock still, and the young man jumped off the horse and left the houndsand began to follow the white stag all alone. And soon it was quitedark, and the sky was black, without a single star shining in it, andthe stag went away into the darkness. And though the man had brought hisgun with him he never shot at the stag, because he wanted to catch it,and he was afraid he would lose it in the night. But he never lost itonce, though the sky was so black and the air was so dark, and the stagwent on and on till the young man didn't know a bit where he was. Andthey went through enormous woods where the air was full of whispers anda pale, dead light came out from the rotten trunks that were lying onthe ground, and just as the man thought he had lost the stag, he wouldsee it all white and shining in front of him, and he would run fast tocatch it, but the stag always ran faster, so he did not catch it. Andthey went through the enormous woods, and they swam across rivers, andthey waded through black marshes where the ground bubbled, and the airwas full of will-o'-the-wisps, and the stag fled away down into rockynarrow valleys, where the air was like the smell of a vault, and the manwent after it. And they went over the great mountains and the man heardthe wind come down from the sky, and the stag went on and the man wentafter. At last the sun rose and the young man found he was in a countrythat he had never seen before; it was a beautiful valley with a brightstream running through it, and a great, big round hill in the middle.And the stag went down the valley, towards the hill, and it seemed tobe getting tired and went slower and slower, and though the man wastired, too, he began to run faster, and he was sure he would catch thestag at last. But just as they got to the bottom of the hill, and theman stretched out his hand to catch the stag, it vanished into theearth, and the man began to cry; he was so sorry that he had lost itafter all his long hunting. But as he was crying he saw there was a doorin the hill, just in front of him, and he went in, and it was quitedark, but he went on, as he thought he would find the white stag. Andall of a sudden it got light, and there was the sky, and the sunshining, and birds singing in the trees, and there was a beautifulfountain. And by the fountain a lovely lady was sitting, who was thequeen of the fairies, and she told the man that she had changed herselfinto a stag to bring him there because she loved him so much. Then shebrought out a great gold cup, covered with jewels, from her fairypalace, and she offered him wine in the cup to drink. And he drank, andthe more he drank the more he longed to drink, because the wine wasenchanted. So he kissed the lovely lady, and she became his wife, and hestayed all that day and all that night in the hill where she lived, andwhen he woke he found he was lying on the ground, close to where he hadseen the stag first, and his horse was there and his hounds were therewaiting, and he looked up, and the sun sank behind the mountain. And hewent home and lived a long time, but he would never kiss any other ladybecause he had kissed the queen of the fairies, and he would never drinkcommon wine any more, because he had drunk enchanted wine. And sometimesnurse told me tales that she had heard from her great-grandmother, whowas very old, and lived in a cottage on the mountain all alone, and mostof these tales were about a hill where people used to meet at night longago, and they used to play all sorts of strange games and do queerthings that nurse told me of, but I couldn't understand, and now, shesaid, everybody but her great-grandmother had forgotten all about it,and nobody knew where the hill was, not even her great-grandmother. Butshe told me one very strange story about the hill, and I trembled when Iremembered it. She said that people always went there in summer, when itwas very hot, and they had to dance a good deal. It would be all dark atfirst, and there were trees there, which made it much darker, and peoplewould come, one by one, from all directions, by a secret path whichnobody else knew, and two persons would keep the gate, and every one asthey came up had to give a very curious sign, which nurse showed me aswell as she could, but she said she couldn't show me properly. And allkinds of people would come; there would be gentle folks and villagefolks, and some old people and boys and girls, and quite small children,who sat and watched. And it would all be dark as they came in, except inone corner where some one was burning something that smelt strong andsweet, and made them laugh, and there one would see a glaring of coals,and the smoke mounting up red. So they would all come in, and when thelast had come there was no door any more, so that no one else could getin, even if they knew there was anything beyond. And once a gentlemanwho was a stranger and had ridden a long way, lost his path at night,and his horse took him into the very middle of the wild country, whereeverything was upside down, and there were dreadful marshes and greatstones everywhere, and holes underfoot, and the trees looked likegibbet-posts, because they had great black arms that stretched outacross the way. And this strange gentleman was very frightened, and hishorse began to shiver all over, and at last it stopped and wouldn't goany farther, and the gentleman got down and tried to lead the horse, butit wouldn't move, and it was all covered with a sweat, like death. Sothe gentleman went on all alone, going farther and farther into the wildcountry, till at last he came to a dark place, where he heard shoutingand singing and crying, like nothing he had ever heard before. It allsounded quite close to him, but he couldn't get in, and so he began tocall, and while he was calling, something came behind him, and in aminute his mouth and arms and legs were all bound up, and he fell into aswoon. And when he came to himself, he was lying by the roadside, justwhere he had first lost his way, under a blasted oak with a black trunk,and his horse was tied beside him. So he rode on to the town and toldthe people there what had happened, and some of them were amazed; butothers knew. So when once everybody had come, there was no door at allfor anybody else to pass in by. And when they were all inside, round ina ring, touching each other, some one began to sing in the darkness, andsome one else would make a noise like thunder with a thing they had onpurpose, and on still nights people would hear the thundering noise far,far away beyond the wild land, and some of them, who thought they knewwhat it was, used to make a sign on their breasts when they woke up intheir beds at dead of night and heard that terrible deep noise, likethunder on the mountains. And the noise and the singing would go on andon for a long time, and the people who were in a ring swayed a little toand fro; and the song was in an old, old language that nobody knows now,and the tune was queer. Nurse said her great-grandmother had known someone who remembered a little of it, when she was quite a little girl, andnurse tried to sing some of it to me, and it was so strange a tune thatI turned all cold and my flesh crept as if I had put my hand onsomething dead. Sometimes it was a man that sang and sometimes it was awoman, and som
etimes the one who sang it did it so well that two orthree of the people who were there fell to the ground shrieking andtearing with their hands. The singing went on, and the people in thering kept swaying to and fro for a long time, and at last the moon wouldrise over a place they called the Tole Deol, and came up and showed themswinging and swaying from side to side, with the sweet thick smokecurling up from the burning coals, and floating in circles all aroundthem. Then they had their supper. A boy and a girl brought it to them;the boy carried a great cup of wine, and the girl carried a cake ofbread, and they passed the bread and the wine round and round, but theytasted quite different from common bread and common wine, and changedeverybody that tasted them. Then they all rose up and danced, and secretthings were brought out of some hiding place, and they playedextraordinary games, and danced round and round and round in themoonlight, and sometimes people would suddenly disappear and never beheard of afterwards, and nobody knew what had happened to them. Andthey drank more of that curious wine, and they made images andworshipped them, and nurse showed me how the images were made one daywhen we were out for a walk, and we passed by a place where there was alot of wet clay. So nurse asked me if I would like to know what thosethings were like that they made on the hill, and I said yes. Then sheasked me if I would promise never to tell a living soul a word about it,and if I did I was to be thrown into the black pit with the dead people,and I said I wouldn't tell anybody, and she said the same thing againand again, and I promised. So she took my wooden spade and dug a biglump of clay and put it in my tin bucket, and told me to say if any onemet us that I was going to make pies when I went home. Then we went on alittle way till we came to a little brake growing right down into theroad, and nurse stopped, and looked up the road and down it, and thenpeeped through the hedge into the field on the other side, and then shesaid, 'Quick!' and we ran into the brake, and crept in and out among thebushes till we had gone a good way from the road. Then we sat down undera bush, and I wanted so much to know what nurse was going to make withthe clay, but before she would begin she made me promise again not tosay a word about it, and she went again and peeped through the bushes onevery side, though the lane was so small and deep that hardly anybodyever went there. So we sat down, and nurse took the clay out of thebucket, and began to knead it with her hands, and do queer things withit, and turn it about. And she hid it under a big dock-leaf for a minuteor two and then she brought it out again, and then she stood up and satdown, and walked round the clay in a peculiar manner, and all the timeshe was softly singing a sort of rhyme, and her face got very red. Thenshe sat down again, and took the clay in her hands and began to shape itinto a doll, but not like the dolls I have at home, and she made thequeerest doll I had ever seen, all out of the wet clay, and hid it undera bush to get dry and hard, and all the time she was making it she wassinging these rhymes to herself, and her face got redder and redder. Sowe left the doll there, hidden away in the bushes where nobody wouldever find it. And a few days later we went the same walk, and when wecame to that narrow, dark part of the lane where the brake runs down tothe bank, nurse made me promise all over again, and she looked about,just as she had done before, and we crept into the bushes till we got tothe green place where the little clay man was hidden. I remember it allso well, though I was only eight, and it is eight years ago now as I amwriting it down, but the sky was a deep violet blue, and in the middleof the brake where we were sitting there was a great elder tree coveredwith blossoms, and on the other side there was a clump of meadowsweet,and when I think of that day the smell of the meadowsweet and elderblossom seems to fill the room, and if I shut my eyes I can see theglaring blue sky, with little clouds very white floating across it, andnurse who went away long ago sitting opposite me and looking like thebeautiful white lady in the wood. So we sat down and nurse took out theclay doll from the secret place where she had hidden it, and she said wemust 'pay our respects,' and she would show me what to do, and I mustwatch her all the time. So she did all sorts of queer things with thelittle clay man, and I noticed she was all streaming with perspiration,though we had walked so slowly, and then she told me to 'pay myrespects,' and I did everything she did because I liked her, and it wassuch an odd game. And she said that if one loved very much, the clay manwas very good, if one did certain things with it, and if one hated verymuch, it was just as good, only one had to do different things, and weplayed with it a long time, and pretended all sorts of things. Nursesaid her great-grandmother had told her all about these images, but whatwe did was no harm at all, only a game. But she told me a story aboutthese images that frightened me very much, and that was what Iremembered that night when I was lying awake in my room in the pale,empty darkness, thinking of what I had seen and the secret wood. Nursesaid there was once a young lady of the high gentry, who lived in agreat castle. And she was so beautiful that all the gentlemen wanted tomarry her, because she was the loveliest lady that anybody had everseen, and she was kind to everybody, and everybody thought she was verygood. But though she was polite to all the gentlemen who wished to marryher, she put them off, and said she couldn't make up her mind, and shewasn't sure she wanted to marry anybody at all. And her father, who wasa very great lord, was angry, though he was so fond of her, and he askedher why she wouldn't choose a bachelor out of all the handsome young menwho came to the castle. But she only said she didn't love any of themvery much, and she must wait, and if they pestered her, she said shewould go and be a nun in a nunnery. So all the gentlemen said theywould go away and wait for a year and a day, and when a year and a daywere gone, they would come back again and ask her to say which one shewould marry. So the day was appointed and they all went away; and thelady had promised that in a year and a day it would be her wedding daywith one of them. But the truth was, that she was the queen of thepeople who danced on the hill on summer nights, and on the proper nightsshe would lock the door of her room, and she and her maid would stealout of the castle by a secret passage that only they knew of, and goaway up to the hill in the wild land. And she knew more of the secretthings than any one else, and more than any one knew before or after,because she would not tell anybody the most secret secrets. She knew howto do all the awful things, how to destroy young men, and how to put acurse on people, and other things that I could not understand. And herreal name was the Lady Avelin, but the dancing people called her Cassap,which meant somebody very wise, in the old language. And she was whiterthan any of them and taller, and her eyes shone in the dark like burningrubies; and she could sing songs that none of the others could sing, andwhen she sang they all fell down on their faces and worshipped her. Andshe could do what they called shib-show, which was a very wonderfulenchantment. She would tell the great lord, her father, that she wantedto go into the woods to gather flowers, so he let her go, and she andher maid went into the woods where nobody came, and the maid would keepwatch. Then the lady would lie down under the trees and begin to sing aparticular song, and she stretched out her arms, and from every part ofthe wood great serpents would come, hissing and gliding in and out amongthe trees, and shooting out their forked tongues as they crawled up tothe lady. And they all came to her, and twisted round her, round herbody, and her arms, and her neck, till she was covered with writhingserpents, and there was only her head to be seen. And she whispered tothem, and she sang to them, and they writhed round and round, faster andfaster, till she told them to go. And they all went away directly, backto their holes, and on the lady's breast there would be a most curious,beautiful stone, shaped something like an egg, and coloured dark blueand yellow, and red, and green, marked like a serpent's scales. It wascalled a glame stone, and with it one could do all sorts of wonderfulthings, and nurse said her great-grandmother had seen a glame stone withher own eyes, and it was for all the world shiny and scaly like a snake.And the lady could do a lot of other things as well, but she was quitefixed that she would not be married. And there were a great manygentlemen who wanted to marry her, but there were five of them who werechief, and their names were Sir
Simon, Sir John, Sir Oliver, SirRichard, and Sir Rowland. All the others believed she spoke the truth,and that she would choose one of them to be her man when a year and aday was done; it was only Sir Simon, who was very crafty, who thoughtshe was deceiving them all, and he vowed he would watch and try if hecould find out anything. And though he was very wise he was very young,and he had a smooth, soft face like a girl's, and he pretended, as therest did, that he would not come to the castle for a year and a day, andhe said he was going away beyond the sea to foreign parts. But hereally only went a very little way, and came back dressed like a servantgirl, and so he got a place in the castle to wash the dishes. And hewaited and watched, and he listened and said nothing, and he hid in darkplaces, and woke up at night and looked out, and he heard things and hesaw things that he thought were very strange. And he was so sly that hetold the girl that waited on the lady that he was really a young man,and that he had dressed up as a girl because he loved her so very muchand wanted to be in the same house with her, and the girl was so pleasedthat she told him many things, and he was more than ever certain thatthe Lady Avelin was deceiving him and the others. And he was so clever,and told the servant so many lies, that one night he managed to hide inthe Lady Avelin's room behind the curtains. And he stayed quite stilland never moved, and at last the lady came. And she bent down under thebed, and raised up a stone, and there was a hollow place underneath, andout of it she took a waxen image, just like the clay one that I andnurse had made in the brake. And all the time her eyes were burning likerubies. And she took the little wax doll up in her arms and held it toher breast, and she whispered and she murmured, and she took it up andshe laid it down again, and she held it high, and she held it low, andshe laid it down again. And she said, 'Happy is he that begat thebishop, that ordered the clerk, that married the man, that had the wife,that fashioned the hive, that harboured the bee, that gathered the waxthat my own true love was made of.' And she brought out of an aumbry agreat golden bowl, and she brought out of a closet a great jar of wine,and she poured some of the wine into the bowl, and she laid her mannikinvery gently in the wine, and washed it in the wine all over. Then shewent to a cupboard and took a small round cake and laid it on theimage's mouth, and then she bore it softly and covered it up. And SirSimon, who was watching all the time, though he was terribly frightened,saw the lady bend down and stretch out her arms and whisper and sing,and then Sir Simon saw beside her a handsome young man, who kissed heron the lips. And they drank wine out of the golden bowl together, andthey ate the cake together. But when the sun rose there was only thelittle wax doll, and the lady hid it again under the bed in the hollowplace. So Sir Simon knew quite well what the lady was, and he waited andhe watched, till the time she had said was nearly over, and in a weekthe year and a day would be done. And one night, when he was watchingbehind the curtains in her room, he saw her making more wax dolls. Andshe made five, and hid them away. And the next night she took one out,and held it up, and filled the golden bowl with water, and took the dollby the neck and held it under the water. Then she said--

  Sir Dickon, Sir Dickon, your day is done, You shall be drowned in the water wan.

  And the next day news came to the castle that Sir Richard had beendrowned at the ford. And at night she took another doll and tied aviolet cord round its neck and hung it up on a nail. Then she said--

  Sir Rowland, your life has ended its span, High on a tree I see you hang.

  And the next day news came to the castle that Sir Rowland had beenhanged by robbers in the wood. And at night she took another doll, anddrove her bodkin right into its heart. Then she said--

  Sir Noll, Sir Noll, so cease your life, Your heart pierced with the knife.

  And the next day news came to the castle that Sir Oliver had fought in atavern, and a stranger had stabbed him to the heart. And at night shetook another doll, and held it to a fire of charcoal till it was melted.Then she said--

  Sir John, return, and turn to clay, In fire of fever you waste away.

  And the next day news came to the castle that Sir John had died in aburning fever. So then Sir Simon went out of the castle and mounted hishorse and rode away to the bishop and told him everything. And thebishop sent his men, and they took the Lady Avelin, and everything shehad done was found out. So on the day after the year and a day, when shewas to have been married, they carried her through the town in hersmock, and they tied her to a great stake in the market-place, andburned her alive before the bishop with her wax image hung round herneck. And people said the wax man screamed in the burning of the flames.And I thought of this story again and again as I was lying awake in mybed, and I seemed to see the Lady Avelin in the market-place, with theyellow flames eating up her beautiful white body. And I thought of it somuch that I seemed to get into the story myself, and I fancied I was thelady, and that they were coming to take me to be burnt with fire, withall the people in the town looking at me. And I wondered whether shecared, after all the strange things she had done, and whether it hurtvery much to be burned at the stake. I tried again and again to forgetnurse's stories, and to remember the secret I had seen that afternoon,and what was in the secret wood, but I could only see the dark and aglimmering in the dark, and then it went away, and I only saw myselfrunning, and then a great moon came up white over a dark round hill.Then all the old stories came back again, and the queer rhymes thatnurse used to sing to me; and there was one beginning 'Halsy cumsy Helenmusty,' that she used to sing very softly when she wanted me to go tosleep. And I began to sing it to myself inside of my head, and I went tosleep.

  The next morning I was very tired and sleepy, and could hardly do mylessons, and I was very glad when they were over and I had had mydinner, as I wanted to go out and be alone. It was a warm day, and Iwent to a nice turfy hill by the river, and sat down on my mother's oldshawl that I had brought with me on purpose. The sky was grey, like theday before, but there was a kind of white gleam behind it, and fromwhere I was sitting I could look down on the town, and it was all stilland quiet and white, like a picture. I remembered that it was on thathill that nurse taught me to play an old game called 'Troy Town,' inwhich one had to dance, and wind in and out on a pattern in the grass,and then when one had danced and turned long enough the other personasks you questions, and you can't help answering whether you want to ornot, and whatever you are told to do you feel you have to do it. Nursesaid there used to be a lot of games like that that some people knew of,and there was one by which people could be turned into anything youliked, and an old man her great-grandmother had seen had known a girlwho had been turned into a large snake. And there was another veryancient game of dancing and winding and turning, by which you could takea person out of himself and hide him away as long as you liked, and hisbody went walking about quite empty, without any sense in it. But I cameto that hill because I wanted to think of what had happened the daybefore, and of the secret of the wood. From the place where I wassitting I could see beyond the town, into the opening I had found, wherea little brook had led me into an unknown country. And I pretended I wasfollowing the brook over again, and I went all the way in my mind, andat last I found the wood, and crept into it under the bushes, and thenin the dusk I saw something that made me feel as if I were filled withfire, as if I wanted to dance and sing and fly up into the air, becauseI was changed and wonderful. But what I saw was not changed at all, andhad not grown old, and I wondered again and again how such things couldhappen, and whether nurse's stories were really true, because in thedaytime in the open air everything seemed quite different from what itwas at night, when I was frightened, and thought I was to be burnedalive. I once told my father one of her little tales, which was about aghost, and asked him if it was true, and he told me it was not true atall, and that only common, ignorant people believed in such rubbish. Hewas very angry with nurse for telling me the story, and scolded her,and after that I promised her I would never whisper a word of what shetold me, and if I did I should be bitten by the great b
lack snake thatlived in the pool in the wood. And all alone on the hill I wondered whatwas true. I had seen something very amazing and very lovely, and I knewa story, and if I had really seen it, and not made it up out of thedark, and the black bough, and the bright shining that was mounting upto the sky from over the great round hill, but had really seen it intruth, then there were all kinds of wonderful and lovely and terriblethings to think of, so I longed and trembled, and I burned and got cold.And I looked down on the town, so quiet and still, like a little whitepicture, and I thought over and over if it could be true. I was a longtime before I could make up my mind to anything; there was such astrange fluttering at my heart that seemed to whisper to me all the timethat I had not made it up out of my head, and yet it seemed quiteimpossible, and I knew my father and everybody would say it was dreadfulrubbish. I never dreamed of telling him or anybody else a word about it,because I knew it would be of no use, and I should only get laughed ator scolded, so for a long time I was very quiet, and went about thinkingand wondering; and at night I used to dream of amazing things, andsometimes I woke up in the early morning and held out my arms with acry. And I was frightened, too, because there were dangers, and someawful thing would happen to me, unless I took great care, if the storywere true. These old tales were always in my head, night and morning,and I went over them and told them to myself over and over again, andwent for walks in the places where nurse had told them to me; and whenI sat in the nursery by the fire in the evenings I used to fancy nursewas sitting in the other chair, and telling me some wonderful story in alow voice, for fear anybody should be listening. But she used to likebest to tell me about things when we were right out in the country, farfrom the house, because she said she was telling me such secrets, andwalls have ears. And if it was something more than ever secret, we hadto hide in brakes or woods; and I used to think it was such fun creepingalong a hedge, and going very softly, and then we would get behind thebushes or run into the wood all of a sudden, when we were sure that nonewas watching us; so we knew that we had our secrets quite all toourselves, and nobody else at all knew anything about them. Now andthen, when we had hidden ourselves as I have described, she used to showme all sorts of odd things. One day, I remember, we were in a hazelbrake, overlooking the brook, and we were so snug and warm, as though itwas April; the sun was quite hot, and the leaves were just coming out.Nurse said she would show me something funny that would make me laugh,and then she showed me, as she said, how one could turn a whole houseupside down, without anybody being able to find out, and the pots andpans would jump about, and the china would be broken, and the chairswould tumble over of themselves. I tried it one day in the kitchen, andI found I could do it quite well, and a whole row of plates on thedresser fell off it, and cook's little work-table tilted up and turnedright over 'before her eyes,' as she said, but she was so frightened andturned so white that I didn't do it again, as I liked her. Andafterwards, in the hazel copse, when she had shown me how to makethings tumble about, she showed me how to make rapping noises, and Ilearnt how to do that, too. Then she taught me rhymes to say on certainoccasions, and peculiar marks to make on other occasions, and otherthings that her great-grandmother had taught her when she was a littlegirl herself. And these were all the things I was thinking about inthose days after the strange walk when I thought I had seen a greatsecret, and I wished nurse were there for me to ask her about it, butshe had gone away more than two years before, and nobody seemed to knowwhat had become of her, or where she had gone. But I shall alwaysremember those days if I live to be quite old, because all the time Ifelt so strange, wondering and doubting, and feeling quite sure at onetime, and making up my mind, and then I would feel quite sure that suchthings couldn't happen really, and it began all over again. But I tookgreat care not to do certain things that might be very dangerous. So Iwaited and wondered for a long time, and though I was not sure at all, Inever dared to try to find out. But one day I became sure that all thatnurse said was quite true, and I was all alone when I found it out. Itrembled all over with joy and terror, and as fast as I could I ran intoone of the old brakes where we used to go--it was the one by the lane,where nurse made the little clay man--and I ran into it, and I creptinto it; and when I came to the place where the elder was, I covered upmy face with my hands and lay down flat on the grass, and I stayed therefor two hours without moving, whispering to myself delicious, terriblethings, and saying some words over and over again. It was all true andwonderful and splendid, and when I remembered the story I knew andthought of what I had really seen, I got hot and I got cold, and the airseemed full of scent, and flowers, and singing. And first I wanted tomake a little clay man, like the one nurse had made so long ago, and Ihad to invent plans and stratagems, and to look about, and to think ofthings beforehand, because nobody must dream of anything that I wasdoing or going to do, and I was too old to carry clay about in a tinbucket. At last I thought of a plan, and I brought the wet clay to thebrake, and did everything that nurse had done, only I made a much finerimage than the one she had made; and when it was finished I dideverything that I could imagine and much more than she did, because itwas the likeness of something far better. And a few days later, when Ihad done my lessons early, I went for the second time by the way of thelittle brook that had led me into a strange country. And I followed thebrook, and went through the bushes, and beneath the low branches oftrees, and up thorny thickets on the hill, and by dark woods full ofcreeping thorns, a long, long way. Then I crept through the dark tunnelwhere the brook had been and the ground was stony, till at last I cameto the thicket that climbed up the hill, and though the leaves werecoming out upon the trees, everything looked almost as black as it wason the first day that I went there. And the thicket was just the same,and I went up slowly till I came out on the big bare hill, and began towalk among the wonderful rocks. I saw the terrible voor again oneverything, for though the sky was brighter, the ring of wild hills allaround was still dark, and the hanging woods looked dark and dreadful,and the strange rocks were as grey as ever; and when I looked down onthem from the great mound, sitting on the stone, I saw all their amazingcircles and rounds within rounds, and I had to sit quite still and watchthem as they began to turn about me, and each stone danced in its place,and they seemed to go round and round in a great whirl, as if one werein the middle of all the stars and heard them rushing through the air.So I went down among the rocks to dance with them and to singextraordinary songs; and I went down through the other thicket, anddrank from the bright stream in the close and secret valley, putting mylips down to the bubbling water; and then I went on till I came to thedeep, brimming well among the glittering moss, and I sat down. I lookedbefore me into the secret darkness of the valley, and behind me was thegreat high wall of grass, and all around me there were the hanging woodsthat made the valley such a secret place. I knew there was nobody hereat all besides myself, and that no one could see me. So I took off myboots and stockings, and let my feet down into the water, saying thewords that I knew. And it was not cold at all, as I expected, but warmand very pleasant, and when my feet were in it I felt as if they were insilk, or as if the nymph were kissing them. So when I had done, I saidthe other words and made the signs, and then I dried my feet with atowel I had brought on purpose, and put on my stockings and boots. ThenI climbed up the steep wall, and went into the place where there are thehollows, and the two beautiful mounds, and the round ridges of land, andall the strange shapes. I did not go down into the hollow this time,but I turned at the end, and made out the figures quite plainly, as itwas lighter, and I had remembered the story I had quite forgottenbefore, and in the story the two figures are called Adam and Eve, andonly those who know the story understand what they mean. So I went onand on till I came to the secret wood which must not be described, and Icrept into it by the way I had found. And when I had gone about halfwayI stopped, and turned round, and got ready, and I bound the handkerchieftightly round my eyes, and made quite sure that I could not see at all,not a twig, nor the end of
a leaf, nor the light of the sky, as it wasan old red silk handkerchief with large yellow spots, that went roundtwice and covered my eyes, so that I could see nothing. Then I began togo on, step by step, very slowly. My heart beat faster and faster, andsomething rose in my throat that choked me and made me want to cry out,but I shut my lips, and went on. Boughs caught in my hair as I went, andgreat thorns tore me; but I went on to the end of the path. Then Istopped, and held out my arms and bowed, and I went round the firsttime, feeling with my hands, and there was nothing. I went round thesecond time, feeling with my hands, and there was nothing. Then I wentround the third time, feeling with my hands, and the story was all true,and I wished that the years were gone by, and that I had not so long atime to wait before I was happy for ever and ever.

  Nurse must have been a prophet like those we read of in the Bible.Everything that she said began to come true, and since then other thingsthat she told me of have happened. That was how I came to know that herstories were true and that I had not made up the secret myself out of myown head. But there was another thing that happened that day. I went asecond time to the secret place. It was at the deep brimming well, andwhen I was standing on the moss I bent over and looked in, and then Iknew who the white lady was that I had seen come out of the water in thewood long ago when I was quite little. And I trembled all over, becausethat told me other things. Then I remembered how sometime after I hadseen the white people in the wood, nurse asked me more about them, and Itold her all over again, and she listened, and said nothing for a long,long time, and at last she said, 'You will see her again.' So Iunderstood what had happened and what was to happen. And I understoodabout the nymphs; how I might meet them in all kinds of places, and theywould always help me, and I must always look for them, and find them inall sorts of strange shapes and appearances. And without the nymphs Icould never have found the secret, and without them none of the otherthings could happen. Nurse had told me all about them long ago, but shecalled them by another name, and I did not know what she meant, or whather tales of them were about, only that they were very queer. And therewere two kinds, the bright and the dark, and both were very lovely andvery wonderful, and some people saw only one kind, and some only theother, but some saw them both. But usually the dark appeared first, andthe bright ones came afterwards, and there were extraordinary talesabout them. It was a day or two after I had come home from the secretplace that I first really knew the nymphs. Nurse had shown me how tocall them, and I had tried, but I did not know what she meant, and so Ithought it was all nonsense. But I made up my mind I would try again, soI went to the wood where the pool was, where I saw the white people, andI tried again. The dark nymph, Alanna, came, and she turned the pool ofwater into a pool of fire....

  EPILOGUE

  'That's a very queer story,' said Cotgrave, handing back the green bookto the recluse, Ambrose. 'I see the drift of a good deal, but there aremany things that I do not grasp at all. On the last page, for example,what does she mean by "nymphs"?'

  'Well, I think there are references throughout the manuscript to certain"processes" which have been handed down by tradition from age to age.Some of these processes are just beginning to come within the purview ofscience, which has arrived at them--or rather at the steps which lead tothem--by quite different paths. I have interpreted the reference to"nymphs" as a reference to one of these processes.'

  'And you believe that there are such things?'

  'Oh, I think so. Yes, I believe I could give you convincing evidence onthat point. I am afraid you have neglected the study of alchemy? It is apity, for the symbolism, at all events, is very beautiful, and moreoverif you were acquainted with certain books on the subject, I could recallto your mind phrases which might explain a good deal in the manuscriptthat you have been reading.'

  'Yes; but I want to know whether you seriously think that there is anyfoundation of fact beneath these fancies. Is it not all a department ofpoetry; a curious dream with which man has indulged himself?'

  'I can only say that it is no doubt better for the great mass of peopleto dismiss it all as a dream. But if you ask my veritable belief--thatgoes quite the other way. No; I should not say belief, but ratherknowledge. I may tell you that I have known cases in which men havestumbled quite by accident on certain of these "processes," and havebeen astonished by wholly unexpected results. In the cases I am thinkingof there could have been no possibility of "suggestion" or sub-consciousaction of any kind. One might as well suppose a schoolboy "suggesting"the existence of AEschylus to himself, while he plods mechanicallythrough the declensions.

  'But you have noticed the obscurity,' Ambrose went on, 'and in thisparticular case it must have been dictated by instinct, since the writernever thought that her manuscripts would fall into other hands. But thepractice is universal, and for most excellent reasons. Powerful andsovereign medicines, which are, of necessity, virulent poisons also, arekept in a locked cabinet. The child may find the key by chance, anddrink herself dead; but in most cases the search is educational, and thephials contain precious elixirs for him who has patiently fashioned thekey for himself.'

  'You do not care to go into details?'

  'No, frankly, I do not. No, you must remain unconvinced. But you saw howthe manuscript illustrates the talk we had last week?'

  'Is this girl still alive?'

  'No. I was one of those who found her. I knew the father well; he was alawyer, and had always left her very much to herself. He thought ofnothing but deeds and leases, and the news came to him as an awfulsurprise. She was missing one morning; I suppose it was about a yearafter she had written what you have read. The servants were called, andthey told things, and put the only natural interpretation on them--aperfectly erroneous one.

  'They discovered that green book somewhere in her room, and I found herin the place that she described with so much dread, lying on the groundbefore the image.'

  'It was an image?'

  'Yes, it was hidden by the thorns and the thick undergrowth that hadsurrounded it. It was a wild, lonely country; but you know what it waslike by her description, though of course you will understand that thecolours have been heightened. A child's imagination always makes theheights higher and the depths deeper than they really are; and she had,unfortunately for herself, something more than imagination. One mightsay, perhaps, that the picture in her mind which she succeeded in ameasure in putting into words, was the scene as it would have appearedto an imaginative artist. But it is a strange, desolate land.'

  'And she was dead?'

  'Yes. She had poisoned herself--in time. No; there was not a word to besaid against her in the ordinary sense. You may recollect a story I toldyou the other night about a lady who saw her child's fingers crushed bya window?'

  'And what was this statue?'

  'Well, it was of Roman workmanship, of a stone that with the centurieshad not blackened, but had become white and luminous. The thicket hadgrown up about it and concealed it, and in the Middle Ages the followersof a very old tradition had known how to use it for their own purposes.In fact it had been incorporated into the monstrous mythology of theSabbath. You will have noted that those to whom a sight of that shiningwhiteness had been vouchsafed by chance, or rather, perhaps, by apparentchance, were required to blindfold themselves on their second approach.That is very significant.'

  'And is it there still?'

  'I sent for tools, and we hammered it into dust and fragments.'

  'The persistence of tradition never surprises me,' Ambrose went on aftera pause. 'I could name many an English parish where such traditions asthat girl had listened to in her childhood are still existent in occultbut unabated vigour. No, for me, it is the "story" not the "sequel,"which is strange and awful, for I have always believed that wonder is ofthe soul.'