Part 20 (1/2)
Indeed, for most people it was simply not worth the trouble of entering at all. Apparently no one ever bothered about it.
Yet, precisely for these very reasons, it was real. Tim described it afterwards as a ”naked” wood. It had no fence to hold it together, it was not dressed up by human beings, it just grew naturally. To this very openness and want of concealment it owed its deep security, its safety was due entirely to the air of innocence it wore. But in reality it was disguised. It was a forest--without a middle, without a heart.
”This is our wood,” announced Tim in a low voice, as they stood and mopped their faces. His tone suggested that they would enter at their peril.
”And is it a big wood?” the other asked with caution, as though he had not noticed it before.
”Much bigger than it looks,” the boy replied. ”You can easily get lost.” Then added, with the first touch of awe about him, ”It has no centre.”
”That's the worst kind,” said his companion s.h.i.+vering slightly. ”Like a pond that has no bottom.”
Tim nodded. His face had grown a trifle paler. He showed no immediate anxiety to make the first advance, reserving that privilege for his comrade. A breath of wind stole out and set the dry leaves rustling.
”We must look out,” he said at length. ”There'll be a sign.”
Uncle Felix listened attentively to every word. The boy had moved up closer to him. ”And if anything happens one of us must climb a tree and signal. _You've_ got the clean handkerchief. You see, it's at the centre that it gets rather nasty--because anybody who gets there simply disappears and is never heard of again. That's why there's no centre at all _really_. It's a terrible rescue we've got to do.”
The adventure fulfilled the desire of his heart, for, since there was no centre, the search would last for ever.
”Keep a sharp look-out for the sign,” replied the man, feeling a small hand steal into his own. ”We'd better go in before it gets any darker.”
”Oh, that's nothing,” was the whispered comment. ”The great thing is not to lose our way. Just follow me!”
They then went into this wood without a centre, without a middle, without a heart. Into this heartless wood they moved stealthily, Uncle Felix singing under his breath to keep his courage up:
”A wood is a mysterious place, It never looks you in the face, But stares _behind_ you all the time.
Your safest plan is just to--climb!
For, otherwise you lose your way, The week, the month, the time of day; It turns you round, it makes you blind, And in the end you lose your mind!
Avoid the centre, If you enter!
”It grows upon you--grows immense, Its peace is _not_ indifference, It sees you--and it takes offence, It knows you're interfering.
Its sleepliness is all pretence, With trunks and twigs and foliage dense It's watching you, alert, intense, It's furious; it's peering.
”Upon the darkening paths below, Whichever way you try to go You'll meet with strange resistance.
So climb a tree and wave your hand, The birds will see and understand, And _may_ bring you a.s.sistance.
Avoid the centre, If you enter, For once you're there You--disappear!
Smothered by depth and distance!”
Tim listened without a sign of interest. Every one has his peculiarity, he supposed, and, provided his companion did not dance as well as sing, it was all right. The noise was unnecessary, perhaps, still--the sound of a human voice was not without its charm. The house was a very long way off; the gardeners never came this way. A wood _was_ a mysterious place! ”Is that all?” he asked--but whether glad or sorry, no man could possibly have told.
”For the present,” came the reply, and the sound of both their voices fell a little dead, m.u.f.fled by the density of the undergrowth. ”Are we going right?”
”There'll be a sign,” Tim explained again. And the way he said it, the air of positive belief in tone and manner, stung the man's consciousness with a thrill of genuine adventure. It began to creep over him. He kept near to the comforting presence of the boy, aware in quite a novel way of the Presence of the Wood. This very ordinary wood, without claim to particular notice, much less to a notice-board, changed his normal feelings by arresting their customary flow. An unusual sensation replaced what he meant to feel, expected to feel. He was aware of strangeness. He felt included in the purpose of a crowd of growing trees. ”But it's just a common little wood,” he a.s.sured himself, realising as he said it that both adjectives were wrong. For nothing left to itself is ever common, and as for ”little”--well, it had suddenly become enormous.
Outside, in what was called the big world, things were going on with frantic hurry and change, but in here the leisured calm was huge, gigantic, so much so that the other dwindled into a kind of lost remoteness. ”Smothered by depth and distance,” he could almost forget it altogether. Out there nations were at war, republics fighting, empires tottering to ruin; great-hearted ladies were burning furniture and stabbing lovely pictures (not their own) to prove themselves intelligent enough to vote; and gallant gentlemen were flying across the Alps and hunting for the top and bottom of the earth instead of hurrying to help them. All manner of tremendous things were happening at a frightful pace--while this unnoticed wood just stood and grew, watching the sun and stars and listening to the brus.h.i.+ng winds. Its unadvertised foliage concealed a busy universe of mult.i.tudinous, secret life.
How still the trees were--far more imposing than in a storm! Still, quiet things are much more impressive than things that draw attention to themselves by making a noise. They are more articulate. The strength of all these trees emerged in their silence. Their steadiness might easily wear one down.
And now, into its quiet presence, a man and a boy from that distressful outer world had entered. They moved with effort and difficulty into its untrodden depths. Uninvited and unasked, they sought its hidden and invisible centre, the mysterious heart of it which the younger of the adventurers could only describe by saying that ”It isn't there, because when you get there, you disappear!” Two ways of expressing the same thing, of course! Moreover, entering involved getting out again. Escape and Rescue--the Wood always in opposition--took possession of the man's slow mind....