Wyndham, John - The Chrysalids

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that certainly were not birds.

Most often I would see this wonderful place by daylight, but

occasionally it was by night when the lights lay like strings of glow-

worms along the shore, and a few of them seemed to be sparks

drifting on the water, or in the air.

It was a beautiful, fascinating place, and once, when I was still

young enough to know no better, I asked my eldest sister, Mary,

where this lovely city could be.

She shook her head, and told me that there was no such place —

not now. But, perhaps, she suggested, I could somehow be

dreaming about times long ago. Dreams were funny things, and

there was no accounting for them; so it might be that what I was

seeing was a bit of the world as it had been once upon a time — the

wonderful world that the Old People had lived in; as it had been

before God sent Tribulation.

But after that she went on to warn me very seriously not to

mention it to anyone else; other people, as far as she knew, did not

have such pictures in their heads, either sleeping or waking, so it

would be unwise to mention them.

That was good advice, and luckily I had the sense to take it.

People in our district had a very sharp eye for the odd, or the

unusual, so that even my left-handedness caused slight disap-

proval. So, at that time, and for some years afterwards, I did not

mention it to anyone — indeed, I almost forgot about it, for as I

grew older the dream came less frequently, and then very rarely.

But the advice stuck. Without it I might have mentioned the

curious understanding I had with my cousin Rosalind, and that

would certainly have led us both into very grave trouble — if anyone

had happened to believe me. Neither I nor she, I think, paid much

attention to it at that time: we simply had the habit of caution. I

certainly did not feel unusual. I was a normal little boy, growing up

in a normal way, taking the ways of the world about me for granted.

occurred to me to connect it with the wondrous doings of the Old

People whom I sometimes heard about. It was simply the bank,

coming round in a wide curve, and then running straight as an

arrow towards the distant hills; just a part of the world, and no

more to be wondered at than the river, the sky, or the hills

themselves.

I had often gone along the top of it, but seldom explored on the

farther side. For some reason I regarded the country there as

foreign — not so much hostile, as outside my territory. But there

was a place I had discovered where the rain, in running down the

far side of the bank, had worn a sandy gully. If one sat in the start

of that and gave a good push off, one could go swishing down at a

fine speed, and finally fly a few feet through the air to land in a pile

of soft sand at the bottom.

I must have been there half a dozen times before, and there had

never been anyone about, but on this occasion, when I was picking

myself up after my third descent and preparing for a fourth, a voice

said:’Hullo!'

I looked round. At first I could not tell where it came from; then a

shaking of the top twigs in a bunch of bushes caught my eye. The

branches parted, and a face looked out at me. It was a small face,

sunburned, and clustered about by dark curls. The expression was

somewhat serious, but the eyes sparkled. We regarded one another

for a moment, then:

'Hallo,’I responded.

She hesitated, then pushed the bushes farther apart. I saw a girl

a little shorter than I was, and perhaps a little younger. She wore

reddish-brown dungarees with a yellow shirt. The cross stitched to

the front of the dungarees was of a darker brown material. Her hair

was tied on either side of her head with yellow ribbons. She stood

still for a few seconds as though uncertain about leaving the

security of the bushes, then curiosity got the better of her caution,

had been sliding.

‘Is that fun?’she inquired, with a wistful look.

I hesitated a moment before inviting her, then:

‘Yes,’I told her.’Come and try.'

She hung back, turning her attention to me again. She studied

me with a serious expression for a second or two, then made up her

mind quite suddenly. She scrambled to the top of the bank ahead of

me.

She sped down the runnel with curls and ribbons flying. When I

landed she had lost her serious look, and her eyes were dancing

with excitement.

‘Again,’she said, and panted back up the bank.

It was on her third descent that the misadventure occurred. She

sat down and shoved off as before. I watched her swish down and

come to a stop in a Hurry of sand. Somehow she had contrived to

land a couple of feet to the left of the usual place. I made ready to

follow, and waited for her to get clear. She did not.

‘Go on,’I told her impatiently.

She tried to move, and then called up,

‘I can't. It hurts.'

I risked pushing off, anyway, and landed close beside her.

‘What's the matter?’I asked.

Her face was screwed up. Tears stood in her eyes.

‘My foot's stuck,’she said.

Her left foot was buried. I scrabbled the soft sand clear with my

hands. Her shoe was jammed in a narrow space between two up-

pointed stones. I tried to move it, but it would not budge.

‘Can't you sort of twist it out?’I suggested.

She tried, lips valiantly compressed.

‘It won't come.'

‘I'll help pull,’I offered.

‘No, no! It hurts,’she protested.

any longer. They ran down her face. But even then she didn't howl:

she made small puppyish noises.

'You'll have to take it off,’I told her.

'No!’she protested again.’No, I mustn't. Not ever. I mustn't.'

I sat down beside her, at a loss. Both her hands held on to one of

mine, gripping it tightly while she cried. Clearly the pain of her foot

was increasing. For almost the first time in my life I found myself in

charge of a situation which needed a decision. I made it.

'It's no good. You've got to get it off,’I told her.’If you don't, you'll

probably stay here and die, I expect.'

She did not give in at once, but at last she consented. She

watched apprehensively while I cut the lace. Then she said:

'Go away! You mustn't look.'

I hesitated, but childhood is a time thickly beset with incom-

prehensible, though important, conventions, so I withdrew a few

yards and turned my back. I heard her breathing hard. Then she

was crying again. I turned round.

'I can't,’she said, looking at me fearfully through her tears, so I

knelt down to see what I could do about it.

'You mustn't ever tell,’she said.’Never, never! Promise?'

I promised.

She was very brave. Nothing more than the puppy noises.

When I did succeed in getting the foot free, it looked queer: I

mean, it was all twisted and puffy - I didn't even notice then that it

had more than the usual number of toes. . . .

I managed to hammer the shoe out of the cleft, and handed it to

her. But she found she could not put it on her swollen foot. Nor

could she put the foot to the ground. I thought I might carry her on

my back, but she was heavier than I expected, and it was clear that

we should not get far like that.

'I'll have to go and fetch somebody to help,’I told her.

'No. I'll crawl,’she said.

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摘要：

thatcertainlywerenotbirds.MostoftenIwouldseethiswonderfulplacebydaylight,butoccasionallyitwasbynightwhenthelightslaylikestringsofglow-wormsalongtheshore,andafewofthemseemedtobesparksdriftingonthewater,orintheair.Itwasabeautiful,fascinatingplace,andonce,whenIwasstillyoungenoughtoknownobetter,Iaskedmy...

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Wyndham, John - The Chrysalids

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