September 2, 2025 • 48 mins
Discover the enchanting world of Day And Night Stories, featuring fifteen captivating short tales by Algernon Henry Blackwood, CBE (1869 ‚ì 1951). Renowned as one of the most prolific ghost story writers, Blackwoods work blends the supernatural with the ethereal, inviting readers into a realm of wonder and intrigue. A journalist and broadcasting narrator, he has been acclaimed for his consistently exceptional storytelling, with literary critic S. T. Joshi noting that his contributions stand among the finest in the genre. Immerse yourself in these timeless narratives that explore the mysteries of life and the unknown.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Story six of Day and Night Stories by Algernon Blackwood.
This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Story six,
The Other Wing One. It used to puzzle him that
after dark some one would look in round the edge
of the bedroom door and withdraw again, too rapidly for
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him to see the face when the nurse had gone
away with the candle. This happened. Good night, master tim,
she said, usually shading the light with one hand to
protect his eyes. Dream of me, and I'll dream of you.
She went out, slowly. The sharp edged shadow of the
door ran across the ceiling like a train. There came
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a whispered colloquy in the corridor outside about himself, of course,
and he was alone. He heard her steps going deeper
and deeper into the bosom of the old country house.
They were audible for a moment on the stone flooring
of the hall, and sometimes times the dull thump of
the bay's door into the servants quarters just reached him too.
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Then silence. But it was only when the last sound,
as well as the last sign of her, had vanished,
that the face emerged from his hiding place and flashed
in upon him round the corner as a rule to
it came just as he was saying, Now I'll go
to sleep, I won't think any longer. Good night mastered
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him and happy dreams. He loved to say this to himself.
It brought a sense of companionship, as though there were
two persons speaking. The room was on the top of
the old house, a big, high ceilinged room, and his
bed against the wall had an iron railing round it.
He felt very safe and protected in it. The curtains
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at the other end of the room were drawn. He
lay watching the firelight dancing on the heavy folds, and
their pattern showed a spaniel chasing a long tailed bird
towards a bushy tree. Interested and amused him. It was
repeated over and over again. He counted the number of dogs,
and the number of birds, and the number of trees,
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but could never make them agree. There was a plan
somewhere in that pattern. If only he could discover it,
the dogs and birds and trees would come out right.
Hundreds and hundreds of times he had played this game,
for the plan in the pattern made it possible to
take sides, and the bird and dog were against him.
They always won. However, Tim usually fell asleep just when
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the advantage was on his own side. The curtains hung
steadily enough most of the time, but it seemed to
him once or twice that they stirred, hiding a dog
or bird on purpose to prevent his winning. For instance,
he had eleven birds and eleven trees, and fixing them
in his mind by saying, that's eleven birds and eleven trees,
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but only ten dogs. His eyes darted back to find
the eleventh dog when the curtain moved and threw all
his calculations into confusion again the eleventh dog was hidden.
He did not quite like the movement. It gave him
questionable feelings. Rather, for the curtain did not move of itself,
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yet usually he was too intent upon counting the dogs
to feel positive alarm. Opposite to him was the fireplace
full of red and yellow coals, and lying with his
head sideways on the pillow, he could see directly in
between the bars. When the coals settled with a soft
and powdery crash, he turned his eyes from the curtains
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to the grate, trying to discover exactly which bits had fallen.
So long as the glow was there, the sound seemed
pleasant enough, but sometimes he awoke later in the night,
the room huge with darkness, the fire almost out, and
the sound was not so pleasant. Then it startled him.
The coals did not fall of themselves. It seemed that
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someone poked them cautiously. The shadows were very thick before
the bars, as with the curtains. Moreover, the morning aspect
of the extinguished fire, the ice cold cinders that made
a clinking sound like tin, caused no emotion whatever in
his soul, and it was usually while he lay waiting
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for sleep, tired both of the curtain and the coal games.
On the point indeed of saying I'll go to sleep
now that the puzzling thing took place, he would be
staring drowsily at the dying fire, perhaps counting the stockings
and flannel garments that hung along the high fender rail,
when suddenly a person looked in with lightning swiftness through
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the door and vanished again before he could possibly turn
his head to sea. The appearance and disappearance were accomplished
with amazing rapidity. All it was a head and shoulders
that looked in, and the movement combined the speed, the
lightness and the silence of a shadow. Only it was
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not a shadow. A hand held the edge of the door.
The face shot round, saw him and withdrew like lightning.
It was utterly beyond him to imagine anything more quick
and clever it darted. He heard no sound it went,
but it had seen him, looked him all over, examined him,
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noted what he was doing With that lightning glance. It
wanted to know if he were awake still, or asleep.
And though it went off, it still watched him from
a distance. It waited somewhere, It knew all about him.
Where it waited, no one could ever guess. It came, probably,
he felt, from beyond the house, possibly from the roof,
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but most likely from the garden or the sky. Yet,
though strange, it was not too terrible. It was a
kindly and protective figure, he felt. And when it happened,
he never called for help because the occurrence simply took
his voice away. It comes from the nightmare passage, he decided.
But it's not a nightmare. It puzzled him sometimes. Moreover,
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it came more than once in a single night. He
was pretty sure, not quite positive, that it occupied his room.
As soon as he was properly asleep, it took possession,
sitting perhaps before the dying fire, standing upright behind the
heavy curtains, or even lying down in the empty bed
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his brother used when he was home from school. Perhaps
it played the curtain game. Perhaps it poked the coals.
It knew at any rate, where the eleventh dog had
lain concealed. It certainly came in and out. Certainly, too,
it did not wish to be seen for more than once.
On waking. Suddenly, in the midnight blackness, Tim knew it
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was standing close beside his bed and bending over him.
He felt, rather than heard, its presence. It glided quietly away.
It moved with marvelous softness, and yet he was positive
it moved. He felt the difference, so to speak. It
had been near him, now it was gone. It came
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back too, just as he was falling into sleep again.
Its midnight coming and going, however, stood out sharply different
from its first, shy, tentative approach, For in the firelight
it came alone, whereas in the black and silent hours
it had with it others. And it was then he
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made up his mind that its swift and quiet movements
were due to the fact that it had wings. It flew,
and the others that came with it in the darkness
were its little ones. He also made up his mind
that all were friendly, comfort protective, and that while positively
not a nightmare, it yet came somehow along the nightmare
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passage before it reached him. You see, it's like this,
he explained to the nurse. The big one comes to
visit me alone, but it only brings its little ones
when I'm quite asleep. Then the quicker you get to sleep,
the better, isn't it, Master Tim, He replied rad the
I always do. Only I wonder where they come from.
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He spoke, however, as though he had an inkling, but
the nurse was so dull about it that he gave
her up and tried. His father, of course, replied this
busy but affectionate parent, it's either nobody at all, or
else it's sleep coming to carry you away to the
land of dreams. He made the statement kindly, but somewhat briskly,
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for he was worried just then about the extra taxes
on his land and the effort to fix his mind
on Tim's fanciful world. World was beyond him at the moment.
He lifted the boy on to his knee, kissed and
patted him as though he were a favorite dog, and
planted him on the rug again with a flying sweep.
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Run and ask your mother, he added, She knows all
that kind of thing. Then come back and tell me
all about it. Another time, Tim found his mother in
an arm chair before the fire of another room. She
was knitting and reading at the same time, a wonderful
thing the boy could never understand. She raised her head
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as he came in, pushed her glasses on to her forehead,
and held her arms out. He told her everything, ending
up with what his father said. You see, it's not
Jackman or Thompson or any one like that, he exclaimed.
It's some one real but nice, she assured him, some
one who comes to take care of you and see
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that you're safe and cozy. Oh yes, I know that.
But I think your father's right, she added quickly, it's sleep,
I'm sure who pops in around the door like that?
Sleep has got wings I've always heard. Then the other thing,
the little ones, he asked, Are they just sorts of
dozes you think? Mother did not answer for a moment.
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She turned down the page of her book, closed it slowly,
put it on the table beside her. More slowly still,
she put her knitting away, arranging the wool and needles.
With some deliberation, perhaps, she said, drawing the boy closer
to her, and looking into his big eyes of wonder,
they're dreams. Tim felt a thrill run through him. As
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she said it, he stepped back a foot or so
and clapped his hands softly. Dreams, he whispered with enthusiasm.
And to believe, of course, I never thought of that.
His mother, having proved her sagacity, then made a mistake.
She noted her success, but instead of leaving it there,
she elaborated and explained as Tim expressed it, she went
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on about it. Therefore, he did not listen. He followed
his train of thought alone, and presently he interrupted her
long sentences with a conclusion of his own. Then I
know where she hides, he announced, with a touch of
awe where she lives? I mean, And without waiting to
be asked, he imparted the information. It's in the other wing, ah,
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said his mother, taken by surprise. How clever of you, Tim,
and thus confirmed it. Thenceforward, this was established in his life,
that sleep and her attendant dreams hid during the daytime
in that unused portion of the Great Elizabethan Mansion called
the Other Wing. This other wing was unoccupied, its corridors untrodden,
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its windows shuttered, and its rooms all closed. At various places,
green baized doors led into it, but no one ever
opened them. For many years this part had been shut up,
and for the children, properly speaking, it was out of bounds.
They never mentioned it as a possible place at any rate.
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In Hide and Seek it was not considered. Even there
was a hint of the inaccessible about the Other Wing. Shadows,
dust and silence had it to themselves. But Tim, having
ideas of his own about everything, possessed special information about
the Other Wing. He believed it was inhabited who occupied
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the immense series of empty rooms, who trod the spacious corridors,
who passed to and fro behind the shuttered windows. He
had not known exactly he had called these occupants. They,
and the most important among them was the ruler. The
ruler of the Other Wing was a kind of deity, powerful,
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far away, ever present, yet never seen. And about this
ruler he had a wonderful conception. For a little boy.
He connected her somehow with deep thoughts of his own,
the deepest of all, when he made up adventures to
the moon, to the stars, or to the bottom of
the sea, adventures that he lived inside himself, as it were,
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to reach them, he must invariably pass through the chambers
of the other wing. Those corridors and halls, the Nightmare
Passage among them, lay along the route. They were the
first stage of the journey. Once the green baize doors
swung to behind him, and the long, dim passage stretched ahead,
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he was well on his way into the adventure of
the moment. The Nightmare Passage once past, he was safe
from capture. But once the shutters of a window had
been flung open, he was free of the gigant world
that lay beyond. For then light poured in and he
could see his way. The conception, for a child was curious.
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It established a correspondence between the mysterious chambers of the
other wing and the occupied but unguessed chambers of his
inner being. Through these chambers, through these darkened corridors, along
a passage sometimes dangerous or at least of questionable repute,
he must pass to find all adventures that were real.
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The light, when he pierced far enough to take the
shutters down was discovery. Tim did not actually think, much
less say all this. He was aware of it, however
he felt it. The other wing was inside himself as
well as through the green Bay's doors. His inner map
of wonder included both of them. But now, for the
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first time in his life, he knew who lived there
and who the ruler was. A shudder had fallen of
its own accord. Light poured in. He made a guess,
and mother had confirmed it. Sleep and her little ones,
the host of dreams, were the daylight occupants. They stole
out when the darkness fell. All adventures in life began
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and ended by a dream, discoverable by first passing through
the other wing two. And having settled this, his one
desire now was to travel over the map upon journeys
of exploration and discovery. The map inside himself he knew already,
but the map of the other wing he had not seen.
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His mind knew it. He had a clear mental picture
of rooms and halls and passages, but his feet had
never trod the silent floors where dust and shadows hid
the flock of dreams by day, the mighty chambers where
sleep ruled. He longed to stand in to see the
ruler face to face. He made up his mind to
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get into the other wing to accomplish. This was difficult,
but tim was a determined youngster, and he meant to try.
He meant also to succeed. He deliberated at night he
could not possibly manage it. In any case, the ruler
and her host all left it after dark to fly
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about the world. The wing would be empty, and the
emptiness would frighten him. Therefore he must make a daylight visit.
And it was a daylight visit he decided on. He
deliberated more. There were rules and risks involved. It meant
going out of bounds, the danger of being seen, the
certainty of being questioned by some idle and inquisitive grown up.
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Where in the world have you been all this time?
And so forth. These things he thought out carefully, and
though he arrived at no solution, he felt satisfied that
it would be all right. That is, he recognized the risks.
To be prepared was half the battle. For nothing then
could take him by surprise. The notion that he might
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slip in from the garden was soon abandoned. The red
bricks showed no openings. There was no door from the courtyard. Also,
entrance was impractical. Even on tiptoe. He could barely reach
the broad window sills of stone. When playing alone or
walking with the French governess, he examined every outside possibility.
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None offered. The shutters, supposing he could reach them, were
thick and solid. Meanwhile, when opportunity offered, he stood against
the outside walls and listened. His ear pressed against the
tight red bricks. The towers and gables of the wing
rose overhead. He heard the wind go whispering along the eaves.
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He imagined tiptoe movements and a sound of wings. In side.
Sleep and her little ones were busily preparing for their journeys.
After dark they hid, but they did not sleep in
this unused wing. Vaster alone than any other country house
he had ever seen. Sleep taught and trained her flock
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of feathered dreams. It was very wonderful. They probably supplied
the entire county. But more wonderful still was the thought
that the ruler herself should take the trouble to come
to his particular room and personally watch over him all
night long. That was amazing, and it flashed across his imaginative,
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inquiring mind. Perhaps they take me with them the moment
I'm asleep, that's why she comes to see me. Yet
his chief preoccupation was how sleep got out through the
green bay's door. Of course, by a process of elimination,
he arrived at a conclusion he too must enter through
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a green bay's door and risk detection. Of late, the
lightning visits had ceased, the silent darting figure had not
peeped in and vanished as it used to do. He
fell asleep too quickly, now almost before Jackman reached the hall,
and long before the fire began to die. Also, the
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dogs and birds upon the curtains always matched the trees exactly,
and he won the curtain game quite easily. There was
never a dog or bird too many. The curtain never stirred.
It had been thus ever since his talk with mother
and father, And so he came to make a second discovery.
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His parents did not really believe in his figure. She
kept away on that account they doubted her she hid.
Here was still another incentive to go and find her out.
He ached for her. She was so kind, She gave
herself so much trouble just for his little self In
the big and lonely bedroom, yet his parents spoke of
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her as though she were of no account. He longed
to see her face to face and tell her that
he believed in her and loved her, for he was
positive that she would like to hear it. She cared,
though he had fallen asleep of late, too quickly for
him to see her flash in at the door. He
had known nicer dreams than ever in his life before
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traveling dreams, and it was she who sent them more,
he was sure. She took him out with her One evening,
in the dusk of a March day, his opportunity came,
and only just in time for his brother, Jack, was
expected home from school on the morrow, and with Jack
in the other bed, no figure would ever care to
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show itself. Also, it was Easter, and after Easter, though
Tim was not aware of it at the time, he
was to say good bye finally to governesses and become
a day boarder at a preparatory school for Wellington. The
opportunity offered itself so naturally, moreover, that Tim took it
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without hesitation. It never occurred to him to question, much
less to refuse it. The thing was obviously meant to be,
for he found himself unexpectedly in front of a green
bay's door, and the green bay's door was swinging. Somebody
therefore had just passed through it. It had come about
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in this wise, Father, away in Scotland at Ingelmer, the
shooting place, was expected back next morning. Mother had driven
over to the church upon some Easter business or other,
and the governess had been allowed her holiday at home
in France. Tim therefore had the run of the house,
and in the hour between tea and bedtime he made
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good use of it, fully, able to defy such second
rate obstacles as nurses and butlers, he explored all manses
of forbidden places with ardent thoroughness, arriving finally in the
sacred precincts of his father's study. This wonderful room was
the very heart and center of the whole big house.
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He had been birched here long ago. Here too, his
father had told him with a grave yet smiling face,
you've got a new companion, Tim, a little sister. You
must be very kind to her. Also, it was the
place where all the money was kept. What he called
father's jolly smell was strong in it. Papers, tobacco, books
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flavored by hunting crops and gunpowder. At first he felt awed,
standing motionless just inside the door, but presently recovering equilibrium,
he moved cautiously on tiptoe towards the gigantic desk, where
important papers were piled in untidy patches. These he did
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not touch, but beside them, his quick eye noted the
jagged piece of iron shell his father brought home from
his Crimean campaign, and now used as a letter weight.
It was difficult to lift, however, he climbed into the
comfortable chair and swung round and round. It was a
swivel chair, and he sank down among the cushions in it,
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staring at the strange things on the great desk before him,
as if fascinated. Next, he turned away and saw the
stick rack in the corner. This he knew he was
allowed to touch. He had played with these sticks before.
There were twenty, perhaps all told, with curious carved handles,
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brought from every corner of the world, many of them
cut by his father's own hand, in queer and distant places.
And among them, Tim fixed his eye upon a cane
with an ivory handle, a slender, polished cane that he
had always coveted tremendously. It was the kind he meant
to use when he was a man. It bent, it rivered,
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and when he swished it through the air, it trembled
like a writing whip and made a whistling noise. Yet
it was very strong. In spite of its elastic qualities
of family treasure, it was also an old fashioned relic.
It had been his grandfather's walking stick. Something of another
century clung visibly about it. Still it had dignity and
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grace and leisure in its very aspect. And it suddenly
occurred to him, how Grandpapa must miss it. Wouldn't he
just love to have it back again. How it happened exactly,
Tim did not know, But a few minutes later he
found himself walking about the deserted halls and passages of
the house with the air of an elderly gentleman of
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a hundred years ago, proud as a courtier, flourishing the
stick like an eighteenth century dandy in the male that
the cane reached to his shoulder made no difference. He
held it accordingly, Swaggering on his way. He was off
upon an adventure. He dived down through the byways of
the Other Wing inside himself, as though the stick transported
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him to the days of the old gentleman who had
used it in another century. It may seem strange to
those who dwell in smaller houses, but in this rambling
Elizabethan mansion there were whole sections that, even to tim
were strange and unfamiliar. In his mind, the map of
the other Wing was clearer by far than the geography
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of the part He traveled. Daily. He came to passages
and dimlit halls, long corridors of stone beyond the picture gallery,
narrow when scutted, connecting channels with four steps down and
a little later two steps up, deserted chambers with arches
guarding them, all hung with the soft march twilight, and
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all bewilderingly unrecognized. With a sense of the adventure born
of naughtiness, he went carelessly along farther and farther into
the heart of this unfamiliar country, swinging the cane, one
thumb stuck into the armpit of his blue serge suit,
whistling softly to himself, excited yet keenly on the alert,
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and suddenly found himself opposite a door that checked all
further advance. It was a green baized door, and it
was swinging. He stopped abruptly facing it, he stared. He
gripped his cane more tightly. He held his breath. The
other wing he gasped in a swallowed whisper. It was
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an entrance, but an entrance he had never seen before.
He thought he knew every door by heart, but this
one was new. He stood motionless for several minutes watching it.
The door had two halves, but one half only was swinging,
each swing shorter than the one before. He heard the
little puffs of air it made. It settled. Finally, the
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last move on, very short and rapid. It stopped, and
the boy's heart, after similar rapid strokes, stopped also for
a moment. Some one's just gone through. He gulped, and
even as he said it, he knew who the some
one was. The conviction just dropped into him. It's grandfather.
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He knows I've got his stick. He wants it on
the heels of this flashed instantly another amazing certainty. He
sleeps in there, He's having dreams. That's what being dead means.
His first impulse then took the form of I must
let father know it'll make him burst for joy. But
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his second was for himself to finish his adventure. And
it was this, naturally enough, that gained the day. He
could tell his father later his first duty was plainly
to go through the door into the other wing. He
must give the stick back to its owner. He must
hand it back. The test of will and character came. Now.
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Tim had imagination and so new the meaning of fear,
but there was nothing craven in him. He could howl
and scream and stamp like any other person of his age,
when the occasion called for such behavior. But such occasions
were due to temper roused by a thwarted will, and
the histrionics were half pretended to produce a calculated effect.
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There was no one to thwart his will at present.
He also knew how to be afraid of nothing, to
be afraid without ostensible cause, that is, which was merely nerves.
He could have the shutters with the best of them.
But when a real thing faced him, Tim's character emerged
to meet it, he would clench his hands, brace his muscles,
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set his teeth, and wish to heaven. He was bigger,
but he would not flinch, being imaginative. He lived the
worst a dozen times before it happened. Yet in the
final crash, he stood up like a man. He had
that highest pluck, the courage of a sensitive temperament, and
at this particular juncture somewhat ticklish for a boy of
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eight or nine, it did not fail him. He lifted
the cane and pushed the swinging door wide open. Then
he walked through it into the other wing three. The
green baized door swung to behind him. He was even
sufficiently master of himself to turn and close it with
a steady hand, because he did not care to hear
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the series of muffled thuds its lessening swings would cause.
But he realized clearly his position, knew he was doing
a tremendous thing. Holding the cane between fingers very tightly clenched,
he advanced bravely along the corridor that stretched before him,
and all fear left him from that moment, replaced, it seemed,
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by a mild and exquisite surprise. His footsteps made no sound.
He walked on air. Instead of darkness or the twilight,
he expected a diffused and gentle light that seemed like
the silver on the lawn. When a half moon, sails,
a cloudless sky lay everywhere. He knew his way. Moreover,
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knew exactly where he was and whither he was going.
The corridor was as familiar to him as the floor
of his own bedroom. He recognized the shape and length
of it. It agreed exactly with the map he had
constructed long ago. Though he had never, to the best
of his knowledge, entered it before, he knew with intimacy
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its every detail, and thus the surprise he felt was
mild and far from disconcerting. I'm here again, was the
kind of thought he had. It was how he got
here that caused the faint surprise. Apparently he no longer swaggered, however,
but walked carefully and half on tiptoe, holding the ivory
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handle of the cane with a kind of a thing
actionate respect. And as he advanced, the light closed softly
up behind him, obliterating the way by which he had come.
But this he did not know, because he did not
look behind him. He only looked in front, where the
corridor stretched its silvery length, towards the great chamber, where
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he knew the cane must be surrendered. The person who
had preceded him down this ancient corridor. Passing through the
green Bay's door. Just before he reached it, this person,
his father's father, now stood in that great chamber, waiting
to receive his own. Tim knew it as surely as
he knew he breathed at the far end. He even
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made out the larger patch of silvery light which marked
its gaping doorway. There was another thing he knew as well,
that this corridor he moved along between rooms with fast
closed doors was the nightmare corridor. Often and often he
had traversed it. Each room was occupied. This is the
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nightmare passage, he whispered to himself. But I know the ruler.
It doesn't matter. None of them can get out or
do anything. He heard them, none the less inside as
he passed by. He heard them scratching to get out.
The feeling of security made him reckless. He took unnecessary risks.
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He brushed the panels as he passed, and the love
of keen sensation for its own sake, the desire to
feel an awful thrill tempted him once so sharply that
he raised his stick and poked a fast shut door
with it. He was not prepared for the result, but
he gained the sensation and the thrill, for the door
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opened with instant swiftness half an inch. A hand emerged,
caught the stick and tried to draw it in. Tim
sprang back as if he had been struck. He pulled
at the ivory handle with all his strength, but his
strength was less than nothing. He tried to shout, but
his voice had gone. A terror of the moon came
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over him, for he was unable to loosen his hold
of the handle. His fingers had become a part of it,
and appalling weakness turned him helpless. He was dragged inch
by inch towards the fearful door. The end of the
stick was already through the narrow crack. He could not
see the hand that pulled, but he knew it was terrific.
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He understood now why the world was strange, why horses
galloped furiously, and why trains whistled as they raced through stations.
All the comedy and terror of nightmare gripped his heart
with pincers made of ice. The disproportion was abominable. The
final collapse rushed over him when without a sign of warning,
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the door slammed silently, and between the jam and the wall.
The cane was crushed as flat as if it were
a bulrush. So irresistible was the force behind the door
that the solid stick just went flat as the stalk
of a bullrush. He looked at it. It was a bullrush.
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He did not laugh. The absurdity was so distressingly unnatural,
the horror of finding a bullrush where he had expected
a polished cane. This hideous and appalling detail held the
nameless horror of the nightmare. It betrayed him utterly. Why
had he not always known, really that the stick was
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not a stick but a thin and hollow reed. Then
the cane was safely in his hand, unbroken. He stood
looking at it. The nightmare was in full swing. He
heard another door opening behind his back, a door he
had not touched. There was just time to see a
hand thrusting and waving dreadfully familiarly at him through the
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narrow crack, just time to realize that this was another nightmare,
acting in a grocious concert with the first. When he
saw closely beside him, towering to the ceiling, the protective,
kindly figure that visited his bedroom. In the turning movement
he made to meet the attack, he became aware of her,
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and his terror passed. It was a nightmare terror, merely
the infinite horror vanished, only the comedy remained. He smiled.
He saw her dimly, only she was so vast. But
he saw her the ruler of the other wing, at last,
and knew that he was safe again. He gazed with
a tremendous love and wonder, trying to see her clearly,
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but the face was hidden, far aloft, and seemed to
melt into the sky beyond the roof. He discerned that
she was larger than the night, only far far softer,
with wings that folded above him more tenderly even than
his mother's arms. That there were points of light like
stars among the feathers, and that she was vaud fast
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enough to cover millions and millions of people all at once. Moreover,
she did not fade or go so far as he
could see, but spread herself in such a way that
he lost sight of her. She spread over the entire wing,
and Tim remembered that this was all quite natural. Really,
he had often and often been down this corridor before.
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The nightmare corridor was no new experience. It had to
be faced as usual, once knowing what hid inside the rooms.
He was bound to tempt them out. They drew enticed
attracted him. This was their power, It was their special strength,
that they could suck him helplessly towards them, and that
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he was obliged to go. He understood exactly why he
was tempted to tap with the cane upon their awful doors.
But having done so, he had accepted the challenge and
could now continue his journey quietly and safely. The ruler
of the other wing had taken him in charge. A
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delicious sense of carelessness came on him. There was softness,
as of water in the solid things about him, nothing
that could hurt or bruise. Holding the cane firmly by
its ivory handle, he went forward along the corridor, walking
as on air. The end was quickly reached. He stood
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upon the threshold of the mighty chamber, where he knew
the owner of the cane was waiting. The long corridor
lay behind him. In front, he saw the spacious dimensions
of a lofty hall that gave him the feeling of
being in the crystal palace. Euston Station or Saint Paul's
high narrow windows cut deeply into the wall, stood in
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a row. Upon the other side, an enormous open fireplace
of burning logs was on his right. Thick tapestries hung
from the ceiling to the floor of stone, and in
the center of the chamber was a massive table of
dark shining wood. Great chairs with carved stiff backs set
here and there beside it, And in the biggest of
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these thrown like chairs, there sat a figure looking at
him gravely, the figure of an old, old man. Yet
there was no surprise in the boy's fast beating heart.
There was a thrill of pleasure and excitement, only a
feeling of satisfaction. He had known quite well the figure
would be there, known also it would look like this exactly.
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He stepped forward on to the floor of stone, without
a trace of fear or trembling, holding the precious cane
in two hands now before him, as though to present
it to its owner. He felt proud and pleased. He
had run risks for this, And the figure rose quietly
to meet him, advancing in a stately manner over the
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hard stone floor. The eyes looked gravely, sweetly down at him.
The aquiline nose stood out tim knew him perfectly. The
knee breeches of shining satin, the gleaming buckles on the shoes,
the neat dark stockings, the lace and ruffles about the
neck and wrists, the colored waistcoat opening so widely. All
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the details of the picture over father's mantelpiece, where it
hung between two crimean bayonets, were reproduced in life before
his eyes. At last, only the polished cane with the
ivory handle was not there. Tim went three steps nearer
to the advancing figure and held out both his hands,
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with the cane laid crosswise on them. I've brought it, grandfather,
he said, in a faint but clear and steady tone.
Here it is. And the others stooped a little, put
out three fingers, half concealed by falling lace, and took
it by the ivory handle. He made a courtly bow
to Tim. He smiled, but though there was pleasure, it
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was a grave, sad smile. He spoke. Then the voice
was slow and very deep. There was a delicate softness
in it, the suave politeness of an older day. Thank you,
he said, I value it. It was given to me
by my grandfather. I forgot it when I His voice
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grew indistinct a little, yes, said Tim. When I left,
the old gentleman repeated, Oh, said Tim, thinking how beautiful
and kind the gracious figure was. The old man ran
his slender fingers carefully along the cane, feeling the polished
surface with satisfaction. He lingered, specially over the smoothness of
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the ivory handle. He was evidently very pleased. I was
not quite myself at the moment, he went on gently.
My memory failed me somewhat, as though an immense relief
was in him. I forget things too, sometimes, Tim mentioned sympathetically.
He simply loved his grandfather. He hoped for a moment
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he would be lifted up and kissed. I'm awfully glad
I brought it. He faltered, that you've got it again.
The other turned his kind gray eyes upon him. The
smile on his face was full of gratitude as he
looked down. Thank you, my boy. I am truly and
deeply indebted to you. You court a danger for my sake.
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Others have tried before, but the nightmare passage um he
broke off. He tapped the stick firmly on the stone flooring,
as though to test it. Bending a trifle, he put
his weight upon it. Ah, he exclaimed, with a short
sigh of relief. I can now His voice again grew indistinct.
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Tim did not catch the words yes. He asked again
away for the first time that a touch of awe
was in his heart. Get about again. The other continued
very low without my cane, he added, the voice failing
with each word. The old lips uttered. I could not
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possibly allow myself to be seen. It was indeed deplorable,
unpardonable of me to forget in such a way. Zound, sir,
I I. His voice sank away suddenly into a sound
of wind. He straightened up, tapping the iron ferule of
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his cane on the stones in a series of loud knocks.
Tim felt a strange sensation creep into his legs. The
queer words frightened him a little. The old man took
a step towards him. He still smiled, but there was
a new meaning in the smile. A sudden earnestness had
replaced the courtly, leisurely manner. The next words seemed to
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blow down upon the boy from above, as though a
cold wind brought them from the sky outside. Yet the
words he knew were kindly meant and very sensible. It
was only the abrupt change that startled him. Grandfather, after all,
was but a man. The distant sound recalled something in
him to that outside world from which the cold wind blew.
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My eternal thanks to you, he heard, while the voice
and face and figure seemed to withdraw deeper and deeper
into the heart of the mighty chamber. I shall not
forget your kindness and your courage. It is a debt
I can fortunately one day repay. But now you had
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best return, and with dispatch for your head and arm,
lie heavily on the table. The documents are scattered, there
is a cushion fallen, and my son is in the house. Farewell.
You had best leave me quickly. See she he stands
behind you, waiting, go with her. Go now. The entire
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scene had vanished even before the final words were uttered.
Tim felt empty space about him. A vast, shadowy figure
bore him through it with its mighty wings. He flew,
He rushed. He remembered nothing more until he heard another
voice and felt a heavy hand upon his shoulder. Tim, you, rascal,
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what are you doing in my study? And in the
dark like this? He looked up into his father's face,
without a word. He felt dazed. The next minute his
father had caught him up and kissed him. Ragamuffin, how
did you guess I was coming back to night? He
shook him playfully and kissed his tumbling air. And you've
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been asleep too, into the bargain. Well, how's everything at home? Eh?
Jack's coming back from school tomorrow, you know. And four.
Jack came home indeed the following day. And when the
Easter holidays were over, the Governess stayed abroad, and Tim
went off to adventures of another kind in the preparatory
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school for Wellington. Life slipped rapidly along with him. He
grew into a man. His mother and his father died.
Jack followed them. Within a little space, Tim inherited, married,
settled down into his great possessions, and opened up the
other wing. The dreams of an imaginative boyhood all had faded.
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Perhaps he had merely put them away, or perhaps he
had forgotten them. At any rate, he never spoke of
such things now, And when his Irish wife mentioned her
belief that the old country house possessed a family ghost,
even declaring that she had met an eighteenth century figure
of a man in the corridors an old old man
who bends down upon a stick. Tim only laughed and said,
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that's as it ought to be. And if these awful
land taxes forced us to sell, some day a respectable
ghost will increase the market value. But one night he
woke and heard a tapping on the floor. He sat
up in bed and listened. There was a chilly feeling
down his back. Belief had long since gone out of him.
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He felt uncannily afraid. The sound came nearer, and nearer.
There were light footsteps with it. The door opened. It
opened a little wider, that is, for it already stood Ajar.
And thereupon the threshold stood a figure that it seemed
he knew. He saw the face as with all the
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vivid sharpness of reality. There was a smile upon it,
but a smile of warning and alarm. The arm was raised.
Tim saw the slender hand lace falling down upon the long,
thin fingers, and in them tightly gripped a polished cane,
shaking the cane twice to and fro in the air.
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The face thrust forward, spoke sir in words, and vanished,
But the words were inaudible, for though the lips distinctly moved.
No sound apparently came from them, and Tim sprang out
of bed. The room was full of darkness. He turned
the light on the door he saw was shut as usual.
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He had of course been dreaming, but he noticed a
curious odor in the air. He sniffed it once or twice,
then grasped the truth. It was a smell of burning.
Fortunately he awoke just in time. He was acclaimed a
hero for his promptitude. After many days, when the damage
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was repaired and nerves had settled down once more into
the calm routine of country life, he told the story
to his wife, the entire story. He told the adventure
of his imaginative boyhood. With it, she asked to see
the old family cane. And it was this request of
her that brought back to memory a detail Tim had
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entirely forgotten all these years. He remembered it suddenly again,
the loss of the cane, the hubbub his father kicked
up about it. The endless, futile search for the stick
had never been found, and Tim, who was questioned very
closely concerning it, swore with all his might that he
had not the smallest notion where it was, which was,
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of course, the truth end of story six.
Story six of Day and Night Stories by Algernon Blackwood.
This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Story six,
The Other Wing One. It used to puzzle him that
after dark some one would look in round the edge
of the bedroom door and withdraw again, too rapidly for
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him to see the face when the nurse had gone
away with the candle. This happened. Good night, master tim,
she said, usually shading the light with one hand to
protect his eyes. Dream of me, and I'll dream of you.
She went out, slowly. The sharp edged shadow of the
door ran across the ceiling like a train. There came
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a whispered colloquy in the corridor outside about himself, of course,
and he was alone. He heard her steps going deeper
and deeper into the bosom of the old country house.
They were audible for a moment on the stone flooring
of the hall, and sometimes times the dull thump of
the bay's door into the servants quarters just reached him too.
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Then silence. But it was only when the last sound,
as well as the last sign of her, had vanished,
that the face emerged from his hiding place and flashed
in upon him round the corner as a rule to
it came just as he was saying, Now I'll go
to sleep, I won't think any longer. Good night mastered
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him and happy dreams. He loved to say this to himself.
It brought a sense of companionship, as though there were
two persons speaking. The room was on the top of
the old house, a big, high ceilinged room, and his
bed against the wall had an iron railing round it.
He felt very safe and protected in it. The curtains
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at the other end of the room were drawn. He
lay watching the firelight dancing on the heavy folds, and
their pattern showed a spaniel chasing a long tailed bird
towards a bushy tree. Interested and amused him. It was
repeated over and over again. He counted the number of dogs,
and the number of birds, and the number of trees,
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but could never make them agree. There was a plan
somewhere in that pattern. If only he could discover it,
the dogs and birds and trees would come out right.
Hundreds and hundreds of times he had played this game,
for the plan in the pattern made it possible to
take sides, and the bird and dog were against him.
They always won. However, Tim usually fell asleep just when
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the advantage was on his own side. The curtains hung
steadily enough most of the time, but it seemed to
him once or twice that they stirred, hiding a dog
or bird on purpose to prevent his winning. For instance,
he had eleven birds and eleven trees, and fixing them
in his mind by saying, that's eleven birds and eleven trees,
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but only ten dogs. His eyes darted back to find
the eleventh dog when the curtain moved and threw all
his calculations into confusion again the eleventh dog was hidden.
He did not quite like the movement. It gave him
questionable feelings. Rather, for the curtain did not move of itself,
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yet usually he was too intent upon counting the dogs
to feel positive alarm. Opposite to him was the fireplace
full of red and yellow coals, and lying with his
head sideways on the pillow, he could see directly in
between the bars. When the coals settled with a soft
and powdery crash, he turned his eyes from the curtains
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to the grate, trying to discover exactly which bits had fallen.
So long as the glow was there, the sound seemed
pleasant enough, but sometimes he awoke later in the night,
the room huge with darkness, the fire almost out, and
the sound was not so pleasant. Then it startled him.
The coals did not fall of themselves. It seemed that
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someone poked them cautiously. The shadows were very thick before
the bars, as with the curtains. Moreover, the morning aspect
of the extinguished fire, the ice cold cinders that made
a clinking sound like tin, caused no emotion whatever in
his soul, and it was usually while he lay waiting
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for sleep, tired both of the curtain and the coal games.
On the point indeed of saying I'll go to sleep
now that the puzzling thing took place, he would be
staring drowsily at the dying fire, perhaps counting the stockings
and flannel garments that hung along the high fender rail,
when suddenly a person looked in with lightning swiftness through
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the door and vanished again before he could possibly turn
his head to sea. The appearance and disappearance were accomplished
with amazing rapidity. All it was a head and shoulders
that looked in, and the movement combined the speed, the
lightness and the silence of a shadow. Only it was
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not a shadow. A hand held the edge of the door.
The face shot round, saw him and withdrew like lightning.
It was utterly beyond him to imagine anything more quick
and clever it darted. He heard no sound it went,
but it had seen him, looked him all over, examined him,
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noted what he was doing With that lightning glance. It
wanted to know if he were awake still, or asleep.
And though it went off, it still watched him from
a distance. It waited somewhere, It knew all about him.
Where it waited, no one could ever guess. It came, probably,
he felt, from beyond the house, possibly from the roof,
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but most likely from the garden or the sky. Yet,
though strange, it was not too terrible. It was a
kindly and protective figure, he felt. And when it happened,
he never called for help because the occurrence simply took
his voice away. It comes from the nightmare passage, he decided.
But it's not a nightmare. It puzzled him sometimes. Moreover,
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it came more than once in a single night. He
was pretty sure, not quite positive, that it occupied his room.
As soon as he was properly asleep, it took possession,
sitting perhaps before the dying fire, standing upright behind the
heavy curtains, or even lying down in the empty bed
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his brother used when he was home from school. Perhaps
it played the curtain game. Perhaps it poked the coals.
It knew at any rate, where the eleventh dog had
lain concealed. It certainly came in and out. Certainly, too,
it did not wish to be seen for more than once.
On waking. Suddenly, in the midnight blackness, Tim knew it
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was standing close beside his bed and bending over him.
He felt, rather than heard, its presence. It glided quietly away.
It moved with marvelous softness, and yet he was positive
it moved. He felt the difference, so to speak. It
had been near him, now it was gone. It came
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back too, just as he was falling into sleep again.
Its midnight coming and going, however, stood out sharply different
from its first, shy, tentative approach, For in the firelight
it came alone, whereas in the black and silent hours
it had with it others. And it was then he
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made up his mind that its swift and quiet movements
were due to the fact that it had wings. It flew,
and the others that came with it in the darkness
were its little ones. He also made up his mind
that all were friendly, comfort protective, and that while positively
not a nightmare, it yet came somehow along the nightmare
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passage before it reached him. You see, it's like this,
he explained to the nurse. The big one comes to
visit me alone, but it only brings its little ones
when I'm quite asleep. Then the quicker you get to sleep,
the better, isn't it, Master Tim, He replied rad the
I always do. Only I wonder where they come from.
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He spoke, however, as though he had an inkling, but
the nurse was so dull about it that he gave
her up and tried. His father, of course, replied this
busy but affectionate parent, it's either nobody at all, or
else it's sleep coming to carry you away to the
land of dreams. He made the statement kindly, but somewhat briskly,
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for he was worried just then about the extra taxes
on his land and the effort to fix his mind
on Tim's fanciful world. World was beyond him at the moment.
He lifted the boy on to his knee, kissed and
patted him as though he were a favorite dog, and
planted him on the rug again with a flying sweep.
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Run and ask your mother, he added, She knows all
that kind of thing. Then come back and tell me
all about it. Another time, Tim found his mother in
an arm chair before the fire of another room. She
was knitting and reading at the same time, a wonderful
thing the boy could never understand. She raised her head
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as he came in, pushed her glasses on to her forehead,
and held her arms out. He told her everything, ending
up with what his father said. You see, it's not
Jackman or Thompson or any one like that, he exclaimed.
It's some one real but nice, she assured him, some
one who comes to take care of you and see
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that you're safe and cozy. Oh yes, I know that.
But I think your father's right, she added quickly, it's sleep,
I'm sure who pops in around the door like that?
Sleep has got wings I've always heard. Then the other thing,
the little ones, he asked, Are they just sorts of
dozes you think? Mother did not answer for a moment.
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She turned down the page of her book, closed it slowly,
put it on the table beside her. More slowly still,
she put her knitting away, arranging the wool and needles.
With some deliberation, perhaps, she said, drawing the boy closer
to her, and looking into his big eyes of wonder,
they're dreams. Tim felt a thrill run through him. As
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she said it, he stepped back a foot or so
and clapped his hands softly. Dreams, he whispered with enthusiasm.
And to believe, of course, I never thought of that.
His mother, having proved her sagacity, then made a mistake.
She noted her success, but instead of leaving it there,
she elaborated and explained as Tim expressed it, she went
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on about it. Therefore, he did not listen. He followed
his train of thought alone, and presently he interrupted her
long sentences with a conclusion of his own. Then I
know where she hides, he announced, with a touch of
awe where she lives? I mean, And without waiting to
be asked, he imparted the information. It's in the other wing, ah,
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said his mother, taken by surprise. How clever of you, Tim,
and thus confirmed it. Thenceforward, this was established in his life,
that sleep and her attendant dreams hid during the daytime
in that unused portion of the Great Elizabethan Mansion called
the Other Wing. This other wing was unoccupied, its corridors untrodden,
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its windows shuttered, and its rooms all closed. At various places,
green baized doors led into it, but no one ever
opened them. For many years this part had been shut up,
and for the children, properly speaking, it was out of bounds.
They never mentioned it as a possible place at any rate.
(12:20):
In Hide and Seek it was not considered. Even there
was a hint of the inaccessible about the Other Wing. Shadows,
dust and silence had it to themselves. But Tim, having
ideas of his own about everything, possessed special information about
the Other Wing. He believed it was inhabited who occupied
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the immense series of empty rooms, who trod the spacious corridors,
who passed to and fro behind the shuttered windows. He
had not known exactly he had called these occupants. They,
and the most important among them was the ruler. The
ruler of the Other Wing was a kind of deity, powerful,
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far away, ever present, yet never seen. And about this
ruler he had a wonderful conception. For a little boy.
He connected her somehow with deep thoughts of his own,
the deepest of all, when he made up adventures to
the moon, to the stars, or to the bottom of
the sea, adventures that he lived inside himself, as it were,
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to reach them, he must invariably pass through the chambers
of the other wing. Those corridors and halls, the Nightmare
Passage among them, lay along the route. They were the
first stage of the journey. Once the green baize doors
swung to behind him, and the long, dim passage stretched ahead,
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he was well on his way into the adventure of
the moment. The Nightmare Passage once past, he was safe
from capture. But once the shutters of a window had
been flung open, he was free of the gigant world
that lay beyond. For then light poured in and he
could see his way. The conception, for a child was curious.
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It established a correspondence between the mysterious chambers of the
other wing and the occupied but unguessed chambers of his
inner being. Through these chambers, through these darkened corridors, along
a passage sometimes dangerous or at least of questionable repute,
he must pass to find all adventures that were real.
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The light, when he pierced far enough to take the
shutters down was discovery. Tim did not actually think, much
less say all this. He was aware of it, however
he felt it. The other wing was inside himself as
well as through the green Bay's doors. His inner map
of wonder included both of them. But now, for the
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first time in his life, he knew who lived there
and who the ruler was. A shudder had fallen of
its own accord. Light poured in. He made a guess,
and mother had confirmed it. Sleep and her little ones,
the host of dreams, were the daylight occupants. They stole
out when the darkness fell. All adventures in life began
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and ended by a dream, discoverable by first passing through
the other wing two. And having settled this, his one
desire now was to travel over the map upon journeys
of exploration and discovery. The map inside himself he knew already,
but the map of the other wing he had not seen.
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His mind knew it. He had a clear mental picture
of rooms and halls and passages, but his feet had
never trod the silent floors where dust and shadows hid
the flock of dreams by day, the mighty chambers where
sleep ruled. He longed to stand in to see the
ruler face to face. He made up his mind to
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get into the other wing to accomplish. This was difficult,
but tim was a determined youngster, and he meant to try.
He meant also to succeed. He deliberated at night he
could not possibly manage it. In any case, the ruler
and her host all left it after dark to fly
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about the world. The wing would be empty, and the
emptiness would frighten him. Therefore he must make a daylight visit.
And it was a daylight visit he decided on. He
deliberated more. There were rules and risks involved. It meant
going out of bounds, the danger of being seen, the
certainty of being questioned by some idle and inquisitive grown up.
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Where in the world have you been all this time?
And so forth. These things he thought out carefully, and
though he arrived at no solution, he felt satisfied that
it would be all right. That is, he recognized the risks.
To be prepared was half the battle. For nothing then
could take him by surprise. The notion that he might
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slip in from the garden was soon abandoned. The red
bricks showed no openings. There was no door from the courtyard. Also,
entrance was impractical. Even on tiptoe. He could barely reach
the broad window sills of stone. When playing alone or
walking with the French governess, he examined every outside possibility.
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None offered. The shutters, supposing he could reach them, were
thick and solid. Meanwhile, when opportunity offered, he stood against
the outside walls and listened. His ear pressed against the
tight red bricks. The towers and gables of the wing
rose overhead. He heard the wind go whispering along the eaves.
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He imagined tiptoe movements and a sound of wings. In side.
Sleep and her little ones were busily preparing for their journeys.
After dark they hid, but they did not sleep in
this unused wing. Vaster alone than any other country house
he had ever seen. Sleep taught and trained her flock
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of feathered dreams. It was very wonderful. They probably supplied
the entire county. But more wonderful still was the thought
that the ruler herself should take the trouble to come
to his particular room and personally watch over him all
night long. That was amazing, and it flashed across his imaginative,
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inquiring mind. Perhaps they take me with them the moment
I'm asleep, that's why she comes to see me. Yet
his chief preoccupation was how sleep got out through the
green bay's door. Of course, by a process of elimination,
he arrived at a conclusion he too must enter through
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a green bay's door and risk detection. Of late, the
lightning visits had ceased, the silent darting figure had not
peeped in and vanished as it used to do. He
fell asleep too quickly, now almost before Jackman reached the hall,
and long before the fire began to die. Also, the
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dogs and birds upon the curtains always matched the trees exactly,
and he won the curtain game quite easily. There was
never a dog or bird too many. The curtain never stirred.
It had been thus ever since his talk with mother
and father, And so he came to make a second discovery.
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His parents did not really believe in his figure. She
kept away on that account they doubted her she hid.
Here was still another incentive to go and find her out.
He ached for her. She was so kind, She gave
herself so much trouble just for his little self In
the big and lonely bedroom, yet his parents spoke of
(20:03):
her as though she were of no account. He longed
to see her face to face and tell her that
he believed in her and loved her, for he was
positive that she would like to hear it. She cared,
though he had fallen asleep of late, too quickly for
him to see her flash in at the door. He
had known nicer dreams than ever in his life before
(20:25):
traveling dreams, and it was she who sent them more,
he was sure. She took him out with her One evening,
in the dusk of a March day, his opportunity came,
and only just in time for his brother, Jack, was
expected home from school on the morrow, and with Jack
in the other bed, no figure would ever care to
(20:48):
show itself. Also, it was Easter, and after Easter, though
Tim was not aware of it at the time, he
was to say good bye finally to governesses and become
a day boarder at a preparatory school for Wellington. The
opportunity offered itself so naturally, moreover, that Tim took it
(21:08):
without hesitation. It never occurred to him to question, much
less to refuse it. The thing was obviously meant to be,
for he found himself unexpectedly in front of a green
bay's door, and the green bay's door was swinging. Somebody
therefore had just passed through it. It had come about
(21:29):
in this wise, Father, away in Scotland at Ingelmer, the
shooting place, was expected back next morning. Mother had driven
over to the church upon some Easter business or other,
and the governess had been allowed her holiday at home
in France. Tim therefore had the run of the house,
and in the hour between tea and bedtime he made
(21:51):
good use of it, fully, able to defy such second
rate obstacles as nurses and butlers, he explored all manses
of forbidden places with ardent thoroughness, arriving finally in the
sacred precincts of his father's study. This wonderful room was
the very heart and center of the whole big house.
(22:12):
He had been birched here long ago. Here too, his
father had told him with a grave yet smiling face,
you've got a new companion, Tim, a little sister. You
must be very kind to her. Also, it was the
place where all the money was kept. What he called
father's jolly smell was strong in it. Papers, tobacco, books
(22:35):
flavored by hunting crops and gunpowder. At first he felt awed,
standing motionless just inside the door, but presently recovering equilibrium,
he moved cautiously on tiptoe towards the gigantic desk, where
important papers were piled in untidy patches. These he did
(22:55):
not touch, but beside them, his quick eye noted the
jagged piece of iron shell his father brought home from
his Crimean campaign, and now used as a letter weight.
It was difficult to lift, however, he climbed into the
comfortable chair and swung round and round. It was a
swivel chair, and he sank down among the cushions in it,
(23:18):
staring at the strange things on the great desk before him,
as if fascinated. Next, he turned away and saw the
stick rack in the corner. This he knew he was
allowed to touch. He had played with these sticks before.
There were twenty, perhaps all told, with curious carved handles,
(23:38):
brought from every corner of the world, many of them
cut by his father's own hand, in queer and distant places.
And among them, Tim fixed his eye upon a cane
with an ivory handle, a slender, polished cane that he
had always coveted tremendously. It was the kind he meant
to use when he was a man. It bent, it rivered,
(24:00):
and when he swished it through the air, it trembled
like a writing whip and made a whistling noise. Yet
it was very strong. In spite of its elastic qualities
of family treasure, it was also an old fashioned relic.
It had been his grandfather's walking stick. Something of another
century clung visibly about it. Still it had dignity and
(24:24):
grace and leisure in its very aspect. And it suddenly
occurred to him, how Grandpapa must miss it. Wouldn't he
just love to have it back again. How it happened exactly,
Tim did not know, But a few minutes later he
found himself walking about the deserted halls and passages of
the house with the air of an elderly gentleman of
(24:46):
a hundred years ago, proud as a courtier, flourishing the
stick like an eighteenth century dandy in the male that
the cane reached to his shoulder made no difference. He
held it accordingly, Swaggering on his way. He was off
upon an adventure. He dived down through the byways of
the Other Wing inside himself, as though the stick transported
(25:10):
him to the days of the old gentleman who had
used it in another century. It may seem strange to
those who dwell in smaller houses, but in this rambling
Elizabethan mansion there were whole sections that, even to tim
were strange and unfamiliar. In his mind, the map of
the other Wing was clearer by far than the geography
(25:32):
of the part He traveled. Daily. He came to passages
and dimlit halls, long corridors of stone beyond the picture gallery,
narrow when scutted, connecting channels with four steps down and
a little later two steps up, deserted chambers with arches
guarding them, all hung with the soft march twilight, and
(25:52):
all bewilderingly unrecognized. With a sense of the adventure born
of naughtiness, he went carelessly along farther and farther into
the heart of this unfamiliar country, swinging the cane, one
thumb stuck into the armpit of his blue serge suit,
whistling softly to himself, excited yet keenly on the alert,
(26:14):
and suddenly found himself opposite a door that checked all
further advance. It was a green baized door, and it
was swinging. He stopped abruptly facing it, he stared. He
gripped his cane more tightly. He held his breath. The
other wing he gasped in a swallowed whisper. It was
(26:36):
an entrance, but an entrance he had never seen before.
He thought he knew every door by heart, but this
one was new. He stood motionless for several minutes watching it.
The door had two halves, but one half only was swinging,
each swing shorter than the one before. He heard the
little puffs of air it made. It settled. Finally, the
(26:59):
last move on, very short and rapid. It stopped, and
the boy's heart, after similar rapid strokes, stopped also for
a moment. Some one's just gone through. He gulped, and
even as he said it, he knew who the some
one was. The conviction just dropped into him. It's grandfather.
(27:20):
He knows I've got his stick. He wants it on
the heels of this flashed instantly another amazing certainty. He
sleeps in there, He's having dreams. That's what being dead means.
His first impulse then took the form of I must
let father know it'll make him burst for joy. But
(27:41):
his second was for himself to finish his adventure. And
it was this, naturally enough, that gained the day. He
could tell his father later his first duty was plainly
to go through the door into the other wing. He
must give the stick back to its owner. He must
hand it back. The test of will and character came. Now.
(28:04):
Tim had imagination and so new the meaning of fear,
but there was nothing craven in him. He could howl
and scream and stamp like any other person of his age,
when the occasion called for such behavior. But such occasions
were due to temper roused by a thwarted will, and
the histrionics were half pretended to produce a calculated effect.
(28:27):
There was no one to thwart his will at present.
He also knew how to be afraid of nothing, to
be afraid without ostensible cause, that is, which was merely nerves.
He could have the shutters with the best of them.
But when a real thing faced him, Tim's character emerged
to meet it, he would clench his hands, brace his muscles,
(28:49):
set his teeth, and wish to heaven. He was bigger,
but he would not flinch, being imaginative. He lived the
worst a dozen times before it happened. Yet in the
final crash, he stood up like a man. He had
that highest pluck, the courage of a sensitive temperament, and
at this particular juncture somewhat ticklish for a boy of
(29:11):
eight or nine, it did not fail him. He lifted
the cane and pushed the swinging door wide open. Then
he walked through it into the other wing three. The
green baized door swung to behind him. He was even
sufficiently master of himself to turn and close it with
a steady hand, because he did not care to hear
(29:34):
the series of muffled thuds its lessening swings would cause.
But he realized clearly his position, knew he was doing
a tremendous thing. Holding the cane between fingers very tightly clenched,
he advanced bravely along the corridor that stretched before him,
and all fear left him from that moment, replaced, it seemed,
(29:55):
by a mild and exquisite surprise. His footsteps made no sound.
He walked on air. Instead of darkness or the twilight,
he expected a diffused and gentle light that seemed like
the silver on the lawn. When a half moon, sails,
a cloudless sky lay everywhere. He knew his way. Moreover,
(30:16):
knew exactly where he was and whither he was going.
The corridor was as familiar to him as the floor
of his own bedroom. He recognized the shape and length
of it. It agreed exactly with the map he had
constructed long ago. Though he had never, to the best
of his knowledge, entered it before, he knew with intimacy
(30:36):
its every detail, and thus the surprise he felt was
mild and far from disconcerting. I'm here again, was the
kind of thought he had. It was how he got
here that caused the faint surprise. Apparently he no longer swaggered, however,
but walked carefully and half on tiptoe, holding the ivory
(30:57):
handle of the cane with a kind of a thing
actionate respect. And as he advanced, the light closed softly
up behind him, obliterating the way by which he had come.
But this he did not know, because he did not
look behind him. He only looked in front, where the
corridor stretched its silvery length, towards the great chamber, where
(31:18):
he knew the cane must be surrendered. The person who
had preceded him down this ancient corridor. Passing through the
green Bay's door. Just before he reached it, this person,
his father's father, now stood in that great chamber, waiting
to receive his own. Tim knew it as surely as
he knew he breathed at the far end. He even
(31:41):
made out the larger patch of silvery light which marked
its gaping doorway. There was another thing he knew as well,
that this corridor he moved along between rooms with fast
closed doors was the nightmare corridor. Often and often he
had traversed it. Each room was occupied. This is the
(32:01):
nightmare passage, he whispered to himself. But I know the ruler.
It doesn't matter. None of them can get out or
do anything. He heard them, none the less inside as
he passed by. He heard them scratching to get out.
The feeling of security made him reckless. He took unnecessary risks.
(32:23):
He brushed the panels as he passed, and the love
of keen sensation for its own sake, the desire to
feel an awful thrill tempted him once so sharply that
he raised his stick and poked a fast shut door
with it. He was not prepared for the result, but
he gained the sensation and the thrill, for the door
(32:44):
opened with instant swiftness half an inch. A hand emerged,
caught the stick and tried to draw it in. Tim
sprang back as if he had been struck. He pulled
at the ivory handle with all his strength, but his
strength was less than nothing. He tried to shout, but
his voice had gone. A terror of the moon came
(33:06):
over him, for he was unable to loosen his hold
of the handle. His fingers had become a part of it,
and appalling weakness turned him helpless. He was dragged inch
by inch towards the fearful door. The end of the
stick was already through the narrow crack. He could not
see the hand that pulled, but he knew it was terrific.
(33:28):
He understood now why the world was strange, why horses
galloped furiously, and why trains whistled as they raced through stations.
All the comedy and terror of nightmare gripped his heart
with pincers made of ice. The disproportion was abominable. The
final collapse rushed over him when without a sign of warning,
(33:50):
the door slammed silently, and between the jam and the wall.
The cane was crushed as flat as if it were
a bulrush. So irresistible was the force behind the door
that the solid stick just went flat as the stalk
of a bullrush. He looked at it. It was a bullrush.
(34:10):
He did not laugh. The absurdity was so distressingly unnatural,
the horror of finding a bullrush where he had expected
a polished cane. This hideous and appalling detail held the
nameless horror of the nightmare. It betrayed him utterly. Why
had he not always known, really that the stick was
(34:30):
not a stick but a thin and hollow reed. Then
the cane was safely in his hand, unbroken. He stood
looking at it. The nightmare was in full swing. He
heard another door opening behind his back, a door he
had not touched. There was just time to see a
hand thrusting and waving dreadfully familiarly at him through the
(34:54):
narrow crack, just time to realize that this was another nightmare,
acting in a grocious concert with the first. When he
saw closely beside him, towering to the ceiling, the protective,
kindly figure that visited his bedroom. In the turning movement
he made to meet the attack, he became aware of her,
(35:15):
and his terror passed. It was a nightmare terror, merely
the infinite horror vanished, only the comedy remained. He smiled.
He saw her dimly, only she was so vast. But
he saw her the ruler of the other wing, at last,
and knew that he was safe again. He gazed with
a tremendous love and wonder, trying to see her clearly,
(35:38):
but the face was hidden, far aloft, and seemed to
melt into the sky beyond the roof. He discerned that
she was larger than the night, only far far softer,
with wings that folded above him more tenderly even than
his mother's arms. That there were points of light like
stars among the feathers, and that she was vaud fast
(36:00):
enough to cover millions and millions of people all at once. Moreover,
she did not fade or go so far as he
could see, but spread herself in such a way that
he lost sight of her. She spread over the entire wing,
and Tim remembered that this was all quite natural. Really,
he had often and often been down this corridor before.
(36:24):
The nightmare corridor was no new experience. It had to
be faced as usual, once knowing what hid inside the rooms.
He was bound to tempt them out. They drew enticed
attracted him. This was their power, It was their special strength,
that they could suck him helplessly towards them, and that
(36:46):
he was obliged to go. He understood exactly why he
was tempted to tap with the cane upon their awful doors.
But having done so, he had accepted the challenge and
could now continue his journey quietly and safely. The ruler
of the other wing had taken him in charge. A
(37:06):
delicious sense of carelessness came on him. There was softness,
as of water in the solid things about him, nothing
that could hurt or bruise. Holding the cane firmly by
its ivory handle, he went forward along the corridor, walking
as on air. The end was quickly reached. He stood
(37:26):
upon the threshold of the mighty chamber, where he knew
the owner of the cane was waiting. The long corridor
lay behind him. In front, he saw the spacious dimensions
of a lofty hall that gave him the feeling of
being in the crystal palace. Euston Station or Saint Paul's
high narrow windows cut deeply into the wall, stood in
(37:48):
a row. Upon the other side, an enormous open fireplace
of burning logs was on his right. Thick tapestries hung
from the ceiling to the floor of stone, and in
the center of the chamber was a massive table of
dark shining wood. Great chairs with carved stiff backs set
here and there beside it, And in the biggest of
(38:10):
these thrown like chairs, there sat a figure looking at
him gravely, the figure of an old, old man. Yet
there was no surprise in the boy's fast beating heart.
There was a thrill of pleasure and excitement, only a
feeling of satisfaction. He had known quite well the figure
would be there, known also it would look like this exactly.
(38:34):
He stepped forward on to the floor of stone, without
a trace of fear or trembling, holding the precious cane
in two hands now before him, as though to present
it to its owner. He felt proud and pleased. He
had run risks for this, And the figure rose quietly
to meet him, advancing in a stately manner over the
(38:57):
hard stone floor. The eyes looked gravely, sweetly down at him.
The aquiline nose stood out tim knew him perfectly. The
knee breeches of shining satin, the gleaming buckles on the shoes,
the neat dark stockings, the lace and ruffles about the
neck and wrists, the colored waistcoat opening so widely. All
(39:20):
the details of the picture over father's mantelpiece, where it
hung between two crimean bayonets, were reproduced in life before
his eyes. At last, only the polished cane with the
ivory handle was not there. Tim went three steps nearer
to the advancing figure and held out both his hands,
(39:40):
with the cane laid crosswise on them. I've brought it, grandfather,
he said, in a faint but clear and steady tone.
Here it is. And the others stooped a little, put
out three fingers, half concealed by falling lace, and took
it by the ivory handle. He made a courtly bow
to Tim. He smiled, but though there was pleasure, it
(40:03):
was a grave, sad smile. He spoke. Then the voice
was slow and very deep. There was a delicate softness
in it, the suave politeness of an older day. Thank you,
he said, I value it. It was given to me
by my grandfather. I forgot it when I His voice
(40:24):
grew indistinct a little, yes, said Tim. When I left,
the old gentleman repeated, Oh, said Tim, thinking how beautiful
and kind the gracious figure was. The old man ran
his slender fingers carefully along the cane, feeling the polished
surface with satisfaction. He lingered, specially over the smoothness of
(40:48):
the ivory handle. He was evidently very pleased. I was
not quite myself at the moment, he went on gently.
My memory failed me somewhat, as though an immense relief
was in him. I forget things too, sometimes, Tim mentioned sympathetically.
He simply loved his grandfather. He hoped for a moment
(41:12):
he would be lifted up and kissed. I'm awfully glad
I brought it. He faltered, that you've got it again.
The other turned his kind gray eyes upon him. The
smile on his face was full of gratitude as he
looked down. Thank you, my boy. I am truly and
deeply indebted to you. You court a danger for my sake.
(41:34):
Others have tried before, but the nightmare passage um he
broke off. He tapped the stick firmly on the stone flooring,
as though to test it. Bending a trifle, he put
his weight upon it. Ah, he exclaimed, with a short
sigh of relief. I can now His voice again grew indistinct.
(41:55):
Tim did not catch the words yes. He asked again
away for the first time that a touch of awe
was in his heart. Get about again. The other continued
very low without my cane, he added, the voice failing
with each word. The old lips uttered. I could not
(42:15):
possibly allow myself to be seen. It was indeed deplorable,
unpardonable of me to forget in such a way. Zound, sir,
I I. His voice sank away suddenly into a sound
of wind. He straightened up, tapping the iron ferule of
(42:37):
his cane on the stones in a series of loud knocks.
Tim felt a strange sensation creep into his legs. The
queer words frightened him a little. The old man took
a step towards him. He still smiled, but there was
a new meaning in the smile. A sudden earnestness had
replaced the courtly, leisurely manner. The next words seemed to
(42:59):
blow down upon the boy from above, as though a
cold wind brought them from the sky outside. Yet the
words he knew were kindly meant and very sensible. It
was only the abrupt change that startled him. Grandfather, after all,
was but a man. The distant sound recalled something in
him to that outside world from which the cold wind blew.
(43:24):
My eternal thanks to you, he heard, while the voice
and face and figure seemed to withdraw deeper and deeper
into the heart of the mighty chamber. I shall not
forget your kindness and your courage. It is a debt
I can fortunately one day repay. But now you had
(43:44):
best return, and with dispatch for your head and arm,
lie heavily on the table. The documents are scattered, there
is a cushion fallen, and my son is in the house. Farewell.
You had best leave me quickly. See she he stands
behind you, waiting, go with her. Go now. The entire
(44:05):
scene had vanished even before the final words were uttered.
Tim felt empty space about him. A vast, shadowy figure
bore him through it with its mighty wings. He flew,
He rushed. He remembered nothing more until he heard another
voice and felt a heavy hand upon his shoulder. Tim, you, rascal,
(44:26):
what are you doing in my study? And in the
dark like this? He looked up into his father's face,
without a word. He felt dazed. The next minute his
father had caught him up and kissed him. Ragamuffin, how
did you guess I was coming back to night? He
shook him playfully and kissed his tumbling air. And you've
(44:46):
been asleep too, into the bargain. Well, how's everything at home? Eh?
Jack's coming back from school tomorrow, you know. And four.
Jack came home indeed the following day. And when the
Easter holidays were over, the Governess stayed abroad, and Tim
went off to adventures of another kind in the preparatory
(45:08):
school for Wellington. Life slipped rapidly along with him. He
grew into a man. His mother and his father died.
Jack followed them. Within a little space, Tim inherited, married,
settled down into his great possessions, and opened up the
other wing. The dreams of an imaginative boyhood all had faded.
(45:28):
Perhaps he had merely put them away, or perhaps he
had forgotten them. At any rate, he never spoke of
such things now, And when his Irish wife mentioned her
belief that the old country house possessed a family ghost,
even declaring that she had met an eighteenth century figure
of a man in the corridors an old old man
who bends down upon a stick. Tim only laughed and said,
(45:53):
that's as it ought to be. And if these awful
land taxes forced us to sell, some day a respectable
ghost will increase the market value. But one night he
woke and heard a tapping on the floor. He sat
up in bed and listened. There was a chilly feeling
down his back. Belief had long since gone out of him.
(46:14):
He felt uncannily afraid. The sound came nearer, and nearer.
There were light footsteps with it. The door opened. It
opened a little wider, that is, for it already stood Ajar.
And thereupon the threshold stood a figure that it seemed
he knew. He saw the face as with all the
(46:35):
vivid sharpness of reality. There was a smile upon it,
but a smile of warning and alarm. The arm was raised.
Tim saw the slender hand lace falling down upon the long,
thin fingers, and in them tightly gripped a polished cane,
shaking the cane twice to and fro in the air.
(46:57):
The face thrust forward, spoke sir in words, and vanished,
But the words were inaudible, for though the lips distinctly moved.
No sound apparently came from them, and Tim sprang out
of bed. The room was full of darkness. He turned
the light on the door he saw was shut as usual.
(47:20):
He had of course been dreaming, but he noticed a
curious odor in the air. He sniffed it once or twice,
then grasped the truth. It was a smell of burning.
Fortunately he awoke just in time. He was acclaimed a
hero for his promptitude. After many days, when the damage
(47:41):
was repaired and nerves had settled down once more into
the calm routine of country life, he told the story
to his wife, the entire story. He told the adventure
of his imaginative boyhood. With it, she asked to see
the old family cane. And it was this request of
her that brought back to memory a detail Tim had
(48:03):
entirely forgotten all these years. He remembered it suddenly again,
the loss of the cane, the hubbub his father kicked
up about it. The endless, futile search for the stick
had never been found, and Tim, who was questioned very
closely concerning it, swore with all his might that he
had not the smallest notion where it was, which was,
(48:26):
of course, the truth end of story six.
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