We have all met the man who says that some odd things have happened to
him, but that he does not really believe that they were supernatural. My
own position is the opposite of this. I believe in the supernatural as a
matter of intellect and reason, not as a matter of personal experience.
I do not see ghosts; I only see their inherent probability. But it is
entirely a matter of the mere intelligence, not even of the motions;
my nerves and body are altogether of this earth, very earthy. But
upon people of this temperament one weird incident will often leave a
peculiar impression. And the weirdest circumstance that ever occurred
to me occurred a little while ago. It consisted in nothing less than my
playing a game, and playing it quite well for some seventeen consecutive
minutes. The ghost of my grandfather would have astonished me less.
On one of these blue and burning afternoons I found myself, to my
inexpressible astonishment, playing a game called croquet. I had
imagined that it belonged to the epoch of Leach and Anthony Trollope,
and I had neglected to provide myself with those very long and luxuriant
side whiskers which are really essential to such a scene. I played
it with a man whom we will call Parkinson, and with whom I had a
semi-philosophical argument which lasted through the entire contest. It
is deeply implanted in my mind that I had the best of the argument; but
it is certain and beyond dispute that I had the worst of the game.
“Oh, Parkinson, Parkinson!” I cried, patting him affectionately on the
head with a mallet, “how far you really are from the pure love of the
sport--you who can play. It is only we who play badly who love the Game
itself. You love glory; you love applause; you love the earthquake voice
of victory; you do not love croquet. You do not love croquet until
you love being beaten at croquet. It is we the bunglers who adore the
occupation in the abstract. It is we to whom it is art for art’s sake.
If we may see the face of Croquet herself (if I may so express myself)
we are content to see her face turned upon us in anger. Our play is
called amateurish; and we wear proudly the name of amateur, for amateurs
is but the French for Lovers. We accept all adventures from our Lady,
the most disastrous or the most dreary. We wait outside her iron gates
(I allude to the hoops), vainly essaying to enter. Our devoted balls,
impetuous and full of chivalry, will not be confined within the pedantic
boundaries of the mere croquet ground. Our balls seek honour in the ends
of the earth; they turn up in the flower-beds and the conservatory; they
are to be found in the front garden and the next street. No, Parkinson!
The good painter has skill. It is the bad painter who loves his art. The
good musician loves being a musician, the bad musician loves music. With
such a pure and hopeless passion do I worship croquet. I love the game
itself. I love the parallelogram of grass marked out with chalk or tape,
as if its limits were the frontiers of my sacred Fatherland, the four
seas of Britain. I love the mere swing of the mallets, and the click of
the balls is music. The four colours are to me sacramental and symbolic,
like the red of martyrdom, or the white of Easter Day. You lose all
this, my poor Parkinson. You have to solace yourself for the absence of
this vision by the paltry consolation of being able to go through hoops
and to hit the stick.”
And I waved my mallet in the air with a graceful gaiety.
“Don’t be too sorry for me,” said Parkinson, with his simple sarcasm. “I
shall get over it in time. But it seems to me that the more a man likes
a game the better he would want to play it. Granted that the pleasure
in the thing itself comes first, does not the pleasure of success come
naturally and inevitably afterwards? Or, take your own simile of the
Knight and his Lady-love. I admit the gentleman does first and foremost
want to be in the lady’s presence. But I never yet heard of a gentleman
who wanted to look an utter ass when he was there.”
“Perhaps not; though he generally looks it,” I replied. “But the truth
is that there is a fallacy in the simile, although it was my own. The
happiness at which the lover is aiming is an infinite happiness, which
can be extended without limit. The more he is loved, normally speaking,
the jollier he will be. It is definitely true that the stronger the love
of both lovers, the stronger will be the happiness. But it is not true
that the stronger the play of both croquet players the stronger will
be the game. It is logically possible--(follow me closely here,
Parkinson!)--it is logically possible, to play croquet too well to enjoy
it at all. If you could put this blue ball through that distant hoop as
easily as you could pick it up with your hand, then you would not put it
through that hoop any more than you pick it up with your hand; it would
not be worth doing. If you could play unerringly you would not play at
all. The moment the game is perfect the game disappears.”
“I do not think, however,” said Parkinson, “that you are in any
immediate danger of effecting that sort of destruction. I do not think
your croquet will vanish through its own faultless excellence. You are
safe for the present.”
I again caressed him with the mallet, knocked a ball about, wired
myself, and resumed the thread of my discourse.
The long, warm evening had been gradually closing in, and by this
time it was almost twilight. By the time I had delivered four more
fundamental principles, and my companion had gone through five more
hoops, the dusk was verging upon dark.
“We shall have to give this up,” said Parkinson, as he missed a ball
almost for the first time, “I can’t see a thing.”
“Nor can I,” I answered, “and it is a comfort to reflect that I could
not hit anything if I saw it.”
With that I struck a ball smartly, and sent it away into the darkness
towards where the shadowy figure of Parkinson moved in the hot haze.
Parkinson immediately uttered a loud and dramatic cry. The situation,
indeed, called for it. I had hit the right ball.
Stunned with astonishment, I crossed the gloomy ground, and hit my ball
again. It went through a hoop. I could not see the hoop; but it was the
right hoop. I shuddered from head to foot.
Words were wholly inadequate, so I slouched heavily after that
impossible ball. Again I hit it away into the night, in what I supposed
was the vague direction of the quite invisible stick. And in the dead
silence I heard the stick rattle as the ball struck it heavily.
I threw down my mallet. “I can’t stand this,” I said. “My ball has gone
right three times. These things are not of this world.”
“Pick your mallet up,” said Parkinson, “have another go.”
“I tell you I daren’t. If I made another hoop like that I should see all
the devils dancing there on the blessed grass.”
“Why devils?” asked Parkinson; “they may be only fairies making fun of
you. They are sending you the ‘Perfect Game,’ which is no game.”
I looked about me. The garden was full of a burning darkness, in which
the faint glimmers had the look of fire. I stepped across the grass
as if it burnt me, picked up the mallet, and hit the ball
somewhere--somewhere where another ball might be. I heard the dull click
of the balls touching, and ran into the house like one pursued.