He looked up with a sudden smile.
‘Did you ever play North-West Passage with me?... No, of course you
didn’t come my way!’
‘It was the sort of game,’ he went on, ‘that every imaginative child
plays all day. The idea was the discovery of a North-West Passage to
school. The way to school was plain enough; the game consisted in
finding some way that wasn’t plain, starting off ten minutes early
in some almost hopeless direction, and working my way round through
unaccustomed streets to my goal. And one day I got entangled among some
rather low-class streets on the other side of Campden Hill, and I began
to think that for once the game would be against me and that I should
get to school late. I tried rather desperately a street that seemed
a _cul-de-sac_, and found a passage at the end. I hurried through
that with renewed hope. “I shall do it yet,” I said, and passed a row
of frowsy little shops that were inexplicably familiar to me, and
behold! there was my long white wall and the green door that led to the
enchanted garden!
‘The thing whacked upon me suddenly. Then, after all, that garden, that
wonderful garden, wasn’t a dream!’
He paused.
‘I suppose my second experience with the green door marks the world
of difference there is between the busy life of a schoolboy and the
infinite leisure of a child. Anyhow, this second time I didn’t for
a moment think of going in straight away. You see---- For one thing,
my mind was full of the idea of getting to school in time--set on not
breaking my record for punctuality. I must surely have felt _some_
little desire at least to try the door--yes. I must have felt that....
But I seem to remember the attraction of the door mainly as another
obstacle to my overmastering determination to get to school. I was
immensely interested by this discovery I had made, of course--I went
on with my mind full of it--but I went on. It didn’t check me. I ran
past, tugging out my watch, found I had ten minutes still to spare, and
then I was going downhill into familiar surroundings. I got to school,
breathless, it is true, and wet with perspiration, but in time. I can
remember hanging up my coat and hat.... Went right by it and left it
behind me. Odd, eh?’
He looked at me thoughtfully. ‘Of course I didn’t know then that it
wouldn’t always be there. Schoolboys have limited imaginations. I
suppose I thought it was an awfully jolly thing to have it there,
to know my way back to it, but there was the school tugging at me.
I expect I was a good deal distraught and inattentive that morning,
recalling what I could of the beautiful strange people I should
presently see again. Oddly enough I had no doubt in my mind that they
would be glad to see me.... Yes, I must have thought of the garden that
morning just as a jolly sort of place to which one might resort in the
interludes of a strenuous scholastic career.
‘I didn’t go that day at all. The next day was a half holiday, and that
may have weighed with me. Perhaps, too, my state of inattention brought
down impositions upon me, and docked the margin of time necessary for
the detour. I don’t know. What I do know is that in the meantime the
enchanted garden was so much upon my mind that I could not keep it to
myself.
‘I told. What was his name?--a ferrety-looking youngster we used to
call Squiff.’
‘Young Hopkins,’ said I.
‘Hopkins it was. I did not like telling him. I had a feeling that
in some way it was against the rules to tell him, but I did. He was
walking part of the way home with me; he was talkative, and if we
had not talked about the enchanted garden we should have talked of
something else, and it was intolerable to me to think about any other
subject. So I blabbed.
‘Well, he told my secret. The next day in the play interval I found
myself surrounded by half a dozen bigger boys, half teasing, and
wholly curious to hear more of the enchanted garden. There was that
big Fawcett--you remember him?--and Carnaby and Morley Reynolds. You
weren’t there by any chance? No, I think I should have remembered if
you were....
‘A boy is a creature of odd feelings. I was, I really believe, in spite
of my secret self-disgust, a little flattered to have the attention of
these big fellows. I remember particularly a moment of pleasure caused
by the praise of Crawshaw--you remember Crawshaw major, the son of
Crawshaw the composer?--who said it was the best lie he had ever heard.
But at the same time there was a really painful undertow of shame at
telling what I felt was indeed a sacred secret. That beast Fawcett made
a joke about the girl in green----’
Wallace’s voice sank with the keen memory of that shame. ‘I pretended
not to hear,’ he said. ‘Well, then Carnaby suddenly called me a young
liar, and disputed with me when I said the thing was true. I said I
knew where to find the green door, could lead them all there in ten
minutes. Carnaby became outrageously virtuous, and said I’d have
to--and bear out my words or suffer. Did you ever have Carnaby twist
your arm? Then perhaps you’ll understand how it went with me. I swore
my story was true. There was nobody in the school then to save a chap
from Carnaby, though Crawshaw put in a word or so. Carnaby had got his
game. I grew excited and red-eared, and a little frightened. I behaved
altogether like a silly little chap, and the outcome of it all was
that instead of starting alone for my enchanted garden, I led the way
presently--cheeks flushed, ears hot, eyes smarting, and my soul one
burning misery and shame--for a party of six mocking, curious, and
threatening schoolfellows.
‘We never found the white wall and the green door....’
‘You mean----?’
‘I mean I couldn’t find it. I would have found it if I could.
‘And afterwards when I could go alone I couldn’t find it. I never found
it. I seem now to have been always looking for it through my schoolboy
days, but I never came upon it--never.’
‘Did the fellows--make it disagreeable?’
‘Beastly.... Carnaby held a council over me for wanton lying. I
remember how I sneaked home and upstairs to hide the marks of my
blubbering. But when I cried myself to sleep at last it wasn’t for
Carnaby, but for the garden, for the beautiful afternoon I had hoped
for, for the sweet friendly women and the waiting playfellows, and the
game I had hoped to learn again, that beautiful forgotten game....
‘I believed firmly that if I had not told--.... I had bad times after
that--crying at night and wool-gathering by day. For two terms I
slackened and had bad reports. Do you remember? Of course you would! It
was _you_--your beating me in mathematics that brought me back to the
grind again.’