inventive. We have desired other things, and we have got them. We have
cleverly made a way of life that exacts so close an attention, if we
would save it from disaster, that we are now its prisoners. Peace and
freedom have become but a vision which the imprisoned view through the
bars they themselves have made. The spring we see now is in a world not
ours, a world we have left, which is still close to us, but is
unapproachable. The children are in it, and even, apparently, the ducks.
It is a world we see sometimes, as a reminder--once a year or so--of what
we could have made of life, and what we have.
Which is the real world? I worried over that as I was leaving the park. I
seemed to be getting nearer to reality near Rotten Row. A reassuring
policeman was in sight. Motor-cars that were humiliating with their
enamel and crystal were threading about. The fashionable ladies and their
consorts seemed to be in no doubt about the world they were in. I began
to feel mean and actual. While thus composing my mind I chanced to look
backwards. A miniature glade was there, where the tree-trunks were the
columns in an aisle. Was it a sward between them? I doubt whether we
could walk it. I call it green. I know of no other word. Perhaps the sun
was playing tricks with it. It may not have been there. As I kept my eye
on it, disbelieving that light--desirous to believe it, but unable to,
faith being weak--a rabbit moved into the aisle. I call it a rabbit, for
I know no other word. But I declare now that I do not accept that
creature. It sat up, and watched me. I don't say it was there. As far as
I know, any rabbit would have been terrified with all those people about.
But not this apparition, its back to the sunset, with an aura and radiant
whiskers of gold. It regarded me steadfastly. I looked around to see if I
were alone in this.
The policeman was unconscious of it. The lady who sat on the chair
opposite, the lady with the noticeable yellow legs, was talking in
animation, but I doubt it was about this rabbit. The saunterers were
passing without a sign. But one little girl stood, her hands behind her,
oblivious of all but that admonitory creature in an unearthly light, and
was smiling at it. It was the only confirmation I had. I have no
recollection now of what I saw in the day's paper. I have later and
better news.
THE END
Transcriber's Note: The following words were inconsistently hyphenated in
the original text: hill-top, hilltop; school-boy, schoolboy.
The following corrections have been made to the original text:
Page 12: Septemer to September
Page 103: foward to forward
Page 146: irresistable to irresistible
Page 199: sarcifice to sacrifice
End of Project Gutenberg's Waiting for Daylight, by Henry Major Tomlinson