The Door in the Wall, and Other Stories Read online

  A MOONLIGHT FABLE

  There was once a little man whose mother made him a beautiful suitof clothes. It was green and gold and woven so that I cannotdescribe how delicate and fine it was, and there was a tie oforange fluffiness that tied up under his chin. And the buttonsin their newness shone like stars. He was proud and pleased by hissuit beyond measure, and stood before the long looking-glass whenfirst he put it on, so astonished and delighted with it that hecould hardly turn himself away.

  He wanted to wear it everywhere and show it to all sorts ofpeople. He thought over all the places he had ever visited and allthe scenes he had ever heard described, and tried to imagine whatthe feel of it would be if he were to go now to those scenes andplaces wearing his shining suit, and he wanted to go out forthwithinto the long grass and the hot sunshine of the meadow wearing it.Just to wear it! But his mother told him, "No." She told him hemust take great care of his suit, for never would he have anothernearly so fine; he must save it and save it and only wear it onrare and great occasions. It was his wedding suit, she said. Andshe took his buttons and twisted them up with tissue paper for feartheir bright newness should be tarnished, and she tacked littleguards over the cuffs and elbows and wherever the suit was mostlikely to come to harm. He hated and resisted these things, butwhat could he do? And at last her warnings and persuasions hadeffect and he consented to take off his beautiful suit and fold itinto its proper creases and put it away. It was almost as thoughhe gave it up again. But he was always thinking of wearing itand of the supreme occasion when some day it might be worn withoutthe guards, without the tissue paper on the buttons, utterly anddelightfully, never caring, beautiful beyond measure.

  One night when he was dreaming of it, after his habit, hedreamed he took the tissue paper from one of the buttons and foundits brightness a little faded, and that distressed him mightily inhis dream. He polished the poor faded button and polished it, andif anything it grew duller. He woke up and lay awake thinking ofthe brightness a little dulled and wondering how he would feel ifperhaps when the great occasion (whatever it might be) shouldarrive, one button should chance to be ever so little short of itsfirst glittering freshness, and for days and days that thoughtremained with him, distressingly. And when next his mother let himwear his suit, he was tempted and nearly gave way to the temptationjust to fumble off one little bit of tissue paper and see if indeedthe buttons were keeping as bright as ever.

  He went trimly along on his way to church full of this wilddesire. For you must know his mother did, with repeated andcareful warnings, let him wear his suit at times, on Sundays, forexample, to and fro from church, when there was no threatening ofrain, no dust nor anything to injure it, with its buttons coveredand its protections tacked upon it and a sunshade in his hand toshadow it if there seemed too strong a sunlight for its colours.And always, after such occasions, he brushed it over and folded itexquisitely as she had taught him, and put it away again.

  Now all these restrictions his mother set to the wearing ofhis suit he obeyed, always he obeyed them, until one strange nighthe woke up and saw the moonlight shining outside his window. Itseemed to him the moonlight was not common moonlight, nor the nighta common night, and for a while he lay quite drowsily with this oddpersuasion in his mind. Thought joined on to thought like thingsthat whisper warmly in the shadows. Then he sat up in his littlebed suddenly, very alert, with his heart beating very fast and aquiver in his body from top to toe. He had made up his mind. Heknew now that he was going to wear his suit as it should be worn.He had no doubt in the matter. He was afraid, terribly afraid, butglad, glad.

  He got out of his bed and stood a moment by the window lookingat the moonshine-flooded garden and trembling at the thing he meantto do. The air was full of a minute clamor of crickets andmurmurings, of the infinitesimal shouting of little living things.He went very gently across the creaking boards, for fear that hemight wake the sleeping house, to the big dark clothes-presswherein his beautiful suit lay folded, and he took it out garmentby garment and softly and very eagerly tore off its tissue-papercovering and its tacked protections, until there it was, perfectand delightful as he had seen it when first his mother had given itto him--a long time it seemed ago. Not a button had tarnished, nota thread had faded on this dear suit of his; he was glad enough forweeping as in a noiseless hurry he put it on. And then back hewent, soft and quick, to the window and looked out upon the gardenand stood there for a minute, shining in the moonlight, with hisbuttons twinkling like stars, before he got out on the sill and,making as little of a rustling as he could, clambered down to thegarden path below. He stood before his mother's house, and it waswhite and nearly as plain as by day, with every window-blind buthis own shut like an eye that sleeps. The trees cast still shadowslike intricate black lace upon the wall.

  The garden in the moonlight was very different from the gardenby day; moonshine was tangled in the hedges and stretched inphantom cobwebs from spray to spray. Every flower was gleamingwhite or crimson black, and the air was aquiver with the thriddingof small crickets and nightingales singing unseen in the depths ofthe trees.

  There was no darkness in the world, but only warm, mysteriousshadows; and all the leaves and spikes were edged and lined withiridescent jewels of dew. The night was warmer than any night hadever been, the heavens by some miracle at once vaster and nearer,and spite of the great ivory-tinted moon that ruled the world, thesky was full of stars.

  The little man did not shout nor sing for all his infinitegladness. He stood for a time like one awe-stricken, and then,with a queer small cry and holding out his arms, he ran out as ifhe would embrace at once the whole warm round immensity of theworld. He did not follow the neat set paths that cut the gardensquarely, but thrust across the beds and through the wet, tall,scented herbs, through the night stock and the nicotine and theclusters of phantom white mallow flowers and through the thicketsof southern-wood and lavender, and knee-deep across a wide space ofmignonette. He came to the great hedge and he thrust his waythrough it, and though the thorns of the brambles scored him deeplyand tore threads from his wonderful suit, and though burs andgoosegrass and havers caught and clung to him, he did not care. Hedid not care, for he knew it was all part of the wearing for whichhe had longed. "I am glad I put on my suit," he said; "I am gladI wore my suit."

  Beyond the hedge he came to the duck-pond, or at least to whatwas the duck-pond by day. But by night it was a great bowl ofsilver moonshine all noisy with singing frogs, of wonderful silvermoonshine twisted and clotted with strange patternings, and thelittle man ran down into its waters between the thin black rushes,knee-deep and waist-deep and to his shoulders, smiting the water toblack and shining wavelets with either hand, swaying and shiveringwavelets, amid which the stars were netted in the tangledreflections of the brooding trees upon the bank. He waded until heswam, and so he crossed the pond and came out upon the other side,trailing, as it seemed to him, not duckweed, but very silver inlong, clinging, dripping masses. And up he went through thetransfigured tangles of the willow-herb and the uncut seeding grassof the farther bank. And so he came glad and breathless into thehighroad. "I am glad," he said, "beyond measure, that I hadclothes that fitted this occasion."

  The highroad ran straight as an arrow flies, straight into thedeep blue pit of sky beneath the moon, a white and shining roadbetween the singing nightingales, and along it he went, running nowand leaping, and now walking and rejoicing, in the clothes hismother had made for him with tireless, loving hands. The road wasdeep in dust, but that for him was only soft whiteness, and as hewent a great dim moth came fluttering round his wet and shimmeringand hastening figure. At first he did not heed the moth, and thenhe waved his hands at it and made a sort of dance with it as itcircled round his head. "Soft moth!" he cried, "dear moth! Andwonderful night, wonderful night of the world! Do you think myclothes are beautiful, dear moth? As beautiful as your scales andall this silver vesture of the earth and sky?"

  And the mo
th circled closer and closer until at last itsvelvet wings just brushed his lips . . . . .

  And next morning they found him dead with his neck broken inthe bottom of the stone pit, with his beautiful clothes a littlebloody and foul and stained with the duckweed from the pond. Buthis face was a face of such happiness that, had you seen it, youwould have understood indeed how that he had died happy, neverknowing the cool and streaming silver for the duckweed in the pond.