The Young that Grows

Chapter 3

I saw the Creature's wild and alarmed-dark eye, I saw the bright white rim of it, and recognised its little added terror of me even in themidst of its anguish.

That must have been the conventional fright of abeast of chase, an instinct to fear rather than an emotion; for ofemotions the poor thing must have been having its fill. It was nottill I saw its mouth horribly open, its lips curled back to show itsshelving teeth that I could have guessed at what it was suffering. Butgradually I apprehended what was being done. Its captor was squeezingits throat. I saw what I had never seen before, and have never seensince, I saw its tongue like a pale pink petal of a flower dart out asthe pressure drove it. Revolting sight as that would have been to me,witnessed in the world, here, in this dark wood, in this outlandpresence, it was nothing but curious.

Now, as I watched and wondered,the being, following my eyes' direction, looked down at the huddledthing between his thighs, and just as children squeeze a snap-dragonflower to make it open and shut its mouth, so precisely did he,pressing or releasing the windpipe, cause that poor beast to throwback its lips and dart its dry tongue. He did this many times while hewatched it; and when he looked up at me again, and while he continuedto look at me, I saw that his cruel fingers, as by habit, continued the t*****e, and that in some way he derived pleasure from theperformance--as if it gratified him to be sure that effect was following on cause inevitably.

I don't think I have ever before in my entire life been cruel to any animal in my life. I hated cruelty then as I hate it now. I have always shirked the sight of anything in pain from my childhood onwards. Yet the fact is that notonly did I nothing to interfere in what I saw going on, but that Iwas deeply interested and absorbed in it. I can only explain that tomyself now, by supposing that I knew then, that the creature in frontof me was not of my own kind, and was not, in fact, outraging any lawof its own being. Is not that possible? May I not have collected unawares so much out of created nature? I am unable to say: all I a clear about is that here was a thing in the semblance of a boy doing what I had never observed a boy do, and what if I ever had observed aboy do, would have flung me into a transport of rage and grief. Here,therefore, was a thing in the semblance of a boy who was no boy atall. So much must have been as certain to me then as it is indisputable now.

At such young age, one do not reason things out; one is awear of them, and is dull, though unconvinced, before powerful syllogisms to the contrary. All children are so, confronted by strange phenomena. And yet I had facts to go upon if, child as I was, I had been capable of inference.I need only mention one. If this creature had been human, upon seeing that I was conscious of its behaviour to the Creature, it would either have stopped the moment it perceived that I did not approve or was not amused, or it would have continued deliberately out of bravado. But it neither stopped nor hardily continued.

It watched its experiment with interest for a little, then, finding me more interesting, did not discontinue it, but ceased to watch it. He went on with itmechanically, dreamingly, as if to the excitation of some other sense than sight, that of feeling, for instance. He went on lasciviously,for the sake of the pleasure so to be had. In other words, beingwithout self-consciousness and ignorant of shame, he must have beennon-human.

After all, too, it must be owned that I cannot have been confronted by the appearance for more than a few minutes. Allow me three to have been spent before I was aware of him, three more will be the outside I can have passed gazing at him. But I speak of "minutes," of course,referring to my ostensible self, that inert, apathetic child who followed its mother, that purblind creature through whose muddy lenses the pent immortal had been forced to see his familiar in the wood, andperchance to dress in form and body what, for him, needed neither to be visible. It was this outward self which was now driven by circumstancesto resume command--the command which for "three minutes" by hisreckoning he had relinquished. Both of us, no doubt, had been much longer there had we not been interrupted.

A woodman, homing from hiswork, came heavily up the path, and like a guilty detected rogue Iturned to run and took my incorruptible with me. Not until I had passed the man did I think to look back. The partner of my secret was not thento be seen. Out of sight out of mind is the way of children. Out of mind, then, withdrew my incorruptible. I hurried on, ran, and overtook my party half-way down the bare hillside. I still remember the feeling of relief with which I swept into the light, felt the cold air on my cheeks, and saw the intimacy of the village open out below me. I a almost sure that my eyes held tears at the assurance of the sweet,familiar things which I knew and could love. .

There, literally, were my own people: that which I had left behind must be unlawful because it wasso strange. In the warmth and plenty of the lighted house, by the schoolroom table, before the cosily covered teapot, amid the high talk,the hot toast and the jam, my experience in the dusky wood seemed unreal, lawless, almost too terrible to be remembered--never, never to be named. It haunted me for many days, and gave rise to curious wondering a now and then. As I passed the patient, humble beasts ofcommon experience--a carter's team nodding, jingling its brasses, a donkey, patient, humble, hobbled in a paddock, dogs sniffing each other,a cat tucked into a cottage window, I mused doubtfully and often whether we had touched the threshold of the heart of their mystery.

But for the most part, being constitutionally timid, I was resolute to put the experience out of mind. When next I chanced to go through the wood there is no doubt I peered askance to right and left among the trees; but I took good care not to desert my companions. That which I had seen was unaccountable, therefore out of bounds. But though I never saw him there again I have never forgotten him.