The Wave: An Egyptian Aftermath Part 3

Before that satisfactory moment, however, he knew difficult times.

His inner life was in a splendid tumult. From the books he purloined he read a good many facts concerning waves and wave-formation. He learned, among other things, that all sensory impressions reached the nerves by impact of force in various wave-lengths; heat, light and sound broke upon the skin and eyes and ears in vibrations of aether or air that advanced in steady series of wavy formations which, though not quite similar to his dream-wave, were akin to it. Sensation, which is life, was thus linked on to his deepest, earliest memory.

A wave, however, instantly rejoined the parent stock and formed again.

And perhaps it was the repet.i.tion of the wave--its forming again and breaking again--that impressed him most. For he imagined his impulses, emotions, tendencies all taking this wave-form, sweeping his moods up to a certain point, then dropping back into his centre--the Sea, he called it-- which held steady below all temporary fluctuations--only to form once more and happen all over again.

With his moral and spiritual life it was similar: a wind came, wind of desire, wind of yearning, wind of hope, and he felt his strength acc.u.mulating, rising, bending with power upon the object that he had in view. To take that object exactly at the top of the wave was to achieve success; to miss that moment was to act with a receding and diminishing power, to dissipate himself in foam and spray before he could retire for a second rise. He saw existence as a wave. Life itself was a wave that rose, swept, curved, and finally--must break.

He merely visualised these feelings into pictures; he did not think them out, nor get them into words. The wave became symbolic to him of all life's energies. It was the way in which all sensation expressed itself.

Lettice was the high-water mark on sh.o.r.e he longed to reach and sweep back into his own tumultuous being. In that great underneath, the Sea, they belonged eternally together. . . .

One thing, however, troubled him exceedingly: he read that a wave was a segment of a circle, the perfect form, yet that it never completed itself.

The ground on which it broke prevented the achievement of the circle.

That, he felt, was a pity, and might be serious; there was always that sinister retirement for another effort that yet never did, and never could, result in complete achievement. He watched the waves a good deal on the sh.o.r.e, when occasion offered in the holidays--they came from France!--and made a discovery on his own account that was not mentioned in any of the books. And it was this: that the top of the wave, owing to its curve, was reflected in the under part. Its end, that is, was foretold in its beginning.

There was a want of scientific accuracy here, a confusion of time and s.p.a.ce, perhaps, yet he noticed the idea and registered the thrill. At the moment when the wave was poised to fall its crest shone reflected in the base from which it rose.

But the more he watched the waves on the sh.o.r.e, the more puzzled he became. They seemed merely a movement of the sea itself. They endlessly repeated themselves. They had no true, separate existence until they-- broke. Nor could he determine whether the crest or the base was the beginning, for the two ran along together, and what was above one minute was below the minute after. Which part started first he never could decide. The head kept chasing the tail in an effort to join up.

Only when a wave broke and fell was it really--a wave. It had to 'happen'

to earn its name.

There were ripples too. These indicated the direction of the parent wave upon whose side they happened, but not its purpose. Moods were ripples: they varied the surface of life but did not influence its general direction.

His own life followed a similar behaviour; he was full of ripples that were for ever trying to complete themselves by happening in acts.

But the main Wave was the thing--end and beginning sweeping along together, both at the same time somehow. That is, he knew the end and could foretell it. It rose from the great 'beneath' which was the sea in him. It must topple over in the end and complete itself. He knew it would; he knew it would hurt; he knew also that he would not shirk it when it came. For it was a repet.i.tion somehow.

'I jolly well mean to enjoy the smash,' he felt. 'I know one pair of Eyes already; there's only the Whiff and the other Eyes to come. The moment I find them, I'll go bang into it.' He experienced a delicious shiver at the prospect.

One thing, however, remained uncertain: the stuff the Wave was made of.

Once he discovered that, he would discover also--_where_ the smash would come.

CHAPTER IV

'Can a chap feel things coming?' he asked his father. He was perhaps fifteen or sixteen then. 'I mean, when you feel them coming, does that mean they _must_ come?'

His father listened warily. There had been many similar questions lately.

'You can feel ordinary things coming,' he replied; 'things due to a.s.sociation of ideas.'

Tom looked up. 'a.s.sociation?' he queried uncertainly.

'If you feel hungry,' explained the doctor, 'you know that dinner's coming; you a.s.sociate the hunger with the idea of eating. You recognise them because you've felt them both together before.'

'They _ought_ to come, then?'

'Dinner does come--ordinarily speaking. You've learned to expect it from the hunger. You could, of course, prevent it coming,' he added dryly, 'only that would be bad for you. You need it.'

Tom reflected a moment with a puckered face. His father waited for him to ask more, hoping he would. The boy felt the sympathy and invitation.

'_Before_,' he repeated, picking out the word with sudden emphasis, his mind evidently breaking against a problem. 'But if I felt hungry for something I _hadn't_ had before----?'

'In that case you wouldn't call it hunger. You wouldn't know what to call it. You'd feel a longing of some kind and would wonder what it meant.'

Tom's next words surprised him considerably. They came promptly, but with slow and thoughtful emphasis.

'So that if I know what I want, and call it dinner, or pain, or--love, or something,' he exclaimed, 'it means that I've had it _before_? And that's why I know it.' The last five words were not a question but a statement of fact apparently.

The doctor pretended not to notice the variants of dinner. At least he did not draw attention to them.

'Not necessarily,' he answered. 'The things you feel you want may be the things that everybody wants--things common to the race. Such wants are naturally in your blood; you feel them because your parents, your grandparents, and all humanity in turn behind your own particular family have always wanted them.'

'They come out of the sea, you mean?'

'That's very well expressed, Tom. They come out of the sea of human nature, which is everywhere the same, yes.'

The compliment seemed to annoy the boy.

'Of course,' he said bluntly. 'But--if it hurts?' The words were sharply emphasised.

'a.s.sociation of ideas again. Toothache suggests the pincers. You want to get rid of the pain, but the pain has to get worse before it can get better. You know that, so you face it gladly--to get it over.'

'You face it, yes,' said Tom. 'It makes you better in the end.'

It suddenly dawned upon him that his learned father knew nothing, nothing at least that could help him. He knew only what other people knew.

He turned then, and asked the ridiculous question that lay at the back of his mind all the time. It cost him an effort, for his father would certainly deem it foolish.

'Can a thing happen before it really happens?'

Dr. Kelverdon may or may not have thought the question foolish; his face was hidden a moment as he bent down to put the Indian rug straight with his hand. There was no impatience in the movement, nor was there mockery in his expression, when he resumed his normal position. He had gained an appreciable interval of time--some fifteen seconds. 'Tom, you've got good ideas in that head of yours,' he said calmly; 'but what is it that you mean exactly?'

Tom was quite ready to amplify. He knew what he meant:

'If I _know_ something is going to happen, doesn't that mean that it has already happened--and that I remember it?'

'You're a psychologist as well as engineer, Tom,' was the approving reply.

'It's like this, you see: In emotion, with desire in it, can predict the fulfilment of that desire. In great hunger you imagine you're eating all sorts of good things.'

'But that's looking forward,'; the boy pounced on the mistake. 'It's not remembering.'

'That _is_ the difficulty,' explained his father; 'to decide whether you're antic.i.p.ating only--or actually remembering.'

'I see,' Tom said politely.

All this a.n.a.lysis concealed merely: it did not reveal. The thing itself dived deeper out of sight with every phrase. _He_ knew quite well the difference between antic.i.p.ating and remembering. With the latter there was the sensation of having been through it. Each time he remembered seeing Lettice the sensation was the same, but when he looked forward to seeing her _again_ the sensation varied with his mood.

'For instance, Tom--between ourselves this--we're going to send Mary to that Finishing School in France where Lettice is.' The doctor, it seemed, spoke carelessly while he gathered his papers together with a view to going out. He did not look at the boy; he said it walking about the room.