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Blackwood, Algernon, 1869-1951

"The Extra Day"


The dreamy melancholy of childhood, the long, long days, the haunted
nights, the everlasting afternoons--all these were in its wild, great,
windy voice, the sighing, the mystery, the laughter too. The joy of
strange fulfilment woke in their wind-kissed hearts. The Night-Wind
was their friend; they had played with it. Now everything could come
true.
And next day Maria, lost to the Authorities for over an hour, was at
length discovered by the forbidden pigsties in a fearful state of
mess, but very pleased and happy about something. She was watching the
pigs with eyes brimful of questioning wonder and excitement. She was
listening intently too. She wanted to find out for certain whether
pigs really--really and truly--saw--anything unusual!


CHAPTER VIII
WHERE WONDER HIDES

The children had never been to London, but they knew the direction in
which it lay--beyond the crumbling kitchen-garden wall, where the
wall-flowers grew in a proud colony. The sky looked different there, a
threatening quality in it. Both snow and thunderstorm came that way,
and the dirty sign-post "London Road" outside the lodge-gates was
tilted into the air significantly.


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