The Seeds of Time
Authors: John Wyndham
John Wyndham Parkes Lucas Benyon Harris was born in 1903, the son of a barrister. He tried a number of careers including farming, law, commercial art and advertising, and started writing short stories, intended for sale, in 1925. From 1930 to 1939 he wrote stories of various kinds under different names, almost exclusively for American publications, while also writing detective novels. During the war he was in the civil service and then the army. In 1946 he went back to writing stories for publication in the USA and decided to try a modified form of science fiction, a form he called âlogical fantasy'. As John Wyndham he wrote
The Day of the Triffids
and
The Kraken Wakes
(both widely translated),
The Chrysalids
,
The Midwich Cuckoos
(filmed as
Village of the Damned)
,
The Seeds of Time
,
Trouble with Lichen
,
The Outward Urge
(with âLucas Parkes'),
Consider Her Ways and Others
,
Web
and
Chocky
, all of which have been published by Penguin. John Wyndham died in March 1969.
The best definition of the science-fiction story that I know is Mr Edmund Crispin's: that it âis one which presupposes a technology, or an effect of technology, or a disturbance in the natural order, such as humanity, up to the time of writing, has not in actual fact experienced'.
The disposition of something like ninety per cent of science-fiction to use this definition only in conjunction with the adventure-narrative form of story is primarily an accident of commercial exploitation, and an unfortunate one that makes it difficult to see the trees for the wood.
When, a good many years ago now, I first happened upon magazines that specialized in stories of the kind, their proprietors had already concocted the formula which they
knew
, with that conviction that sustains minor showmen everywhere, to be the only one that the public would stand for and pay for; and almost the only reason for not dismissing their productions forthwith was the occasional discovery of the different story that had somehow got under their guard.
In general, the formula has been preserved so that even now, after twenty-five years, the bulk of science-fiction, and its adaptations to film and broadcast serial form, has been determinedly kept in the cliff-hanger class.
Nevertheless, there came a time when certain editors grew mildly mutinous with the perception that the terms of reference did not truly restrict them to the adventures of galactic gangsters in space-opera, and they began, some by stealth, others by declaration, to encourage their authors to do a bit more exploration within the definition.
With that, the field became open to experiments, and the ten stories I have chosen here are (or were) virtually experiments, made at intervals during fifteen years, in adapting the science-fiction motif to various styles of short story.
The earliest,
Meteor
, is closest to the usual adventure-narrative, and was written to suit a pre-war editor (though its beginning was later adapted a little for post-war republication).
Taking a look at science-fiction again after a wartime interval, one seemed to see indications that it was trying to change its spots. This idea set off the somewhat pastoral
Time to Rest
. It was swiftly returned by an American agent with the hurt reproof that it wouldn't do at all: this kind of thing, as I ought to know, hadn't a chance unless it was packed full of adjectives and action. However, it did later on appear in four periodicals and two anthologies, so I felt better about it.
Meanwhile,
Pillar to Post
, written to suit, I hoped, the policy of a newly arisen American magazine, came near enough to it to be accepted and afterwards anthologized.
After that, I rather gave up other people's policies, and tried various styles. The intention of
Chronoclasm
, in the comedy-romantic, was to entertain the general reader and break away from the science-fiction enthusiast.
Pawley's Peepholes
is satirical farce.
Opposite Number
attempts, with perhaps qualified success, the light presentation of a somewhat complicated idea. For
Dumb Martian
and
Survival
I tried to use the pattern of the English short-story in its heyday.
Compassion Circuit
is the short horror-story. A neo-Gothick trifle, could one say? And finally there is
Wild Flower
where one has encouraged science-fiction to try the form of the modern short-story.
In the careers of these stories my debts have become too widely spread to be acknowledged here with the detail one could wish, and since it would be invidious to mention only some editors and their periodicals, I must have recourse to the collective (and the order of the alphabet). Thus, with a great deal more
gratitude than adequacy, I fear, I take this opportunity of thanking those editors, a number of whom I can never hope to meet, in Australia, France, Great Britain, Holland, Italy, South Africa, Sweden and the USA who have so much encouraged me by printing one or more of these experiments on the theme: âI wonder what might happen
if
⦠?'                  J. W.
I first heard of Tavia in a sort of semi-detached way. An elderly gentleman, a stranger, approached me in Plyton High Street one morning. He raised his hat, bowed, with perhaps a touch of foreignness, and introduced himself politely:
âMy name is Donald Gobie, Doctor Gobie. I should be most grateful, Sir Gerald, if you could spare me just a few minutes of your time. I am so sorry to trouble you, but it is a matter of some urgency, and considerable importance.'
I looked at him carefully.
âI think there must be some mistake,' I told him. âI have no handle to my name â not even a knighthood.'
He looked taken aback.
âDear me. I
am
sorry. Such a likeness â I was quite sure you must be Sir Gerald Lattery.'
It was my turn to be taken aback.
âMy name
is
Gerald Lattery,' I admitted, âbut Mister, not Sir.'
He grew a little confused.
âOh, dear. Of course. How very stupid of me. Is there â' he looked about us, ââ is there somewhere where we could have a few words in private?' he asked.
I hesitated, but only for a brief moment. He was clearly a gentleman of education and some culture. Might have been a lawyer. Certainly not on the touch, or anything of that kind. We were close to
The Bull
, so I led the way into the lounge there. It was conveniently empty. He declined the offer of a drink, and we sat down.
âWell, what is this trouble, Doctor Gobie?' I asked him.
He hesitated, obviously a little embarrassed. Then he spoke, with an air of plunging:
âIt is concerning Tavia, Sir Gerald â er, Mr Lattery. I think perhaps you don't understand the degree to which the whole situation is fraught with unpredictable consequences. It is not just my own responsibility, you understand, though that troubles me greatly â it is the results that cannot be foreseen. She really must come back before very great harm is done. She
must
, Mr Lattery.'
I watched him. His earnestness was beyond question, his distress perfectly genuine.
âBut, Doctor Gobie â' I began.
âI can understand what it may mean to you, sir, nevertheless I do implore you to persuade her. Not just for my sake and her family's, but for everyone's. One has to be so careful; the results of the least action are incalculable. There has to be order, harmony; it must be preserved. Let one single seed fall out of place, and who can say what may come of it? So I beg you to persuade her â'
I broke in, speaking gently because whatever it was all about, he obviously had it very much at heart.
âJust a minute, Doctor Gobie. I'm afraid there is some mistake. I haven't the least idea what you are talking about.'
He checked himself. A dismayed expression came over his face.
âYou â ?' he began, and then paused in thought, frowning. âYou don't mean you haven't met Tavia yet?' he asked.
âAs far as I know, I do. I've never even heard of anyone called Tavia,' I assured him.
He looked winded by that, and I was sorry. I renewed my offer of a drink. But he shook his head, and presently he recovered himself a little.
âI am so sorry,' he said. âThere has been a mistake indeed. Please accept my apologies, Mr Lattery. You must think me quite light-headed, I'm afraid. It's so difficult to explain. May I ask you just to forget it, please forget it entirely.'
Presently he left, looking forlorn. I remained a little puzzled,
but in the course of the next day or two I carried out his final request â or so I thought.
The first time I did see Tavia was a couple of years later, and, of course, I did not at the time know it was she.
I had just left
The Bull
. There was a number of people about in the High Street, but just as I laid a hand on the car door I became aware that one of them on the other side of the road had stopped dead, and was watching me. I looked up, and our eyes met. Hers were hazel.
She was tall, and slender, and good-looking â not pretty, something better than that. And I went on looking.
She wore a rather ordinary tweed skirt and dark-green knitted jumper. Her shoes, however, were a little odd; low-heeled, but a bit fancy; they didn't seem to go with the rest. There was something else out of place, too, though I did not fix it at the moment. Only afterwards did I realize that it must have been the way her fair hair was dressed â very becoming to her, but the style was a bit off the beam. You might say that hair is just hair, and hairdressers have infinite variety of touch, but they haven't. There is a kind of period-style overriding current fashion; look at any photograph taken thirty years ago. Her hair, like her shoes, didn't quite suit the rest.
For some seconds she stood there frozen, quite unsmiling. Then, as if she were not quite awake, she took a step forward to cross the road. At that moment the Market Hall clock chimed. She glanced up at it; her expression was suddenly all alarm. She turned, and started running up the pavement, like Cinderella after the last bus.
I got into my car wondering who she had mistaken me for. I was perfectly certain I had never set eyes on her before.
The next day when the barman at
The Bull
set down my pint, he told me:
âYoung woman in here asking after you, Mr Lattery. Did she find you? I told her where your place is.'
I shook my head. âWho was she?'
âShe didn't say her name, but â¦' he went on to describe her. Recollection of the girl on the other side of the street came back to me. I nodded.
âI saw her just across the road. I wondered who she was,' I told him.
âWell, she seemed to know you all right. “Was that Mr Lattery who was in here earlier on?” she says to me. I says yes, you was one of them. She nodded and thought a bit. “He lives at Bagford House, doesn't he?” she asks. “Why, no Miss,” I says, “that's Major Flacken's place. Mr Lattery, he lives out at Chatcombe Cottage.” So she asks me where that is, and I told her. Hope that was all right. Seemed a nice young lady.'
I reassured him. âShe could have got the address anywhere. Funny she should ask about Bagford House â that's a place I might hanker for, if I ever had any money.'
âBetter hurry up and make it, sir. The old Major's getting on a bit now,' he said.
Nothing came of it. Whatever the girl had wanted my address for, she didn't follow it up, and the matter dropped out of my mind.
It was about a month later that I saw her again. I'd kind of slipped into the habit of going riding once or twice a week with a girl called Marjorie Cranshaw, and running her home from the stables afterwards. The way took us by one of those narrow lanes between high banks where there is barely room for two cars to pass. Round a corner I had to brake and pull right in because an oncoming car was in the middle of the road after overtaking a pedestrian. It pulled over, and squeezed past me. Then I looked at the pedestrian, and saw it was this girl again. She recognized me at the same moment, and gave a slight start. I saw her hesitate, and then make up her mind to come across and speak. She came a few steps nearer with obvious intention. Then she caught sight of Marjorie beside me, changed her mind, with as bad an imita
tion of not having intended to come our way at all as you could hope to see. I put the gear in.
âOh,' said Marjorie in a voice that penetrated naturally, and a tone that was meant to, âwho was that?'
I told her I didn't know.
âShe certainly seemed to know you,' she said, disbelievingly.
Her tone irritated me. In any case it was no business of hers. I didn't reply.
She was not willing to let it drop. âI don't think I've seen her about before,' she said presently.
âShe may be a holiday-maker for all I know,' I said. âThere are plenty of them about.'
âThat doesn't sound very convincing, considering the way she looked at you.'
âI don't care for being thought, or called, a liar,' I said.
âOh, I thought I asked a perfectly ordinary question. Of course, if I've said anything to embarrass you â'
âNor do I care for sustained innuendo. Perhaps you'd prefer to walk the rest of the way. It's not far.'
âI see, I am sorry to have intruded. It's a pity it's too narrow for you to turn the car here,' she said as she got out. âGoodbye, Mr Lattery.'
With the help of a gateway it was not too narrow, but I did not see the girl when I went back. Marjorie had roused my interest in her, so that I rather hoped I would. Besides, though I still had no idea who she might be, I was feeling grateful to her. You will have experienced, perhaps, that feeling of being relieved of a weight that you had not properly realized was there?
Our third meeting was on a different plane altogether.
My cottage stood, as its name suggests, in a coombe which, in Devonshire, is a small valley that is, or once was, wooded. It was somewhat isolated from the other four or five cottages there, being set in the lower part, at the end of the track. The heathered
hills swept steeply up on either side. A few narrow grazing fields bordered both banks of the stream. What was left of the original woods fringed between them and the heather, and survived in small clumps and spinneys here and there.
It was in the closest of these spinneys, on an afternoon when I was surveying my plot and decided that it was about time the beans came out, that I heard a sound of small branches breaking underfoot. I needed no more than a glance to find the cause of it; her fair hair gave her away. For a moment we looked at one another as we had before.
âEr â hullo,' I said.
She did not reply at once. She went on staring. Then: âIs there anyone in sight?' she asked.
I looked up as much of the track as I could see from where I stood, and then up at the opposite hillside.
âI can't see anyone,' I told her.
She pushed the bushes aside, and stepped out cautiously, looking this way and that. She was dressed just as she had been when I first saw her â except that her hair had been a trifle raked about by branches. On the rough ground the shoes looked even more inappropriate. Seeming a little reassured she took a few steps forward.
âI â' she began.
Then, higher up the coombe, a man's voice called, and another answered it. The girl froze for a moment, looking scared.
âThey're coming. Hide me somewhere, quickly, please,' she said.
âEr â' I began, inadequately.
âOh, quick, quick. They're coming,' she said urgently.
She certainly looked alarmed.
âBetter come inside,' I told her, and led the way into the cottage.
She followed swiftly, and when I had shut the door she slid the bolt.
âDon't let them catch me. Don't let them,' she begged.
âLook here, what's all this about. Who are “they”?' I asked.
She
did not answer that; her eyes, roving round the room, found the telephone.
âCall the police,' she said. âCall the police, quickly.' I hesitated. âDon't you
have
any police?' she added.
âOf course we have police, but â'
âThen call them, please.'
âBut look here â' I began.
She clenched her hands.
âYou must call them, please. Quickly.'
She looked very anxious.
âAll right,
I'll
call them. You can do the explaining,' I said, and picked up the instrument.
I was used to the rustic leisure of communications in those parts, and waited patiently. The girl did not; she stood twining her fingers together. At last the connexion was made:
âHullo,' I said, âis that the Plyton Police?'
âPlyton Police â' an answering voice had begun when there was an interruption of steps on the gravel path, followed by a heavy knocking at the door. I handed the instrument to the girl and went to the door.
âDon't let them in,' she said, and then gave her attention to the telephone.
I hesitated. The rather peremptory knocking came again. One can't just stand about, not letting people in; besides, to take a strange young lady hurriedly into one's cottage, and immediately bolt the door against all comers ⦠? At the third knocking I opened up.
The aspect of the man on my doorstep took me aback. Not his face â that was suitable enough in a young man of, say, twenty-five â it was his clothes. One is not prepared to encounter something that looks like a close-fitting skating-suit, worn with a full-cut, hip-length, glass-buttoned jacket, certainly not on Dartmoor, at the end of the summer season. However, I pulled myself together enough to ask what he wanted. He paid no attention to that as he stood looking over my shoulder at the girl.
âTavia,' he said. âCome here!'
She didn't stop talking hurriedly into the telephone. The man stepped forward.
âSteady on!' I said. âFirst, I'd like to know what all this is about.'