Chapter 3 Chapter 3 The Woods Between Worlds

Immediately Uncle Andrew and his study disappeared.The next moment, the surroundings were dark and confused.Then Digory felt a soft green light overhead and darkness below.He didn't seem to be standing on anything, sitting or lying on anything, and there was nothing around him. "I believe I'm in the water," said Digory, "or under." This startled him, but he felt at once that he was going up.Suddenly, his head touched the air, and he found himself crawling out, lying on the flat green grass by the pool. Standing up, he noticed that he didn't appear to be out of the water, neither wet nor short of breath.His clothes are completely dry.He was standing by a small pool of water not ten feet wide in the woods.Those trees grow densely together, with luxuriant branches and leaves, covering the sky and the sun.The only light is the green light that seeps through the leaves.However, the sun must have been high above the woods, for the green light was bright and warm.As you can imagine, it is the most peaceful forest, with no birds, no insects, no animals, and no wind.You can even feel the trees growing.In addition to the pool he just drilled out of, there were many other pools in the woods, as far as the eye could see, there was one every few steps.You can almost feel the trees drinking water with their roots.The woods are full of life.When Digory later tried to describe it, he always said: "It was a lush place, as green as a raisin cake."

The strangest thing was that before he had time to look around, Digory almost forgot how he had gotten there.He couldn't think of Polly, Uncle Andrew, or even his mother at all.He felt no fear, no excitement or curiosity.If someone asked him, "Where are you from?" he'd probably say, "I've been here all the time." That's the feeling—even though nothing happened, you seemed to be there all the time and never got bored.As he said much later: "It was a place where nothing happened. The trees just kept growing." Digory stared at the forest for a long time, and then, he found that not far from him, a girl was lying under a tree, her eyes were slightly closed, she seemed to be asleep.He watched for a long time without speaking.She spoke in a tone of sleepy contentment.

"I think I've seen you somewhere before," she said. "I think so too," said Digory. "Have you been here long?" "Yes, it's been here," said the girl, "at least—I don't know—for a long time." "Me too, always here," said Digory. "No," she said, "I just saw you coming out of that puddle." "I think I came out of the puddle," said Digory vaguely, "but I forgot." The two were silent for a long time. "Oh," said the girl, "I wonder, have we met before? I have an idea—a picture in my head—a boy and a girl, like us—living in another A very different place from here - doing all kinds of things. Probably just a dream."

"I thought I had the same dream," said Digory. "A boy and a girl, living next door—like crawling between the rafters. I remember the girl's face was dirty." "Is it the other way around? In my dream, the boy's face was the one that was dirty." "I don't remember the boy's face," said Digory, before adding, "Hi! What's that?" "Wow! A guinea pig," said the girl.A fat guinea pig is sniffing here and there in the grass.But the guinea pig had a gauze belt round its waist, and a shining yellow ring around its body.

"Look! look!," cried Digory, "the ring! look! you have one on your finger, and I have it." The girl finally got interested and sat up.They stared at each other, trying to remember the past.Almost at the same moment she called "Mr. Ketterley" and he called "Uncle Andrew," and both realized who they were and began to recall the whole story.After a difficult conversation, they were wide awake.Digory described how Uncle Andrew was ruthless as a brute. "What shall we do now?" said Polly, "and take the guinea-pig with us?" "No hurry." Digory yawned long.

"I think we should be in a hurry," said Polly. "The place is so still, it's like—like a dream, and you always feel sleepy. And when we can't hold on, we lie down and sleep forever and ever." "It's a nice place," said Digory. "Yes," said Polly, "but we must go back." She got up and started walking cautiously towards the guinea-pig, but then she changed her mind. "Keep the guinea-pig," she said, "it's happy here, and your Uncle Andrew will do him no favors if we take him back." "I'm sure he will," answered Digory; "look what he's done to us! Why, how shall we go back?"

"I thought, just go back to the pool." They walked over and stood by the pool side by side, looking at the calm water.The dense green trees reflected in the water make the pool water look very deep. "We don't have bathing suits," said Polly. "No, fool," said Digory, "we go in with our clothes on. Don't you forget that we came up wet?" "Can you swim?" "A little while, how about you?" "Not swimming very well." "I don't think we need to swim," Digory said. "We need to sink, don't we?"

Neither of them really wanted to jump into the pool, but neither of them said it.They held hands, shouted "one, two, three, jump" and jumped in.The water splashed, and they naturally closed their eyes, but when they opened them, they were still standing hand in hand in the green forest, and the water only submerged to their ankles.Apparently the pool was only a few inches deep.They waded back to land again. "What's the matter?" said Polly, frightened, but not so frightened as you might think, because, in that wood, no one could be really frightened, it was too peaceful, too quiet.

"Oh, I see!" said Digory. "Of course it won't work. We still have the yellow rings on. They only go out, you know, and the green ones go back. We must change the rings. You have Pocket? Well, put the yellow ring in the left pocket. I have two green rings, one for you." They put on the green rings and went back to the pool.Before he could dance again, Digory cried out "O-oh-ah!" "What's the matter?" said Polly. "I have a brilliant idea," said Digory. "What about those other pools?" "What's the meaning?"

"If we can go back by jumping into this pool, wouldn't we be able to go to another place by jumping into other pools? Think about it, there may be a world under each pool!" "But I think we've reached what your Uncle Andrew calls 'another world' or 'another place,' or whatever. You mean..." "Oh, nasty Uncle Andrew," interrupted Digory, "I don't believe he knows everything. He never dared to come here. He only said one 'other world,' and there may be many more!" "You mean, the woods might just be one of them?"

"No, I don't think the woods are a world. It's just a middle ground, I think." Polly was puzzled. "Don't you understand?" said Digory. "Then listen to me. Think of those tunnels under the flagstones at home. It's not a room in any house, that is, it's not really a part of any house." But as long as you go in, you can follow the tunnel and walk into any of the houses in that row. Isn't this forest the same? - a place that doesn't belong to any world, but if you find it right, you reach all the worlds." "Well, even if you could..." Polly had begun, Digory went on as if he hadn't heard: "That would explain everything, of course," he said. "That's why it's so sleepily quiet here. Nothing ever happens here. It's like at home, people talking in the house , doing things, eating, but nothing in the middle, behind the walls, on the ceiling, under the floor, or in our tunnel. But if you go out of the tunnel, you find yourself in a house. I think, We can go out from here, wherever we want! We don't need to jump back into the puddle we came from. At least not now." "The wood between the worlds," murmured Polly as if in sleep, "it's wonderful." "Come on," said Digory, "which pool shall we jump into?" "Well," said Polly, "we'll have to find out if we can go back to the old pool, or I won't be jumping into any other. We're not sure we can go back." "Well," said Digory, "it's no fun to be caught by Uncle Andrew and take the ring away when you're not playing." "May we jump back to the old pool, but only half way," said Polly, "and see if the green ring can take us back. If so, we'll change rings before we get to Mr. Ketterley's study, and come back here .” "is this okay?" "Well, it only took a while to come, and I think it will be quick to go back." Digory had a lot of complaints about this, but he had no choice but to agree, because Polly refused to go to any new world without knowing whether she could go back. to explore.Polly is as brave as he is in the face of danger (i.e., facing bad guys), but she's not very interested in exploring new and unheard of things.Since Digory was the kind of person who wanted to know everything, he grew up to be the famous Professor Kirk in other books in the series. After some argument, they all agreed to wear green rings ("Green is the color of safety," said Digory, "so you can always remember which ring is for what."), and jumped hand in hand.But as they approached Uncle Andrew's study, and were about to return to their own world, Polly would say "Change," and they would take off the green rings and put on the yellow ones.Digory wanted to call the "change," but Polly would not agree. They put on their green rings, joined hands, and shouted "One, two, three, jump" again.This time it worked.It's hard to tell what it's like because everything changes so fast.At first there were bright lights moving in the night sky: Digory always thought they were stars, and even swore that he saw Jupiter very close, and saw its satellites clearly.Then, rows of roofs and chimney-caps soon appeared around them, and they saw St. Paul's Cathedral, and knew they were in London, and, being able to see through the walls, into houses.They saw the vague figure of Uncle Andrew, which was becoming clearer and more fixed, and seemed to be gradually becoming the center of sight.Just when Uncle Andrew's figure was about to become fully distinct, Polly called out "Change"; and as soon as they changed the rings, our world faded away like a dream, and the green light over their heads grew stronger and stronger, Finally, they got out of the pool again and lay down on the shore.The woods were as green and bright and quiet as ever.The whole process of things happened in less than a minute. "Look," said Digory, "it's all going well, and now it's time to explore. Pick any waterhole. Here, we'll take that." "Stop!" said Polly. "Aren't we marking the edge of this pool?" They looked at each other.Both paled with horror as they realized the serious consequences of what Digory had almost done.Because there are many waterholes in the woods, the appearance is very similar, and the trees are no different. Once they leave the waterholes leading to our world without leaving any marks, the possibility of finding them again is only one percent. Digory opened the pencilknife with trembling hands, and cut a long strip of turf at the edge of the pool.The soil (with a clear fragrance) is dark reddish brown, very conspicuous in the green grass. "It's a good thing one of us thought of it," said Polly. "Come on, don't keep bragging," said Digory, "come on, I want to see what's in the other pools." Polly answered sharply, and Digory returned some harsh words.The bickering went on for several minutes, but it would be boring to write about.Let's skip this paragraph.Then, putting on their yellow rings, they stood nervously hand in hand on the edge of the pool, their hearts beating, and they shouted again, "One, two, three, jump!" Splash! Failed again.The pool appeared to be just a small puddle.They failed to reach the new world; for the second time that morning their feet were wet and their legs were splashed (assuming it was morning: there seemed to be no change of time in the woods between worlds). "What a nuisance!" exclaimed Digory. "What's the matter? We wear yellow rings. He said the yellow ones should go out." Actually, Uncle Andrew didn't know anything about the woods between the worlds, and he was wrong about the ring.The yellow ring was not a "going" ring, and the green ring was not a "returning" ring, at least not in the way he understood it.Both rings are made from material taken from the woods.The material of the yellow ring has a "centripetal force" that can take you to the woods, and it is the material itself that returns to the native land, to the middle ground.But the material of the green ring has a kind of "centrifugal force" that wants to leave the country, so it can take you out of the woods.You see, Uncle Andrew doesn't really understand what he does, as most wizards do.Of course, Digory did not fully realize the truth, or did not until later.After deliberation, they decided to put on the green rings, jump in and try again, and see how it turned out. "You will and I will," said Polly.The reason why she said this was because she believed in the bottom of her heart that no matter what kind of ring it was, it would not work in the new puddle, and at most a splash of water would be nothing to be afraid of.At any rate, they put on the green rings, and stood hand in hand at the water's edge again.This time, they looked cheerful and not as serious as the first time. "One, two, three, jump!" said Digory, and they jumped down.