The Princess and the Goblin
'And yet you won't believe me, Curdie?' expostulated the princess, now
fairly crying with vexation and sorrow at the gulf between her and
Curdie.
'No. I can't, and I can't help it,' said Curdie, turning to leave the
room.
'What SHALL I do, grandmother?' sobbed the princess, turning her face
round upon the lady's bosom, and shaking with suppressed sobs.
'You must give him time,' said her grandmother; 'and you must be
content not to be believed for a while. It is very hard to bear; but I
have had to bear it, and shall have to bear it many a time yet. I will
take care of what Curdie thinks of you in the end. You must let him go
now.'
'You're not coming, are you?' asked Curdie.
'No, Curdie; my grandmother says I must let you go. Turn to the right
when you get to the bottom of all the stairs, and that will take you to
the hall where the great door is.'
'Oh! I don't doubt I can find my way--without you, princess, or your
old grannie's thread either,' said Curdie quite rudely.
'Oh, Curdie! Curdie!'
'I wish I had gone home at once. I'm very much obliged to you, Irene,
for getting me out of that hole, but I wish you hadn't made a fool of
me afterwards.'
He said this as he opened the door, which he left open, and, without
another word, went down the stair. Irene listened with dismay to his
departing footsteps. Then turning again to the lady:
'What does it all mean, grandmother?' she sobbed, and burst into fresh
tears.
'It means, my love, that I did not mean to show myself. Curdie is not
yet able to believe some things. Seeing is not believing--it is only
seeing. You remember I told you that if Lootie were to see me, she
would rub her eyes, forget the half she saw, and call the other half
nonsense.'
'Yes; but I should have thought Curdie--'
'You are right. Curdie is much farther on than Lootie, and you will
see what will come of it. But in the meantime you must be content, I
say, to be misunderstood for a while. We are all very anxious to be
understood, and it is very hard not to be. But there is one thing much
more necessary.'
'What is that, grandmother?'
'To understand other people.'
'Yes, grandmother. I must be fair--for if I'm not fair to other
people, I'm not worth being understood myself. I see. So as Curdie
can't help it, I will not be vexed with him, but just wait.'
'There's my own dear child,' said her grandmother, and pressed her
close to her bosom.
'Why weren't you in your workroom when we came up, grandmother?' asked
Irene, after a few moments' silence.
'If I had been there, Curdie would have seen me well enough. But why
should I be there rather than in this beautiful room?'
'I thought you would be spinning.'
'I've nobody to spin for just at present. I never spin without knowing
for whom I am spinning.'
'That reminds me--there is one thing that puzzles me,' said the
princess: 'how are you to get the thread out of the mountain again?
Surely you won't have to make another for me? That would be such a
trouble!'
The lady set her down and rose and went to the fire. Putting in her
hand, she drew it out again and held up the shining ball between her
finger and thumb.
'I've got it now, you see,' she said, coming back to the princess, 'all
ready for you when you want it.'
Going to her cabinet, she laid it in the same drawer as before.
'And here is your ring,' she added, taking it from the little finger of
her left hand and putting it on the forefinger of Irene's right hand.
'Oh, thank you, grandmother! I feel so safe now!'
'You are very tired, my child,' the lady went on. 'Your hands are hurt
with the stones, and I have counted nine bruises on you. Just look
what you are like.'
And she held up to her a little mirror which she had brought from the
cabinet. The princess burst into a merry laugh at the sight. She was
so draggled with the stream and dirty with creeping through narrow
places, that if she had seen the reflection without knowing it was a
reflection, she would have taken herself for some gipsy child whose
face was washed and hair combed about once in a month. The lady laughed
too, and lifting her again upon her knee, took off her cloak and
night-gown. Then she carried her to the side of the room. Irene
wondered what she was going to do with her, but asked no
questions--only starting a little when she found that she was going to
lay her in the large silver bath; for as she looked into it, again she
saw no bottom, but the stars shining miles away, as it seemed, in a
great blue gulf. Her hands closed involuntarily on the beautiful arms
that held her, and that was all.
The lady pressed her once more to her bosom, saying:
'Do not be afraid, my child.'
'No, grandmother,' answered the princess, with a little gasp; and the
next instant she sank in the clear cool water.
When she opened her eyes, she saw nothing but a strange lovely blue
over and beneath and all about her. The lady, and the beautiful room,
had vanished from her sight, and she seemed utterly alone. But instead
of being afraid, she felt more than happy--perfectly blissful. And
from somewhere came the voice of the lady, singing a strange sweet
song, of which she could distinguish every word; but of the sense she
had only a feeling--no understanding. Nor could she remember a single
line after it was gone. It vanished, like the poetry in a dream, as
fast as it came. In after years, however, she would sometimes fancy
that snatches of melody suddenly rising in her brain must be little
phrases and fragments of the air of that song; and the very fancy would
make her happier, and abler to do her duty.
How long she lay in the water she did not know. It seemed a long
time--not from weariness but from pleasure. But at last she felt the
beautiful hands lay hold of her, and through the gurgling water she was
lifted out into the lovely room. The lady carried her to the fire, and
sat down with her in her lap, and dried her tenderly with the softest
towel. It was so different from Lootie's drying. When the lady had
done, she stooped to the fire, and drew from it her night-gown, as
white as snow.
'How delicious!' exclaimed the princess. 'It smells of all the roses
in the world, I think.'
When she stood up on the floor she felt as if she had been made over
again. Every bruise and all weariness were gone, and her hands were
soft and whole as ever.
'Now I am going to put you to bed for a good sleep,' said her
grandmother.
'But what will Lootie be thinking? And what am I to say to her when
she asks me where I have been?'
'Don't trouble yourself about it. You will find it all come right,'
said her grandmother, and laid her into the blue bed, under the rosy
counterpane.
'There is just one thing more,' said Irene. 'I am a little anxious
about Curdie. As I brought him into the house, I ought to have seen
him safe on his way home.'
'I took care of all that,' answered the lady. 'I told you to let him
go, and therefore I was bound to look after him. Nobody saw him, and
he is now eating a good dinner in his mother's cottage far up in the
mountain.'
'Then I will go to sleep,' said Irene, and in a few minutes she was
fast asleep.
CHAPTER 23
Curdie and His Mother
Curdie went up the mountain neither whistling nor singing, for he was
vexed with Irene for taking him in, as he called it; and he was vexed
with himself for having spoken to her so angrily. His mother gave a
cry of joy when she saw him, and at once set about getting him
something to eat, asking him questions all the time, which he did not
answer so cheerfully as usual. When his meal was ready, she left him
to eat it, and hurried to the mine to let his father know he was safe.
When she came back, she found him fast asleep upon her bed; nor did he
wake until his father came home in the evening.
'Now, Curdie,' his mother said, as they sat at supper, 'tell us the
whole story from beginning to end, just as it all happened.'
Curdie obeyed, and told everything to the point where they came out
upon the lawn in the garden of the king's house.
'And what happened after that?' asked his mother. 'You haven't told us
all. You ought to be very happy at having got away from those demons,
and instead of that I never saw you so gloomy. There must be something
more. Besides, you do not speak of that lovely child as I should like
to hear you. She saved your life at the risk of her own, and yet
somehow you don't seem to think much of it.'
'She talked such nonsense,' answered Curdie, 'and told me a pack of
things that weren't a bit true; and I can't get over it.'
'What were they?' asked his father. 'Your mother may be able to throw
some light upon them.'
Then Curdie made a clean breast of it, and told them everything.
They all sat silent for some time, pondering the strange tale. At last
Curdie's mother spoke.
'You confess, my boy,' she said, 'there is something about the whole
affair you do not understand?'
'Yes, of course, mother,' he answered. 'I cannot understand how a
child knowing nothing about the mountain, or even that I was shut up in
it, should come all that way alone, straight to where I was; and then,
after getting me out of the hole, lead me out of the mountain too,
where I should not have known a step of the way if it had been as light
as in the open air.'
'Then you have no right to say what she told you was not true. She did
take you out, and she must have had something to guide her: why not a
thread as well as a rope, or anything else? There is something you
cannot explain, and her explanation may be the right one.'
'It's no explanation at all, mother; and I can't believe it.'
'That may be only because you do not understand it. If you did, you
would probably find it was an explanation, and believe it thoroughly.
I don't blame you for not being able to believe it, but I do blame you
for fancying such a child would try to deceive you. Why should she?
Depend upon it, she told you all she knew. Until you had found a better
way of accounting for it all, you might at least have been more sparing
of your judgement.'
'That is what something inside me has been saying all the time,' said
Curdie, hanging down his head. 'But what do you make of the
grandmother? That is what I can't get over. To take me up to an old
garret, and try to persuade me against the sight of my own eyes that it
was a beautiful room, with blue walls and silver stars, and no end of
things in it, when there was nothing there but an old tub and a
withered apple and a heap of straw and a sunbeam! It was too bad! She
might have had some old woman there at least to pass for her precious
grandmother!'
'Didn't she speak as if she saw those other things herself, Curdie?'
'Yes. That's what bothers me. You would have thought she really meant
and believed that she saw every one of the things she talked about.
And not one of them there! It was too bad, I say.'
'Perhaps some people can see things other people can't see, Curdie,'
said his mother very gravely. 'I think I will tell you something I saw
myself once--only perhaps you won't believe me either!'
'Oh, mother, mother!' cried Curdie, bursting into tears; 'I don't
deserve that, surely!'
'But what I am going to tell you is very strange,' persisted his
mother; 'and if having heard it you were to say I must have been
dreaming, I don't know that I should have any right to be vexed with
you, though I know at least that I was not asleep.'
'Do tell me, mother. Perhaps it will help me to think better of the
princess.'
'That's why I am tempted to tell you,' replied his mother. 'But first,
I may as well mention that, according to old whispers, there is