The Princess and the Goblin
something more than common about the king's family; and the queen was
of the same blood, for they were cousins of some degree. There were
strange stories told concerning them--all good stories--but strange,
very strange. What they were I cannot tell, for I only remember the
faces of my grandmother and my mother as they talked together about
them. There was wonder and awe--not fear--in their eyes, and they
whispered, and never spoke aloud. But what I saw myself was this: Your
father was going to work in the mine one night, and I had been down
with his supper. It was soon after we were married, and not very long
before you were born. He came with me to the mouth of the mine, and
left me to go home alone, for I knew the way almost as well as the
floor of our own cottage. It was pretty dark, and in some parts of the
road where the rocks overhung nearly quite dark. But I got along
perfectly well, never thinking of being afraid, until I reached a spot
you know well enough, Curdie, where the path has to make a sharp turn
out of the way of a great rock on the left-hand side. When I got
there, I was suddenly surrounded by about half a dozen of the cobs, the
first I had ever seen, although I had heard tell of them often enough.
One of them blocked up the path, and they all began tormenting and
teasing me in a way it makes me shudder to think of even now.'
'If I had only been with you!' cried father and son in a breath.
The mother gave a funny little smile, and went on.
'They had some of their horrible creatures with them too, and I must
confess I was dreadfully frightened. They had torn my clothes very
much, and I was afraid they were going to tear myself to pieces, when
suddenly a great white soft light shone upon me. I looked up. A broad
ray, like a shining road, came down from a large globe of silvery
light, not very high up, indeed not quite so high as the horizon--so it
could not have been a new star or another moon or anything of that
sort. The cobs dropped persecuting me, and looked dazed, and I thought
they were going to run away, but presently they began again. The same
moment, however, down the path from the globe of light came a bird,
shining like silver in the sun. It gave a few rapid flaps first, and
then, with its wings straight out, shot, sliding down the slope of the
light. It looked to me just like a white pigeon. But whatever it was,
when the cobs caught sight of it coming straight down upon them, they
took to their heels and scampered away across the mountain, leaving me
safe, only much frightened. As soon as it had sent them off, the bird
went gliding again up the light, and the moment it reached the globe
the light disappeared, just as if a shutter had been closed over a
window, and I saw it no more. But I had no more trouble with the cobs
that night or ever after.'
'How strange!' exclaimed Curdie.
'Yes, it was strange; but I can't help believing it, whether you do or
not,' said his mother.
'It's exactly as your mother told it to me the very next morning,' said
his father.
'You don't think I'm doubting my own mother?' cried Curdie.
'There are other people in the world quite as well worth believing as
your own mother,' said his mother. 'I don't know that she's so much the
fitter to be believed that she happens to be your mother, Mr. Curdie.
There are mothers far more likely to tell lies than the little girl
I saw talking to the primroses a few weeks ago. If she were to lie I
should begin to doubt my own word.'
'But princesses have told lies as well as other people,' said Curdie.
'Yes, but not princesses like that child. She's a good girl, I am
certain, and that's more than being a princess. Depend upon it you
will have to be sorry for behaving so to her, Curdie. You ought at
least to have held your tongue.'
'I am sorry now,' answered Curdie.
'You ought to go and tell her so, then.'
'I don't see how I could manage that. They wouldn't let a miner boy
like me have a word with her alone; and I couldn't tell her before that
nurse of hers. She'd be asking ever so many questions, and I don't
know how many the little princess would like me to answer. She told me
that Lootie didn't know anything about her coming to get me out of the
mountain. I am certain she would have prevented her somehow if she had
known it. But I may have a chance before long, and meantime I must try
to do something for her. I think, father, I have got on the track at
last.'
'Have you, indeed, my boy?' said Peter. 'I am sure you deserve some
success; you have worked very hard for it. What have you found out?'
'It's difficult, you know, father, inside the mountain, especially in
the dark, and not knowing what turns you have taken, to tell the lie of
things outside.'
'Impossible, my boy, without a chart, or at least a compass,' returned
his father.
'Well, I think I have nearly discovered in what direction the cobs are
mining. If I am right, I know something else that I can put to it, and
then one and one will make three.'
'They very often do, Curdie, as we miners ought to be very well aware.
Now tell us, my boy, what the two things are, and see whether we can
guess at the same third as you.'
'I don't see what that has to do with the princess,' interposed his
mother.
'I will soon let you see that, mother. Perhaps you may think me
foolish, but until I am sure there, is nothing in my present fancy, I
am more determined than ever to go on with my observations. Just as we
came to the channel by which we got out, I heard the miners at work
somewhere near--I think down below us. Now since I began to watch
them, they have mined a good half-mile, in a straight line; and so far
as I am aware, they are working in no other part of the mountain. But
I never could tell in what direction they were going. When we came out
in the king's garden, however, I thought at once whether it was
possible they were working towards the king's house; and what I want to
do tonight is to make sure whether they are or not. I will take a
light with me--'
'Oh, Curdie,' cried his mother, 'then they will see you.'
'I'm no more afraid of them now than I was before,' rejoined Curdie,
'now that I've got this precious shoe. They can't make another such in
a hurry, and one bare foot will do for my purpose. Woman as she may be,
I won't spare her next time. But I shall be careful with my light, for
I don't want them to see me. I won't stick it in my hat.'
'Go on, then, and tell us what you mean to do.'
'I mean to take a bit of paper with me and a pencil, and go in at the
mouth of the stream by which we came out. I shall mark on the paper as
near as I can the angle of every turning I take until I find the cobs
at work, and so get a good idea in what direction they are going. If
it should prove to be nearly parallel with the stream, I shall know it
is towards the king's house they are working.'
'And what if you should? How much wiser will you be then?'
'Wait a minute, mother dear. I told you that when I came upon the
royal family in the cave, they were talking of their prince--Harelip,
they called him--marrying a sun-woman--that means one of us--one with
toes to her feet. Now in the speech one of them made that night at
their great gathering, of which I heard only a part, he said that peace
would be secured for a generation at least by the pledge the prince
would hold for the good behaviour of her relatives: that's what he
said, and he must have meant the sun-woman the prince was to marry. I
am quite sure the king is much too proud to wish his son to marry any
but a princess, and much too knowing to fancy that his having a peasant
woman for a wife would be of any great advantage to them.'
'I see what you are driving at now,' said his mother.
'But,' said his father, 'our king would dig the mountain to the plain
before he would have his princess the wife of a cob, if he were ten
times a prince.'
'Yes; but they think so much of themselves!' said his mother. 'Small
creatures always do. The bantam is the proudest cock in my little
yard.'
'And I fancy,' said Curdie, 'if they once got her, they would tell the
king they would kill her except he consented to the marriage.'
'They might say so,' said his father, 'but they wouldn't kill her; they
would keep her alive for the sake of the hold it gave them over our
king. Whatever he did to them, they would threaten to do the same to
the princess.'
'And they are bad enough to torment her just for their own amusement--I
know that,' said his mother.
'Anyhow, I will keep a watch on them, and see what they are up to,'
said Curdie. 'It's too horrible to think of. I daren't let myself do
it. But they shan't have her--at least if I can help it. So, mother
dear--my clue is all right--will you get me a bit of paper and a pencil
and a lump of pease pudding, and I will set out at once. I saw a place
where I can climb over the wall of the garden quite easily.'
'You must mind and keep out of the way of the men on the watch,' said
his mother.
'That I will. I don't want them to know anything about it. They would
spoil it all. The cobs would only try some other plan--they are such
obstinate creatures! I shall take good care, mother. They won't kill
and eat me either, if they should come upon me. So you needn't mind
them.'
His mother got him what he had asked for, and Curdie set out. Close
beside the door by which the princess left the garden for the mountain
stood a great rock, and by climbing it Curdie got over the wall. He
tied his clue to a stone just inside the channel of the stream, and
took his pickaxe with him. He had not gone far before he encountered a
horrid creature coming towards the mouth. The spot was too narrow for
two of almost any size or shape, and besides Curdie had no wish to let
the creature pass. Not being able to use his pickaxe, however, he had
a severe struggle with him, and it was only after receiving many bites,
some of them bad, that he succeeded in killing him with his
pocket-knife. Having dragged him out, he made haste to get in again
before another should stop up the way.
I need not follow him farther in this night's adventures. He returned
to his breakfast, satisfied that the goblins were mining in the
direction of the palace--on so low a level that their intention must,
he thought, be to burrow under the walls of the king's house, and rise
up inside it--in order, he fully believed, to lay hands on the little
princess, and carry her off for a wife to their horrid Harelip.
CHAPTER 24
Irene Behaves Like a Princess
When the princess awoke from the sweetest of sleeps, she found her
nurse bending over her, the housekeeper looking over the nurse's
shoulder, and the laundry-maid looking over the housekeeper's. The room
was full of women-servants; and the gentlemen-at-arms, with a long
column of servants behind them, were peeping, or trying to peep in at
the door of the nursery.
'Are those horrid creatures gone?' asked the princess, remembering
first what had terrified her in the morning.
'You naughty, naughty little princess!' cried Lootie.
Her face was very pale, with red streaks in it, and she looked as if
she were going to shake her; but Irene said nothing--only waited to
hear what should come next.
'How could you get under the clothes like that, and make us all fancy
you were lost! And keep it up all day too! You are the most obstinate
child! It's anything but fun to us, I can tell you!'
It was the only way the nurse could account for her disappearance.
'I didn't do that, Lootie,' said Irene, very quietly.
'Don't tell stories!' cried her nurse quite rudely.
'I shall tell you nothing at all,' said Irene.
'That's just as bad,' said the nurse.