Fairy Tales & Fantasy: George MacDonald Collection (With Complete Original Illustrations). George MacDonald
delight, Curdie sat down at a corner of the hearth, on a stool opposite his mother's chair, and gazed at the princess, who slept as peacefully as if she had been in her own bed. All at once she opened her eyes and fixed them on him.
"Oh, Curdie! you're come!" she said quietly. "I thought you would!"
Curdie rose and stood before her with downcast eyes.
"Irene," he said, "I am very sorry I did not believe you."
"Oh, never mind, Curdie!" answered the princess. "You couldn't, you know. You do believe me now, don't you?"
"I can't help it now. I ought to have helped it before."
"Why can't you help it now?"
"Because, just as I was going into the mountain to look for you, I got hold of your thread, and it brought me here."
"Then you've come from my house, have you?"
"Yes, I have."
"I didn't know you were there."
"I've been there two or three days, I believe."
"And I never knew it!—Then perhaps you can tell me why my grandmother has brought me here? I can't think. Something woke me—I didn't know what, but I was frightened, and I felt for the thread, and there it was! I was more frightened still when it brought me out on the mountain, for I thought it was going to take me into it again, and I like the outside of it best. I supposed you were in trouble again, and I had to get you out, but it brought me here instead; and, oh, Curdie! your mother has been so kind to me—just like my own grandmother!"
Here Curdie's mother gave the princess a hug, and the princess turned and gave her a sweet smile, and held up her mouth to kiss her.
"Then you didn't see the cobs?" asked Curdie.
"No; I haven't been into the mountain, I told you, Curdie."
"But the cobs have been into your house—all over it—and into your bedroom making such a row!"
"What did they want there? It was very rude of them."
"They wanted you—to carry you off into the mountain with them, for a wife to their Prince Harelip."
"Oh, how dreadful!" cried the princess, shuddering.
"But you needn't be afraid, you know. Your grandmother takes care of you."
"Ah! you do believe in my grandmother then? I'm so glad! She made me think you would some day."
All at once Curdie remembered his dream, and was silent, thinking.
"But how did you come to be in my house, and me not know it?" asked the princess.
Then Curdie had to explain everything—how he had watched for her sake, how he had been wounded and shut up by the soldiers, how he heard the noises and could not rise, and how the beautiful old lady had come to him, and all that followed.
"Poor Curdie! to lie there hurt and ill, and me never to know it!" exclaimed the princess, stroking his rough hand. "I would not have hesitated to come and nurse you, if they had told me."
"I didn't see you were lame," said his mother.
"Am I, mother? Oh—yes—I suppose I ought to be. I declare I've never thought of it since I got up to go down amongst the cobs!"
"Let me see the wound," said his mother.
He pulled down his stocking—when behold, except a great scar, his leg was perfectly sound!
Curdie and his mother gazed in each other's eyes, full of wonder, but Irene called out—
"I thought so, Curdie! I was sure it wasn't a dream. I was sure my grandmother had been to see you.—Don't you smell the roses? It was my grandmother healed your leg, and sent you to help me."
"No, Princess Irene," said Curdie; "I wasn't good enough to be allowed to help you: I didn't believe you. Your grandmother took care of you without me."
"She sent you to help my people, anyhow. I wish my king-papa would come. I do want so to tell him how good you have been!"
"But," said the mother, "we are forgetting how frightened your people must be.—You must take the princess home at once, Curdie—or at least go and tell them where she is."
"Yes, mother. Only I'm dreadfully hungry. Do let me have some breakfast first. They ought to have listened to me, and then they wouldn't have been taken by surprise as they were."
"That is true, Curdie; but it is not for you to blame them much. You remember?"
"Yes, mother, I do. Only I must really have something to eat."
"You shall, my boy—as fast as I can get it," said his mother, rising and setting the princess on her chair.
But before his breakfast was ready, Curdie jumped up so suddenly as to startle both his companions.
"Mother, mother!" he cried, "I was forgetting. You must take the princess home yourself. I must go and wake my father."
Without a word of explanation, he rushed to the place where his father was sleeping. Having thoroughly roused him with what he told him, he darted out of the cottage.
CHAPTER XXIX
MASON-WORK
HE had all at once remembered the resolution of the goblins to carry out their second plan upon the failure of the first. No doubt they were already busy, and the mine was therefore in the greatest danger of being flooded and rendered useless—not to speak of the lives of the miners.
When he reached the mouth of the mine, after rousing all the miners within reach, he found his father and a good many more just entering. They all hurried to the gang by which he had found a way into the goblin country. There the foresight of Peter had already collected a great many blocks of stone, with cement, ready for building up the weak place—well enough known to the goblins. Although there was not room for more than two to be actually building at once, they managed, by setting all the rest to work in preparing the cement, and passing the stones, to finish in the course of the day a huge buttress filling the whole gang, and supported everywhere by the live rock. Before the hour when they usually dropped work, they were satisfied that the mine was secure.
They had heard goblin hammers and pickaxes busy all the time, and at length fancied they heard sounds of water they had never heard before. But that was otherwise accounted for when they left the mine; for they stepped out into a tremendous storm which was raging all over the mountain. The thunder was bellowing, and the lightning lancing out of a huge black cloud which lay above it, and hung down its edges of thick mist over its sides. The lightning was breaking out of the mountain, too, and flashing up into the cloud. From the state of the brooks, now swollen into raging torrents, it was evident that the storm had been storming all day.
The wind was blowing as if it would blow him off the mountain, but, anxious about his mother and the princess, Curdie darted up through the thick of the tempest. Even if they had not set out before the storm came on, he did not judge them safe, for, in such a storm even their poor little house was in danger. Indeed he soon found that but for a huge rock against which it was built, and which protected it both from the blasts and the waters, it must have been swept if it was not blown away; for the two torrents into which this rock parted the rush of water behind it united again in front of the cottage—two roaring and dangerous streams, which his mother and the princess could not possibly have passed. It was with great difficulty that he forced his way through one of them, and up to the door.
The moment his hand fell on the latch, through all the uproar of winds and waters came the joyous cry of the princess:—
"There's Curdie! Curdie! Curdie!"
She was sitting wrapped in blankets on the bed, his mother trying for the hundredth