Long, long ago, in the farthest corner of the Kingdom, was a mountain
covered with a pathless forest. Human folk never came this way. The
shadows of the forest were gloomy, and the sounds of the forest were
strange, and the name of the forest was full of dread. Men called it the
Great Fear. For it was here that the Gnomes lived and did their wicked
dealings.
The Gnomes were ugly and deformed and black; no larger than the
Elf-People, but instead of Fairy kindness their minds plotted evil. They
lived in the hollows and cracks of the mountain. Some of them camped out
under the great, poisonous toadstools which they loved, as they loved
everything dangerous to man. And all day long they dreamed, all night
long they wrought mischief. They were at the bottom of many of the evil
happenings in Kisington and elsewhere. For they could wreak their evil
magic from a long distance.
Now, of the race of Gnomes there was one apart. He was a queer little
fellow, the oldest, the ugliest, and the crookedest of them all. His
face was wrinkled like a brown walnut; and his little misshapen body was
bent under a hump which was the biggest part of him. But his mind was
not evil. He was quite harmless and mild and lazy, and he hated the dire
doings of his fellows who would neither mind their own business nor
leave him to his.
For centuries things went on from bad to worse in the Great Fear. At
last the Old Gnome could bear it no longer.
"I am very old and tired," he said. "It is almost time for me to curl up
in the long sleep. But I cannot sleep here! I should have bad dreams. I
will leave the Great Fear, which owes none of its name to me. I will go
and become a Hermit, as men say."
So spoke the queer little Gnome. And one bright noon when all the other
Gnomes were dreaming with shut eyes,--for they hated the daylight,--he
stumbled away as fast as his crooked little legs could take him south
from the Great Fear. Now, beyond this was a meadow, which was the
borderland across which human folk dared not approach the haunt of the
Gnomes. And beyond the meadow again was an Ancient Wood, which, though
he did not know it, was on the outskirts of Derrydown. Thither the Old
Gnome betook himself, and found it very good indeed. Like the Great Fear
it was dense and shadowy and cool. In places it was very dark. But there
was scarcely a spot whence you could not, when the sun shone, catch
speckled gleams of gold upon the moss; or, when the moon beamed, spy a
wealth of filtered silver. For the Ancient Wood was intersected hither
and yon by paths of the woodchoppers. And sun and moon love to peer down
through the man-made windows in the green roof of trees and beautify the
ways which human feet have trod.
The Old Gnome peered and pried about the Ancient Wood, seeking a
hermitage. At last he came upon the hollow stump of a tree, hidden in a
clump of feathery fern. It was thatched with green lichens without, and
carpeted within in a mossy pattern of green and gray and scarlet. Little
hard mushrooms, growing shelf-wise one above another, made a winding
staircase up to the doorway. Portieres of finest spider-wrought tapestry
swayed before door and window and draped the dark-hued walls; while
across one corner hung a hammock of heavier web, the very thing for a
weary Gnome's resting-place.
As soon as the Old Gnome spied this stump he cried,--"Ha! This is the
spot for me! Here will I make my hermitage. And when the time comes for
my long sleep, here will I rest forever." For you must know that the
Gnomes do not die, being immortal like the Fays; but unlike them growing
older and dryer and drowsier until they are fit only for eternal sleep.
The Old Gnome was soon at home in his cell; and very peaceful and cozy
he found it. For several days he lay and swung in his hammock, growing
comfortably drowsier and drowsier, too lazy even to gather berries for
his food. He would soon sleep without waking; and by and by the moss and
lichens would grow over him, too, and he would become a silent part of
the Ancient Wood,--a little green mound such as you yourself may have
seen many a time.
But one day while he was snoring, with his wrinkled hands folded
peacefully on his little chest, he heard a sound which made him open his
eyes with a snap. It was the noise of an axe chopping. The Old Gnome sat
up nervously and peered through his knot-hole window. A woodcutter was
at work at the very next tree.
"Hello!" said the Old Gnome, staring open-eyed; "That must be a _man_!"
For this was the first mortal he had ever seen.
Forgetting his drowsiness, he climbed up his staircase and peered
closely at the creature from behind a curtain of fern.
It was a strong young man, who wielded the axe heartily against the
giant oak. The Old Gnome watched him curiously, admiring the lithe sweep
of his arm and the rhythmic bend of his body.
"They are goodly folk, these men!" he sighed, looking down on his own
misshapen frame. "How can those evil brothers of mine care so much to
vex and trouble them?" And he turned over and tried to go to sleep; but
the sound of the axe kept knocking at something within him.
Suddenly, the man made a mis-stroke. The axe slipped and came down upon
his sandaled foot. With a cry he dropped the axe and fell to the ground,
lying very still and white.
"Ha!" frowned the Old Gnome, "the work of my brothers! Some one of them
must have charmed that axe. But how strange he looks! Doubtless it is
pain, which I do not know. Ah, pain must be something very sore!" And he
felt a throb of pity.
He hobbled to the spot where the woodman lay. Across his leg was a deep
gash and on the moss were drops of crimson. The Old Gnome looked at them
wonderingly, for the Gnomes are bloodless. "How beautiful the color!" he
cried, and he touched his finger to one of the drops. Immediately a
thrill went through his cold body, and he seemed to feel a fresh draught
of life. New impulses came to him.
"These men!" cried he, "how weak they are, after all! How greatly they
need aid. I can help him now,--even I!" And his ugly little face
wrinkled into the first grin it had known for centuries.
He called to mind his long-forgotten skill in herbs, and hunted in the
Ancient Wood for certain plants of healing. One he crushed and laid upon
the wound to stanch the blood. Others he set out in the ground close
under the young man's nose, so that they seemed to be growing naturally
there.
Presently the woodman opened his eyes and stared about him dazedly, but
the Old Gnome had hidden himself. As he gained strength, the woodman
tore a strip of linen and bound it upon his leg. Then, sniffing the
aromatic herbs which grew conveniently at hand, he plucked a bunch with
which to make a lotion, and with it limped painfully from the wood.
The Old Gnome watched him go with curious eyes. "I wonder if he will
return," he said to himself. And he decided not to sleep until he should
know how it fared with the young man.
It was not many days thereafter before the woodman returned to the
forest. The lotion had been wondrous helpful, and had healed him more
quickly than he had dared to hope; for he was eager to be at work again.
Limping slightly, for the wound had been a sore one, David began work
anew.
Day by day the Old Gnome watched him, half jealously at first. But the
more he watched the more he liked the ways of the intruder. The woodman
sang at his work; his eyes sparkled and his lips smiled as if with
pleasant thoughts.
The Old Gnome found himself smiling too, unseen behind the fern. "I will
not sleep yet awhile," he said, "for there is work to do."
In the night when the Ancient Wood was silent he toiled long and
heartily at the crafts wherein he was wise. And the woodman tasted the
result. For the Old Gnome made the berries to ripen more quickly in that
glade. He caused delicious mushrooms to spring up all about. He coaxed a
spring of fair water from the bed where it slumbered underground and
made it gush into a little basin where David came upon it gladly. He
caused medicinal herbs to grow, and certain fragrant plants that drove
away the mischievous insects sent by his brother Gnomes. All this the
Old One did while David was away; and the young man did not know. But he
was very happy and busy. Now, one day the young man finished his
woodcutting, and lo! he had made a clearing in the Ancient Wood large
enough for a tiny house; but the Gnome did not know this. David looked
about him at the spring and the flowers and the berries of the pleasant
place which the Old Gnome had prepared, and said, "It is good!"
Forthwith of the logs which he had felled he began to build the house
itself.
When the Old Gnome saw what David was about to do, indeed he was angry!
For he said,--
"Oho! I did not bargain for this. This is my wood! I want no
neighbor,--though a merry visitor was not unwelcome. What is to become
of my solitude, of my hermitage? And how am I to sleep, with another
restless creature living close by forever and ever?"
For several days he sulked in his cell and would not work. But finally
the merry sound of the young man's whistle keeping time to the wheeze of
saw and the knock of hammer made the Old Gnome smile again, and he said
to himself,--
"Well, what of it? True, I shall have a neighbor for good and all. But
he will be alone and speechless, since there is no one with whom to
chatter; and he will never trouble me. Let him build here if he will."
David builded his house; and a pretty little place it was, for he was a
careful workman and his heart was in it. When all was done he laid the
axe aside, hid the hammer and saw, put on fine new clothes and went away
across the meadow, whistling happily as a bird. It was the Gnome's first
chance to see the inside of a man's dwelling, and he lost no time in
going there, you may be sure. He found many things to wonder at, for
naturally it was very different from a Gnome's hermitage. But nothing
surprised him more than the wreaths of flowers which David had hung over
door and window and fireplace, over bed and chairs and table, so that
the place was like a fragrant bower prepared for a beloved guest.
The Old Gnome shook his head. "Strange folk, these men!" said he. "Why,
and why, and why?" But he brushed up the sawdust, which David had
forgotten in a corner; and he re-piled the kindlings on the hearth,
which David had hastily put together for a fire. He neatly spread the
bed, which David had clumsily prepared; and he made tidy the kitchen
which, in his eagerness to don his new clothes, David had quite
overlooked. Then the Old One went back to his cell and lay down in his
hammock, chuckling. "How surprised the fellow will be!" he said.
At night the Old Gnome heard voices in the wood, and sprang up from his
hammock angrily. "More of them?" he cried. "Am I to hear human prattle
around me, after all?" And he peered from the balcony of his cell with
eyes almost as fierce as those of his brother Gnomes in the Great Fear.
He stared and stared at what he saw. For the young woodcutter was
returning in his fine clothes, and with him was a fair maiden, also in
holiday gear. Both looked very happy and smiling.
They entered the open door, and the Old Gnome watched to see David's
surprise when he should discover how matters had improved in his
absence. But the woodman was thinking so much about his pretty new wife
that he had eyes for nothing else. However, she looked about her with
surprise and pleasure, and the Old Gnome heard her say to her husband,--
"Ah, David! What a tidy housekeeper you are! Or is it some Fairy who has
made the house so neat and ready for me? Surely, no one but a beautiful,
kind Fairy would sweep the floor so spotless and make so smooth the bed.
Oh, I am glad we have a Fairy friend!"
What David replied the Old Gnome did not hear. He was filled with
wondering delight. A Fairy! The sweet little thing had thought it must
be a beautiful Fairy who had done this work! The Old Gnome looked
whimsically down at his bandy legs and ugly body, and sighed and smiled.
"Ah, if I were but a Fairy!" he said. "Fairies are beautiful and good;
they live forever young and gay, and there is no end to the kindness
they may do. But I!"--he sighed again,--"a Fairy, indeed!" And he
hobbled away to his cell, thinking kindly of the little wife who of all
the world had spoken the first word of praise for him; and of the strong
young man who loved her.
Now happy days followed in the little house in the Ancient Wood; happy
days, too, for the Old Gnome in his hermit's cell. For he was busy all
the time doing kind deeds for his new neighbors; without their knowing
it. Sometimes he set the table for the morning meal. Sometimes he helped
in the churning and made the butter come quickly. Sometimes he blew the
fire like a little bellows; a hundred and one things he found to do
about the cottage. And it was his reward to hear the young wife
say,--"Oh! David, the good Fairy has been here again. What a dear, good,
beautiful Fairy it must be!"
The Old Gnome was very careful to keep his ugly face out of sight, you
may be sure.
Days went by, and the Old Gnome was ever more and more busy in the hut
of the young people, so that really I do not know how they would have
done without him. He was scarcely ever in the hermitage nowadays, except
for a few hours' sleep by daylight; and he scarcely found time to look
after his own affairs, such as they were, so little of a hermit was he
become! But every night the young wife set out a bowl of curds and cream
for the beautiful Fairy who helped her; and sometimes David left half
his luncheon of bread and cheese in the woods, for his unknown friend.
The Old Gnome was growing fat and merry because of this good fare; but
he seemed as little like a Fairy as ever.
The months went by; and one day a surprising thing happened. The Old
Gnome, sleeping in his hammock, was wakened by a strange, shrill little
cry. He sat up and listened wonderingly. It was broad daylight, but at
the risk of being seen he ran as fast as he could, and climbing up the
vine of eglantine peered in at the chamber window whence came the cry.
And there lying on the young wife's bed was a wee pink baby! The Old
Gnome looked at it long and earnestly; and the more he peered the more
he liked the look of this newest little neighbor.
"It is as beautiful as a Fairy!" he thought. "I must be good to it, and
perhaps it will grow to love me."
From that time the Old Gnome had no rest at all. Unseen--wrapped in a
cloak of shadows--he sat for hours while the baby was asleep, fanning
the flies away from its little face. When it was restless, he kept the
clothes over its tiny feet, drawing them up as fast as the baby kicked
them away. And when the young wife came, she would say,
"See, David! Our Fairy has been watching over our baby, just as it
watched over us. Oh, now I feel quite safe from those wicked Gnomes who
live in the Great Fear!" At this the Old Gnome would chuckle from the
corner where he lurked, and where only the baby's bright eyes could
pierce the cloak of shadows. It was a great day for the Old Gnome when
first the baby smiled at him. It was a still greater day when she held
out her little arms to him, and the Old One knew that they were friends.
Soon she was lisping words in her shrill voice; and one of the first
things she tried to say was "Fairy friend." She looked straight at the
Old Gnome when she did it, and a thrill went through him at the words.
She saw him; yet she thought he was a Fairy! Poor little mite! He
dreaded the day when she should know the difference. But the baby seemed
to love him more and more every day, and the Old Gnome's cell became her
favorite playhouse.
When she grew old enough to talk, she and her mother spoke often of the
Fairy friend; and the little girl told strange tales of his doings when
no one but herself was about, for still he shyly crept into his cloak of
shadows when the grown-up folk were near. When the mother asked what
like the Fairy was, she shook her head. "I cannot tell!" she would
answer. "Not like you, Mother dear; but beautiful also, and good and
merry."
Now, the woodcutter's wife was a very good woman, but she was curious.
The more she heard about the friendly, mysterious Fairy whom her child
alone had seen, the more she longed to see him for herself. This was not
kind; for she knew he did not wish to be seen. But she was sorely
tempted. One day she heard the little one out in the Ancient Wood
laughing and talking merrily with some one. "It is the Fairy!" said the
mother, and she picked up her toes and crept noiselessly to spy upon
them.
There was the baby sitting on a bed of moss; and there, plainly seen
without his shadow-cloak, was the Old Gnome, turning somersaults for her
and dancing on his crooked legs to make her laugh.
But the mother did not laugh at what she saw! She burst out of the
bushes with a cry and seized the baby in her arms. "My child!" she
screamed. "Oh, the wicked Gnome! Help, David, help!"
Her cry summoned the woodcutter, who came running up, very pale, with
his axe in his hand. "What is this?" he asked. "Who is injuring my
child?"
Sobbing, his wife pointed to where the Old Gnome cowered, blinking,
caught at last in the sunlight outside his cell.
"A Gnome!" cried David in horror. "One of the pests from the Great Fear!
What are you doing here, Monster? How shall we pay you to go away and
leave us in peace?"
"I will go away," said the Old Gnome humbly, "though I belong not to the
Great Fear, and I came here before you. My wish is not evil you-ward. It
is I who am a friend. But I will go." With a kind look at the baby he
turned away.
But the baby struggled down from her mother's arms and ran after him
crying,--"No, no! Do not go away, dear, beautiful Fairy! Mother! Father!
It is the friend whom we all love. I have heard you praise him. Do not
send him away."
"The Fairy!" cried the father, running to capture her.
"It is no Fairy, child!" said the mother. "It is one of the ugly, wicked
Gnomes who do only evil. Let him go!"
But the child struggled and shrieked. "He shall not go! It is the
beautiful Fairy who helps us. I have watched him doing all the kind
things you say the Fairy does, and I love him dearly. He shall not go!"
The father and mother looked at each other, then at the shrinking Gnome.
"Is this true?" they demanded, "or is this some wicked Gnome-trick which
has bewitched our child?"
The Old Gnome bowed meekly. "Alas! I am no Fairy, as I fain would be,"
he confessed. "But I loved to hear you call me so. I am a Gnome; but I
have done no evil, only good, so far as my skill went. The happy days
are over now. The child knows the truth. No one will ever again think me
beautiful or good. I had forgotten how old I was; I had almost grown to
feel young again in the merry, busy days of service. But now the time
has come indeed for me to lie down in the long sleep. I will go away and
find a new cell, and curl me up in a happy dream which will last
forever."
Once more he turned to go. The father and mother were silent.
But the baby burst into violent weeping. "Oh, he is beautiful,
beautiful, the kind, dear Fairy! Do you not see how beautiful he is,
Mother, Father?" she cried.
The Old Gnome turned and looked at her, smiling sadly and shaking his
head with a tender light in his eyes. "No, no!" he said, "not beautiful;
only loving!"
"But yes!" cried the mother, staring amazedly. "Think, David, of all he
has done for us. He does, he does look beautiful to me!"
David stared also. "From the day my foot was wounded," he said, "only
good has befallen me here. And if he has done it, the kind little
fellow!--Yes, yes! He does, indeed, look beautiful to me!"
"Ah!" cried the child, laughing and clapping her hands. "I was right! I
knew he was our kind Fairy, all the time. If he is good, he is no Gnome.
It is only a name. If he seems beautiful to us, then he is beautiful,
indeed. He is a Fairy! He shall live here with us and we will love him
forever."
And lo, as she spoke, the Old Gnome looked wonderingly down at his body.
He seemed to have changed. He was no longer crooked and old, but light
and airy and beautiful. Over his head arched gauzy wings and his dress
sparkled like dew. Also he felt young and full of power to do things he
had never done before.
"I believe I am a Fairy!" he cried joyously. "And I may live and love
and serve forever, and never be tired or sleepy!"
So it fell out as they all wished. And the hermit's cell became a Fairy
palace.