_The Court of the Fairy Queen_
At first Meg thought she was alone, but soon she saw a lady standing
near, picking pale yellow blossoms. She wore a green gown, and her feet
were bare. On her bright hair was a little crown that seemed made of
wee gold stars, and her face was very grave and sweet. Meg went up to
her timidly.
“Please,” she said with a catch in her voice, “will you tell me the way
to Fairyland? I—I’m in a great hurry.”
“What do you want to do in Fairyland?” said the lady, kindly. “Are you
in trouble?”
“N-n-o—that is, a little. I want to tell the Fairy Queen something she
ought to know. And I want to let Mother Goose know how sorry I am that
I was disobedient and naughty, and of course if I could I should like
to help Dick save Humpty Dumpty.”
“You look sad,” said the lady, and put her arm about Meg.
“I want Bab and Dick,—that’s all,” said Meg, simply. “And—and—of course
I’m sorry, and—and _worried_ about things, you know.”
The lady smiled quite merrily. Then she lifted Meg in her arms and
kissed her softly.
“Dear little girl!” she said. “Sweet Meg! you have had a harder journey
than Bab, but you are at the end of it.”
“Who—who are you, please?” whispered Meg, wondering that she knew their
names.
“You may call me the Lady of Dreams-Come-True,” said the green-gowned
stranger. “But that is not my name. Now run along quickly to the Court
of the Fairies.”
“Oh, but I am so dusty and dirty!” exclaimed Meg. “I can’t go to Court
this way!”
“You have your pink silk dress with you,” said the Lady of
Dreams-Come-True, laughing.
Meg looked down in surprise. Over her left arm hung her once-treasured
pink gown! Somehow, among these wonderful flowers and beside this
beautiful lady, it did not look nearly so pretty as it once had. She
let it slip to the ground.
“I must have been very silly,” she said half to herself, “to want to
bring _that_ to Make Believe Land!”
[Illustration: BAB AND THE SAND MAN]
The lady laughed again, in a pleased way.
“Then you must go to Court as you are,” she said; “but _I_ think that
you look very nice!”
Meg looked down again, and saw that her white dress was now as fresh
and clean as though it had just been washed.
“Why—why—” she stammered, “how wonderful! It might almost be Fairyland
already!”
“It _is_ Fairyland already,” said her new friend. “Look!”
Over the flowers Meg could see a thousand faint and shining wings. The
air shimmered and glinted with them; the flowers swayed softly beneath
their fanning. The daintiest, loveliest faces and forms showed dimly
between every glistening, misty pair of these wonderful wings.
Meg gazed, bewildered.
“Oh, how beautiful!” she cried softly.
“Good-bye, Meg,” was all the lady would say. She seemed to be growing
transparent and misty herself.
“Good-bye!” cried Meg. “Oh! shall I see you again?”
“Oh, yes! yes!” she answered, smiling, and seemed to become a little
less distinct. “Some day—some day—” murmured Dreams-Come-True; and
straightway vanished into the soft rainbow-tinted air.
As Meg walked on through the Flower Meadow, the delicate wings and
faces grew more and more distinct, and seemed to crowd ever closer
and closer about her. Everywhere they floated, like faintly coloured
mist-wreaths, like the ghosts of big, beautiful butterflies, like
flowers made alive. Everywhere the light glowed, brilliant and yet
soft, like a huge, liquid opal. Sometimes it seemed to Meg to be shot
with the palest pink, sometimes the purest blue, sometimes the most
exquisite green, the clearest yellow, the faintest lavender. And what
with the flowers, and the wings, and the magical colours in the air,
Meg felt as though she were moving through the heart of a great rainbow.
About her feet and against her dress swayed and bumped the big bright
flowers. Some of them were so tall that they touched her shoulders
with their sweet, nodding heads; sometimes they were so tiny that she
almost stepped on them, though, of course, she tried not to. The sky
was filled with rainbow-coloured clouds; a delicious perfume hung
everywhere. In the distance rose slender turrets—gold and rose-coloured
and snow-white—from the mist of flowers and wings.
And as Meg listened, she could hear any number of voices singing, in
the sweetest chorus imaginable, a little, soft song about roses and
clouds and dew and star-beams.
There was no doubt about it,—no doubt at all: as the Lady of
Dreams-Come-True had said, she really was in Fairyland at last. These
airy beings floating and fluttering, singing and crowding on every
hand, were certainly the Fairies,—the dainty folk whose Queen she was
seeking.
Meg resolved not to loiter any longer in that delicious field, but to
hurry across it as fast as she could and to find the Queen. But when
she tried to move more quickly, she found that the soft transparent
forms were holding her back. She struggled for a minute or two in
vain. She felt hands as light as rain-drops on her wrists, and at last
she heard a high, sweet laugh. Then the clearest of bell-like voices
said:
“Well, Mortal, what are you doing here? And why do you struggle so hard
against the Fairy Folk?”
“Oh, please!” panted Meg. “Take me to the Fairy Queen!”
Again came the light, soft laugh.
“Not so fast, Mortal! That is easy to ask. Do you think our Queen is so
easy to see? You must state your business.”
“I _must_ see the Queen!” cried Meg. “It—it’s very important!
It’s”—speaking with a sort of rush—“it’s about the Wicked King, and the
spell in the crystal box!”
Instantly an angry chorus filled the air, and Meg found herself held
more tightly than before.
“How dare she?” cried the Fairies. “How dare she speak of the Wicked
King and the spell _here_? She must know either the Wicked King or
Grump!”
“Yes!” Meg tried to explain, speaking eagerly. “And Grump told me—”
But at this point the chorus rose to the shrillest rage.
“Grump! Grump! She knows him! She admits it! Away with her! She shall
not live another hour! No—no—turn her into a rat or an oyster! She is a
friend of our dear Lady’s enemy, the Gray Dwarf!”
“Indeed I’m _not_ a friend of Grump’s!” exclaimed Meg, indignantly.
“You just ask _him_ if I am!”
But they would not listen to her, and she felt herself being hurried
away, faster and faster and faster with every second, until she was
sure she should die if they did not let her stop to take breath.
“Please—please—” she panted, as they pulled her along, “I can explain
if you will just wait one moment!” But they were far too busy abusing
her, to hear a word she said.
“Oh, dear, dear, dear!” sighed poor Meg to herself. “Grump _must_ be a
nasty person, if just mentioning his name has this effect!”
As she was dragged along through the Flower Meadow, she kept repeating
over and over: “I _must_ see the Queen! I _must_ tell her! I _must_
warn her!” And suddenly—she never knew how, but she suspected Mother
Goose or Dreams-Come-True of having something to do with it—she really
did break from the grasp of her captors and dash on across the field
alone.
She could hear the sweet, excited voices of the Fairies, and could feel
their wings fan the back of her neck as they followed her. But at that
moment she caught sight of a low, flowery hedge, with a gateway made of
two tall trees wreathed with blossoming vines, and through that gate
she dashed, just as the Fairies behind her cried:
“She has gone into the Palace Garden! She has gone into the Queen’s
presence! How dare she!”
Meg was in the loveliest place she had ever seen, but she was too
frightened to think of its magical beauty just then. By the time the
Fairy Folk came crowding into the Garden after her, she had espied
a lady sitting on a throne, with giant roses all about, and Fairy
Court-ladies standing in rows with folded wings.
“Oh, are you the Queen?” she asked eagerly, running forward.
“Yes,” said the beautiful lady. And all the Fairies stopped and stood
motionless as she spoke. She had great shining wings that moved up
and down, trembling like flower-petals, and her face gleamed with a
wonderfully sunny smile; and sometimes she swayed a little, like a very
tall lily in a high wind. And no one could say what colour her eyes
were, nor what sort of features she had. But one knew at once that she
was surely the Queen of the Fairy Folk.
“Yes,” she said again. “I am the Queen. What is it that you wish of me?”
“Oh, your Majesty!” cried the Fairies who had followed Meg; and they
all bent low, and spread out their wings as she spoke—just the way a
bird sometimes does, close to the ground, when it begins to rain,—“Oh,
your Majesty! Do not listen to her! She is a friend of the Gray Dwarf
and the Wicked King!”
“Is that true?” asked the Queen, bending over Meg, and flashing her
eyes at her until she felt as though she were looking deep into two
huge stars.
“No!” cried Meg, boldly. “It isn’t!”
“Oh!” exclaimed the Fairies, angrily. “How truly wicked she is! And
_how_ she lies! She _told_ us she was a friend of theirs!”
“I said I _knew_ Grump,” said Meg, ready to cry. “I _never_ said he was
my friend. He’s dreadful, and tried to kill me; and as for the Wicked
King, I only saw him in some magic pot-steam!”
“What is all this about?” asked the Queen, frowning slightly. “Come,
little girl, tell your story; we will listen.”
So Meg told her story from the time she met the Gray Dwarf. The Queen
was much interested, and she thanked her for warning her about the
Wicked King’s wish to steal her valuable spell. And the Fairies who had
wanted to turn Meg into a rat or an oyster looked very much ashamed of
themselves, and hung down their wings in a very humble manner.
“But,” said the Queen, “how did it happen that you, a little mortal
girl, were travelling through the Wonderful Wood alone, so very, very
far from your own country?”
Then Meg remembered her real errand, and explained at greater length,
telling all about Mother Goose’s directions, and everything from the
very beginning. At last it was all told, and the Queen sat for a space
in silence, as though considering what she had heard.
At last she sent two of the Fairies for the crystal box containing the
spell. When they returned, bearing it between them, she opened the
little casket, and took out of it a roll of paper as blue as the sky,
covered with writing that glowed like orange fire.
“Listen,” said the Fairy Queen, and then read aloud:
“‘Closed door, closed shell,
Locked box, sealed well,
Shot bolt, shut gate
Yield up your contents straight.
All things that fastened are,
Shake off the spell or bar;
All strange disguises flee,
Everything held,—go free!
Closed door, closed shell,
Yield to the opening spell!’
Now, do you understand that?”
“I—I think so—partly,” said Meg, doubtfully. “But what am I to do with
it, please?”
“Take it to your brother,” said the Queen. “With it he can free Humpty
Dumpty, and fulfil Mother Goose’s command. He has only to read it to
Humpty Dumpty, at the same time striking the great egg-shell with
something hard and sharp, and the young prince will be free, and in his
own shape once more.”
“Oh, splendid!” cried Meg joyfully, clapping her hands, and dancing
first on one foot and then on the other.
“The next difficulty,” continued the Queen, “will be for your brother
to escape. Humpty Dumpty can escape from the wall well enough, but your
brother cannot be freed by the spell, for he will be neither bound nor
locked up; in neither shell, prison, nor box; behind no gate, no door,
and no bars. Yet he will be on the top of the city wall, which is near
the ground on the inside, but far, far from it on the outside. For this
he has only to whisper ‘Help me!’ into one of the red flowers on the
vine that grows on the outer side of the wall. Then he can clamber down
by the help of these tiny climbing creepers. They are Fairy Flowers,
and like to give aid. They cannot grow inside the city of the Wicked
King, but they come as near as possible, and are always hoping that
some day they may be able to help someone. Now, little Mortal, take my
spell and hurry back with it!”
“Oh, but—your Majesty!” stammered Meg. “I—I was told to serve you for a
year and a day, or until I had done you some great service!”
The Queen laughed until it sounded like a hundred little gold bells.
“Dear child, you have served me,” she said. “Have you already forgotten
the warning you gave me?”
“Oh!” exclaimed Meg, and was dumb. She had never thought of that!
[Illustration]
IX
_Under the Sea of Glass_
[Illustration]
[Illustration]