WHAT _IS_ IN A NAME?
For a time that seemed to them long, the two men stood waiting, while
still the Mother of Light did not return. So long was she absent that
they began to grow anxious: how were they to find their way from the
natural hollows of the mountain crossed by goblin paths, if their lamps
should go out? To spend the night there would mean to sit and wait until
an earthquake rent the mountain, or the earth herself fell back into the
smelting furnace of the sun whence she had issued--for it was all night
and no faintest dawn in the bosom of the world. So long did they wait
unrevisited, that, had there not been two of them, either would at
length have concluded the vision a home-born product of his own seething
brain. And their lamps _were_ going out, for they grew redder and
smokier! But they did not lose courage, for there is a kind of capillary
attraction in the facing of two souls, that lifts faith quite beyond
the level to which either could raise it alone: they knew that they had
seen the lady of emeralds, and it was to give them their own desire that
she had gone from them, and neither would yield for a moment to the
half-doubts and half-dreads that awoke in his heart. And still she who
with her absence darkened their air did not return. They grew weary, and
sat down on the rocky floor, for wait they would--indeed, wait they
must. Each set his lamp by his knee, and watched it die. Slowly it sank,
dulled, looked lazy and stupid. But ever as it sank and dulled, the
image in his mind of the Lady of Light grew stronger and clearer.
Together the two lamps panted and shuddered. First one, then the other
went out, leaving for a moment a great red, evil-smelling snuff. Then
all was the blackness of darkness up to their very hearts and everywhere
around them. Was it? No. Far away--it looked miles away--shone one
minute faint point of green light--where, who could tell? They only knew
that it shone. It grew larger, and seemed to draw nearer, until at last,
as they watched with speechless delight and expectation, it seemed once
more within reach of an outstretched hand. Then it spread and melted
away as before, and there were eyes--and a face--and a lovely form--and
lo! the whole cavern blazing with lights innumerable, and gorgeous, yet
soft and interfused--so blended, indeed, that the eye had to search and
see in order to separate distinct spots of special colour.
The moment they saw the speck in the vast distance they had risen and
stood on their feet. When it came nearer they bowed their heads. Yet now
they looked with fearless eyes, for the woman that was old and yet young
was a joy to see, and filled their hearts with reverent delight. She
turned first to Peter.
"I have known you long," she said. "I have met you going to and from the
mine, and seen you working in it for the last forty years."
"How should it be, madam, that a grand lady like you should take notice
of a poor man like me?" said Peter, humbly, but more foolishly than he
could then have understood.
"I am poor as well as rich," said she. "I too work for my bread, and I
show myself no favour when I pay myself my own wages. Last night when
you sat by the brook, and Curdie told you about my pigeon, and my
spinning, and wondered whether he could believe that he had actually
seen me, I heard all you said to each other. I am always about, as the
miners said the other night when they talked of me as Old Mother
Wotherwop."
The lovely lady laughed, and her laugh was a lightning of delight in
their souls.
"Yes," she went on, "you have got to thank me that you are so poor,
Peter. I have seen to that, and it has done well for both you and me, my
friend. Things come to the poor that can't get in at the door of the
rich. Their money somehow blocks it up. It is a great privilege to be
poor, Peter--one that no man ever coveted, and but a very few have
sought to retain, but one that yet many have learned to prize. You must
not mistake, however, and imagine it a virtue; it is but a privilege,
and one also that, like other privileges, may be terribly misused. Hadst
thou been rich, my Peter, thou wouldst not have been so good as some
rich men I know. And now I am going to tell you what no one knows but
myself: you, Peter, and your wife have both the blood of the royal
family in your veins. I have been trying to cultivate your family tree,
every branch of which is known to me, and I expect Curdie to turn out a
blossom on it. Therefore I have been training him for a work that must
soon be done. I was near losing him, and had to send my pigeon. Had he
not shot it, that would have been better; but he repented, and that
shall be as good in the end."
She turned to Curdie and smiled.
"Ma'am," said Curdie, "may I ask questions?"
"Why not, Curdie?"
"Because I have been told, ma'am, that nobody must ask the king
questions."
"The king never made that law," she answered, with some displeasure.
"You may ask me as many as you please--that is, so long as they are
sensible. Only I may take a few thousand years to answer some of them.
But that's nothing. Of all things time is the cheapest."
"Then would you mind telling me now, ma'am, for I feel very confused
about it--are you the Lady of the Silver Moon?"
"Yes, Curdie; you may call me that if you like. What it means is true."
"And now I see you dark, and clothed in green, and the mother of all the
light that dwells in the stones of the earth! And up there they call you
Old Mother Wotherwop! And the Princess Irene told me you were her
great-great-grandmother! And you spin the spider-threads, and take care
of a whole people of pigeons; and you are worn to a pale shadow with old
age; and are as young as anybody can be, not to be too young; and as
strong, I do believe, as I am."
The lady stooped towards a large green stone bedded in the rock of the
floor, and looking like a well of grassy light in it. She laid hold of
it with her fingers, broke it out, and gave it to Peter.
"There!" cried Curdie, "I told you so. Twenty men could not have done
that. And your fingers are white and smooth as any lady's in the land. I
don't know what to make of it."
"I could give you twenty names more to call me, Curdie, and not one of
them would be a false one. What does it matter how many names if the
person is one?"
"Ah! but it is not names only, ma'am. Look at what you were like last
night, and what I see you now!"
"Shapes are only dresses, Curdie, and dresses are only names. That which
is inside is the same all the time."
"But then how can all the shapes speak the truth?"
"It would want thousands more to speak the truth, Curdie; and then they
could not. But there is a point I must not let you mistake about. It is
one thing the shape I choose to put on, and quite another the shape that
foolish talk and nursery tale may please to put upon me. Also, it is one
thing what you or your father may think about me, and quite another what
a foolish or bad man may see in me. For instance, if a thief were to
come in here just now, he would think he saw the demon of the mine, all
in green flames, come to protect her treasure, and would run like a
hunted wild goat. I should be all the same, but his evil eyes would see
me as I was not."
"I think I understand," said Curdie.
"Peter," said the lady, turning then to him, "you will have to give up
Curdie for a little while."
"So long as he loves us, ma'am, that will not matter--much."
"Ah! you are right there, my friend," said the beautiful princess.
And as she said it she put out her hand, and took the hard, horny hand
of the miner in it, and held it for a moment lovingly.
"I need say no more," she added, "for we understand each other--you and
I, Peter."
The tears came into Peter's eyes. He bowed his head in thankfulness, and
his heart was much too full to speak.
Then the great old young beautiful princess turned to Curdie.
"Now, Curdie, are you ready?" she said.
"Yes, ma'am," answered Curdie.
"You do not know what for."
"You do, ma'am. That is enough."
"You could not have given me a better answer, or done more to prepare
yourself, Curdie," she returned, with one of her radiant smiles. "Do you
think you will know me again?"
"I think so. But how can I tell what you may look like next?"
"Ah, that indeed! How can you tell? Or how could I expect you should?
But those who know me _well_, know me whatever new dress or shape or
name I may be in; and by-and-by you will have learned to do so too."
"But if you want me to know you again, ma'am, for certain sure," said
Curdie, "could you not give me some sign, or tell me something about you
that never changes--or some other way to know you, or thing to know you
by?"
"No, Curdie; that would be to keep you from knowing me. You must know me
in quite another way from that. It would not be the least use to you or
me either if I were to make you know me in that way. It would be but to
know the sign of me--not to know me myself. It would be no better than
if I were to take this emerald out of my crown and give it you to take
home with you, and you were to call it me, and talk to it as if it heard
and saw and loved you. Much good that would do you, Curdie! No; you must
do what you can to know me, and if you do, you will. You shall see me
again--in very different circumstances from these, and, I will tell you
so much, it _may_ be in a very different shape. But come now, I will
lead you out of this cavern; my good Joan will be getting too anxious
about you. One word more: you will allow that the men knew little what
they were talking about this morning, when they told all those tales of
Old Mother Wotherwop; but did it occur to you to think how it was they
fell to talking about me at all?--It was because I came to them; I was
beside them all the time they were talking about me, though they were
far enough from knowing it, and had very little besides foolishness to
say."
As she spoke she turned and led the way from the cavern, which, as if a
door had been closed, sunk into absolute blackness behind them. And now
they saw nothing more of the lady except the green star, which again
seemed a good distance in front of them, and to which they came no
nearer, although following it at a quick pace through the mountain. Such
was their confidence in her guidance, however, and so fearless were they
in consequence, that they felt their way neither with hand nor foot, but
walked straight on through the pitch dark galleries. When at length the
night of the upper world looked in at the mouth of the mine, the green
light seemed to lose its way amongst the stars, and they saw it no more.
Out they came into the cool, blessed night. It was very late, and only
starlight. To their surprise, three paces away they saw, seated upon a
stone, an old countrywoman, in a cloak which they took for black. When
they came close up to it, they saw it was red.
"Good evening!" said Peter.
"Good evening!" returned the old woman, in a voice as old as herself.
But Curdie took off his cap and said,--
"I am your servant, princess."
The old woman replied,--
"Come to me in the dove-tower to-morrow night, Curdie--alone."
"I will, ma'am," said Curdie.
So they parted, and father and son went home to wife and mother--two
persons in one rich, happy woman.