And a little old woman came to the door. "Welcome!" she said, and added,
"My dear," when the Queen came into sight in the light that fell through
the open door.
The Queen slipped down from the horse and went into the door with the
little old woman, whilst the ploughman disappeared with the horses.
"She really is a dear little old woman," the Queen said to
herself--"very different from old Mrs. Hexer."
And so indeed she was--quite a little woman in comparison with her
stalwart son, with white hair and a rosy face and eyes not at all
age-dimmed, but blue as the cornflower or as a summer sky, and looking,
like a child's, so gentle that a hard word would make them wince.
She put a chair ready for the Queen by the fireside, and then, on the
white wood table, set out forks and knives for her.
"You must be tired," she said kindly; "but we go to bed soon after
supper, and so you will have a good rest."
The Queen said, "Yes, I am a little tired; and it is very kind of you to
let me stop."
The little old woman looked at her with an odd, amused look in her
gentle eyes.
"Now I see you are a stranger," she said
"Yes, I come from a long way off," the Queen said. "At least I suppose
it is a great way off, for it has taken me a long time to get here."
At that moment the ploughman came in, with the heavy step of a tired
man.
"Mother, mother!" he said gaily; "I'm hungry."
"Son, son," she answered, "I am glad to hear it. There will be plenty."
And so the supper was made ready, and heartily glad the Queen was, for
she was as hungry as the ploughman.
And they had the whitest of floury potatoes, in the whitest of white
wooden bowls, and the sweetest of new milk, and the clearest of honey
overrunning the comb, and junket laid on rushes, and plums, and apples,
and apricots. And be certain that the Queen enjoyed it.
And, when it was finished, they drew their chairs round the fire, and
the ploughman said, addressing the Queen--
"Now, friend, since you have travelled far, tell us something of what
may have befallen you on the way, for we are such stay-at-home folk
here, that we know little of the world around. But perhaps you are
tired and would rather go to bed."
But the Queen said, "Oh no, I am very well rested now, and I will gladly
tell you my story--only first tell me where I am."
"This is the farm of Woodward, from which we take our names, my mother
and I, and we are some ten miles from the Narrow Seas."
"But what is the land called, and who rules it?" the Queen said.
The ploughman laughed. "Why, it is called the land of the Happy Folk;
and as for who rules it, why, just nobody, because it gets along very
well as it is."
The Queen leant back in the great chair they had given her. She rubbed
her chin reflectively and looked at the fire.
"The Regent told me that a country couldn't possibly exist without a
King or Queen," she said.
"Who is the Regent?" the ploughman said. He too kept his face to the
fire that he could not see.
"Oh, well, he's just the Regent of my kingdom. But I forgot you didn't
know. I am Eldrida, Queen of the Narrowlands and all the Isles."
The little old woman looked at her interestedly.
And the ploughman said, "After all, you're not so _very_ far from your
home; because one can see the coast of it quite plainly on a clear day
from our shore, so they say."
"Why, then you must have quite a number of people from there?" the Queen
said.
But the ploughman answered, "No, hardly ever any one, because the seas
run so swiftly through the straights that no boat can live in them--so
people would have to come a long way round by land. Besides, they've
got everything that we've got, so what could they want here?" the
ploughman said, and added slily, "all except one thing, that is."
"Why, what is that?" the Queen asked.
And the ploughman answered, "Why, the Queen, of course; because we have
got her."
But the little old woman held her hand to shield her eyes from the
fire's blaze, and looked across at the Queen.
"I shouldn't think it was a very nice country to live in," she said.