them growing lower they grew higher and higher, arching over more and
more until at last they met and made a sort of gallery. There was very
little light here, and when at last the pig stopped and the gander
settled to the ground Ellen had to look twice before she saw that they
were in front of a heavily barred door. "Where are we now?" she asked.
The eyes of the boy were flashing with eagerness. "It is the door of
the Queerbodies' house," he cried. He sprang from the pig, and, taking
hold of the handle, he tried to open it. "Locked!" he added.
Slipping his hand into his pocket he drew from it a whole handful of
keys. Then Ellen knew that they were what had jingled every time he
moved.
He began to try one key after another, but none of them seemed to fit.
As he was busy in this way a curious roar sounded through the gallery,
echoing and re-echoing from the rocky walls. "What's that?" cried Ellen.
"Oh, only the dragon yawning. He must have wakened up," answered the
lad coolly, still busy with his keys.
"But won't he follow us?"
"No; he only guards the entrance to the defile."
Finding that none of the keys he first held would open the lock the
lad had drawn out another handful; but these were no better than the
others. One after another he tried all that he had, but not any would
unlock the door. Having tried the last of all, the boy threw it down
and sank upon the floor in despair.
"It is no good," he cried. "It is just as I feared. And yet I've been
collecting those keys for the last seven months."
"Can't you unlock it?"
"No."
"Then what are you going to do?"
"I don't know. I didn't mind the desert or the dragon, but this was
what I was afraid of all along."
"Mistress," said the gander, "Where is the key that the lady Fatima
gave you? If what she said was true, it should unlock the door."
"Oh yes!" cried Ellen. "I forgot it."
With eager fingers she took the key from her pocket and pressed it into
the lad's hand. "Try this," she said.
Very hopelessly the boy arose and put the key to the lock. His face
changed as he found it seemed to go in it easily. He turned the key,
the lock slipped back, the door opened, and Ellen, following close at
his heels, entered at last the House of the Queerbodies.
_Chapter Ten_
_In the House of the Queerbodies_
Ellen and her companions were standing in a circular golden hall. All
around the hall were arched doorways, and overhead, supported by golden
pillars, was a blue dome studded with jewels that shone like stars.
There were no windows to be seen, but all the hall was filled with a
clear and pleasant light that seemed to come from the dome.
As Ellen looked wonderingly about, she heard a tapping sound behind
her, and turning saw a tall man oddly dressed in green and yellow, and
holding in his hand an ivory rod tipped with gold. It was this rod that
she had heard as it tapped on the floor.
[Illustration]
The man stood looking at her and her friends in silence for a few
moments.
Then he said, "Now how did you all get in here I should like to know;
I have not opened the door to any one this morning."
"I had a key," answered Ellen, "and it fitted the door, so this lad
unlocked it. We didn't know there was any one here to open it for us."
"Yes, I am the keeper of the gate, but I don't open for every one that
knocks. But how did you find your way to the door, in the first place?"
"I came on this gander; it's Mother Goose's gander, you know."
"Oh, then, that is all right. But how about this lad? Did he come on
the gander too?"
"No, I came on the pig," answered the boy, speaking for himself.
"I don't know that pig. Where did you get it?"
The lad told him. The gate-keeper shook his head. "It isn't really your
pig, you know. You ought to have made it out of nothing. But did you
come across the desert?"
"Yes."
"And you passed the dragon?"
"Yes."
"And unlocked the door! Well, I suppose it's all right. And what do you
want to set about, now that you are here?"
"I should like to try my hand at fitting a puzzle together," answered
the lad boldly.
Ellen stared. She had never heard anything so curious; for the lad to
have come all that way and through all those dangers, and then want to
play with a puzzle the first thing.
The gate-keeper, however, did not seem at all surprised. He walked over
to one of the golden pillars and took a key from the bunch at his side.
And now Ellen noticed that in each of the pillars was a narrow door.
The gate-keeper unlocked the one in front of which he stood, and when
he opened it the little girl could see that the pillar was hollow and
fitted with shelves just like a closet. From a shelf the man took a
box of puzzle blocks and put it in the lad's hand.
"That's your room in there," he said, pointing to one of the arched
doorways.
The lad took the puzzle, and hastened away with such eager joy that he
seemed to have quite forgotten Ellen and everything, even the magic pig
that followed close at his heels.
The little girl looked after him. "I should think if he just wanted a
puzzle he could have gotten one at home," she said.
"Not such puzzles as these," answered the man. "Did you ever see a
Queerbodies' puzzle when it was finished?"
"I don't think I did."
"Then come here, and I'll show you some."
The man led Ellen over to a large case and opening the lid he bade
her look in. There, all placed in rows, were countless boxes of
puzzles,--puzzles that were finished. As Ellen looked she gave a
little cry of astonishment and delight. The pictures she saw were just
such as one might see upon any puzzle blocks,--pictures of children
swinging in a garden, of a farm-yard scene, or a child's birthday
party. The difference was that all of these were alive. The swing
really swung up and down; the trees and flowers stirred their leaves;
the tiny cows switched their tails to scare away flies too small for
Ellen to see, and a cock upon the fence swelled his neck and crowed.
The children at the party looked at the gifts and then began to play.
Ellen even fancied that she could hear their voices very tiny and clear
as they laughed and talked together.
"Do you have puzzles like that at home?" asked the keeper of the gate.
"Oh no," cried Ellen. She drew a long breath as the man closed the
case. "Can everybody that comes here make puzzles like those?"
"No, indeed. Sometimes even when they get the puzzles finished they
don't come alive, and then they're good for nothing but to be thrown
away. Do you see all these doorways?"
"Yes."
"Well, there are people in all those rooms, and in every room they're
doing something different."
"What are some of the things they do?"
"Over there," and the man pointed to one of the doorways, "they're
making garments out of thin air; in the room next to that they're
stringing stars."
"Stringing stars?"
"Yes. They fish for them with nets from the windows and then string
them for crowns and necklaces. It's very pretty to see. Then there's a
whole room where they do nothing but make forgotten stories over into
new ones."
"Oh! Oh!" cried Ellen, clasping her hands. "That's what I came for. I
came to look for a forgotten story. _Do_ you suppose it's there?"
"Why, I don't know. I shouldn't wonder. But do you want to make it
over?"
"No, I want to find it the way it is. My grandmamma used to know it,
but she's forgotten it now, so I want to find it, so as to tell her
about it."
"Well, I don't know," said the man doubtfully. "We might go and ask
about it. I don't know very much about the different rooms myself, but
come and we'll see."
The room of the forgotten stories, to which the gate-keeper now led
Ellen was very large. So large that when the little girl stood in the
doorway and looked about her she could hardly see where it ended. Upon
the floor in rows stood countless golden jars. Among these rows figures
were moving about or pausing at different jars to take something from
them. They all seemed very busy, though Ellen could not make out what
they were doing at first.
Quite near the door a girl or a woman was standing; Ellen could not
tell which she was. She looked like a woman, but her hair hung down
her back in a heavy plait. She wore some sort of loose brown garments.
Her hands were clasped before her and she seemed to be thinking deeply;
so deeply that she did not notice the gate-keeper nor Ellen nor the
gander as they stood looking at her.
Suddenly she began to smile to herself, and, bending over one of the
jars, she thrust her hand into it and brought it forth filled with
some substance like wet clay, only much more beautiful than clay, for
it glistened and shone between her fingers with all the colors of the
rainbow. This she began to pat and mould into shape as she held it,
humming softly to herself meanwhile as if from sheer happiness.
The gate-keeper waited a few minutes to see whether she would notice
him, and then he tapped upon the floor with his ivory staff. The
Queerbody looked around at the sound.
"Excuse me," said the man, "but here's a little girl who has just come,
and she says she's come to look for a forgotten story; can you tell her
anything about it?"
The Queerbody gazed earnestly at Ellen. "A forgotten story!" she
repeated slowly. "This is the place to come for forgotten stories, but
it may be that it has been made into something else. How long is it
since it was forgotten,--this story that you want?"
Ellen told her a long time; ever since her grandmother was a little
girl.
The Queerbody shook her head. "I'm afraid it may have been made over,"
she said; "but there's no telling. There are some stories that have
been here for many, many years; this one I was just beginning to use,
for instance," and she held out her hands full of the shimmering stuff
for Ellen to see.
"Why, is that a forgotten story?" asked Ellen. "I didn't know stories
ever looked like that."
"This is only part of a story. When a story has been forgotten it
is all divided up and put into different jars. Wondercluff we call
it then. When we make a new story we take a handful from this and a
handful from that, and when it's done you'd never know it was just old
things pieced together. But what did your forgotten story look like?
Can you tell me anything about it?"
Ellen could not tell her very much. "It was about a little princess
called Goldenhair, and she had a wicked stepmother. The stepmother made
her wear a sooty hood, but the fairies helped the princess. Then one
time Goldenhair was combing her hair in the scullery and the stepmother
came in and made her cut all her hair off; and I don't know the rest."
The Queerbody began to laugh. She held out the handful of wondercluff
toward Ellen. "Why this is a part of that very story," she cried, "and
you came just in time. A little later and it would have been made into
something else. Wait a bit. See if I can't put it together."
She reached down into other jars, and took out handful after handful of
different wondercluff. Heaping it on a marble table she began to pat
and mould it, working deftly with her slim long fingers. And as she
worked, beneath her hands a figure began to grow.
Ellen watched, as if fascinated.
First the head with a golden crown. "It must have a crown because the
story's about a princess and royal folk," the Queerbody explained. Next
appeared the body in a long flowing robe fastened by an embroidered
girdle. Then beautiful white hands and arms. At last it was all done
but the feet.
With her eyes fixed lovingly upon the figure she had made, the
Queerbody reached down into a jar that she had not touched before.
Suddenly her look changed. The smile faded from her face and she
turned her eyes on Ellen. "Oh, I forgot," she said in a low, sad voice.
She drew her hand from the jar. There was nothing in it.
"What did you forget?" asked the little girl.
"I forgot the castle. I can't finish the story after all."
"But why not? She's all done but her feet. I should think you could
easily do those."
"No, you see they have to be made of castle wondercluff. There was a
castle in the story, and I haven't used any of that yet."
"What _do_ you mean?"
"You see, when a story is broken to pieces all the parts of it are put
in different jars, as I told you. All the king wondercluff in a jar,
and birds in another jar, magic in another, witches in another, and so
on. All the castles were put in this jar, and now I remember another
Queerbody was making a story this morning and she used the last piece
of castle there was. Look for yourself. The jar is empty."
Ellen looked in the jar. There was nothing there. "Can't you use
something else?"
"Of course not." The Queerbody spoke with some impatience. "Don't you
remember the story begins with a castle where the princess lives?"
Suddenly, like a flash, Ellen remembered the genie and his promise. At
the same moment the gander plucked at her sleeve. "Mistress, the castle
you were promised," he whispered. There was no need of his reminding
her.
"If I were to get a castle for you could you finish the story?" she
asked the Queerbody hesitatingly.
"Yes, but where could you get a castle, you little girl?"
"I think I can get one." Ellen looked about. "We'd better go out in the
hall," she whispered. She was afraid if she summoned the genie in there
it would frighten the busy people around her.
She led the way back into the silent, empty hall while the gatekeeper
and the Queerbody followed her wondering.
Ellen walked on until she stood under the centre of the dome. Then she
stopped and looked at the others. "You needn't be afraid," she said,
"he won't hurt you;" but she herself felt a little nervous at the idea
of calling up the genie again. However, she drew a long breath, and
then, clapping her hands three times, she summoned him to appear.
There was a loud noise as of thunder that made the gander cower behind
Ellen, while the gatekeeper and the Queerbody trembled and turned pale.
Immediately the genie appeared, more gigantic and terrible-looking than
ever.
"Thou hast called me, and I am here at thy command," he said to Ellen.
"Wilt thou now have the castle, the treasures, the slaves and horsemen
that I promised thee?"
"Not the treasures and all that," answered Ellen, and her voice
sounded very little and soft after the genie's, "but I should like the
castle now if I may have it?"
"It shall be thine. And where wilt thou have it?"
"I'd like it in a golden jar over in that room," said Ellen, pointing
over to the forgotten story room.
"In a jar!" cried the genie in amaze, and he scowled as though he
thought Ellen was making fun of him. But when she explained how it was,
and why she wanted the castle, he burst into a roar of laughter that
echoed and re-echoed against the blue dome. "I have heard of a genie in
a bottle, but never of a castle in a jar," he cried. "However, it shall
be thine. But hast thou no further wishes?"
"No, that's all," said Ellen.
"Then look in the jar and thou wilt find it there. Henceforth I appear
to thee no more."
Immediately, and with another crash as of thunder, the genie was
resolved into air and disappeared. For a moment the hall seemed
clouded with a thin gray vapor and then that too faded away and all was
as it had been before.
Ellen and the others looked at each other while the gander craned its
neck this way and that, as if to make sure that the genie had really
gone.
The Queerbody was the first to speak. She drew a long breath. "I
shouldn't like to see _him_ again," she said. "But I wonder if he
really put the castle there."
"I believe he did," said Ellen.
"Let us go and see." The Queerbody was all eagerness.
They hastened back to the room of the forgotten stories and bent over
the castle jar. The Queerbody gave a cry of joy. It was half full of
glistening wondercluff.
Reaching down into the jar she brought out great handfuls that shone
and glistened. "_Now_ I can finish the story," she cried.
She began patting and moulding with hands that trembled with eagerness
and under her fingers the silvery feet of the fairy tale seemed almost
to shape themselves. Then suddenly the figure stood complete, a tall
and shining lady with a crown upon her head. The eyes, however, were
blank and unseeing, and there was no breath to stir the silver robe.
"Take her hand," the Queerbody said to Ellen.
Timidly the little girl took the white hand of the Fairy Tale in hers.
It was very cold, but as she held it, it seemed to grow warm and soft
in her fingers.
"Speak to her," the Queerbody now commanded. At first Ellen could not
think of what to say. Then, "Are you,--are you the forgotten Story I
came to find?" she whispered.
Slowly the color flushed into the Fairy Tale's face; the life came into
her eyes. Slowly very slowly she turned her head and looked down into
Ellen's eager face. "Am I that Story?" she murmured. "Look in my
eyes and see."
[Illustration]
She bent toward the child, and Ellen looked into her eyes. Such
wonderful eyes they were. As she looked, Ellen seemed to lose herself
in their clear depths. She lost all sense of where she was--even of the
lady herself.
She never could tell afterward whether the lady spoke and told her the
story, or whether she saw it mirrored in those eyes, or whether she was
herself the little Princess Goldenhair living it all, but this was the
fairy tale.
_Chapter Eleven_
_The Princess Goldenhair_
There were once a king and queen who had no children, though they
greatly longed for them.
One day the queen was sitting at the window sewing, and the sunlight
shone upon the golden thimble she wore, so that it fairly dazzled the
eyes. "I wish," said the queen, "that I had a little daughter and that
her hair was as golden as my thimble in the sun."
Soon after this a daughter was indeed born to the queen, and the hair
upon her head was of pure gold, but in the hour that she was born the
queen herself died.
As the little princess grew up, her hair was the wonder of all and
because it was so beautiful she was always called the Princess
Goldenhair or Goldilocks.
The king was prouder of his daughter's beauty than of all his
treasures, and there was nothing he loved better than to see her
unfasten her shining hair and shake it down about her, and then it was
so long and bright that it covered her like a golden mantle.
But one day the king went hunting, and in the chase he rode so fast
that at last he left all his followers behind.
He had reached a deep and lonely glade when suddenly his horse reared
under him, and there, standing directly in his path was a beautiful
woman dressed all in black. Her hair, too, was black as a raven's wing
and her eyes were strangely bright. She stood looking at the king and
she did not speak.
The king did not speak either, at first, for there was something in her
look that made him ill at ease, even while he wondered at her beauty.
"Who are you?" he said at last; but she made no answer. Then he
questioned her whence she came, but she was still silent. But when he
asked her if she would go back to the palace with him she nodded her
head. So the king took her up before him and rode home with her.
After that the stranger lived at the palace. She spoke little and when
she did her voice was hoarse and croaking, but she was very beautiful,
and the king loved her and made her his queen.
There were great rejoicings over the marriage; but Goldenhair wept and
wept; she feared the stepmother with her black hair and her bright
round eyes.
Nevertheless at first the new queen was kind enough to the child. But
then, little by little, she began to show the hatred she felt toward
her. After a while it was nothing but hard words and harder looks.
Above all, she could not bear the sight of the princess's hair, but
shuddered every time she saw it. After a while she had a dark hood
made, and she obliged the princess to wear it, so that her hair might
be hidden.
The child never dared to take off the hood by day, but every evening
after the maids had left the scullery she would steal down there with
a candle. It was very dark in the scullery, and the mice and beetles
scuttled to and fro, but as Goldenhair opened the door she would say,
"_Nimble mice that fear the light,
Small, black beetles of the night,
Shadows lurking here and there,
I pray you fright not Goldenhair._"
Then the mice and the beetles would noiselessly disappear in the
cracks; the shadows would shrink into corners, and entering, Goldenhair
would take off her hood, and shake down her hair to comb and brush its
shining lengths. Then she would bind it up again and cover it with her
hood before she went up into the castle.
The stepmother knew nothing of this, but every day she grew bolder in
her hate. She took from Goldenhair all the beautiful clothes and jewels
that her father had had made for her and gave her instead things scarce
better than those a kitchen wench might wear.
However the princess made no complaint, and the king her father did not
even seem to notice it. It was as though the wicked queen had cast a
spell over him so that he could see or think of no one but her.
One day when Goldenhair's heart was very heavy she wandered off by
herself into the deep forest that lay all about the palace.
She had not gone far when her cloak caught upon a thorn-bush and was
torn. When she saw the rent she was frightened, for she knew her cruel
stepmother would make it an excuse for punishing her; and at the
thought of her helplessness the child threw herself down at the foot
of a tree and began to weep.
Suddenly a voice beside her said, "Why do you weep so bitterly,
Princess?"
Goldenhair looked up, and there, standing close beside her, was a fairy
youth. He was very small, and was dressed all in green and silver. He
had a cap upon his head, and about his neck was a chain, from which
hung a jewel that sparkled brighter than a diamond.
Goldenhair gazed at him wonderingly. "I am weeping because I have torn
my cloak," she answered, "and I am afraid my stepmother will punish
me." And with that she began to sob again.
Then the fairy felt sorry for her, as he had never felt sorry for any
one before. "Do not weep," he said, "and I may be able to help you."
With that he stepped to a toadstool close by, and, feeling under it,
he drew out a toadstool thorn, invisible to mortal eyes. This he
threaded with a strand of spider-web silk, and then he placed it in
Goldenhair's fingers. "Draw together the edges of the cloak where it is
torn," he said, "and sew it with this."
[Illustration]
The princess looked at her fingers, but she could see nothing. Still,
she could feel the magic strand. Wondering, she drew the edges of the
rent together, and began stitching with the invisible needle; and as
she stitched, the torn edges twisted and wove together again, so that
they became whole as they had been before.
When she had finished, the fairy knelt before her and lifted the edge
of the cloak. "Look," he said; "now no one could know that it had ever
been torn." And then immediately he vanished like a breath.
Goldenhair rubbed her eyes and looked about her. The forest was very
still. There was not a living thing to be seen, not even a bird or a
squirrel. She lifted her cloak and looked, but she could not see where
it had been mended. Then suddenly she felt afraid, and, turning, she
ran back to the castle as fast as she could.
All the rest of the day she thought and thought about the fairy, and
wondered whether she had really seen him, but she could scarcely
believe it.
The next night when it grew dark Goldenhair stole down as usual to the
scullery to comb her hair. She made sure that no one was there, and
then she took off her hood and shook down her locks. When she had done
that, they almost covered her with their golden strands. She began to
brush and comb them, and as she brushed she sang:--
"_I comb my locks, I comb my locks!
My father is a king;
My stepmother has hair as black
As any raven's wing._
"_I comb my locks, I comb my locks!
She bids me bind them tight;
She makes me wear a sooty hood
To hide them from her sight._
"_I comb my locks, I comb my locks!
Alas! that only here
I dare to lay my hood aside
And brush them without fear._"
Having brushed her hair until it shone, Goldenhair bound it up again,
and covered its brightness with her hood. She took up her candle and
was about to leave the scullery when she heard a sound as of some one
sighing sadly.
She listened, but all was still. "'Twas only the wind that sighed
beneath the door," she said to herself, and again she was about to go
when she heard the sighing once more, and this time she knew that it
was not the wind. The sound came from the outer door of the scullery,
the one that opened into the forest.
Goldenhair was frightened, but yet she could not think of any one being
in distress without longing to help them. She crept over to the door
and laid her ear against it. "Who is there?" she asked.
There was no answer, but she heard some one grieving softly on the
other side of the door. Then all was still.