On and on went Rose-Marie, over moss and fern, stopping now and then in
the darkness to loosen a bramble from her gown. But save for a stumble
and a lash from some low-hanging bough, nothing happened to frighten
her.
At last, as her feet began to falter, it seemed as if tiny lights
gleamed here and there through the thickets, and when she sank at
length upon a mossy knoll at the foot of a great oak-tree, a faint
humming came to her ears, like the far-away singing of gnats, and
finally, as she was dropping asleep, the sound seemed to change into a
kind of chant.
“See, oh, see,
On every tree,
What lamps are shining (ting, ting, ting).
They are eyes
Of fireflies,
To light your wandering (ting, ting, ting).
And sweetly sleep, dear Rose-Marie,
We watch will keep, and guard o’er thee;
And ne’er a danger cometh nigh
When fairies chant a lullaby.”
And so, to the chime of faint fairy bells, Rose-Marie fell softly
asleep and dreamed of little Eldwald and their home.
When she awoke, the sun was high, though but few of his rays could
pierce the green gloom about her. At her side lay a large leaf heaped
high with bright berries. Springing up, she vainly sought for the giver
of this gift, but heard nothing save the trickling of a tiny rill
nearby, and saw nothing but a flash of crimson as a redbird flew before
her.
After a little prayer of thankfulness, she ran to wash her face in
the little stream, and ate a hearty breakfast from her store of food,
finishing with the fairies’ berries, for she decided it must be those
little people who had gathered them, for fairies always stand ready to
help good children, and when once you start to do a good thing, though
it seems hard, hundreds of little helpers spring up unseen on every
side to aid the task.
Cheered and refreshed, Rose-Marie went on her way until, at evening
she came to a barren, rocky opening in the woods. Through the trees, a
long red beam of light seemed pointing like a fiery finger at a dark
pool which lay there, dull and slimy, amid blasted trees and withered
rushes, which seemed to shrink back from the dead, dark water.
High above it towered a cliff, rough with boulders and dark with dusky
pine, and at its base, just beyond the margin of the pool, she could
see a dark opening, or cave, which seemed very narrow and deep.
It was a sad place at all times; but to a little girl alone at
nightfall, it seemed a frightful place. As she paused, shivering, a
chant of tiny voices buzzed in her ear:
“Now human love
Must dare and fare
Where fairies fear to tread.”
Darkness fell suddenly, strange noises sounded about her, and from the
cave in the cliff came a faint whimpering sound like the noise of many
little animals crying weakly. With a sinking heart, Rose-Marie knew
that this place must be the place she had come so far to seek. This was
the den of the Witch o’ Woods.