Lina
It was Lina. All at once Curdie recognized her--the frightful creature
he had seen at the princess's. He dropped his pickaxes and held out
his hand. She crept nearer and nearer, and laid her chin in his palm,
and he patted her ugly head. Then she crept away behind the tree, and
lay down, panting hard.
Curdie did not much like the idea of her being behind him. Horrible as
she was to look at, she seemed to his mind more horrible when he was
not looking at her. But he remembered the child's hand, and never
thought of driving her away. Now and then he gave a glance behind him,
and there she lay flat, with her eyes closed and her terrible teeth
gleaming between her two huge forepaws.
After his supper and his long day's journey it was no wonder Curdie
should now be sleepy. Since the sun set the air had been warm and
pleasant. He lay down under the tree, closed his eyes, and thought to
sleep. He found himself mistaken, however. But although he could not
sleep, he was yet aware of resting delightfully.
Presently he heard a sweet sound of singing somewhere, such as he had
never heard before--a singing as of curious birds far off, which drew
nearer and nearer. At length he heard their wings, and, opening his
eyes, saw a number of very large birds, as it seemed, alighting around
him, still singing. It was strange to hear song from the throats of
such big birds.
And still singing, with large and round but not the less birdlike
voices, they began to weave a strange dance about him, moving their
wings in time with their legs. But the dance seemed somehow to be
troubled and broken, and to return upon itself in an eddy, in place of
sweeping smoothly on.
And he soon learned, in the low short growls behind him, the cause of
the imperfection: they wanted to dance all round the tree, but Lina
would not permit them to come on her side.
Now curdie liked the birds, and did not altogether like Lina. But
neither, nor both together, made a reason for driving away the
princess's creature. Doubtless she had been the goblins' creature, but
the last time he saw her was in the king's house and the dove tower,
and at the old princess's feet. So he left her to do as she would, and
the dance of the birds continued only a semicircle, troubled at the
edges, and returning upon itself.
But their song and their motions, nevertheless, and the waving of their
wings, began at length to make him very sleepy. All the time he had
kept doubting whether they could really be birds, and the sleepier he
got, the more he imagined them something else, but he suspected no harm.
Suddenly, just as he was sinking beneath the waves of slumber, he awoke
in fierce pain. The birds were upon him--all over him--and had begun
to tear him with beaks and claws. He had but time, however, to feel
that he could not move under their weight, when they set up a hideous
screaming, and scattered like a cloud. Lina was among them, snapping
and striking with her paws, while her tail knocked them over and over.
But they flew up, gathered, and descended on her in a swarm, perching
upon every part of her body, so that he could see only a huge misshapen
mass, which seemed to go rolling away into the darkness. He got up and
tried to follow, but could see nothing, and after wandering about
hither and thither for some time, found himself again beside the
hawthorn. He feared greatly that the birds had been too much for Lina,
and had torn her to pieces. In a little while, however, she came
limping back, and lay down in her old place. Curdie also lay down,
but, from the pain of his wounds, there was no sleep for him. When the
light came he found his clothes a good deal torn and his skin as well,
but gladly wondered why the wicked birds had not at once attacked his
eyes. Then he turned, looking for Lina. She rose and crept to him.
But she was in far worse plight than he--plucked and gashed and torn
with the beaks and claws of the birds, especially about the bare part
of her neck, so that she was pitiful to see. And those worst wounds
she could not reach to lick.
'Poor Lina!' said Curdie, 'you got all those helping me.'
She wagged her tail, and made it clear she understood him. Then it
flashed upon Curdie's mind that perhaps this was the companion the
princess had promised him. For the princess did so many things
differently from what anybody looked for! Lina was no beauty
certainly, but already, the first night, she had saved his life.
'Come along, Lina,' he said, 'we want water.'
She put her nose to the earth, and after snuffing for a moment, darted
off in a straight line. Curdie followed. The ground was so uneven,
that after losing sight of her many times, at last he seemed to have
lost her altogether. In a few minutes, however, he came upon her
waiting for him. Instantly she darted off again. After he had lost and
found her again many times, he found her the last time lying beside a
great stone. As soon as he came up she began scratching at it with her
paws. When he had raised it an inch or two, she shoved in first her
nose and then her teeth, and lifted with all the might of her neck.
When at length between them they got it up, there was a beautiful
little well. He filled his cap with the clearest and sweetest water,
and drank. Then he gave to Lina, and she drank plentifully. Next he
washed her wounds very carefully. And as he did so, he noted how much
the bareness of her neck added to the strange repulsiveness of her
appearance. Then he bethought him of the goatskin wallet his mother
had given him, and taking it from his shoulders, tried whether it would
do to make a collar of for the poor animal. He found there was just
enough, and the hair so similar in colour to Lina's, that no one could
suspect it of having grown somewhere else.
He took his knife, ripped up the seams of the wallet, and began trying
the skin to her neck. It was plain she understood perfectly what he
wished, for she endeavoured to hold her neck conveniently, turning it
this way and that while he contrived, with his rather scanty material,
to make the collar fit. As his mother had taken care to provide him
with needles and thread, he soon had a nice gorget ready for her. He
laced it on with one of his boot laces, which its long hair covered.
Poor Lina looked much better in it. Nor could any one have called it a
piece of finery. If ever green eyes with a yellow light in them looked
grateful, hers did.
As they had no longer any bag to carry them in, Curdie and Lina now ate
what was left of the provisions. Then they set out again upon their
journey. For seven days it lasted. They met with various adventures,
and in all of them Lina proved so helpful, and so ready to risk her
life for the sake of her companion, that Curdie grew not merely very
fond but very trustful of her; and her ugliness, which at first only
moved his pity, now actually increased his affection for her. One day,
looking at her stretched on the grass before him, he said:
'Oh, Lina! If the princess would but burn you in her fire of roses!'
She looked up at him, gave a mournful whine like a dog, and laid her
head on his feet. What or how much he could not tell, but clearly she
had gathered something from his words.