Up there in the street was an old, old house.
All the other houses in the street were new, with large window panes
and smooth walls, but the old house had queer faces cut out of the
beams over the windows, and under the eaves was a dragon's head for a
rain-water spout. The front steps were as broad as those to a palace,
and as high, it seemed, as to a church tower.
"How long is that old place to stand and spoil our street?" said the
families who lived in the new houses.
But at the window opposite the old house there sat a little boy with
rosy cheeks and bright eyes. He certainly liked the old house best, in
sunshine or when the moon shone on it. He knew who lived there, an old
man who wore a coat with large brass buttons and a wig which one could
see was really a wig. Every morning there came an ancient servant to
put his rooms in order and to do his errands. Now and then the old man
came to the window and looked out, and the little boy nodded to him,
and the old man nodded back as if he were pleased. The little boy
heard his father and mother say,
"The old man opposite is rich, but he is so very, very lonely."
The Sunday following the little boy took something, and wrapped it up
in a piece of paper. He went downstairs and stood in the doorway, and
when the errand man came past, he said to him,
"I say, sir, will you give this to the old man over the way for me? I
have two toy soldiers. This is one of them and he shall have it, for I
hear that he is lonely."
The errand man looked pleased, nodded, and took the toy soldier over
to the old house. Afterwards there came a message; it was to ask if
the little boy himself would not come over and pay a visit. So he got
permission of his mother, and went over to the old house.
It seemed as if the brass balls on the iron fence shone brighter than
ever because he had come. There were steps in the garden that went
down and then up again, and the porch, even, was overgrown with green
stuff as if it were part of the garden. The walls of the hall were
hung with musty leather, printed with gold flowers, and there were
chairs with high backs that creaked as if they had the gout.
And at last the little boy came into the room where the old man sat.
"I thank you for the toy soldier, my little friend," said the old man,
"and I thank you because you came over to see me."
The pendulum of the great clock went to and fro, and the hands turned,
and everything in the room became still older, but the little boy went
up to the old man and took his hand.
"They said at home," said the little boy, "that you were very lonely."
Then the old man took a book with pictures in it down from a shelf,
and he went into the other room to the pantry. It was really
delightful in the old house!
But the toy soldier, who sat on a cabinet, suddenly spoke.
"I can't bear it any longer," he said. "The days are so dull and the
evenings are still duller. Here it is not at all like your home, where
your father and mother talk so pleasantly, and you and the other
children make such a delightful noise."
"Oh, you mustn't mind that," said the little boy. "This house is full
of old thoughts that come and visit and bring much company with them."
"I see nothing of them, and I don't know them because I am new," said
the toy soldier. "I cannot bear it!"
"But you must!" said the little boy.
Then in came the old man with the most pleased and happy face, and
bringing such delicious sweets, apples, and nuts. So the little boy
thought no more about the toy soldier.
He went home, happy. Weeks and days passed, and he nodded over to the
old house, and the old man nodded back. Then the little boy went over
again.
The old man went to find a treasure box that he had with secret
drawers, and the toy soldier took this opportunity of speaking once
more to the little boy.
"Do you still sing on Sundays?" he asked. "When the curtains are up I
can see you all over there at home distinctly. Tell me about my
brother. Does he still live? Yes, he is happy then. Oh, I cannot bear
it here any longer."
"You are given away as a present," the little boy said. "You will have
to stay. Can't you try and make the best of it?"
The old man came in now with the box. Secret springs released the
drawers and in these were cards, large and gilded, such as one never
sees now. Then he opened the piano. It had landscapes painted on the
inside of the lid. It was very hoarse but the old man could play on it
and he sang a song too.
"I will go to the wars! I will go to the wars!" shouted the toy
soldier as loudly as he could, and he threw himself off the cabinet
right down on the floor.
Where was he? The old man looked, and the little boy looked, but the
soldier was away and he stayed away.
"I shall find him!" said the old man, but he never did. The floor was
too open. The toy soldier had fallen through a crack, and there he
lay.
The little boy went home, and that week passed, and several weeks too.
The windows were frosted; the little boy had to breathe on them to get
a peep over at the old house; and snow covered the carved heads over
the windows. The old house looked very cold, but now there was no one
at home in it. And when the spring came they pulled the house down.
After a while a fine house was built in its place with large windows
and smooth white walls. Before it, where part of the old house had
stood, a garden was laid out and there were grape vines running along
the walks. Birds built their nests in the vines and chattered away to
each other, but not about the old house, for they could not remember
it, so many years had passed. So many years had gone by that the
little boy had grown up to a whole man. And he had just been married
and had brought his wife to live in the house here, where the garden
was. She had brought a wild flower with her that she found very pretty
and he stood by her as she planted it in the garden and pressed the
earth around it with her fingers.
Oh, what was that? She had pricked her finger. There sat something
pointed, sticking straight out of the soft mould.
It was--yes, guess--it was the toy soldier who had tumbled and turned
about among the timber and the rubbish, and had lain for many years in
the ground.
The young wife wiped the dirt off the soldier, first with a green
leaf, and then with her fine handkerchief. It was just as if the toy
soldier had awakened from a dream. Then the young man told his wife
about the old house and the old man and the toy soldier that he had
sent over because the old man had been so lonely.
"Very, very lonely!" said the toy soldier, "but it is delightful not
to be forgotten!"