It was not until late the next day that the sea began to be calm again,
though the sun had been shining since morning.
Daimur lost no time in getting ready for his departure to the Island of
Roses, and after bidding good-bye to the Old King and Prince Tasmir,
who made him promise to come to his wedding with the Princess Maya,
which was to take place shortly, he embarked again with his marines,
accompanied by the Duchess of Rose Petals and the faithful Prince
Redmond, who declared that he would not leave Daimur until he had
finished his task.
They soon found that the storm of the night before had been much worse
on sea than on land, as the sea was covered with parts of wrecked
ships, pieces of wood, boxes, articles of furniture and great timbers.
Towards noon they sighted a large vessel half sunk on a dangerous reef,
but they could not get near enough to it to read the name. Apparently
there was no one left aboard. A mile further on they passed a half
broken life-boat nearly full of water, on the bow of which was painted
H. M. S. "Sadna." There was nothing in it.
Then Prince Redmond felt certain that it was his brother's ship which
they had passed caught on the reef, and that he had perished in the
storm with all hands.
They proceeded on their course, and in a few hours more reached the
chief city of the Kingdom of Roses.
Nobody made any attempt to stop their landing, so they all marched up
the street, this time the Duchess leading the procession with Daimur.
She was overjoyed to be at home again, and people began at once to
recognize her and came running after them with shouts of welcome until
a crowd had collected. It was noticeable that they were all very poor
and fagged looking.
The strangers exclaimed with wonder at the beauty of the roses which
bloomed everywhere. They climbed over the houses, over fences and up
great stone buildings to the very roofs. Rose trees stood in all the
parks. Rose bushes made all the hedges. Roses of all colors met the
eye at every turn, and the air was quite heavy with their perfume. It
was truly a magnificent sight.
No doubt they would have been still more impressed had they known that
in prosperous times people had fresh rose petals to sleep on every
night instead of feather beds or Ostermoor mattresses; that the pigs
were fed on roses until their skins grew to be so fine and transparent
that they were as clear as wax and the pigs themselves were red, white
or yellow or pink, according to the color of the roses they ate; that
housewives made rose petals into pies, cakes and candy, and even bread,
and stewed them with sugar and lemons for jam. Of course this was only
done with the surplus, as the real business of the kingdom was making
perfume from them.
On went our friends, the Duchess leading the way, until at last they
came in sight of the palace. As they entered the grounds they were
surprised to see that all the blinds were down and nobody seemed to be
guarding the gates, or the door of the palace. In fact, the gates hung
ajar, and one of them was off its hinges. The grass on the lawn was
tall and rank. The gardens, or as little of them as they could see,
were full of tall weeds, and everything was going to decay.
The poor Duchess stood and wept at the sight, but Daimur cried, "Cheer
up, cheer up, my dear Duchess, everything may be quite all right yet,"
and ordering the marines to keep everyone out he and Redmond led the
weeping Duchess up to the great entrance and loudly rang the door bell.
They could hear it echoing far inside, but no one came. They looked
through the windows, but inside all was empty and dusty.
The Duchess was by this time in a perfect sea of tears and Daimur had
given up trying to comfort her.
"Well, we'll try the back," he said, and taking the Duchess again by
the arm he led the way around the wide drive towards the rear of the
palace. As it was an immense building and very rambling it took them
some time to reach a high gate in a wall, which, the Duchess moaned
out, led to the kitchen.
Inside was a courtyard all paved with red bricks, very neat-looking, no
doubt, when kept in proper order, but now the weeds were growing up
through the crevices in the bricks and the placed looked very neglected.
They walked across the courtyard to the kitchen door, and after
knocking several times and getting no response Daimur tried it, and to
his surprise found that it was not locked.
He pushed it open and they entered the great kitchen. There was not a
soul in sight.
They walked on through the rooms and found them almost bare. Carpets
had been taken up, furniture removed, all of the best silver was
missing, and the Royal Rose china was completely gone,--so the Duchess
said.
What could it mean? And where was Queen Amy, her court and her
servants?
It was the same throughout the whole palace. Everything that had any
value had been removed, even the embroidered satin bedspreads.
They descended to the cellar and went towards the little room where the
Duchess declared had stood the steel treasure chest. The door of the
little room stood open and to tell the truth they expected to find the
place empty, but what was their surprise to see the chest standing
there perfectly solid looking.
"Of course it is empty," said the Duchess with a sniff, as she stooped
and fitted the little key into the lock.
Daimur and Redmond lifted the lid, and behold! IT WAS FULL OF GOLD TO
THE VERY BRIM!
It was all packed carefully in glass boxes bound with steel and each
box was labeled with the owner's name.
The largest box bore Queen Amy's name, and the royal coat of arms.
They were so astonished that they did not say a word but stood staring
at the gold as if fascinated.
Suddenly they were startled by a slight noise behind them, and both
Daimur and Prince Redmond involuntarily drew their swords as they
turned quickly around.
What they beheld was a frightened looking little creature who gazed at
them from behind a large empty packing case in a corner.
"Come here," said Daimur rather sternly. "Who are you and what are you
doing here? Are there any other people about?"
The little thing advanced trembling, and then they saw that she was a
fair-haired young girl of about eighteen or twenty, but so thin and
pale that at first glance she appeared to be a child. She was
dreadfully dirty too, and clad in various garments that seemed to have
belonged to someone else much larger.
"Don't frighten her, Daimur," said Prince Redmond as he stepped over
beside the poor little thing.
"Tell us who you are, and what you are doing here," he said, addressing
her kindly. "We will do you no harm."
"I am Princess Helda of Oaklands," she said in a very timid voice.
"And where may that be?" asked Daimur, thinking she was probably out of
her head, as so far as he knew no such place existed.
"Alas," said the Princess. "Oaklands is now the Island of Despair,"
and she wrung her hands with a hopeless gesture.
At this answer Daimur was so amazed that he could not say a word, and
it was Prince Redmond who asked the Princess to tell them her story,
and whether she knew anything of Queen Amy. The Duchess had dried her
eyes and stood waiting in silence for every word.
The Princess began in her quiet voice.
"When I was only fourteen years old, my parents, who were King and
Queen of Oaklands and very much beloved by their subjects, one day
quite by accident, offended the Evil Magician, who had been traveling
through the kingdom disguised as a juggler, and entertaining crowds in
the streets with his skilful tricks.
"In revenge the Evil Magician enchanted the whole kingdom, tearing our
island up from the eastern sea and setting it down in this western one.
He turned my father and mother and their subjects into stones and built
a house and wall of them, and changed our beautiful cities into a dense
forest.
"Me he could not change, as I wear upon my arm a bracelet placed there
by a good fairy at my birth, which guards me from enchantment and harm.
"I lived then in the Magician's house, and his old witch of a
housekeeper and her ugly daughter made me do all manner of rough work,
and many a time would have beaten me had it not been for my magic
bracelet. At any rate they half starved me. I lived in the cellar
when I was not working in the kitchen."
"My dear," said the Duchess, "how can you expect us to believe such a
story? You say you were fourteen when all this happened. You cannot
be more than twenty now, and yet the Island of Despair has been where
it is for over seventy years."
"Yes," said the Princess, "that is true, but the Evil Magician does not
measure years as you do. On his kitchen wall hangs the year clock. It
has only one hand, and the figures on its face run from one to fifteen.
Each figure represents one of your years, but the hand of the clock has
to go completely around the dial and reach the figure fifteen before
the Magician counts a year. In therefore what has been five years to
us in the Magician's house has been seventy-five years to you. That is
the reason why the Magician and the witch seem so old to you, who know
that they have been living for hundreds of years. They are really not
very old after all."
"But how did you get here?" asked Prince Redmond, who was becoming very
much interested in the small Princess.
"One day," answered the Princess, "I overhead the Evil Magician telling
the old witch to prepare a bed in the cellar for a Queen."
"Good mercy," cried the Duchess. "My dear niece in that dreadful
place. Oh, what shall I do?" And she began to weep afresh, but Daimur
was so interested in the story that he hardly heard her.
"What happened next?" he asked breathlessly.
"The next day the Queen arrived, so beautiful and so sad. I loved her
at once, and was happy to be with her when I might. She told me that
she had a chest full of gold in her palace, but that her aunt had the
key to it, and that she had mysteriously disappeared. She was afraid
she had been murdered. A foreign king, a kind of pirate, had been
threatening to invade her kingdom for more than a year, and she had
been able to keep him off for a time, but at last she had no more
soldiers to oppose against him and he would have taken the kingdom had
not the Evil Magician, in the form of a young and handsome knight,
offered to lend her as much gold as was in the treasure chest until
such time as she could get another key, for she had found that the
chest was a magic one and could neither be broken into nor moved from
where it stood.
"The pirate king took the money and went away, but in a few months the
Evil Magician came back and demanded payment for his gold or that the
Queen would marry him at once.
"The Queen refused to marry him and could not pay him, so he took her
prisoner to the Island of Despair, as you call it, where he said he
would keep her until she consented to marry him and would sign over to
him all right to her throne. There she still is if she is alive.
"As for me, the Evil Magician soon found that I was Queen Amy's friend,
and fearing that I might help her to escape he had me brought here,
where I have been ever since.
"As soon as Queen Amy was captured her cousin Bethel took the throne,
and it was to her that I was sent as a servant. How she treated me you
can see for yourselves. I have had to do the meanest work, live in
this cellar, wear what clothes she threw to me, and eat what I could
get from the cook, who on days when she was very cross would give me
nothing at all."
"Poor child, poor child," said Prince Redmond.
"And where is Princess Bethel now?" asked Daimur.
"And what has happened to the furniture, and all the plate and china,
my dear?" asked the Duchess in a teary voice.
"I am just coming to that part, if you please, madam," answered the
Princess.
"At night, when the servants were talking in the kitchen I used to sit
behind the cellar door and then I heard all that was said. One night
they whispered to each other that the pirate king had come back and
that he threatened instant invasion if he did not get more money.
Princess Bethel had sent him all she had in the palace and he went away.
"That kept him off for a time, but before long he came again and then
kept on coming more and more frequently until there was scarcely an
article of value in the palace that had not been sent to him, or sold
to get money to keep him quiet. Princess Bethel was very miserable
indeed, and taxed her subjects until they were all reduced to beggary
in order to get the money to give him.
"I could not help feeling rather sorry for her, it was such a dreadful
existence. The servants had to be dismissed one after another until
there was no one to wait upon her but me, and my! How she did scold!
"At last the pirate came just a few nights ago and marching up to the
palace gates demanded the chest of gold, which he had evidently just
heard about.
"Bethel would gladly have given it to him if she could have moved it,
and told him so, at which he and a great many rough sailors tramped
into the palace and down these stairs and tried their best to pry it up
with crowbars, but with no success of course. When he found he really
could not take it, he was so angry that he kidnapped Princess Bethel,
saying he would keep her in a dungeon until she found the key for him.
"I was in the darkest corner when the pirates came and kept hidden
until they went away. Since then I have not dared to go any further
than to the kitchen for some bread and water."
"Dear me, that is very poor fare," said Prince Redmond, "it is no
wonder you are so thin. We will have to try and make up for all this
bad treatment," and to anyone with two eyes it was quite evident that
he had fallen in love with her.
The Duchess too was very sympathetic, though greatly worried about her
niece, Queen Amy, and Daimur told the new Princess that the Evil
Magician was now dead and that they would try and deliver her parents
and Queen Amy from enchantment.
At this moment the roar of many voices from outside caused them all to
hurry upstairs as fast as they could and they ran out of the palace to
see what was going on. They were just in time to see a great crowd
pouring down the street towards the water, all shouting and
gesticulating.
"What is the meaning of this commotion?" asked Daimur of those of his
men who were guarding the palace gates.
"They say," answered one, "that the pirates who have been raiding this
shore for so long are drowned and some of them have been washed ashore."
Hastily sending the Duchess and Princess Helda back to the palace,
Daimur followed Prince Redmond, who was already making his way through
the crowd towards the shore.
They reached the beach, and there stretched lifeless on the sand beside
his overturned life-boat lay Prince Sadna, and beside him a young
officer, whom Redmond recognized as a distant cousin.
It may well be imagined how very sad Prince Redmond felt over his
brother's disgraceful life, and now at the sight of him lying there
dead, a dreaded pirate to the people crowding around, instead of a
friendly king as he should have been, the Prince burst into tears.
Daimur stood beside him feeling very sorry for his friend, and
remembering that after all Sadna had been a royal prince, he decided to
have him buried at sea with all honors befitting his rank, and
motioning to a few of his men who had come to the shore with him, he
had Prince Sadna's body removed to his ship.
Redmond was very grateful indeed to Daimur for his kindness, and after
the funeral was over they came back to the city and called together the
elders. They explained why they had come and took them to see the
Duchess of Rose Petals at the palace, who by this time had had some tea
and was feeling much refreshed.
The elders were all delighted to see her, but when she told them that
she still had the key of the magic chest and that they could now have
their savings as they needed them, they wept for joy, and falling on
their knees vowed undying allegiance to her, and begged her to be their
queen, as they were sure Queen Amy was dead.
The Duchess refused this honor, as she told them her niece was still
alive, and Daimur then came forward and related what Princess Helda had
told them of Queen Amy's capture and that he was going to rescue her
and bring her back, and in the meantime that the Duchess would act as
Queen Regent.