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[Illustration: MERRIMEG]
BY WILLIAM BOWEN
THE ENCHANTED FOREST
Illustrated by Maud and
Miska Petersham
THE OLD TOBACCO SHOP
Illustrated by Reginald Birch
SOLARIO THE TAILOR
Illustrated by J. Ormsbee
[Illustration: THE TWO GNOMES LED MERRIMEG AWAY.]
_MERRIMEG_
BY
WILLIAM BOWEN
_Illustrated by_
EMMA BROCK
[Illustration]
New York
_THE MACMILLAN COMPANY_
1923
_All rights reserved_
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
COPYRIGHT, 1923,
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and electrotyped. Published August, 1923.
_To
Marjorie Ann_
CONTENTS
STORY PAGE
(_1_) _MERRIMEG AND THE CHIMNEY IMPS_ 3
(_2_) _MERRIMEG AND THE CLOP-CLOP SHOES_ 29
(_3_) _MERRIMEG AND THE STARLIGHT FAIRIES_ 51
(_4_) _MERRIMEG AND THE ECHO DWARFS_ 75
(_5_) _MERRIMEG AND THE RAG-BONE MAN_ 95
(_6_) _MERRIMEG AND THE APPLE-SEED ELF_ 119
(_7_) _MERRIMEG AND THE MAY-DEW_ 141
ILLUSTRATIONS
_The two gnomes led Merrimeg away._ _Frontispiece_
_“Bless my soul!” said one of the gnomes._ 13
_In front of them rose a great mountain of snow._ _Facing page_ 21
_The clop-clop shoes went on into the woods----_ _Facing page_ 34
_Around the walls was a row of gray owls._ 41
_“Look!” she cried._ 58
_Upward through the water----_ _Facing page_ 65
“_Oxtragob borgs, gooblik!_” 79
“_How dare you say such a thing? How dare you?_” _Facing page_ 82
_“Gimme a handkerchief, quick,” said the
Rag-Bone Man._ _Facing page_ 98
“_I can see her peeking in through the door._” 106
_Merrimeg was sitting in an apple tree._ 121
_The two gnomes followed him out of the door._ _Facing page_ 134
“_Have you got the May-dew?_” 161
[Illustration: MERRIMEG AND THE CHIMNEY IMPS]
MERRIMEG
_MERRIMEG AND THE CHIMNEY IMPS_
Once upon a time there was a little girl. Her name was Merrimeg.
Sometimes she was good, and sometimes she was naughty. But she was
always merry.
One morning her mother gave her a little broom and told her to sweep
the kitchen floor and her mother said, “Now, Merrimeg, be sure to
sweep all the dust neatly into the dustpan, and carry it out to the
cabbage garden. Will you do that?”
“Yes, mother,” said Merrimeg.
“Don’t sweep any dust into the corners,” said her mother; and she
left Merrimeg in the kitchen, and went into the front room to make
the beds.
Merrimeg swept and swept with her little broom, and she made up a
little song and sang it out loud, keeping time with the broom.
Every little while her mother would call to her from the next room
and say,----
“Have you finished yet, Merrimeg?”
“Not yet, mother!” Merrimeg would say, and then she would go on with
her sweeping and singing.
She was very happy, but this wasn’t her day to be good; for she was
in a great hurry to be out in the garden in the sunshine, and she
forgot all about what her mother had said to her; so instead of
wasting time on the dustpan, she swept all the dust into the nice
clean fireplace, a very large fireplace, big enough to roast a pig
in. An iron pot was hanging there, but there wasn’t any fire, and her
mother had just cleaned off the hearth so that it was as spotless as
new brick.
She swept the dust from under the table and chairs, and out of the
corners, and everywhere. And every single bit of the dust she swept
into the fireplace, and piled it up at the back on the clean bricks,
out of sight. And all the while she kept on singing.
[Illustration]
She was stooping down into the fireplace, with her head right at the
back, under the chimney, when her mother called to her from the next
room and said,----
“Have you finished now, Merrimeg?”
“Yes, mother!” said Merrimeg. “I’m going out into the garden now!”
But she didn’t go out into the garden. Instead of that,--just as she
said, “I’m going out into the garden now,” whack! she was knocked
against the iron pot, and bang! she was tossed against the back of
the fireplace, and whoof! she was whirled up into that black dirty
chimney like a leaf in a wind.
And it _was_ a wind, too! She was sucked up in a wind that was
rushing up the chimney,--and _such_ a wind! Never had she been caught
in a wind like that, not even in the wildest March weather. Before
she knew it, she was high up inside the chimney in the pitch dark,
stuck fast, and the wind began to die down.
“Mother!” she cried, at the top of her voice. But her mother couldn’t
hear her; and all that Merrimeg heard was a sound as if a great many
people were laughing at her, a long way off.
It was pitch dark. But all around her, in the black soot of the
chimney, were little sparks, like the sparks you see in the soot
at the back of the fireplace when the fire is crackling on the
hearth,--thousands of tiny sparks, and all of them getting dimmer as
the wind died down more and more.
Suddenly the wind sprang up again, stronger and stronger, and the
harder the wind blew the brighter the sparks burned. Merrimeg had to
hold on fast with her feet and back to keep from being blown out of
the top of the chimney.
She could see better now, and she saw what these sparks were. There
were thousands of little black imps, sitting along the edges of the
bricks in the walls of the chimney; and each spark was the head of
a little black imp. She had to look close to see them, they were so
tiny, but there they were, sure enough. She could hear them laughing,
and it sounded as if a great crowd of grown-up people were laughing
fit to kill, a long, long way off.
Every one of them was holding in his hands a wee mite of a bag with
two handles, and when he would press these handles together a strong
wind would come out of the bag and blow on his head, and make it burn
bright like a spark of fire; and when he stopped pressing the handles
of his wind bag his head would grow dim again. They were working away
at a great rate, keeping their heads alive, and the wind they made
nearly blew Merrimeg up out of the chimney.
She didn’t have much time to think about it, for all at once the imps
stopped working at their wind bags, and the wind began to go down
and their heads to grow dim, and before she knew what was coming
Merrimeg felt these little imps, thousands of them, pounce on her,
all over her, as thick as flies on honey, over her hair, and face,
and arms, and legs, and dress, everywhere, and they were scratching
and pinching, so that she screamed out in fright, and nearly fell
down the chimney, for there was no wind now to hold her up.
But just then, when all the sparks had nearly gone out, the terrible
little creatures suddenly stopped scratching and pinching and began
to pump away at their wind bags like mad; for in another second their
sparks would have been out, and that would have been the end of
_them_.
That was what saved Merrimeg. The wind that sprang up from the wind
bags was twice as strong as it has been before. It caught her, and
tore her loose, and picked her up, and whirled her up the chimney,
right up to the top of it and _out_.
There she was, standing in the bright sunshine, on the roof of her
own house, looking down into the cabbage garden.
It was a little house, only one story high, but it was too high for
her to jump down to the ground; so she crawled to the edge of the
roof, and sure enough there was the garden ladder standing against
the front wall of the house, and it didn’t take her more than a
minute to clamber down the ladder and run to the door.
She knocked on the door and waited for her mother to let her in.
The door opened, and her mother stood in the doorway looking at her.
When she saw the little girl who was waiting on the step she raised
both her hands in astonishment and opened her mouth wide.
“Oh, mother!” cried Merrimeg. “Let me in, quick! I’m terrible sorry,
and I’ve been up the chimney, and I’ll never, never do so any more,
indeed I won’t!”
“Why, child,” said her mother, “_who are you_?”
“Let me in, mother!”
“Who are you, child?”
“Who am I? I’m Merrimeg, of course! Let me in!”
Her mother laughed. “Merrimeg!” she cried, and laughed louder than
before. “You! The idea! You must be crazy! Why, child, you’re as
black as ink! My Merrimeg is as fair as a lily! I never saw you
before!”
“Oh, mother!” cried Merrimeg. “I’m not black. I’m Merrimeg, and I
want to come in!”
“Run away, child,” said her mother. “I’ve no time to bother with
strange children now. Run away home to your mother. I’m too busy to
bother with you now.”
When she had said that, she went back into the house, and closed the
door after her. Merrimeg knocked at the door again and again, but it
was no use. Her mother would not pay any attention.
She cried to herself and walked away down the village street. No one
knew her. She stopped two or three times, when she met children whom
she knew, but they laughed at her and mocked her. They called her
“Black face! Black face!” and she ran away.
She came to the end of the village street and went into the woods.
She sat down beside a pool of clear water, to rest. She looked down
into the pool. She was black.
Her dress was black too. Wherever the imps had touched her (and they
had touched her all over) she was as black as chimney soot. She lay
down on the grass and cried.
Then she jumped up and stooped over the pool to wash her face in the
clear water. She scrubbed her face hard, and looked at it again in
the water; and then she cried again, harder than before. Her face was
still black; it wouldn’t wash off!
She went on further into the woods, and she really didn’t care what
became of her; she wouldn’t care if she got lost and never came home
any more; and if she never came home any more, oh! wouldn’t her
mother be sorry! She stopped to cry for a few minutes, but she went
on again pretty soon, and after a long, long while she found herself
in a part of the woods where she had never been before.
She came to a place where there was a great bank of bright green moss
under the trees. It was higher in the middle, something like a roof,
and it was very soft and cool-looking, and Merrimeg was very tired.
She threw herself down on the bed of moss.
“How soft it is!” she said to herself.
As she said this, she sank down deep into the moss. Down she sank,
deeper and deeper. She was frightened, and tried to jump up; but
it was too late. The moss closed all over her, and she sank out of
sight. She was _gone_.
Where do you think she was? She was in a little house under the
ground. The moss was the roof of the house, and she fell right
down through it into a little kitchen, where two gnomes were
sitting at a table eating their dinner. She sat down plump on the
floor, and stared at the gnomes.
[Illustration: “BLESS MY SOUL!” SAID ONE OF THE GNOMES]
“Bless my soul!” said one of the gnomes.
“Bless my soul too, brother!” said the other gnome.
“I’ll tell you what it is, brother Nibby,” said the first gnome, “the
roof’s broken in again.”
“I believe you’re right, brother Malkin, I believe you’re right,”
said the other gnome.
“What’ll we do with her?” said the gnome called Malkin.
“Whatever you say, brother,” said the gnome called Nibby. “You always
know best.”
“She’s all black,” said the first gnome.
“So she is, brother, so she is,” said the other gnome.
“But not quite all black,” said the first gnome.
“No, not quite,” said the other one. “How clever you are, brother
Malkin.”
“I see a white place behind her ear,” said brother Malkin.
“There’s a white place behind her ear, sure enough,” said brother
Nibby. “I wouldn’t have noticed it myself.”
“Then why isn’t she white all over?” said brother Malkin.
“Ah! that’s the point!” said brother Nibby. “Why isn’t she?”
“Because she’s never been thrown onto the Great Snow Mountain,” said
Malkin.
“That’s it, that’s it, just what I was going to say,” said Nibby.
“Then we’d better throw her onto the Great Snow Mountain,” said
Malkin.
“That’s a very clever idea, brother,” said Nibby. “I don’t know why I
didn’t think of it myself.”
“But suppose she doesn’t want to be white?” said Malkin.
“That’s so,” said the other. “I never thought of that.”
“How will we find out?” said brother Malkin.
“That’s the trouble,” said Nibby. “How are we ever going to find
out?”
“How would it do to ask her?” said Malkin.
“That’s a very good idea,” said brother Nibby. “How you do think of
things!”
“Which one of us had better ask her?” said Malkin.
“Oh, that should be you, brother,” said Nibby.
“I think you should be the one,” said Malkin.
“Oh, no indeed, brother Malkin, no, no, no, no, no,----”
“I’ll tell you!” cried Merrimeg, jumping to her feet, out of all
patience with these gnomes. “I _do_ want to be white! I do! I do!”
“I believe she wants to be white,” said brother Malkin.
“I’m pretty sure of it,” said Nibby.
“Then you’d better tell her to come along with us,” said Malkin.
“Oh dear no, brother, I think _you_ should be the one to tell her,”
said brother Nibby.
“No, you should be the one,” said Malkin.
“No, you, brother Malkin.”
“No, no; _you_, brother Nibby.”
“Goodness gracious me!” cried Merrimeg, more and more out of
patience. “For mercy’s sake come along! Don’t let’s stay here talking
all day! Let’s hurry, hurry!”
“She’s not very polite, brother,” said Malkin.
“Not very, indeed,” said Nibby. “I noticed it myself.”
Each of the gnomes took a lighted candle from the table; then they
opened a door in the floor of the kitchen and went down a ladder, and
Merrimeg went down after them.
When they were at the bottom, in a dark tunnel, lit only by the
candles carried by the gnomes, Malkin stopped and said:
“We mustn’t forget to have that roof fixed.”
“No, we mustn’t forget that,” said Nibby.
“Oh, bother the roof,” said Merrimeg to herself. “I wish we would get
on.”
“Did you hear what she said?” said Malkin. “It sounded to me like
something rude.”
“That’s the way it sounded to me, too,” said Nibby.
“I think we ought to ask her if she’s rude or not,” said Malkin.
“Yes, we ought to know that,” said Nibby.
“Because if she is, we oughtn’t to be out alone in the dark with
her,” said Malkin.
“No,” said Nibby, “it wouldn’t be safe.”
“Then suppose you ask her if she’s rude,” said Malkin.
“_You’re_ the one to ask her, brother,” said Nibby.
“Oh, dear me!” said Merrimeg. “You don’t need to ask me. I’m _not_
rude. Only sometimes maybe I am, but I don’t mean it, and I wish
you’d please hurry.”
“I guess it’s all right, brother Nibby,” said Malkin.
They came to a stream of water, flowing along underground in the
dark, and a little boat was tied to a stake in the stream. Merrimeg
sat down at the back end of the boat, and the two gnomes sat down
before her, each one with a paddle in his hand. The paddles began
to dip in the water, and the little boat began to go swiftly up the
stream.
“A little faster, brother,” said Malkin.
“Very good, brother, very good,” said Nibby.
With that, they began to paddle so fast that Merrimeg positively
could not see their paddles, and the candles went out, and then she
could not see anything at all. She felt that she was rushing along
like lightning, and she had to hold on to the sides of the boat.
“It’s getting colder now,” said Malkin.
“So it is, brother, so it is,” said Nibby.
Merrimeg was so cold by this time that her teeth chattered.
“We ought to have asked her if she’d mind being cold,” said Malkin.
“We forgot to ask her that.”
“Yes, we forgot to ask her that,” said Nibby. “But it’s too late now.”
Merrimeg’s legs and arms were nearly frozen. They were so stiff that
she could not move them. She thought that she was freezing to death.
“We’re going up now,” said Malkin.
“We are, sure enough, brother,” said Nibby.
“Now for a good push up over the waterfall, and we’ll be there,” said
Malkin.
[Illustration: IN FRONT OF THEM ROSE A GREAT MOUNTAIN OF SNOW....]
“Yes, now for a good push,” said Nibby.
They were going up and up, and Merrimeg was getting stiffer and
stiffer. She couldn’t move at all by this time.
A great roar of falling water came to her from just ahead, and “Now!”
cried Malkin, and “All right!” cried Nibby, and the boat turned
straight up and climbed the side of the waterfall like an arrow, with
the gnomes paddling for dear life.
“Here we are!” cried Malkin, and “Here we are, brother!” cried Nibby,
and they came out of the side of the earth and paddled on quietly up
the stream through a wide field of ice under a dark cloudy sky.
In front of them rose the top of a great mountain of snow.
“I don’t believe she can move,” said Malkin.
“I’m pretty sure she can’t,” said Nibby.
The boat stopped, and the gnomes got out on the ice and lifted out
Merrimeg between them. She could hear and see, but she was frozen so
stiff that she could not move.
“Do you think we can throw that far?” said Malkin.
“You’re so strong, brother, you’re so strong,” said Nibby.
“Then let’s try it,” said Malkin.
They looked over at the top of the Great Snow Mountain, and picked
Merrimeg up and swung her back and forth several times. Then Malkin
cried “Now!” and they gave her a mighty toss and fling and away she
flew through the air towards the mountain of snow; and she lit on the
very top of it, and sank down and down in the soft snow until she was
out of sight.
“We mustn’t forget to fix the roof,” said Malkin. “We’d better put
some boards under the moss.”
“I suppose so, brother; you always know best,” said Nibby.
“Then let’s go home and attend to it,” said Malkin.
Up on the mountain top, Merrimeg sank down deeper and deeper into the
soft snow. It seemed to her that she was falling for hours, and that
she would never come to the bottom; but at last she broke through
the bottom of the snow, and underneath was a dark river, and in it
were floating blocks of thick ice, and Merrimeg dropped right onto
one of these blocks of ice as it was going along under her, and it
carried her away down the dark stream, with a roof of snow over her
head. Then she grew so dizzy that she really didn’t know anything for
a long time.
When she came to herself, she was floating along quietly on her block
of ice through the woods, and the sun was shining and the birds were
singing; and the ice had melted away so much that it would scarcely
hold her. It was only a thin film under her, and she was getting
wetter and wetter; and in another moment the ice struck a stone in
the bottom and broke, and she was standing in the water up to her
knees.
The water was cool and pleasant, and she was surprised to find that
she wasn’t cold any longer, and that she could move as well as ever.
She waded to the shore and walked on into the woods; and she had
not walked very far when she saw a bright green patch of moss under
the trees. She knew that it was the roof of the gnomes’ house, and
she wanted to see them again, for she was afraid she hadn’t been
very polite to them, and she knew she ought to thank them. She threw
herself down on the bed of moss, but it wouldn’t give way under her.
The gnomes must have put something strong underneath to hold it up.
Anyway, she couldn’t break through.
She knew where she was now, and it didn’t take her long to reach the
pool where she had tried to wash the black off her face. She stooped
down over the pool and looked at herself in the clear water.
She was fair as a lily, and her cheeks were red as roses.
She jumped up singing and ran towards the village where she lived.
As she skipped down the village street, she was singing over and over
again, “The mountain has made me white again! The mountain has made
me white again!” And all the children playing in the street stopped
to stare at her, wondering what she meant, and some of them called
after her, “Merrimeg! Merrimeg!” But she paid no attention. She ran
home, skipping and dancing, and hurried through the cabbage garden
and in at the kitchen door. Her little broom was lying on the floor
where she had left it. At the back of the fireplace was the pile of
dust, exactly where she had swept it. She thought it was queer that
the wind which had drawn her up the chimney hadn’t blown away the
dust; but there it was. Probably those chimney imps wanted to leave
it where her mother would be sure to see it.
She snatched up the broom and swept the dust into the dustpan, and
you can believe that she didn’t put her head into the fireplace,
either; she reached in and swept the dust out into the dustpan and
carried it out to the cabbage garden and emptied it. And as she came
back into the kitchen her mother came in from the front room and
said,----
“Oh, here you are. Where have you been so long? While you were out
there was a funny little black girl who came to the door and said she
was Merrimeg!”
“Yes’m,” said Merrimeg.
[Illustration: MERRIMEG AND THE CLOP-CLOP SHOES]
_MERRIMEG AND THE CLOP-CLOP SHOES_
It was Sunday morning, and Merrimeg was always good on Sunday.
Everybody was in church,--everybody but Merrimeg. Her mother had let
her stay at home as a reward, because she had done her sweeping so
neatly.
The house was empty, and there was not a soul in the village street.
Merrimeg was sitting at the front window, looking at pictures in a
book and telling herself stories about them. Sometimes she would gaze
out of the open window at the sunshine.
After a while she stopped talking to herself, and looked up and
listened. She was sure that she heard a sound in the street. It was
a kind of clop-clop! and it seemed to be coming nearer. She peeped
around the corner of the window and looked out.
Two pairs of wooden shoes, quite small, were coming down the street
side by side, towards her house. Each pair of wooden shoes was
walking along in the usual way, but the astonishing thing was that
there were no feet in them. There was nobody at all in them. They
were walking along all by themselves.
Merrimeg opened her eyes wide. She had never seen such a sight as
that before. Clop-clop! went the wooden shoes on the hard ground,
just as if two people were stepping down the street. But no, there
was nothing anywhere in the street but those two pairs of shoes,
coming along clop-clop!
Merrimeg held her breath and watched to see the shoes go by her
window. Clop-clop! they came, sounding plainer and plainer;
clop-clop! right up to the door of her house; and when they came to
the door, there they stopped.
Merrimeg drew her head back a little, getting ready to run if she had
to, but she watched them with both eyes.
“I think this is a house,” said a voice.
“I believe it is, brother, I believe it is,” said another voice.
Merrimeg looked all around, but she could see nobody. The voices
seemed to be coming from the spot where the shoes were standing.
“What if she should be cross to-day?” said the first voice.
“Then she wouldn’t help us, brother,” said the other voice, “and what
on earth _would_ we do then?”
“But it’s Sunday,” said the first voice, “and they aren’t cross on
Sunday, hardly ever.”
“That’s so, brother, that’s so,” said the other voice. “You do think
of everything.”
“How would it do to knock?” said the first voice.
“I was just thinking about that myself,” said the other voice.
Merrimeg was listening with both ears, and she heard, as plain as
could be, three knocks on the front door; but what it was that was
knocking at the door, she couldn’t see. All that she could see was
that two pairs of wooden shoes moved up onto the doorstep, and stood
there.
While she was wondering about it the knock sounded again, and without
stopping to think any more she jumped up and ran to the door and
opened it, not very wide, and looked down at the shoes.
“It’s herself, brother Nibby,” said a voice in the doorway.
“So it is, brother Malkin, so it is,” said the other voice.
“Why, it’s the two gnomes!” cried Merrimeg. “But where are you?”
“She can’t see us, of course,” said the first voice.
“No, of course not,” said the second voice. “I forgot that.”
“If you’re there,” said Merrimeg, “come in!” and she opened the door
wide.
The two pairs of shoes stepped into the room, and stood with their
toes towards Merrimeg.
“Do you suppose she’ll be willing to help us?” said the voice of
Malkin the gnome.
“Just what I’m wondering, brother,” said the voice of Nibby.
“Of course I’ll help you!” said Merrimeg. “What’s the matter?”
“She’s pretty good to-day,” said Malkin’s voice.
“I can see that, brother,” said Nibby’s voice.
“I can’t see anything at all!” cried Merrimeg. “Where _are_ you,
anyway? Are you _here_, or where?”
“Of course she doesn’t know what the witch has done to us,” said the
voice of Malkin.
“No, she doesn’t know that the witch has taken away our bodies,” said
the voice of Nibby.
“And we want to get them back,” said Malkin’s voice.
“And we want her to help us,” said Nibby’s voice.
“It’s a frightful nuisance being without a body,” said Malkin’s voice.
“She ought to know that without being told, I should think,” said
Nibby’s voice.
“How can I help you?” said Merrimeg. “I’ll do anything I can.”
“She isn’t cross at all to-day,” said Malkin’s voice.
“No, it’s Sunday,” said Nibby’s voice.
“She’d better come along with us at once, then,” said Malkin’s voice.
“Yes,” said Nibby’s voice, “they’ll throw our bodies down the well if
we don’t hurry.”
“Suppose you tell her, then.”
“Oh, no, brother, _you’re_ the one to tell her.”
“Oh dear no, brother Nibby, _you_ are the one to----”
“I’ll come!” said Merrimeg. “Never mind telling me. Go ahead, and
I’ll follow you!”
The two pairs of wooden shoes turned and went out of the open door,
and Merrimeg followed them as they went clop-clopping down the street.
They left the village and went into the woods. They found a path
which Merrimeg had never seen before, and they walked along this
path, under the trees and bushes, and across little streams, for
a long, long time; and the woods grew thicker and thicker, so that
at last they could not see the sun, and it was very dark; and all
the while the two pairs of little shoes went on before, and Merrimeg
followed behind.
[Illustration: THE CLOP-CLOP SHOES WENT ON INTO THE WOODS]
“I suppose we’d better tell her the right word now,” said the voice
of Malkin, “before we meet old Verbum Sap.”
“Yes, before we meet old Sappy,” said Nibby’s voice.
“Dear me!” said Malkin’s voice. “Blest if I haven’t forgotten the
word myself!”
“Oh, mercy on us, whatever will we do now?” said Nibby’s voice.
“Oh dear, oh dear!” said Malkin’s voice. “If I could only remember
the word! Isn’t it something like _cat-tails_?”
“No, no, brother, nothing like that!”
“Can’t _you_ remember the word, brother Nibby?”
“Oh, _me_? Oh dear yes, brother, I know what the word is. But
_you’ve_ forgotten it, brother Malkin! Whatever shall we do now?
We’ll never get our bodies back without the word, never, never!”
“But don’t _you_ know what it is, brother Nibby?”
“Oh yes, brother Malkin, but what good will that do, if _you_ don’t
know what it is?”
“That’s so, that’s so. I never thought of that. Oh dear me, I’m sure
I don’t know what we’re going to do about it.”
Merrimeg very nearly lost all patience at this.
“Why don’t you _tell_ him what it is, then?” she said.
“I do hope she isn’t going to be cross,” said Malkin’s voice. “But
anyway, that’s a pretty good idea. Suppose you _tell_ me what the
word is? Isn’t it something like _cat-tails_?”
“Nothing like that, brother, nothing like that!”
“What _is_ it, then?”
“It’s _kitten-tails_!”
“Then we’d better tell her now, before old Sappy comes up, so she’ll
know the word.”
“Which one of us had better tell her?”
“I think _you_ should be the one to tell her, brother Nibby----”
“Oh bother!” said Merrimeg. “I _know_ what the word is now. It’s
kitten-tails.”
“She’s getting cross, she’s getting cross, brother Nibby,” said
Malkin’s voice. “Do you think we’d better go back?”
“I’m not cross,” said Merrimeg. “Please excuse me. I won’t speak so
any more.”
“I believe it’s all right, brother Nibby,” said Malkin’s voice. “Now
you’d better tell her about the word. Whatever they say to her, she
must use that word, and she mustn’t use any other; tell her that,
brother Nibby. She mustn’t say anything else to them, because if she
does they’ll take her body away from her too, and we’ll never get our
bodies back; tell her that, brother Nibby. And we mustn’t speak at
all, because that would spoil everything. And whatever she does, she
mustn’t let them take her shoes off. Tell her, brother.”
“Excuse me,” said Merrimeg, very politely, “I heard what you said,
so he needn’t tell me, if you please.”
“Now that’s what I call very clever of her,” said Malkin’s voice.
“Very, very,” said Nibby’s voice.
In a few minutes they came to a place where the vines and brambles
hung down so low over the path that Merrimeg had to crawl on her
hands and knees; and just then Malkin said, in a very low voice:
“There’s old Sappy.”
Right in the middle of the path before them stood a great gray owl,
staring at them with his big round eyes. The shoes stopped still, and
Merrimeg sat up on her heels. The owl seemed to be staring straight
at her. He opened his beak, and a hoarse voice came out of his mouth,
sounding as if he had a bad cold, and the voice said:
“What do you want here, child?”
“Kitten-tails,” said Merrimeg, remembering that she wasn’t on any
account to say anything else.
The owl ruffled his feathers and winked one of his eyes, very slowly.
He stared at Merrimeg for a moment, then he turned around and walked
off down the path before them. The wooden shoes stepped along after
him, and Merrimeg followed on her hands and knees.
Old Sappy, if that was his name, led them a long way under the vines
and brambles, and stopped at the end of the path before a green wall
of leaves, very tall, made of vines matted thick together. At the
bottom of this leafy wall was a little opening, and after looking
behind him for a moment old Sappy went in, and after him stepped the
two pairs of shoes, and last of all in crawled Merrimeg.
When she was inside, she stood up. She was standing on a floor which
looked like green marble, very hard and shiny, and as she moved her
feet on it her shoes began to pinch her feet painfully. All around
her, in a circle, was the high wall of green leaves, and overhead the
branches of the trees hung down, making a green roof.
On one of these branches was perched a great black ugly bird, very
like a buzzard. Its little sharp eyes were looking hard at Merrimeg.
Around the walls, on the ground, was a row of gray owls,--dozens of
them, all staring at Merrimeg with their big round eyes.
In the middle of the floor was a dark opening, like the mouth of a
well; and alongside of it were lying the bodies of the two gnomes,
on their backs, with their eyes closed. They had no shoes on their
feet. The two pairs of wooden shoes walked across the floor and stood
beside the bodies.
Old Sappy stopped beside the well and looked up at the ugly black
bird over his head, and ruffled his feathers as if he were shivering.
The bird overhead perked its head down side-wise, and gave a croak
and said:
“It’s nearly time!”
“Time for what? Time for what?” croaked all the owls together.
“Time to put the bodies in the well!” said the ugly bird.
[Illustration: AROUND THE WALLS WAS A ROW OF GRAY OWLS]
“What shall we do first?” said the owls together.
“Get me another body for the well!” said the bird overhead.
“There are only two bodies!” sang out the owls.
“I see another, I see another!” said the bird on the branch.
Then the bird in the tree began to croak and grumble to itself, and
old Sappy stared at Merrimeg and said:
“What must she do?”
“She must come to the well!” said all the owls together.
“How must she come?”
“She must walk! She must walk!”
“Who’ll take off her shoes?” said old Sappy.
“We will, we will!” cried all the owls together, and they all ran
towards her, opening their beaks and squawking as they crowded in
around her feet.
But Merrimeg kicked out right and left and scattered them in every
direction. She found herself standing before the well and the ugly
black bird overhead gave an angry screech.
“What shall we do with her?” said old Sappy.
“The riddle! The riddle!” screamed the ugly black bird overhead.
“The riddle! The riddle!” sang out all the owls together.
“Answer the riddle!” said old Sappy. But as he said it he gave a slow
wink with his right eye. “Answer the riddle, and answer it right! Or
else,--or else,--off come your shoes, off come your shoes!”
“What is the riddle?” cried all the owls.
“This is the riddle, and answer it right,” said old Sappy. “What
is it that has no feet and runs away on four feet and is chased by
the same four feet, and lives on food and drink and never eats nor
drinks?”
“What is it? What is it?” croaked all the owls.
“Kitten-tails!” said Merrimeg, sobbing with fright as she said it.
The black bird overhead gave a piercing scream, spread its wings, and
tried to fly away. But before it could fly, while it was flapping and
struggling, a change came over it, and in its place was a horrible
little old woman, hanging on to the branch and kicking and screaming,
and trying to keep from falling down out of the tree. She was much
heavier than the bird had been, and the branch was not strong enough
to bear her; it snapped in half under her, and down she fell, still
kicking, directly into the opening of the well. She was gone.
Merrimeg heard a splash far down in the well, and at the same time
the green walls disappeared, and the well-opening was covered over,
and the green marble floor turned into soft green moss, raised in the
middle like a roof, and the owls flew away among the trees.
Merrimeg looked down at the bodies of the two gnomes, lying on
the bright green moss. One of them opened his eyes and yawned and
stretched his arms; and the other yawned and stretched his arms and
opened his eyes; and they both got up together, and looked down at
their feet.
“I suppose we’d better put on our shoes,” said one of them.
“I suppose we had, brother,” said the other one.
They put on their wooden shoes quickly, and then they noticed
Merrimeg.
[Illustration]
“Oh, yes,” said one of the gnomes, “I remember everything now.
Brother Nibby, we ought to thank her for helping us get our bodies
back.”
“That we ought, brother, that we ought, indeed,” said Nibby.
“Which one of us should tell her?” said Malkin.
“I think you could do it much better,” said Nibby. “You’re always so
clever.”
“Please don’t bother about thanking me,” said Merrimeg. “I’m so glad
I could help you.”
“Really, she isn’t rude at all to-day,” said Malkin.
“Not a bit, brother Malkin, not a bit,” said Nibby.
“Then we’d better go home,” said Malkin. “Why, bless me, we’re home
right now! This is the roof of our own house!”
“Now it’s queer I didn’t notice that before,” said Nibby. “How you do
notice everything, brother!”
“Good-by,” said Merrimeg. “I must get home before mother comes back
from church. Good-by.”
“Brother Nibby,” said Malkin, “will you ask her to stay and have
dinner with us in our own house?”
“I’m sorry,” said Merrimeg, “but I can’t stay now. Thank you ever so
much. I must hurry home. Good-by.”
She didn’t wait for an answer. Away she ran, and it wasn’t very long
before she was in the village street again. In a few minutes she was
sitting quietly at the front window of her house with the picture
book on her knee, and there she was sitting when her mother came home
from church.
“That’s what I call a good little girl,” said her mother, “--sitting
there quietly with your book, just as I left you.”
“Yes’m,” said Merrimeg.
[Illustration: MERRIMEG AND THE STARLIGHT FAIRIES]
_MERRIMEG AND THE STARLIGHT FAIRIES_
Merrimeg was asleep in her little bed, and Merrimeg’s mother was
asleep in her big bed.
It was late at night, and everybody in the village was asleep. All
the houses were dark, and the stars were shining overhead.
Merrimeg woke up, and listened. She thought she heard a sound as if
someone were crying.
She got up out of bed in her white nightgown, and tiptoed over to her
mother and looked at her. Her mother was fast asleep, but she still
heard the sound of crying.
She decided that it must be outside in the street, so she opened the
front door and peeped out.
In the street before the door were three beautiful children, and one
of them was crying.
They were all of about the same size as Merrimeg, and they were
dressed in long dark blue gowns, fine as spider webs, which rippled
around them in the cool air. They were barefoot and bareheaded. Each
one had long black hair streaming down to her waist, and a pair of
great wide wings standing out straight from her shoulders, like the
wings of an enormous butterfly, all blue and silver.
One of the children had her arms about the one who was crying. They
all looked up at Merrimeg as she opened the door.
“You’re Merrimeg, aren’t you?” said the one who had her arms about
the other.
Merrimeg stepped out into the street under the stars.
“Yes,” said she. “What is she crying about? Are you lost?”
“You’d--better--tell her--who we are, Pennie,” said the one who had
been crying, choking back her sobs.
“We aren’t lost,” said the one who hadn’t yet spoken. “We’re looking
for our star.”
“We’ve lost it,” said the one who had been crying, breaking out into
sobs again.
“Don’t cry, Winnie,” said the one who had her arms about her. “She’ll
help us find it, I know she will.”
“Why is she crying?” said Merrimeg again.
“She’s Winnie, and I’m Florrie,” said the one who had just spoken,
“and this one’s Pennie. Don’t you know who we are?”
“No,” said Merrimeg.
“We’re the starlight fairies,” said Florrie. “_Now_ do you know?”
“No,” said Merrimeg.
“I thought everybody knew,” said Florrie. “Every evening at dark we
fly along the sky up there and hang out the stars. Haven’t you ever
seen us?”
“No,” said Merrimeg.
“I suppose they can’t see us from down here, and we’ve never been
away from the stars before.”
“I wish we’d never come,” said Winnie, crying again.
“I’ll tell you,” said Pennie. “To-night we were hanging out the
stars, and Winnie--poor Winnie!”
“I didn’t mean to,” sobbed Winnie. “I didn’t mean to!”
“What did she do?” said Merrimeg.
“She dropped one of her stars,” said Pennie.
“It’s gone!” sobbed Winnie. “And I can’t go back without it!”
“It fell and fell and fell and fell,” said Florrie, “and then we
couldn’t see it any more. It dropped down here, somewhere near here,
we’re sure of it.”
“Do you see up there?” said Pennie. “Up there where there’s a wide
dark space between the stars?” She pointed to the sky, directly
overhead. There was a space there, about as big as a blanket, without
any star.
“Yes, I see,” said Merrimeg.
“That’s where the star belongs,” said Pennie.
“We’ll never find it!” said Winnie, putting her face down on
Florrie’s shoulder.
“I’m sure we shall,” said Florrie, “if Merrimeg will only help us.
We don’t know anything about this dreadful earth place, but she
knows.”
“Will you help us?” said Pennie.
“If I can,” said Merrimeg.
“Then come along,” said Pennie.
“Can’t I put on my clothes first?” said Merrimeg.
“There’s no time,” said Pennie. “Suppose daylight should come before
we find it? What _would_ we do?”
“Let’s go, then,” said Florrie; and she moved away lightly down the
street, drawing Winnie along by the hand, their wings waving gently
in the air.
“Where shall we go?” said Pennie.
A thought came into Merrimeg’s mind. She would take them to the
gnomes’ house, and the two brothers would surely tell them how to
find the star.
“I’ll take you,” said she, pushing on ahead towards the woods beyond
the village. She was used to going barefoot, and she didn’t mind the
rough ground. It was a warm night, and she soon forgot that she was
only in her nightgown.
They went into the woods.
“It’s so gloomy,” said Winnie, in a whisper. “I don’t like these
strange earth places. I wish we were at home among the stars.”
“We’ll be home before morning, never fear,” said Florrie.
They stopped beside the pool where Merrimeg had once tried to
wash the black from her face. The trees were wide apart here, and
Merrimeg, looking up, could see the bare spot in the sky directly
overhead, where the lost star belonged.
“Where are you taking us?” said Pennie.
“I’m taking you to the gnomes’ house,” said Merrimeg. “We’ll soon be
there. It’s two gnomes who’ve been very good to me; I know where they
live. They’re the ones to help us.”
“Is one of them named Malkin?” said Florrie.
“And the other one Nibby?” said Pennie.
“Yes,” said Merrimeg.
[Illustration: “LOOK!” SHE CRIED]
“Then it’s no use,” said Pennie. “We’ve been there already.”
“They were asleep,” said Florrie, “and we woke them up, and they
didn’t like it a bit. They wouldn’t get up for any foolish old
star,--that’s what they said. But they told us about you, and that’s
how we came to hunt you up. But the horrid gnomes wouldn’t do a thing
for us; they wouldn’t even get up.”
“They’re not horrid,” said Merrimeg. “Oh dear, I don’t know what
we’re going to do now.”
She looked down sadly into the dark water of the pool, trying to
think what to do next. She gave a little jump of surprise, and looked
harder. Far, far down, away down deep under the water of the pool,----
She saw a star.
“Look!” she cried, and pointed her finger at it.
The starlight fairies leaned over, and looked down into the pool.
“That’s it!” cried Florrie.
“It’s my star!” cried Winnie.
“It’s our lost star!” cried Pennie. “Dropped down from the sky to the
bottom of this pool.”
“Then,” said Merrimeg, “you’d better go down and get it.”
“Oh no! oh no! oh no!” cried the three fairies together.
“We mustn’t get our wings wet!” said Pennie.
“We’d never be able to fly home if our wings got wet,” said Winnie.
“But _you_ have no wings,” said Florrie to Merrimeg.
“No, _she_ has no wings,” said Pennie.
“_She_ shall go down for our star,” said Winnie. “You will, won’t
you?”
“The water’s deep and dark,” said Merrimeg.
“But you have no wings,” said Florrie.
“The water’s cold and gloomy,” said Merrimeg.
“But you have no wings,” said Pennie.
“I wonder if I could do it,” said Merrimeg.
“Oh please!” cried Winnie. “Oh dearest Merrimeg, please get my star.”
“I’ll see how deep it is,” said Merrimeg, and she threw a stone into
the middle of the pool. The water rippled away as the stone sank, and
the star could not be seen any longer.
“Oh!” cried Winnie. “Now you’ve sent my star away! It’s gone!”
But the water became quiet in a moment, and there was the star again,
shining bright at the bottom of the pool.
At that instant, they heard a splash in the water, and a shrill
voice, like the voice of an angry boy, cried out:
“Who breaks my glass? Who breaks my glass?”
“What can that be?” whispered Merrimeg.
“I don’t know,” said Florrie. “Throw another stone, and perhaps we’ll
hear it again.”
Merrimeg tossed another stone into the pool, and when the ripples had
died away they heard the same voice again. This time it said:
“Who strikes my children? Who strikes my children?”
“Throw another,” whispered Pennie, and Merrimeg cast in another stone.
This time there was a loud wail, and the voice cried:
“My children! My children! I’m coming! I’m coming!”
Then there was a splash, and nothing more. They waited a long time,
but they heard nothing more.
“I’m going to see,” said Merrimeg. “I may have hurt somebody. I can
see better from the end of that log.”
There was a dead log, the trunk of a fallen tree, lying out from the
bank of the pool into the water, and Merrimeg stepped onto it and
getting down on her hands and knees crawled out to the end of it.
It was slippery, and she had to hold on very carefully to keep from
falling off into the water.
She leaned over as far as she could and looked down into the pool.
She looked everywhere for the star, but she couldn’t see it; there
seemed to be some dark thing under the water between herself and the
star.
“The star is gone!” she said to the others, in a whisper.
As she said this, a hand came up out of the water and seized her
wrist and pulled her off the log. Over she went into the pool, down,
down, far down. The hand never once let go of her wrist. It pulled
her down and down, faster and faster. At first she thought she was
going to choke with the water, but in a moment she was all right
again, only wet, very wet. And in another moment she was at the
bottom, and the hand let go of her wrist. She stood up on her two
feet on a floor of what looked like glass.
There was a pale light shining all about her through the water, and
she saw that it came from the star, lying on the floor nearby. Just
over her head was a roof of glass, and it was badly broken in three
or four places. Around her were walls of glass. She was in a little
house of glass, with a broken roof, and full of water.
A hand took hold suddenly of her arm, and she was dragged across the
floor in a great hurry, by the creature who had pulled her down from
the log. It was a sprite; a water sprite, whose head just reached to
her shoulder; full-grown, evidently, in spite of being so small; with
pointed ears, and no hair on his head, and long green water grass
trailing around him.
He dragged Merrimeg straight to the star, and picked it up by a kind
of sling that it was meant to hang by. It flashed and glittered as he
snatched it up.
He pointed to the floor, and Merrimeg saw, lying there side by side,
three tiny sprites, babies, no bigger than kittens, and exactly like
the grown one who was holding her arm. They looked as if they were
asleep, but on the forehead of each one was a black and blue bruise,
and Merrimeg knew that she must have hurt them with her stones, as
well as broken the glass of their little home.
Their father, if it was their father, motioned to her to pick them
up. She gathered them up in her arms, and the sprite, carrying the
star in one hand, seized her hair with the other hand and sprang up
towards the holes in the broken glass roof; and in another instant
she was being dragged upward through the water as fast as she had
been pulled down.
[Illustration: UPWARD THROUGH THE WATER ...]
She almost dropped the little mites she was holding in her arms, but
she hugged them tighter, and when they came to the surface of the
pool she was holding them safe in her arms.
They came out dripping on the bank of the pool, and there were the
three starlight fairies.
“Oh!” cried Winnie. “She’s brought my star!”
The water sprite dragged Merrimeg onto the dry grass, and took the
three babies from her arms and laid them down on the grass.
“Now! now! now!” he cried. It was plain that he was very angry. He
was trembling all over. “What are you going to do about it? Look what
you’ve done.”
“Why,” said Merrimeg, “why----”
“First comes this horrible star and breaks in the roof of my house
and lets in all the water! And then--oh you wicked creatures!--you
throw down your ’bom’nable stones and break my roof all to pieces
and kill my children--my poor children--_look_ at ’em--_look_ at
’em, will you?--look at those bumps on their foreheads--oh my poor
children--You ’bom’nable creatures, you! You perfectly awful wicked
’bom’nable----”
“Oh!” said Florrie. “It’s too bad. I’m so sorry.”
“We didn’t mean to do any harm,” said Pennie.
“And after he was so kind as to bring our star back to us, too,” said
Winnie.
“Is this your star?” cried out the water sprite.
“Yes, yes! It’s mine!” said Winnie.
“Then you’ll never get it! You shan’t have it!” cried the water
sprite, angrier than ever. “You’ll see what I’m going to do with it!
You’ll never get it again! Ah! there she goes!”
He swung the star by the sling in his hand, and gave it a great
fling, and away it flew over the tree tops, in a beautiful bright
curve, higher and higher, and then lower and lower.
But he was greatly mistaken if he thought he could get rid of the
star in any such way as that. Quick as a flash all three of the
starlight fairies were in the air, and off like three arrows over the
tree tops after the star. Before Merrimeg knew what was happening
they were out of sight, and the star was gone.
The water sprite was so astonished that he forgot he was angry.
“Who are they?” he said, in a kind of whisper.
“They’re the starlight fairies,” said Merrimeg. “They hang out the
stars each night, and to-night they dropped that star by accident,
and it fell into your pool. If they don’t get it back they can’t go
home.”
“But they killed my children and----”
At that moment the lost star appeared over the tree tops, coming on
towards them in a streak of white light, and in another moment the
three starlight fairies stood on the ground, and Winnie was swinging
the star in her hand.
“Oh! oh!” she said, and began to laugh and cry at the same time. She
couldn’t say another word, for joy.
“We’ve got it!” cried Florrie. “We can go home now!”
“But what about these poor babies?” said Merrimeg. “Can’t we do
anything for them?”
The three fairies knelt around the three tiny bodies on the ground,
and looked closely at their foreheads.
“Why,” said Pennie, “it’s nothing but a bruise!”
“So it is,” said Winnie and Florrie together.
“Is that all?” said Merrimeg.
“Is that _all_?” said the water sprite, looking very helpless and
pitiful.
“Yaa! yaa!” came a little piping cry from the grass, and the water
sprite dropped to the ground beside the babies.
“He’s crying!” sang out the water sprite. “His eyes are open!”