The Fairies and the Christmas Child Read online

  Chapter IV

  The Bird at the Window.

  There were so many things in Brittany that Father wanted to showme--places he had seen with Mother, and curious monuments, and lovelyviews,--that I could not get out alone again until the day before wewent on to Normandy. No Fairy would ever speak to me unless I was quiteby myself, and the quaint little men who peered out from the old ruinswhen I ran on in front, scampered away at once when Father came insight.

  On that last morning a funny old postman in a blue cap brought him someletters from home. They were about the practice, and Father said that hemust stay indoors to answer them. The patients did not seem to like the"locust" at all, according to Nancy. I don't suppose he gave them suchnice-tasting medicines as Father did.

  The moment he took up his pen I was off to the wood. The paths werecarpeted with velvet moss, and starry flowers peeped through the green.Some bees were buzzing round a clump of violets that grew by the side ofthe fountain, and sitting on the steps were two hideous old women, withbleared red eyes and wisps of faded hair. As I drew near they scowledmost horribly, and vanished in the spray. I was delighted to find myWood-Elf by the violets, for somehow the sight of those two old croneshad made me shiver.

  "They were Korrigans!" the Wood-Elf whispered. "That is how they look bydaylight, so it is no wonder that they hate to be seen by mortals! Ishouldn't advise you to come here to-night, for they will bear you agrudge, and might tempt you to dance with them!"

  I thought of what had befallen Jean, and shook my head. It must bedreadful to have a hump, though I read of one once that turned intowings. But Jean's didn't seem that kind.

  "I know better than to put myself in their power," I cried, and theWood-Elf laughed.

  "You think you are very wise," she said, pausing the next moment to coaxa bee to give her a sip of honey, "but mortal men are not a match forFairy Folk. The Dwarfs, or Courils, who haunt the stone tables andcurious mounds you find throughout this country, compel all travellersby night who come their way to dance with them, whether they will or no.They don't let them stop dancing until they drop to the ground, wornout with fatigue, and sometimes the poor creatures never regain theirstrength. Mere Gautier's husband danced with the Dwarfs when he was buteight-and-twenty, and he has not done a stroke of work from that dayto this, though now he is eighty-five. Mere Gautier keeps the hometogether, and he sits by the fireside and tells the neighbours how theDwarfs looked and what they said. The Cure declares that such idlenessis sinful, and that he might work if he would; but one cannot be sure,and he makes himself out to be a very poor creature.

  The Gorics--tiny men but three feet high, though they have the strengthof giants--are little better than Courils. Near Quiberon, by the seashore, is a heap of huge stones, some say no less than four thousand innumber, known as 'The House of the Gorics,' and every night the Dwarfscome out and dance round it till break of day. If they spy a belatedtraveller, even in the distance, they compel him to join them, just asthe Courils do; and when he faints from sheer exhaustion they vanish inpeals of laughter."

  "The Fairy I met in the South spoke of little men who gave away fairygold," I said, trying not to let my voice sound sleepy. The sun was hot,though it was early spring, and there was a grasshopper just at my elbowwho had been chirping a lullaby to her babies for the last half-hour.

  "If you shut your eyes you will see nothing!" the Wood-Elf pouted; andI knew that she had noticed my yawn. I sat up then, and told her howpretty I thought her frock, all brown and green, with a dainty girdle ofsilver. She laughed at this, and I coaxed her to tell me another story.It was one, she said, that had been sung in verse on the Welsh hills,for in ancient times the people of Wales and those of "Little Britain"were the closest friends.

  The Wee Men of Morlaix

  "Long, long ago," she began, "a lordly castle was built at Morlaix,in the midst of such pleasant surroundings that some little Dwarfs insearch of a home thought that they could not do better than build theirstronghold underneath it. So they set to work immediately, for theyhave a very wise rule that when once they decide that a thing mustbe done, it shall be done at once. By the time that the castle wasfinished, their home was completed too. Far below the ground they hadfashioned a number of oval chambers, with ceilings encrusted withgleaming pearls which they found in the bay, and floors paved withprecious amber. Beyond these chambers lay their treasure house, wherethey kept rich stores of fairy gold, and the winding passages which ledto the upper world were only just wide enough to allow them to creepthrough. Their entrances were cunningly contrived to look like rabbitholes, so that strangers might think they led to nothing more than somesandy warren.

  But the country folk knew better, for they often watched the little menrun in and out, beating a faint tattoo on the silver basins in whichthey collected the morning dew and the evening mist, which served themfor food and drink. Now and then, when the sky was a vault of blue,and the sun shone his brightest, they brought up piles of their goldencoins, that they might see them glisten in the light of day. So friendlywere they to mortals, that if they were surprised while thus employed,they seldom failed to share their wealth.

  One very bleak autumn there was much distress on the countryside, forthe harvest had failed for the third season, and many of the smallerfarmers were on the verge of ruin. Jacques Bosquet--_Bon Jacques_--hisneighbours called him, for he had never refused his help to a friend inneed--was one of these. His frail old mother was weak and ailing, and hedid not know how to tell her that she must leave the homestead to whichshe had come as a bride, full fifty years before. In his despair hetried to borrow a thousand francs from a rich merchant in the next town;but the merchant was a hard man, and his mouth closed like a cruel steeltrap when he told Jacques roughly that he had no money to lend. AsJacques returned home his eyes were so dim with the tears which prideforbade him to shed, that in passing the castle of Morlaix he all butfell over three little men, who were counting out gold by a deep hole.

  'What is wrong with you, friend, that you do not see where you aregoing?' cried the eldest of the three; and when Jacques told them of hisfruitless errand, they at once invited him to help himself to theirtreasure.

  'Take all you can hold in your hand!' they urged, and since Jacques'hand had been much broadened with honest toil, this meant a goodly sum.The three little men had vanished before Jacques found words to expresshis gratitude, and he hurried away with a thankful heart. The coins wereof solid gold, and stamped with curious signs; to his great joy he verysoon sold them for a big price, and had now sufficient not only to payhis debts, but to carry him through the winter.

  When the merchant who had received his appeal so churlishly heard of hisgood fortune, he was full of envy, and determined to lay in wait for thelittle men himself. Though blessed with ample means, he coveted more,and when at last he surprised the Dwarfs as Jacques had done, he madeso piteous a tale that they generously allowed him to take two handfulsinstead of one. But this did not content the greedy fellow, and pushingthe wee men rudely away, he stooped to fill his pockets from the heap.As he did so, a shower of blows rained fiercely round his head and face,and so heavily did they fall that he had much ado to save his skull.When at last the blows ceased, and he dared to open his eyes, the Dwarfshad gone, with all their gold, and his pockets were empty of even thatwhich they had contained before."

  The Wood Elf paused, for a large brown bird had perched himself on abranch which overhung the fountain. She waited until he had dipped hisbeak in the sparkling stream and flown away before she spoke again.

  "That bird is a stranger to these woods," she said presently under herbreath, "and I wondered if it were really an Elf or a Fee. One neverknows in these parts."

  "Tell me!" I urged; for I knew by her look that she was thinking ofanother story.

  The Bird at the Window.

  "There was once a most beautiful lady," she began, "whose face was sokind and gentle that wherever she went the children flocked round herand hung on her gown
. No flower in the garden could hold up its headbeside her, for the roses themselves were not so sweet, and even thelilies drooped before her exceeding fairness.

  From far and near lovers came to woo her, but she would none of them;for ever in her mind was a gallant knight to whom she had plightedher troth in the land of dreams. In the presence of a holy man, whosefeatures were those of the Cure who confirmed her, he had placed a ringupon her finger; and so real did this dream seem, that she held herselfto to be the knight's true wife. Her songs were all of him as she satat her spinning, and her tender thoughts made warp and weft with theshining threads. When she went to the fountain, she heard his voice inthe splash of the falling water, and when the stars shone through hercasement, she fancied that they were the adoring eyes of her beloved.She prayed each night that she might be patient and faithful until heclaimed her, for he, and none other, should touch her lips.

  But she was very beautiful, and her parents were very poor. And when thelord of those parts saw and desired her, they gave her to him, despiteher prayers, though he was bent and old. He carried her off to his grimcastle, and that no man but he should gaze on her loveliness, he shuther in his tower, with only an aged widow as her attendant. The widowwas half-blind and wholly deaf, and withal so crabbed in dispositionthat as she passed the very dogs in the street slunk off to a safedistance. In vain the beautiful lady pleaded to be allowed to stroll inthe gardens, or to ply her needle on the balcony; he would not let herstir from her gloomy chamber, and for seven long years he kept her indurance. His love had by this time turned to hate, for her beauty wasdimmed with weeping. No longer did her hair make a mesh of gold forsunbeams to dance in, and her face was like a sad white pearl from whichall tints had fled. And the heart of the wicked lord rejoiced, for sincehe could not win her favour, and she no longer delighted his eyes, hewas glad that she should die.

  One morning in May when the dew lay thick upon the meadows and everythrush had found a mate, the old lord went off for a long day'shunting, and the aged widow fell fast asleep. The beautiful lady sighedanew as the sweet spring sunshine flooded her prison, seeming to mockher with its splendour. 'Ah, woe is me!' she cried. 'I may not evenrejoice in the sun as the meanest of God's creatures!' And in her greatdespair she called aloud to her own true knight, bidding him deliver herfrom her misery. Even as she spoke, a shadow fell across the window. Abird had stayed his flight beside it; he pressed through the bars andwas at her feet. His ash-brown plumage and rounded wings told her hewas a goshawk, and from the jesses on his legs she saw he had beena'hunting. While she gazed in surprise at his sudden appearance, shebeheld a transformation, and in less time than it takes to tell, thegoshawk had become a gallant knight, with raven locks and flashing eyes.It was the knight of her dreams, and with a cry of joy she flew to him.

  'I could not come to thee before, my Sweet,' said he, 'since thou didstnot call for me aloud. Now shall I be with thee at thy lightest wish,and no more shalt thou be lonely. But beware of the aged crone whoguards thy door! Her purblind eyes are not beyond seeing, and shouldshe discover me I must die.'

  And now the beautiful lady no longer pined to leave her prison, for shehad only to breathe his name, and her lover reappeared. Her beauty cameback to her as gladness to the earth when the sun shines after rain, andher songs were as joyous as those of the lark when it soars high in theheavens. The old lord was greatly puzzled, and bade the ancient widowkeep a careful watch.

  'My beautiful lady is gay!' he said, with an ugly smile. 'We must learnwhy she and sighs are strangers. I had thought ere this to lay her tosleep beneath a smooth green coverlet, and it does not please me to seeher thus content.'

  The aged crone bathed her eyes in water that flowed from a sacredshrine, so that sight might come back to them, and hid herself behind acurtain when the beautiful lady thought that she had left the tower.From this place of vantage she beheld, shortly after, the arrival ofthe goshawk, and his transformation into a handsome and tender knight.Slipping away unseen, she hastened to her master and told him all, notforgetting to describe the beautiful lady's rapture in her knight'sembrace.

  The jealous lord was furious with rage, and caused, at dead of night,four sharp steel spikes to be fixed to the bars of the window in thetower. On leaving his love, the goshawk flew past these safely, butwhen he returned at dusk the next evening, he overlooked them in hiseagerness, and was sorely hurt. The beautiful lady hung over herbeloved, distraught with grief; all bleeding from his wounds, he soughtto comfort her.

  She hid herself behind a curtain.]

  'Dear love, I must die!' he murmured faintly, 'but thou shalt shortlybear me a son who will dispel thy sorrows and avenge my fate.' Then hegave her a ring from his finger, telling her that while she wore itneither the old lord nor the widow would remember aught that she wouldhave them forget. He also gave her his jewelled sword, and bade her keepit till the day when Fate should bring her to his tomb, and she should'learn the story of the dead.' Then, and then only, he commanded, washis son to know what had befallen him.

  The beautiful lady wept anew, and in a passion of grief begged him notto leave her; but once more bidding her a fond farewell, he resumed theform of a goshawk, and flew mournfully away.

  It happened as the knight foretold. Neither the widow nor the old lordremembered his coming, and when the beautiful lady's son was born, theold lord was proud and happy. His satisfaction made him somewhat lesscruel to the beautiful lady, who lived but for her boy. In cherishinghim her grief grew less, but though she had now her freedom, she neverceased to long for the time when her son should know the truth about hisfather.

  The boy grew into a lad, and the lad into a handsome and gallantknight. He was high in favour at court, since none could approach him inchivalry or swordmanship, and many marvelled that one so brave and pureas he could be the son of the old lord, whose advancing years were asevil as those of his youth had been. One day his mother and he weresummoned by the King to a great festival, and rather than let them outof his sight, the old lord rose from his bed to go with them. Theyhalted on their way at a rich Abbey, where the Abbot feasted themroyally and before they left desired to show them some of the Abbey'ssplendours. When they had duly admired the exquisite carvings in thechapels, and the golden chalice on the High Altar, he conducted them toa chapter room, where, covered with hangings of finely wrought tapestry,and gorgeous embroideries of blue and silver, was a stately tomb. Tapersin golden vessels burned at its head and feet, and the clouds of incensethat filled the air floated from amethyst vessels. It was the tomb, theAbbot said, of 'a noble and most valiant knight,' who had met his deathfor love's sweet sake, slain by certain mysterious wounds which he boreon his stricken breast.

  When the beautiful lady heard this, she knew she had found the restingplace of her own true love, and taking his sword from the silken foldsof her gown, where she had ever carried it concealed from view, shehanded it to the young knight and told him all.

  'Fair son, you now have heard,' she said, 'That God hath us to this place led. It is your father who here doth lie, Whom this old man slew wrongfully.'

  With this she fell dead at her son's feet; and forthwith he drew thesword from its jewelled scabbard, and with one swift blow smote off theold lord's head.

  Thus did he avenge the wrongs of his parents, whom he vowed to keep inhis remembrance while life should last."