Ilka on the Hill-Top and Other Stories Part 15

"Well, I learned something about gnomes and pigmies and elves and fairies and salamanders, and--"

"And what?" interrupted Mabel, impatiently.

"And salamanders," repeated I. "You know the forests and rivers and mountains of Germany are full of all sorts of strange sprites, and you know the people believe in them, and that is one of the things which make life in the Old World so fascinating. But here we are too prosy and practical and business-like, and we don't believe in anything except what we can touch with our hands, and see with our eyes, and sell for money."

"Now, Jamie, that is not true," responded Mabel, energetically; for she was a strong American at heart, and it didn't take much to rouse her. "I believe, for instance, that you know a great deal although not as much as my father; but I can't see your learning with my eyes, neither can I touch it with my hands--"

"But I hope I can sell it for money," interrupted I, laughing.

"No, joking aside. I don't think we are quite as bad as you would like to make us out."

"And then you think, perhaps, that the gnomes and river-sprites would be as apt to thrive here as in the Old World?"

"Who knows?" said Mabel, with an expression that seemed to me half serious and half playful. "But I wish you would tell me something about your German sprites. I am so very ignorant in such things, you know."

I stretched myself comfortably on the edge of the shawl at Mabel's feet, and began to tell her the story about the German peasant who caught the gnome that had robbed his wheat-field.

"The gnomes wear tiny red caps," I went on, "which make them invisible. They are called tarn-caps, or caps of darkness. The peasant that I am telling about had a suspicion that it was the gnomes who had been stealing his wheat. One evening, he went out after sunset (for the gnomes never venture out from their holes until the sun is down) and began to fight in the air with his cane about the borders of the field. Then suddenly he saw a very tiny man with knee-breeches and large frightened eyes, turning a somersault in the gra.s.s right at his feet. He had struck off his cap, and then, of course, the gnome was no longer invisible. The peasant immediately seized the cap and put it into his pocket; the gnome begged and implored to get it back, but instead of that, the peasant caught him up in his arms and carried him to his house, where he kept him as a captive until the other gnomes sent a herald to him and offered him a large ransom. Then the gnome was again set free and the peasant made his fortune by the transaction."

"Wouldn't it be delightful if such things could ever happen here?"

exclaimed Mabel, while her beautiful eyes shone with pleasure at the very thought.

"I should think so," said I. "It is said, too, that if there are gnomes and elves in the neighborhood, they always gather around you when you talk about them."

"Really?" And Mabel sent a timid glance in among the large mossy trunks of the beeches and pines.

"Tell me something more, Jamie," she demanded, eagerly.

Mabel had such a charming way of saying "Jamie," that I could never have opposed a wish of hers, whatever it might be. The professor called me James, and among my friends I was Jim; but it was only Mabel who called me Jamie. So I told her all I knew about the nixies, who sang their strange songs at midnight in the water; about the elves, who lived in the roses and lilies, and danced in a ring around the tall flowers until the gra.s.s never grew there again; and about the elf-maiden who led the knight astray when he was riding to his bride on his wedding-day. And all the while Mabel's eyes seemed to be growing larger; the blood burned in her cheeks, and sometimes she shuddered, although the afternoon was very warm. When I had finished my tale, I rose and seated myself at her side. The silence suddenly seemed quite oppressive; it was almost as if we could hear it. For some reason neither Mabel nor I dared to speak; but we both strained our ears listening to something, we did not know what. Then there came a strange soft whisper which filled the air all about us, and I thought I heard somebody calling my name.

"They are calling you, Jamie," whispered Mabel.

"Calling me? Who?" said I.

"Up there in the tree. No, not there. It is down in the brook.

Everywhere."

"Oh," cried I, with a forced laugh. "We are two great children, Mabel.

It is nothing."

Suddenly all was silent once more; but the wood-stars and violets at my feet gazed at me with such strange, wistful eyes, that I was almost frightened.

"You shouldn't have done that, Jamie," said Mabel. "You killed them."

"Killed what?"

"The voices, the strange, small voices."

"My dear girl," said I, as I took Mabel's hands and helped her to rise. "I am afraid we are both losing our senses. Come, let us go. The sun is already down. It must be after tea-time."

"But you know we were talking about them," whispered she, still with the same fascinated gaze in her eyes. "Ah, there, take care! Don't step on that violet. Don't you see how its mute eyes implore you to spare its life?"

"Yes, dear, I see," answered I; and I drew Mabel's arm through mine, and we hurried down the wood-path, not daring to look back, for we had both a feeling as if some one was walking close behind us, in our steps.

II.

It was a little after ten, I think, when I left the professor's house, where I had been spending the evening, and started on my homeward way.

As I walked along the road the thought of Mabel haunted me. I wondered whether I ever should be a professor, like her father, and ended with concluding that the next best thing to being one's self a professor would be to be a professor's son-in-law. But, somehow, I wasn't at all sure that Mabel cared anything about me.

"Things are not what they seem," I murmured to myself, "and the real Mabel may be a very different creature from the Mabel whom I know."

There was not much comfort in that thought, but nevertheless I could not get rid of it. I glanced up to the big round face of the moon, which had a large ring of mist about its neck; and looking more closely I thought I saw a huge floundering body, of which the moon was the head, crawling heavily across the sky, and stretching a long misty arm after me. I hurried on, not caring to look right or left; and I suppose I must have taken the wrong turn, for as I lifted my eyes, I found myself standing under the willow-tree at the creek where Mabel and I had been sitting in the afternoon. The locusts, with their shrill metallic voices, kept whirring away in the gra.s.s, and I heard their strange hissing sh-h-h-h-h, now growing stronger, then weakening again, and at last stopping abruptly, as if to say: "Didn't I do well?" But the blue-eyed violets shook their heads, and that means in their language: "No, I don't think so at all." The water, which descended in three successive falls into the wide, dome-shaped gorge, seemed to me, as I stood gazing at it, to be going the wrong way, crawling, with eager, foamy hands, up the ledges of the rock to where I was standing.

"I must certainly be mad," thought I, "or I am getting to be a poet."

In order to rid myself of the painful illusion, which was every moment getting more vivid, I turned my eyes away and hurried up along the bank, while the beseeching murmur of the waters rang in my ears.

As I had ascended the clumsy wooden stairs which lead up to the second fall, I suddenly saw two little blue lights hovering over the ground directly in front of me.

"Will-o'-the-wisps," said I to myself. "The ground is probably marshy."

I pounded with my cane on the ground, but, as I might have known, it was solid rock. It was certainly very strange. I flung myself down behind the trunk of a large hemlock. The two blue lights came hovering directly toward me. I lifted my cane,--with a swift blow it cut the air, and,--who can imagine my astonishment? Right in front of me I saw a tiny man, not much bigger than a good-sized kitten, and at his side lay a small red cap; the cap, of course, I immediately s.n.a.t.c.hed up and put it in a separate apartment in my pocket-book to make sure that I should not lose it. One of the lights hastened away to the rocks and vanished before I could overtake it.

There was something so very funny in the idea of finding a gnome in the State of New York, that the strange fear which had possessed me departed and I felt very much inclined to laugh. My blow had quite stunned the poor little creature; he was still lying half on his back, as if trying to raise himself on his elbows, and his large black eyes had a terrified stare in them, and seemed to be ready to spring out of their sockets.

"Give--give me back my cap," he gasped at last, in a strange metallic voice, which sounded to me like the clinking of silver coins.

"Not so fast, my dear," said I. "What will you give me for it?"

"Anything," he cried, as he arose and held out his small hand.

"Then listen to me," continued I. "Can you help me to see things as they are? In that case I shall give you back your cap, but on no other condition."

"See things as they are?" repeated the gnome, wonderingly.

"Yes, and not only as they seem," rejoined I, with emphasis.

"Return here at midnight," began he, after a long silence. "Upon the stone where you are sitting you shall find what you want. If you take it, leave my cap on the same spot."

"That is a fair bargain," said I. "I shall be here promptly at twelve. Good-night."

I had extended my palm to shake hands with my new friend, but he seemed to resent my politeness; with a sort of snarl, he turned a somersault and rolled down the hill-side to where the rocks rise from the water.

I need not say that I kept my promise about returning. And what did I find? A pair of spectacles of the most exquisite workmans.h.i.+p; the gla.s.ses so clear as almost to deceive the sight, and the bows of gold spun into fine elastic threads.

"We shall soon see what they are good for," thought I, as I put them into the silver case, the wonderful finish of which I could hardly distinguish by the misty light of the moon.