CHAPTER 25
Curdie Comes to Grief
Everything was for some time quiet above ground. The king was stillaway in a distant part of his dominions. The men-at-arms kept watchingabout the house. They had been considerably astonished by finding atthe foot of the rock in the garden the hideous body of the goblincreature killed by Curdie; but they came to the conclusion that it hadbeen slain in the mines, and had crept out there to die; and except anoccasional glimpse of a live one they saw nothing to cause alarm.Curdie kept watching in the mountain, and the goblins kept burrowingdeeper into the earth. As long as they went deeper there was, Curdiejudged, no immediate danger.
To Irene the summer was as full of pleasure as ever, and for a longtime, although she often thought of her grandmother during the day, andoften dreamed about her at night, she did not see her. The kids andthe flowers were as much her delight as ever, and she made as muchfriendship with the miners' children she met on the mountain as Lootiewould permit; but Lootie had very foolish notions concerning thedignity of a princess, not understanding that the truest princess isjust the one who loves all her brothers and sisters best, and who ismost able to do them good by being humble towards them. At the sametime she was considerably altered for the better in her behaviour tothe princess. She could not help seeing that she was no longer a merechild, but wiser than her age would account for. She kept foolishlywhispering to the servants, however--sometimes that the princess wasnot right in her mind, sometimes that she was too good to live, andother nonsense of the same sort.
All this time Curdie had to be sorry, without a chance of confessing,that he had behaved so unkindly to the princess. This perhaps made himthe more diligent in his endeavours to serve her. His mother and heoften talked on the subject, and she comforted him, and told him shewas sure he would some day have the opportunity he so much desired.
Here I should like to remark, for the sake of princes and princesses ingeneral, that it is a low and contemptible thing to refuse to confess afault, or even an error. If a true princess has done wrong, she isalways uneasy until she has had an opportunity of throwing thewrongness away from her by saying: 'I did it; and I wish I had not; andI am sorry for having done it.' So you see there is some ground forsupposing that Curdie was not a miner only, but a prince as well. Manysuch instances have been known in the world's history.
At length, however, he began to see signs of a change in theproceedings of the goblin excavators: they were going no deeper, buthad commenced running on a level; and he watched them, therefore, moreclosely than ever. All at once, one night, coming to a slope of veryhard rock, they began to ascend along the inclined plane of itssurface. Having reached its top, they went again on a level for anight or two, after which they began to ascend once more, and kept onat a pretty steep angle. At length Curdie judged it time to transferhis observation to another quarter, and the next night he did not go tothe mine at all; but, leaving his pickaxe and clue at home, and takingonly his usual lumps of bread and pease pudding, went down the mountainto the king's house. He climbed over the wall, and remained in thegarden the whole night, creeping on hands and knees from one spot tothe other, and lying at full length with his ear to the ground,listening. But he heard nothing except the tread of the men-at-arms asthey marched about, whose observation, as the night was cloudy andthere was no moon, he had little difficulty in avoiding. For severalfollowing nights he continued to haunt the garden and listen, but withno success.
At length, early one evening, whether it was that he had got carelessof his own safety, or that the growing moon had become strong enough toexpose him, his watching came to a sudden end. He was creeping frombehind the rock where the stream ran out, for he had been listening allround it in the hope it might convey to his ear some indication of thewhereabouts of the goblin miners, when just as he came into themoonlight on the lawn, a whizz in his ear and a blow upon his legstartled him. He instantly squatted in the hope of eluding furthernotice. But when he heard the sound of running feet, he jumped up totake the chance of escape by flight. He fell, however, with a keenshoot of pain, for the bolt of a crossbow had wounded his leg, and theblood was now streaming from it. He was instantly laid Hold of by twoor three of the men-at-arms. It was useless to struggle, and hesubmitted in silence.
'It's a boy!' cried several of them together, in a tone of amazement.'I thought it was one of those demons. What are you about here?'
'Going to have a little rough usage, apparently,' said Curdie,laughing, as the men shook him.
'Impertinence will do you no good. You have no business here in theking's grounds, and if you don't give a true account of yourself, youshall fare as a thief.'
'Why, what else could he be?' said one.
'He might have been after a lost kid, you know,' suggested another.
'I see no good in trying to excuse him. He has no business here,anyhow.'
'Let me go away, then, if you please,' said Curdie.
'But we don't please--not except you give a good account of yourself.'
'I don't feel quite sure whether I can trust you,' said Curdie.
'We are the king's own men-at-arms,' said the captain courteously, forhe was taken with Curdie's appearance and courage.
'Well, I will tell you all about it--if you will promise to listen tome and not do anything rash.'
'I call that cool!' said one of the party, laughing. 'He will tell uswhat mischief he was about, if we promise to do as pleases him.'
'I was about no mischief,' said Curdie.
But ere he could say more he turned faint, and fell senseless on thegrass. Then first they discovered that the bolt they had shot, takinghim for one of the goblin creatures, had wounded him.
They carried him into the house and laid him down in the hall. Thereport spread that they had caught a robber, and the servants crowdedin to see the villain. Amongst the rest came the nurse. The moment shesaw him she exclaimed with indignation:
'I declare it's the same young rascal of a miner that was rude to meand the princess on the mountain. He actually wanted to kiss theprincess. I took good care of that--the wretch! And he was prowlingabout, was he? Just like his impudence!' The princess being fastasleep, she could misrepresent at her pleasure.
When he heard this, the captain, although he had considerable doubt ofits truth, resolved to keep Curdie a prisoner until they could searchinto the affair. So, after they had brought him round a little, andattended to his wound, which was rather a bad one, they laid him, stillexhausted from the loss of blood, upon a mattress in a disusedroom--one of those already so often mentioned--and locked the door, andleft him. He passed a troubled night, and in the morning they foundhim talking wildly. In the evening he came to himself, but felt veryweak, and his leg was exceedingly painful. Wondering where he was, andseeing one of the men-at-arms in the room, he began to question him andsoon recalled the events of the preceding night. As he was himselfunable to watch any more, he told the soldier all he knew about thegoblins, and begged him to tell his companions, and stir them up towatch with tenfold vigilance; but whether it was that he did not talkquite coherently, or that the whole thing appeared incredible,certainly the man concluded that Curdie was only raving still, andtried to coax him into holding his tongue. This, of course, annoyedCurdie dreadfully, who now felt in his turn what it was not to bebelieved, and the consequence was that his fever returned, and by thetime when, at his persistent entreaties, the captain was called, therecould be no doubt that he was raving. They did for him what theycould, and promised everything he wanted, but with no intention offulfilment. At last he went to sleep, and when at length his sleepgrew profound and peaceful, they left him, locked the door again, andwithdrew, intending to revisit him early in the morning.
The Princess and the Goblin Page 25