The Rupa Book of Love Stories & Favourite Fairy Tales (2 in 1)

by Ruskin Bond

  But, when I stooped for him to dismount on the further bank, he showed no manner of inclination to do so. On the contrary, he gripped me with both hands round my throat, and beat me violently in the ribs with his heels. What with the throttling, and the hard blows with his heels, I swooned away; but, notwithstanding, when I regained my senses I found the old fellow still clinging like a leech to my neck. And now he belaboured me so unmercifully that I was forced to rise against my will.

  Once on my feet I determined to shake him off, but he rode me well, and even my efforts to crush him against the trunks of trees were of no avail. I ran hither and thither wildly, employing every trick against him, but all in vain: he kept his seat, and with hand and heel punished me severely. In less than an hour I was broken to the will of this truculent fellow, and he guided me hither and thither among the fruit trees, pulling me up when he would gather fruit and eat, and urging me on again when he so desired.

  In this fashion he stuck to me all that day, and such was his behaviour that I forswore my first opinion of him. He was by no means the gentle being I had thought him. Though he clung so close we were not friends, nor likely to become such. I was his bond-slave, and he ceased not to remind me of it by his utterly vile behaviour. When I dallied he thrashed me unmercifully with his feet; when I thought to brush him off against the overhanging branch of a tree he would duck his head and throttle me with his long bony hands. At night, when I slept exhausted, I woke to find him digging his heels into me in his sleep; indeed, once it seemed that I had thwarted him in a dream, for he thrashed me and treated me abominably. I thought my end had come.

  Thus for many days and nights was I beridden by this abandoned fellow, forced hither and thither at his will, with never a word from him, though he had many from me. So great was my agony that I turned upon myself, crying, 'By the living Allah! Never again will I do a kindness to any; never again will I show mercy!'

  Long I pondered by what subtle trick I might unseat him. I thought of many things, but dared not try one of them, lest it should fail and I be punished unmercifully. But at last Allah took pity on me and threw a strange opportunity in my way.

  It chanced that, one day, while I was being goaded about the island, we came upon a place where pumpkins grew. They were ripe and luscious, and, while the old fellow was eating greedily, I bethought me of a fashion of our own country. I gathered some of the largest, and, having scooped them out, I filled them with the juice squeezed from grapes which I found growing in abundance nearby. Then I sealed them up and set them in the sun. In this way I obtained in a few days a good quantity of pure wine.

  The old man did not notice my curious behaviour—he was always engaged in eating pumpkins—until one day I drank so deep of my new-made wine that I became exalted, and danced and rollicked about with him among the trees. With fist and heel he sought to sober me, requiring to know the reason of my merriment. At length I took him to the spot where I had laid my pumpkins in the sun, and then, laughing and dancing again, signed to him that they contained pure wine.

  The idea was new to him, but, when he understood that I had drunk with such pleasant results, he insisted on drinking also. So I unsealed one of the pumpkins and handed it to him, whereupon he drank and smacked his lips. Then he drank again and again and again, with evident satisfaction, until the wine taking effect, and the pumpkin being empty, he broke it over my head and bade me hand him another. This also he emptied and broke in the same manner. Being by this time in a state of vile intoxication, he thrashed me thrice round the open space, and then in among the trees, behaving in the wildest manner possible, rocking and rolling from side to side with laughter.

  Now I had not drunk so much of the wine that I could not see my chance. I adopted the utmost docility, and, never letting him suspect my purpose, contrived to regain the place where I had laid the pumpkins in the sun. As I had expected, he demanded another, and I gave it him. This time he drank half the wine and emptied the remainder over my face—so vile was this creature of sin. Then I perceived with joy that he was losing control of his limbs. He swayed from side to side, and his head lolled. Slowly I unwound his legs from my neck, and then, with a vicious twist, I flung him on the ground.

  As I looked upon him lying there, my joy turned to uncontrollable fury. I thought of what I had endured at the hands of this aged villain. Should I allow him to live he would surely serve some other poor shipwrecked traveller in the same abominable fashion. The island would be well rid of such an inhuman monster. Without another thought I slew him then and there. May his accursed spirit be ridden forever by one worse than himself!

  I went forth upon the island like one walking on air. Never was mortal man rid of so heavy a burden as I had just flung from me. Even the very atmosphere of the place seemed light and joyous with relief. The streams rippled more merrily, the birds sang more sweetly, the dreamy trees sighed with content as if at a great and long-desired riddance. They all seemed to feel that this terrible old man no longer oppressed them: his legs were no longer round their necks, his masterful feet and hands no longer gripped them in a vice. Rid—all was rid of an intolerable burden. Having found a shady spot, I sank down on the bank of a stream and wiped my brow, thanking Allah devoutly for this sweet deliverance.

  For long days thereafter I sat by the seashore, scanning the ocean for the speck of a sail. But none came in sight, and I was abandoning myself to the thought that Allah had rescued me from one peril only to consign me into the hands of another—that of death by desolation—when one morning I descried a large ship standing in towards the shore. She cast her anchor, and many passengers landed on the island. With a great shout of joy I ran down to greet them. Many voices answered mine, and all plied me with questions respecting my condition. Presently, perceiving that my case was extraordinary, they ceased questioning while I told them my story. They listened with amazement. Then someone said:

  'In my travels in these seas I have heard many tales of such an old man of whom thou speakest, dwelling alone upon an island, and lying in wait for shipwrecked sailors. I know not how these tales were spread abroad, for it is said that of those he has ridden none has survived. Thou art the only survivor. His name is called the Old Man of the Sea. But now he is no more: Allah be praised for that! And thou hast escaped: Allah be praised for that also!' And all extolled the greatness of Allah.

  I returned with them to the ship, and they clothed me in rich apparel and set food and wine before me; and, when I had refreshed myself, we made merry as the ship set sail.

  We were bound for El-Basrah, and my thoughts flew further—to Baghdad, the Abode of Peace.

  CINDERELLA

  A Fairy Tale from the French

  Once upon a time there lived a gentleman who married twice. He had one fair daughter by his first wife. Ella was sweet and gentle, taking after her dear dead mother, who had been the most lovable of women. His second wife, a widow with two hard-featured daughters, was very proud and overbearing; and, if her two daughters had only never been born, or, being born, had died, she would then have possessed the vilest temper in all the world. As it was, the three were all equally gifted in that respect.

  From the very day of the wedding the stepmother and her daughters took a violent dislike to the young girl, for they could see how beautiful she was, both outwardly and inwardly; and green envy soon turns to hate. They dared not show it openly, for fear of the father's anger; but he, poor man, finding he had taken too heavy a burden upon his shoulders, fell ill and died—simply worried into his grave. Then his young daughter reaped the full measure of jealousy and spite and malice which her stepmother and sisters could now openly bestow upon her. She was put to do the drudgery of the household at no wages at all, and what was saved in this way was spent on the finery so sorely needed to make the two hard-featured ones at all passable. The poor girl scrubbed the floors, polished the brights, swept the rooms and stairs, cleaned the windows, turned the mangle, and made the beds; and in the evening, when al
l the work was done, she would sit by the kitchen fire darning the stockings for recreation. When bedtime came she would gaze awhile into the fire, answer the door to her stepsisters coming home from the theatre in all their finery; and then, with their stinging words still in her ears, she would creep up to bed in the garret, there, on a wretched straw mattress, to sleep fast for very weariness and dream of princes and palaces till at morning light she had to begin her dreary round again.

  And it was indeed a dreary round. No sooner had she begun to sift the cinders when the bell would ring, and ring again. One of the sisters wanted her—sometimes both wanted her at once. It was merely a matter of a pin to be fixed, or a ribbon to be tied, but when she came to do it she met with a shower of abuse, 'Look at your hands, you dirty little kitchen slut! How dare you answer the bell with such hands? And your face—go and look in the glass, Ella: no, go straight to the kitchen pump—you filthy little slut!'

  The 'glass' was corrected to the 'kitchen pump' because they knew very well that if she stood before the glass she would see the reflection of a very beautiful girl—a reflection which they themselves spent hours looking for but could never find.

  Yet the child endured it all patiently, and, when her work was done, which happened sometimes, she would sit in the chimney corner among the cinders, dreaming of things which no one knows. And it was from this habit of musing among the cinders that she got her name of Cinder-slut, which was afterwards softened, for some unknown reason, to Cinderella.

  Now the day of a great festival drew near. It was the occasion of the king's son's coming of age, and it was spread abroad that he would select his bride from among the most beautiful attending the state ball. As soon as the elder sisters got breath of this they preeked and preened and powdered and anointed, and even ran to the door themselves at every knock, for they expected invitations; and they were not disappointed, for you will easily see that at a ball even beauty must have its plain background to set it off. Very proud they were of their gold-lettered invitation cards bearing the royal seal, and, when they rang for Cinderella, they held them in their hands to emphasise their orders. This must be ironed, just so; this must be pressed and set aside in tissue paper; this must be tucked and frilled and goffered in just such a fashion, and so on with crimping and pleating and tabbing and piping and boxing, until poor Cinderella began to wonder why the lot of some was so easy and the lot of others so hard. Nevertheless, she worked and worked and worked; and always in her drudgery came day-dreams of what she would wear if she were invited to the ball. She had it all planned out to the smallest frill—but how absurd! She must toil at her sisters' bidding and, on the great night when they were there in their finery, she must sit among the cinders dreaming—in a fairy world of her own—of the prince who came to claim her as his bride. Fool! What a wild fancy! What an unattainable dream!—and there was the bell ringing again: her sisters wanted something, and woe betide her if she dallied.

  At last the night of the ball arrived. Early towards the evening there was no peace in the household. When the elder sister had fully decided, in spite of her complexion, to wear her velvet cramoisie trimmed à l'anglaise, and the younger had brought out her gold-flowered robe in conjunction with a jewelled stomacher, to say nothing of an old silk underskirt, which, after all, would be hidden; when they had squabbled over the different jewels they possessed, each complimenting the other on the set she desired least herself; when the milliner and the hairdresser had called and gone away exhausted; when the beauty specialist had reached the limit of his art and departed sighing heavily; then and not till then was Cinderella called up and allowed the great privilege of admiring the result.

  Now Cinderella had, by nature, what one might call 'absolute taste'. She knew instinctively how one should look at a state ball, and she gave them her simple, but perfect, advice, with a deft touch to this and that, which made all the difference. She got no thanks, of the couple; but one of the sisters did unbend a little.

  'Cinderella,' said she, 'wouldn't you like to be going to the ball?'

  'Heigho!' sighed Cinderella. 'Such delights are not for me. I dream of them, but that is all.'

  'Quite enough, too,' said the other sister. 'Fancy the Cinder-slut at a ball! How the whole Court would laugh!'

  Cinderella made no reply, though the words hurt her. Pin after pin she took from her mouth and fixed it dexterously, where you or I might have done some accidental damage with it, and drawn blood. But not so Cinderella. She had no venom in her nature. When she had arrayed them perfectly she expected no thanks, but just listened to their fault-finding with a hidden smile. It was only when they had left the house, and she was going downstairs to the kitchen, that one word escaped her: 'Cats!' And if she had not said that she would not have been a girl at all, but only an angel. Then she sat down in her favourite place in the chimney corner to look into the fire and imagine things quite different from what they were.

  The house was very still—so still that you could have heard a pin fall in the top room. The stepmother was on a visit to a maiden aunt, who was not only dying, but very rich, so the best thing to do was to show the dying aunt her invitation card to the ball and play another card—the ace of self-sacrifice. Yes, the house was very still. Cinderella, watching the pictures in the glowing embers, could almost hear what the prince of her dreams was saying.

  All of a sudden a storm of feeling seemed to burst in her bosom. She—Cinderella—was sitting there alone in the chimney corner dreaming dreams of princes and palaces: what a contrast between what was and what was not, nor ever could be! It was too much for the child; she broke down, and, taking her head in her hands, she sobbed as if her heart would break.

  While she was still crying bitterly, a gust of cold air swept through the kitchen. She looked up, thinking that the door had blown open. But no, it was shut. Then she gradually became aware of a blue mist gathering and revolving upon itself on the other side of the fireplace. It grew bluer still, and began to shine from within. It spun itself to a standstill, and there, all radiant, stood the queerest little lady you could ever imagine. Her dress was like that of the fairy mother of a prince, with billowy lace flounces and a delicate waist. There was not an inch of it that did not sparkle with a jewel. And as this little lady stood, fingering her wand and looking lovingly and laughingly at Cinderella, the girl knew not what to do. She could only smile back to those kindly eyes, while, half-dazed, she fell to counting the powdered ringlets of her hair, which was so very beautiful that surely it must have been grown in Fairyland! Then, when she looked again at the wand and saw a bright blue flame issue shimmering from the tip of it, she was certain that the door of Fairyland had opened and some one had stepped out.

  'Good evening, my dear,' said the visitant, in the voice and manner of one who could do things. 'Dry your tears and tell me all about it.'

  Cinderella was gazing up at her with wonder in her beautiful eyes, though they still brimmed with misery.

  'Oh!' she said, choking down her sobs, 'I want—I want to go—,'and then she broke down again and could say no more.

  'Ah! you got that want from me, I'll warrant; for I have come on purpose to supply it. You want to go to the ball, my dear; that's what you want, though you didn't know it before. And you shall. Come, come, dry your eyes, and we'll see about it. I'm your fairy godmother, you know; and your dear mother, whom I knew very well, has sent me to you. That's better, you have got your mother's smile. Ah! How beautiful she was, to be sure, and you—you're her living image. Now to work! Have you any pumpkins in the garden?'

  'What an odd question!' thought Cinderella. 'Why pumpkins? But still, why not?' Then she hastened to assure her fairy godmother that there were plenty of them, big and ripe.

  Together they went out into the dark garden, and Cinderella led the way to the pumpkin bed.

  'There,' said her godmother, pointing with her wand at the finest and largest, 'pick it and bring it along.'

  Cinderella, wondering greatl
y, obeyed, and her godmother led her to the front doorstep, where, bidding the child sit beside her, she took from the bosom of her dress a silver fruit-knife, and with this she scooped out the fruit of the pumpkin, leaving only the rind. This she set down in the street before them, and then touched it with her wand, when, lo and behold! The pumpkin was immediately transformed into a magnificent coach, all wrought with pure gold.

  Cinderella was so amazed that she could not speak. She caught a quick breath of delight, and waited.

  'That's that!' said her godmother. 'Now for the horses. Let me see: I suppose you haven't a mousetrap anywhere in the house.'

  'Yes, yes, I have,' cried Cinderella, 'I set one early this evening, and I always catch such a lot—sometimes a whole family at once.'

  'Then go find it, child; we shall want at least six.'

  So Cinderella ran in and found the mousetrap she had set; and, sure enough, there was a whole family of six—father and mother, a maiden aunt, and three naughty children who had led them into the trap. In high glee Cinderella ran back to her godmother and showed her.