by Maria Gripe
The only ones who could take advantage of Nana’s sleep were Klas and Klara. However strange it sounds, they had come to think of her naps as peaceful, restful times. A little freedom. For in spite of everything, Nana was less dangerous when she slept. And so half-hour naps were twice as good for them.
Mimi also slept through, and so, as soon as they both fell asleep, the children would creep out of their beds and leave the room silently. When Nana woke she would find them back in their beds again. They were very careful not to come back too late, because her naps were the only times they had to themselves.
In fact, there wasn’t very much for them to do in the House, but they were free, and that was enough. At least in the beginning.
They walked as they used to up and down the stairs and played their old game: that the House was a mountain. But in some strange way the House had become more dangerous than before. Every day it seemed to grow bigger and darker, more frightening and grimmer. It was no good pretending that it was an ordinary old mountain on the ground. It had become a very threatening peak. It rumbled ceaselessly as if a giant lay there, ready to spring out, a sleeping giant who could wake up at any moment.
Klas said he wanted to play that they were going away from the mountain. He didn’t want to just walk up and down. He wanted to get away sometimes. But Klara didn’t know how to play that game. Perhaps that game didn’t even exist. Perhaps there were mountains from which you could never escape.
They didn’t know what to play any more.
They stood in the middle of the House on an endless double staircase with the growling roar rising and falling around them. All at once they realized how lonely they were. And they weren’t just alone—people can want to be alone sometimes—they were abandoned, and that is much, much worse, because no one wants to be abandoned.
They slumped down on the steps.
Now, for the first time, they felt how vast the House was. They felt so comfortless, so lost, as if they were actually shrinking. The House was swallowing them up; they’d never find a way out; they would grow smaller and smaller. That’s how it felt to them.
Then, through the rumble—from above, from below, from all sides—small, faint ticking sounds reached them. They listened excitedly. It was the clocks measuring time throughout the House. There were clocks in all the rooms, just as there were mirrors. And, from where the children sat, they could hear all the clocks ticking at once. It was as if all the ticking sounds were pitched to reach this one spot. And Klas and Klara listened excitedly: somehow there was comfort in the sound, a little hope.
The clocks could be heard despite the rumbling roar. They hadn’t stopped. They ticked along as if life depended on it.
Just then, asleep in her bed, Nana seemed to sense that the children were not listening to her, and that was inexcusable. She let out one great breath that silenced all the clocks in the House completely.
Like a wave high enough to cover the sky, the noise rose and engulfed all other sounds in the House. Nana was in command once again, she alone.
Klas and Klara stood up and took each other by the hand. They walked slowly up the stairs, sadder than ever before. Now all hope had gone. Even the clocks didn’t exist any more. Nana had conquered time, too. For ever and ever into eternity, only she would be heard.
They turned down the corridor where they used to meet the Mirrorchildren, so long ago. That was before Nana had come. They had taken on themselves those children’s sorrows because they had none of their own. But now they did have their own. They were the most unhappy children in the world. And they thought that perhaps the Mirrorchildren might be able to help them. Perhaps they had become happy again.
Yes, they just had to reach the Mirrorchildren.
They started running, but soon grew tired. The corridor was very long. They walked and walked. Why weren’t the children coming to meet them? Why didn’t they see any children there? They came all the way up to the mirror where they used to meet, where they used to stand, pressing their foreheads against those in the mirror, with only the glass between them.
But this time they didn’t meet the Mirrorchildren. The mirrors were empty.
And then Klas and Klara understood that they had ceased to exist.
12
THE LORD WALKED from window to window, checking to see whether all his street lamps were alight. He did this every evening. They were always lit, but he checked them just the same.
From up there in the House they looked like small, pale lemon seeds arranged in rows. It was easy to see right away if any were out. But this had never happened—every evening the Lord was satisfied.
Otherwise he didn’t have very much to be happy about.
The Lady was ill; she wouldn’t leave her bed. The doctors claimed that she wasn’t ill at all, yet she refused to get up.
Nothing amused her any more. Nothing.
The Lord paced back and forth through his rooms, deep in thought. He was a calm man, he never lost control, but now he thought this situation had gone on too long. It was just too much. He did everything, but never got any thanks. A very long time had now passed since anyone had said thank you to him.
The Lord said to himself that he was definitely the only clever person in the whole world. He was the only one who realized what was wrong with the Lady. She couldn’t wish, that was her whole sickness. It was crystal clear. But how could he get her to grasp that fact herself? Impossible. When he talked to her, she only sighed or hissed at him or burst into tears.
And she had never thanked him for the children. Properly speaking, he should have sent them back, since she was so ungrateful, but now they belonged to the House. He’d even got them a governess.
Nana, yes. . . .
He wandered anxiously from window to window. Nana belonged to the House, too. It wouldn’t do to argue with her. And that was something the Lady could understand. Nana was, actually, a most remarkable person, when she wasn’t sleeping.
But that was it: if and when she wasn’t sleeping, when she wasn’t asleep. . . .
The Lord repeated this several times, wrinkling his forehead with thought.
For just at that moment Nana happened to be sleeping, and the thought got stuck in his mind. He went to the nearest window and counted the lemon seeds again. They threaded along for him, they seemed to hop, but he counted, anyway, to have something to do while Nana slept.
When she awoke, he returned to his thought.
The Lady had said something that he didn’t know how to take. This was recently. He had, as usual, begged her to try to wish for something, so that everything would be all right again.
And then she had answered, “You might just as well beg me to do some magic.”
What could she have meant by that? To wish and to perform magic were surely not at all the same. Next time he asked why she had said that, she only got angry with him. And then, though he asked her time and again, she never explained.
But yesterday she had answered suddenly, “My dear, I just mean that you’ll need witchcraft to get me to wish for anything more in life.”
Witchcraft! What kind of witchcraft? He begged her to explain herself a little more clearly, but she only added, “I mean exactly what I say. Witchcraft.”
It wasn’t easy to understand.
Somehow, he had to find out what she meant. He paused at each window, pondering his problem. Truly he didn’t have an easy time.
The mood in the House had grown even grimmer. This was for two reasons.
Nana’s cockatoo, which couldn’t sing, had begun to shriek in its sleep. And then glasses had started to shatter again. It was terrible.
Mimi might shriek as much as several times a day. The only person who didn’t suffer from it was Nana, who was never even wakened by the sound. She insisted that Mimi only screamed because she was displeased with the children. She would scream whenever the children were stupid, said Nana. Klas and Klara were ashamed. It was a ghastly screech, awful, unwholesome, ill-b
oding, unbearable.
And glasses were shattering, too, while Nana slept. Not much, but it happened several times a day, regularly. And how it came about was a complete mystery, because this time the pieces didn’t end up on the floor. Glasses lay shattered where they stood, yes, even inside a cupboard where the glasses were kept safely, they would be found broken in dainty, neat rows.
The whole thing was ghostly. The coachman took up his spying once again, but never caught anyone. No matter how hard he worked, setting traps, he never caught anyone. He suspected Klas, but never was able to catch him redhanded.
He even began to doubt his own sanity. Glasses practically shattered right in front of his eyes without his catching a glimpse of Klas. It got to be too much for him, he felt so helpless and inefficient. He fell to brooding and complaining.
And so that winter passed, a black, desperate winter, without snow, without sun, without moon, and without stars.
The Lord wandered through the House counting his lamps; the coachman walked about spying and wringing his hands. And Klas and Klara tiptoed up and down the stairs and along the endless corridors searching for the Mirrorchildren. Mimi screeched. Glasses shattered. And all the while, Nana slept and the Lady wept.
13
IN THE VILLAGE where Albert and Sofia lived, life went on as usual.
Trees dropped their leaves and new ones unfurled, flowers faded and fresh ones bloomed, birds flew away and returned.
But Klas and Klara never came back.
Sofia wandered about the cottage brooding, and Albert stayed in his workshop. He just had to keep working. But the bowls he made always turned out like big, light-struck tears. Each one was different from the others, but also the same, for each in its own way reminded people of tears. No matter what he tried to make, they turned out that way, though he, himself, didn’t notice it.
Nor could he understand why every single piece of his glassware sold at the fairs these days. He could never make enough. Albert was becoming famous. People came from near and far to buy from him.
He watched people clap their hands and sigh over the beauty of his bowls. He watched with wonderment. People picked up the bowls so carefully, as if, at the very least, they were made of gold. He shook his head over it.
Though Albert didn’t realize it, the people sensed something. They sensed that sorrow had made his bowls more beautiful. People have nothing against each other’s tears—as long as they are beautiful to see.
But Albert got no pleasure from his success. Nor did he realize that he was becoming a very well-known glassblower. He didn’t notice when people bowed to him; he was deaf to their compliments.
He could only think of his lost children.
He felt that he alone was responsible for their disappearance, for he alone had heard Flutter Mild-weather’s predictions. She had warned him that the children were going to disappear, and yet he had let it happen. At first when he heard her, he’d been terrified, and then later he hadn’t believed it, because nothing had happened right away. How could he have been so foolish?
And now Flutter Mildweather had closed her doors to him. He might have been thin air as far as she was concerned. She had no more to say to Albert. Yes, he understood. In the village, she’d let it be known that she didn’t intend to tell fortunes any more. It wasn’t worthwhile for anyone to try asking her.
At home in the cottage Sofia blamed herself for everything. It was she who had brought misfortune on them all. It went back to that time when she had said that the children were only a bother. This was her punishment. She knew such words never went unpunished. Night and day she tormented herself with the thought; every waking moment it plagued her. And in her sleep the thought returned like a nightmare. Yes, she bore the blame: she was guilty, no one else.
And another thing pained her, too. She couldn’t quite figure out what it was. But time and again a feeling came over her that she had forgotten something—something very important for her to remember.
Sometimes, in a flash, she’d feel that, if only she could remember what it was, everything would work out in the end.
What could she have forgotten?
She discussed it with Albert, but he only shook his head. She was brooding too much, he said, and that never did any good. Useless. And he was right, of course. It was just her imagination at work.
Nevertheless this feeling would sweep over her for an instant: yes, yes, that was it! The solution depended on her! She was certain that it was up to her. She must find it! The very next moment that certainty vanished again, and her despair seemed deeper than ever.
Albert would reason with her this way: if you’ve forgotten something, then you also know what it is you’ve forgotten. She was just the victim of her imagination.
One night Sofia woke with her heart pounding hard. She’d been sleeping soundly and dreaming of something, but she couldn’t remember her dream.
Uneasiness drove her from her bed, her heart beating even more wildly, and, without really knowing what she was doing, she walked over to the little cradle that still hung from the ceiling in front of the open fireplace. A whole lot of odds and ends were stuffed away in the cradle. A length of flax hung down from it, shining like gold. She searched and searched, in a daze, without knowing what she wanted.
Suddenly she felt a little cold, hard object in her hand. She picked it up and carried it over to the window. She sat down where the moonlight flooded into the room. The object lay in the palm of her hand.
The ring Albert had given her long ago at the fair, the ring with the shifting green stone, lay in her hand. Oh dear, such a long time ago. . . .
She put it on her finger and studied her hands thoughtfully.
Suddenly, a great calm descended upon her. She sat there in the moonlight, remembering. It had been such a wonderful fair that season. Albert and she had been so happy, so very happy. . . .
Why had she stopped wearing the ring? That was stupid. The ring was very fine—she ought to wear it.
It was sweet of Albert to give it to her, though he really hadn’t been able to afford it then. Absentmindedly, she twisted the ring on her finger, sitting there deep in thought.
Suddenly her glance was drawn back to the ring.
Now she remembered why she’d put it away. It had upset and worried her.
Just as it did now. For again the very same forebodings returned: the stone seemed like an eye, and that eye watched her as she wore it.
She thought it blinked, and for a while she didn’t dare move.
Then she held her hand out in the moonlight to look at it more clearly. She felt a chill and began shivering with fright. The stone had a look that terrified her. It was like a deep hole, a well, a ghastly sorrow, something inhuman.
After a moment it blinked again. It was repulsive.
Quickly she took off the ring and tossed it away from her by the window. She didn’t dare look at it any more. Her heart beat wildly. What did this mean? Was she losing her mind?
Then her thoughts turned to the little old man who had sold them the ring, a really dreadful old man. Could he have bewitched it somehow? No, she really must calm herself. Here she was again, letting her imagination run away with her.
But there really had been something odd about that old man. Where had he disappeared to afterward? They’d never seen him before, or ever again.
And as for Flutter Mildweather, why, why had she behaved so strangely when she had caught a glimpse of the ring? What was it she had said?
Hadn’t the old woman wanted the ring right away?
Sofia had gone to see her to have her fortune told, but Flutter hadn’t wanted to . . . and then what?
Yes, what had happened then?
Now, once more, that feeling of certainty seized Sofia, the certainty that she alone could solve their problem. She felt stronger than ever before. She felt surer, that the solution was here, right here, she had only to stretch out her hand. . . .
Where . . . where? Her me
mory still teased and taunted her, but she sat there quietly waiting . . . and, without knowing why, she reached out her hand and took up the ring. . . .
And then she remembered! Like a stroke of lightning she remembered what she had forgotten. Yes, now she knew.
She drew a deep breath. The moonlight quivered, trembled.
For one last time she let her eyes fall on the shifting green stone, deep into it. Far, far away she seemed to hear Flutter Mildweather’s forgotten words, and her lips formed them silently.
“You’re wearing a ring, Sofia. If misfortune should ever befall you one day, you must send me that ring, and I’ll help you, wherever you may be. Don’t forget my words! Send me the ring!”
Trembling a little with the memory, she kissed the ring.
After a while she rose, dressed, and walked out into the moonlight. The village lay there sleeping. But, up on the old Gallows Hill, a pale light shone from the window under the apple tree.
An owl shrieked.
The apple tree glowed with blossoms. A night wind swept over the hill, and a few petals drifted down like snow.
The light up there flickered slightly.
The owl that had shrieked got no answer and shrieked again.
Sofia walked with her ring through the moonlight. She held the ring carefully in her hand, she didn’t wear it, she wouldn’t put it on. . . .
14
IT WAS NOW well past midnight.
Flutter Mildweather sat in her cottage, hunched over her loom, weaving. She stared thoughtfully at the pattern as if searching for something. The candle had almost burnt out in its holder. Taking it up, she held it high over her loom. The light flickered wildly.
Perched on the loom, Wise Wit the raven peered out the window. He watched the appleblossoms falling so gently and beautifully through the moonlight. He heard the owl screech.