The work was hard at best, for it is very warm underground; but it was not particularly unpleasant, and some of the miners, when they wanted to earn a little more money for a particular purpose, would stop behind the rest and work all night. But you could not tell night from day down there, except from feeling tired and sleepy; for no light of the sun ever came into those gloomy regions. Some who had thus remained behind during the night, although certain there were none of their companions at work, would declare the next morning that they heard, every time they halted for a moment to take breath, a tap-tapping all about them, as if the mountain were then more full of miners than ever it was during the day; and some in consequence would never stay overnight, for all knew those were the sounds of the goblins. They worked only at night, for the miners’ night was the goblins’ day. Indeed, the greater number of the miners were afraid of the goblins; for there were strange stories well known amongst them of the treatment some had received whom the goblins had surprised at their work during the night. The more courageous of them, however, amongst them Peter Peterson and Curdie, who in this took after his father, had stayed in the mine all night again and again, and although they had several times encountered a few stray goblins, had never yet failed in driving them away. As I have indicated already, the chief defence against them was verse, for they hated verse of every kind, and some kinds they could not endure at all. I suspect they could not make any themselves, and that was why they disliked it so much. At all events, those who were most afraid of them were those who could neither make verses themselves nor remember the verses that other people made for them; while those who were never afraid were those who could make verses for themselves; for although there were certain old rhymes which were very effectual, yet it was well known that a new rhyme, if of the right sort, was even more distasteful to them, and therefore more effectual in putting them to flight.
Perhaps my readers may be wondering what the goblins could be about, working all night long, seeing they never carried up the ore and sold it; but when I have informed them concerning what Curdie learned the very next night, they will be able to understand.
For Curdie had determined, if his father would permit him, to remain there alone this night—and that for two reasons: first, he wanted to get extra wages that he might buy a very warm red petticoat for his mother, who had begun to complain of the cold of the mountain air sooner than usual this autumn; and second, he had just a faint hope of finding out what the goblins were about under his window the night before.
When he told his father, he made no objection, for he had great confidence in his boy’s courage and resources.
‘I’m sorry I can’t stay with you,’ said Peter; ‘but I want to go and pay the parson a visit this evening, and besides I’ve had a bit of a headache all day.’
‘I’m sorry for that, father,’ said Curdie.
‘Oh, it’s not much. You’ll be sure to take care of yourself, won’t you?’
‘Yes, father; I will. I’ll keep a sharp look-out, I promise you.’ Curdie was the only one who remained in the mine. About six o’clock the rest went away, everyone bidding him good night, and telling him to take care of himself; for he was a great favourite with them all.
‘Don’t forget your rhymes,’ said one.
‘No, no,’answered Curdie.
‘It’s no matter if he does,’ said another, ‘for he’ll only have to make a new one.’
‘Yes: but he mightn’t be able to make it fast enough,’ said another; ‘and while it was cooking in his head, they might take a mean advantage and set upon him.’
‘I’ll do my best,’ said Curdie. ‘I’m not afraid.’ ‘We all know that,’ they returned, and left him.
CHAPTER 8.The Goblins
For some time Curdie worked away briskly, throwing all the ore he had disengaged on one side behind him, to be ready for carrying out in the morning. He heard a good deal of goblin-tapping, but it all sounded far away in the hill, and he paid it little heed. Towards midnight he began to feel rather hungry; so he dropped his pickaxe, got out a lump of bread which in the morning he had laid in a damp hole in the rock, sat down on a heap of ore, and ate his supper. Then he leaned back for five minutes’ rest before beginning his work again, and laid his head against the rock. He had not kept the position for one minute before he heard something which made him sharpen his ears. It sounded like a voice inside the rock. After a while he heard it again. It was a goblin voice—there could be no doubt about that—and this time he could make out the words.
‘Hadn’t we better be moving?’it said.
A rougher and deeper voice replied:
‘There’s no hurry. That wretched little mole won’t be through tonight, if he work ever so hard. He’s not by any means at the thinnest place.’
‘But you still think the lode does come through into our house?’ said the first voice.
‘Yes, but a good bit farther on than he has got to yet. If he had struck a stroke more to the side just here,’ said the goblin, tapping the very stone, as it seemed to Curdie, against which his head lay, ‘he would have been through; but he’s a couple of yards past it now, and if he follow the lode it will be a week before it leads him in. You see it back there—a long way. Still, perhaps, in case of accident it would be as well to be getting out of this. Helfer, you’ll take the great chest. That’s your business, you know.’
‘Yes, dad,’ said a third voice. ‘But you must help me to get it on my back. It’s awfully heavy, you know.’
‘Well, it isn’t just a bag of smoke, I admit. But you’re as strong as a mountain, Helfer.’
‘You say so, dad. I think myself I’m all right. But I could carry ten times as much if it wasn’t for my feet.’
‘That is your weak point, I confess, my boy.’ ‘Ain’t it yours too, father?’
‘Well, to be honest, it’s a goblin weakness. Why they come so soft, I declare I haven’t an idea.’
‘Specially when your head’s so hard, you know, father.’
‘Yes my boy. The goblin’s glory is his head. To think how the fellows up above there have to put on helmets and things when they go fighting! Ha! ha!’
‘But why don’t we wear shoes like them, father? I should like it—especially when I’ve got a chest like that on my head.’
‘Well, you see, it’s not the fashion. The king never wears shoes.’
‘The queen does.’
‘Yes; but that’s for distinction. The first queen, you see—I mean the king’s first wife—wore shoes, of course, because she came from upstairs; and so, when she died, the next queen would not be inferior to her as she called it, and would wear shoes too. It was all pride. She is the hardest in forbidding them to the rest of the women.’
‘I’m sure I wouldn’t wear them—no, not for—that I wouldn’t!’ said the first voice, which was evidently that of the mother of the family. ‘I can’t think why either of them should.’
‘Didn’t I tell you the first was from upstairs?’ said the other. ‘That was the only silly thing I ever knew His Majesty guilty of. Why should he marry an outlandish woman like that-one of our natural enemies too?’
‘I suppose he fell in love with her.’ ‘Pooh! pooh! He’s just as happy now with one of his own people.’
‘Did she die very soon? They didn’t tease her to death, did they?’
‘Oh, dear, no! The king worshipped her very footmarks.’
‘What made her die, then? Didn’t the air agree with her?’
‘She died when the young prince was born.’
‘How silly of her! We never do that. It must have been because she wore shoes.’
‘I don’t know that.’
‘Why do they wear shoes up there?’
‘Ah, now that’s a sensible question, and I will answer it. But in order to do so, I must first tell you a secret. I once saw the queen’s
feet.’
‘Without her shoes?’
‘Yes—without her shoes.’
‘No! Did you? How was it?’
‘Never you mind how it was. She didn’t know I saw them. And what do you think!—they had toes!’
‘Toes! What’s that?’
‘You may well ask! I should never have known if I had not seen the queen’s feet. Just imagine! the ends of her feet were split up into five or six thin pieces!’
‘Oh, horrid! How could the king have fallen in love with her?’
‘You forget that she wore shoes. That is just why she wore them. That is why all the men, and women too, upstairs wear shoes. They can’t bear the sight of their own feet without them.’
‘Ah! now I understand. If ever you wish for shoes again, Helfer, I’ll hit your feet—I will.’
‘No, no, mother; pray don’t.’
‘Then don’t you.’
‘But with such a big box on my head—’
A horrid scream followed, which Curdie interpreted as in reply to a blow from his mother upon the feet of her eldest goblin.
‘Well, I never knew so much before!’ remarked a fourth voice.
‘Your knowledge is not universal quite yet,’ said the father. ‘You were only fifty last month. Mind you see to the bed and bedding. As soon as we’ve finished our supper, we’ll be up and going. Ha! ha! ha!’
‘What are you laughing at, husband?’
‘I’m laughing to think what a mess the miners will find themselves in—somewhere before this day ten years.’
‘Why, what do you mean?’
‘Oh, nothing.’
‘Oh, yes, you do mean something. You always do mean something.’
‘It’s more than you do, then, wife.’ ‘That may be; but it’s not more than I find out, you know.’
‘Ha! ha! You’re a sharp one. What a mother you’ve got, Helfer!’
‘Yes, father.’
‘Well, I suppose I must tell you. They’re all at the palace consulting about it tonight; and as soon as we’ve got away from this thin place I’m going there to hear what night they fix upon. I should like to see that young ruffian there on the other side, struggling in the agonies of—’
He dropped his voice so low that Curdie could hear only a growl. The growl went on in the low bass for a good while, as inarticulate as if the goblin’s tongue had been a sausage; and it was not until his wife spoke again that it rose to its former pitch.
‘But what shall we do when you are at the palace?’ she asked.
‘I will see you safe in the new house I’ve been digging for you for the last two months. Podge, you mind the table and chairs. I commit them to your care. The table has seven legs—each chair three. I shall require them all at your hands.’
After this arose a confused conversation about the various household goods and their transport; and Curdie heard nothing more that was of any importance.
He now knew at least one of the reasons for the constant sound of the goblin hammers and pickaxes at night. They were making new houses for themselves, to which they might retreat when the miners should threaten to break into their dwellings. But he had learned two things of far greater importance. The first was, that some grievous calamity was preparing, and almost ready to fall upon the heads of the miners; the second was—the one weak point of a goblin’s body; he had not known that their feet were so tender as he had now reason to suspect. He had heard it said that they had no toes: he had never had opportunity of inspecting them closely enough, in the dusk in which they always appeared, to satisfy himself whether it was a correct report. Indeed, he had not been able even to satisfy himself as to whether they had no fingers, although that also was commonly said to be the fact. One of the miners, indeed, who had had more schooling than the rest, was wont to argue that such must have been the primordial condition of humanity, and that education and handicraft had developed both toes and fingers—with which proposition Curdie had once heard his father sarcastically agree, alleging in support of it the probability that babies’ gloves were a traditional remnant of the old state of things; while the stockings of all ages, no regard being paid in them to the toes, pointed in the same direction. But what was of importance was the fact concerning the softness of the goblin feet, which he foresaw might be useful to all miners. What he had to do in the meantime, however, was to discover, if possible, the special evil design the goblins had now in their heads.
Although he knew all the gangs and all the natural galleries with which they communicated in the mined part of the mountain, he had not the least idea where the palace of the king of the gnomes was; otherwise he would have set out at once on the enterprise of discovering what the said design was. He judged, and rightly, that it must lie in a farther part of the mountain, between which and the mine there was as yet no communication. There must be one nearly completed, however; for it could be but a thin partition which now separated them. If only he could get through in time to follow the goblins as they retreated! A few blows would doubtless be sufficient—just where his ear now lay; but if he attempted to strike there with his pickaxe, he would only hasten the departure of the family, put them on their guard, and perhaps lose their involuntary guidance. He therefore began to feel the wall With his hands, and soon found that some of the stones were loose enough to be drawn out with little noise.
Laying hold of a large one with both his hands, he drew it gently out, and let it down softly.
‘What was that noise?’ said the goblin father.
Curdie blew out his light, lest it should shine through.
‘It must be that one miner that stayed behind the rest,’ said the mother.
‘No; he’s been gone a good while. I haven’t heard a blow for an hour. Besides, it wasn’t like that.’
‘Then I suppose it must have been a stone carried down the brook inside.’
‘Perhaps. It will have more room by and by.’
Curdie kept quite still. After a little while, hearing nothing but the sounds of their preparations for departure, mingled with an occasional word of direction, and anxious to know whether the removal of the stone had made an opening into the goblins’ house, he put in his hand to feel. It went in a good way, and then came in contact with something soft. He had but a moment to feel it over, it was so quickly withdrawn: it was one of the toeless goblin feet. The owner of it gave a cry of fright.
‘What’s the matter, Helfer?’ asked his mother.
‘A beast came out of the wall and licked my foot.’
‘Nonsense! There are no wild beasts in our country,’ said his father.
‘But it was, father. I felt it.’
‘Nonsense, I say. Will you malign your native realms and reduce them to a level with the country upstairs? That is swarming with wild beasts of every description.’
‘But I did feel it, father.’
‘I tell you to hold your tongue. You are no patriot.’
Curdie suppressed his laughter, and lay still as a mouse—but no stiller, for every moment he kept nibbling away with his fingers at the edges of the hole. He was slowly making it bigger, for here the rock had been very much shattered with the blasting.
There seemed to be a good many in the family, to judge from the mass of confused talk which now and then came through the hole; but when all were speaking together, and just as if they had bottle-brushes—each at least one—in their throats, it was not easy to make out much that was said. At length he heard once more what the father goblin was saying.
‘Now, then,’ he said, ‘get your bundles on your backs. Here, Helfer, I’ll help you up with your chest.’
‘I wish it was my chest, father.’
‘Your turn will come in good time enough! Make haste. I must go to the meeting at the palace tonight. When that’s over, we can come back and clear out the last of the things bef
ore our enemies return in the morning. Now light your torches, and come along. What a distinction it is, to provide our own light, instead of being dependent on a thing hung up in the air—a most disagreeable contrivance—intended no doubt to blind us when we venture out under its baleful influence! Quite glaring and vulgar, I call it, though no doubt useful to poor creatures who haven’t the wit to make light for themselves.’
Curdie could hardly keep himself from calling through to know whether they made the fire to light their torches by. But a moment’s reflection showed him that they would have said they did, inasmuch as they struck two stones together, and the fire came.
CHAPTER 9.The Hall of the Goblin Palace
A sound of many soft feet followed, but soon ceased. Then Curdie flew at the hole like a tiger, and tore and pulled. The sides gave way, and it was soon large enough for him to crawl through. He would not betray himself by rekindling his lamp, but the torches of the retreating company, which he found departing in a straight line up a long avenue from the door of their cave, threw back light enough to afford him a glance round the deserted home of the goblins. To his surprise, he could discover nothing to distinguish it from an ordinary natural cave in the rock, upon many of which he had come with the rest of the miners in the progress of their excavations. The goblins had talked of coming back for the rest of their household gear: he saw nothing that would have made him suspect a family had taken shelter there for a single night. The floor was rough and stony; the walls full of projecting corners; the roof in one place twenty feet high, in another endangering his forehead; while on one side a stream, no thicker than a needle, it is true, but still sufficient to spread a wide dampness over the wall, flowed down the face of the rock. But the troop in front of him was toiling under heavy burdens. He could distinguish Helfer now and then, in the flickering light and shade, with his heavy chest on his bending shoulders; while the second brother was almost buried in what looked like a great feather bed. ‘Where do they get the feathers?’ thought Curdie; but in a moment the troop disappeared at a turn of the way, and it was now both safe and necessary for Curdie to follow them, lest they should be round the next turning before he saw them again, for so he might lose them altogether. He darted after them like a greyhound. When he reached the corner and looked cautiously round, he saw them again at some distance down another long passage. None of the galleries he saw that night bore signs of the work of man—or of goblin either. Stalactites, far older than the mines, hung from their roofs; and their floors were rough with boulders and large round stones, showing that there water must have once run. He waited again at this corner till they had disappeared round the next, and so followed them a long way through one passage after another. The passages grew more and more lofty, and were more and more covered in the roof with shining stalactites.
The Classic Children's Literature Collection: 39 Classic Novels Page 6