Cornelli Part 13

said Dino.

"No, let them be! I know exactly how it is," cried Cornelli, making an effort to push her hair back again. "Only you won't say it, because you want to be my friend. But I know it and everybody can see it and hate me."

"But Cornelli, why are you crying?" said Dino, full of astonishment.

"I don't know what you mean and I am sure you are imagining something.

You must be, for one often does."

"No, I'm not, and there are people who can see it. You must not think that I imagine something, Dino; otherwise I would not be so frightened that I often cannot go to sleep for a long, long while. I have to think and think all the time. I know that it will get worse and worse and that I won't be able to cover it up in the end. Then there won't be a single person in the world who does not hate me when he looks at me.

You, too, will hate me then, I know."

"I swear to you right now that I shall not hate you, whatever should appear," Dino exclaimed enthusiastically. "Just tell me for once and all what you mean. Please do it, for I might be able to help you and give you some advice. Just tell me, for you know now that I will remain your friend in spite of everything that might turn up."

Cornelli still hesitated.

"But will you still be my friend later on, when everything is still more changed and n.o.body else will be my friend?" she asked persistently.

"Yes, I promise; and here is my hand!" said Dino, giving the little girl a hearty handshake. "You can see that I really mean it, for what one has promised that way, one can never take back. Now you can be sure that I shall always be your friend."

Cornelli's face lit up with joy. It was obviously a great comfort to her to have a friend who would remain so for all time.

"So now, I'll tell you what it is. But you must promise not to tell anyone in the whole, wide world about it, as long as you live."

Dino promised, giving his hand again for solemn a.s.surance.

"Look, here on both sides of my forehead," said Cornelli now, hesitating a little and pushing the fringes of hair out of her face, "I have two large b.u.mps, they grow all the time and especially when I frown. I have to make a cross face all the time, for I cannot be jolly any more and can never laugh again. So the b.u.mps keep on growing and in the end they will be just like regular horns. Then everyone will hate me, for n.o.body else has horns. I can do nothing now but hide them, but in the end they will come through and then my hair won't hide them any more.

Then everybody can see it and people will despise me and children will be sure to throw stones after me. Oh!"

Cornelli again put her head on her arms and groaned in her great trouble. Dino had listened, full of astonishment. He had never before heard anything like that.

"But, Cornelli," he said, "why do you frown all the time, if the b.u.mps grow when you do it? It would be so much better if you would think of funny things and would try to laugh. If you always made a pleasant face they would perhaps go away entirely."

"I can't! I can't possibly do it," Cornelli lamented. "I know that I make a horrid face and that I am so ugly that n.o.body wants to look at me. Whenever anybody looks at me I have to make a cross face, for I know that everybody thinks how horrid I look. I never can be happy any more, because I have to think all the time about that terrible thing on my head, and that it is getting worse. And I can't help it and can do nothing. You don't know how it is. As long as I live I have to be that way, and everybody will hate me. You could not laugh any more, either, if you were like that."

"You should try to think of quite different things and then you would forget it. Later on it would probably seem quite different to you. You keep on thinking about it all the time and so you believe in it more and more. Get it out of your head, then it will be sure to get better,"

said Dino, who could not quite understand it. "Come, I'll tell you a story that will change your thoughts. Once upon a time there was an old copper pan---See, you have laughed already!"

"Oh, that will be a fine kind of story--about an old copper pan!"

Cornelli said.

"It certainly is a fine story," Dino a.s.sured her; "just listen: She had a step-brother who was a wash boiler--you see, you have laughed again! That's the way! So they went together to Paris, where there was a revolution."

"What is a revolution?" Cornelli asked, quite thrilled.

"See how the story interests you!" said Dino, thoroughly pleased. "You have no more wrinkles on your forehead, because you are listening well.

Didn't I guess what you have to do? I'll go on now. You call it a revolution when n.o.body wants to remain in their old places and everything goes to pieces."

"What do you mean by going to pieces? Do you mean it the way chairs begin to go to pieces when the glue comes off and the legs get loose and shaky?"

"Just that way," Dino a.s.sented. "When all laws and orders begin to go to pieces like chairs, when the glue is off and everything crashes and tumbles down; do you understand?"

"Yes. And what happened?" Cornelli wanted to know.

"The travellers liked that well," Dino continued, "for they were full of discontented thoughts. The copper pan had thought for a long time that she wanted to be something else. She was tired of cooking greasy food and of all the time being full of soot at the bottom; she wanted to be something better. The wash boiler had similar thoughts. He thought he would be much better off as a nice tea kettle. He thought how nice it would be to stand on a fine table, so he wanted to get away from the laundry.

"When they came to the revolution they joined in it, too. They became quite famous making speeches, for they both could talk very well. The wash boiler had learned it from the washer women, and the copper pan from the cook. So they were both asked what they wanted to become. The copper pan wanted to become an ice box; she wanted to sparkle outside with fine wood and inside with splendid ice. The wash boiler wanted to become a fine tea kettle and be able to stand on a finely laid-out table. So they both became what they had wished.

"But the copper pan, who had been used to the cosy fire, began to shake and freeze when the ice filled her whole inside. Her teeth were chattering while she looked about to see if she could discover a little fire anywhere. But n.o.body ever brought any burning spark near her. She suffered the bitterest hunger besides, because she had been used to quite different nourishment from fat morsels roasting in her insides.

Now she had to swallow little lumps of ice and nothing else. She was not a bit pleased with shining outside and in, for she had to think all the time: how terrible it is to starve and freeze to death.

"The tea kettle meanwhile was standing on a beautifully set table.

Many splendidly dressed young ladies and gentlemen were sitting around him and drinking tea out of fine china cups, and eating from lovely gold-rimmed plates. The tea kettle felt flattered and said to himself: 'Oh, now I can be anybody's equal.' But one of the ladies said: 'I can smell tar soap and I think it comes from this tea kettle. I wonder what that means?' Her neighbor laughed and said: 'I noticed it long ago. I hope it has not been used for washing stockings.' So they looked at the kettle and sniffed and turned up their noses with disdain.

"The tea kettle lost his a.s.surance, for he knew quite well that many hundreds of stockings had been boiled inside of him. The poor thing had never guessed that the smell of tar soap would stick to him in his new shape. He felt very cramped and uncomfortable in the society he was in, and was possessed with the thought of getting away and returning to the place where he had been comfortable and had been held in high esteem, for he had really been a first-rate boiler.

"Then suddenly the revolution ceased. The lady of the house who owned the ice box said: 'I do not want the horrible ice box any more, which they have exchanged for my good old ice box. All the ice that comes out of it tastes of onion soup.' The copper pan had always cooked this soup better than any other. 'Lulu, throw it out to the old iron heap,'

said the lady. So Lulu, the butler, and Lala, the maid, took the ice box and with terrible might threw her down on the sc.r.a.p heap, where old iron, bones and dirt lay in the back yard.

"The ice box felt that all her limbs were giving way and that everything was going to end badly. She lamented: 'Oh, if only I had not joined the revolution! If I had only stayed at home by the cosy fire! Oh, if only---' And with that she cracked completely.

"On the same day the young lady on whose table the kettle was standing said: 'Now I have had enough of this horrid tar-soap boiler. I want a genuine tea kettle and not an imitation. Away with this thing!' So the butler took the kettle and dashed him down to the heap of rubbish in the yard. It was the same rubbish heap where his step-sister had been thrown, and in his fall he broke his own and his step-sister's last bones. Then he exclaimed in bitter pain: 'Oh, if only I had not joined the revolution! Oh, if I were only home in the peaceful, steaming laundry.' Then he was completely smashed by the old muskets that were used in the revolution and that had been thrown down on top of him.

And this is the end of the story."

"Yes, they were right. If only they had not joined the revolution!"

Cornelli said sympathetically.

"Yes, and I am right, too," Dino cried triumphantly. "Just see how much it helped you to forget your curious b.u.mp affair. You have no more wrinkles on your forehead and you have pushed all your hair away.

You look entirely different; I hardly know you now."

Cornelli in very truth had been so eager in listening to the story that with one quick motion she had pushed the hanging curtains out of her eyes. She had been anxious not to miss a word, and the hair had bothered her very much. Her whole face had become bright and changed during the thrilling tale.

"Just look at yourself!" Dino encouraged her, taking a little mirror from the wall and holding it in front of the little girl.

"No, no, I do not want to see it!" she cried out. In the same moment she had pulled her hair back again over her eyes, and on her forehead appeared a lot of wrinkles.

"Don't get so excited!" said Dino, putting back the mirror. "But I am awfully glad to know a way to help you. I shall do it every day, but you must promise to come regularly. I am sure you'll forget everything else that worries you, and in the end you'll forget about it and so be gay again."

Cornelli shook her head. "No, you can't prevent it from getting worse,"

she said, covering her forehead with more hair. However, she took Dino's hand as a promise to come again, for she had enjoyed her visit very much and was looking forward to repeating it.

From that day on, Cornelli wandered over to Martha's little house as she had always done. The old woman cried with joy when she heard the child's merry laughter after all that time, for it had been a great grief to her to see the bright child so terribly changed. She loved to leave the children by themselves, for then they always seemed to enjoy themselves best. From time to time she heard their happy laughter; it thrilled her with joy, and she never wanted to interrupt it. She had seen how Cornelli behaved when listening to one of Dino's stories; the little girl was as eager as if she were experiencing it all herself.

In her burning zeal she would fling back her hair, her eyes would sparkle as in days gone by, and a brightly laughing face would regard the story teller. Everything else was forgotten for the time; but if something reminded Cornelli of her own life and troubles, all sunshine was suddenly gone from her face, her forehead clouded up, and the horrible sticky hair was again hanging over her eyes.

So Martha always tried to leave the children undisturbed. She had many hopes for Cornelli on account of this daily intercourse with the charming boy, whose clear brow was never troubled and who could so quickly drive away the clouds from his friend's face.

As soon as Cornelli left the little house and was approaching her own garden, everything changed back to the old condition. Martha, looking after the child, could always see the fearful looking hair that so strangely disfigured the little girl's pretty face. Then she would sigh deeply and would say to herself: It seems like a disease, but who can help her? Oh, if our blessed lady had seen her child so terribly disfigured!

Cornelli was very much surprised when she found that Sat.u.r.day evening had come again, for the last two weeks had flown by very fast.

She ran through the garden. Under the plum tree lay the last fully ripened dark gold plums. Cornelli picked them up; they were really splendid, but they had given her no pleasure that year. She took them with her and put them on Martha's table.