Davy and The Goblin Part 2

The Hole-keeper began fumbling at the leaves of his book in great agitation, when the king, pointing at him with his wand, roared furiously: "Boil _him_, at all events!"

"Tut! Tut! your majesty," began the Hole-keeper, confusedly, with his stiff little tunic fairly rustling with fright; but before he could utter another word he was rushed upon and dragged away, screaming with terror.

"Don't you go with them!" shouted Davy, made really desperate by the Hole-keeper's danger. "They're nothing but a lot of mola.s.ses candy!"

At this the king gave a frightful shriek, and, aiming a furious blow at Davy with his wand, rolled off the platform into the midst of the struggling crowd. The wand broke into a hundred pieces, and the air was instantly filled with a choking odor of peppermint; then everything was wrapped in darkness, and Davy felt himself being whirled along, heels over head, through the air. Then there came a confused sound of bells and voices, and he found himself running rapidly down a long street with the Goblin at his side.

CHAPTER IV.

THE b.u.t.tERSCOTCHMEN.

Bells were pealing and tolling in all directions, and the air was filled with the sound of distant shouts and cries.

"What were they?" asked Davy, breathlessly.

"b.u.t.terscotchmen," said the Goblin. "You see, they always b.u.t.ter their chairs so that they won't stick fast when they sit down."

"And what makes you that color?" said Davy, suddenly noticing that the Goblin had changed his color to a beautiful blue.

"Trouble and worry," said the Goblin. "I always get blue when the b.u.t.terscotchmen are after me."

"Are they coming after us now?" inquired Davy, in great alarm.

"Of course they are," said the Goblin. "But the best of it is, they can't run till they get warm, and they can't get warm without running, you see. But the worst of it is that _we_ can't stop without sticking fast," he added, anxiously. "We must keep it up until we get to the Amuserum."

"What's that?" said Davy.

"It's a place they have to amuse themselves with," said the Goblin,--"curiosities, and all that sort of thing, you know. By the way, how much money have you? We have to pay to get in."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "BELLS WERE PEALING IN ALL DIRECTIONS."]

Davy began to feel in his pockets (which is a very difficult thing to do when you're running fast), and found, to his astonishment, that they were completely filled with a most extraordinary lot of rubbish. First he pulled out what seemed to be an iron ball; but it proved to be a hard-boiled egg, without the sh.e.l.l, stuck full of small tacks. Then came two slices of toast, firmly tied together with a green cord. Then came a curious little gla.s.s jar, filled with large flies. As Davy took this out of his pocket, the cork came out with a loud "pop!" and the flies flew away in all directions. Then came, one after another, a tart filled with gravel, two chicken-bones, a bird's nest with some pieces of brown soap in it, some mustard in a pill-box, and a cake of beeswax stuck full of caraway seeds. Davy remembered afterward that, as he threw these things away, they arranged themselves in a long row on the curb-stone of the street. The Goblin looked on with great interest as Davy fished them up out of his pockets, and finally said, enviously, "That's a splendid collection; where did they all come from?"

"I'm sure _I_ don't know," said Davy, in great bewilderment.

"And I'm sure _I_ don't know," repeated the Goblin. "What else is there?"

Davy felt about in his pockets again, and found what seemed to be a piece of money. On taking it out, however, he was mortified to find that it was nothing but an old b.u.t.ton; but the Goblin exclaimed, in a tone of great satisfaction, "Ah! hold on to that!" and ran on faster than ever.

The sound of the distant voices had grown fainter and fainter still, and Davy was just hoping that their long run was almost over, when the street came abruptly to an end at a brick wall, over the top of which he could see the branches of trees. There was a small round hole in the wall, with the words "PAY HERE" printed above it, and the Goblin whispered to Davy to hand in the b.u.t.ton through this hole. Davy did so, feeling very much ashamed of himself, when, to his surprise, instead of receiving tickets in return, he heard a loud exclamation behind the wall, followed by a confused sound of scuffling, and the hole suddenly disappeared. The next moment a little bell tinkled, and the wall rose slowly before them like a curtain, carrying the trees with it apparently, and he and the Goblin were left standing in a large open s.p.a.ce paved with stone.

Davy was exceedingly alarmed at seeing a dense ma.s.s of b.u.t.terscotchmen in the centre of the square, pushing and crowding one another in a very quarrelsome manner, and chattering like a flock of magpies, and he was just about to propose a hasty retreat, when a figure came hurrying through the square, carrying on a pole a large placard, bearing the words:--

"JUST RECEIVED!

THE GREAT FRUNGLES THING!

ON EXHIBITION IN THE PLUM-GARDEN!"

At the sight of these words the mob set up a terrific shout, and began streaming out of the square after the pole-bearer, like a flock of sheep, jostling and shoving one another as they went, and leaving Davy and the Goblin quite alone.

"I verily believe they're gone to look at my b.u.t.ton," cried Davy, beginning to laugh, in spite of his fears. "They called _me_ Frungles, you know."

"That's rather a nice name," said the Goblin, who had begun smiling again. "It's better than Snubgraddle, at all events. Let's have a look at the curiosities;" and here he walked boldly into the centre of the square.

Davy followed close at his heels, and found, to his astonishment and disappointment, that the curiosities were simply the things that he had fished out of his pockets but a few minutes before, placed on little pedestals and carefully protected by transparent sugar shades. He was on the point of laughing outright at this ridiculous exhibition, when he saw that the Goblin had taken a large telescope out of his pocket, and was examining the different objects with the closest attention, and muttering to himself, "Wonderful! wonderful!" as if he had never seen anything like them before.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "THE GOBLIN TURNED HIS TELESCOPE TOWARD HIM."]

"Pooh!" said Davy, contemptuously; "the only wonderful thing about them is, how they ever came _here_."

At this remark the Goblin turned his telescope toward Davy, and uttered a faint cry of surprise; and Davy, peering anxiously through the large end, saw him suddenly shrink to the size of a small beetle, and then disappear altogether. Davy hastily reached out with his hands to grasp the telescope, and found himself staring through a round gla.s.s window into a farm-yard, where a red Cow stood gazing up at him.

CHAPTER V.

JACK AND THE BEAN-STALK'S FARM.

It was quite an ordinary-looking farm-yard and quite an ordinary-looking Cow, but she stared so earnestly up at Davy that he felt positively certain she had something to say to him. "Every creature I meet _does_ have something to say," he thought, as he felt about for the window-fastening, "and I should really like to hear a Cow"--and just at this moment the window suddenly flew open, and he pitched head-foremost out upon a pile of hay in the farm-yard, and rolled from it off upon the ground. As he sat up, feeling exceedingly foolish, he looked anxiously at the Cow, expecting to see her laughing at his misfortune, but she stood gazing at him with a very serious expression of countenance, solemnly chewing, and slowly swishing her tail from side to side. As Davy really didn't know how to begin a conversation with a Cow, he waited for her to speak first, and there was consequently a long pause.

Presently the Cow said, in a melancholy, lowing tone of voice, "The old gray goose is dead."

"I'm very sorry," said Davy, not knowing what else to say.

"She is," said the Cow, positively, "and we've buried her in the vegetable garden. We thought gooseberries would come up, but they didn't. Nothing came up but feathers."

"That's very curious," said Davy.

"Curious, but comfortable," replied the Cow. "You see, it makes a feather-bed in the garden. The pig sleeps there, and calls it his quill pen. Now _I_ think that pigpens should be made of porcupine quills."

"So do I," said Davy, laughing. "What else is there in the garden?"

"Nothing but the bean-stalk," said the Cow. "You've heard of 'Jack and the Bean-stalk,' haven't you?"

"Oh! yes, indeed!" said Davy, beginning to be very much interested. "I should like to see the bean-stalk."

"You can't _see_ the beans talk," said the Cow, gravely. "You might _hear_ them talk; that is, if they had anything to say, and you listened long enough. By the way, that's the house that Jack built. Pretty, isn't it?"

Davy turned and looked up at the house. It certainly was a very pretty house, built of bright red brick, with little gables, and dormer-windows in the roof, and with a trim little porch quite overgrown with climbing roses. Suddenly an idea struck him, and he exclaimed:--

"Then you must be the Cow with a crumpled horn!"

"It's not crumpled," said the Cow, with great dignity. "There's a slight crimp in it, to be sure, but nothing that can properly be called a crump. Then the story was all wrong about my tossing the dog. It was the cat that ate the malt. He was a Maltese cat, and his name was Flipmegilder."