Jewel's Story Book Part 61

"'From whence come you?' he asked, when he could speak.

"'From the Heavenly Country,' she answered.

"'And what may be your name?'

"'Purity.'

"'I ordered you out of my grounds!' exclaimed the old man.

"'I did not hear it,' returned the child, unmoved.

"'Don't you fear the dogs?'

"'What is fear?' asked Purity, her eyes wondering.

"'This is the land of Vain Regret,' said the man. 'Be off!'

"'This is a beautiful land,' returned the child.

"For a moment her fearless obstinacy held him silent, then he thought he would voice the question that was always with him.

"'Have you ever heard, in your country, of the Castle of True Delight?' he asked.

"'Often,' replied the child.

"'I wish to go there,' he declared eagerly.

"'Then why not?' returned Purity.

"'I cannot find the way.'

"'That is a pity,' said the child. 'It is in my country.'

"'And you have seen it?'

"'Oh, many times.'

"'Then you shall show me the way.'

"'Whenever you are ready,' returned Purity. So saying, she pa.s.sed him, still accompanied by the hounds, and walked up the steps of the castle and pa.s.sed within and out of sight."

The story-teller paused. Jewel had risen from her seat on the floor and come to sit on a wicker ha.s.sock at his feet, and Topaz rapped with his tail as she moved.

"I wish you'd been there, grandpa, to take care of that little girl," she said earnestly, her eyes fixed on his. "What happened next?"

"Ask your father," was the response.

Harry Evringham rolled over in the hammock where he lay stretched, until he could see his daughter's face. She rose again and pulled her ha.s.sock close to him as he continued:--

"As Purity pa.s.sed into the house, the dogs whined, and the servant calling them, they ran back to him. The old man stood still, bewildered, for a minute; then he struck his hands together.

"'It is true, then. Even that child has seen it. I will go to her at once, and we will set forth.'

"So the old man entered the castle, and gave orders that the child who had just come in should be found and brought to him.

"The servants immediately flew to do his bidding, but no child could they find.

"'Lock the gates lest she escape,' ordered the master. 'She is here. Find her, or off goes every one of your foolish heads.'

"This was a terrible threat. You may be sure the servants ran hither and thither, and examined every nook and corner; but still no little girl could be found. The master scowled and fumed, but he considered that if he had his servants all beheaded, it would put him to serious inconvenience; so he only sat down and bit his thumbs, and began to try to think up some new way to search for the Castle of True Delight.

"He felt sure the child had told the truth when saying she had beheld it.

It was even in the country where she had her home. The man began to see that he had made a mistake not to treat the stranger more civilly. The very dogs that he kept to drive away intruders had been more hospitable than he.

"All at once he had a bright thought. The roc, the oldest and wisest of all birds, lived at the top of the mountain which rose above his castle.

"'She will tell me the way,' he said, 'for she knows the world from its very beginning.'

"So he ordered that they should saddle and bridle his strongest steed, and up the mountain he rode for many a toilsome hour, until he came to where the roc lived among the clouds.

"She listened civilly to the man's question. 'So you are weary of your life,' she said. 'Many a pilgrim comes to me on the same quest, and I tell them all the same thing. The obstacles to getting away from the Valley of Vain Regret are many, for there is but one road, and that has difficulties innumerable; but the thing that makes escape nearly impossible is the dragon that watches for travelers, and has so many eyes that two of them are always awake. There is one hope, however. If you will examine my wings and make yourself a similar pair, you can fly above the pitfalls and the dragon's nest, and so reach the palace safely.'

"As she said this, the roc slowly stretched her great wings, and the man examined them eagerly, above and below.

"'And in what direction do I fly?' he asked at last.

"'Toward the rising sun,' replied the roc; then her wings closed, her head drooped, and she fell asleep, and no further word could the man get from her.

"He rode home, and for many weeks he labored and made others labor, to build an air-ship that should carry him out of the Valley of Vain Regret.

It was finished at last. It was cleverly fashioned, and had wings as broad as the roc's; but on the day when the man finally stepped within it and set it in motion, it carried him only a short distance outside the castle gates, and then sank to the boughs of a tall tree, and, try as he might, the air-ship could not be made to take a longer flight.

"His poor shrunken heart fluttered with rage and disappointment. 'I will go to the wise hermit,' he said. So he went far through the woods to the hut of the wise hermit, and he told him the same gruesome things about the difficulties that beset the road out of the Valley of Vain Regret, and said that one's only hope lay in tunneling beneath them.

"So the old man hired a large number of miners, and, setting their faces eastward, they burrowed down into the earth, and blasted and dug a way which the man followed, a greater and greater eagerness possessing him with each step of progress; but just when his hopes were highest, the miners broke through into an underground cavern, bottomless and black, from which they all started back, barely in time to save themselves. It was impossible to go farther, and the whole company returned by the way they had come, and the miners were very glad to breathe the air of the upper world again; but the man's disappointment was bitter.

"'It is of no use,' he said, when again he stood on the terrace in front of his castle. 'It is of no use to struggle. I am imprisoned for life in the Valley of Vain Regret.'"

Jewel's father paused. She had listened attentively. Now she turned to her grandfather.

"Is that the way you think the story went, grandpa?"

Mr. Evringham nodded. "I think it did," he replied.

"Then go on, please, father, because I like a lot of happiness in my stories, and I want that man to hurry up and know that--that error is cheating him."