Prince Ricardo of Pantouflia Part 9

CHAPTER VII.

Prince Ricardo and an Old Enemy.

{The Yellow Dwarf: p123.jpg}

"There is one brute I wish I could get upsides with," said Ricardo, at breakfast one morning, his mouth full of sardine.

"Really, Ricardo, your language is most unprincely," said his august father; "I am always noticing it. You mean, I suppose, that there is one enemy of the human race whom you wish to abolish. What is the name of the doomed foe?"

"Well, he is the greatest villain in history," said Ricardo. "You must have read about him, sir, the Yellow Dwarf."

"Yes, I have certainly studied what is told us about him," said the king.

"He is no favourite of mine."

"He is the only one, if you notice, sir, of all the scoundrels about whom our ancestors inform us, who escaped the doom which he richly merited at the sword of a good knight."

You may here remark that, since d.i.c.k took to his studies, he could speak, when he chose, like a printed book, which was by no means the case before.

"If you remember, sir, he polished off--I mean, he slew--the King of the Golden Mines and the beautiful, though frivolous, Princess Frutilla. All that the friendly Mermaid could do for them was to turn them into a pair of beautiful trees which intertwine their branches. Not much use in _that_, sir! And nothing was done to the scoundrel. He may be going on still; and, with your leave, I'll go and try a sword-thrust with him.

Francalanza says I'm improving uncommon."

"You'll take the usual Sword of Sharpness," said his Majesty.

"What, sir, to a dwarf? Not I, indeed: a common small sword is good enough to settle _him_."

"They say he is very cunning of fence," said the king; "and besides, I have heard something of a diamond sword that he stole from the King of the Golden Mines."

"Very likely he has lost it or sold it, the shabby little miscreant; however, I'll risk it. And now I must make my preparations."

The king did not ask what they were; as a rule, they were simple. But, being in the shop of the optician that day, standing with his back to the door, he heard d.i.c.k come in and order a pair of rose-coloured spectacles, with which he was at once provided. The people of Pantouflia were accustomed to wear them, saying that they improved the complexions of ladies whom they met, and added cheerfulness to things in general.

"Just plain rose-coloured gla.s.s, Herr Spex," said d.i.c.k, "I'm not short- sighted."

"The boy is beginning to show some sense," said the king to himself, knowing the nature and the difficulties of the expedition.

Ricardo did not disguise his intention of taking with him a Dandie Dinmont terrier, named Pepper, and the king, who understood the motive of this precaution, silently approved.

"The lad has come to some purpose and forethought," the king said, and he gladly advanced a considerable sum for the purchase of crocodiles' eggs, which can rarely be got quite fresh. When Jaqueline had made the crocodiles' eggs, with millet-seed and sugar-candy, into a cake for the Dwarf's lions, Ricardo announced that his preparations were complete.

Not to be the mere slave of custom, he made this expedition on horseback, and the only magical thing he took with him was the Cap of Darkness (the one which would not work, but he did not know that), and this he put in his pocket for future use. With plenty of egg sandwiches and marmalade sandwiches, and cold minced-collop sandwiches, he _p.r.i.c.ked forth_ into the wilderness, making for the country inhabited by the Yellow Dwarf. The princess was glad he was riding, for she privately accompanied him in the disguise of a wasp; and a wasp, of course, could not have kept up with him in his Seven-league Boots.

"Hang that wops!" said Prince Ricardo several times, buffeting it with his pocket-handkerchief when it buzzed in his ear and round his horse's head.

{"Hang that wops!" said Prince Ricardo: p129.jpg}

Meanwhile, King Prigio had taken his precautions, which were perfectly simple. When he thought Ricardo was getting near the place, the king put on his Wishing Cap, sat down before the magic crystal ball, and kept his eye on the proceedings, being ready to wish the right thing to help Ricardo at the right moment. He left the window wide open, smoked his cigar, and seemed the pattern of a good and wise father watching the conduct of a promising son.

The prince rode and rode, sometimes taking up Pepper on his saddle; pa.s.sing through forests, sleeping at lonely inns, fording rivers, till one day he saw that the air was becoming Yellow. He knew that this showed the neighbourhood of Jaunia, or Daunia, the country of the Yellow Dwarf. He therefore drew bridle, placed his rose-coloured spectacles on his nose and put spurs to his horse, for the yellow light of Jaunia makes people melancholy and cowardly. As he p.r.i.c.ked on, his horse stumbled and nearly came on its nose. The prince noticed that a steel chain had been drawn across the road.

"What caitiff has dared!" he exclaimed, when his hat was knocked off by a well-aimed orange from a neighbouring orange-tree, and a vulgar voice squeaked:

"Hi, Blinkers!"

There was the Yellow Dwarf, an odious little figure, sitting sucking an orange in the tree, swinging his wooden shoes, and grinning all over his wrinkled face.

"Well, young Blinkers!" said the Dwarf, "what are you doing on my grounds? You're a prince, by your look. Yah! down with kings! I'm a man of the people!"

"You're a dwarf of the worst description, that's what _you_ are," said Ricardo; "and let me catch you, and I'll flog the life out of you with my riding-whip!"

The very face of the Dwarf, even seen through rose-coloured spectacles, made him nearly ill.

"Yes, when you can catch me," said the Dwarf; "but that's not to-day, nor yet to-morrow. What are you doing here? Are you an amba.s.sador, maybe come to propose a match for me? I'm not proud, I'll hear you. They say there's a rather well-looking wench in your parts, the Princess Jaqueline--"

"Mention that lady's name, you villain," cried d.i.c.k, "and I'll cut down your orange-tree!" and he wished he had brought the Sword of Sharpness, for you cannot prod down a tree with the point of a rapier.

"Fancy her yourself?" said the Dwarf, showing his yellow teeth with a detestable grin; while Ricardo turned quite white with anger, and not knowing how to deal with this insufferable little monster.

"I'm a widower, I am," said the Dwarf, "though I'm out of mourning," for he wore a dirty clay-coloured Yellow jacket. "My ill.u.s.trious consort, the Princess Frutilla, did not behave very nice, and I had to avenge my honour; in fact, I'm open to any offers, however humble. Going at an alarming sacrifice! Come to my box" (and he pointed to a filthy clay cottage, all surrounded by thistles, nettles, and black boggy water), "and I'll talk over your proposals."

"Hold your impudent tongue!" said d.i.c.k. "The Princess Frutilla was an injured saint; and as for the lady whom I shall not name in your polluting presence, I am her knight, and I defy you to deadly combat!"

We may imagine how glad the princess was when (disguised as a wasp) she heard d.i.c.k say he was her knight; not that, in fact, he had thought of it before.

"Oh! you're for a fight, are you?" sneered the Dwarf. "I might tell you to hit one of your own weight, but I'm not afraid of six of you. Yah!

mammy's brat! Look here, young Blinkers, I don't want to hurt you. Just turn old Dobbin's head, and trot back to your mammy, Queen Rosalind, at Pantouflia. Does she know you're out?"

"I'll be into _you_, pretty quick," said Ricardo. "But why do I bandy words with a miserable peasant?"

"And don't get much the best of them either," said the Dwarf, provokingly. "But I'll fight, if you will have it."

The prince leaped from his horse, leaving Pepper on the saddle-bow.

No sooner had he touched the ground than the Dwarf shouted:

"Hi! to him, Billy! to him, Daniel! at him, good lions, at him!" and, with an awful roar, two lions rushed from a neighbouring potato-patch and made for Ricardo. These were not ordinary lions, history avers, each having two heads, each being eight feet high, with four rows of teeth; their skins as hard as nails, and bright red, like morocco. {135}

The prince did not lose his presence of mind; hastily he threw the cake of crocodiles' eggs, millet-seed, and sugar-candy to the lions. This is a dainty which lions can never resist, and running greedily at it, with four tremendous snaps, they got hold of each other by their jaws, and their eight rows of teeth were locked fast in a grim and deadly _struggle for existence_!

The Dwarf took in the affair at a glance.

"Cursed be he who taught you this!" he cried, and then whistled in a shrill and vulgar manner on his very dirty fingers. At his call rushed up an enormous Spanish cat, ready saddled and bridled, and darting fire from its eyes. To leap on its back, while Ricardo sprang on his own steed, was to the active Dwarf the work of a moment. Then clapping spurs to its sides (his spurs grew naturally on his bare heels, horrible to relate, like a c.o.c.k's spurs) and taking his cat by the head, the Dwarf forced it to leap on to Ricardo's saddle. The diamond sword which slew the king of the Golden Mines--that invincible sword which hews iron like a reed--was up and flashing in the air!

At this very moment King Prigio, seeing, in the magic globe, all that pa.s.sed, and despairing of Ricardo's life, was just about to wish the dwarf at Jericho, when through the open window, with a tremendous whirr, came a huge vulture, and knocked the king's wishing cap off! Wishing was now of no use.

This odious fowl was the Fairy of the Desert, the Dwarf's trusted ally in every sort of mischief. The vulture flew instantly out of the window; and ah! with what awful anxiety the king again turned his eyes on the crystal ball only a parent's heart can know. Should he see Ricardo bleeding at the feet of the abominable dwarf? The king scarcely dared to look; never before had he known the nature of fear. However, look he did, and saw the dwarf un-catted, and Pepper, the gallant Dandie Dinmont, with his teeth in the throat of the monstrous Spanish cat.