The Three Mulla-mulgars Part 6

Then Thimble, who was standing in the shadow, hobbled a little nearer into the light of the fire, and lifting up his leaf-smeared face as if to see, said: "Have no fear for yourself, Nod. They have caught us, but not for long. But you they dare not frizzle a hair of, little brother, because of Tishnar's Wonderstone sewn up in your sheep's-coat. They have smelt out its magic. Keep the stone safe, then, Ummanodda, and, when you are alone, rub it Samaweeza as Mutta told you before she died.

Tishnar, perhaps, will answer. See only that none of these miching mouse-faces are near. Had we but been awake when they found us!..."

But the Minimuls began to grow restless at all this palaver, for, though the Munza-mulgar tongue is known to them, they cannot understand, except a word here and there, the secret language of Mulgar-royal. So they laid hold of the Cullum-ropes again, and lugged Thumb and Thimble back under the sandy arch through which they had come. Thumb had only time enough to cry in a loud voice, "Courage, Nizza-neela," before he was dragged again out of sight and hearing.

And Nod remembered that when the Gunga-mulgar had led him down out of his huddle to show him the Bobberie, the moon was shining then at dwindling halves. So he knew that, unless many days had pa.s.sed since then, it would be some while yet before these Minimuls made their cannibal Moon-feast. He lay still, with eyes half shut, thinking as best he could, with an aching head and throbbing shoulder.

The firelight glanced on the earthy roof far above him. Here and there the contorted root of some enormous forest-tree jutted out into the air.

There was a continued faint rustle around him, as of bees in a hive or ants in a pine-wood. This was the shuffling of the Minimuls' shoes, which are flat, like sandals, and made of silver gra.s.s plaited together, that rustles on the sandy floor of their chambers and galleries. This plaited gra.s.s they tie, too, round their middles for a belt or pouch, beneath which, as they walk, their long lean tails descend. Their fur shines faintly shot in moon or firelight, and is either pebble-grey or sand-coloured. It never bristles into hair except about their polls and chops, where it stands in a smooth, even wall, about one and a half to two inches high, leaving the remnant of their faces light and bare.

They stand for the most part about three spans high in their gra.s.s slippers. Their noses are even flatter than the noses of the Mullabruks.

Their teeth stand out somewhat, giving their small faces a cunning mouse-look, which never changes. Their eyes are round and thin-lidded, and almost as colourless as gla.s.s. Yet behind their gla.s.siness seems to be set a gleam, like a far and tiny taper shining, so that they are perfectly visible in the dark, or even dusk. Thus may they be seen, a horde of them together in the evening gloom of the forest when they go Mulgar-hunting. When they are closely looked on, they can, as it were within their eyes, shut out this gleam--it vanishes; but still they continue to see, though dimly. By day their eyes are as empty as pure gla.s.s marbles. Their smell is faintly rank, through eating so much flesh. The she and young Minimuls feed in the deeper chambers of their mounds, and never venture out.

Nod was falling into a nap from weariness and pain, when there came spindling along an old sallow-hued Earth-mulgar, whose eyes were pink, rather than gla.s.s-grey, like the others. He shook his head this way, that way, muttering his magic over Nod; then, with a mottled gourd beside him, he very gently and dexterously rolled back the strip or bandage of leaves on Nod's shoulder, and peered close into his poisoned wound. He probed it softly with his hairless fingers. Then out of the pouch hanging on his stomach he took fresh leaves, smeared and stalked, a little clay pot of green healing-grease, and anointed the sore. This he rubbed ever so smoothly with his two middle fingers. After which he bound all up again so skilfully with leaves and gra.s.s that it seemed to Nod his wounded shoulder was the easiest and most comfortable part of his body. Out of his pinkish eyes he gazed greedily into Nod's face for a moment, and took his departure.

After he had gone, Nod smoothed his face, and with his own comb combed himself as far as he could reach without pain. Presently shuffled along two or three more of the Mouse-faces carrying roasted Nanoes and Mambel-berries, and a kind of citron, like a Keeri, very refreshing; also a little gourd of very thin Subbub. But, although he was too wretched and too much afraid to be hungry, and shuddered at sight of the Minimul food, Nod knew he must quickly grow strong if ever he and his brothers were to reach the Valleys of Tishnar. So he ate and drank, and was refreshed. Then he turned to a little sleek Minimul that tended him, and asked him in Munza-mulgar: "Is it day--sunshine? Is it day?"

The little creature shook his head and shut his eyes, as if to signify he did not understand the question.

Nod at that shut his eyes too, and laid his cheek on his lean little hand, as if to say, "Sleep."

Thereupon eight thickish Minimuls came--four on either side--and hoisted up by its handles the gra.s.s mat on which he lay, while others went before, strewing dried leaves and a kind of forest-flower that smells like mint when crushed, and carrying lanterns of candle-worms, while others waddled with them, beating on little tambours of Skeeto-skin--all this because Nod breathed magic, part his own, part his Wonderstone's.

They laid him down in a sandy chamber strewn with flowers. And, bowing many times, their heads betwixt their rather bandy legs, they left him.

When they were gone, Nod wriggled softly up and looked about him. The chamber was round and caved, and on the walls were still visible the marks of the Minimuls' hands and scoops which had hollowed it out.

Through the roof a rugged root pierced, crossed over, and dipped into the earth again. The candle-worms cast a gentle sheen on the golden sanded walls. Hung from the roof were strings of dried flowers, shedding so heavy and languid a smell in the narrow chamber that Nod's drowsy eyelids soon began to droop. His bright eyes glanced like fireflies, darting to and fro with his thoughts. But the odour of the flowers soon soothed them all to rest. Nod fell asleep.

The next day (that is, the next Minimul day, which is Munza night) crept slowly by. Nod was never left alone. Every hour the little soft-shuffling Mouse-faces tended and fed and watched him, and burnt little magic sticks around him. Three dead Skeetoes, with fast-shut eyes, lay on the floor, shot by their poisoned darts in the dusk of the evening, when he was carried into the big fire-chamber, or kitchen, again. They were soon skinned and trussed by the hungry Minimuls, and stretched along the spit. The smell of their roasting rose up in smoke.

At last came sleeping-time again. And then, when all was silent, Nod rose softly from his gra.s.s-mat, and stealing down the low, narrow earth-run, looked out into the kitchen where he had lain all day. The fire was dying in faintly glowing embers. All was utterly still. But which way should he go now, he wondered, to seek his brothers? And which of these dark arches led to the open forest, the snow, and the a.s.sasimmon?

[Ill.u.s.tration: NOD WAS NEVER LEFT ALONE.]

His quick eyes caught sight of the thin smoke winding silently up from the logs. Somewhere that must escape into the air. But on high it was so dim he could scarcely see the roof, only the steep walls, ragged with snake-skins, and the huge pods of the silky poison-seed. He crept stealthily under one of the arches hung at the entrance with the dried carca.s.s of a little fierce-faced, snow-white Gunga cub, and presently came to where, all in their sandy beds, with their tails curled up, side by side in double rows, the mousey Earth-mulgars slept. He returned to the kitchen, and called softly in the hollow cavern, "Thumb, Thumb!"

Only his own voice echoed back to him. Yet a sound feeble as this awoke the light-sleeping Minimuls. For their mounds echo more than mere hollowness would seem to make them. The lightest stir or footfall of beast walking above in Munza may be heard. Nod had only just time enough to scamper up his own narrow corridor and throw himself on his mat before a score of shuffling footfalls followed, and he felt many gla.s.sy eyes peering closely into his face.

All the rest of that night (and for the few nights that followed) Minimuls stood behind his bed beating faintly on their skin Zoots or tambours, while two others sat one on each side of him with fans of soporiferous Moka-wood. But though they might lull Nod's lids asleep, they couldn't still his busy brain. He dreamed and dreamed. Now, in his dreams he was come in safety to his Uncle a.s.sasimmon's, and they were all rejoicing at a splendid feast, and he was dressed in beads from neck to heel, with a hat of stained ivory and a peac.o.c.k's feather. Now he was alone in the forest in the dark, and a Talanteuti was lamenting in his ear, "Noom-anossi, Noom-anossi." And now it seemed he sat beneath deep emerald waters in the silver courts of the Water-middens, amid the long gold of their streaming hair. But he would awake babbling with terror, only to smell the creeping odour on the air of broiling Mulgar.

One day came many Earth-mulgars from distant mounds to see this Prince of Magic whom their kinsmen had captured in the forest. They stared at him, sniffed, bowed, and burned smoulder-sticks, and then were led off to stare too at fat Thumb and fattening Thimble. And that same day the Minimuls dragged into their kitchen a long straight branch of iron-wood, which with much labour they turned by charring into a prodigious spit.

And Nod knew his hour was come, that there was no time to be lost.

When he had once more been carried on his mat into his own chamber or sleeping-place, he drove out the drumming and fan-waving Minimuls, making signs to them that their noise and odour drove sleep away instead of charming it to him. He waited on and on, tossing on his mat, springing up to listen, hearing now some forest beast tread hollowly overhead, and now a distant cry as if of fear or anguish. But at last, when all was still, he very cautiously fumbled and fumbled, gnawed and gnawed with his sharp little dog-teeth, until in the dim light of his worm-lantern peeped out the strange pale glowing milk-white Wonderstone, carved all over with labyrinthine beast and bird and unintelligible characters. It lay there marvellously beautiful, as if in itself it were all Munza-mulgar, its swamps and forests and mountains lying tinied in the pale brown palm of his hand, and as full of changing light as the bellies of dead fishes in the dark. He got up softly, clutching the stone tightly in his hand. He listened. He stole down his sandy gallery, and stood, small and hairy, in his sheep-skin, peering out into the great evil-smelling kitchen. Then he spat with his spittle on the stone, and began to rub softly, softly, three times round with his left thumb Samaweeza, dancing lightly, and slowly the while, with eyes tight shut and ears twitching.

And it seemed of a sudden as if all his care and trouble had been swept away. A voice small and clear called softly within him: "Follow, Ummanodda, follow! Have now no fear, Prince of Tishnar, Nizza-neela; but follow, only follow!"

He opened his eyes, and there, hovering in the air, he saw as it were a little flame, crystal clear below, but mounting to the colour of rose, and shaped like a little pear. As soon as he looked at it it began softly to stir and float away from him across the glowery kitchen. And again the mysterious voice he had heard called softly: "Follow, Prince of Tishnar, follow!" With shining eyes he hobbled warily after the little flame that, burning tranquil in the air, about a span above his head, was floating quietly on.

It led him past the gaunt black spit and the dying fire. It wafted across the great kitchen to the fifth of the gloomy arches, and stealthily as a shadow Nod stole after it. Under this arch and up the shelving gallery gently slid the guiding flame. And now Nod saw again the furry Earth-mulgars, lying on their stomachs in their sandy beds, whimpering and snuffling in their sleep. On glided the flame; after it crept Nod, scarcely daring to breathe. "Softly, now softly," he kept muttering to himself. And now this gallery began to slope downward, and he heard water dripping. A thin moss was growing on the stony walls. It felt colder as he descended. But Nod kept his eyes fixed on the clear, unswerving flame. And in the silence he heard a m.u.f.fled groan, and a harsh voice muttered drowsily, "Oo mutchee, nanga," and he knew Thumb must be near.

The strange voice whispered: "Hasten, Ummanodda Nizza-neela; full moon is rising!" Then Nod whimpering in his fear a little, like a cat, edged on once more through a gallery where was laid up on sandy shelves a great store of nuts and pods and skins and spits and sharp-edged flints.

And at last he came to where, in a filthy hollow, cold and lightless, and oozing with dark-glistening water-drops, his brothers Thimble and Thumb were sleeping. They were tied hand and foot with Samarak to the thick root of a b.o.o.bab-tree, even their eyes bound up with sticky leaves. Nod hobbled over and knelt down beside Thumb, and put his mouth close to his ear. "Thumb, Thumb," says he, "it is Nod! Wake, Mulla-mulgar; it is Nod who calls!" And he shook him by the shoulder.

Thumb stirred in his sleep and opened his mouth, so that Nod could see the hovering flame glistening on his teeth. "Oohmah, oohmah," he grunted, "na nasmi mutta kara theartchen!" Which means in Mulgar-royal: "Sorry, oh sorry, don't whip me, mother dear!" And Nod knew he was dreaming of long ago.

He shook him again, and Thumb, with a kind of groan, rolled over, trembling, and seemed to listen. "Thumb, Thumb," Nod cried, "it's only me; it's only Nod with the Wonderstone!" And while Nod was stripping off the leaves and bandages which covered Thumb's eyes he told him everything. "And don't cry out, Thumb, if Tishnar's flame burns your shins. They've tied your legs in knots so tight with this tough Samarak, my fingers can't undo them." So Thumb stretched out his legs, and clenched his hands, while the flame stooped and came down, and burned through the Samarak. He rubbed his poor singed shins where the flame had scorched them. But now he stood up. Soon his arms were unbound, and Thimble, too, was roused and unloosed, and they were all three ready to tread softly out.

"Lead on, my wondrous fruit of magic!" said Nod.

The light curtsied, as it were, in the air, and glided up through the doorway; and the three Mulla-mulgars crept out after it, Thumb and Thimble on their fours, being too stiff to walk upright.

"Hasten, hasten, Mulla-mulgars!" said Nod softly. "The full moon is shining; night is come. The pot is ready for the feast."

So one by one, with Nod's clear flame for guide, they trod noiselessly up the sandy earth-run. It led them without faltering past the huddled sleepers again; past, too, where the she-Minimuls lay cuddling their tiny ones, and up into the big empty kitchen. Under another arch they crept after it, along another gallery of rough steps, hollowed out of the sandy rock, beneath great tortuous roots, through such a maze as would have baffled a weasel.

And suddenly Thumb stopped and snuffed and snuffed again. "Immamoosa, Immamoosa!" he grunted.

Almond and evening-blooming Immamoosa it was, indeed, which they could smell, shedding its fragrance abroad at nightfall. And in a little while out at last into the starry darkness they came, the great forest-trees standing black and still around them, their huge boughs cloaked with snow.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

[Ill.u.s.tration]

CHAPTER VII

It was bitterly cold, and as the three travellers stood there, ragged and sore and hungry, they thought they would never weary of gazing at the starry sky and sniffing the keen night air between the trees. But which way should they go? No path ran here, for the Earth-mulgars never let any path grow clear around their mounds. Thumb climbed a little way up a Gelica-tree that stood over them, and soon espied low down in the sky the Bear's bright Seven, which circle about the dim Pole Star. So he quickly slid down again to tell his brothers. It so happened, however, that in this tree grows a small, round, gingerish nut that takes two whole years to ripen, and hangs in thick cl.u.s.ters amid the branches.

They have a taste like cinnamon, and with these the Earth-mulgars flavour their meat. And as Thumb slid heavily down, being stiff and sore now, and very heavy, he shook one of these same cl.u.s.ters, and down it came rattling about Nod's head. They have but thin sh.e.l.ls, these nuts, and are not heavy, but they tumbled so suddenly, and from such a height, that Nod fell flat, his hands thrown out along the snow. He clambered up, rubbing his head, and in the quietness, while they listened, they heard as it were a distant and continuous throbbing beneath them.

Thimble crouched down, with head askew. "The Minimuls, the Zoots!"

he grunted.

But even at the same moment Nod had cried out too. "Thumb, Thumb, O Mulla-mulgar, the Wonderstone! the Wonderstone! the snow, the snow!" No pale and tapering light hovered clearly beaming now beneath these cold and starlit branches. The Mounds of the Minimuls were awake and astir.

Soon the furious little Flesh-eaters would come pouring up in their hundreds, and to-morrow, their magic gone, all three brothers would be quickly frizzling, with these same Gelica-nuts for seasoning, on the spit.

Nod flung himself down; down, too, went Thumb and Thimble in the ice-bespangled snow. At last they found the stone, shining like a pale moon amid the twinkling starriness of the frost. But it was only just in time. Even now they could hear the far-away crying and clamour, and the surly Zoot-beating of the Earth-mulgars drawing nearer and nearer.

Without pausing an instant, Nod cast the stone into his mouth for safety, and away went the three travellers, bundle and cudgel, rags and sheep's-coat, helter-skelter, between the silvery breaks of the trees, scampering faster than any Mulgar, Mulla, or Munza had ever run before.

The snow was crisp and hard; their worn and hardened feet made but the faintest flip-flap in the hush. And scarcely had they run their first short wind out, when lo and behold! there, in a leafy bower of snow in their path, three short-maned snorting little Horses of Tishnar, or Zevveras, stood, rearing and chafing, and yet it seemed tethered invisibly to that same frosty stable by a bridle from which they could not break away.

They whinnied in concert to see these scampering Mulgars come panting over the snow. And Nod remembered instantly the longed-for gongs and stripes of his childhood, and he called like a parakeet: "Tishnar, O Tishnar!" He could say no more. The Wonderstone that had lain couched on his tongue, as he opened his mouth, slid softly back, paused for his cry, and the next instant had glided down his throat. But by this time Thumb had straddled the biggest of the little plunging beasts. And, like arrows from the Gunga's bow, each with his hands clasped tight about his Zevvera's neck, away went Thumb, away went Thimble, away went Nod, the night wind whistling in their ears, their rags a-flutter, the clear stripes of the Zevveras winking in the rising moon.

But the Little Horse of Tishnar which carried Nod upon his back was by much the youngest and smallest of the three. And soon, partly because of his youth, and partly because he had started last, he began to fall farther and farther behind. And being by nature a wild and untamable beast, his spirit flamed up to see his brothers out-stripping him so fast. He flung up his head with a shrill and piercing whinny, and plunged foaming on. The trees winked by. Now up they went, now down, into deep and darkling glades, now cantering softly over open and moon-swamped snow. If only he could fling the clumsy, clinging Mulgar off his back he would soon catch up his comrades, who were fast disappearing between the trees. He jumped, he reared, he kicked, he plunged, he wriggled, he whinnied. Now he sped like the wind, then on a sudden stopped dead, with all four quivering legs planted firmly in the snow. But still Nod, although at every twist and turn he slipped up and down the sleek and slippery shoulders, managed to cling fast with arms and legs.

Then the cunning beast chose all the lowest and brushiest trees to run under, whose twigs and thorns, like thick besoms, lashed and scratched and sc.r.a.ped his rider. But Nod wriggled his head under his sheep's-coat, and still held on. At last, maddened with shame and rage, the Zevvera flung back his beautiful foam-flecked face, and with his teeth snapped at Nod's shoulder. The Mulgar's wound was not quite healed. The gleaming teeth just sc.r.a.ped his sore. Nod started back, with unclasped hands, and in an instant, head over heels he shot, plump into the snow, and before he could turn to scramble up, with a triumphing squeal of delight, the little Zevvera had vanished into the deep shadows of the moon-chequered forest.

[Ill.u.s.tration: HE JUMPED, HE REARED, HE KICKED, HE PLUNGED, HE WRIGGLED, HE WHINNIED.]

At last Nod managed to get to his feet again. He brushed the snow out of his eyes, and spat it out of his mouth. The Zevvera's hoof-prints were plain in the snow. He would follow them, he thought, till he could follow no longer. His brothers had forsaken him. His Wonderstone was gone. He felt it even now burning like a tiny fire beneath his breast-bone. He limped slowly on. But at every step he stumbled. His shoulder throbbed. He could scarcely see, and in a little while down he fell again. He lay still now, rolled up in his jacket, wishing only to die and be at peace. Soon, he thought, the prowling Minimuls would find him, stiff and frozen. They would wrap him up in leaves, and carry him home between them on a pole to their mounds, and pick his small bones for the morrow's supper. Everything he had done was foolish--the fire, the wild pig, the Ephelantoes. He could not even ride the smallest of the Little Horses of Tishnar. The languid warmth of his snow-bed began to lull his senses. The moon streamed through the trees, silvering the branches with her splendour. And in the beautiful glamour of the moonbeams it seemed to Nod the air was aflock with tiny wings. His heavy eyelids drooped. He was falling softly--falling, falling--when suddenly, close to his ear, a harsh and angry voice broke out.