The counterpane fairy

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I.—THE PRINCESS OF THE GOLDEN CASTLE, 7

II.-THE OWLS AND THE GAMBLESOME ELF, 29

Chapter First. The Princess Of The Golden Castle

EDDY was all alone, for his mother had been up with him so much the night before that at about four o’clock in the after¬ noon she said that she was going to lie down for a little while.

The room where Teddy lay was very pleasant, with two big windows, and the furniture covered with gay old-fashioned

India calico. His mother had set a glass of milk on the table beside his bed, and left the stair door ajar so that he could call Hannah, the cook, if he wanted any¬ thing, and then she had gone over to her own room.

The little boy had always enjoyed being ill, for then he was read aloud to and had lemonade, but this had been a real illness, and though he was better now, the doctor still would not let him have anything but milk and gruel. He was feeling rather lonely, too, though the fire crackled cheer¬ fully, and he could hear Hannah singing to herself in the kitchen below.

Teddy turned over the leaves of Robin¬ son Crusoe for a while, looking at the gaily colored pictures, and then he closed it and called, “Hannah!” The singing in the kitchen below ceased, and Teddy knew that Hannah was listening. “ Hannah ! ” he called again.

At the second call Hannah came hurrying up the stairs and into the room. “What do you want, Teddy?” she asked.

“ Hannah, I want to ask mamma some¬ thing,” said Teddy.

“Oh,” said Hannah, “you wouldn’t want me to call your poor mother, would you, when she was up with you the whole of last night and has just gone to lie down a bit ? ”

“ I want to ask her something,” re¬ peated Teddy.

“You ask me what you want to know,” suggested Hannah. “ Your poor mother’s so tired that I’m sure you are too much of a man to want me to call her.”

“ Well, I want to ask her if I may have a cracker,” said Teddy.

“ Oh, no ; you could n’t have that,” said Hannah. “ Don’t you know that the doctor said you must n’t have anything but milk and gruel ? Did you want to ask her anything else ? ”

io The Counterpane Fairy.

“ No,” said Teddy, and his lip trem¬ bled.

After that Hannah went down-stairs to her work again, and Teddy lay staring out of the window at the windy gray clouds that were sweeping across the April sky. He grew lonelier and lonelier and a lump rose in his throat; presently a big tear trickled down his cheek and dripped off his chin.

“ Oh dear, oh dear! ” said a little voice just back of the hill his knees made as he lay with them drawn up in bed ; “what a hill to climb ! ”

Teddy stopped crying and gazed wonderingly toward where the voice came from, and presently over the top of his knees appeared a brown peaked hood, a tiny withered face, a flapping brown cloak, and last of all two small feet in buckled shoes. It was a little old woman, so weazened and brown that she looked more like a dried leaf than anything else.

She seated herself on Teddy’s knees and gazed down at him solemnly, and she was so light that he felt her weight no more than if she had been a feather.

Teddy lay staring at her for a while, and then he asked, “ Who are you ? ”

“ I’m the Counterpane Fairy,” said the little figure, in a thin little voice.

“ I don’t know what that is,” said Teddy.

“Well,” said the Counterpane Fairy, “ it’s the sort of a fairy that lives in houses and watches out for the children. I used to be one of the court fairies, but I grew tired of that. There was nothing in it, you know.”

“ Nothing in what ? ” asked Teddy.

“ Nothing in the court life. All day the fairies were swinging in spider-webs and sipping honey-dew, or playing games of hide-and-go-seek. The only comfort I had was with an old field-mouse who lived at the edge of the wood, and I used to spend a great deal of time with her; I used to take care of her babies when she was out hunting for something to eat; cunning little things they were, — five of them, all fat and soft, and with such funny little tails.”

“ What became of them?”

“ Oh, they moved away. They left be¬ fore I did. As soon as they were old enough, Mother Field-mouse went. She said she could n’t stand the court fairies. They were always playing tricks on her, stopping up the door of her house with sticks and acorns, and making faces at her babies until they almost drove them into fits. So after that I left too.”

“ Where did you go ? ”

“ Oh, hither and yon. Mostly where there were little sick boys and girls.”

“ Do you like little boys ?”

“Yes, when they don’t cry,” said the Counterpane Fairy, staring at him very hard.

“Well, I was lonely,” said Teddy. “I wanted my mamma.”

“ Yes, I know, but you ought n’t to have cried. I came to you, though, because you were lonely and sick, and I thought maybe you would like me to show you a story.”

“ Do you mean tell me a story ?” asked Teddy.

“ No,” said the fairy, “ I mean show you a story. It’s a game I invented after I joined the Counterpane Fairies. Choose any one of the squares of the counterpane and I will show you how to play it. That’s all you have to do,—to choose a square.”

Teddy looked the counterpane over carefully. “ I think I ’ll choose that yel¬ low square,” he said, “because it looks so nice and bright.”

“ Very well,” said the Counterpane Fairy. “ Look straight at it and don’t turn your eyes away until I count seven

14 The Counterjpane Fairy.

times seven, and then you shall see the story of it.”

Teddy fixed his eyes on the square and the fairy began to count. “ One—two— three—four,” she counted; Teddy heard her voice, thin and clear as the hissing of the logs on the hearth. “ Don’t look away from the square,” she cried. “ Five — six—seven” — it seemed to Teddy that the yellow silk square was turning to <a mist before his eyes and wrapping everything about him in a golden glow. “ Thirteen—fourteen ”—the fairy counted on and on. “Forty-six — forty-seven — forty-eight— forty-nine ! ”

At the words forty-nine, the Counter¬ pane Fairy clapped her hands and Teddy looked about him. He was no longer in a golden mist. He was standing in a wonderful enchanted garden. The sky was like the golden sky at sunset, and the grass was so thickly set with tiny yel¬ low flowers that it looked like a golden carpet. From this garden stretched a long flight of glass steps. They reached up and up and up to a great golden castle with shining domes and turrets.

“ Listen ! ” said the Counterpane Fairy. “In that golden castle there lies an en¬ chanted princess. For more than a hun¬ dred years she has been lying there waiting for the hero who is to come and rescue her, and you are the hero who can do it if you will.”

With that the fairy led him to a little pool close by, and bade him look in the water. When Teddy looked, he saw him¬ self standing there in the golden garden, and he did not appear as he ever had be¬ fore. He was tall and strong and beauti¬ ful, like a hero.

“ Yes,” said Teddy, “ I will do it.”

At these words, from the grass, the bushes, and the trees around, suddenly started a flock of golden birds. They cir¬ cled about and over him, clapping their wings and singing triumphantly. Their song reminded Teddy of the blackbirds that sang on the lawn at home in the early spring, when the daffodils were up. Then in a moment they were all gone, and the garden was still again.

Their song had filled his heart with a longing for great deeds, and, without pausing longer, he ran to the glass steps and began to mount them.

Up and up and up he went. Once he turned and waved his hand to the Coun¬ terpane Fairy in the golden garden far below. She waved her hand in answer, and he heard her voice faint and clear. “ Good-bye ! Good-bye ! Be brave and strong, and beware of that that is little and gray.”

Then Teddy turned his face toward the castle, and in a moment he was stand¬ ing before the great shining gates.

He raised his hand and struck bravely upon the door. There was no answer.

Again he struck upon it, and his blow rang through the hall iqside; then he opened the door and went in.

The hall was five-sided, and all of pure gold, as clear and shining as glass. Upon three sides of it were three arched doors; one was of emerald, one was of ruby, and one was of diamond; they were arched, and tall, and wide,—fit for a hero to go through. The question was, behind which one lay the enchanted princess.

While Teddy stood there looking at them and wondering, he heard a little thin voice, that seemed to be singing to itself, and this is what it sang:

“ In and out and out and in,

Quick as a flash I weave and spin.

Some may mistake and some forget,

But I ’ll have my spider-web finished yet.”

When Teddy heard the song, he knew that someone must be awake in the en¬ chanted castle, so he began looking about him.

On the fourth side of the wall there hung a curtain of silvery-gray spider-web, and the voice seemed to come from it. The hero went toward it, but he saw nothing, for the spider that was spinning it moved so fast that no eyes could follow it. Presently it paused up in the left-hand corner of the web, and then Teddy saw it. It looked very little to have spun all that curtain of silvery web.

As Teddy stood looking at it, it began to sing again :

“ Here in my shining web I sit,

To look about and rest a bit.

I rest myself a bit and then,

Quick as a flash, I begin again."

“ Mistress Spinner ! Mistress Spinner ! ” cried Teddy. “ Can you tell me where to find the enchanted princess who lies asleep waiting for me to come and rescue her ? ”

The spider sat quite still for a while, and then it said in a voice as thin as a hair:

“ You must go through the emerald door ; you must go through the emerald door. What so fit as the emerald door for the hero who would do great deeds ? ”

Teddy did not so much as stay to thank the little gray spinner, he was in such a hurry to find the princess, but turning he sprang to the emerald door, flung it open, and stepped outside.

He found himself standing on the glass steps, and as his foot touched the topmost one the whole flight closed up like an um¬ brella, and in a moment Teddy was sliding down the smooth glass plane, faster and faster and faster until he could hardly catch his breath.

The next thing he knew he was standing in the golden garden, and there was the Counterpane Fairy beside him looking at him sadly. “ You should have known bet¬ ter than to try the emerald door,” she said ; “ and now shall we break the story ? ” “ Oh, no, no !” cried Teddy, and he was still the hero. “ Let me try once more, for it may be I can yet save the princess.”

Then the Counterpane Fairy smiled. “Very well,” she said, “you shall try again : but remember what I told you, beware of that that is little and gray, and take this with you, for it may be of use.” Stooping, she picked a blade of grass from the ground and handed it to him.

The hero took it wondering, and in his hands it was changed to a sword that shone so brightly that it dazzled his eyes. Then he turned, and there was the long flight of glass steps leading up to the golden castle just as before; so thrusting the magic sword into his belt, he ran nimbly up and up and up, and not until he reached the very top¬ most step did he turn and look back to wave farewell to the Counterpane Fairy below. She waved her hand to him. “ Re¬ member,” she called, “ beware of what is little and gray.”

He opened the door and went into the

The Princess of the Golden Castle.

five-sided golden hall, and there were the three doors just as before, and the spider spinning and singing on the fourth side :

“ Now the brave hero is wiser indeed ;

He may have failed once, but he still may succeed.

Dull are the emeralds ; diamonds are bright ;

So is his wisdom that shines as the light.”

“The diamond door!” cried Teddy. “ Yes, that is the door I should have tried. How could I have thought the emerald door was it?” and opening the diamond door he stepped through it.

He hardly had time to see that he was standing at the top of the glass steps, be¬ fore—br-r-r-r !—they had shut up again in¬ to a smooth glass hill, and there he was spinning down them so fast that the wind whistled past his ears.

In less time than it takes to tell, he was back again for the third time in the golden garden, with the Counterpane Fairy stand¬ ing before him, and he was ashamed to raise his eyes.

“So!” said the Counterpane Fairy. “ Did you know no better than to open the diamond door?”

“ No,” said Teddy, “ I knew no better.”

“ Then,” said the fairy, “ if you can pay no better heed to my warnings than that, the princess must wait for another hero, for you are not the one.”

“ Let me try but once more,” cried Teddy, “for this time I shall surely find her.”

“ Then you may try once more and for the last time,” said the fairy, “but beware of what is little and gray.” Stooping she picked from the grass beside her a fallen acorn cup and handed it to him. “ Take this with you,” she said, “ for it may serve you well.”

As he took it from her, it was changed in his hand to a goblet of gold set round with precious stones. He thrust it into his bosom, for he was in haste, and turn¬ ing he ran for the third time up the flight of glass steps. This time so eager was he that he never once paused to look back, but all the time he ran on up and up he was wondering what it was that she meant about her warning. She had said, “ Be¬ ware of what is little and gray.” What had he seen that was little and gray ?

As soon as he reached the great golden hall he walked over to the curtain of spider-web. The spider was spinning so fast that it was little more than a gray streak, but presently it stopped up in the left-hand corner of the web. As the hero looked at it he saw that it was little and gray. Then it began to sing to him in its little thin voice :

“ Great hero, wiser than ever before,

Try the red door ; try the red door.

Open the door that is ruby, and then

You never need search for the princess again.”

“ No, I will not open the ruby door,” cried Teddy. “ Twice have you sent me back to the golden garden, and now you shall fool me no more.”

As he said this he saw that one corner of the spider-web curtain was still unfin¬ ished, in spite of the spiders haste, and underneath was something that looked like a little yellow door. Then suddenly he knew that that was the door he must go through. He caught hold of the cur¬ tain and pulled, but it was as strong as steel. Quick as a flash he snatched from his belt the magic sword, and with one blow the curtain was cut in two, and fell at his feet.

He heard the little gray spider calling to him in its thin voice, but he paid no heed, for he had opened the little yellow door and stooped his head and entered.

Beyond was a great courtyard all of gold, and with a fountain leaping and splashing back into a golden basin in the middle. But what he saw first of all was the enchanted princess, who lay stretched out as if asleep upon a couch all covered with cloth of gold. He knew she was a princess, because she was so beautiful and because she wore a golden crown.

He stood looking at her without stir¬ ring, and at last he whispered : “ Princess ! Princess ! I have come to save you.”

Still she did not stir. He bent and touched her, but she lay there in her en¬ chanted sleep, and her eyes did not open. Then Teddy looked about him, and seeing the fountain he drew the magic cup from his bosom and, filling it, sprinkled the hands and face of the princess with the water.

Then her eyes opened and she raised herself upon her elbow and smiled. “ Have you come at last ? ” she cried.

“ Yes,” answered Teddy, “ I have come.”

The princess looked about her. “ But what became of the spider ? ” she said. Then Teddy, too, looked about, and there was the spider running across the floor toward where the princess lay.

Quickly he sprang from her side and set his foot upon it. There was a thin squeak and then—there was nothing left of the little gray spinner but a tiny gray smudge on the floor.

Instantly the golden castle was shaken from top to bottom, and there was a sound of many voices shouting outside. The princess rose to her feet and caught the hero by the hand. “You have broken the enchantment,” she cried, “ and now you shall be the King of the Golden Castle and reign with me.”

“ Oh, but I can’t, ’’said Teddy, “ because —because-”

But the princess drew him out with her through the hall, and there they were at the head of the flight of glass steps. A great host of soldiers and courtiers were running up it. They were dressed in cloth of gold, and they shouted at the sight of Teddy : “ Hail to the hero ! Hail to the hero ! ” and Teddy knew them by their voices for the golden birds that had fluttered around him in the garden below.

“ And all this is yours,” said the beauti¬ ful princess, turning toward him with-

“ So that is the story of the yellow square,” said the Counterpane Fairy.

Teddy looked about him. The golden castle was gone, and the stairs, and the shouting courtiers. He was lying in bed with the silk coverlet over his little knees, and Hannah was still singing in the kitchen below.

“ Did you like it ?” asked the fairy.

Teddy heaved a deep sigh. “Oh! was n’t it beautiful ? ” he said. Then he lay for a while thinking and smiling. “Wasn’t the princess lovely?” he whis¬ pered half to himself.

The Counterpane Fairy got up slowly and stiffly, and picked up the staff that she had laid down beside her. “Well, I must be journeying on,” she said.

“Oh, no, no !” cried Teddy. “ Please don’t go yet.”

“ Yes, I must,” said the Counterpane Fairy. “ I hear your mother coming.”

“ But will you come back again ? ” cried T eddy.

The Counterpane Fairy made no an¬ swer. She was walking down the other side of the bedquilt hill, and Teddy heard her voice, little and thin, dying away in the distance : “ Oh dear, dear, dear! What a hill to go down ! What a hill it is ! Oh dear, dear, dear ! ”

Then the door opened and his mother came in. She was looking rested, and she smiled at him lovingly, but the little brown Counterpane Fairy was gone.

Chapter Second. The Owls And The Gamblesome Elf

TL HE next morning when Teddy awoke it was still very early ; so early that even Hannah was not yet stirring.

Outside everything was wrapped in a silvery mist, and now and then a drop of moisture plumped down on the porch roof.

Teddy lay still for a while, growing wider and wider awake, and then he be¬ gan to stir restlessly and wish that his mother would come. After a while he called her, but the house was so silent that he did n’t like to call very loudly, and there was no answer.

He thought he would call again, and then suddenly he remembered the Counterpane Fairy, and wondered if she would like little boys who called their mothers so early.

He turned over in bed, and raising his knees into a hill stared at the yellow silk square and thought of the wonderful golden castle where she had taken him the day before. He wished he knew what all the bird people would have done when they reached the top of the stairs. He thought they would have put a golden crown on his head and made him a king.

And the princess was so beautiful he longed to see her again. How surprised Hannah would have been if she had heard voices, and had come up-stairs to see who it was, and had found the beautiful prin¬ cess sitting with him, and had seen a golden crown on his head ! If she only knew about it she would never call him a mischievous boy again. He had done a great deal more than Hannah could.

“ Oh dear, oh dear ! ” said a little voice just back of his knees ; “ almost at the top, anyway.” Teddy knew the voice; it was that of the Counterpane Fairy, and there was the tip of her brown hood showing over his knees. He watched, breathless with eagerness, until he saw her face ap¬ pear above them, and then he cried out: “ I wondered whether you would come ; I ’m so glad. Are you going to show me another story, and will you stay a long while ? ”

The Counterpane Fairy said nothing until she had sat down on top of his knees for a while and caught her breath, and then she said: “Well, well! It’s steeper than it was yesterday. I thought I should never get across that satin square, it was so slippery.”

“Shall I put my knees down?” asked Teddy, moving them.

“ For mercy’s sake ! no,” said the fairy, clutching at the quilt. “ You might upset me. Keep right still and I ’ll show you another story.”

“Oh, yes !” cried Teddy; “please do; and let me go to the golden castle again.”

“ No, I can’t do that,” said the Counter¬ pane Fairy, “ for that was yesterday’s story, and this will be another.”

“But what became of the princess?” asked Teddy.

“ Oh ! she married the hero, of course,” said the fairy.

“ But I thought / was the hero.”

“ There, there ! ” said the fairy, impa¬ tiently, “ I told you that was yesterday’s story, and if you want to see any more you must choose another square.”

“Well, I will,” said Teddy. “May I choose that green square ? ”

“Yes,” said the fairy. “Now fix your eyes on it while I count.”

Teddy began to stare at the green square so hard that he scarcely winked, but he heard the Counterpane Fairy counting on in her thin little voice until she reached

FORTY-NINE.

The green square spread and grew just as the yellow one had done while she counted, until Teddy seemed drifting off into endless green spaces. Then the Counterpane Fairy clapped her hands and he saw that he was hovering over a grassy hillside.

“ Now you are an elf, you know,” he heard the fairy say.

At the bottom of the green hill there was a brook, and at the top was a line of shady green woods. Overhead the sky was very blue, with shining heaps of cot¬ tony white clouds ; a soft wind was blow¬ ing, but the sun was warm, and insects were buzzing past intent on business. A brown bird whirred by and dropped out of sight among the grasses.

Teddy floated through the air lighter than a feather, and he felt so happy that he clapped his hands together and turned head over heels in the air. As he came right side up again he saw a bit of thistle¬ down drifting on up the hill, and he was so little that when he flew after it and set himself astride of it, it seemed as big as a barrel to him. He floated on up the hill with it, and the wind was like a cushion behind him.

As they reached the edge of the hill the thistle-down caught on a bush, and Teddy almost had his leg wedged between it and a leaf. He jumped off in a hurry, and stood looking about him and wondering what he should do next.

Suddenly he saw something that made him open his eyes in astonishment. Four large black-and-yellow butterflies were tied to a knot on an old tree close by, but it was not at the butterflies themselves that he wondered, for he had often seen them flitting about the fields ; it was at the way they were loaded down with the strangest things : all sorts of fairy household fur¬ niture—little chairs and tables, bedsteads, tiny pots and pans, a great soup-kettle al¬ most as large as a huckleberry, two thistle¬ down mattresses, and a number of other things. All these were very neatly packed and tied between the butterflies’ wings with spider-web ropes.

In the middle of the knot was a hole, but instead of being round, as a knot-hole generally is, it was square, and there was a little door fitted into it.

Suddenly this door opened, and on the threshold of it stood a beautiful little fairy. She stood there looking about, and then she drew from her pocket a handkerchief, thin and delicate as gossamer, and wiped .her eyes. After that she began to sob, and Teddy knew that what he had thought was the buzzing of a bee inside the knot had really been the sound of her weeping.

“ Hello ! ” called the elf.

The fairy stopped sobbing and looked about her. When she saw Teddy she stared at him for a moment and then she began to wipe her eyes and sob again.

Teddy climbed up the branch of a black¬ berry bush until he was quite close to the knot-hole, and sat down on the stem and stared at her. “ What makes you cry ? ” he asked.

Still the fairy said nothing, but she folded her little handkerchief, though it was quite wet, and put it carefully back into her pocket.

Just then in the doorway at her side ap¬ peared another fairy. He was quite dif¬ ferent from her, though he, too, was very small. He was as withered as a dried pea, and looked as though he must be at least a hundred years old.

“ Is everything packed up ? ” he asked in a querulous voice. Then his eyes fell on Teddy the elf. He scowled until his little pin-pricks of eyes almost disappeared. “ Ugh ! there s one of those nasty gamblesome elves,” he said. “Now mischief s sure to follow.”

“ I ’m not a gamblesome elf! ” cried Teddy.

“Yes you are!” said the withered old fairy. “You need n’t tell me! Look at your red cap and the way your toes turn down. I say you are a gamblesome elf.”

Teddy looked at his toes and sure enough they did turn down. “ I wonder if I am a gamblesome elf,” he thought.

But the old fairy paid no more attention to him. He seemed to be in a great hurry and very cross. He bustled in and out of the knot-hole, bringing a broom and an old coat that had been forgotten, and packed them on the butterflies, and then he helped the lady fairy on to one, and clambered on another himself.

After they were all ready to start he found that he had forgotten to unhitch the butterflies, and grumbling and scolding he clambered down again and untied them. Then he climbed back once more, and away they all flew down the hillside and out of sight, the lady fairy weeping all the time as though her heart would break.