the fire lit and the scalding-pans warming
over it. And as for her needlework, it was a wonder.
Some said she was a changeling; others that she had found the
four-leaved clover or the fairy ointment, and rubbed her eyes with
it. But it was her own secret; for whenever the people tried to
follow her to the "Gardens," _whir! whir! whir!_ buzzed in their
ears, as if a flight of bees were passing, and every limb would feel
as if stuck full of pins and pinched with tweezers, and they were
rolled over and over, their tongues tied as if with cords, and at
last, as soon as they could manage, they would pick themselves up,
and hobble home for their lives.
Well, the history--which, I must remind you, is a true one--goes on
to say that in time the girl grew ambitious, or fell in love
(I cannot remember which), and went to London. In any case it must
have been a strong call that took her: for there are no fairies in
London. I regret that my researches do not allow me to tell you how
the Small People at home took her departure; but we will suppose that
it grieved them deeply. Nor can I say precisely how the girl fared
for many years. I think her fortune contained both joy and sorrow
for a while; and I suspect that many passages of her life would be
sadly out of place in this story, even if they could be hunted out.
Indeed, fairy-tales have to omit so much nowadays, and therefore seem
so antiquated, that one marvels how they could ever have been in
fashion.
But you may take it as sure that in the end this girl met with more
sorrow than joy; for when next she comes into sight it is in London
streets and she is in rags. Moreover, though she wears a flush on
her cheeks, above the wrinkles it does not come of health or high
spirits, but perhaps from the fact that in the twenty years' interval
she has seen millions of men and women, but not one single fairy.
In those latter days I met her many times. She passed under your
windows shortly before dawn on the night that you gave your dance,
early in the season. You saw her, I think?--a woman who staggered a
little, and had some words with the policeman at the corner: but,
after all, a staggering woman in London is no such memorable sight.
All day long she was seeking work, work, work; and after dark she
sought forgetfulness. She found the one, in small quantities, and
out of it she managed to buy the other, now and then, over the
counter. But she had long given up looking
|