Snow White 4

Snow White 4

The child objected that it was still daylight; she tried to look wide

awake, and succeeded for a few minutes, while they were putting away

the dishes in the most charming little hanging cupboard with glass

doors; but after that her head grew heavy, and her eyelids, as she

expressed it, kept flopping into her eyes.

 

"Where am I going to sleep?" she asked. "There ought to be little white

beds, you know, and one would be too big, and the next would be too

small, and--no, that's the Three Bears, isn't it? I don't see any beds

at all in this place." She began to rub her eyes, and it was clear that

there must be no further delay.

 

"Come in here," said the man. "Here is your bed, all ready for you."

 

He led her through the other door, and there was a tiny bedroom, all

shining and clean, like the other rooms. The bed stood in one corner,

white and smooth, with a plumpy pillow that seemed to be waiting for

the child. She sighed, a long sigh of contented weariness, and put

up her arms in a fashion which the man seemed to understand. He sat

down in a low chair and took her in his arms, where she nestled like a

sleepy kitten. He rocked her gently, patting her in an absent fashion;

but presently she raised her eyes with an indignant gleam. "You aren't

singing anything!" she said. "Sing!"

 

"Hush!" said the man. "How can I sing unless you are quiet?"

 

He hummed under his breath, as if trying to recall something; then he

laughed, in a helpless sort of way, and said to the door, "Look at

this, will you?" but there was really nothing to look at; and after

awhile he began to sing, in a soft, crooning voice, about birds, and

flowers, and children, all going to sleep: such a drowsy song, the

words seemed to nod along the music till they nodded themselves sound

asleep.

 

When he finished, the child seemed to be asleep too; but she roused

herself once more. She sat up on his knee and rubbed her eyes.

 

"Does dwarfs know about prayers?" she said, drowsily. "Do you know

about them?"

 

The man's eyes looked dark again. "Not much," he said; "but I know

enough to hear yours, Snow-white. Will you say it on my knee here?"

 

But the child slipped down to the floor, and dropped her head on his

knee in a business-like way.

 

"'Now I lay me down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep.'

 

"I don't say the rest, 'cause I don't like it. And God bless papa and

mamma, and make me a goo'--l'--girl--amen. And God bless this dwarf,"

she added. "That's all." Then she lifted her head, and looked at the

dwarf; and something in her look, flushed as she was with sleep, the

light in her eyes half veiled, made the man start and flinch, and turn

very pale.

 

"No!" he said, putting out his hands as if to push the child away. "No;

leave me alone!"

 

The child opened her eyes a little wider, and looked at him. "What is

the matter of you, dwarf?" she said. "I wasn't touching you. Are you

cross?"

 

"No," said the man; and he smiled again. "Snow-white, if I don't put

you to bed, you'll be going to sleep on my best floor, and I can't have

that."

 

He laid her in the little bed, and tucked the bed-clothes round her

smoothly; she was asleep almost before her head touched the pillow. The

man stood looking at her a long time. Presently he took up one of her

curls and examined it, holding it up to the fading light. It was a

pretty curl, fine and soft, and of a peculiar shade of reddish brown.

He went to a box and took out a folded paper. Unfolding this, took out

another curl of hair, and laid it beside the child's; they might have

grown on the same head.

 

"Though I take the wings of the morning--" said the man. Then he laid

the curl back in the box, and went out and shut the door softly behind

him.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER IV.

 

ASKING QUESTIONS.

 

 

"How many birds have you got, dwarf?" asked the child.

 

They were sitting at breakfast the next morning. To look at the child,

no one would have thought she had ever been sleepy in her life; she was

twinkling all over with eagerness and curiosity.

 

"How many?" repeated the man, absently. He hardly seemed to hear what

the child said; he looked searchingly at her, and seemed to be trying

to make out something that was puzzling him.

 

"Yes, how many?" repeated the child, with some asperity. "Seems to me

you are rather stupid this morning, dwarf; but perhaps you are like

bats, and sleep in the daytime. Are you like bats? Are dwarfs like

bats? Can you hang up by your heels in trees? Have you got claws on

them?"

 

Her eyes dilated with awful joy; but the man shook his head and

laughed. "No, no, Snow-white. I wasn't sleepy at all; I was only

thinking."

 

"Did you sleep last night?" asked the child, slightly disappointed. "I

was in your bed, so you couldn't sleep. If you did sleep, where did

you? Please give me some more bread. I don't see where you get bread;

and I don't see where you slept; and you didn't tell me how many birds

you had. I shall be angry pretty soon, I don't wonder."

 

"Snow-white," said the dwarf, "if you talk so fast, your tongue will be

worn out before you are seventy."

 

"What is seventy?" said the child. "I hate it, anyway, and I won't be

it."

 

"Hurrah!" said the man, "I hate it, too, and I won't be it, either. But

as to the birds; how many should you think there were? Have you seen

any of them?"

 

"I've seen lots and lots!" said the child, "and I've heard all the

rest. When I woke up, they were singing and singing, as if they were

seeing who could most. One of them came in the window, and he sat on my

toe, and he was yellow. Then I said, 'Boo!' and then he flew away just

as hard as he could fly. Do you have that bird?"

 

"Yes," said the man. "That is my Cousin Goldfinch. I'm sorry you

frightened him away, Snow-white. If you had kept quiet, he would have

sung you a pretty song. He isn't used to having people say 'Boo!' to

him. He comes in every morning to see me, and sing me his best song."

 

"Are they all your birds?" queried the child. "Aren't you ever going

to tell me how many you have? I don't think you are very polite. Miss

Tyler says it's horrid rude not to answer questions."

 

"Miss Tyler is not here!" said the man, gravely. "I thought you said we

were not to talk about her."

 

"So I did!" cried the child. "I say hurrah she isn't here, dwarf. Do

you say it, too?"

 

"Hurrah!" said the man, fervently. "Now come, Snow-white, and I'll show

you how many birds I have."

 

"Before we wash the dishes? Isn't that horrid?"

 

"No, not at all horrid. Wait, and you'll see."

 

The man crumbled a piece of bread in his hand, and went out on the

green before the house, bidding the child stay where she was and watch

from the window. Watching, the child saw him scatter the crumbs on the

shining sward, and heard him cry in a curious kind of soft whistle:

 

"Coo! coo! coo!"

 

Immediately there was a great rustling all about; in the living green

of the roof, in the yellow birches, but most of all in the vast

depths of the buttonwood tree. In another moment the birds appeared,

clouds and clouds of them, flying so close that their wings brushed

each other; circling round and round the man, as he stood motionless

under the great tree; then settling softly down, on his head, on his

shoulders, on his outstretched arms, on the ground at his feet. He

broke another piece from the loaf, and crumbled it, scattering the

crumbs lavishly. The little creatures took their morning feast eagerly,

gratefully; they threw back their tiny heads and chirped their thanks;

they hopped and ran and fluttered about the sunny green space, till

the whole seemed alive with swift, happy motion. Standing still among

them, the man talked to them gently, and they seemed to understand. Now

and then he took one in his hand and caressed it, with fingers as light

as their own fluffy wings; and when he did that, the bird would throw

back its head and sing; and the others would chime in, till the whole

place rang with the music of them. It was a very wonderful thing, if

any one had been there who understood about wonderful things; but to

the child it seemed wholly natural, being like many other matters in

the Fairy Books; only she wished she could do it, too, and determined

she would, as soon as she learned a little more about the ways of

dwarfs.

 

By and by, when he had fed and caressed and talked to them, the man

raised his arm; and the gray fluttering cloud rose in the air with

merry cries, and vanished in the leafy gloom. The child was at the door

in a moment. "How do you do that?" she asked, eagerly. "Who telled you

that? Why can't I do it, too? What is their names of all those birds?

Why don't you answer things when I say them at you?"

 

"Snow-white," said the man, "I haven't yet answered the questions you

asked me last night, and I haven't even begun on this morning's batch."

 

"But you will answer them all?" cried the child.

 

"Yes, I will answer them all, if you give me time."

 

"'Cause I have to know, you know!" said the child, with a sigh of

relief.

 

"Yes, you have to know. But first I must ask you some questions,