Snow White 7
He was speaking slowly, and for the time seemed to forget the child,
and to be speaking to himself. "Freedom and forgetfulness; the sting
left behind, instead of carried about with one, world without end. The
weary at rest--at rest!"
"No wives?" asked the child. The man looked at her with startled eyes.
"Wives?" he repeated.
"Dead ones," said the child. "Hanging up by their hairs, you know,
dwarf, just heads of 'em, all the rest gone dead. Isn't that awful?
Would you go in just the same? I would!"
"No, no wives!" said the dwarf; and he laughed, not his pleasant laugh,
but one that sounded more like a bark, the child told him. "No wives!"
he repeated; "my own or other people's, Snow-white. What should I have
to do with wives, dead or alive?"
The child considered him attentively. "I don't suppose you could get
one, anyhow, do you?" she said. "Always, you know, the dwarfs try to
get the princesses, but never they do. You never was yellow, was you?"
she asked, with a sudden note of apprehension in her voice.
"No, Snow-white, never yellow; only green."
The child bubbled over. "Was you truly green?" she cried. "Isn't that
funny, dwarf? and then you turned brown, didn't you? you don't suppose
I'll turn brown, do you? because I ain't green, am I? but I was just
thinking, suppose you should be the Yellow Dwarf, wouldn't it be awful?"
"Probably it would. He was a pretty bad sort of fellow, was he,
Snow-white? I--it's a good while since I heard anything about him, you
see."
"Oh, he was just puffickly frightful! He--Do you want me to tell you
the story, dwarf?"
Yes, the dwarf wanted that very much indeed.
"Well, then, if I tell you that, you must tell me one about some dwarfs
what you knew. I suppose you knew lots and lots of them, didn't you?
Was they different colours? was they blue and green and red? what made
you turn brown when you was green? well!
"Once they was a queen, and she had twenty children, and they was all
dead except the Princess All-fair, and she wouldn't marry any of the
kings what wanted to marry her, and so her mother went to ask the
Desert Fairy what she should do wiz her. So she took a cake for the
lions, and it was made of millet and sugar-candy and crocodiles' eggs,
but she went to sleep and lost it. Did ever you eat a cake like that?
should you think it would be nasty? I should! Well, and so there was
the Yellow Dwarf sitting in the tree--why, just the way you are, dwarf.
We might play I was the queen, and you was the Yellow Dwarf. Let's play
it."
"But I don't want to be a horrid one," the man objected, "and I want to
hear the story, besides."
"Oh, well, so I will. Well, he said he would save her from the lion,
if she would let him marry the Princess, and she didn't want to one
bit, but she said she supposed she'd have to, so he saved her, and she
found herself right back there in the palace. Well, and so then she was
very unhappy all the time, and the Princess didn't know what upon earth
_was_ the matter wiz her, so she thought _she_ would go and ask the
Desert Fairy. So she went just the same way what her mother went, but
she ate so many oranges off the tree that she lost her cake, too. That
was greedy, don't you think so?"
"Very greedy! she was old enough to know better."
"Why, yes! why, I'm only six, and I don't eat so many as all that, only
till I feel queer in front, and then I _always_ stop. Do always you
stop when you feel queer in front? Well! so then the Yellow Dwarf comed
along, and he said her mother said she had to marry him, anyway. And
the Princess said, '_How!_ my mother promised me to you in marriage!
_you_, such a fright as _you_!'
"And he was puffickly horrid. He said, 'Well, if you don't, the lions
will get you, and eat you up every scrap, and I sha'n't care a bit.'
Wasn't he mean? So she said she s'posed she'd have to; and right off
then she went to sleep, and there she was in her own bed, and all
trimmed up wiz ribbons, and on her finger was a ring, and it was just
one red hair, and she couldn't get it off. Wasn't that puffickly awful,
dwarf?"
"It chills my marrow, Snow-white. Go on!"
"What is your marrow? what does it look like? why do you have it, if it
gets cold so easy as that? I wouldn't! Well! So at last the Princess
said she guessed she would marry the King of the Golden Mines, 'cause
he was puffickly beautiful, and most prob'ly the old dwarf wouldn't
dare to say a word when he found how beautiful he was, and strong and
big and rich and everything."
"No!" said the dwarf, bitterly. "The poor dwarf would have no chance,
certainly, against that kind of king. He might as well have given up in
the beginning."
"But, Mark, this dwarf wasn't poor, or anything else but just as horrid
as he could be. Why, when the Princess and the King was going to be
married, all in gold and silver, wiz roses and candy and everything
lovely, they saw a box coming along, and an old woman was on it and she
said she was the Desert Fairy, and the Yellow Dwarf was her friend,
and they shouldn't get married. So they said they didn't care, they
would--oh, and she said if they did she would burn her crutch; and they
said they didn't care one bit if she did. They were just as brave! And
the King of the Golden Mines told her get out, or he would kill her;
and then the top of the box comed off, and there was the Yellow Dwarf,
and he was riding on a cat,--did ever you ride on a cat, Mark?"
"No, never."
"Well, he was; and he said the Princess promised to marry him, and the
King said he didn't care, she shouldn't do _noffing_ of the kind. So
they had a fight, and while they were fighting that horrid old Fairy
hit the Princess, and then the Yellow Dwarf took her up on the cat, and
flewed away wiz her. That's all about the first part. Don't you think
it's time for luncheon?"
"Oh, but you are never going to stop there, Snow-white! I want to know
what became of them. Even if the dwarf did carry off the Princess,
and even if she had promised to marry him,--for she did promise, you
say,--still, of course he did not get her. Dwarfs have no rights that
anybody is bound to respect, have they, Snow-white?"
"Well, I don't like the last part, because it doesn't end right. The
Desert Fairy falled in love wiz the King, and she hoped he would marry
her, but he said no indeed, he wouldn't have her in the same place wiz
him at all; so he wouldn't stay in the house, but he went out to walk
by the wall that was made of emeralds, and a mermaid came up and said
she was sorry, and if he hit everything wiz this sword it would kill
them, but he must never let go of it. So he thanked her very much, and
he went along, and he killed lots of things, spinxes and nymps and
things, and at last he came to the Princess, but then he was so glad to
see her that he let go of the sword _just a minute_, and what do you
think that horrid dwarf did? Why, he comed right along and took it, and
said he shouldn't have it back unless he would give up the Princess.
'No,' said the King, 'I scorn thy favour on such terms.' And then that
mean old thing stabbed him to the heart, and so he was dead; and the
Princess said, 'You puffickly hideous old horrid thing, I won't marry
you, anyway!' and then she fell down and perspired wizout a sigh. And
that's all. And the mermaid turned them into palm-trees, because that
was all she knew how to do, don't you know? and that's all. Aren't
you going to get me something to eat? can't we have it up here in
this place? aren't you glad I'm here to keep you company and tell you
stories? don't you say hurrah for us, dwarf? I do; hurrah!"
CHAPTER VI.
MILKING THE COW.
"What let's do now?" said the child.
They had had dinner; a most exciting dinner, all coming out of tin
boxes and delightful china pots. It was almost as good as Little
Two-Eyes' feasts in "Little Kid Milk, Table Appear," as the child
preferred to call the story. The child shut her eyes and said what she
wanted, and when she opened them, there it mostly was, standing on the
table before her. At least, that was the way it happened when she said
chicken, and jam, and Albert biscuits; but when she said sponge cake,
there was none, and the dwarf was mortified, and said he would tell the
people they ought to be ashamed of themselves.
"Where all do you get them?" asked the child. "Do you stamp your foot
on the floor, and say, 'JAM!' like that, hard, just as loud as you can?
do you? does it come up pop through holes? will you do it now, this
minute?"
No, the dwarf could not do it now, he had not the right kind of shoes
on. Besides, there were other reasons.
"Well, then, what let's do?" asked the child again.
"Let us go and milk the cow," said the dwarf.
Oh, that _was_ exciting! Was it a truly cow? did it turn into things
all day, and be a cow at night, or the other way? what did it turn
into? Sometimes they were fawns and sometimes they were ducks, and
sometimes--what would he like to be if he didn't have to be a dwarf?
could he be things if he wanted to? was he only just playing dwarf, and
by and by he would turn into a Beautiful Prince all gold and silver,
wiz diamond clothes and a palace all made of candy? would he?
"And then you could marry me, you know!" said the child. "I shall be
grown up by that time--"
"Yes, I think you will!" said the dwarf.
"And we will be married, and I will wear a dress like the sun, and we
will go in a gold coach, wiz six black horses--or do you say white,
Mark?""I say white."
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