Part 8

“Ah, my son, my son! I wouldn’t have thought it of you,” said the old man, still gently.

I knelt beside him, and found around his neck a noose of the slenderest thread, extremely tough; and the end of this thread the boy was holding in his hand. I took it from him and looked at him inquiringly.

“Yes,” said the boy, “it was spun by Goolk the Spider, and there is no will can stand against it, not even my father’s. It’s the thing that made him first able to pluck out the eyebrows of the people. I stole it as we left the shop to-night. You won’t do him any harm, will you?”

I stood up, keeping the end of the thread in my hand. A patter of running feet sounded from the next room, and the eight tailors crowded in at the doorway. They rushed to their master, and wailed and wrung their hands. One of them drew a pair of shears, and began to snip away at the thread, but it was plain that no ordinary blade would cut it, and the tailor gave it up, and the other seven wailed louder than before.

“Lift up this knave,” I said, “and follow me.”

The eight tailors obeyed instantly, and our party started back to the court of the dry fountain. I walked beside the body of Babadag, keeping close hold of the thread. When we reached the court, the three ballad singers were sitting calmly on the rim of the basin, singing softly to themselves. My daughter, ever incorrigible, greeted them with an amused laugh, and they crowded around her, each trying to elbow the others out of the way. At my command, the eight tailors laid Babadag down on his back in the dry basin. I then gave the end of the thread into the hand of my daughter, and left them.

I ran down the cypress alley to the deserted audience chamber. I looked through the cobweb at Urban, and by the dim light of the high window saw him sitting there motionless as stone, in the same attitude as before.

“I am here!” I cried, but he neither moved nor spoke. I applied the Shears, and in a moment the cobweb was hanging in shreds, and I was standing beside my friend. I tried to pull him up, but I could not budge him. I lifted the golden chain from around his neck, and dropped it to the floor. Immediately he raised his head, stretched his arms, looked up at me as if awaking from a dream, and sprang to his feet.

“Prince!” he cried, and threw his arms about me in a transport of joy.

I calmed him, and when he had recovered himself he said, “What of Babadag?”

“He is in the court at this moment,” said I, “bound fast.”

“Good news indeed!” he cried. “Let us go!”

_The Governor, Being Released, Beholds the Prince’s Daughter_

We sped back to the court, and when Urban beheld my daughter he scattered the blind men right and left and clasped her hand in his. I took from her the end of the thread and knelt in the basin beside the huge body of Babadag, and gazed down into his eyes, glittering up at me in the moonlight through their tangle of hair. I drew the Shears.

“No, no!” cried the boy. “You must not! Give me the Shears! I must do it, for you do not love him, and I do! Only the hand of love! Give me the Shears!”

“No time for talking!” I cried. “This is no child’s play. Work for a man! And I trust no one but myself! Now for the shearing of the Eyebrow!”

The boy shrieked, as if in despair, and with a mighty snap of the Shears I cut in among the hairs of Babadag’s left eyebrow.

_The Shearing of the Eyebrow_

A spout of yellow smoke shot upward from his eyebrow, and whirled and spread outward in a cloud, thick, sickening, blinding, pierced with wriggling pencils of light, as if tiny snakes had been set riotously free. It covered us both, so that he was suddenly hidden from my sight. I gasped and choked. My eyes smarted with pain. I snapped blindly away at him through the smoke with my Shears, resolved not to be foiled. There was a sharp crack, as of the snapping of a whip; the Shears had cut,--alas, alas!--not the Eyebrow, but the thread around Babadag’s neck! Instantly the Shears were wrenched from my hand, I did not know how; and I felt them ripping through my smock, and I knew that some injury had been done to my doublet. A terrible voice bellowed, “Hither, accursed dogs, and bind me this peddler!” And the next moment I was lying on my back, with the thread fastened securely about my neck; and my strength was suddenly gone, and the smoke began to clear away.

I saw the old man put his arm tenderly about his son, and heard him say, “It’s all right now, my boy. I am not angry. You have put your father in great danger, but not from malice; I know it well. Don’t be grieved; we’ll laugh about it together, hereafter. All’s well again. Come, Figli, my son. Rascals, follow me!”

He stalked away with his son down the cypress alley, and the eight tailors lifted me and bore me after, followed by my daughter and my friend. I looked for the three blind ballad singers, but they were gone. I was in terrible danger, and I bitterly regretted my haste in refusing the Shears to the boy.

_The Prince before the Seat of Judgment_

In the circular audience chamber they laid me down upon the floor. Babadag, grotesque and somber in the darkness, seated himself in the marble armchair on the daïs; and at the same time I heard, or fancied I heard, the voices of the ballad singers, afar off somewhere in the palace, singing away at one of their songs.

“Pluck out the hairs!” said Babadag.

“No, no!” said Figli, lying on the step of the daïs at his father’s feet.

“Quick, scoundrels!” said Babadag; and the eight tailors, kneeling around me, plucked out with tiny instruments all the hairs of my eyebrows, by the roots. Then, at a sign from their master, they stood me on my feet and removed the spider’s thread from around my neck. My strength returned, and I found myself able to stand alone.

“Gone is your power, maker of fables!” said Babadag. “The doublet is worthless. See!” And he held up what appeared to be the thread of a button. My smock was in strips, and the doublet was exposed to view. One button was missing. What had become of it? Babadag exhibited only the thread.

“Dog of a peddler,” said he, “it is your due that I give you to Goolk the Spider for his web.”

“Spare him! Spare him!” said Figli, in a kind of moan, rocking himself back and forth on the step of the daïs.

“But Babadag is merciful,” went on the old man, “and loves a tale; and never have I heard so amusing a tissue of lies as that tale of Bald-er-Dash the Peddler. For that, and for the pleasure I shall have in repeating that tale hereafter, I spare you. You are harmless. Go! and as you have chosen to darken your skin with juices, let it be darker still. Go! and be you henceforth as black as night. I will lead you to the palace gate, and speed you, with your daughter and your friend, on your journey away from Oogh. Return no more, peddler, for the web awaits you, and Goolk the Spider longs for a brother.”

He stepped down from his seat, and we others followed him in silence. I was conscious of no will to resist him further. We came to the court of the dry fountain, and there my daughter looked into my face in the moonlight. She screamed.

We followed mournfully through the dark rooms, and came out on the steps before the palace; and there we saw a sight both terrible and beautiful.

_The Doom of the City of Oogh_

The city was in flames. From every roof, as far as we could see, rose sheets of fire, and sparks showered upward into a pall of black smoke; and as we watched, new tongues of flame blazed up from quarters dark before. The city was doomed.

“Ah!” said Babadag with a groan. “My city, my city!”

“What have I done? What have I done?” cried Figli, wringing his hands in anguish.

“You, my son? What have you to do with this?” said his father, never taking his eyes from the burning city.

“It’s my work!” cried the boy. “But I never dreamed of this! I set fire to the shop, our shop, before I left,--to burn up all the black secrets in my father’s house, and to kill Goolk the Spider, to kill him, kill him, so that he would never get the Blind Bowler, nor any one else! So that all the old riches and wickedness might be burned up forever! And now, and now, I haven’t destroyed the Eyebrow, and I’ve burned up the city! Oh, what shall I do? What shall I do?”

“My son, my son,” said Babadag, quietly, never taking his eyes from the burning city.

I recalled now the spark of fire I had seen through the window as we had left the tailor’s shop that night.

The flames of the furnace below us shot higher and higher, and spread wider and wider in every direction.

“The Book of the Shavian Magic,” said Babadag, as if to himself. “That must be saved.”

He ran down the steps and started across the park.

“Father! father! where are you going?” cried Figli, but his father paid no attention. The boy sped after him, and we others followed.

_The Tailor’s Son Follows Him into the Burning City_

Out at the park gate and down the hill ran Babadag, and straight into the blazing ruin which was once his city. Nothing could stop him. Flames roared on both sides of him; sparks showered around him; walls toppled behind him; smoke swallowed him; but he kept on. We paused in terror; only his little boy continued to follow him, calling to him to come back.

A wall of flame shot out behind the running boy, and a house fell crashing behind him into the street; and father and boy were no longer to be seen.

I turned away, and leaving the eight tailors wailing, I made my way with my daughter and my friend back to the palace; and there, on the palace steps, we sat all night long, watching the great fire burn itself out.

The sun rose on a city of smoking ruins; and with its first rays there came plodding in through the park gate a blind man, who called aloud as he reached the steps. It was the Blind Bowler.

“I am here,” said I, “Figli’s friend; and my daughter too, and the governor whom once you tried to help. What news?”

“Ten strikes still lacking!” said the Blind Bowler. “But it makes no difference now. Figli has saved me, and all the rest of us too. Come with me.”

He led us out into the street and down into the city, where the homeless people were standing as if bewildered. We came into the street where once had been the shop of Babadag the Tailor. It was there no longer; but by some chance there yet remained the wall which held the doorway, and above it the yardstick and the shears; and across the sill lay Figli, on his face.

_The Boy Is Found on the Sill of His Ruined Home, Alive_

My daughter ran to him and put her arm about him. He was alive, and he shook his head and moaned, “I want my father. I want my father.”

“Yes,” said she, “your father. Is he--?”

“In there,” he whispered.

“Ah! He is--”

“Under the wall. I saw it fall on him. He is in there.”

“Oh, my poor boy!”

“I killed him. And all I wanted was to make him good.”

She put her arm under him and raised him, and he stood up.

“Come with me, dear boy,” said she.

“I can’t go away. I can’t leave him in there. Can’t you help me to see him?”

“Not now, but later, perhaps. Come with me now, and we will talk of him together.”

“He loved me, too. He did, didn’t he? And I killed him.”

“Yes, he did, he did. But you mustn’t say that you--”

“It wasn’t because I meant to harm him, was it? I wouldn’t have harmed him, would I?”

“No, no. It was just because you loved him, that was all.”

“Yes, that was it. That was all it was.”

He suffered her to lead him away, and he said nothing more, but repeated to himself, once or twice, “That was all it was.”

On my part, I spoke at length to the Blind Bowler, and gave him many directions; and he, having received at my hands a purse of gold, for use as I had instructed him, went his way; and we others then walked slowly back to the palace, where we rested on the steps, waiting, and Figli fell asleep with his head on my daughter’s shoulder.

When the sun was high in the east, people began to come in at the park gate, and the Blind Bowler, his first duty done, joined us on the palace steps. More people came, and the park began to be filled with them; they came before long in a steady stream, and at length the park was crowded with a great multitude, from the steps to the gate.

At a signal from myself, my party on the steps arose, and I addressed the people of Oogh. I told them who I was, and how my skin had come to be black; I told them that I was going away, and that their governor was resolved to go with me; that I meant to leave a governor who would help them rebuild their city, and lead them in the ways of goodness and mercy; that the person whom I had selected for that office was the boy known as Figli Babadag, whose soundness of heart was worth to them more than the wisdom of years; and that such wisdom as was necessary would be supplied by him who was called the Blind Bowler, a man who had known how to be cheerful under affliction. And I asked them to say whether they would have the boy Figli for their governor, and the Blind Bowler for his aide.

A shout of approval went up from the multitude.

“And will you,” said I, turning to Figli, “lead these people in the ways of goodness and mercy, and help them to forget?”

“If you think I can,” said Figli, standing up very straight, “I will try.”

“And will you,” said I to the Blind Bowler, “keep faithfully at his right hand, and never fail him?”

“That I will!” said the Blind Bowler. “Keep everlastingly at it, that’s the motto!”

“The great King, my father,” said I, turning again to the people, “will build your city ten times fairer than it was. I have given directions for your help already, and food and shelter will soon be at hand. Farewell! I leave you in the care of a blind man and a child! A sound heart and a cheerful mind, my friends, are better than an army. Farewell!”

The multitude shouted back farewell, and my friend Urban and myself each kissed Figli on the cheek; but my daughter kissed him on both cheeks and hugged him to her heart; and then we went down the steps, leaving the pale and beautiful boy and the blind man alone, and passed out across the park through a lane opened in the crowd, down into the city toward the city gate.

_The Eight Tailors Stand Before Them in a Row_

As we came to the last street corner before reaching the city wall, my daughter pulled forth a handful of figs from her pocket and divided them laughingly with Urban and myself; and at that moment a party of eight men filed solemnly from around the corner, and came to a stop before us in a row. It was the eight tailors. They bowed gravely, and the first one of them said:

“Excellency, we implore you to take pity upon us. Our master is gone, our occupation is gone, we are friendless and alone; we can live no longer in the city of Oogh.”

“What do you wish me to do?” said I.

“We beseech you to take us with you, to be your servants, your slaves, anything. We can sew, we can knit, we can--”

“But I am going into exile,” said I. “I am going to hide my hideous face from the eyes of the world.”

“Listen, most merciful one! It is known to us that the missing button needs only to be sewn on the doublet by a tailor, with the proper thread, in order that your skin may be white again. Nine tailors are allowed for the trial, and here are eight!”

“But I have neither the button nor the thread.”

“No matter! We will search until we find them, or else turn black ourselves in the trial. Have pity upon us, Prince!”

“Oh, father,” said my daughter, “do let the poor things come along with us.”

“Very well,” said I, whereupon we walked on, and the eight tailors gave a faint cheer and fell into line behind us.

_They Meet the Three Blind Ballad Singers for the Last Time_

As we passed through the city gate, a loud singing struck up just outside the wall, and we beheld the three blind ballad singers, in the midst of a dozen idlers, prancing up and down in their ridiculous dance. They were shouting out one of their ballads, as follows:

“The peddler came, the peddler went, the peddler lost his pack, He came in honest walnut brown, he went away in black, And ‘Oh!’ said the peddler, ‘I cannot come again, For out of buttons ten, oh! only nine remain, Only nine remain,’--”

My daughter laughed aloud, and at the sound of her voice one of the ballad singers cried out, “Ho! master blackface! Ballads or buttons, what will you buy?”

The idlers laughed, and the other two vagabonds sang out:

“Ballads or buttons! Buy, master blackface! Ballads or buttons!”

“What will you give for a button?” shouted the first, and he held up in my view a large ivory button, the identical one, beyond a doubt, which was missing from the doublet.

“A fig for a button!” I said, and held out one of the figs in my hand.

“A button for a fig! A bargain!” cried the first ballad singer, and taking the fig from me placed the button in my hand.

The idlers laughed at this nonsense, and we turned to go.

“Farewell, farewell!” cried the first ballad singer. “What do we say to the breaker of hearts who forgets her promise to marry?” The other two laughed, and began to sing.

We moved on down the road, followed by the tailors marching by fours, and as we departed we heard behind us the voices of the blind ballad singers for the last time, shouting out a song in this wise:

“She said that she wanted to marry all three, Fiddle-de-dee! Fiddle-de-dee! And it broke her heart that it could not be, But ‘Oh!’ said she, ‘you must all agree On one who shall be the fortunate he, For only one can I marry!’ But oh! she would not wait to see, And oh! she would not tarry, For all that she said to the artless three Was nothing but fiddle-de-dee, Ah me! Was nothing but fiddle-de-dee!”

THE FOURTH NIGHT

THE RAGPICKER AND THE PRINCESS

_The Queen said, “Domino!” very sweetly, and smiled at the Second Lady in Waiting, who was much chagrined._

_“I don’t see how I could have been so stupid,” said the Second Lady in Waiting._

_“Indeed, my dear,” said the Queen, kindly, “I don’t think you were nearly so stupid as usual.”_

_At this moment the Princess Dorobel, with Prince Bilbo and their son Bojohn, and the latter’s friend Bodkin, came in from the throne room, and the Princess Dorobel, standing behind the Queen’s chair, said:_

_“Mother, we are going to hear a story, and Bojohn insists that you--”_

_“Yes, grandmother!” said Bojohn. “We are going to ask Solario for another story, and you must come along too.”_

_“Dear me,” said the Queen. “I must put away the dominoes first.”_

_She stacked them neatly in the box, one by one, and when this was done she rose, and Bojohn took her arm and led her through the throne room where the King was engaged at chess with the Lord Chamberlain._

_“My dear,” said the Queen to the King, “you had better come with us. We are going to--”_

_“It makes no difference to me,” said the King. “You can have the bishop if you want him. But I’ve got your queen! How do you like that? It’s your move! Go on, why don’t you move?”_

_“It’s no use, grandmother,” said Bojohn. “Come along.”_

_They left the King at his game, and proceeded to the room of Solario the Tailor in the tower. They were admitted by Solario himself._

_In the center of the room stood Mortimer the Executioner. He was wearing an unfinished garment without any sleeves, fastened together with pins, and basted with white thread along the seams. He looked extremely foolish._

_“Oh!” said Solario, covered with confusion. “Pray come in, come in! Her majesty herself! This is indeed an honor! I will find more chairs in the next room. I am overpowered by this honor. Pray be seated, your majesty. Mortimer, the fitting is postponed. Pray be seated, your majesty. I do not know when I have received the honor of such a visit. Pray be seated. Mortimer, bring in some chairs. I beg your majesty to take the other chair; it is far more comfortable. Mortimer, divest yourself; divest yourself.”_

_Mortimer, red with embarrassment, took off the unfinished garment and put on his old one. Solario ran from chair to chair, assisting each of the party to a seat._

_“We have come for a story,” said Prince Bilbo, “and I hope that you will be so good as to--”_

_“We want to hear about Montesango’s Cave!” cried Bojohn._

_“Or the Blind Giant!” said Bodkin._

_“I beg your pardon,” said Solario, “perhaps her majesty would deign to--”_

_“Ask him for Montesango’s Cave, grandmother!” cried Bojohn._

_“Dear me,” said the Queen, “I hardly know what to-- It’s a very pleasant room you have here, Solario; do you ever play dominoes here? Dear me!”_

_“I’ll tell you what I should like,” said the Princess Dorobel. “I should like to hear how the goldsmith’s son won the Princess. Bojohn has been telling us about Alb and the Princess Hyla, and I understand there is a story, a love story--you know I dearly like love stories.”_

_“It isn’t precisely a love story,” said Solario, “but if her majesty will permit me, I will--”_

_“Dear me, yes,” said the Queen. “A very comfortable room it is, to be sure.”_

_Solario, after receiving the Queen’s permission to be seated, sat himself cross-legged on his table, and all of the others, Mortimer the Executioner, Bodkin, Prince Bilbo, Bojohn, the Princess Dorobel, and the Queen, drew up their chairs before him in a row._

_“I will relate to you, seeing that you wish it,” said Solario, “the story told me by Alb, the goldsmith’s son, regarding the winning of the Princess Hyla. Shall I proceed?”_

_“I wish I had brought my knitting,” said the Queen, “but never mind.”_

_Solario picked up his shears, and gazing at them thoughtfully for a moment, cleared his throat._

_“This, then,” said he, “is the story told me by Alb, regarding_

“THE RAGPICKER AND THE PRINCESS.”

When I was sixteen years old (said Alb the Fortunate) and my dear Princess Hyla fourteen, the King, her father, sojourned for a time at his castle of Ventamere, beside the sea; and you may be sure that the Princess was with him there, for he could never bear to be parted from her for a single day.

My father followed in the King’s train, and I, on my part, was not to be left behind; and we lodged together, my father and myself, in the town hard by the castle, where I saw the Princess every day, and daily grew in favor with her father.

The windows of the King’s castle looked out across the Great Sea, and beneath the windows of the Princess’s room the tide washed up and down against the wall.

One evening, as it was growing dusk, and the moon was beginning to tinge a wave here and there with silver, the Princess was leaning out from her window and looking across the sea-- But what I am now to tell you I did not know at the time, as you will understand, but only later.

Night fell, and still the Princess leaned upon her hand and gazed out across the sea. I do not know whether she was thinking of me, but--However. In the town of Ventamere near by, where the shore curved inward in a bay, lights began to glimmer, but the castle was dark, for the King, intending to commence at daybreak his journey back to his capital, was already a-bed.

_The Princess Hears a Voice from the Waves Beneath Her Window_

The Princess, beginning to be drowsy, reached out her hand to close the casement of her window; and as she did so she heard a voice, a melancholy voice, not loud, as of a young man singing to himself, directly beneath her window. She started in astonishment and looked down, but she could see no one. The moonlight glittered on the sea to the very base of her wall; there was no foothold anywhere for a human foot; but the voice rose nevertheless from just below her in the restless waters, and it was singing a kind of lament, pausing once to put in a few spoken words, in this wise: