Chapter 50

"No," the Stranger Child said; "not exactly that; for most of them are shining stars themselves, and others of them do not wear any coats on which they could stick things of the sort. I must tell you that my mother's ministers are all powerful spirits, either hovering in the sky, or dwelling in the waters, doing, and carrying out everywhere what my mother orders them to do. Once, a long while ago, there came amongst us a stranger, who called himself Pepasilio, who said he was very learned, and could do more, and accomplish greater things, than all the others of us. My mother took him in amongst the ranks of her other ministers; but his natural spite and wickedness very soon developed themselves and came to light, Not only did he strive to undo all that the other ministers did, but he set himself specially to spoil all the happy enjoyments of children. He had pretended to the queen that he, of all others, was the very spirit who could make children glad, and happy, and clever; but instead of that, he hung himself with a weight of lead on to the tails of the pheasants, so that they could not fly aloft any more; and when the children climbed up the rose-trees, he would drag them down by the legs, so that they knocked their noses on the ground and made them bleed; and any that were jumping and dancing he dashed down to the ground, to go crawling wretchedly about there with downcast heads. Those who were singing he crammed all sorts of nasty stuff into the mouths of, so that they had to stop; for singing he could not abide. As for the poor tame beasts, he always wanted to eat them, instead of playing with them, for he said that was what they were meant for. The worst was, that with the help of his followers, he had a way of smearing all the beautiful, sparkling precious stones of the palace, the many-tinted glowing flowers, the roses and lilies, and even the shining rainbows, with a horrible black juice, so that all the glory and the beauty of them was gone, and everything became sorrowful and dead. And when he had accomplished this, he would out with a loud ringing laugh, and say that everything was now just as he wished it to be. But when, at last, he declared that he did not consider my mother to be queen at all, and that the rule really belonged to him alone,--and when he went hovering up in the shape of an enormous fly, with flashing eyes, and a great trunk, or snout, sticking out, all about my mother's throne, buzzing and humming in an abominable manner,--then she, and all the rest of her court, saw that this malignant minister, who had come amongst us under the fine name of Pepasilio, was none other than Pepser, the morose and gloomy King of the Gnomes. But he had foolishly overestimated his power, as well as the bravery of his followers. The ministers of the Air department surrounded the queen, and fanned perfumed breezes towards her, whilst the ministers of the Fire department rushed up and down in billows of flame, and the singers (whose bills had been cleaned out) chanted the most full-voiced choruses, so that the queen neither saw nor heard the ugly Pepser, neither could she be aware of his evil-smelling breath. Moreover, at that moment, the pheasant prince seized him with his glittering beak, and gripped him so strenuously that he screamed with agony and rage; and then the pheasant prince let him down to the earth from a height of three thousand ells, so that he could not stir hand or foot till his aunt, and crony, the great blue toad, took him on her back, and so carried him home. Five hundred fine sprightly children armed themselves with fly-flappers, with which they banged Pepser's horrible followers to death, when they were still swarming about intending to destroy all the beautiful flowers. Now, as soon as Pepser was gone, all the black juice which he had covered everything over with, flowed away of itself, and everything was restored, and was soon beaming and shining, and blooming as gloriously as ever. You may imagine that this horrid Pepser has no more power in my mother's kingdom. But he knows that I often venture out, and he follows me everywhere, in shapes of every kind, so that, wretched child that I am, I often do not know where to hide myself in my flight; and that is why I often get away from you so quickly that you cannot see what becomes of me. Therefore things must go on just as they are; and I can assure you that if I were to try to take you with me to my home, Pepser would be sure to lie in wait for us, and kill us."

Christlieb wept bitterly over the danger to which the Stranger Child must always be exposed. But Felix said, "If that horrible Pepser is nothing but a great fly, I'll soon be at him with father's big fly-flapper; and if once I give him a good crack on the nose with it, Aunty Toad will have a job to get him home, I can tell her."

HOW THE TUTOR ARRIVED, AND HOW THE CHILDREN WERE AFRAID OF HIM.

Felix and Christlieb ran home as fast as they could, crying, as they went, "Ah! the Stranger Child is a beautiful prince!"--"Ah! the Stranger Child is a beautiful princess!" They wanted, in their delight, to tell this to their parents; but they stood at the door like marble statues when they found the baron meeting them there with a stranger at his side, an extraordinary-looking personage, who muttered to himself, half intelligibly, "Ah, a nice pair of gawkies those are, it seems to me!"

The baron took him by the hand, saying, "This gentleman is the tutor whom your gracious uncle has sent. So say, 'How-do-you do, sir?' to him properly."

But the children looked askance at the man, and could move neither hand nor foot. This was because they had never seen such an extraordinary-looking creature. He was scarcely more than half a head taller than Felix; but he was stumpy and thick-set, and his little weasened legs formed an astonishing contrast with his body, which was stout and powerful. His shapeless head was almost to be called four-square, and his face was almost too ugly altogether. For not only was his nose much too long and sharp-pointed to suit with his fat, brownish cheeks, and his wide mouth, but his little prominent eyes glittered so alarmingly that one hardly liked to look at him. Moreover, he had a black periwig crammed on to his four-cornered head; he was clad in black from top to toe, and his name was "Tutor Ink."

Now, as the children stood staring like stone images, their mother got angry, and cried, "Good gracious, children, what are you thinking of? This gentleman will take you for a pair of raw country gabies! Come, come; give him your hands!"

The children, taking heart of grace, did as their mother bade them. But as soon as the tutor took hold of their hands, they jumped back with a loud cry of "Oh! oh! It hurts!" The tutor laughed aloud, and showed a needle which he had hidden in his hand, to prick the children with. Christlieb was weeping; but Felix growled, in an aside, "Just you try that again, little Big-belly!"

"Why did you do that, dear Mr. Tutor Ink?" the baron asked, rather annoyed.

The tutor answered, "Well, it is my way; I can't alter it!" With which he stuck his hands in his sides, and went on laughing, till at length his laughter sounded as ugly as the noise of a broken rattle.

"You seem to be a person fond of your little jokes, Master Tutor Ink!" the baron said. But he, and his wife, and most particularly the children, were beginning to feel very eery and uncomfortable. "Well, well," said Tutor Ink, "what sort of a state are these little crabs here in? Pretty well grounded in the sciences? We'll see directly." With which he began to ask questions of Felix and Christlieb, of the sort that their uncle and aunt had asked of their cousins. But, as they both declared that, as yet, they did not know any of the sciences, by heart, Tutor Ink beat his hands over his head till everything rang again, and cried, like a man possessed, "A pretty story indeed! No sciences! Then we've got our work cut out for us. However, we shall soon make a job of it."

Felix and Christlieb could both write fairly well, and, from many old books which their father put in their hands, and which they were fond of reading, they had learned a good many pretty stories, and could repeat them. But Tutor Ink despised all this, and said it was stupid nonsense.

Alas! there was no more running about in the woods to be so much as thought of. Instead of that, the children had to sit within the four walls of the house all day long, and babble, after Tutor Ink, things which they did not in the least understand. It was really a heart-breaking business. With what longing eyes they looked at the woods! Often it was as if they heard, amidst the happy songs of the birds, and the rustling of the trees, the Stranger Child's voice calling to them and saying, "Felix! Christlieb! are you not coming any more to play with me? Oh, come! I have made you a palace, all of flowers; we will sit there, and I will give you all sorts of beautiful stones, and then we'll soar into the air, and build ourselves cloud-castles. Come! oh come!"

At this, the children were drawn to the woods with all their thoughts, and neither saw nor heard their tutor any longer. But he would get very angry, thump on the table with both his fists, and hum, and growl, and snarl, "Pim--sim--prr--srr knurr kirr--what's all this? Wait a little! "Felix, however, did not endure this very long; he jumped up, and cried, "Don't bother me with your stupid nonsense, Mr. Ink; I must be off to the woods! Go and get hold of Cousin Pumpbreeks; that's the sort of stuff for _him_. Come along, Christlieb! The Stranger Child is waiting for us;" with which they started off. But Tutor Ink sprang after them with remarkable agility, and seized hold of them just outside the door. Felix fought like a man, and Tutor Ink was on the point of getting the worst of it, as the faithful Sultan came to Felix's help. Sultan--generally a good, kindly-behaved dog took a strong dislike to Tutor Ink the moment he set eyes on him. Whenever the tutor came near him, he growled, and swept about him so forcibly with his tail that he nearly knocked the tutor down, managing deftly to hit him great thumps on his little weazened legs. So Sultan came dashing up, when Felix was holding the tutor by the shoulders, and hung on to his coat-tails. Master Ink raised a doleful yell, which brought up the baron to the rescue. The tutor let go his hold of Felix, and Sultan let go his hold on the tutor's coat-tails.

"He said we weren't to go to the woods any more," cried Christlieb, weeping and lamenting. And although the baron gave Felix a good scolding, he was very sorry that the children might not go wandering, as they used, amongst the trees and bushes, and told the tutor that he wished him to go with them into the woods for a certain time every day.

The tutor did not like the idea at all. He said, "Ah, Herr Baron, if you had but a sensible piece of garden, with nicely-clipped box, and railed-in enclosures, one might go and take the children for a little walk there of forenoons! But what in all the world is the good of going into a wild forest?"

The children did not like it either, saying, "What business has Tutor Ink in our darling wood?"

HOW TUTOR INK TOOK THE CHILDREN FOR A WALK IN THE WOODS, AND WHAT HAPPENED ON THE OCCASION.

"Well, Master Ink, isn't it delightful in our wood here?" Felix said, as they were making their way through the rustling thickets. Tutor Ink made a face, and answered, "Stupid nonsense! There's no road. All that one does is to tear one's stockings. And one can't say or hear a word of sense, for the abominable screaming noise the birds are making."

"Ha, ha! master," said Felix, "I see you don't know anything about singing! And I daresay you don't hear when the morning wind is talking with the bushes, and the old forest brook is telling all those delightful tales." "And you don't even love the flowers," Christlieb chimed in; "do you, master?"

At this the tutor's face became of even a deeper cherry-brown than it was usually; and he beat with his hands about him, crying, "What stupid, ridiculous nonsense you are talking! Who has put such trash in your heads? Who ever heard that woods and streams had got the length of engaging in rational conversation? Neither is there anything in the chirping of birds. I like flowers well enough when they are nicely arranged in a room in glasses. They smell then; and one doesn't require a scent-bottle. But there are no proper flowers in woods."

"But don't you see those dear little lilies of the valley, peeping up at you with such bright, loving eyes?" Christlieb said.

"What? what?" the tutor screamed. "Flowers--eyes? Ha, ha! Nice 'eyes' indeed! The useless things haven't even got what you would call a smell!" With which Master Ink bent down and plucked up a handful of them, roots and all, and chucked them away into the thickets. To the children it seemed, almost, as if they heard a cry of pain pass through the wood. Christlieb could not help bitter tears, and Felix gnashed his teeth in anger. Just then, a little siskin went fluttering close past the tutor's nose, alighted on a branch, and began a joyous song. "That is a mockingbird, I think!" said the tutor; and, taking up a stone, he threw it at the poor bird, which it struck, and silenced into death; it fell from the green branch to the ground.

Felix could restrain himself no longer. "You horrible Tutor Ink," he cried, "what had the bird done to you that you should strike it dead? Ah, where are you, you beautiful Stranger Child? Oh come! only come! Let us fly far, far away. I cannot stay beside this horrible creature any longer. I want to go to your home with you." Christlieb chimed in, sobbing and weeping bitterly, crying, "Oh, thou darling child, come to us, come to us! Rescue us, rescue us! Tutor Ink is killing us, as he is killing the flowers and the birds."

"What do you mean by the Stranger Child?" Tutor Ink asked. But at that instant there came a louder whispering and rustling amongst the bushes, mingled with melancholy, heart-breaking tones, as if of muffled bells tolling in the far distance. In a shining cloud, which came sailing over above them, they saw the beautiful face of the Stranger Child, and presently it came wholly into view, wringing its little hands, whilst tears, like glittering pearls streamed down its rosy cheeks. "Ah, darling playmates," cried the Stranger Child, in tones of sorrow, "I cannot come to you any more. You will never see me again. Farewell, farewell! The gnome Pepser has you in his power. Oh, you poor children, good-bye, good-bye!" and the Stranger Child soared up far into the sky. But, at the children's backs, there began a horrid, fearsome sort of buzzing and humming, and snarling and growling; and lo! Tutor Ink had taken the shape of an enormous frightful-looking fly. And the horrible part of the thing was, that he had a man's face at the same time, and even some of his clothes on still. He began to fly upwards, slowly and with difficulty, evidently with the intention of following the Stranger Child. Felix and Christlieb, overpowered with terror, ran away out of the wood as quickly as they could, and did not so much as dare to look up to the sky till they had got some distance off. When they did so, they could just perceive a shining speck in the sky, glittering amongst the clouds like a star, and apparently coming nearer, and downwards. "That's the Stranger Child," Christlieb cried. The star grew bigger and bigger, and as it did, they could hear a braying of trumpets; and presently they saw that the star was a splendid bird, with wondrous shining plumage, coming soaring down to the wood, flapping its mighty wings, and singing loud and clear. "Ha!" cried Felix, "this is the pheasant prince. He will bite Master Tutor Ink to death. The Stranger Child is saved and so are we! Come, Christlieb; let us get home as fast as we can, and tell father all about it."

HOW THE BARON TURNED TUTOR INK OUT OF DOORS.

The baron and his spouse were both sitting before the door of their simple dwelling, looking at the evening-red, which was beginning to flame up from behind the blue mountains in golden streamers. They had their supper laid out on a little table: it consisted of a noble jug of splendid milk, and a plate of bread-and-butter.

"I don't know," the baron began, "where Tutor Ink can be staying out so long with the children. At first there was no getting him to go out at all to the wood, and now there's no getting him back from it. He's really a very extraordinary fellow, this Tutor Ink, taking him all in all. I sometimes almost wish he had never entered our doors. To begin with, his pricking the children with that needle was a thing that I cannot say I liked; and I don't think his knowledge of the sciences amounts to very much, either. He plappers out a lot of stuff that nobody run make head or tail of, and can tell you what kind of spatterdashes the Grand Mogul puts on; but when he goes outside, he can't tell a lime-tree from a chestnut; and his behaviour has always struck me as being most remarkable."

"I feel just as you do, dearest husband," said Frau von Brakel; "and, glad as I was that your great cousin should interest himself about the children, I feel quite sure, now, that he might have done it in other and better ways than by saddling us with this Tutor Ink. As regards his knowledge of the sciences, I don't pretend to give an opinion; but I know that the little black creature, with his little weeny legs, is more and more disagreeable to me every day. He has such a nasty way of gobbling things. He can't see a drop of beer at the bottom of a glass, or the fag-end of a jug of milk, but he must gulp them down his throat; and if he finds the sugar-box open, he's at it in a moment, snuffing at the sugar, and dipping his fingers in it, till one has to clap to the lid in his face; and then away he darts, humming and buzzing in a way that's most disgusting and abominable."

The baron was going to carry this conversation further, when Felix and Christlieb came running home through amongst the birches.

"Hurrah! hurrah!" Felix kept shouting, "the pheasant prince has bitten Master Tutor Ink to death!"

"Oh, mamma dear," cried Christlieb, "Master Tutor Ink is not a Tutor Ink at all! What he really is, is Pepser, king of the Gnomes; a great, monstrous fly, but a fly with a wig on, and shoes and stockings!"

The parents gazed at the children in utter amazement, as they went on excitedly telling them all about the Stranger Child, whose mother was a great fairy queen; and of the Gnome King Pepser, and his combat with the pheasant prince.

"Who on earth has been cramming all this nonsense into your heads?" the baron asked over and over again. "Have you been dreaming? or what in the name of goodness has happened to you?" However, the children declared, and stuck to it, that everything had happened just as they told it, and that the horrible Pepser, who had given himself out as being Master Ink, the tutor, must be lying killed in the wood.

Frau von Brakel struck her hands over her head and cried, in much sorrow, "Oh, children, children, I don't know what on earth is to become of you, when fearful things of this sort come into your heads, and you won't let yourselves be persuaded to the contrary!"

But the baron grew very grave and thoughtful. "Felix," he said, "you are really a very sensible boy now; and I must admit that Tutor Ink has always, from the very first, struck me as being a very strange, mysterious creature. Indeed, it often seemed to me that there was something very queer about him, which I could by no means get to the bottom of; he is not like the common run of tutors at all. Your mother and I are by no means satisfied with him, particularly your mother. He has such a terribly liquorish tooth of his own, there's no keeping him away from sweet things! And then he hums and buzzes in such a distressing way! Altogether, I can assure you he wouldn't have been here much longer. No! But now, my dear boy, just bethink yourself calmly; even if there were, really, any such nasty things as gnomes existing in the world, could (I ask you now to think it over calmly and rationally), _could_, I say, a tutor really be a fly?"

Felix looked his father steadily in the face with his clear blue eyes, as he repeated this question. "Well," said Felix, "I never thought very much about that; in fact, I should not have believed it myself, if the Stranger Child had not said so, and if I had not seen, with my own eyes, that he is a horrible, nasty fly, and only pretends to be Tutor Ink. And then," continued Felix, while the baron shook his head in silence, like one who does not know quite what to say, or think, "see what mother says about his fondness for sweet things. Isn't that just like a fly? Flies are always grabbing at sweet things. And then, his hummings and buzzings!"

"Silence!" cried the baron. "Whatever Tutor Ink may really be, one thing is certain; that the pheasant prince has not bitten him to death, for here he comes out of the wood!"

At this the children uttered loud screams, and fled into the house.

For, in truth, Tutor Ink was approaching out of the wood, up the path among the birches. But he was all wild-looking and bewildered, with sparkling eyes, and his wig all touzled. He was buzzing and humming, and making great springs, high off the ground, first to one side, then to another, banging his head against the birches till you heard them resound. When he got to the house, he dashed at the milk-jug and popped his face into it, so that the milk ran over the sides; and he gulped it down, making a horrible noise of swallowing.

"For the love of heaven, Master Ink," cried Fran von Brakel, "what are you about?"

"Are you out of your senses?" said the baron. "Is the foul fiend after you?"

But, regardless of those interrogations, Master Ink, taking his mouth from the milk-jug, threw himself down bodily on the dish of bread-and-butter; fluttered over it with his coat-tails, and, somehow, made such play over it with his weazened legs, that he smoothed it down all over. Then, with a louder buzzing, he made for the house-door; but he couldn't manage to get into the house, but staggered hither and thither as if he was drunk, banging against the windows till they rattled and rang.

"I'll tell you what it is, my good sir!" cried the baron. "This is pretty behaviour! Look out, or you'll come to grief before you know where you are!" And he tried to seize Master Ink by the coat-tails; but Master Ink always managed to elude him, deftly. Here Felix came running out, with his father's big fly-flapper in his hand; and he gave it to the baron, crying, "Here you are, father; knock the horrible Pepser to death!"

The baron took the fly-flapper, and then they all set to work at Master Ink. Felix, Christlieb, and their mother took table-napkins, and made sweeps with them in the air, driving the tutor backwards and forwards, here and there; whilst the baron kept letting drive at him with the fly-flapper, which did not hit him, unfortunately, because he took good care never to stay a moment in the same place. And wilder and wilder grew the chase. "Summ-summ----simm-simm----trr-trr," went the tutor, storming hither and thither; "huss-huss," went the table-napkins, pursuing the foe; "klip-klap" fell the baron's strokes with the flapper, thick as hail. At last the baron managed to hit the tutor's coat-tails; he fell down with a groan. But just as the baron was going to get a second stroke at him, he bounced up into the air, with renewed and redoubled strength, stormed, humming and buzzing, away through the birches, and was seen no more.

"A good job," said the baron, "that we're well rid of horrible Tutor Ink: never shall he cross my threshold again."