CHAPTER IX
When Prince Dolor sat up in bed, trying to remember where he was,whither he had been, and what he had seen the day before, he perceivedthat his room was empty.
Generally his nurse rather worried him by breaking his slumbers, comingin and "setting things to rights," as she called it. Now the dust laythick upon chairs and tables; there was no harsh voice heard to scoldhim for not getting up immediately, which, I am sorry to say, this boydid not always do. For he so enjoyed lying still, and thinking lazilyabout everything or nothing, that, if he had not tried hard against it,he would certainly have become like those celebrated
"Two little men Who lay in their bed till the clock struck ten."
It was striking ten now, and still no nurse was to be seen. He wasrather relieved at first, for he felt so tired; and besides, when hestretched out his arm, he found to his dismay that he had gone to bed inhis clothes.
Very uncomfortable he felt, of course; and just a little frightened.Especially when he began to call and call again, but nobody answered.Often he used to think how nice it would be to get rid of his nurse andlive in this tower all by himself--like a sort of monarch able to doeverything he liked, and leave undone all that he did not want to do;but now that this seemed really to have happened, he did not like it atall.
"Nurse,--dear nurse,--please come back!" he called out. "Come back, andI will be the best boy in all the land."
And when she did not come back, and nothing but silence answered hislamentable call, he very nearly began to cry.
"This won't do," he said at last, dashing the tears from his eyes. "It'sjust like a baby, and I'm a big boy--shall be a man some day. What hashappened, I wonder? I'll go and see."
He sprang out of bed,--not to his feet, alas! but to his poor littleweak knees, and crawled on them from room to room. All the four chamberswere deserted--not forlorn or untidy, for everything seemed to have beendone for his comfort--the breakfast and dinner things were laid, thefood spread in order. He might live "like a prince," as the proverbis, for several days. But the place was entirely forsaken--there wasevidently not a creature but himself in the solitary tower.
A great fear came upon the poor boy. Lonely as his life had been, he hadnever known what it was to be absolutely alone. A kind of despair seizedhim--no violent anger or terror, but a sort of patient desolation.
"What in the world am I to do?" thought he, and sat down in the middleof the floor, half inclined to believe that it would be better to giveup entirely, lay himself down, and die.
This feeling, however, did not last long, for he was young and strong,and, I said before, by nature a very courageous boy. There came intohis head, somehow or other, a proverb that his nurse had taught him--thepeople of Nomansland were very fond of proverbs:
"For every evil under the sun There is a remedy, or there's none; If there is one, try to find it-- If there isn't, never mind it."
"I wonder is there a remedy now, and could I find it?" cried the Prince,jumping up and looking out of the window.
No help there. He only saw the broad, bleak, sunshiny plain--that is, atfirst. But by and by, in the circle of mud that surrounded the base ofthe tower, he perceived distinctly the marks of a horse's feet, and justin the spot where the deaf-mute was accustomed to tie up his great blackcharger, while he himself ascended, there lay the remains of a bundle ofhay and a feed of corn.
"Yes, that's it. He has come and gone, taking nurse away with him. Poornurse! how glad she would be to go!"
That was Prince Dolor's first thought. His second--wasn't itnatural?--was a passionate indignation at her cruelty--at the crueltyof all the world toward him, a poor little helpless boy. Then hedetermined, forsaken as he was, to try and hold on to the last, and notto die as long as he could possibly help it.
Anyhow, it would be easier to die here than out in the world, among theterrible doings which he had just beheld--from the midst of which, itsuddenly struck him, the deaf-mute had come, contriving somehow to makethe nurse understand that the king was dead, and she need have no fearin going back to the capital, where there was a grand revolution, andeverything turned upside down. So, of course, she had gone. "I hopeshe'll enjoy it, miserable woman--if they don't cut off her head too."
And then a kind of remorse smote him for feeling so bitterly toward her,after all the years she had taken care of him--grudgingly, perhaps, andcoldly; still she had taken care of him, and that even to the last: for,as I have said, all his four rooms were as tidy as possible, and hismeals laid out, that he might have no more trouble than could be helped.
"Possibly she did not mean to be cruel. I won't judge her," said he. Andafterward he was very glad that he had so determined.
For the second time he tried to dress himself, and then to do everythinghe could for himself--even to sweeping up the hearth and putting onmore coals. "It's a funny thing for a prince to have to do," said he,laughing. "But my godmother once said princes need never mind doinganything."
And then he thought a little of his godmother. Not of summoning her, orasking her to help him,--she had evidently left him to help himself,and he was determined to try his best to do it, being a very proud andindependent boy,--but he remembered her tenderly and regret-fully, as ifeven she had been a little hard upon him--poor, forlorn boy that he was.But he seemed to have seen and learned so much within the last few daysthat he scarcely felt like a boy, but a man--until he went to bed atnight.
When I was a child, I used often to think how nice it would be to livein a little house all by my own self--a house built high up in a tree,or far away in a forest, or halfway up a hillside so deliciously aloneand independent. Not a lesson to learn--but no! I always liked learningmy lessons. Anyhow, to choose the lessons I liked best, to have as manybooks to read and dolls to play with as ever I wanted: above all, to befree and at rest, with nobody to tease or trouble or scold me, would becharming. For I was a lonely little thing, who liked quietness--as manychildren do; which other children, and sometimes grown-up people even,cannot understand. And so I can understand Prince Dolor.
After his first despair, he was not merely comfortable, but actuallyhappy in his solitude, doing everything for himself, and enjoyingeverything by himself--until bedtime. Then he did not like it at all.No more, I suppose, than other children would have liked my imaginaryhouse in a tree when they had had sufficient of their own company.
But the Prince had to bear it--and he did bear it, like a prince--forfully five days. All that time he got up in the morning and went to bedat night without having spoken to a creature, or, indeed, heard asingle sound. For even his little lark was silent; and as for histraveling-cloak, either he never thought about it, or else it had beenspirited away--for he made no use of it, nor attempted to do so.
A very strange existence it was, those five lonely days. He neverentirely forgot it. It threw him back upon himself, and into himself--ina way that all of us have to learn when we grow up, and are the betterfor it; but it is somewhat hard learning.
On the sixth day Prince Dolor had a strange composure in his look, buthe was very grave and thin and white. He had nearly come to the end ofhis provisions--and what was to happen next? Get out of the tower hecould not: the ladder the deaf-mute used was always carried away again;and if it had not been, how could the poor boy have used it? And even ifhe slung or flung himself down, and by miraculous chance came alive tothe foot of the tower, how could he run away?
Fate had been very hard to him, or so it seemed.
He made up his mind to die. Not that he wished to die; on the contrary,there was a great deal that he wished to live to do; but if he must die,he must. Dying did not seem so very dreadful; not even to lie quiet likehis uncle, whom he had entirely forgiven now, and neither be miserablenor naughty any more, and escape all those horrible things that he hadseen going on outside the palace, in that awful place which was called"the world."
"It's a great deal nicer here," said the poor little Prince, andcol
lected all his pretty things round him: his favorite pictures, whichhe thought he should like to have near him when he died; his books andtoys--no, he had ceased to care for toys now; he only liked them becausehe had done so as a child. And there he sat very calm and patient, likea king in his castle, waiting for the end.
"Still, I wish I had done something first--something worth doing, thatsomebody might remember me by," thought he. "Suppose I had grown a man,and had had work to do, and people to care for, and was so useful andbusy that they liked me, and perhaps even forgot I was lame? Then itwould have been nice to live, I think."
A tear came into the little fellow's eyes, and he listened intentlythrough the dead silence for some hopeful sound.
Was there one?--was it his little lark, whom he had almost forgotten?No, nothing half so sweet. But it really was something--something whichcame nearer and nearer, so that there was no mistaking it. It was thesound of a trumpet, one of the great silver trumpets so admired inNomansland. Not pleasant music, but very bold, grand, and inspiring.
As he listened to it the boy seemed to recall many things which hadslipped his memory for years, and to nerve himself for whatever might begoing to happen.
What had happened was this.
The poor condemned woman had not been such a wicked woman after all.Perhaps her courage was not wholly disinterested, but she had done avery heroic thing. As soon as she heard of the death and burial of theKing and of the changes that were taking place in the country, a daringidea came into her head--to set upon the throne of Nomansland itsrightful heir. Thereupon she persuaded the deaf-mute to take her awaywith him, and they galloped like the wind from city to city, spreadingeverywhere the news that Prince Dolor's death and burial had been aninvention concocted by his wicked uncle that he was alive and well, andthe noblest young prince that ever was born.
It was a bold stroke, but it succeeded. The country, weary perhaps ofthe late King's harsh rule, and yet glad to save itself from the horrorsof the last few days, and the still further horrors of no rule at all,and having no particular interest in the other young princes, jumped atthe idea of this Prince, who was the son of their late good King and thebeloved Queen Dolorez.
"Hurrah for Prince Dolor! Let Prince Dolor be our sovereign!" rang fromend to end of the kingdom. Everybody tried to remember what a dear babyhe once was--how like his mother, who had been so sweet and kind, andhis father, the finest-looking king that ever reigned. Nobody rememberedhis lameness--or, if they did, they passed it over as a matter of noconsequence. They were determined to have him reign over them, boy ashe was--perhaps just because he was a boy, since in that case the greatnobles thought they should be able to do as they liked with the country.
Accordingly, with a fickleness not confined to the people of Nomansland,no sooner was the late King laid in his grave than they pronounced himto have been a usurper; turned all his family out of the palace, andleft it empty for the reception of the new sovereign, whom they wentto fetch with great rejoicing, a select body of lords, gentlemen,and soldiers traveling night and day in solemn procession through thecountry until they reached Hopeless Tower.
There they found the Prince, sitting calmly on the floor--deadlypale, indeed, for he expected a quite different end from this, and wasresolved, if he had to die, to die courageously, like a Prince and aKing.
But when they hailed him as Prince and King, and explained to him howmatters stood, and went down on their knees before him, offering thecrown (on a velvet cushion, with four golden tassels, each nearly asbig as his head),--small though he was and lame, which lameness thecourtiers pretended not to notice,--there came such a glow into hisface, such a dignity into his demeanor, that he became beautiful,king-like.
"Yes," he said, "if you desire it, I will be your king. And I will do mybest to make my people happy."
Then there arose, from inside and outside the tower, such a shout asnever yet was heard across the lonely plain.
Prince Dolor shrank a little from the deafening sound. "How shall I beable to rule all this great people? You forget, my lords, that I am onlya little boy still."
"Not so very little," was the respectful answer. "We have searchedin the records, and found that your Royal Highness--your Majesty, Imean--is fifteen years old."
"Am I?" said Prince Dolor; and his first thought was a thoroughlychildish pleasure that he should now have a birthday, with a wholenation to keep it. Then he remembered that his childish days were done.He was a monarch now. Even his nurse, to whom, the moment he saw her,he had held out his hand, kissed it reverently, and called himceremoniously "his Majesty the King."
"A king must be always a king, I suppose," said he half-sadly, when, theceremonies over, he had been left to himself for just ten minutes, toput off his boy's clothes and be reattired in magnificent robes, beforehe was conveyed away from his tower to the royal palace.
He could take nothing with him; indeed, he soon saw that, howeverpolitely they spoke, they would not allow him to take anything. If hewas to be their king, he must give up his old life forever. So he lookedwith tender farewell on his old books, old toys, the furniture he knewso well, and the familiar plain in all its levelness--ugly yet pleasant,simply because it was familiar.
"It will be a new life in a new world," said he to himself; "but I'llremember the old things still. And, oh! if before I go I could but oncesee my dear old godmother."
While he spoke he had laid himself down on the bed for a minute ortwo, rather tired with his grandeur, and confused by the noise of thetrumpets which kept playing incessantly down below. He gazed, halfsadly, up to the skylight, whence there came pouring a stream ofsunrays, with innumerable motes floating there, like a bridge thrownbetween heaven and earth. Sliding down it, as if she had been made ofair, came the little old woman in gray.
So beautiful looked she--old as she was--that Prince Dolor was at firstquite startled by the apparition. Then he held out his arms in eagerdelight.
"Oh, godmother, you have not forsaken me!"
"Not at all, my son. You may not have seen me, but I have seen you manya time."
"How?"
"Oh, never mind. I can turn into anything I please, you know. And I havebeen a bearskin rug, and a crystal goblet--and sometimes I have changedfrom inanimate to animate nature, put on feathers, and made myself verycomfortable as a bird."
"Ha!" laughed the prince, a new light breaking in upon him as he caughtthe infection of her tone, lively and mischievous. "Ha! ha! a lark,for instance?"
"Or a magpie," answered she, with a capital imitation of Mistress Mag'scroaky voice. "Do you suppose I am always sentimental, and never funny?If anything makes you happy, gay, or grave, don't you think it is morethan likely to come through your old godmother?"
"I believe that," said the boy tenderly, holding out his arms. Theyclasped one another in a close embrace.
Suddenly Prince Dolor looked very anxious. "You will not leave me nowthat I am a king? Otherwise I had rather not be a king at all. Promisenever to forsake me!"
The little old woman laughed gayly. "Forsake you? that is impossible.But it is just possible you may forsake me. Not probable though. Yourmother never did, and she was a queen. The sweetest queen in all theworld was the Lady Dolorez."
"Tell me about her," said the boy eagerly. "As I get older I think I canunderstand more. Do tell me."
"Not now. You couldn't hear me for the trumpets and the shouting. Butwhen you are come to the palace, ask for a long-closed upper room, whichlooks out upon the Beautiful Mountains; open it and take it for yourown. Whenever you go there you will always find me, and we will talktogether about all sorts of things."
"And about my mother?"
The little old woman nodded--and kept nodding and smiling to herselfmany times, as the boy repeated over and over again the sweet words hehad never known or understood--"my mother--my mother."
"Now I must go," said she, as the trumpets blared louder and louder, andthe shouts of the people showed that they would not endur
e any delay."Good-by, good-by! Open the window and out I fly."
Prince Dolor repeated gayly the musical rhyme--but all the while triedto hold his godmother fast.
Vain, vain! for the moment that a knocking was heard at his door the sunwent behind a cloud, the bright stream of dancing motes vanished, andthe little old woman with them--he knew not where.
So Prince Dolor quitted his tower--which he had entered so mournfullyand ignominiously as a little helpless baby carried in the deaf-mute'sarms--quitted it as the great King of Nomansland.
The only thing he took away with him was something so insignificant thatnone of the lords, gentlemen, and soldiers who escorted him with suchtriumphant splendor could possibly notice it--a tiny bundle, whichhe had found lying on the floor just where the bridge of sunbeams hadrested. At once he had pounced upon it, and thrust it secretly into hisbosom, where it dwindled into such small proportions that it mighthave been taken for a mere chest-comforter, a bit of flannel, or an oldpocket-handkerchief. It was his traveling-cloak!