All the Way to Fairyland Part 14

"If you do find her," continued the gra.s.shopper, "do you think the Princess will play with you again?"

"Oh, no," sighed the Prince. "She will only want to play with the Lady Emmelina."

"Then don't try to find the Lady Emmelina," said the gra.s.shopper, promptly.

"I must," said Prince Perfection. "Anything is better than seeing the Princess cry. I took her doll away, you see, and it is my fault that Pansy is so unhappy. I don't mean to go home again until I have found the Lady Emmelina."

"Right you are," said the gra.s.shopper. "You're the man for me. I'll help you as far as I can, but you must come down here first; I can't go on shouting like this."

"Down there?" said the Prince. "The hole is much too small."

"Nonsense! Come and try," said the gra.s.shopper, and indeed, before he tried at all, the Prince found himself inside the neat round hole, with the mossy walls reaching far above his head, and the gra.s.shopper shaking hands with him.

"Feel all right?" asked the gra.s.shopper. "Sit down and get your breath. These sudden changes are apt to be exhausting if you are not used to them."

"Are you used to them?" asked the Prince, when he had recovered enough breath to speak.

"Dear me, yes!" said the gra.s.shopper with a chuckle. "When I get up in the morning I never know how many changes I may not have to go through before the day is over. Don't think I am complaining though, for of course it is part of my profession."

"What is your profession?" asked the Prince.

"Chief Spy in Particular to the Fairy Queen," answered the gra.s.shopper.

"It's very hard work, I can tell you; some days I haven't a moment to myself. Of course, I find out a great deal that n.o.body else knows, which is always amusing. Yesterday, for instance, if I hadn't been a c.o.c.kchafer, a doll's teapot, a garden seat, a rose tree and a nursery table, I shouldn't know as much as I do about you and the Lady Emmelina."

"Then please tell me what I must do in order to find the Lady Emmelina," begged the Prince.

"By all means," said the gra.s.shopper, cheerfully. "Go straight on without turning to the right or the left; and whenever some one greets you, ask him politely to give you what he is thinking about, and then you will be able to find the Lady Emmelina."

It seemed rather a roundabout way of finding anything; but, as the gra.s.shopper disappeared directly he had finished speaking, there was nothing to do but to follow his advice. The first part was easy enough, for just in front of him the Prince noticed a little door in the green mossy wall, which he was quite sure had not been there before; and through this he straightway walked. He immediately found himself in a blaze of suns.h.i.+ne on the sea-sh.o.r.e, with green waves stretching before him as far as he could see, and nothing on either side of him except the flat stony beach. "It's all very well to tell any one to go straight on, but how am I to get across the sea?" thought the Prince. He had never been afraid of anything in his life, however, so he ran down the beach and put one foot into the white foam at the edge.

"Good-day to you!" said a voice. "Who are you, and what do you want?"

"I am Prince Perfection, and I want what you are thinking about,"

answered the Prince, boldly, although he could not see who was speaking.

"That is a strange thing to want," said the voice; "for I was just thinking about a little steamboat that would go by real steam; and how you can possibly want such a thing as that is more than I can understand."

At that moment there was a faint puffing sound in the distance, which came nearer and nearer; and presently over the waves rode a most perfect little steamboat, with real smoke coming out of the funnel. It was just large enough for the Prince, and he stepped on board directly it came near enough, and put his hand on the little bra.s.s wheel.

"Thank you very much," he said as loudly as he could, in the hope that the owner of the mysterious voice would hear him. n.o.body answered him; but he wondered why an old crab, who was shuffling along the beach, chose that particular moment to wink at him.

Certainly, no one has ever reached the sh.o.r.e on the opposite side of the sea so quickly as Prince Perfection in his real steamboat. It was a pleasure to hear it puff as it cut through the big green waves; and he stood like a real captain with his hand on the little bra.s.s wheel, and steered it right into a bay that seemed waiting on purpose for it.

It was very sad that it should disappear directly he stepped out of it; but as it had come from nowhere at all because he wanted it, he could not complain because it went back to nowhere at all when he had done with it. So he sighed twice, and then walked straight ahead as before, up the beach and over a flat gra.s.sy plain, covered with yellow poppies and gorse bushes and purple heather. Nothing could have been easier than this; and Prince Perfection had not the slightest wish to turn to the right or the left, until he came suddenly upon a thick clump of gorse bushes which lay in the very middle of his path. He made two attempts to clamber over it; but, each time, he was caught in the gorse bushes and was scratched all over; and even if one is ten years old and a prince, it is hard to bear being scratched all over by a gorse bush.

Prince Perfection began to wonder if it would be very wrong to follow the path to the right until he should come to an opening, but before he had time to decide such a difficult question a shrill voice broke the silence once more.

"Good-day to you," it said. "Who are you, and what do you want?"

"I am Prince Perfection, and I want what you are thinking about,"

answered the Prince, boldly.

"How ridiculous!" laughed the voice. "Why, I am thinking about a cannon, a real cannon that will fire real gunpowder. Surely, you can want nothing so useless as that?"

"Indeed, I do," said the Prince; and there stood the most perfect little real cannon, loaded with real shot, and in his hand was a lighted match ready to fire it with. He lost no time in pointing it straight at the clump of furze bushes, and the real gunpowder made a flash and a splutter, and the shot went right into the middle of the yellow gorse and blew it all away so completely that not a trace of it was left, except one small bush that the Prince had no difficulty in jumping over. The cannon went back to nowhere at all, just as the steamboat had done.

"Thank you very much," said the Prince Perfection as loudly as he could; and again no one answered him. He was much surprised, however, when he looked back and found that the gorse bush had disappeared as soon as he had jumped over it. After that he walked on for a long way; and just as he was beginning to feel tired, and the sun was beginning to think about setting, he tumbled right up against a big iceberg. It is not usual for icebergs to drop down suddenly in the middle of the road, but that is what this particular iceberg did, and that is why the Prince tumbled against it.

"Dear me," sighed Prince Perfection, for even a prince's legs are not very long when he is only ten years old, and it is not pleasant to have to climb an iceberg at the end of a long walk. There was no help for it, however, for there was the iceberg waiting to be climbed; so the little Prince went straight at it as bravely as he could. Any one who is accustomed to climbing icebergs will at once know how difficult Prince Perfection found it; and he tried seven times without being able to get up a single yard of it.

"Good-day to you," said a voice, which sounded as though it came from the very middle of the iceberg. "Who are you, and what do you want?"

"I am so glad you have come!" exclaimed the Prince; although, for that matter, no one had come at all. "I am Prince Perfection, and I want what you are thinking about."

"There certainly is no accounting for tastes," observed the voice. "I was just thinking about a real balloon that would take me wherever I wanted to go; and what use that would be to you I cannot imagine."

The Prince did not trouble to explain what use it would be to him, for at that very instant the balloon floated down towards him, and he stepped into it as a matter of course. It was far more beautiful than anything he had ever been able to imagine, however; and the movement of it was so delicious that he fell sound asleep the moment it began to carry him upwards; and he could not keep awake long enough even to thank the sender of it. When he awoke, he was lying on the gra.s.s under a silver birch tree, and in front of him was a red brick fort with battlements and a drawbridge. It was so like the fort in which he kept all his tin soldiers in the nursery at home that he was not at all surprised when a sentinel without a head came out in answer to his knock. He remembered melting off the head of that particular tin soldier only two days before, and he was much relieved when he showed no signs of recognising him. As the poor tin fellow had no head, this was hardly to be wondered at.

"Make haste, and let down the drawbridge," said the Prince, banging away at the wooden gate with his fists; "I want to see if the Lady Emmelina is inside."

He thought he could do what he liked with his own property, but the soldier without a head was evidently of another opinion. He did not attempt to let down the drawbridge, and he answered the Prince in a rhyme which he seemed to have made up for the occasion:

"What a ridiculous clatter Over _such_ a small matter!

I was peacefully napping When you came with your tapping; You are vastly mistaken If you think I've forsaken My official position Because no physician Could give me a cranium Like a pot of geranium.

And these are my orders-- No one pa.s.ses these borders Unless he is able, In song, rhyme, or fable, The real, true intention Of his coming to mention!"

To be sure, it was not much of a rhyme, but it was not bad for a soldier who had no head. When he had finished it he went away again, and the Prince sat down disconsolately under the silver birch tree. He felt more convinced than before that the Lady Emmelina was inside the fort; but although he thought as much as most people would over an ordinary arithmetic lesson, he could not think of a single rhyme.

"Good-day to you," said a voice that seemed to come from the very top of the birch tree. "Who are you, and what do you want?"

"I am Prince Perfection, and I want what you are thinking about,"

answered the Prince, although he hardly hoped, this time, that he would get what he wanted.

"Do you really mean it?" remarked the voice. "I was just composing a song about a charming little lady in a white silk frock, who lives behind that drawbridge over there. It is not very likely you can want that!"

"Hurrah!" shouted the little Prince, standing on his head for joy.

"Then, it is the Lady Emmelina!"

"The fact is," continued the voice, without noticing the interruption, "I always make poetry when there is nothing else to do. So does the tin soldier. He can't help it, poor fellow, because he has lost his head, you see. If you have lost your head you cannot be expected to make anything except poetry."

"Have you lost your head, too, may I ask?" said the Prince, as politely as he could put such an awkward question.

"For the time being I have no head to lose," answered the voice. "That is how I happened to be inventing a song just as you came by. Are you sure there is nothing else you would like better? A nightmare, for instance, or a thunder-storm?"

The Prince was sure he would like nothing better; and the voice in the birch tree sang him the following song, very softly:

"Here I've come as I was bidden To seek the dolly you have hidden-- The dolly with the yellow hair, With cheeks so pink and eyes so fair, With hands that move and feet that stand-- The doll that came from Fairyland.

"Do you pretend you've never seen her, The dainty Lady Emmelina?

I pray you let the drawbridge down, I'm ten years old and I can frown!