Her cry summoned the woodcutter, who came running up, very pale, with his axe in his hand. "What is this?" he asked. "Who is injuring my child?"
Sobbing, his wife pointed to where the Old Gnome cowered, blinking, caught at last in the sunlight outside his cell.
"A Gnome!" cried David in horror. "One of the pests from the Great Fear! What are you doing here, Monster? How shall we pay you to go away and leave us in peace?"
"I will go away," said the Old Gnome humbly, "though I belong not to the Great Fear, and I came here before you. My wish is not evil you-ward. It is I who am a friend. But I will go." With a kind look at the baby he turned away.
But the baby struggled down from her mother's arms and ran after him crying,--"No, no! Do not go away, dear, beautiful Fairy! Mother! Father! It is the friend whom we all love. I have heard you praise him. Do not send him away."
"The Fairy!" cried the father, running to capture her.
"It is no Fairy, child!" said the mother. "It is one of the ugly, wicked Gnomes who do only evil. Let him go!"
But the child struggled and shrieked. "He shall not go! It is the beautiful Fairy who helps us. I have watched him doing all the kind things you say the Fairy does, and I love him dearly. He shall not go!" The father and mother looked at each other, then at the shrinking Gnome. "Is this true?" they demanded, "or is this some wicked Gnome-trick which has bewitched our child?"
The Old Gnome bowed meekly. "Alas! I am no Fairy, as I fain would be," he confessed. "But I loved to hear you call me so. I am a Gnome; but I have done no evil, only good, so far as my skill went. The happy days are over now. The child knows the truth. No one will ever again think me beautiful or good. I had forgotten how old I was; I had almost grown to feel young again in the merry, busy days of service. But now the time has come indeed for me to lie down in the long sleep. I will go away and find a new cell, and curl me up in a happy dream which will last forever."
Once more he turned to go. The father and mother were silent.