“Heigh-ho!” yawned Benevaldo, stretching his long arms. “Here I’ve been dodging and dancing about all the afternoon in a country much too small for me, with nobody to speak to, or to look at me, for that matter. It’s time I went home where there is room to walk and some one to talk to.”
But when he came to start on again, he did not turn around after all. He kept on walking south, south, south, as fast as he could for the roads and the towns. A feeling he could not explain drew him on. In spite of the cramps in his legs and the scratches on his feet, he could not give up his uncomfortable adventure.
It grew dark; and the houses seemed to become closer and closer. He could not put his foot down without feeling them pressing against it on all sides. He hardly dared to step at any rate, for every open space seemed swarming with people and the little buzzing, beetle-like wagons. A thousand small lights seemed to burst out in that world around his ankles. They dazzled him until he could see less than ever where he was going.
His leg came against something cold and hard. He drew back cautiously, stepped over and stopped. His eyes got over their blinking, and he stood still, looking about. He was knee-deep in brick walls. As far as he could see were rows on rows of other brick walls, some higher, some lower, all honeycombed with lights. He bent down over those in front of him, listening. They seemed full of bustle and tiny voices.
Benevaldo had almost reached the shining towers
Benevaldo straightened up in surprise. Were there people, then, inside? These walls were like no houses he ever had seen in his life. Were they prisons perhaps, or traps?
He looked ahead for a new foothold. But there was nowhere for him to step. Between the rows of walls were nothing but streets lined with lights, seething with small vehicles and people. The whole vast extent of twinkling walls seemed shaken with the rumble, rumble, rumble of moving.
Benevaldo sighed, and peered about for some way to go on. He could not turn back now. An idea struck him. Over at his right, the lights suddenly stopped. He edged cautiously that way, and then he saw. The walls stopped as well as the lights, before a wide, dark river.
With one mighty spring, Benevaldo cleared the distance in between and landed splashing in midstream. The water soothed his aching feet, and he felt as fresh and adventurous as in the early morning. The lines of glittering walls on the shore challenged him. Far ahead he could make out lighted towers, as tall perhaps as he was. Leaping and eager, he ran toward them down the river.