“When I came out into the woods, I left the path that leads away—away,”—he spread out his dimpled arms and looked far off,—“I know not whither it goes, but I left it, and sought the deep wood. The shadows are heavy there, and it is very still. While I stood under a tree, uncertain which way to go, suddenly down toward me, through the trees, came the Dark.”
“Holy Mary! it was some robber,” exclaimed the mother.
“No, mamma, I tell you, it was the Dark. He was very black; his armor was black, and so were his beard and his eyes. He looked at me as though he wanted to eat me. But I said, ‘Are you the Dark? I come to find you and to tell you that I do not fear you.’ And then I looked at him, and he laughed, and I said, ‘I think I am going to like you;’ and he said, ‘Who are you? Have you strayed from Fairyland?’
“So I told him who I was, and he frowned and said, ‘Careless woman, to guard such a treasure so slackly.’ Who did he mean, mamma?”
“I think I am going to like you.”
The lady’s face flushed. “Continue, my son; did he harm you?”
“Oh, mamma, no. He found me some berries and a drink from a spring; and then he showed me how, at his coming, the little birds went to sleep in the trees, and the deer beneath them. And he showed me the stars, coming out in the deep sky. And when I grew sleepy, he held me in his arms, and sang of the white moths, and the glowworms; and the bird that sings at night sang with him; and then I went to sleep. But when morning came he found a great black horse, which was his; and so he brought me home, and made me promise never to seek for him again. I did not want to promise, only his eyes looked so that I feared him; so I promised; and he gave me this keepsake, for my mamma.”
“He gave me this keepsake for my mamma.”