“Why, child,” said the apple-woman, “go away from here she must; but she need not go off with the deer, I suppose, unless she likes. They look gentle and harmless; but it is very hard to get at the truth in this country, and I’ve heard queer stories about them.”
“Have you?” said the Queen. “Well you can repeat them if you like; but remember that the poor brown doe cannot contradict them.”
So the apple-woman said, “I have heard, but I don’t know how true it is, that in that country they shut up their queen in a great castle, and cover her with a veil, and never let the sun shine on her; for if by chance the least little sunbeam should light on her she would turn into a doe directly, and all the nation would turn with her, and stay so.”
“I don’t want to be shut up in a castle,” said Mopsa.
“But is it true?” asked Jack.
“Well,” said the apple-woman, “as I told you before, I cannot make out whether it’s true or not, for all these stags and fawns look very mild, gentle creatures.”
“I won’t go,” said Mopsa; “I would rather run away.”
All this time the Queen with the brown doe had been gently pressing with the crowd nearer and nearer to the brink of the river, so that now Jack and Mopsa, who stood facing them, were quite close to the boat; and while they argued and tried to make Mopsa come away, Jack suddenly whispered to her to spring into the boat, which she did, and he after her, and at the same time he cried out:
“Now, boat, if you are my boat, set off as fast as you can, and let nothing of fairy birth get on board of you.”
No sooner did he begin to speak than the boat swung itself away from the edge, and almost in a moment it was in the very middle of the river, and beginning to float gently down with the stream.