Yellow-Cap and Other Fairy-Stories For Children

by Julian Hawthorne

'We shall die!' moaned the children. 'Oh, will no one help us!'

Then a sound was heard like an earthquake, and the walls that separated them from Abra were rent asunder, and a terrible white light streamed forth, and fell upon the unhappy children. In that light they looked at one another, and saw that they were deformed and hideous beyond the power of words to describe. The next instant the walls closed together again, but a faint illumination still remained, in which Calladon and Callia again seemed to themselves to resume their natural form. But even then, Calladon caught a glimpse of himself in the enchanted mirror; and there was once more the crook-backed, grisly-faced dwarf that had frightened him in Cada, now made more ugly yet by the serpent-mud of Bra.

'Oh, Callia, it is the truth!' groaned he. 'Our own eyes have deceived us, and our lamp has led us astray; but in the mirror is the light of the great lamp, and it shows me as I really am.'

'Yes, it is the truth!' answered Callia. 'It must be so!'

'It is well that you have found it out, even so late as this,' said a stern voice close behind them; and looking round, the children saw a tall, threatening figure, with angry eyes, and in his hand a heavy whip.

'Who is it?' faltered the children to each other, with trembling voices.

'I am he who built Abracadabra,' replied he of the angry eyes, brandishing his whip. 'I built it clean and wholesome, and you have made it a place of mud and serpents, and all unclean things. This dirt in which you have wallowed is the evil that has come out of your own minds and hearts, and these snakes were called into life by the light of the lamp which you stole from the lamp of Abra. Therefore your doom is, to repair the mischief you have done. You shall cleanse these rooms that you have defiled, until they are as pure as they appeared when you looked on them through the alabaster wall. From this hour, too, you shall see each other no more until your work is done. As you were given to each other for happiness, so, since you have disobeyed the law by which alone your happiness could be everlasting, you shall be separated to do your penance. And I will stand over you with the whip; and every time you pause to breathe or rest, you shall be driven onwards with a blow.'

Scarcely had the tall man uttered these awful words, than Calladon saw Callia suddenly vanish from his side; and at the same moment he felt the heavy stroke of the whip across his shoulders, and heard the stern voice bidding him work. So to work he went with all his might; and with his bare hands—for no tools were given him—he strove to scrape away the mud from the floor, and to clear the mould from the walls, and to pull down the decaying weeds that dangled from the roof. But, for a long time, he seemed to make no progress; the mud rose before him in mountains; the mould collected on the walls as fast as he swept it down, and the weeds hung from the roof in thicker masses. Nevertheless, if he stopped to take breath or rest, down came the heavy whip with relentless blows; his skin was cut and bleeding, his face was bruised, and the bones of his back were broken. With tears and groans he struggled on; and ever and anon in the darkness near him his ear caught the sound of sobbing and piteous cries, and the voice that uttered them reminded him of the voice of Callia.

Thus he strove for many weary hours; and at last it seemed to him that he could strive no more, yet half his work was still undone. But the thought that, unless it were finished, he would see Callia no more, gave him new strength, and he fell to again, and worked like a whirlwind; and the mountains of mud gave way before him, and the mould fell from the walls in showers, and the dangling weeds were swept down in mighty heaps. And although the blows of the whip still fell, they no longer weakened him as before, but made his strength greater. Indeed, it seemed to him as if he were inspired with a strength not his own, and as if, when the work were done, it would be the achievement not of himself, but of a mightier than he. In the midst of these thoughts the gloom suddenly brightened, and he saw that his work was done.

'Well, Calladon, what do you think of yourself?' said the tall man, in a somewhat less stern tone than before. 'Are you as handsome as you once were?'