Afterward Moit started the car and gave the arrow-maker an impressive ride around the valley, gradually increasing the speed until we very nearly flew over the ground.
When, at last, we came to a halt at the forest’s edge, it was evident we had won the dwarf completely. His face was full of animation and delight, and he proceeded to touch each of our foreheads, and then his own heart, to indicate that we were henceforth friends.
“We will ride into the forest,” he said. “I will show you the way.”
It suited us very well to hide the machine among the trees, for we might expect the natives to search for us and give us further annoyance. But we failed to understand how the big machine might be guided into the tangled forest.
Tcharn, however, knew intimately every tree and shrub. He directed Moit to a place where we passed between two giant mahoganies, after which a sharp turn disclosed an avenue which led in devious windings quite a distance into the wood. Sometimes we barely grazed a tree-trunk on either side, or tore away a mass of clinging vines or dodged, by a hair’s breadth, a jagged stump; and, after all, our journey was not a great way from the edge of the forest and we were soon compelled to halt for lack of a roadway.
“The rest of the distance we will walk,” announced the dwarf. “Follow me, if you will.”
I shall never forget the impressiveness of this magnificent forest. The world and its glaring sunlight were shut out. Around our feet was a rank growth of matted vines, delicate ferns and splendid mosses. We stood in shadow-land, a kingdom of mystery and silence. The foliage was of such dainty tracery that only in the deep seas can its equal be found, and wonderful butterflies winged their way between the tender plants, looking like dim ghosts of their gorgeous fellows in the outer world. Here was a vast colonnade, the straight, slender, gray tree-trunks supporting a massive roof of green whose outer branches alone greeted the sun. Festooned from the upright columns were tangled draperies of climbing vines which here rested in deep shadow and there glowed with a stray beam of brilliant sunshine that slyly crept through the roof. And ever, as we pressed on, new beauties and transformations were disclosed in the forest’s mysterious depths, until the conviction that here must be the favorite retreat of elfins and fays was dreamily impressed upon our awed minds.
But almost before we were aware of it we came to a clearing, a circular place in the wood where great trees shot their branches into the sky and struggled to bridge the intervening space with their foliage. The vain attempt left a patch of clear sky visible, although the entire enclosure was more than half roofed with leaves.
Instead of mosses and vines, a grassy sward carpeted the place, and now we came upon visible evidence that we had reached the abode of the little arrow-maker.
On one side was a rude forge, built of clay, and supporting a bellows. In a basket beside the forge were hundreds of arrow-points most cleverly fashioned of bronze, while heaps of fagots and bars of metal showed that the dwarf’s daily occupation was seldom neglected.