DAME MARTHA'S STEP-DAUGHTER;
OR,
THE GRANDMOTHER OF THE GNOMES.
DAME MARTHA lived at the foot of a high mountain. Her cottage was large enough to give shelter only to herself and two young girls, one of them her own child and the other the child of Dame Martha's late husband, who, about six months before this story opens, slipped down a fissure in the rocks and had nevermore been seen. Dame Martha did not bear a very good character in the neighborhood, as she was known to be violent in temper and dishonest in her dealings. While her husband lived, she had quarrelled with him from morning till night, and after he disappeared, people used to hint that Dame Martha knew better than any one else how the poor man came to his sudden death. But nothing was ever proved upon her, and as the dame's cottage stood in a desolate valley, overshadowed by a frowning cliff on which grew a single lightning-blasted pine-tree, children shunned the lonely spot, and few grown people found anything to attract them in that direction. Margaret, the dame's own daughter, was a handsome haughty lass of about nineteen, so spoiled and self-willed that she bid fair to rival her mother in temper, in the course of time. Hilda, the step-daughter, was a fair and gentle little creature, sixteen years of age, who bore with patient cheerfulness all the unhappiness of her lot. Sometimes, for days together, she would be left alone in the house, while Dame Martha and Margaret dressed themselves up in all their finery, and went off to fairs and merrymakings in the neighboring town. Melancholy were the hours spent in a solitude unbroken save by the rush of the waterfall leaping from cliff to cliff, or the hootings of owls after nightfall, and the unceasing wail of the wind through the forest. But Hilda was at least spared the sound of Margaret's taunting voice and laugh, and the cruel scolding tongue of her step-mother. These two wicked women were heartily tired of Hilda, and cast about in their minds how they could get rid of her, and take possession of a little bag of gold pieces coming to her from her father. Then, thought they, the old house could be shut up and left to the rats and bats, while they might set out on their travels and enjoy life.
One day, when Hilda was bleaching the linen on a patch of grass near the brook, her step-mother called out, "Hilda, the red cow has strayed away, and I hear her bell over by the old stone quarry. Be quick, and you may head her off."
Hilda secured her linen, and with nimble steps, ran up the steep mountain side. She did not fancy the idea of going by the old stone quarry, for there it had been, six months before, that her dear father was last seen in life. Near that spot his hat and shepherd-staff had been found. But Hilda was accustomed to obey without remonstrance, and away she ran, climbing as lightly as a mountain goat. She too, could hear the tinkle of the little bell far up among the bushes, and guided by the sound, she drew near the dreaded scene of her greatest sorrow. A thick screen of fir bushes lay between her and the red cow's place of refuge. Interwoven with evergreens, grew masses of alpine-rose, whose tough branches became entangled in Hilda's feet, and hid the path from sight. At last, she found herself in a dense thicket, not knowing how to emerge. As she paused for a moment to look about her, the red cow's bell tinkled again—a strange uncertain tinkle this—immediately behind the bushes at her left.
"There you are, good-for-nothing!" cried Hilda, struggling bravely forward through the undergrowth in the direction indicated by the bell. She heard a low mocking laugh. Surely that laugh could come only from her step sister! "Margaret!" she called. No answer, and poor Hilda, uttering a wild shriek for help, plunged headlong down a hidden opening in the ground, into a fathomless abyss, where no foot of man might follow her.
Wicked Margaret stood on the brink of this treacherous pit-fall, known only to her mother and herself, and laughed, holding in her hand the little red cow's bell, with which she had lured Hilda to her doom.
"Rest there!" the wretched girl said, kneeling down to peer into the darkness of the rocky pit. "At any rate, you have found a burial-place for your bones, alongside of your father, who was never heard to groan after my mother and I pushed him over the brink here, last autumn! And now, I will go home, and tell the old woman that we are rid of all our burdens. Ha! ha! Won't we spend the father's gold, and revel! This very night must we steal away, and seek our fortune in a distant country."
Hilda fell, unharmed, upon a hillock of soft green moss, so far, so far beneath the ledge whence Margaret had pushed her, that the opening above looked no bigger than a star. The poor girl was overcome by her terrible fate, and for a long time she lay weeping as if her heart would break. Then, looking about her, she saw the opening to a cavern in the rocks, resembling an arch of crystal, so bravely did it glitter.
Around the hillock where she lay was a small courtyard with turf as smooth as velvet, and upon the rocky walls encircling it were trained vines of roses, myrtle and jasmine, covered with lovely blossoms. Hilda, who knew best the alp-rose and the corn-flower, the hardy violet and the rock-seeking columbine, had never seen such rare and radiant flowers as these, and their rich perfume intoxicated her with delight. Stealing down the side of the cliff, trickled a sparkling rivulet, its stream caught in a basin of gleaming pearl. Hilda, enchanted by the lovely scene, forgot her grief, and felt a longing desire to follow the path of many-colored pebbles leading beneath the crystal arch. Without a token of fear, she tripped along this pretty path winding through a gallery supported by pillars of frosted silver. Here and there glowed a lamp of pink, blue or crimson, fashioned like a flower. Strains of sweet music were heard in the distance, and at last Hilda reached a gate of golden trellis-work, beside which slept a tiny old man, whose beard and hair fell over his red mantle to the very ground.