"Oh! you pretty darlings!" cried the old woman, kissing them rapturously, "here is a new nurse for you; and mind you keep her busy."
When Hilda found that she was expected to bathe, and clean, and walk out with, and sleep with these loathsome creatures, she felt that she had rather die. But fear of the terrible G. G. kept her silent, and setting about her task, she soon had them ready for an airing in the garden. Here she beheld many strange sights, but nothing more curious than to see all the bushes and plants and trees bearing large ears, which, as she drew near, became erect and fixed in an attitude of attention. Remembering the caution of the friendly gnome to express no surprise, Hilda drove her little flock before her along the garden path, then returning to the house, fed them and put them to bed in the most orderly fashion. For reward, she found, on a bench outside the door, a nice bowl of milk with fine
white bread and butter, and after devouring it eagerly, she fell asleep. When she awoke next day, Hilda found herself in another garden. This one was most beautiful. All the rose-bushes had gold or silver leaves, and flowers made of jewels. She longed to twitch off one of the shining leaves, but dared not, contenting herself with watering their roots and neatly clearing up the paths, as the Gnome Grandmother had directed her. For reward, she had a bowl of delicious hot soup, and a cup of amber jelly, and falling asleep, she awakened next day in still another garden. Here sported birds of radiant hue and plumage, singing delightfully, as they flitted about the brim of a great marble fountain on a grassy lawn, surrounded by blooming flowers.
"Here, children, I bring you a new nurse-maid," said the Gnome Grandmother, presenting her to the birds; and immediately, the lovely creatures surrounded Hilda, perching on her arms, her head, her shoulders, and caressing her with evident pleasure.
"Now that you have successfully met my three tests—the first, of your fidelity, by doing your duty toward the creatures you abhorred; secondly, by passing through my jewel-garden without plucking a flower or leaf; thirdly, by showing no surprise at the wonders you have seen—you have proved yourself worthy to be the keeper of my birds," said the old woman. "It is well for you that the ears have heard no grumbling. And mind you go on as you've begun."
Hilda thanked her with beaming glances, but would not venture to speak, although she longed to ask news of her dear father. "To those who wait, all things come in time," she remembered her father used to say, and determined not to break silence yet a while. The Grandmother of the Gnomes disappeared, and Hilda set herself to the task of caring for her new and lovely pets. Around the garden were bowers of sweet-smelling honeysuckle, and in each of these hung a silver cage. Hilda's duty was to cover the bottoms of the cages with sand of broken diamonds, to gather fresh sprays of flowers to stick between their bars, and to fill the jewelled drinking-troughs with dew from the cups of flowers. Day after day passed in attendance upon the birds, who all became devoted to her, in return. Each morning the Grandmother of the Gnomes came into the garden, and sometimes even smiled on Hilda, her grin making her ugliness and deformity seem to increase, if possible. Still Hilda dared not speak the words that were always trembling on her tongue. When night came, the young girl retired to rest in a delightful little house shaped from a bush of growing box, out of which doors and windows had been cut. Within was a bed of moss like velvet, and a coverlet made of the woven wings of the butterfly, with blankets of swansdown. Her meals were served by unseen hands. Punctually at breakfast, dinner, and tea-time, there sprang up in the bower house a little table shaped like a huge mushroom, covered with dainty food in dishes of gold and silver. New clothes were prepared for her, and laid across the foot of her couch while she slept. Among them were gauzy gowns that seemed to have been cut from the clouds after sunset, cobweb handkerchiefs, shoes made of mole-skin, and necklaces of petrified dew-drops. Hilda might have been quite happy but for the continual thought that her father was imprisoned somewhere near, and her longing to find him and tell him she was there. One night, while she lay thinking, apparently asleep, footsteps came to the side of her bed, and stopped. Somebody held a lamp close to her face, but Hilda pretended to be in a deep slumber, and soon the G. G., for she it was, went away, pattering about the bower, and talking to the old lodge-keeper, who followed her.
"She is sound asleep, so come along. We are already a little late for our round among the prisoners. Foolish creatures! Why hadn't they, too, the sense to restrain themselves as this child did, and they might all have been working in the gardens, to this day. But no! Each one must needs twitch off a leaf here, or a rose there, and stare, and chatter over what they saw, or else go into convulsions over the work given them to do for my pretty toads, and bats, and serpents. That silly father of hers, for example! He seemed an honest fellow, but what should he do, when he thought no one was looking, but pluck one of my choicest ruby roses to carry back to Hilda. Hum! much likelihood there is that Hilda ever finds out where he is hidden, after a crime like that!"
The Grandmother of the Gnomes seemed to have worked herself up into such an angry state, that Hilda dared not give any sign of waking. So she lay, still as a mouse, till the old couple had laid across her couch the new robe for next day, and trotted off. Then, gliding swiftly from her bed, the girl followed them, down a long green alley of the garden, to a grassy bank she had often noticed. There, putting her hand upon a trap-door, half hidden from sight by a mass of vines, the old crone knocked thrice, saying, "Open to the Grandmother of the Gnomes!"