A Little Wizard

by Stanley John Weyman

The boy had shaken off his first terror. Frank, he thought, must be safe by this time. He kept his feet therefore, but hesitated in doubt what to do; standing, to outward view a sullen pale-faced child, beside the dark trunk of the yew. Gridley noticed that he kept his one hand closed, and acting on a momentary impulse asked him roughly what he had there. The boy, without answering, opened his fingers mechanically, disclosing three tiny whinberries which he had picked while he talked with his brother in the rift, and had involuntarily retained in his hand ever since. The butler struck them out of his little palm with a disappointed "pish!" and turning him round by the shoulder sent him off with a push. "There, go and pick some more!" he said. "Be off! Be off!"

The lad obeyed slowly, and with apparent reluctance. When he was out of sight, Gridley, who had stepped a few paces from the tree that he might watch him the better, returned and picked up his spade. "There, he is gone!" he said, with an inquisitive look at the woman, whose mood puzzled him. "And if you will have the things up, it must be done. Let us lose no more time."

He struck the spade into the ground, and began to dig, while his companion watched him. But her face betrayed none of the greedy excitement which had always marked it before when the treasure was in question. Instead, it wore a look of dread and expectation. Something like grey fear lay like a shadow upon it, and left it only when the man stopped digging, and throwing down his spade, dragged a small white bundle from the shallow hole he had made.

Then she showed at last some animation. "They are there," she muttered, her eyes beginning to burn. "I fancied----"

"Oh, they are here," he answered, chuckling as he stooped to unfasten the napkin. "They are here, never fear! Safe bind safe find, you know, my lady."

Scarcely were the words out of his mouth, however, when he fell back pale and trembling. A hideous look of disappointment and dismay took in a moment the place of the gloating smile which had before distorted his features. The napkin being untied disclosed three stones; no gold, no cups, no treasure, but only three stones!

For a moment the two stood silent and thunderstruck, gazing at the pebbles, which in their perfect worthlessness seemed to mock them. Then the man turned swiftly and suddenly on the woman, rage and suspicion so transforming him, that he did not look like the same person. "You hag!" he cried, with lips which writhed under the effort he made to control himself. "You thieving witch! This is your work! Where is my gold? Where is my gold, I say?" he repeated wildly. "Tell me, or I will murder you!" And he advanced upon her, his hands opening and shutting on the empty air.

His frantic gestures and the passion of his manner might have appalled even a brave man. But the woman, who had evinced less surprise and more fear on making the discovery, waved him back with the purest contempt. "Fool!" she hissed, with a flash of scorn in her eyes, "do you think that I should have played this farce with you?"

"But the gold?" he cried, cowering away from her in a moment like the craven he was. "It is gone, woman! It is gone, you see! If you have not taken it, who has? For heaven's sake, say you have taken it, and hidden it somewhere else!"

She looked darkly at him, and the look did more to persuade him she was innocent than any words. He wrung his hands and all but wept. "Some one has taken it," he moaned. "It is gone, and I shall never see it again!"