“And what is that you have there in your hand?”
“That,” said the old woman, “is the scepter he is making for the king’s Christmas present.” And turning her back to the kettle, she looked significantly at Snyge and tapped her forehead. “Tell Snyge about your present, Bebelle, and perhaps he will give you a better stick of wood.”
But the child held the stick close and answered fearfully: “Oh, no, thank you, Mother Jorgan! No, thank you! this will do very well for what I want. But I will tell the man what I know of it.”
At these words one of the small footmen, who had stopped swinging his hammer for a moment in order to eat a walnut, nudged his neighbor, and they both picked up their bowls of nuts and squatted down on the floor in front of the kettle. And the maid who dusted the royal throne, and was just then going through the kitchen, saw the pages and joined the little group.
“We will now have some fun,” one of them whispered to her.
Bebelle, who was unaware of his audience on the other side of the kettle, turning towards Snyge, began his tale.
“You see,” he said, “although I am lame and stupid and of no use to any one, the good king allows me to stay here in his kitchen. I sit here all day behind the kettle; and when Mother Jorgan has something else she must do, she allows me to stir the soup. Each day I have a crust of bread and bowl of froth from the top of the soup, and at night the baker allows me to lie behind the great oven. You see, I should be happy, for I have done nothing to deserve this easy lot. But sometimes I am very discontented. I was feeling that way one evening, and, as I was alone in the kitchen, I climbed up there on the table to look out of the casement. It was a lovely night, with all the stars shining, and as I stood there thinking how ashamed I should be to be unhappy when so much splendor was about me, I saw before me a beautiful hand reaching up on the other side of the sill. It clasped a stick of wood and a piece of paper. The hand laid them on the window-ledge, and I heard a voice like music say, “These are for you, Bebelle.’”
Here there was a great nudging and giggling on the part of his unseen audience, and the little maid called out, “Where is the paper now?”
Bebelle leaned far out over the kettle, and, seeing the maid’s duster on the floor, turned again to Snyge and said: “They often come to hear me tell about it. The paper blew into the fire,” he explained, and went on: “I was very much frightened and wanted to climb down from the window and leave them there, but at last I found courage to look at the paper. On it were these words: Justice, Mercy, Verity, Lowliness, Devotion, Patience, Courage, and, above all, Love. I stood there a long time, and at last I thought how fine it would be to make a new scepter for a Christmas present to the king, and to carve these words upon it. They are pretty words and have a pleasant sound. I have never heard the wonderful voice again, but I feel that this is what it would have me do.”
“Now tell about how the words come,” demanded one of the footmen.