And one day she went to the
Court, and she wore on her head a crown of pure angel-gold, so nurse
said, and it shone like the sun, and it was much more splendid than the
crown the king was wearing himself, and in her ears she wore the
emeralds, and the big ruby was the brooch on her breast, and the great
diamond necklace was sparkling on her neck. And the king and queen
thought she was some great princess from a long way off, and got down
from their thrones and went to meet her, but somebody told the king and
queen who she was, and that she was quite poor. So the king asked why
she wore a gold crown, and how she got it, as she and her mother were so
poor. And she laughed, and said it wasn't a gold crown at all, but only
some yellow flowers she had put in her hair. And the king thought it was
very strange, and said she should stay at the Court, and they would see
what would happen next. And she was so lovely that everybody said that
her eyes were greener than the emeralds, that her lips were redder than
the ruby, that her skin was whiter than the diamonds, and that her hair
was brighter than the golden crown. So the king's son said he would
marry her, and the king said he might. And the bishop married them, and
there was a great supper, and afterwards the king's son went to his
wife's room. But just when he had his hand on the door, he saw a tall,
black man, with a dreadful face, standing in front of the door, and a
voice said--

    Venture not upon your life,
    This is mine own wedded wife. Then the king's son fell down on the ground in a fit. And they came and
tried to get into the room, but they couldn't, and they hacked at the
door with hatchets, but the wood had turned hard as iron, and at last
everybody ran away, they were so frightened at the screaming and
laughing and shrieking and crying that came out of the room. But next
day they went in, and found there was nothing in the room but thick
black smoke, because the black man had come and taken her away. And on
the bed there were two knots of faded grass and a red stone, and some
white stones, and some faded yellow flowers. I remembered this tale of
nurse's while I was standing at the bottom of the deep hollow; it was so
strange and solitary there, and I felt afraid. I could not see any
stones or flowers, but I was afraid of bringing them away without
knowing, and I thought I would do a charm that came into my head to
keep the black man away. So I stood right in the very middle of the
hollow, and I made sure that I had none of those things on me, and then
I walked round the place, and touched my eyes, and my lips, and my hair
in a peculiar manner, and whispered some queer words that nurse taught
me to keep bad things away. Then I felt safe and climbed up out of the
hollow, and went on through all those mounds and hollows and walls, till
I came to the end, which was high above all the rest, and I could see
that all the different shapes of the earth were arranged in patterns,
something like the grey rocks, only the pattern was different. It was
getting late, and the air was indistinct, but it looked from where I was
standing something like two great figures of people lying on the grass. And I went on, and at last I found a certain wood, which is too secret
to be described, and nobody knows of the passage into it, which I found
out in a very curious manner, by seeing some little animal run into the
wood through it. So I went after the animal by a very narrow dark way,
under thorns and bushes, and it was almost dark when I came to a kind of
open place in the middle. And there I saw the most wonderful sight I
have ever seen, but it was only for a minute, as I ran away directly,
and crept out of the wood by the passage I had come by, and ran and ran
as fast as ever I could, because I was afraid, what I had seen was so
wonderful and so strange and beautiful. But I wanted to get home and
think of it, and I did not know what might not happen if I stayed by the
wood. I was hot all over and trembling, and my heart was beating, and
strange cries that I could not help came from me as I ran from the
wood. I was glad that a great white moon came up from over a round hill
and showed me the way, so I went back through the mounds and hollows and
down the close valley, and up through the thicket over the place of the
grey rocks, and so at last I got home again. My father was busy in his
study, and the servants had not told about my not coming home, though
they were frightened, and wondered what they ought to do, so I told them
I had lost my way, but I did not let them find out the real way I had
been. I went to bed and lay awake all through the night, thinking of
what I had seen. When I came out of the narrow way, and it looked all
shining, though the air was dark, it seemed so certain, and all the way
home I was quite sure that I had seen it, and I wanted to be alone in my
room, and be glad over it all to myself, and shut my eyes and pretend it
was there, and do all the things I would have done if I had not been so
afraid. But when I shut my eyes the sight would not come, and I began to
think about my adventures all over again, and I remembered how dusky and
queer it was at the end, and I was afraid it must be all a mistake,
because it seemed impossible it could happen. It seemed like one of
nurse's tales, which I didn't really believe in, though I was frightened
at the bottom of the hollow; and the stories she told me when I was
little came back into my head, and I wondered whether it was really
there what I thought I had seen, or whether any of her tales could have
happened a long time ago. It was so queer; I lay awake there in my room
at the back of the house, and the moon was shining on the other side
towards the river, so the bright light did not fall upon the wall. And
the house was quite still. I had heard my father come upstairs, and just
after the clock struck twelve, and after the house was still and empty,
as if there was nobody alive in it. And though it was all dark and
indistinct in my room, a pale glimmering kind of light shone in through
the white blind, and once I got up and looked out, and there was a great
black shadow of the house covering the garden, looking like a prison
where men are hanged; and then beyond it was all white; and the wood
shone white with black gulfs between the trees. It was still and clear,
and there were no clouds on the sky. I wanted to think of what I had
seen but I couldn't, and I began to think of all the tales that nurse
had told me so long ago that I thought I had forgotten, but they all
came back, and mixed up with the thickets and the grey rocks and the
hollows in the earth and the secret wood, till I hardly knew what was
new and what was old, or whether it was not all dreaming.