A Prisoner in Fairyland (The Book That 'Uncle Paul' Wrote)Blackwood, Algernon
Science
A Prisoner in Fairyland (The Book That 'Uncle Paul' Wrote)
Blackwood, Algernon
Magic -- Fiction; Voyages and travels -- Fiction
There were cross-currents, though. The main, broad, shining stream
poured downwards in front of them towards the opening of the Cave, a
mile or two beyond, where the forests dipped down among the precipices
of the Areuse; but from behind--from some house in the slumbering
village--came a golden tributary too, that had a peculiar and
astonishing brightness of its own. It came, so far as they could make
out, from the humped outline of La Citadelle, and from a particular
room there, as though some one in that building had a special source
of supply. Moreover, it scattered itself over the village in separate
swift rivulets that dived and dipped towards particular houses here
and there. There seemed a constant coming and going, one stream
driving straight into the Cave, and another pouring out again, yet
neither mingling. One stream brought supplies, while the other
directed their distribution. Some one, asleep or awake--they could not
tell--was thinking golden thoughts of love and sympathy for the world.
'It's Mlle. Lemaire,' said Jimbo. 'She's been in bed for thirty
years---' His voice was very soft.
'The Spine, you know,' exclaimed Monkey, a little in the rear.
'----and even in the daytime she looks white and shiny,' added the
boy. 'I often go and talk with her and tell her things.' He said it
proudly. 'She understands everything--better even than Mother.' Jimbo
had told most. It was all right. His leadership was maintained and
justified. They entered the main stream and plunged downwards with it
towards the earth--three flitting figures dipped in this store of
golden brilliance.
A delicious and wonderful thing then happened. All three remembered.
'This was where we met you first,' they told him, settling down among
the trees together side by side. 'We saw your teeth of gold. You came
in that train----'
'I was thinking about it--in England,' he exclaimed, 'and about coming
out to find you here.'
'The Starlight Express,' put in Jimbo.
'----and you were just coming up to speak to us when we woke, or you
woke, or somebody woke--and it all went,' said Monkey.
'That was when I stopped thinking about it,' he explained.
'It all vanished anyhow. And the next time was'--she paused a moment--
'you--we saw your two gold teeth again somewhere, and half recognised
you----'
It was the daylight world that seemed vague and dreamlike now, hard to
remember clearly.
'In another train--' Jimbo helped her, 'the Geneva omnibus that starts
at--at----' But even Jimbo could not recall further details.
'You're wumbled,' said Rogers, helping himself and the others at the
same time. 'You want some starlight to put you in touch again. Come
on; let's go in. We shall find all the others inside, I suspect, hard
at it.'
'At what?' asked two breathless voices.
'Collecting, of course--for others. Did you think they ate the stuff,
just to amuse themselves?'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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