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
Sweeping chimneys and cleaning flues,
That is the work I love;
Brushing away the blacks and the blues,
And letting in light from above!
I twirl my broom in your tired brain
When you're tight in sleep up-curled,
Then scatter the stuff in a soot-like rain
Over the edge of the world.
The voice grew fainter and fainter in the distance--
For I'm a tremendously busy Sweep,
Catching the folk when they're all asleep,
And tossing the blacks on the Rubbish Heap
Over the edge of the world...!
The voice died away into the wind among the high branches, and they
heard it no more.
'There's a Sweep worth knowing,' murmured Rogers, strong yearning in
him.
'There are no blacks or blues in _my_ brain,' exclaimed Monkey, 'but
Jimbo's always got some on his face.'
The impudence passed ignored. Jimbo took his cousin's hand and led him
to the opening. The 'men' went in first together; the other sex might
follow as best it could. Yet somehow or other Monkey slipped between
their legs and got in before them. They stood up side by side in the
most wonderful place they had ever dreamed of.
And the first thing they saw was--Jane Anne.
'I'm collecting for Mother. Her needles want such a chronic lot, you
see.' Her face seemed full of stars; there was no puzzled expression
in the eyes now. She looked beautiful. And the younger children stared
in sheer amazement and admiration.
'I have no time to waste,' she said, moving past them with a load in
her spread apron that was like molten gold; 'I have to be up and awake
at six to make your porridge before you go to school. I'm a busy
monster, I can tell you!' She went by them like a flash, and out into
the night.
Monkey felt tears in her somewhere, but they did not fall. Something
in her turned ashamed--for a moment. Jimbo stared in silence. 'What a
girl!' he thought. 'I'd like to be like that!' Already the light was
sticking to him.
'So this is where she always comes,' said Monkey, soon recovering from
the temporary attack of emotion. 'She's better out than in; she's
safest when asleep! No wonder she's so funny in the daytime.'
Then they turned to look about them, breathing low as wild-flowers
that watch a rising moon.
The place was so big for one thing--far bigger than they had expected.
The storage of lost starlight must be a serious affair indeed if it
required all this space to hold it. The entire mountain range was
surely hollow. Another thing that struck them was the comparative
dimness of this huge interior compared with the brilliance of the
river outside. But, of course, lost things are ever dim, and those
worth looking for dare not be too easily found.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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