Chapter VIII

Next morning when Prince Dolor awoke he perceived that his room was empty.

Very uncomfortable he felt, of course; and just a little frightened. Especially when he began to call again and again, but nobody answered.

"Nurse--dear nurse--please come back!" he called out. "Come back, and I will be the best boy in all the land."

And when she did not come back, and nothing but silence answered his lamentable call, he very nearly began to cry.

"This won't do," he said at last, dashing the tears from his eyes. "It's just like a baby, and I'm a big boy--shall be a man some day. What has happened, I wonder? I'll go and see."

He sprang out of bed and crawled from room to room on his knees.

"What in the world am I to do?" thought he, and sat down in the middle of the floor, half inclined to believe that it would be better to give up entirely, lay himself down and die.

This feeling, however, did not last long. He jumped up and looked out of the window. No help there. At first he only saw the broad bleak sunshiny plain. But, by-and-by, in the mud around the base of the tower he saw clearly the marks of horses' feet, and just in the spot where the deaf mute always tied his great black charger, there lay the remains of a bundle of hay.

"Yes, that's it. He has come and gone, taking nurse with him. Poor nurse! how glad she must have been to go!"

That was Prince Dolor's first thought. His second was one of indignation at her cruelty.

He decided that it would be easier to die here alone than out in the world, among the terrible doings which he had just beheld.

The deaf mute had come--contrived somehow to make the nurse understand that the king was dead, and that she need have no fear in going back to the capital.

"I hope she'll enjoy it," said the Prince.

And then a kind of remorse smote him for feeling so bitterly towards her, after all the years she had taken care of him--grudgingly, perhaps, still, she had taken care of him.

For the second time he tried to dress himself, and then to do everything he could for himself--even to sweeping the hearth and putting on more coals.

He then thought of his godmother. Not of calling her or asking her to help him--she had evidently left him to help himself, and he was determined to try his best to do it, being a very proud and independent boy--but he remembered her tenderly.

After his first despair, he was comfortable and happy in his solitude, but when it was time to go to bed, he was very lonely, even his little lark was silent and as for his traveling cloak, either he never thought about it, or else it had been spirited away--for he made no use of it, nor attempted to do so.

On the sixth day, Prince Dolor had a strange contented look in his face. Get out of the tower he could not; the ladder the deaf mute used was always carried away again and his food was nearly gone. So he made up his mind to die. Not that he wished to die; on the contrary, there was a great deal that he wished to live to do. Dying did not seem so very dreadful; not even to lie quietly like his uncle, whom he had entirely forgiven now.

"Suppose I had grown to be a man, and had had work to do, and people to care for, and was so useful and busy that they liked me, and perhaps even forgot that I was lame. Then, it would have been nice to have lived, I think," and tears came into the little fellow's eyes. Then he heard a trumpet, one of the great silver trumpets so admired in Nomansland. Not pleasant music, but very bold and grand.

The poor condemned woman had not been such a wicked woman after all. As soon as she heard of the death of the King, she persuaded the deaf-mute to take her away with him, and they galloped like the wind from city to city, spreading everywhere the news that Prince Dolor's death and burial had been an invention concocted by his wicked uncle--that he was alive and well, and the noblest young Prince that ever was born.

It was a bold stroke, but it succeeded. People jumped at the idea of this Prince, who was the son of their late good King and Queen.

"Hurrah for Prince Dolor! Let him be our king!" rang from end to end of the kingdom. They were determined to have him reign over them. Accordingly no sooner was the late king laid in his grave than they pronounced him a usurper; turned all his family out of the palace, and left it empty for the reception of the new sovereign, whom they went to fetch with great rejoicing.

They hailed him with delight, as prince and king and went down on their knees before him, offering the crown to him.

"Yes," he said, "if you desire it, I will be your king. And I will do my best to make my people happy."

"Oh!" said he, "if before I go, I could only see my dear godmother." He gazed sadly up to the skylight, whence there came pouring a stream of sunrays like a bridge between heaven and earth. Sliding down it, came the little woman in grey.

He held out his arms in eager delight.

"Oh, godmother, you have not forsaken me!"

"Not at all my son. You may not have seen me, but I have seen you many a time."

"How?"

"Oh, never mind. I can turn into anything I please you know."

"A lark, for instance," cried Prince Dolor.

"Or a Magpie," answered she with a capital imitation of Mag's croaky voice.

"You will not leave me now that I am king? Otherwise I had rather not be a king at all," said he.

The little old woman laughed gaily. "Forsake you? That is impossible. But now I must go. Good-bye! Open the window and out I fly."

Prince Dolor tried to hold his godmother fast, but in vain. A knocking was heard at the door, and the little woman vanished.

His godmother helped him out of many difficulties for there was never such a wise old woman.

He was very happy and contented; first, because he took his affliction patiently; second, because being a brave man, he bore it bravely. Therefore other people grew to love him so well, that I think hundreds of his subjects might have been found who were almost ready to die for their poor lame king.

He did a good many things, however, which a little astonished his subjects. First, he pardoned the condemned woman, who had been his nurse and ordered that there should be no such thing as the death punishment in Nomansland.

Then he chose the eldest son of his eldest cousin, a quiet, unobtrusive boy, to be educated as heir to the throne.

In course of time, when the little prince had grown into a tall young man, King Dolor fixed a day when the people should assemble in the great square of the capital to see the young prince installed solemnly in his new duties.

The king lifted up his thin slender hand and there came a silence over the vast crowd immediately as he pronounced the vows which made the young prince king.

My people he said, I am tired; I want to rest; it is time for me to go and I do not think I shall come back any more. He drew a little bundle out of his breast pocket. Then, so suddenly that even those nearest to his Majesty could not tell how, the king was away--floating right up in the air--upon something they knew not what. Whither he went or who went with him it is impossible to say, but I myself believe that his godmother took him on his traveling cloak to the Beautiful Mountains.

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