The Three Mulla-mulgars Page 8

  CHAPTER VIII

  Nod still lay huddled up in his jacket, his small, hairy face all drawnand grey, his eyes tight-shut and sorrowful beneath their thick blacklashes. Mishcha squatted over him, and put her head down close to hislittle body. "He breathes no more, sister, than a moth or anImmamoosa-bud."

  "Let us drag him out of his sheep-skin, and bury him in the snow," saidMoha.

  But Mishcha listened more closely still. "I hear his heart beating; Ihear his drowsy blood just come and go. But what is it that, sweeterthan a panther's breath, smells so of Magic? We must not harm the littleMulgar, sister; he is cunning. A Meermut of Magic would soon return toplague us." So she wrapped him up still closer in dry leaves andtree-moss, and opened his mouth to sprinkle a pinch of snow between hislips.

  All that night and the next day Nod slept without stirring. But theevening after that, when the snow had ceased again, he opened his eyesand called "Wallah, wallah!" Mishcha hopped off and brought him snow ina plantain-leaf, and wrapped him up still warmer. But the little dryherbs and powdered root she put on his tongue he choked at, and couldnot swallow. His shoulder burned, he tossed to and fro with eyesblazing. Now he would start up and shout, "Thumb, Thumb!" then presentlyhis face would all pucker up with fear, and he would scream, "The fire,the fire!" and then soon after he would be whispering, "Muzza, muzza,mutta; kara mutta, mutta!" just as if he were at home again in thelittle dried-up Portingal's hut.

  Mishcha did all she could to soothe and quieten him. And at last shemanaged to make him swallow a little hard bright blue seed calledCandar, which drives away fever and quiets dreams. But old Moha eyed himangrily, and wanted to throw him out into the forest to die. "Who'dsleep in a jacket that a gibbering Mulgar has died in?" she said.

  When the next night was nearly gone, but before it was yet day, Nodawoke, cool and clear, and stared into the musty darkness of theDragon-tree, wondering in vain where he was. Only one small spark oflight could he see--the red star Antares, that was now burning through alittle rift in the bark. He thought he heard a faint rustling of dryleaves.

  "Hey, there!" he called out. "Where is Nod?"

  "Hold your tongue, thieving Mulgar," cried an angry voice, "and lethonest folk sleep in peace."

  "If I could see," Nod answered weakly, "you wouldn't sleep muchto-night, honest or no."

  "You can't see," answered the voice softly, "because, my man of bones,you are dead and buried under the snow."

  Nod grew cold. He pinched his legs; he opened and shut his mouth, andtook long, deep breaths; then he laughed. "It's none so bad, then, beingdead, Voice-of-Kindness," he said cheerfully, "if it weren't for thissore shoulder of mine."

  But to this the morose voice made no answer. Not yet, even, could Nodremember all that had happened. "Hey, there!" he called out againpresently, "who buried me, then?"

  "Buried you? Why, Mishcha and Moha, the old witch-hares, who found yousnuffling in the snow in your stolen sheep's-coat--Mishcha and Moha, whowouldn't touch monkey-skin, not for a grove of green Candar-trees."

  "I remember Moha," said Nod meekly, "a gentle and sleek, a very, veryhandsome old Quatta. And is she dead, too?"

  But again the sour voice made no reply.

  "Once," said Nod, in a little while, "I had two brave brothers. I wonderwhere those Mulla-mulgars are now?"

  "He wonders," said the voice slowly--"he _wonders_! Frizzling,frizzling, frizzling, my pretty Talk-by-Night, with seven smokingGelica-nuts for company on the spit."

  At this Nod fell silent. He lay quaking in his warm, rustling bed, withpuckered forehead and restless eyes, wondering if the voice had toldhim the truth, while daybreak stole abroad in the forest.

  When dusk began to stir within the Dragon-tree, Mishcha awoke and cameand looked at him.

  She hearkened at his ribs and mouth, and there seemed, Nod thought, alittle kindness in her ways. So he put out his shrunken hand, and said:"Tell me truly, witch-hare. A voice in the night was merry with me, andtold me for pleasure that my brothers Thumb and Thimble were frizzlingon the cannibal Minimuls' spits. That is not true?"

  "'One long and lean,'" said Mishcha, "'one fat and very heavy, and onesly and tiny, a Nizza-neela.' Here's the Nizza-neela Mulla-mulgar; Iknow nothing of the others."

  "Ah, then," said Nod, starting up out of his bed, "I must be off to lookfor them. Their Little Horses ran faster than mine. And mine, he was acoward, and nibbled my sore shoulder to make me loose hold. But he couldnot buck or scrape me off, witch-hare, tried he never so hard. I must beoff at once to look for my brothers. If they are dead, then I die too."

  "Well, well," said the old hare, "it's sad to die, but it's sadder tolive alone. But tell me first one thing," she said. "Where have thesestrange Mulgars come from in their rags and bravery?"

  "Ohe," said Nod, and told her who they were.

  "And tell me just one thing more," she said, when he had finished."Where, little Mulgar, is all this Magic I can smell?"

  And at that question Nod thought he could never keep from laughing. Buthe looked very solemn, and said: "There are three things, old hare, Ialways carry about with me--one is my sheep's-jacket, one is hunger, andthe other is Magic; and the Magic just now is where my hunger is."

  The old hare eyed him narrowly. "Well," she said, "wherever it is, if ithadn't been for the Magic, little Mulgar, the Jaccatrays would have beenquarrelling over your bones. But there! remember old Mishcha sometimesin your travels, who hated every Mulgar except just one little one!" Shebade him be very quiet, for her sister, after the night's talk, stilllay fast asleep, her eyes wide open, in the gloom.

  And she put Ukka-nuts, and dried berries and fruits of many kinds, andseven pepper-pods into his pockets, and buttoned the flaps. And she gavehim also some powdered physic-nuts, three bright-blue Candar-seeds, anda little bunch of faded saffron-flower for a protection against theteeth of the dreaded Coccadrillo. She tied up his shoulder with softclean moss, and fetched him a stout stick for cudgel out of the forest.And then she hobbled out with him to see him on his way. Dawn lay rosyand still upon the snow-laden branches.

  "Where burns the Sulemn[=a]gar, old hare?" said Nod, pretending utterbravery. And the wise old Quatta hare pointed out to him where still theSulemn[=a]gar gleamed faint and silver above the glistening trees.

  So Nod thanked her, went forward a few paces, and stepped back to thankher again; then set out truly and for good.

  He walked very cautiously, spying about him as he went. The red sunglinted on his cudgel. Once he saw a last night's leopard's track in thesnow. So he roved his eyes aloft as well as to left and right of him,lest she should be lying in wait, crouched in the branches. A troop ofSkeetoes pelted him with Ukka-nuts. But these, as fast as they threwthem down, he gathered up and put into his bulging pockets, and wavedhis cap at them for thanks. They gibbered and mocked at him, and flungmore nuts. "So long as it isn't stones, my long-tailed friends," he saidto himself, "I will not throw back."

  After a while he came to where Cullum and Samarak grew so dense amid thetree-trunks that he could scarcely walk upright. But he determined, ashis mother had bidden him, to keep from stooping on to his fours as longas ever he could. Tumbling Numnuddies startled him, calling in the air.And once a clouded vulture with wings at least six cudgels wide droppedlike a stone upon a leafless B[=o][=o]bab-branch, and watched himgloatingly go limping by.

  He sat down in his loneliness and rested, and nibbled one of Mishcha'snuts. But try as he might, he could not swallow much. When once more heset out, for a long way some skulking beast which he could not plainlysee stalked through the nodding grasses a few paces distant from him,but side by side. He flourished his cudgel, and sang softly theMulla-mulgars' Journey-Song which Seelem had taught him long ago:

  "That one Alone Who's dared, and gone To seek the Magic Wonderstone, No fear, Or care, Or black despair, Shall heed until his journey's done.

  "Who knows Where blows The Mulgars' rose, In valleys 'neat
h unmelting snows-- All secrets He Shall pierce and see, And walk unharmed where'er he goes."

  Whether it was the Wonderstone under his breast-bone, on the sight ofhis cudgel, or a distaste for his shrill voice and skinniness, Nod couldnot tell, but in a little while, when he stopped a moment to peerbetween the thick streamers of Samarak, the secret beast was gone. Daydrew on. He saw no tracks in the snow, except of wild pig andlong-snouted Brackanolls. The only sound he heard was the falling offrosted clots of snow from the branches of the trees and the sad,continuous "Oo-ee, oo-ee, oo-ee!" of the little rust-coloured Bittockamid the sunlit snow. He did not dare now to rest, though his feet grewmore painful at every step, and his poisoned shoulder itched and ached.

  He stumbled on, scarcely heeding where his footsteps were leading him.Mulgar flies, speckled and humped, roused by the cloudless sun, buzzedround his eyes and bit and stung him. And suddenly his heart stood stillat sight of seven amber and spotted beasts standing amid the grasses,casting a league-long shadow with their necks--such beasts as he hadnever seen before. But they were busy feeding, their heads and tinyhorns and lustrous eyes half hidden in the foliage of the branches. Nodstared in fear and wonder, and passed their arbour very softly by.

  Night began to fall, and the long-beaked bats to flit in their leatheryhoods, seeking small birds and beasts to quench their thirst. It seemednow to Nod, his brave heart fallen, that he was utterly forsaken.Darkness had always sent him scuttling home to the Portingal's hut whenhe was little. How often his mother had told him that N[=o][=o]manossiwith his luring harp-strings roamed these farther forests, and strangebeasts, too, that never show their faces to the sun! Worse still, as helifted his poor wrinkled forehead to the tree-tops to catch the lastbeams of day, he felt a dreadful presence around him. Leopard it wasnot, nor Gunga, nor Minimul. He stood still, his left hand resting onits knuckles in the snow, his right clutching his cudgel, and leaninghis round ear sidelong, he listened and listened. He put down hiscudgel, and stood upright, his hands clasped behind his neck, andlifting his flat nose, sniffed and sniffed again the scarcely-stirringair. There was a smell, faint and strange. He turned as if to rush away,to hide himself--anywhere away from this brooding, terrifying smell,when, as if it were a little voice speaking beneath his ribs, he heardthe words: "Fear not, Ummanodda; press on, press on!" He took up hiscudgel with a groan, and limped quickly forward, and in an instantbefore he could start back, before even he could cry out, he heard aclick, his foot slipped, out of the leaves whipped something smooth andshining, and he was jerked into the air, caught, bound fast in a snare.

  He writhed and kicked, he spat and hissed. But the more he struggled,the tighter drew the cord round his neck. Everywhere, faint andtrembling, rose the strange and dreadful unknown smell. He hung quitestill. And as he dangled in pain, a night-wandering Bittock on a branchabove him called piteously: "Oo-ee, oo-ee, oo-ee!"

  "Why do you mock me, my friend?" groaned Nod.

  "Oo-ee, oo-ee, oo-ee!" wailed the Bittock, and hopping down slowly,perched herself before his face. Her black eye gleamed. She clapped hertiny wings above her head, and softly let them fold. "Oo-ee, oo-ee,oo-ee!" she cried again.

  Nod stared in a rage: "Oo-ee, oo-ee!" he mocked her feebly. "Who'scaught me in this trap? Why do you come mocking me, swinging here todie? Put out my eyes, Bird of Sorrow. Nod's tired of being Nod."

  The little bird seemed to listen, with rusty poll poked forward. Shepuffed out her feathers, raised her pointed bill, and piercingly intothe shadows rang out her trembling voice again. "Oo-ee, oo-ee, oo-ee!"she sang, spread her wings, and left Nod quite alone.

  His thong twitched softly. He shut his eyes. And once again, borne onthe faint cold wind, that smell came sluggishly to his nostrils. Hisfears boiled up. His hair grew wet on his head. And suddenly he heard adistant footfall. Nearer and nearer--not panther's, nor Gunga's, norEphelanto's. And then some ancient voice whispered in his memory:"Oomgar, Oomgar!" Man!