The mouths of the poor little mine-sprites watered, and they smacked their lips, but Grouthead snapped his long snake-whip so that it sounded like a pistol-shot, and they frantically continued digging away in the earth with their fingers.
Boundingbore flew to do Dragonfel's bidding, and Snoutpimple observed, rather timidly:
"The air down here is very bad, kind master!"
"That's good," said Dragonfel, with hearty unction. "It might make me ill if I were obliged to remain, so as I have a proper regard for my health I think I will get right out into the open."
Attended by Mandrake, Snoutpimple, Wolfinger, and some of the rest, he went on his way, while Grouthead snapped his whip to incite the frightened, gasping, exhausted mine-sprites to further effort.
[Illustration: HELPLESSNESS IN THE MINE.]
When he came up out of the shaft Dragonfel gave a deep breath of relief as his nostrils sucked in the bracing air that had a salt tang of the sea in it. Out in the harbor there tossed a galleon on the lazy swell--a craft built low amid-ship, and with both bow and stern curving high into the air.
Dragonfel gazed off at it with interest, and remarked:
"It may come in handy soon if these Brownies and fairies continue longer. They are getting altogether too good, and must be stopped. But let us go back to the palace to see if anything has happened in our absence."
Nothing else was to be seen on the wide water to draw his attention, except some mermaids who were above the waves, engaged in combing their hair, who, to most people, are very interesting.
[Illustration]
A little bird with very acute hearing listened intently to his words as it lightly balanced on the twig of a gumdrop tree, and then flew straight across the sea to tell a fairy, who told the other fairies.
Dragonfel with his big, clumsy, lumbering cohorts strode on to the palace that was guarded by a Demon Usher--a queer, comical-looking chap who with his wings much resembled a human grasshopper, and who half flew, half walked.
He had thin little wisps of hair sticking out from each side of his nose, like the scanty whiskers of a cat.
The Demon Usher with hops and jumps escorted him to a magnificent throne, and grovelled with smirks before him, while Dragonfel with what he thought to be the quintessence of grace sank upon it, and then arranged himself in what he imagined was a kingly posture.
"Well," he gruffly said, "has anyone been here since I've been gone?"
"No, kind master!" the Demon Usher hastened to assure him. "No one has been here since the band and you remember them."
"Ah, that band!" repeated Dragonfel, with a shudder. "I can't get their notes out of my ears yet. But what have we here?"
[Illustration]
A huge creature resembling an octopus, with great, staring eyes popping from his head, and hundreds of fuzzy tentacles protruding in all directions from his grotesque body, came crawling toward him.
Straightway Dragonfel sprang up from the throne, while Wolfinger, Mandrake, Boundingbore, and Snoutpimple, who had assumed respectful positions at his sides, drew back in alarm.
But the Demon Usher gave a cackle of a laugh, and gleefully rubbed his hands together as though he were washing them with invisible soap.
"Have no fear, kind master!" said a thin, piping voice from somewhere within the horrid creature's hulk. "Is not this a pretty disguise?"
"The Red Spirit, as I live!" cried Dragonfel, in a tone of admiration not unmixed with relief. "You rascal, why have you chosen this masquerade?"
"But is it not a clever one?" persisted the Red Spirit. "See, kind master, I can either compress or expand myself at will."
As he spoke he shrank to practical insignificance, and then almost immediately afterward swelled out until it seemed that he would burst.
"Capital!" said Dragonfel encouragingly. "You can be of great assistance to me. I have a mean task for you to do."
"The meaner the better, kind master!"
Dragonfel raised his arm, and pointed toward a window that gave a vista of the far-off, smiling sea.
"Go, Human Octopus," he commanded, "and spy upon the Brownies and fairies!" Without another word the hideous object started to crawl off by means of his myriad tentacles, and all who were present watched his convulsive, eccentric movements with malicious satisfaction.
[Illustration]
CHAPTER V
PRINCE FLORIMEL MEETS THE BROWNIES
[Illustration]
Prince Florimel gave a great shudder of fright when the gift of his ex-fairy godmother so utterly failed him in that moment of terrible danger. As the savage beasts, screaming for his blood, came toward him, he turned and fled, without relaxing his hold upon the treacherous bow.
He made a frantic leap for the trunk of the tree, and grasping one of the low branches pulled himself up with desperate haste as far as he could.
The beasts with thunderous roars and sharp teeth showing sprang up at him, and a lion with knife-like claws just grazed the skin of one of his legs, and tore off a portion of his garment.
Florimel climbed up further, and still further, for safety, while the animals roaring their defeat continued to hurl themselves at the tree until it shook and shook again.
[Illustration]
Finally they took to fighting among themselves, with outcries that were terrible, and finished by slinking or limping away discomfited.
[Illustration]
The eaglets disturbed by all this clamor perched on the edges of their nest as though deliberating upon the hazard of trying for the first time their wings in the dizzy space of blue. High overhead their angry parents soared screaming their protests at what seemed to them an unwarrantable intrusion.
Still retaining the bow, Florimel climbed out toward the nest, intending to usurp possession of it, and with timid flaps of their untried wings the eaglets essayed flight. Finding they could fly, they soon gained confidence, and joined the parent-birds who led them a mad aerial chase.
Soon Florimel was the sole tenant of the nest, and, after he had established himself comfortably in his new quarters, he set about to repair the damage to the bow.
He tied the broken cord securely, and drew it taut, pulling it back as far as he could repeatedly, but he did not waste in a trial one of the remaining arrows in his quiver. For, though it had already brought to him one grievous disappointment, he still had faith in his ex-fairy godmother's gift.
[Illustration]
The eagles resenting his possession of their home kept flying threateningly at him, but every time they came near he menaced them with the bow and drove them away. Finally they alighted on another limb of the tree, where they all sat in a row viewing him with silent moody protest.
Worn by fatigue and excitement Florimel closed his eyes in sleep, with an arm bared to the elbow hanging from the nest. When at last he was awakened by a confused babel of voices from below, dusk had fallen, and a crescent moon hung low in the sky.
The eagles young and old in agitated manner once more were circling the darkening sky, and leaning over the nest and looking down Florimel was astounded by what he saw.