Part 26 (1/2)
The next day, the little girl-whose name was Elsie-was at the stream again. She had brought her little sister, who had the same orange hair and spatter of freckles. Jack and Jill were in a tree this time, inventing stories for each other.
”Can I come up?” Elsie asked. Jack gestured for her to join them.
”Can I?” echoed her little sister in a thin voice.
”Sure,” said Jill. And she slid over on the branch to make room for the girls.
Over the course of the next week, a small group of children formed in the forest. Each day, in the warmth of the late afternoon, they would gather and play with Jack and Jill. And no one said anything about their skin or their clothes or where they lived. They just did not seem to care.
Soon, it was a regular ritual. Every day, after Jack and Jill had sold the last of their sticks, they would be greeted by a small group of boys and girls at their clearing in the wood. It felt good. It felt like home.
From time to time, Jack and Jill still took out the Gla.s.s. They peered into it, marveling at its perplexing uselessness.
”How did the goblins find it so valuable?” Jack wondered.
”Dunno,” Jill shrugged. They studied it for a while longer. ”Guess the whole quest was a waste,” she concluded, tossing it aside.
”Yeah,” Jack agreed.
But neither child felt that way. Not anymore. Not at all.
And then, one day, the frog poked his head out of the hollow log in the clearing. ”Hey, guys! I figured something out!”
Jack lifted him out of the log.
”Get the Gla.s.s, too,” the frog instructed Jill.
She looked at him oddly, and then reached down and withdrew the Gla.s.s from its hiding place in the log.
”Hold it up,” the frog directed Jill. She held the Gla.s.s in front of him.
”Still looks like a fat old frog,” said Jack.
The frog ignored him. ”I think I know what it says.”
Jack looked at the frog's reflection. ”You know what what says?”
”The inscription, dummy!” cried the frog.
Suddenly, the children's expressions grew serious. Jill said, ”It says, 'Fo timb hat da jeek, bok no father.'”
”Great wisdom,” added Jack.
”Maybe it's in goblin . . .” Jill wondered.
”No, stop, listen for a second,” the frog insisted. ”It's not, 'Fo timb hat da jeek, bok no father.' That first letter isn't an f , it's a t.”
”To?” Jill said slowly.
”And in the next word, it's not a t, it's an f.”
Jack and Jill leaned more closely over the Gla.s.s.
”And an n, not an m, and, I guess, a weird looking d.”
”How much time have you been spending on this?” Jack asked.
”A lot,” said the frog. ”And that's a w, not a decorative squiggle.”
Jack leaned over, his finger on his lips, peering at the letters. ”Oh . . .” he murmured.
”And that's a y, not a d. And an e, not an a.”
”Where did you learn to read?” Jill asked suddenly.
But Jack said, ”Frog, you're a genius . . .”
The frog grinned and went on. ”Then there's an s, not a j, and that's two o's after an l, not a b and an o.”
Jill nodded wonderingly.
”Finally,” said the frog, ”that's not an a. It's a u and an r.”
Jack and Jill studied the mirror.
Their eyes traveled down the silvered pane.
They stared at their reflections.
And Jack and Jill, staring into the Gla.s.s, suddenly realized what their quest had actually been for, and what they had really been seeking all this time. And at that very moment, they found it.
Wait!
What?
What just happened?
What had they been looking for? What did they find?
Is the mirror magic? What did it show them?