Part 9 (1/2)
XI. HOPE
”Dear me!” said Red Rex, when Harold had finished this story. ”I never saw one of those lion-dolls which your tale mentions. I would that I had one to present to my little girl.”
”Have you a little girl?” exclaimed Harold in surprise. ”Why, I had no idea that you were the father of little children.”
”Well, why not?” asked the Red King crossly. ”I have a dear little girl of seven, and her name is Hope.”
”Oh, if you have a dear little girl of your own, how can you make war on a city where other dear little girls live?” cried Harold. ”I cannot understand!”
”No, you cannot understand, because you are only a child yourself,” said the Red King. ”When you are grown up you will feel differently.”
”Your Majesty, I do not think so,” declared Harold, shaking his head decidedly. ”When I have learned all the books in our library, and seen all the countries there are to see, and done all the interesting things there are to do, there may be time to think about war. But these other matters will keep me busy all my life, I should think.”
”Rubbis.h.!.+--Can one purchase a lion-doll in your city?” asked Red Rex, changing the subject uneasily.
”Yes,” said Harold. ”Every child in the city owns a lion-doll. Your Majesty ought to visit the great factory at Derrydown, near where Claribel lived,--where the dolls are still made. It is close by the Ancient Wood, where there was such good hunting, and where David had his adventure with the Old Gnome, you know.”
”No, I do not know the Old Gnome,” retorted the Red King peevishly. ”How do you expect me to know all the legends of your precious country? We know nothing about this Kingdom in my own warlike land.”
”Then why should you want to fight us?” asked Harold. ”If you had taken the trouble to know us better, you could then judge whether we deserve to be fought. But I think you would like our people if you knew them.”
Again Red Rex changed the subject. ”What of the hunting in this Ancient Wood?” he asked. ”When I have taken your city, and after it the rest of your Kingdom, I will go there to hunt.”
”There was good hunting,” said Harold, ”once upon a time. In those days one had to beware the wicked Gnomes of the Great Fear. That was why the Old One fled.”
”What about this 'Old One,' and this 'Great Fear'?” asked the Red King.
”I suppose that is another story which you want to read to me.”
”Nay; I do not care to read the tale unless Your Majesty wishes it,”
said Harold with dignity. ”But if Your Majesty desires a lion-doll for your little Princess, I can get one for you and return with it and the story at the same time. There is a dear little girl in the story. I think your daughter must be very like her.”
The Red King gnawed his red mustache and frowned forbiddingly at Harold.
At last he slapped his knee and gave a grunt of a.s.sent. ”Well,” said he, ”fetch me the doll and the book. I may as well give my soldiers another day's holiday. But in sooth, this has gone on too long! To-morrow's tale must positively be the last. I hope there will be much fighting in it.
Your tales are something too peaceful for my taste. Look, now! Your city must be destroyed in short order, because I have set my heart on it.”
”Will Your Majesty promise me one other thing, beside the truce, till my return?” begged Harold, looking up in his face with a winning smile.
Red Rex frowned and tried to look very wicked and cruel.
”Well, what is it now?” he growled.
”Promise me, Your Majesty, for the sake of your little dear daughter, whose name is Hope, that when you fight again you will spare that part of the city where the schoolhouse stands. Robert and Richard and all my friends are there.”
”What part of the city is that?” asked Red Rex sullenly.
”It is the west part,” answered Harold, pointing in the opposite direction from that in which he had declared the Wonder-Garden to have been.
”Very well; I promise,” said the Red King. ”_n.o.blesse oblige_.”