It seemed to me hours that I lay there on my back in the bottom of the tarantass with my head hanging over the side, but of course it was only minutes. I was aroused by a prickling sensation in my left cheek, and as I slowly came to myself I discovered that it proceeded from the gravel thrown up against it by one of the front wheels of the tarantass, for the horses were galloping along at the top of their speed, and there on the driver’s seat sat my faithful Bulger, the reins in his teeth, bracing himself so as to keep them taut over the horses’ backs; and as I sat up and pressed my hand against my poor hurt head, the whole truth broke upon me: —
The moment Ivan had struck the ground Bulger had released his hold upon the fellow’s throat, and ere he had had a chance to revive had leaped up into the driver’s seat, and, catching up the reins in his teeth, had drawn them taut and thus put an end to the rearing and plunging of the frightened beasts and started them on their way, leaving the enraged Ivan brandishing his knife and uttering imprecations upon mine and Bulger’s heads as he saw his horses and wagon disappear in the distance. Now was it that a mad shouting assailed my ears and I caught a glimpse of half a dozen peasants who, seeing this, as they thought, empty tarantass come nearer and nearer with its galloping horses, had abandoned their work and rushed out to intercept it.
Judge of their amazement, dear friends, as their eyes fell upon the calm and skillful driver bracing himself on the front seat, and with oft repeated backward tosses of his head urging those horses to bear his beloved master farther and farther away from the treacherous Ivan’s sheath-knife.
As the peasants seized the animals by the heads and brought them to a standstill, I staggered to my feet, and threw my arms around my dear Bulger. He was more than pleased with what he had done, and licked my bruised brow with many a piteous moan.
“St. Nicholas, save us!” cried one of the peasants, devoutly making the sign of the cross; “but if I should live long enough to fill the Giants’ Well with pebbles, I never would expect to see the like of this again.”
“The Giants’ Well, the Giants’ Well!” I murmured to myself as I followed one of the peasants to his cot, standing a little back from the highway, for I stood sore in need of rest after the terrible experience I had just had. The blow of Ivan’s whip-handle had jarred my brain, and I was skilled enough in surgery to know that the hurt called for immediate attention. As good luck would have it, I found beneath the peasant’s roof one of those old women, half witches perhaps, who have recipes for everything and who know an herb for every ailment. After she had examined the cut made by the loaded whip-handle, she muttered out,—
“It is not as broad as the mountain, nor as deep as the Giants’ Well, but it’s bad enough, little master.”
“The Giants’ Well again,” thought I, as I laid me down on the best bed they could make up for me. “I wonder where it may be, that Giants’ Well, and how deep it is, and who drinks the water that is drawn from it?”
Chapter 4
MY WOUND HEALS. — YULIANA TALKS ABOUT THE GIANTS’ WELL. — I RESOLVE TO VISIT IT. — PREPARATIONS TO ASCEND THE MOUNTAINS. — WHAT HAPPENED TO YULIANA AND TO ME. — REFLECTION AND THEN ACTION. — HOW I CONTRIVED TO CONTINUE THE ASCENT WITHOUT YULIANA FOR A GUIDE.
It was a day or so before I could walk steadily, and meantime I made unusual efforts to keep my brain quiet, but in spite of all I could do every mention of the Giants’ Well by one of the peasants sent a strange thrill through me, and I would find myself suddenly pacing up and down the floor, and repeating over and over again the words, “Giants’ Well! Giants’ Well!” Bulger was greatly troubled in his mind, and sat watching me with a most bewildered look in his loving eyes. He had half a suspicion, I think, that that cruel blow from Ivan’s whip-handle had injured my reasoning powers, for at times he uttered a low, plaintive whine. The moment I took notice of him, however, and acted more like myself, he gamboled about me in the wildest delight. As I had directed the peasants to drive Ivan’s horses back towards Ilitch on the Ilitch, until they should meet that miscreant and deliver them to him, I was now without any means of continuing my journey northward, unless I set out, like many of my famous predecessors, on foot. They had longer legs than I, however, and were not loaded with so heavy a brain in proportion to their size, and a brain, too, that scarcely ever slept, at least not soundly. I was too impatient to reach the portals to the World within a World to go trudging along a dusty highway. I must have horses and another tarantass, or at least a peasant’s cart. I must push on. My head was quite healed now, and my fever gone.
“Hearken, little master,” whispered Yuliana; such was the name of the old woman who had taken care of me, “thou art not what thou seemst. I never saw the like of thee before. If thou wouldst, I believe thou couldst tell me how high the sky is, how thick through the mountains are, and how deep the Giants’ Well is.”
I smiled, and then I said, —
“Didst ever drink from the Giants’ Well, Yuliana?”
At which she wagged her head and sent forth a low chuckle.
“Hearken, little master,” she then whispered, coming close to me, and holding up one of her long, bony fingers, “thou canst not trick me — thou knowest that the Giants’ Well hath no bottom.”
“No bottom?” I repeated breathlessly, as Don Fum’s mysterious words, “The people will tell thee!” flashed through my mind. “No bottom, Yuliana?”
“Not unless thine eyes are better than mine, little master,” she murmured, nodding her head slowly.
“Listen, Yuliana,” I burst out impetuously, “where is this bottomless well? Thou shalt lead me to it; I must see it. Come, let’s start at once. Thou shalt be well paid for thy pains.”
“Nay, nay, little master, not so fast,” she replied. “It’s far up the mountains. The way is steep and rugged, the paths are narrow and winding, a false step might mean instant death, were there not some strong hand to save thee. Give up such a mad thought as ever getting there, except it be on the stout shoulders of some mountaineer.”
“Ah, good woman,” was my reply, “thou hast just said that I am not what I seem, and thou saidst truly. Know, then, thou seest before thee the world-renowned traveller, Wilhelm Heinrich Sebastian von Troomp, commonly called ‘Little Baron Trump,’ that though short of stature and frail of limb, yet what there is of me is of iron. There, Yuliana, there’s gold for thee; now lead the way to the Giants’ Well.”
“Gently, gently, little baron,” almost whispered the old peasant woman, as her shrivelled hand closed upon the gold piece. “I have not told thee all. For leagues about, I ween, no living being excepting me knows where the Giants’ Well is. Ask them and they’ll say, “It’s up yonder in the mountains, away up under the eaves of the sky. That’s all. That’s all they can tell thee. But, little master, I know where it is, and the very herb that cured thy hurt head and saved thee from certain death by cooling thy blood, was plucked by me from the brink of the well!” These words sent a thrill of joy through me, for now I felt that I was on the right road, that the words of the great master of all masters, Don Fum, had come true.
“The people will tell thee!”
Ay, the people had told me, for now there was not the faintest shadow of doubt in my mind that I had found the portals to the World within a World! Yuliana should be my guide. She knew how to thread her way up the narrow pass, to turn aside from overhanging rocks which a mere touch might topple over, to find the steps which nature had hewn in the sides of the rocky parapets, and to pursue her way safely through clefts and gorges, even the entrance to which might be invisible to ordinary eyes. However, in order that the superstitious peasants might be kept friendly to me, I gave it out that I was about to betake myself to the mountains in search of curiosities for my cabinet,