Karen had heard these stories, and laughed at them. No fairy or gnome had ever met her eyes in the woods she loved so well; and as for hair, Rosel Pilaff's, and Gretchen Erl's too, was almost as pale as hers. Fair hair is common enough in the German mountains. Her little boy – bless him! – had downy rings which promised to become auburn in time, the color of his father's beard. She did not believe in the gnome story a bit.
But there came a time when she almost wished to believe it, for the gnomes are said to be wise folk, and little Fritz fell ill of a strange disease, which neither motherly wisdom nor motherly nursing was able to reach. Each day left him thinner and weaker, till he seemed no more than half his former size. His very face looked strange as it lay on the cradle-pillow, and Karen was at her wits' end to know what to do.
"I will go to the village and ask Mother Klaus to come and see the child," said Fritz. "She may know of a remedy."
"It will be of no use," declared Karen, sadly. "She went to the Berards' and the baby died, and to Heinrich's and little Marie died. But go, go, Fritz! – only come back soon, lest our angel take flight while you are away!"
She almost pushed him from the door, in her impatience to have him return.
A while after, when the baby had wailed himself to sleep, she went again to the door to look down the path into the valley. It was too soon to hope for Fritz, but the movement seemed a relief to her restlessness. It was dusk, not dark, – a sweet, mild dusk, with light enough left to show the tree-branches as they met and waved against the dim yellow sky. Deep shadows lay on the moss-beds and autumn flowers which grew beneath; only a faint perfume here and there told of their presence, and the night was very near.
Too unhappy to mind the duskiness, Karen wandered a little way up the wood-path, and sat down on the root of an old oak, so old that the rangers had given it the name of "Herr Grandfather." It was only to clear her brimming eyes that she sat down. She wiped them with her kerchief, and, with one low sob, was about to rise, when she became aware that somebody was standing at her side.
This somebody was a tiny old woman, with a pale, shadowy, but sweet face, framed in flossy white hair. She wore a dark, foreign-looking robe; a pointed hood, edged with fur, was pulled over her head; and the hand which she held out as she spoke was as white as the stalk of celery.
"What is the matter, my child?" she asked, in a thin, rustling voice, which yet sounded pleasantly, because it was kind.
"My baby is so ill," replied Karen, weeping.
"How ill?" inquired the old woman, anxiously. "Is it cold? Is it fever? Do its eyes water? My baby once had a cold, and her eyes – " She stopped abruptly.
"His eyes do not water," said Karen, who felt singularly at home with the stranger. "But his head is hot, and his hands; he sleeps ill, and for these ten days has hardly eaten. He grows thinner and whiter every hour, and wails whenever he is awake. Oh, what am I doing? I must go back to him." And, as she spoke, she jumped from her seat.
"One minute!" entreated the little old woman. "Has he pain anywhere?"
"He cries when I move his head," said Karen, hurrying on.
The stranger went too, keeping close beside her in a swift, soundless way.
"Take courage, Liebchen, child to her who was child of my child's child," she said. "Weep not, my darling. I will send you help. Out of the wisdom of the earth shall come aid for the little dear one."
"What do you mean?" cried Karen, stopping short in her surprise.
But the old woman did not answer. She had vanished. Had the wind blown her away?
"How could I wander so far? How could I leave my baby? Wicked mother that I am!" exclaimed Karen, in sudden terror, as she ran into the cottage.
But nothing seemed disturbed, and no one had been there. The baby lay quietly in his cradle, and the room was quite still, save for the hiss of the boiling pot and the fall of an ember on the hearth. Gradually her heart ceased its terrified beating; a sense of warmth and calm crept over her, her eyes drooped, and, seated at the cradle-foot, she fell asleep in her chair.
Whether it was an hour or a minute that she slept, she never knew. Slowly and dimly her waking senses crept back to her; but though she heard and saw and understood, she could neither stir nor speak. Two forms were bending over the cradle, forms of little men, venerable and shadowy, with hair like snow, and blanched, pale hands, like her visitor of the afternoon. They did not look at Karen, but consulted together above the sleeping child.
"It is here, brother, and here," said one, laying his finger gently on the baby's head and heart.
"Does it lie too deep for our reaching?" asked the second, anxiously.
"No. The little herb you know of is powerful."
"And the crystal dust you know of is more powerful still."
Then they took out two minute caskets, and Karen saw them open the baby's lips, and each drop in a pinch of some unknown substance.
"He is of ours," whispered one, "more of ours than any of them have been since the first."
"He has the gift of the far sight," said the other, lightly touching the closed eyes, "the divining glance, and the lucky finger."
"I read in him the apprehension of metals," said the second old man, "the sense of hidden treasures, the desire to penetrate."
"We will teach him how the waters run, and what the birds say – yes, and the way in and the way out!"
"Put the charm round his neck, brother."
Then Karen saw the little men tie a bright object round the baby's neck. She longed to move, but still she sat mute and powerless, while the odd figures passed round the cradle, slowly at first, then faster and faster, crooning, as they went, a song which was like wind in branches, and of which this scrap lodged in her memory: —
"Eyes to pierce the darkness through,
Wit to grasp the hidden clew,
Heart to feel and hand to do, —
These the gnomes have given to you."
So the song and the circling movement went on, faster and more fast, and round and round, till Karen's head swam and her senses seemed to spin in a whirling dance; and she knew no more till roused by the opening of the door, and Fritz's voice exclaiming: "Come in, Dame Klaus – come in! Karen! Where are you, wife? Ah, here she is, fast asleep, and the little man is asleep too."
"I am not asleep," said Karen, finding her voice with an effort. Then, to her husband's surprise, she began to weep bitterly. But, for all his urgings, she would not tell the cause, for she was afraid of Dame Klaus's tongue.
The dame shook her head over the sick baby. He was very bad, she said; still, she had brought through others as bad as he, and there was no telling. She asked for a saucepan, and began to brew a tea of herbs, while Karen, drawing her husband aside, told her wonderful tale in a whisper.
"Thou wert dreaming, Karen; it is nothing but a dream," declared the astounded Fritz.
"No, no," protested Karen. "It was not a dream. Baby will be well again, and great things are to happen! You will see! The little men know!"
"Little men! Oh, Karen! Karen!" exclaimed Fritz.
But he said no more, for Karen, bending over the cradle, lifted the strange silver coin which was tied round the baby's neck, and held