As she said this, she stepped up to the housemaid and gave her,
instead of time to answer, a box on the ear that almost threw her

down; and whoever could get at her began to push and bustle and
pinch and punch her.

'You invite your fate,' she said quietly.
They fell furiously upon her, drove her from the hall with kicks

and blows, hustled her along the passage, and threw her down the
stair to the wine cellar, then locked the door at the top of it,

and went back to their breakfast.
In the meantime the king and the princess had had their bread and

wine, and the princess, with Curdie's help, had made the room as
tidy as she could - they were terribly neglected by the servants.

And now Curdie set himself to interest and amuse the king, and
prevent him from thinking too much, in order that he might the

sooner think the better. Presently, at His Majesty's request, he
began from the beginning, and told everything he could recall of

his life, about his father and mother and their cottage on the
mountain, of the inside of the mountain and the work there, about

the goblins and his adventures with them.
When he came to finding the princess and her nurse overtaken by the

twilight on the mountain, Irene took up her share of the tale, and
told all about herself to that point, and then Curdie took it up

again; and so they went on, each fitting in the part that the other
did not know, thus keeping the hoop of the story running straight;

and the king listened with wondering and delighted ears, astonished
to find what he could so ill comprehend, yet fitting so well

together from the lips of two narrators.
At last, with the mission given him by the wonderful princess and

his consequent adventures, Curdie brought up the whole tale to the
present moment. Then a silence fell, and Irene and Curdie thought

the king was asleep. But he was far from it; he was thinking about
many things. After a long pause he said:

'Now at last, MY children, I am compelled to believe many things I
could not and do not yet understand - things I used to hear, and

sometimes see, as often as I visited my mother's home. Once, for
instance, I heard my mother say to her father - speaking of me -

"He is a good, honest boy, but he will be an old man before he
understands"; and my grandfather answered, "Keep up your heart,

child: my mother will look after him." I thought often of their
words, and the many strange things besides I both heard and saw in

that house; but by degrees, because I could not understand them, I
gave up thinking of them. And indeed I had almost forgotten them,

when you, my child, talking that day about the Queen Irene and her
pigeons, and what you had seen in her garret, brought them all back

to my mind in a vague mass. But now they keep coming back to me,
one by one, every one for itself; and I shall just hold my peace,

and lie here quite still, and think about them all till I get well
again.'

What he meant they could not quite understand, but they saw plainly
that already he was better.

'Put away my crown,' he said. 'I am tired of seeing it, and have
no more any fear of its safety.' They put it away together,

withdrew from the bedside, and left him in peace.
CHAPTER 25

The Avengers
There was nothing now to be dreaded from Dr Kelman, but it made

Curdie anxious, as the evening drew near, to think that not a soul
belonging to the court had been to visit the king, or ask how he

did, that day. He feared, in some shape or other, a more
determined assault. He had provided himself a place in the room,

to which he might retreat upon approach, and whence he could watch;
but not once had he had to betake himself to it.

Towards night the king fell asleep. Curdie thought more and more
uneasily of the moment when he must again leave them for a little

while. Deeper and deeper fell the shadows. No one came to light
the lamp. The princess drew her chair close to Curdie: she would

rather it were not so dark, she said. She was afraid of something
- she could not tell what; nor could she give any reason for her

fear but that all was so dreadfully still.
When it had been dark about an hour, Curdie thought Lina might have

returned; and reflected that the sooner he went the less danger was
there of any assault while he was away. There was more risk of his

own presence being discovered, no doubt, but things were now
drawing to a crisis, and it must be run. So, telling the princess

to lock all the doors of the bedchamber, and let no one in, he took
his mattock, and with here a run, and there a halt under cover,

gained the door at the head of the cellar stair in safety. To his
surprise he found it locked, and the key was gone. There was no

time for deliberation. He felt where the lock was, and dealt it a
tremendous blow with his mattock. It needed but a second to dash

the door open. Someone laid a hand on his arm.
'Who is it?' said Curdie.

'I told you they wouldn't believe me, sir,' said the housemaid. 'I
have been here all day.'

He took her hand, and said, 'You are a good, brave girl. Now come
with me, lest your enemies imprison you again.'

He took her to the cellar, locked the door, lighted a bit of
candle, gave her a little wine, told her to wait there till he

came, and went out the back way.
Swiftly he swung himself up into the dungeon. Lina had done her

part. The place was swarming with creatures - animal forms wilder
and more grotesque than ever ramped in nightmare dream. Close by

the hole, waiting his coming, her green eyes piercing the gulf
below, Lina had but just laid herself down when he appeared. All

about the vault and up the slope of the rubbish heap lay and stood
and squatted the forty-nine whose friendship Lina had conquered in

the wood. They all came crowding about Curdie.
He must get them into the cellar as quickly as ever he could. But

when he looked at the size of some of them, he feared it would be
a long business to enlarge the hole sufficiently to let them

through. At it he rushed, hitting vigorously at the edge with his
mattock. At the very first blow came a splash from the water

beneath, but ere he could heave a third, a creature like a tapir,
only that the grasping point of its proboscis was hard as the steel

of Curdie's hammer, pushed him gently aside, making room for
another creature, with a head like a great club, which it began

banging upon the floor with terrible force and noise. After about
a minute of this battery, the tapir came up again, shoved Clubhead

aside, and putting its own head into the hole began gnawing at the
sides of it with the finger of its nose, in such a fashion that the

fragments fell in a continuous gravelly shower into the water. In
a few minutes the opening was large enough for the biggest creature

among them to get through it.
Next came the difficulty of letting them down: some were quite

light, but the half of them were too heavy for the rope, not to say
for his arms. The creatures themselves seemed to be puzzling where

or how they were to go. One after another of them came up, looked
down through the hole, and drew back. Curdie thought if he let

Lina down, perhaps that would suggest something; possibly they did
not see the opening on the other side. He did so, and Lina stood

lighting up the entrance of the passage with her gleaming eyes.
One by one the creatures looked down again, and one by one they

drew back, each standing aside to glance at the next, as if to say,
Now you have a look. At last it came to the turn of the serpent