Wet Magic - E. Nesbit (read novels website TXT) 📗

be foolish,” she said. “You’ll never have such a chance again. And I feel that this air is full of your horrid human microbes⁠—distrust, suspicion, fear, anger, resentment⁠—horrid little germs. I don’t want to risk catching them. Come.”

“No,” said Francis, and held out to her the lock of her hair; so did Mavis and Bernard. But Kathleen had tied the lock of hair round her neck, and she said:

“I should have liked to, but I promised Bernard I would not do anything unless he said I might.” It was toward Kathleen that the Mermaid turned, holding out a white hand for the lock.

Kathleen bent over the water trying to untie it, and in one awful instant the Mermaid had reared herself up in the water, caught Kathleen in her long white arms, pulled her over the edge of the pool, and with a bubbling splash disappeared with her beneath the dark water.

Mavis screamed and knew it; Francis and Bernard thought they did not scream. It was the Spangled Child alone who said nothing. He had not offered to give back the lock of soft hair. He, like Kathleen, had knotted it round his neck; he now tied a further knot, stepped forward, and spoke in tones which the other three thought the most noble they had ever heard.

“She give me the plum pie,” he said, and leaped into the water.

He sank at once. And this, curiously enough, gave the others confidence. If he had struggled⁠—but no⁠—he sank like a stone, or like a diver who means diving and diving to the very bottom.

“She’s my special sister,” said Bernard, and leaped.

“If it’s magic it’s all right⁠—and if it isn’t we couldn’t go back home without her,” said Mavis hoarsely. And she and Francis took hands and jumped together.

It was not so difficult as it sounds. From the moment of Kathleen’s disappearance the sense of magic⁠—which is rather like very sleepy comfort and sweet scent and sweet music that you just can’t hear the tune of⁠—had been growing stronger and stronger. And there are some things so horrible that if you can bring yourself to face them you simply can’t believe that they’re true. It did not seem possible⁠—when they came quite close to the idea⁠—that a Mermaid could really come and talk so kindly and then drown the five children who had rescued her.

“It’s all right,” Francis cried as they jumped.

“I⁠ ⁠…” He shut his mouth just in time, and down they went.

You have probably dreamed that you were a perfect swimmer? You know the delight of that dream-swimming, which is no effort at all, and yet carries you as far and as fast as you choose. It was like that with the children. The moment they touched the water they felt that they belonged in it⁠—that they were as much at home in water as in air. As they sank beneath the water their feet went up and their heads went down, and there they were swimming downward with long, steady, easy strokes. It was like swimming down a well that presently widened to a cavern. Suddenly Francis found that his head was above water. So was Mavis’s.

“All right so far,” she said, “but how are we going to get back?”

“Oh, the magic will do that,” he answered, and swam faster.

The cave was lighted by bars of phosphorescence placed like pillars against the walls. The water was clear and deeply green and along the sides of the stream were sea anemones and starfish of the most beautiful forms and the most dazzling colors. The walls were of dark squarish shapes, and here and there a white oblong, or a blue and a red, and the roof was of mother-of-pearl which gleamed and glistened in the pale golden radiance of the phosphorescent pillars. It was very beautiful, and the mere pleasure of swimming so finely and easily swept away almost their last fear. This, too, went when a voice far ahead called: “Hurry up, France⁠—Come on, Mavis,”⁠—and the voice was the voice of Kathleen.

They hurried up, and they came on; and the gleaming soft light grew brighter and brighter. It shone all along the way they had to go, making a path of glory such as the moon makes across the sea on a summer night. And presently they saw that this growing light was from a great gate that barred the waterway in front of them. Five steps led up to this gate, and sitting on it, waiting for them, were Kathleen, Reuben, Bernard and the Mermaid. Only now she had no tail. It lay beside her on the marble steps, just as your stockings lie when you have taken them off; and there were her white feet sticking out from under a dress of soft feathery red seaweed.

They could see it was seaweed though it was woven into a wonderful fabric. Bernard and Kathleen and the Spangled Boy had somehow got seaweed dresses too, and the Spangled Boy was no longer dressed as a girl; and looking down as they scrambled up the steps Mavis and Francis saw that they, too, wore seaweed suits⁠—“Very pretty, but how awkward to go home in,” Mavis thought.

“Now,” said the Mer-lady, “forgive me for taking the plunge. I knew you’d hesitate forever, and I was beginning to feel so cross! That’s your dreadful atmosphere! Now, here we are at the door of our kingdom. You do want to come in, don’t you? I can bring you as far as this against your will, but not any farther. And you can’t come any farther unless you trust me absolutely. Do you? Will you? Try!”

“Yes,” said the children, all but Bernard, who said stoutly:

“I don’t; but I’ll try to. I want to.”

“If you want to, I think you do,” said she very kindly. “And now I will tell you one thing. What you’re breathing isn’t air, and it isn’t water. It’s something that both water people and air people can breathe.”

“The greatest common measure,” said Bernard.

“A