The Ice Maiden Page #14

"The Ice Maiden" is a captivating fairy tale by Hans Christian Andersen about Rudy, a young Swiss man with a tragic past and an unusual ability to communicate with animals. Rudy grows up and falls in love with beautiful Babette, but their love is threatened by the sinister Ice Maiden, a supernatural being who claims the lives of those who venture into her icy realm. The book explores themes like love, death, and destiny, melded with a chilling supernatural narrative and picturesque depictions of Swiss landscapes.

• Children

								

plan to believe nothing you hear."

The greatest happiness was coming for Rudy and Babette. The
happy day, as it is called, that is, their wedding-day, was near at
hand. They were not to be married at the church at Bex, nor at the
miller's house; Babette's godmother wished the nuptials to be
solemnized at Montreux, in the pretty little church in that town.
The miller was very anxious that this arrangement should be agreed to.
He alone knew what the newly-married couple would receive from
Babette's godmother, and he knew also that it was a wedding present
well worth a concession. The day was fixed, and they were to travel as
far as Villeneuve the evening before, to be in time for the steamer
which sailed in the morning for Montreux, and the godmother's
daughters were to dress and adorn the bride.

"Here in this house there ought to be a wedding-day kept," said
the parlor-cat, "or else I would not give a mew for the whole affair."

"There is going to be great feasting," replied the kitchen-cat.
"Ducks and pigeons have been killed, and a whole roebuck hangs on
the wall. It makes me lick my lips when I think of it."

"To-morrow morning they will begin the journey."

Yes, to-morrow! And this evening, for the last time, Rudy and
Babette sat in the miller's house as an engaged couple. Outside, the
Alps glowed in the evening sunset, the evening bells chimed, and the
children of the sunbeam sang, "Whatever happens is best."


XIV. NIGHT VISIONS

The sun had gone down, and the clouds lay low on the valley of the
Rhone. The wind blew from the south across the mountains; it was an
African wind, a wind which scattered the clouds for a moment, and then
suddenly fell. The broken clouds hung in fantastic forms upon the
wood-covered hills by the rapid Rhone. They assumed the shapes of
antediluvian animals, of eagles hovering in the air, of frogs
leaping over a marsh, and then sunk down upon the rushing stream and
appeared to sail upon it, although floating in the air. An uprooted
fir-tree was being carried away by the current, and marking out its
path by eddying circles on the water. Vertigo and his sisters were
dancing upon it, and raising these circles on the foaming river. The
moon lighted up the snow on the mountain-tops, shone on the dark
woods, and on the drifting clouds those fantastic forms which at night
might be taken for spirits of the powers of nature. The
mountain-dweller saw them through the panes of his little window. They
sailed in hosts before the Ice Maiden as she came out of her palace of
ice. Then she seated herself on the trunk of the fir-tree as on a
broken skiff, and the water from the glaciers carried her down the
river to the open lake.

"The wedding guests are coming," sounded from air and sea. These
were the sights and sounds without; within there were visions, for
Babette had a wonderful dream. She dreamt that she had been married to
Rudy for many years, and that, one day when he was out chamois
hunting, and she alone in their dwelling at home, the young Englishman
with the golden whiskers sat with her. His eyes were quite eloquent,
and his words possessed a magic power; he offered her his hand, and
she was obliged to follow him. They went out of the house and
stepped downwards, always downwards, and it seemed to Babette as if
she had a weight on her heart which continually grew heavier. She felt
she was committing a sin against Rudy, a sin against God. Suddenly she
found herself forsaken, her clothes torn by the thorns, and her hair
gray; she looked upwards in her agony, and there, on the edge of the
rock, she espied Rudy. She stretched out her arms to him, but she
did not venture to call him or to pray; and had she called him, it
would have been useless, for it was not Rudy, only his hunting coat
and hat hanging on an alpenstock, as the hunters sometimes arrange
them to deceive the chamois. "Oh!" she exclaimed in her agony; "oh,
that I had died on the happiest day of my life, my wedding-day. O my
God, it would have been a mercy and a blessing had Rudy travelled
far away from me, and I had never known him. None know what will
happen in the future." And then, in ungodly despair, she cast
herself down into the deep rocky gulf. The spell was broken; a cry
of terror escaped her, and she awoke.

The dream was over; it had vanished. But she knew she had dreamt
something frightful about the young Englishman, yet months had
passed since she had seen him or even thought of him. Was he still
at Montreux, and should she meet him there on her wedding day? A
slight shadow passed over her pretty mouth as she thought of this, and
she knit her brows; but the smile soon returned to her lip, and joy
sparkled in her eyes, for this was the morning of the day on which she
and Rudy were to be married, and the sun was shining brightly. Rudy
was already in the parlor when she entered it, and they very soon
started for Villeneuve. Both of them were overflowing with
happiness, and the miller was in the best of tempers, laughing and
merry; he was a good, honest soul, and a kind father.

"Now we are masters of the house," said the parlor-cat.


XV. THE CONCLUSION

It was early in the afternoon, and just at dinner-time, when the
three joyous travellers reached Villeneuve. After dinner, the miller
placed himself in the arm-chair, smoked his pipe, and had a little
nap. The bridal pair went arm-in-arm out through the town and along
the high road, at the foot of the wood-covered rocks, and by the deep,
blue lake.

The gray walls, and the heavy clumsy-looking towers of the
gloomy castle of Chillon, were reflected in the clear flood. The
little island, on which grew the three acacias, lay at a short
distance, looking like a bouquet rising from the lake. "How delightful
it must be to live there," said Babette, who again felt the greatest
wish to visit the island; and an opportunity offered to gratify her
wish at once, for on the shore lay a boat, and the rope by which it
was moored could be very easily loosened. They saw no one near, so
they took possession of it without asking permission of any one, and
Rudy could row very well. The oars divided the pliant water like the
fins of a fish--that water which, with all its yielding softness, is
so strong to bear and to carry, so mild and smiling when at rest,
and yet so terrible in its destroying power. A white streak of foam
followed in the wake of the boat, which, in a few minutes, carried
them both to the little island, where they went on shore; but there
was only just room enough for two to dance. Rudy swung Babette round
two or three times; and then, hand-in-hand, they sat down on a
little bench under the drooping acacia-tree, and looked into each
other's eyes, while everything around them glowed in the rays of the
setting sun.

The fir-tree forests on the mountains were covered with a purple
hue like the heather bloom; and where the woods terminated, and the
rocks became prominent, they looked almost transparent in the rich
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