The Ice Maiden Page #5

"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

								

accustomed to danger and practised flight. The large bird, alarmed
at the report of the gun, wheeled off in another direction, and Rudy's
uncle was saved from danger, of which he knew nothing till he was told
of it by the boy.

While they were both in pleasant mood, wending their way
homewards, and the uncle whistling the tune of a song he had learnt in
his young days, they suddenly heard a peculiar sound which seemed to
come from the top of the mountain. They looked up, and saw above them,
on the over-hanging rock, the snow-covering heave and lift itself as a
piece of linen stretched on the ground to dry raises itself when the
wind creeps under it. Smooth as polished marble slabs, the waves of
snow cracked and loosened themselves, and then suddenly, with the
rumbling noise of distant thunder, fell like a foaming cataract into
the abyss. An avalanche had fallen, not upon Rudy and his uncle, but
very near them. Alas, a great deal too near!

"Hold fast, Rudy!" cried his uncle; "hold fast, with all your
might."

Then Rudy clung with his arms to the trunk of the nearest tree,
while his uncle climbed above him, and held fast by the branches.
The avalanche rolled past them at some distance; but the gust of
wind that followed, like the storm-wings of the avalanche, snapped
asunder the trees and bushes over which it swept, as if they had
been but dry rushes, and threw them about in every direction. The tree
to which Rudy clung was thus overthrown, and Rudy dashed to the
ground. The higher branches were snapped off, and carried away to a
great distance; and among these shattered branches lay Rudy's uncle,
with his skull fractured. When they found him, his hand was still
warm; but it would have been impossible to recognize his face. Rudy
stood by, pale and trembling; it was the first shock of his life,
the first time he had ever felt fear. Late in the evening he
returned home with the fatal news,--to that home which was now to be
so full of sorrow. His uncle's wife uttered not a word, nor shed a
tear, till the corpse was brought in; then her agony burst forth.
The poor cretin crept away to his bed, and nothing was seen of him
during the whole of the following day. Towards evening, however, he
came to Rudy, and said, "Will you write a letter for me? Saperli
cannot write; Saperli can only take the letters to the post."

"A letter for you!" said Rudy; "who do you wish to write to?"

"To the Lord Christ," he replied.

"What do you mean?" asked Rudy.

Then the poor idiot, as the cretin was often called, looked at
Rudy with a most touching expression in his eyes, clasped his hands,
and said, solemnly and devoutly, "Saperli wants to send a letter to
Jesus Christ, to pray Him to let Saperli die, and not the master of
the house here."

Rudy pressed his hand, and replied, "A letter would not reach
Him up above; it would not give him back whom we have lost."

It was not, however, easy for Rudy to convince Saperli of the
impossibility of doing what he wished.

"Now you must work for us," said his foster-mother; and Rudy
very soon became the entire support of the house.


IV. BABETTE

Who was the best marksman in the canton Valais? The chamois knew
well. "Save yourselves from Rudy," they might well say. And who is the
handsomest marksman? "Oh, it is Rudy," said the maidens; but they
did not say, "Save yourselves from Rudy." Neither did anxious
mothers say so; for he bowed to them as pleasantly as to the young
girls. He was so brave and cheerful. His cheeks were brown, his
teeth white, and his eyes dark and sparkling. He was now a handsome
young man of twenty years. The most icy water could not deter him from
swimming; he could twist and turn like a fish. None could climb like
he, and he clung as firmly to the edges of the rocks as a limpet. He
had strong muscular power, as could be seen when he leapt from rock to
rock. He had learnt this first from the cat, and more lately from
the chamois. Rudy was considered the best guide over the mountains;
every one had great confidence in him. He might have made a great deal
of money as guide. His uncle had also taught him the trade of a
cooper; but he had no inclination for either; his delight was in
chamois-hunting, which also brought him plenty of money. Rudy would be
a very good match, as people said, if he would not look above his
own station. He was also such a famous partner in dancing, that the
girls often dreamt about him, and one and another thought of him
even when awake.

"He kissed me in the dance," said Annette, the schoolmaster's
daughter, to her dearest friend; but she ought not to have told
this, even to her dearest friend. It is not easy to keep such secrets;
they are like sand in a sieve; they slip out. It was therefore soon
known that Rudy, so brave and so good as he was, had kissed some one
while dancing, and yet he had never kissed her who was dearest to him.

"Ah, ah," said an old hunter, "he has kissed Annette, has he? he
has begun with A, and I suppose he will kiss through the whole
alphabet."

But a kiss in the dance was all the busy tongues could accuse
him of. He certainly had kissed Annette, but she was not the flower of
his heart.

Down in the valley, near Bex, among the great walnut-trees, by the
side of a little rushing mountain-stream, lived a rich miller. His
dwelling-house was a large building, three storeys high, with little
turrets. The roof was covered with chips, bound together with tin
plates, that glittered in sunshine and in the moonlight. The largest
of the turrets had a weather-cock, representing an apple pierced by
a glittering arrow, in memory of William Tell. The mill was a neat and
well-ordered place, that allowed itself to be sketched and written
about; but the miller's daughter did not permit any to sketch or write
about her. So, at least, Rudy would have said, for her image was
pictured in his heart; her eyes shone in it so brightly, that quite
a flame had been kindled there; and, like all other fires, it had
burst forth so suddenly, that the miller's daughter, the beautiful
Babette, was quite unaware of it. Rudy had never spoken a word to
her on the subject. The miller was rich, and, on that account, Babette
stood very high, and was rather difficult to aspire to. But said
Rudy to himself, "Nothing is too high for a man to reach: he must
climb with confidence in himself, and he will not fail." He had learnt
this lesson in his youthful home.

It happened once that Rudy had some business to settle at Bex.
It was a long journey at that time, for the railway had not been
opened. From the glaciers of the Rhone, at the foot of the Simplon,
between its ever-changing mountain summits, stretches the valley of
the canton Valais. Through it runs the noble river of the Rhone, which
often overflows its banks, covering fields and highways, and
destroying everything in its course. Near the towns of Sion and St.
Maurice, the valley takes a turn, and bends like an elbow, and
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