Broken Hearts Damaged Goods (19 page)

She now came to a space of marshy ground in the
wood, where large, fat water-snakes were rolling in the mire, and showing their
ugly, drab-colored bodies. In the midst of this spot stood a house, built with
the bones of shipwrecked human beings. There sat the sea witch, allowing a toad
to eat from her mouth, just as people sometimes feed a canary with a piece of
sugar. She called the ugly water-snakes her little chickens, and allowed them
to crawl all over her bosom.

"I know what you want," said the sea
witch; "it is very stupid of you, but you shall have your way, and it will
bring you to sorrow, my pretty princess. You want to get rid of your fish's
tail, and to have two supports instead of it, like human beings on earth, so that
the young prince may fall in love with you, and that you may have an immortal
soul." And then the witch laughed so loud and disgustingly, that the toad
and the snakes fell to the ground, and lay there wriggling about.

"You are but just in time," said the
witch; "for after sunrise to-morrow I should not be able to help you till
the end of another year. I will prepare a draught for you, with which you must
swim to land tomorrow before sunrise, and sit down on the shore and drink it.
Your tail will then disappear, and shrink up into what mankind calls legs, and
you will feel great pain, as if a sword were passing through you. But all who
see you will say that you are the prettiest little human being they ever saw.
You will still have the same floating gracefulness of movement, and no dancer
will ever tread so lightly; but at every step you take it will feel as if you
were treading upon sharp knives, and that the blood must flow. If you will bear
all this, I will help you."

"Yes, I will," said the little princess in
a trembling voice, as she thought of the prince and the immortal soul.

"But think again," said the witch;
"for when once your shape has become like a human being, you can no more
be a mermaid. You will never return through the water to your sisters, or to
your father's palace again; and if you do not win the love of the prince, so
that he is willing to forget his father and mother for your sake, and to love
you with his whole soul, and allow the priest to join your hands that you may
be man and wife, then you will never have an immortal soul. The first morning
after he marries another your heart will break, and you will become foam on the
crest of the waves."

"I will do it," said the little mermaid,
and she became pale as death.

"But I must be paid also," said the witch,
"and it is not a trifle that I ask. You have the sweetest voice of any who
dwell here in the depths of the sea, and you believe that you will be able to charm
the prince with it also, but this voice you must give to me; the best thing you
possess will I have for the price of my draught. My own blood must be mixed
with it, that it may be as sharp as a two-edged sword."

"But if you take away my voice," said the
little mermaid, "what is left for me?"

"Your beautiful form, your graceful walk, and
your expressive eyes; surely with these you can enchain a man's heart. Well,
have you lost your courage? Sing for me so as may take my payment; then you
shall have the powerful draught."

"It shall be," said the little mermaid.

Then the witch placed her cauldron on the fire, to
prepare the magic draught.

"Cleanliness is a good thing," said she,
scouring the vessel with snakes, which she had tied together in a large knot;
then she pricked herself in the breast, and let the black blood drop into it.

The steam that rose formed itself into such horrible
shapes that no one could look at them without fear. Every moment the witch
threw something else into the vessel, and when it began to boil, the sound was
like the weeping of a crocodile. When at last the magic draught as ready, it
looked like the clearest water.

"There it is for you," said the witch.  "If
the polypi should seize hold of you as you return through the wood," said
the witch, "throw over them a few drops of the potion, and their fingers will
be torn into a thousand pieces." But the little mermaid had no occasion to
do this, for the polypi sprang back in terror when they caught sight of the
glittering draught, which shone in her hand like a twinkling star.

So she passed quickly through the wood and the
marsh, and between the rushing whirlpools. She saw that in her father's palace the
torches in the ballroom were extinguished, and all within asleep; but she did
not venture to go in to them, for now she was mute and going to leave them
forever, she felt as if her heart would break.

She stole into the garden, took a flower from the
flower-beds of each of her sisters, kissed her hand a thousand times towards
the palace, and then rose up through the dark blue waters. The sun had not risen
when she came in sight of the prince's palace, and approached the beautiful
marble steps, but the moon shone clear and bright.

Then the little mermaid drank the magic draught, and
it seemed as if a two-edged sword went through her delicate body: she fell into
a swoon, and lay like one dead. When the sun arose and shone over the sea, she
recovered, and felt a sharp pain; but just before her stood the handsome young
prince. He fixed his coal-black eyes upon her so earnestly that she cast down
her own, and then became aware that her fish's tail was gone, and that she had
as pretty a pair of white legs and tiny feet as any little maiden could have;
but she had no clothes, so she wrapped herself in her long, thick hair.

The prince asked her who she was, and where she came
from, and she looked at him mildly and sorrowfully with her deep blue eyes; but
she could not speak. Every step she took was as the witch had said it would be,
she felt as if treading upon the points of needles or sharp knives; but she
bore it willingly, and stepped as lightly by the prince's side as a
soap-bubble, so that he and all who saw her wondered at her graceful-swaying
movements. She was very soon arrayed in costly robes of silk and muslin, and
was the most beautiful creature in the palace; but she could neither speak nor
sing.

Beautiful female slaves, dressed in silk and gold,
stepped forward and sang before the prince and his royal parents: one sang
better than all the others, and the prince clapped his hands and smiled at her.

This was great sorrow to the little mermaid; she
knew how much more sweetly she herself could sing once, and she thought,
"Oh if he could only know that! I have given away my voice forever, to be
with him."

The slaves next performed some pretty fairy-like
dances, to the sound of beautiful music. Then the little mermaid raised her
lovely white arms, stood on the tips of her toes, and glided over the floor,
and danced as no one yet had been able to dance. At each moment her beauty
became more revealed, and her expressive eyes appealed more directly to the
heart than the songs of the slaves.

Everyone was enchanted, especially the prince, who
called her his little foundling; and she danced again quite readily, to please
him, though each time her foot touched the floor it seemed as if she trod on
sharp knives.

The prince said she should remain with him always,
and she received permission to sleep at his door, on a velvet cushion. He had a
page's dress made for her, that she might accompany him on horseback. They rode
together through the sweet-scented woods, where the green boughs touched their
shoulders, and the little birds sang among the fresh leaves. She climbed with
the prince to the tops of high mountains; and although her tender feet bled so
that even her steps were marked, she only laughed, and followed him till they could
see the clouds beneath them looking like a flock of birds travelling to distant
lands.

While at the prince's palace, and when all the
household were asleep, she would go and sit on the broad marble steps; for it
eased her burning feet to bathe them in the cold sea-water; and then she
thought of all those below in the deep.

Once during the night her sisters came up
arm-in-arm, singing sorrowfully, as they floated on the water. She beckoned to
them, and then they recognized her, and told her how she had grieved them.
After that, they came to the same place every night; and once she saw in the distance
her old grandmother, who had not been to the surface of the sea for many years,
and the old Sea King, her father, with his crown on his head. They stretched
out their hands towards her, but they did not venture so near the land as her
sisters did.

As the days passed, she loved the prince more
fondly, and he loved her as he would love a little child, but it never came
into his head to make her his wife; yet, unless he married her, she could not receive
an immortal soul; and, on the morning after his marriage with another, she
would dissolve into the foam of the sea.

"Do you not love me the best of them all?"
the eyes of the little mermaid seemed to say, when he took her in his arms, and
kissed her fair forehead.

"Yes, you are dear to me," said the prince;
"for you have the best heart, and you are the most devoted to me; you are
like a young maiden whom I once saw, but whom I shall never meet again. I was
in a ship that was wrecked, and the waves cast me ashore near a holy temple, where
several young maidens performed the service. The youngest of them found me on
the shore, and saved my life. I saw her but twice, and she is the only one in
the world whom I could love; but you are like her, and you have almost driven
her image out of my mind. She belongs to the holy temple, and my good fortune
has sent you to me instead of her; and we will never part."

"Ah, he knows not that it was I who saved his
life," thought the little mermaid. "I carried him over the sea to the
wood where the temple stands: I sat beneath the foam, and watched till the
human beings came to help him. I saw the pretty maiden that he loves better
than he loves me;" and the mermaid sighed deeply, but she could not shed
tears. "He says the maiden belongs to the holy temple, therefore she will
never return to the world. They will meet no more: while I am by his side, and
see him every day. I will take care of him, and love him, and give up my life
for his sake."

Very soon it was said that the prince must marry,
and that the beautiful daughter of a neighboring king would be his wife, for a
fine ship was being fitted out. Although the prince gave out that he merely intended
to pay a visit to the king, it was generally supposed that he really went to
see his daughter. A great company was to go with him. The little mermaid
smiled, and shook her head. She knew the prince's thoughts better than any of
the others.

"I must travel," he had said to her;
"I must see this beautiful princess; my parents desire it; but they will
not oblige me to bring her home as my bride. I cannot love her; she is not like
the beautiful maiden in the temple, whom you resemble. If I were forced to
choose a bride, I would rather choose you, my mute foundling, with those expressive
eyes." And then he kissed her rosy mouth, played with her long waving
hair, and laid his head on her heart, while she dreamed of human happiness and
an immortal soul. "You are not afraid of the sea, my mute child,"
said he, as they stood on the deck of the noble ship which was to carry them to
the country of the neighboring king.

And then he told her of storm and of calm, of
strange fishes in the deep beneath them, and of what the divers had seen there;
and she smiled at his descriptions, for she knew better than anyone what wonders
were at the bottom of the sea.

In the moonlight, when all on board were asleep,
excepting the man at the helm, who was steering, she sat on the deck, gazing
down through the clear water. She thought she could distinguish her father's
castle, and upon it her aged grandmother, with the silver crown on her head,
looking through the rushing tide at the keel of the vessel. Then her sisters
came up on the waves, and gazed at her mournfully, wringing their white hands.
She beckoned to them, and smiled, and wanted to tell them how happy and well
off she was; but the cabin-boy approached, and when her sisters dived down he
thought it was only the foam of the sea which he saw.

The next morning the ship sailed into the harbor of
a beautiful town belonging to the king whom the prince was going to visit. The church
bells were ringing, and from the high towers sounded a flourish of trumpets;
and soldiers, with flying colors and glittering bayonets, lined the rocks
through which they passed. Every day was a festival; balls and entertainments
followed one another.

But the princess had not yet appeared. People said
that she was being brought up and educated in a religious house, where she was learning
every royal virtue. At last she came. Then the little mermaid, who was very
anxious to see whether she was really beautiful, was obliged to acknowledge
that she had never seen a more perfect vision of beauty. Her skin was
delicately fair, and beneath her long dark eye-lashes her laughing blue eyes
shone with truth and purity.

"It was you," said the prince, "who
saved my life when I lay dead on the beach," and he folded his blushing
bride in his arms. "Oh, I am too happy," said he to the little
mermaid; "my fondest hopes are all fulfilled. You will rejoice at my
happiness; for your devotion to me is great and sincere."

The little mermaid kissed his hand, and felt as if
her heart were already broken. His wedding morning would bring death to her,
and she would change into the foam of the sea. All the church bells rung and
the heralds rode about the town proclaiming the betrothal.

Perfumed oil was burning in costly silver lamps on
every altar. The priests waved the censers, while the bride and bridegroom
joined their hands and received the blessing of the bishop. The little mermaid,
dressed in silk and gold, held up the bride's train; but her ears heard nothing
of the festive music, and her eyes saw not the holy ceremony; she thought of
the night of death which was coming to her, and of all she had lost in the
world. On the same evening the bride and bridegroom went on board ship; cannons
were roaring, flags waving, and in the centre of the ship a costly tent of
purple and gold had been erected. It contained elegant couches, for the
reception of the bridal pair during the night. The ship, with swelling sails
and a favorable wind, glided away smoothly and lightly over the calm sea.