The Doll - Bolesaw Prus [281]
‘My suspicions are vile,’ Wokulski muttered. At this moment, a mysterious voice seemed to be ordering him to choose between the thousands like Węgiełek, who needed help, and this one woman coming down the hillside: ‘But I’ve already made my choice,’ Wokulski thought.
‘I can’t get up to the castle by myself, you will have to give me your hand,’ said Izabela, stopping beside Wokulski.
‘Perhaps the lady and gentleman will deign to take an easier path?’ Węgiełek exclaimed.
‘Lead the way!’
They encircled the hill and began climbing to its summit up the bed of a dried stream.
‘What a strange colour these stones are,’ cried Izabela, looking at pieces of limestone stained brown.
‘Crude ore,’ Wokulski replied.
‘Oh no,’ Węgiełek put in, ‘that’s not ore — but blood.’
Izabela drew back. ‘Blood?’ she echoed.
They halted on the hill-top, screened from the rest of the company by a broken-down wall. From here, they could see the castle courtyard, overgrown with thorns and barberries. Under one of the towers a huge block of granite was leaning against the wall.
‘That’s the stone,’ said Wokulski.
‘That stone? I wonder how they got it here? My good man, what were you saying about blood?’ Izabela asked Węgiełek.
‘It’s an old story,’ Węgiełek replied, ‘my grandfather told it to me, and everyone around knows it.’
‘Tell it to us,’ Izabela insisted, ‘I like hearing legends told in ruins. The castles of the Rhine are full of them.’
Węgiełek was not in the least put out by this request. Indeed, he smiled and began: ‘In the olden days, when my grandfather used to go bird-catching in the oak-trees, water used to run over those stones we came up by. Now water only comes in the spring, or after heavy rain, but when my grandfather was young, it ran all year round. There was a stream here.
‘And when grandfather was a boy, a big stone lay at the bottom of the stream, as if someone had used it to block a hole. And really there was a hole, which was a window into some vaults, where great treasures are hidden, the likes of which can’t be found anywhere else in the whole world. Among these treasures slept a young lady, maybe a princess, on a bed of pure gold, very pretty and richly dressed. And the reason why she sleeps is that someone drove a gold pin into her head, out of malice or hatred perhaps: goodness knows. So she sleeps and will never wake up until someone draws the pin out of her head and marries her. But that’s hard to do, and even dangerous, for monsters guard the treasures and the young lady too. I know well what they’re like, because until my house burned down I had a tooth as big as my fist, which my grandfather found in this very spot — that’s the truth, I’m not telling a lie. And if one tooth alone was as big as my fist (I saw it myself, and often held it in my hand), then the head must be big as a stove, and the whole person the size of a barn.
‘People had long known,’ Węgiełek went on, ‘of the young lady and her treasures: because twice a year, at Easter and at St John’s Eve, the stone on the bottom of the stream would move, and if anyone were standing over it, he might see down into the pit, and the wonderful things there.
‘One Easter (my grandfather was not even born yet), a young smith came here from Zasław. He stood by the stream and wondered ‘Why shouldn’t I see the treasures? I’d get at them immediately, through the smallest of holes. I’d load my pockets, and wouldn’t have to puff my bellows any more.’ No sooner had he thought this that all at once the stone moved aside, and the smith saw heaps of money, pure gold dishes and splendid clothing, just like you see at a fair …
‘But when he set eyes on the sleeping lady, who was so beautiful, the smith froze in amazement. She was fast asleep, but tears were streaming from her eyes, and each one that fell, whether on her nightdress or bed or floor changed at once into a jewel. She was asleep and sighing with pain from that pin: whenever she