CHAPTER ELEVEN
百度搜索 The Lion, the Witch and the War 天涯 或 The Lion, the Witch and the War 天涯在线书库 即可找到本书最新章节.
ASLAN IS NEAREREDMUND meanwhile had been having a most disappointing time. When the dwarf had goo get the sledge ready he expected that the Witch would start being o him, as she had been at their last meeting. But she said nothing at all. And when at last Edmund plucked up his ce to say, "Please, your Majesty, could I have some Turkish Delight?
You - you - said -" she answered, "Silence, fool!" Then she appeared to ge her mind and said, as if to herself, a "A will not do to have the brat fainting on the way,”
and once more clapped her hands. Another, dwarf appeared.
&qu the humaure food and drink," she said.
The dwarf went aresently returned bringing an iron bowl with some water in it and an iron plate with a hunk of dry bread on it. He grinned in a repulsive manner as he set them down on the floor beside Edmund and said: "Turkish Delight fo<bdi></bdi>r the little Prince. Ha! Ha! Ha!" "Take it away," said Edmund sulkily. "I dont want dry bread." But the Witch suddenly turned on him with such a terrible expression on her face that he, apologized and began to nibble at the bread, though, it was so stale he could hardly get it down.
"You may be glad enough of it before you taste bread again," said the Witch.
While he was still chewing away the first dwarf came bad annouhat the sledge was ready. The White Witch rose a out, Edmund to go with her. The snow was again falling as they came into the courtyard, but she took no notice of that and made Edmund sit beside her on the></a> sledge. But before they drove off she called Maugrim and he came bounding like an enormous dog to the side of the sledge.
"Take with you the swiftest of your wolves and go at oo the house of the Beavers,”
said the Witch, "and kill whatever you find there. If they are already gohen make all speed to the Stoable, but do not be seen. Wait for me there in hiding. I meanwhile must go many miles to the West before I find a place where I drive across the river.
You may overtake these humans before they reach the Stoable. You will know what to do if you find them!”
"I hear and obey, O Queen," growled the Wolf, and immediately he shot away into the snow and darkness, as quickly as a horse gallop. In a few minutes he had called another wolf and was with him down on the dam sniffing at the Beavers house. But of course they found it empty. It would have been a dreadful thing for the Beavers and the children if the night had remained fine, for the wolves would then have been able to follow their trail - ao one would have overtaken them before they had got to the cave. But now that the snow had begun again the st was cold and even the footprints were covered up.
Meanwhile the dwarf whipped up the reindeer, and the Witd Edmund drove out uhe archway and on and away into the darkness and the cold. This was a terrible
journey for Edmund, who had no coat. Before they had been going quarter of an hour all the front of him was covered with snow - he soon stopped trying to shake it off because, as quickly as he did that, a new lot gathered, and he was so tired. Soon he was wet to the skin. And oh, how miserable he was! It didnt look now as if the Witch inteo make him a King. All the things he had said to make himself believe that she was good and kind and that her side was really the right side souo him silly now. He would have given anything to meet the others at this moment - eveer! The only way to fort himself now was to try to believe that the whole thing was a dream and that he might wake up at any moment. And as they went on, hour after hour, it did e to seem like a dream.
This lasted lohan I could describe even if I wrote pages and pages about it. But I will skip on to the time when the snow had stopped and the m had e and they were rag along in the daylight. And still they went on and on, with no sound but the everlasting swish of the snow and the creaking of the reindeers harness. And then at last the Witch said, "What have we here? Stop!" and they did.
How Edmund hoped she was going to say something about breakfast! But she had stopped for quite a different reason. A little way off at the foot of a tree sat a merry party, a squirrel and his wife with their children and two satyrs and a dwarf and an old dogfox, all on stools round a table. Edmund couldnt quite see what they were eating, but it smelled lovely and there seemed to be decorations of holly and he wasnt at all sure that he didnt see something like a plum pudding. At the moment when the sledge stopped, the Fox, who was obviously the oldest perso, had just risen to its feet, holding a glass in its right paw as if it was going to say something. But when the whole party saw the sledge stopping and who was in it, all the gaiety went out of their faces. The father squirrel stopped eating with his fork half-way to his mouth and one of the satyrs stopped with its fork actually in its mouth, and the baby squirrels squeaked with terror.
"What is the meaning of this?" asked the Witch Queen. Nobody answered.
"Speak, vermin!" she said again. "Or do you want my dwarf to find you a toh his whip? What is the meaning of all this gluttony, this waste, this selfindulgence? Where did you get all these things?”
"Please, your Majesty," said the Fox, "we were given them. And if I might make so bold as to drink your Majestys very good health - “
"Who gave them to you?" said the Witch.
"F-F-F-Father Christmas," stammered the Fox.
"What?" roared the Witch, springing from the sledge and taking a few strides <big></big>o the terrified animals. "He has not been here! He ot have been here! How dare you - but no. Say you have been lying and you shall even now be fiven.”
At that moment one of the young squirrels lost its head pletely.
"He has - he has - he has!" it squeaked, beating its little spoon oable. Edmund saw the Witch bite her lips so that a drop of blood appeared on her white cheek. Then she raised her wand. "Oh, dont, dont, please dont," shouted Edmund, but even while he was shouting she had waved her wand and instantly where the merry party had been there were only statues of creatures (oh its stone fork fixed forever half -way to its stone mouth) seated round a stoable on which there were stone plates and a stone plum pudding.
"As for you," said the Witch, giving Edmund a stunning blow on the face as she re-mouhe sledge, "let that teach you to ask favour for spies and traitors. Drive on!”
And Edmund for the first time in this story felt sorry for someone besides himself. It seemed so pitiful to think of those little stone figures sitting there all the silent days and all the dark nights, year after year, till the moss grew on them and at last even their faces crumbled away.
Now they were steadily rag on again. And soon Edmund noticed that the snow which splashed against them as they rushed through it was much wetter than it had been all last night. At the same time he noticed that he was feeling much less cold. It was also being foggy. In fact every mi grew foggier and warmer. And the sledge was not running nearly as well as it had been running up till now. At first he thought this was because the reindeer were tired, but soon he saw that that couldhe real reason. The sledge jerked, and skidded a on jolting as if it had struck against stones. And however the dwarf whipped the poor reihe sledge went slower and slower. There also seemed to be a curious noise all round them, but the noise of their driving and jolting and the dwarfs shouting at the reindeer prevented Edmund from hearing what it was, until suddenly the sledge stuck so fast that it wouldnt go on at all. When that happehere was a moments silence. And in that silence Edmund could at last listen to the other noise properly. A strange, sweet, rustling, chattering noise - a not se, for hed heard it before - if only he could remember where! Then all at once he did remember. It was the noise of running water. All round them though out of sight, there were streams, chattering, murmuring, bubbling, splashing and even (in the distance) r. And his heart gave a great leap (though he hardly knew why) when he realized that the frost was over. And muearer there was a drip-drip-drip from the branches of all the trees. And then, as he looked at oree he saw a great load of snow slide off it and for the first time since he had entered Narnia he saw the dark green of a fir tree. But he hadnt time to listen or waty longer, for the Witch said: "Dont sit staring, fool! Get out and help.”
And of course Edmund had to obey. He stepped out into the snow - but it was really only slush by now - and began helping the dwarf to get the sledge out of the muddy hole it had got into. They got it out in the end, and by being very cruel to the reihe dwarf mao get it on the move again, and they drove a little further. And now the snow was really melting in ear and patches of green grass were beginning to appear in
every dire. Unless you have looked at a world of snow as long as Edmund had been looking at it, you will hardly be able to imagine what a relief those green patches were after the endless white. Then the sledge stopped again.
"Its no good, your Majesty," said the dwarf. "We t sledge in this thaw.”
"Then we must walk," said the Witch.
"We shall never overtake them walking," growled the dwarf. "Not with the start theyve got.”
"Are you my cillor or my slave?" said the Witch. "Do as youre told. Tie the hands of the humaure behind it and keep hold of the end of the rope. And take your whip.
And cut the harness of the reiheyll find their own way home.”
The dwarf obeyed, and in a few minutes Edmund found himself being forced to walk as fast as he could with his hands tied behind him. He kept on slipping in the slush and mud a grass, and every time he slipped the dwarf gave him a curse and sometimes a flick with the whip. The Witch walked behind the dwarf a on saying, "Faster!
Faster!”
Every moment the patches of green grew bigger and the patches of spow grew smaller.
Every moment more and more of the trees shook off their robes of snow. Soon, wherever you looked, instead of white shapes you saw the dark green of firs or the black prickly branches of bare oaks and beeches and elms. Then the mist turned from white to gold and presently cleared away altogether. Shafts of delicious sunlight struck down on to the forest floor and overhead you could see a blue sky betweeree tops.
Soon there were more wonderful things happening. ing suddenly round a er into a glade of silver birch trees Edmund saw the ground covered in all dires with little yellow flowers - dihe noise of water grew louder. Presently they actually crossed a stream. Beyond it they found snowdrops growing.
"Mind your own business!" said the dwarf when he saw that Edmund had turned his head to look at them; and he gave the rope a vicious jerk.
But of course this didnt prevent Edmund from seeing. Only five minutes later he noticed a dozen crocuses growing round the foot of an old tree - gold and purple and white. Then came a sound even more delicious than the sound of <q></q>the water. Close beside the path they were following a bird suddenly chirped from the branch of a tree. It was answered by the chuckle of another bird a little further off. And then, as if that had been a signal, there was chattering and chirruping in every dire, and then a moment of full song, and within five mihe whole wood was ringing with birds musid wherever Edmunds eyes turned he saw birds alighting on branches, or sailing overhead or chasing one another or having their little quarrels or tidying up their feathers with their beaks.
"Faster! Faster!" said the Witch.
There was no trace of the fog now. The sky became bluer and bluer, and now there were white clouds hurrying across it from time to time. In the wide glades there were primroses. A light breeze sprang up which scattered drops of moisture from the swaying branches and carried cool, delicious sts against the faces of the travellers. The trees began to e fully alive. The larches and birches were covered with green, the laburnums with gold. Soon the beech trees had put forth their delicate, transparent leaves.
As the travellers walked uhem the light also became green. A bee buzzed across their path.
"This is no thaw," said the dwarf, suddenly stopping. "This is Spring. What are we to do?
Your winter has beeroyed, I tell you! This is Aslans doing.”
"If either of you mention that name again," said the Witch, "he shall instantly be killed.”
百度搜索 The Lion, the Witch and the War 天涯 或 The Lion, the Witch and the War 天涯在线书库 即可找到本书最新章节.