ence sprang toward a window. Ellen stood in his way; he struck her
in the face with his open hand and threw her on the floor. After that
nobody saw him but Kathleen. She saw him go toward the window. It was
open just a little crack. Before her very eyes he grew smaller and
smaller, till he scrambled and rolled and slipped through the crack
and was gone.
That very instant the door opened and the Hill Terence came in. He saw
Ellen lying on the floor, and, without noticing anyone else, he went
to her and lifted her up. Ellen looked in his face, started back from
him for an instant, still gazing in his face, and then caught him in
her arms and cried, with her voice all full of tears, "It's my own
boy--my own boy--the one I always saw in my dreams! Don't come near
me, any of you, or you'll wake me and it'll be another dream! Oh, let
me keep this dream while I can!"
"You'll keep this dream always, Ellen, dear," the old woman said.
"Have no more fear. This is the dream that's for all your life and
forever."
It was about that time, or it may have been a little later, that Peter
came in. They told him all about it as well as they could. "It's glad
I am that it all came out so," Peter said, after they had completely
bewildered him by trying to make him understand the story; "it's glad
I am. And yet I did like to hear Terence play the fiddle."
"I can play the fiddle a little too," the new Terence said.
"Oh, yes, indeed he can!" said Kathleen. "Bring the fiddle and he will
show you."
Peter brought the fiddle and Terence played, and the fiddle sang a
great song of gladness--the song of a soul born to find itself a full
man all at once.
"Ah! don't you see now? Don't you see now?" Kathleen cried. "That
means something!"
* * * * *
The fairies in the hill were dancing their endless dance, when
Naggeneen, as if he had been lifted up in the air and dropped, was
suddenly among them. They stopped the dance and gathered around him.
"What for are you back here?" the King asked.
"They drove me out!" Naggeneen cried. "I knew they would! I told you
they would! I told you you could do nothing and I could do nothing!
It's the only wonder that they didn't drive me out long ago."
"What do you keep your hand behind you for?" the King asked.
"I couldn't tell you that," said Naggeneen; "I couldn't say the words
that I'ld have to say to tell you."
"And how did they drive you out?"
"By brewi
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