Lewis, C.S. - Narnia 3 - The Horse and his boy

VIP免费
2024-12-23 0 0 186.76KB 67 页 5.9玖币
侵权投诉
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
PRINCE CASPIAN
BY
C.S. LEWIS
CHAPTER ONE
THE ISLAND
ONCE there were four children whose names were Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy, and it has been
told in another book called The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe how they had a remarkable
adventure. They had opened the door of a magic wardrobe and found themselves in a quite different
world from ours, and in that different world they had become Kings and Queens in a country called
Narnia. While they were in Narnia they seemed to reign for years and years; but when they came
back through the door and found themselves in England again, it all seemed to have taken no time
at all. At any rate, no one noticed that they had ever been away, and they never told anyone
except one very wise grown-up.
That had all happened a year ago, and now all four of them were sitting on a seat at a railway
station with trunks and playboxes piled up round them. They were, in fact, on their way back to
school. They had travelled together as far as this station, which was a junction; and here, in a
few minutes, one train would arrive and take the girls away to one school, and in about half an
hour another train would arrive and the boys would go off to another school. The first part of the
journey, when they were all together, always seemed to be part of the holidays; but now when they
would be saying good-bye and going different ways so soon, everyone felt that the holidays were
really over and everyone felt their term-time feelings beginning again, and they were all rather
gloomy and no one could think of anything to say. Lucy was going to boarding school for the first
time.
It was an empty, sleepy, country station and there was hardly anyone on the platform except
themselves. Suddenly Lucy gave a sharp little cry, like someone who has been stung by a wasp.
"What's up, Lu?" said Edmund - and then suddenly broke off and made a noise like "Ow!"
"What on earth-",began Peter, and then he too suddenly changed what he had been going to say.
Instead, he said, "Susan, let go! What are you doing? Where are you dragging me to?"
"I'm not touching you," said Susan. "Someone is pulling me. Oh - oh -oh -stop it!"
Everyone noticed that all the others' faces had gone very white.
"I felt just the same," said Edmund in a breathless voice. "As if I were being dragged along. A
most frightful pulling-ugh! it's beginning again."
"Me too," said Lucy. "Oh, I can't bear it."
"Look sharp!" shouted Edmund. "All catch hands and keep together. This is magic - I can tell by
the feeling. Quick!"
"Yes," said Susan. "Hold hands. Oh, I do wish it would stop-oh!"
Next moment the luggage, the seat, the platform, and the station had completely vanished. The four
children, holding hands and panting, found themselves standing in a woody place - such a woody
place that branches were sticking into them and there was hardly room to move. They all rubbed
their eyes and took a deep breath.
"Oh, Peter!" exclaimed Lucy. "Do you think we can possibly have got back to Narnia?"
"It might be anywhere," said Peter. "I can't see a yard in all these trees. Let's try to get into
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (1 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:25 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
the open - if there is any open."
With some difficulty, and with some stings from nettles and pricks from thorns, they struggled out
of the thicket. Then they had another surprise. Everything became much brighter, and after a few
steps they found themselves at the edge of the wood, looking down on a sandy beach. A few yards
away a very calm sea was falling on the sand with such tiny ripples that it made hardly any sound.
There was no land in sight and no clouds in the sky. The sun was about where it ought to be at ten
o'clock in the morning, and the sea was a dazzling blue. They stood sniffing in the sea-smell.
"By Jove!" said Peter. "This is good enough."
Five minutes later everyone was barefooted and wading in the cool clear water.
"This is better than being in a stuffy train on the way back to Latin and French and Algebra!"
said Edmund. And then for quite a long time there was no more talking, only splashing and looking
for shrimps and crabs.
"All the same," said Susan presently, "I suppose we'll have to make some plans. We shall want
something to eat before long."
"We've got the sandwiches Mother gave us for the journey," said Edmund. "At least I've got mine."
"Not me," said Lucy. "Mine were in my little bag."
"So were mine," said Susan.
"Mine are in my coat-pocket, there on the beach," said Peter. "That'll be two lunches among four.
This isn't going to be such fun."
"At present," said Lucy, "I want something to drink more than something to eat."
Everyone else now felt thirsty, as one usually is after wading in salt water under a hot sun.
"It's like being shipwrecked," remarked Edmund. "In the books they always find springs of clear,
fresh water on the island. We'd better go and look for them."
"Does that mean we have to go back into all that thick wood?" said Susan.
"Not a bit of it," said Peter. "If there are streams they're bound to come down to the sea, and if
we walk along the beach we're bound to come to them."
They all now waded back and went first across the smooth, wet sand and then up to the dry, crumbly
sand that sticks to one's toes, and began putting on their shoes and socks. Edmund and Lucy wanted
to leave them behind and do their exploring with bare feet, but Susan said this would be a mad
thing to do. "We might never find them again," she pointed out, "and we shall want them if we're
still here when night comes and it begins to be cold."
When they were dressed again they set out along the shore with the sea on their left hand and the
wood on their right. Except for an occasional seagull it was a very quiet place. The wood was so
thick and tangled that they could hardly see into it at all; and nothing in it moved - not a bird,
not even an insect.
Shells and seaweed and anemones, or tiny crabs in rockpools, are all very well, but you soon get
tired of them if you are thirsty. The children's feet, after the change from the cool water, felt
hot and heavy. Susan and Lucy had raincoats to carry. Edmund had put down his coat on the station
seat just before the magic overtook them, and he and Peter took it in turns to carry Peter's great-
coat.
Presently the shore began to curve round to the right. About quarter of an hour later, after they
had crossed a rocky ridge which ran out into a point, it made quite a sharp turn. Their backs were
now to the part of the sea which had met them when they first came out of the wood, and now,
looking ahead, they could see across the water another shore, thickly wooded like the one they
were exploring.
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (2 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
"I wonder, is that an island or do we join on to it presently?" said Lucy.
"Don't know," said Peter and they all plodded on in silence.
The shore that they were walking on drew nearer and nearer to the opposite shore, and as they came
round each promontory the children expected to find the place where the two joined. But in this
they were disappointed. They came to some rocks which they had to climb and from the top they
could see a fairway ahead and - "Oh bother!" said Edmund, "it's no good. We shan't be able to get
to those other woods at all. We're on an island!"
It was true. At this point the channel between them and the opposite coast was only about thirty
or forty yards wide; but they could now see that this was its narrowest place. After that, their
own coast bent round to the right again and they could see open sea between it and the mainland.
It was obvious that they had already come much more than halfway round the island.
"Look!" said Lucy suddenly. "What's that?" She pointed to a long, silvery, snake-like thing that
lay across the beach.
"A stream! A stream!" shouted the others, and, tired as they were, they lost no time in clattering
down the rocks and racing to the fresh water. They knew that the stream would be better to drink
farther up, away from the beach, so they went at once to the spot where it came out of the wood.
The trees were as thick as ever, but the stream had made itself a deep course between high mossy
banks so that by stooping you could follow it up in a sort of tunnel of leaves. They dropped on
their knees by the first brown, dimply pool and drank and drank, and dipped their faces in the
water, and then dipped their arms in up to the elbow.
"Now," said Edmund, "what about those sandwiches?"
"Oh, hadn't we better have them?" said Susan. "We may need them far worse later on."
"I do wish," said Lucy, "now that we're not thirsty, we could go on feeling as not-hungry as we
did when we were thirsty."
"But what about those sandwiches?" repeated Edmund. "There's no good saving them till they go bad.
You've got to remember it's a good deal hotter here than in England and we've been carrying them
about in pockets for hours." So they got out the two packets and divided them into four portions,
and nobody had quite enough, but it was a great deal better than nothing. Then they talked about
their plans for the next meal. Lucy wanted to go back to the sea and catch shrimps, until someone
pointed out that they had no nets. Edmund said they must gather gulls' eggs from the rocks, but
when they came to think of it they couldn't remember having seen any gulls' eggs and wouldn't be
able to cook them if they found any. Peter thought to himself that unless they had some stroke of
luck they would soon be glad to eat eggs raw, but he didn't see any point in saying this out loud.
Susan said it was a pity they had eaten the sandwiches so soon. One or two tempers very nearly got
lost at this stage. Finally Edmund said:
"Look here. There's only one thing to be done. We must explore the wood. Hermits and knights-
errant and people like that always manage to live somehow if they're in a forest. They find roots
and berries and things."
"What sort of roots?" asked Susan.
"I always thought it meant roots of trees," said Lucy.
"Come on," said Peter, "Ed is right. And we must try to do something. And it'll be better than
going out into the glare and the sun again."
So they all got up and began to follow the stream. It was very hard work. They had to stoop under
branches and climb over branches, and they blundered through great masses of stuff like
rhododendrons and tore their clothes and got their feet wet in the stream; and still there was no
noise at all except the noise of the stream and the noises they were making themselves. They were
beginning to get very tired of it when they noticed a delicious smell, and then a flash of bright
colour high above them at the top of the right bank.
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (3 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
"I say!" exclaimed Lucy. "I do believe that's an apple tree."
It was. They panted up the steep bank, forced their way through some brambles, and found
themselves standing round an old tree that was heavy with large yellowishgolden apples as firm and
juicy as you could wish to see.
"And this is not the only tree," said Edmund with his mouth full of apple. "Look there-and there."
"Why, there are dozens of them," said Susan, throwing away the core of her first apple and picking
her second. "This must have been an orchard - long, long ago, before the place went wild and the
wood grew up."
"Then this was once an inhabited island," said Peter.
"And what's that?" said Lucy, pointing ahead.
"By Jove, it's a wall," said Peter. "An old stone wall."
Pressing their way between the laden branches they reached the wall. It was very old, and broken
down in places, with moss and wallflowers growing on it, but it was higher than all but the
tallest trees. And when they came quite close to it they found a great arch which must once have
had a gate in it but was now almost filled up with the largest of all the apple trees. They had to
break some of the branches to get past, and when they had done so they all blinked because the
daylight became suddenly much brighter. They found themselves in a wide open place with walls all
round it. In here there were no trees, only level grass and daisies, and ivy, and grey walls. It
was a bright, secret, quiet place, and rather sad; and all four stepped out into the middle of it,
glad to be able to straighten their backs and move their limbs freely.
CHAPTER TWO
THE ANCIENT TREASURE HOUSE
"THIS wasn't a garden," said Susan presently. "It was a castle and this must have been the
courtyard."
"I see what you mean," said Peter. "Yes. That is the remains of a tower. And there is what used to
be a flight of steps going up to the top of the walls. And look at those other steps - the broad,
shallow ones - going up to that doorway. It must have been the door into the great hall."
"Ages ago, by the look of it," said Edmund.
"Yes, ages ago," said Peter. "I wish we could find out who the people were that lived in this
castle; and how long ago."
"It gives me a queer feeling," said Lucy.
"Does it, Lu?" said Peter, turning and looking hard at her. "Because it does the same to me. It is
the queerest thing that has happened this queer day. I wonder where we are and what it all means?"
While they were talking they had crossed the courtyard and gone through the other doorway into
what had once been the hall. This was now very like the courtyard, for the roof had long since
disappeared and it was merely another space of grass and daisies, except that it was shorter and
narrower and the walls were higher. Across the far end there was a kind of terrace about three
feet higher than the rest.
"I wonder, was it really the hall?" said Susan. "What is that terrace kind of thing?"
"Why, you silly," said Peter (who had become strangely excited), "don't you see? That was the dais
where the High Table was, where the King and the great lords sat. Anyone would think you had
forgotten that we ourselves were once Kings and Queens and sat on a dais just like that, in our
great hall."
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (4 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
"In our castle of Cair Paravel," continued Susan in a dreamy and rather sing-song voice, "at the
mouth of the great river of Narnia. How could I forget?"
"How it all comes back!" said Lucy. "We could pretend we were in Cair Paravel now. This hall must
have been very like the great hall we feasted in."
"But unfortunately without the feast," said Edmund. "It's getting late, you know. Look how long
the shadows are. And have you noticed that it isn't so hot?"
"We shall need a camp-fire if we've got to spend the night here," said Peter. "I've got matches.
Let's go and see if we can collect some dry wood."
Everyone saw the sense of this, and for the next halfhour they were busy. The orchard through
which they had first come into the ruins turned out not to be a good place for firewood. They
tried the other side of the castle, passing out of the hall by a little side door into a maze of
stony humps and hollows which must once have been passages and smaller rooms but was now all
nettles and wild roses. Beyond this they found a wide gap in the castle wall and stepped through
it into a wood of darker and bigger trees where they found dead branches and rotten wood and
sticks and dry leaves and fir-cones in plenty. They went to and fro with bundles until they had a
good pile on the dais. At the fifth journey they found the well, just outside the hall, hidden in
weeds, but clean and fresh and deep when they had cleared these away.
The remains of a stone pavement ran half-way round it. Then the girls went out to pick some more
apples and the boys built the fire, on the dais and fairly close to the corner between two walls,
which they thought would be the snuggest and warmest place. They had great difficulty in lighting
it and used a lot of matches, but they succeeded in the end. Finally, all four sat down with their
backs to the wall and their faces to the fire. They tried roasting some of the apples on the ends
of sticks. But roast apples are not much good without sugar, and they are too hot to eat with your
fingers till they are too cold to be worth eating. So they had to content themselves with raw
apples, which, as Edmund said, made one realize that school suppers weren't so bad after all - "I
shouldn't mind a good thick slice of bread and margarine this minute," he added. But the spirit of
adventure was rising in them all, and no one really wanted to be back at school.
Shortly after the last apple had been eaten, Susan went out to the well to get another drink. When
she came back she was carrying something in her hand.
"Look," she said in a rather choking kind of voice. "I found it by the well." She handed it to
Peter and sat down. The others thought she looked and sounded as if she might be going to cry.
Edmund and Lucy eagerly bent forward to see what was in Peter's hand - a little, bright thing that
gleamed in the firelight.
"Well, I'm - I'm jiggered," said Peter, and his voice also sounded queer. Then he handed it to the
others.
All now saw what it was - a little chess-knight, ordinary in size but extraordinarily heavy
because it was made of pure gold; and the eyes in the horse's head were two tiny little rubies or
rather one was, for the other had been knocked out.
"Why!" said Lucy, "it's exactly like one of the golden chessmen we used to play with when we were
Kings and Queens at Cair Paravel."
"Cheer up, Su," said Peter to his other sister.
"I can't help it," said Susan. "It brought back - oh, such lovely times. And I remembered playing
chess with fauns and good giants, and the mer-people singing in the sea, and my beautiful horse -
and - and -"
"Now," said Peter in a quite different voice, "it's about time we four started using our brains."
"What about?" asked Edmund.
"Have none of you guessed where we are?" said Peter.
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (5 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
"Go on, go on," said Lucy. "I've felt for hours that there was some wonderful mystery hanging over
this place."
"Fire ahead, Peter," said Edmund. "We're all listening."
"We are in the ruins of Cair Paravel itself," said Peter.
"But, I say," replied Edmund. "I mean, how do you make that out? This place has been ruined for
ages. Look at all those big trees growing right up to the gates. Look at the very stones. Anyone
can see that nobody has lived here for hundreds of years."
"I know," said Peter. "That is the difficulty. But let's leave that out for the moment. I want to
take the points one by one. First point: this hall is exactly the same shape and size as the hall
at Cair Paravel. Just picture a roof on this, and a coloured pavement instead of grass, and
tapestries on the walls, and you get our royal banqueting hall."
No one said anything.
"Second point," continued Peter. "The castle well is exactly where our well was, a little to the
south of the great hall; and it is exactly the same size and shape."
Again there was no reply.
"Third point: Susan has just found one of our old chessmen - or something as like one of them as
two peas."
Still nobody answered.
"Fourth point. Don't you remember - it was the very day before the ambassadors came from the King
of Calormen don't you remember planting the orchard outside the north gate of Cair Paravel? The
greatest of all the wood-people, Pomona herself, came to put good spells on it. It was those very
decent little chaps the moles who did the actual digging. Can you have forgotten that funny old
Lilygloves, the chief mole, leaning on his spade and saying, `Believe me, your Majesty, you'll be
glad of these fruit trees one day.' And by Jove he was right."
"I do! I do!" said Lucy, and clapped her hands.
"But look here, Peter," said Edmund. "This must be all rot. To begin with, we didn't plant the
orchard slap up against the gate. We wouldn't have been such fools."
"No, of course not," said Peter. "But it has grown up to the gate since."
"And for another thing," said Edmund, "Cair Paravel wasn't on an island."
"Yes, I've been wondering about that. But it was a what-do-you-call-it, a peninsula. Jolly nearly
an island. Couldn't it have been made an island since our time? Somebody has dug a channel."
"But half a moment!" said Edmund. "You keep on saying since our time. But it's only a year ago
since we came back from Narnia. And you want to make out that in one year castles have fallen
down, and great forests have grown up, and little trees we saw planted ourselves have turned into
a big old orchard, and goodness knows what else. It's all impossible."
"There's one thing," said Lucy. "If this is Cair Paravel there ought to be a door at this end of
the dais. In fact we ought to be sitting with our backs against it at this moment. You know - the
door that led down to the treasure chamber."
"I suppose there isn't a door," said Peter, getting up.
The wall behind them was a mass of ivy.
"We can soon find out," said Edmund, taking up one of the sticks that they had laid ready for
putting on the fire. He began beating the ivied wall. Tap-tap went the stick against the stone;
and again, tap-tap; and then, all at once, boomboom, with a quite different sound, a hollow,
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (6 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
wooden sound.
"Great Scott!" said Edmund.
"We must clear this ivy away," said Peter.
"Oh, do let's leave it alone," said Susan. "We can try it in the morning. If we've got to spend
the night here I don't want an open door at my back and a great big black hole that anything might
come out of, besides the draught and the damp. And it'll soon be dark."
"Susan! How can you?" said Lucy with a reproachful glance. But both the boys were too much excited
to take any notice of Susan's advice. They worked at the ivy with their hands and with Peter's
pocket-knife till the knife broke. After that they used Edmund's. Soon the whole place where they
had been sitting was covered with ivy; and at last they had the door cleared.
"Locked, of course," said Peter.
"But the wood's all rotten," said Edmund. "We can pull it to bits in no time, and it will make
extra firewood. Come on."
It took them longer than they expected and, before they had done, the great hall had grown dusky
and the first star or two had come out overhead. Susan was not the only one who felt a slight
shudder as the boys stood above the pile of splintered wood, rubbing the dirt off their hands and
staring into the cold, dark opening they had made.
"Now for a torch," said Peter.
"Oh, what is the good?" said Susan. "And as Edmund said -"
"I'm not saying it now," Edmund interrupted. "I still don't understand, but we can settle that
later. I suppose you're coming down, Peter?"
"We must," said Peter. "Cheer up, Susan. It's no good behaving like kids now that we are back in
Narnia.
You're a Queen here. And anyway no one could go to sleep with a mystery like this on their minds."
They tried to use long sticks as torches but this was not a success. If you held them with the
lighted end up they went out, and if you held them the other way they scorched your hand and the
smoke got in your eyes. In the end they had to use Edmund's electric torch; luckily it had been a
birthday present less than a week ago and the battery was almost new. He went first, with the
light. Then came Lucy, then Susan, and Peter brought up the rear.
"I've come to the top of the steps," said Edmund.
"Count them," said Peter.
"One - two - three," said Edmund, as he went cautiously down, and so up to sixteen. "And this is
the bottom," he shouted back.
"Then it really must be Cair Paravel," said Lucy. "There were sixteen." Nothing more was said till
all four were standing in a knot together at the foot of the stairway. Then Edmund flashed his
torch slowly round.
"O - o - o - oh!!" said all the children at once.
For now all knew that it was indeed the ancient treasure chamber of Cair Paravel where they had
once reigned as Kings and Queens of Narnia. There was a kind of path up the middle (as it might be
in a greenhouse), and along each side at intervals stood rich suits of armour, like knights
guarding the treasures. In between the suits of armour, and on each side of the path, were shelves
covered with precious things - necklaces and arm rings and finger rings and golden bowls and
dishes and long tusks of ivory, brooches and coronets and chains of gold, and heaps of unset
stones lying piled anyhow as if they were marbles or potatoes - diamonds, rubies, carbuncles,
emeralds, topazes, and amethysts. Under the shelves stood great chests of oak strengthened with
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (7 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
iron bars and heavily padlocked. And it was bitterly cold, and so still that they could hear
themselves breathing, and the treasures were so covered with dust that unless they had realized
where they were and remembered most of the things, they would hardly have known they were
treasures. There was something sad and a little frightening about the place, because it all seemed
so forsaken and long ago. That was why nobody said anything for at least a minute.
Then, of course, they began walking about and picking things up to look at. It was like meeting
very old friends. If you had been there you would have heard them saying things like, "Oh look!
Our coronation rings - do you remember first wearing this? - Why, this is the little brooch we all
thought was lost - I say, isn't that the armour you wore in the great tournament in the Lone
Islands? - do you remember the dwarf making that for me? - do you remember drinking out of that
horn? - do you remember, do you remember?"
But suddenly Edmund said, "Look here. We mustn't waste the battery: goodness knows how often we
shall need it. Hadn't we better take what we want and get out again?"
"We must take the gifts," said Peter. For long ago at a Christmas in Narnia he and Susan and Lucy
had been given certain presents which they valued more than their whole kingdom. Edmund had had no
gift, because he was not with them at the time. (This was his own fault, and you can read about it
in the other book.)
They all agreed with Peter and walked up the path to the wall at the far end of the treasure
chamber, and there, sure enough, the gifts were still hanging. Lucy's was the smallest for it was
only a little bottle. But the bottle was made of diamond instead of glass, and it was still more
than half full of the magical cordial which would heal almost every wound and every illness. Lucy
said nothing and looked very solemn as she took her gift down from its place and slung the belt
over her shoulder and once more felt the bottle at her side where it used to hang in the old days.
Susan's gift had been a bow and arrows and a horn. The bow was still there, and the ivory quiver,
full of wellfeathered arrows, but - "Oh, Susan," said Lucy. "Where's the horn?"
"Oh bother, bother, bother," said Susan after she had thought for a moment. "I remember now. I
took it with me the last day of all, the day we went hunting the White Stag. It must have got lost
when we blundered back into that other place - England, I mean."
Edmund whistled. It was indeed a shattering loss; for this was an enchanted horn and, whenever you
blew it, help was certain to come to you, wherever you were.
"Just the sort of thing that might come in handy in a place like this," said Edmund.
"Never mind," said Susan, "I've still got the bow." And she took it.
"Won't the string be perished, Su?" said Peter.
But whether by some magic in the air of the treasure chamber or not, the bow was still in working
order. Archery and swimming were the things Susan was good at. In a moment she had bent the bow
and then she gave one little pluck to the string. It twanged: a chirruping twang that vibrated
through the whole room. And that one small noise brought back the old days to the children's minds
more than anything that had happened yet. All the battles and hunts and feasts came rushing into
their heads together.
Then she unstrung the bow again and slung the quiver at her side.
Next, Peter took down his gift - the shield with the great red lion on it, and the royal sword. He
blew, and rapped them on the floor, to get off the dust. He fitted the shield on his arm and slung
the sword by his side. He was afraid at first that it might be rusty and stick to the sheath. But
it was not so. With one swift motion he drew it and held it up, shining in the torchlight.
"It is my sword Rhindon," he said; "with it I killed the Wolf." There was a new tone in his voice,
and the others all felt that he was really Peter the High King again. Then, after a little pause,
everyone remembered that they must save the battery.
They climbed the stair again and made up a good fire and lay down close together for warmth. The
ground was very hard and uncomfortable, but they fell asleep in the end.
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (8 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
CHAPTER THREE
THE DWARF
THE worst of sleeping out of doors is that you wake up so dreadfully early. And when you wake you
have to get up because the ground is so hard that you are uncomfortable. And it makes matters
worse if there is nothing but apples for breakfast and you have had nothing but apples for supper
the night before. When Lucy had said - truly enough that it was a glorious morning, there did not
seem to be anything else nice to be said. Edmund said what everyone was feeling, "We've simply got
to get off this island."
When they had drunk from the well and splashed their faces they all went down the stream again to
the shore and stared at the channel which divided them from the mainland.
"We'll have to swim," said Edmund.
"It would be all right for Su," said Peter (Susan had won prizes for swimming at school). "But I
don't know about the rest of us." By "the rest of us" he really meant Edmund who couldn't yet do
two lengths at the school baths, and Lucy, who could hardly swim at all.
"Anyway," said Susan, "there may be currents. Father says it's never wise to bathe in a place you
don't know."
"But, Peter," said Lucy, "look here. I know I can't swim for nuts at home - in England, I mean.
But couldn't we all swim long ago - if it was long ago - when we were Kings and Queens in Narnia?
We could ride then too, and do all sorts of things. Don't you think -?"
"Ah, but we were sort of grown-up then," said Peter.
"We reigned for years and years and learned to do things. Aren't we just back at our proper ages
again now?"
"Oh!" said Edmund in a voice which made everyone stop talking and listen to him.
"I've just seen it all," he said.
"Seen what?" asked Peter.
"Why, the whole thing," said Edmund. "You know what we were puzzling about last night, that it was
only a year ago since we left Narnia but everything looks as if no one had lived in Cair Paravel
for hundreds of years? Well, don't you see? You know that, however long we seemed to have lived in
Narnia, when we got back through the wardrobe it seemed to have taken no time at all?"
"Go on," said Susan. "I think I'm beginning to understand."
"And that means," continued Edmund, "that, once you're out of Narnia, you have no idea how Narnian
time is going. Why shouldn't hundreds of years have gone past in Narnia while only one year has
passed for us in England?"
"By Jove, Ed," said Peter. "I believe you've got it. In that sense it really was hundreds of years
ago that we lived in Cair Paravel. And now we're coming back to Narnia just as if we were
Crusaders or Anglo-Saxons or Ancient Britons or someone coming back to modern England?"
"How excited they'll be to see us -" began Lucy, but at the same moment everyone else said,
"Hush!" or "Look!" For now something was happening.
There was a wooded point on the mainland a little to their right, and they all felt sure that just
beyond that point must be the mouth of the river. And now, round that point there came into sight
a boat. When it had cleared the point, it turned and began coming along the channel towards them.
There were two people on board, one rowing, the other sitting in the stern and holding a bundle
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (9 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt
that twitched and moved as if it were alive. Both these people seemed to be soldiers. They had
steel caps on their heads and light shirts of chain-mail. Their faces were bearded and hard. The
children drew back from the beach into the wood and watched without moving a finger.
"This'll do," said the soldier in the stern when the boat had come about opposite to them.
"What about tying a stone to his feet, Corporal?" said the other, resting on his oars.
"Garn!" growled the other. "We don't need that, and we haven't brought one. He'll drown sure
enough without a stone, as long as we've tied the cords right." With these words he rose and
lifted his bundle. Peter now saw that it was really alive and was in fact a Dwarf, bound hand and
foot but struggling as hard as he could. Next moment he heard a twang just beside his ear, and all
at once the soldier threw up his arms, dropping the Dwarf into the bottom of the boat, and fell
over into the water. He floundered away to the far bank and Peter knew that Susan's arrow had
struck on his helmet. He turned and saw that she was very pale but was already fitting a second
arrow to the string. But it was never used. As soon as he saw his companion fall, the other
soldier, with a loud cry, jumped out of the boat on the far side, and lie also floundered through
the water (which was apparently just in his depth) and disappeared into the woods of the mainland.
"Quick! Before she drifts!" shouted Peter. He and Susan, fully dressed as they were, plunged in,
and before the water was up to their shoulders their hands were on the side of the boat. In a few
seconds they had hauled her to the bank and lifted the Dwarf out, and Edmund was busily engaged in
cutting his bonds with the pocket knife. (Peter's sword would have been sharper, but a sword is
very inconvenient for this sort of work because you can't hold it anywhere lower than the hilt.)
When at last the Dwarf was free, he sat up, rubbed his arms and legs, and exclaimed:
"Well, whatever they say, you don't feel like ghosts."
Like most Dwarfs he was very stocky and deep-chested. He would have been about three feet high if
he had been standing up, and an immense beard and whiskers of coarse red hair left little of his
face to be seen except a beak-like nose and twinkling black eyes.
"Anyway," he continued, "ghosts or not, you've saved my life and I'm extremely obliged to you."
"But why should we be ghosts?" asked Lucy.
"I've been told all my life," said the Dwarf, "that these woods along the shore were as full of
ghosts as they were of trees. That's what the story is. And that's why, when they want to get rid
of anyone, they usually bring him down here (like they were doing with me) and say they'll leave
him to the ghosts. But I always wondered if they didn't really drown 'em or cut their throats. I
never quite believed in the ghosts. But those two cowards you've just shot believed all right.
They were more frightened of taking me to my death than I was of going!"
"Oh," said Susan. "So that's why they both ran away."
"Eh? What's that?" said the Dwarf.
"They got away," said Edmund. "To the mainland."
"I wasn't shooting to kill, you know," said Susan. She would not have liked anyone to think she
could miss at such a short range.
"Hm," said the Dwarf. "That's not so good. That may mean trouble later on. Unless they hold their
tongues for their own sake."
"What were they going to drown you for?" asked Peter.
"Oh, I'm a dangerous criminal, I am," said the Dwarf cheerfully. "But that's a long story.
Meantime, I was wondering if perhaps you were going to ask me to breakfast? You've no idea what an
appetite it gives one, being executed."
"There's only apples," said Lucy dolefully.
"Better than nothing, but not so good as fresh fish," said the Dwarf. "It looks as if I'll have to
file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txt (10 of 67) [2/3/03 12:09:26 AM]
摘要：

file:///F|/rah/C.%20S.%20Lewis/CS%20Lewis%20-%204%20-%20Prince%20Caspian.txtPRINCECASPIANBYC.S.LEWISCHAPTERONETHEISLANDONCEtherewerefourchildrenwhosenameswerePeter,Susan,Edmund,andLucy,andithasbeentoldinanotherbookcalledTheLion,theWitchandtheWardrobehowtheyhadaremarkableadventure.Theyhadopenedthe...

展开>> 收起<<
Lewis, C.S. - Narnia 3 - The Horse and his boy.pdf

共67页,预览14页

还剩页未读， 继续阅读

声明：本站为文档C2C交易模式，即用户上传的文档直接被用户下载，本站只是中间服务平台，本站所有文档下载所得的收益归上传人(含作者)所有。玖贝云文库仅提供信息存储空间，仅对用户上传内容的表现方式做保护处理，对上载内容本身不做任何修改或编辑。若文档所含内容侵犯了您的版权或隐私，请立即通知玖贝云文库，我们立即给予删除！

相关推荐

更多
立即下载
分类：外语学习 价格：5.9玖币 属性：67 页 大小：186.76KB 格式：PDF 时间：2024-12-23

开通VIP享超值会员特权

  • 多端同步记录
  • 高速下载文档
  • 免费文档工具
  • 分享文档赚钱
  • 每日登录抽奖
  • 优质衍生服务

作者详情

相关内容

更多

热门标签

人际关系 配电装置 动力学连接体 力的合成 高考理综 全宋诗作者索引 公务员考试
/ 67
评分 收藏
分享
立即下载 VIP免费下载
客服
关注