The Red Axe. S. R. Crockett

you do!"

      Then even as I spoke I saw that my father had drawn himself up in bed, and that he too was staring at the strange, elfish figure. Gottfried Gottfried, as I remember him in these days, was a tall, dark, heavily browed man, with a shock of bushy blue-black hair, of late silvering at the temples—grave, sombre, quiet in all his actions.

      But what was my surprise as the little maid came nearer to the bed with her pretty dancing movement, carrying the axe much as if it had been an over-heavy babe, to see the Duke's Justicer suddenly skip over the far side of the bedstead and stand with his red cloak about him, watching her.

CHAPTER IV

       Table of Contents

      THE PRINCESS HELENE

      "What devil's work is this?" he said, frowning at her severely.

      And I confess that I trembled, but not so the little maid.

      "Do not be afraid, mannie," she said, laying down the axe on the stock of the couch, against which its broad red blade and glass-clear cutting edge made an irregular patch of light. "Come and sit down beside me on your bed. I shall not hurt you indeed, mannie, and I want to talk to you. There is nothing but a little boy down-stairs. And I like best to talk with men."

      "I declare it is the dead man's brat I saved last night for Hugo's sake!"

       I heard my father mutter, "the maid with the girdle of golden letters."

      Presently a smile of amusement struggled about his mouth at her bairnly imperiousness, but he came obediently enough and sat down. Nevertheless he took away the heavy axe from her and said, "Put this down, then, or give it to me. It is not a pretty plaything for little girls!"

      The small figure in white put up a tiny fat hand, and solemnly withdrew the red patch of mask from before the wide-open baby eyes.

      "I am not a little girl, remember, mannie," she said, "I am a Princess and a great lady."

      My father bowed without rising.

      "I shall not forget," he said.

      "You should stand up and bow when I tell you that," said she. "I declare you have no more manners than the little boy in the brown blanket down-stairs."

      "Princess," said my father, gravely, "during my life I have met a great many distinguished people of your rank; and, do you know, not one of them has ever complained of my manners before."

      "Ah," cried the little maid, "then you have never met my father, the Prince. He is terribly particular. You must go so" (she imitated the mincing walk of a court chamberlain), "you must hold your tails thus" (wagging her white nightrail and twisting about her head to watch the effect), "and you must retire—so!" With that she came bowing backward towards the well of the staircase, so far that I was almost afraid she would fall plump into my arms. But she checked herself in time, and without looking round or seeing me she tripped back to my father's bedside and sat down quite confidingly beside him.

      "Now you see," cried she, "what you would have had to put up with if you had met my father. Be thankful then that it is only the little Princess Helene that is sitting here."

      "I think I had the honor to meet your father," said Gottfried Gottfried, gravely, again removing the restless baby fingers from the Red Axe and laying it on the far side of the couch beyond him.

      "Then, if you met him, did he not make you bow and bend and walk backward?" asked the Playmate, looking up very sharply.

      "Well, you see, Princess," explained my father, "it was for such a very short time that I had the honor of converse with him."

      "Ah, that does not matter," cried the maid; "often he would be most difficult when you came running in just for a moment. Why, he would straighten you up and make you do your bows if you were only racing after a kitten, or, what was worse, he would call the Court Chamberlain to show you how to do it. But when I am grown up—ah, then!—I mean to make the Chamberlain bow and walk backward; for you know he is only taking care of my princedom for me. Oh, and I shall have you well taught by that time, long man. It is cold—cold. Let me get into your bed and I will give you your first lesson now."

      So with that she skipped into my father's place and drew the great red cloak about her.

      "Now then, first position," she commanded, clapping her hands like a Sultana, "your feet together. Draw back your left—so. Very well! Bend the knee—stupid, not that one. Now your head. If I have to come to you, sir—there, that is better. Well done! Oh, I shall have a peck of trouble with you, I can see that. But you will do me credit before I have done with you."

      In a little while she tired of the lesson.

      "Come and sit down now"—she waved her hand graciously—"here on the bed by me. Though I am a Princess really, I am not proud, and, as I said, I may make something of you yet."

      My father came forward gravely, wrapped himself in another of his red cloaks, and sat down. I shivered in my blanket on the stair-head, but I could not bear to move nor yet reveal myself. This was better than any play I had ever watched from the sparred gallery of the palace, to which Gottfried Gottfried took me sometimes when the mummers came from Brandenburg to divert Duke Casimir.

      "My father, the great Prince, took me for a long ride last night. There was much noise and many bonfires behind us as we rode away, and some of the men spoke roughly, for which my father will rate them soundly to-day. Oh, they will be sick and sorry this morning when the Prince takes them to task. I hope you will never make him angry," she said, laying her hand warningly on my father's; "but if ever you do, come to me and I will speak to the Prince for you. You need not be bashful, for I do not mind a bit speaking to him, or indeed to any one. You will remember and not be bashful when you have something to ask?"

      "I will assuredly not be bashful," said my father, very solemnly. "I will come and tell you at once, little lady, if I ever have the misfortune to offend the most noble Prince."

      Then he bent his head and raised her hand to his lips. She bowed in return with exquisite reserve and hauteur; and, as it seemed to me, more with her long eyelashes than with anything else.

      "Do you know, Black Man," she said—"for, you know, you are black, though you wear red clothes—I am glad you are not afraid of me. At home every one was afraid of me. Why, the little children stood with their mouths open and their eyes like this whenever they saw me."

      And she illustrated the extremely vacant surprise into which her appearance paralyzed the infantry of her native city.

      "I am glad my father left me here till he should come back. Do you know, I like your house. There are so many interesting things about it. That funny axe over there is nice. It looks as if it could cut things. Has it ever cut anything? It is so nicely polished. How do you keep it so, and can I help you?"

      "I had just finished polishing and oiling it before I fell asleep," answered Gottfried Gottfried. "You see, little Princess, I had very many things to cut with it last night."

      "What a pity the Prince had not time to wait and see you! He is so very fond of going out into the forest with the woodman. Once he took me to see the tallest tree in all our woods cut down with just such an axe as that—only it was not red. Have you ever seen a high tree cut down?"

      "I have cut down some pretty tall ones myself!" said the Duke's Justicer, smiling quietly at her.

      "Ah, but not as tall as my father! It is beautiful to see him strip his doublet and lay to. They say there is not a woodman like him in all our land."

      Helene looked at my father, whose arms were folded in his great cloak.

      "But you have fine strong arms too," she said. "You look as if you could cut things. Did my father ever see you cut down tall trees?"

      "Yes,"