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The boy hesitated; but the same moment came that melancholy voice "My brother is rich, and I am poor; he is clad in silk, and I in rags. Alas, for me!" "It shall not be!" cried the noble boy. "I will go out of this place as poor as I came; but I will take Reutha with me. I will work all the days of my life; but Reutha shall not stay here. Hill-people!
"Dear Arndt, let me sit down and rest for a minute, I can go no farther," said Reutha, as she sank down on a little mound that seemed to rise up invitingly, with its shelter of bushes, from the midst of the desolate moor.
They climbed the gloomy staircase, and stood at the opening in the hillock. Then the little Hill-man appealed once more to his master "Noble gentleman! remember, a life of labour with Reutha or one of continual pleasure alone! Think again!" "No, not for a moment," said Arndt, as he felt the breezes of earth playing on his cheek. How sweet they were, even after the fragrant airs of elfin-land!
I shall never see you, and you will never see me again." Arndt's Night Underground It was on a dreary winter's night, just such a one as it may be now only you cannot see it for your closed shutters and curtains that two children were coming home from their daily work, for their parents were poor, and Arndt and Reutha had already to use their little hands in labour.
Arndt burst into tears, and told his friend of all that had happened that night. The peddler's face grew graver and graver as the boy told him it was on this very spot that he lost his little sister. "Arndt," whispered he, "did you ever hear of the Hill-men? It is they who have carried little Reutha away."
No, no, I am your master, good dwarf, as you very well know, and I command you to take me down in the hill with you, for I want to see Reutha." There shone a dim light on the grass, like a glowworm, and then Arndt saw the elfin mound open again; but this time the palace looked like a dim, gloomy staircase.
The Hill-men and women will kill her!" "No," said the old man, "they are very good little people, and they live in a beautiful palace underground. Truly, you will never see Reutha again, for they will keep her with them a hundred years; and when she comes back you will be dead and buried, while she is still a beautiful child."
"Not I," said Reutha; and all the while she rubbed her eyes to keep them open, and leaned her head against a branch which seemed to her as soft and inviting as a pillow. Arndt went a little way, until he saw the light which his father always placed so as to guide the children over the moor. Then he felt quite safe and at home, and went back cheerfully to his sister. Reutha was not there!
And there for a long time did Arndt sit by the hillock, wringing his hands and vainly expecting that his sister would hear him and come back. At last there passed by an old man, who travelled about the country selling ribbons and cloths. "How you are grown since I saw you last, my little fellow!" said the man. "And where is your sister Reutha?"
Then he kissed her, and wept over her, and dressed her in his own beautiful robes, while the Hill-men dared not interfere. Arndt took his sister by the hand, and said "Now, let us go; we have stayed long enough. Good Hill-man, you shall have your cap again when you have brought Reutha and me to our own father's door." But the Hill-man shook his tiny head, and made his most obsequious bow.
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