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The Flute-Player’s Story
by
“After this dance was over the Count rose, and he and his guests retired to rest. The fiddler was given a purse full of money, and the Count gave orders that he should be served refreshment in the kitchen.
“Elisinde went up to her bedroom, which overlooked the garden. She threw the window wide open and looked out into the starry darkness. It was a breathless summer night. The air was full of warm scents. Lights still twinkled in the village; now and again a dog barked, otherwise everything was still. She leant out of the window, and cried bitterly because her lot was loathsome to her, and she had not a friend in the world to whom she could confide her sorrow.
“While she was thus sobbing she heard a rustling in the bushes beneath; she looked down and she saw a face looking up towards her, a beautiful face, glistening in the moonlight. It was the fiddler.
“‘Elisinde,’ he called to her in a low voice, ‘if you want to escape I have the means. Come with me; I love you, and I will save you from your doom.’
“‘I would come with you to the end of the world,’ she said, ‘but how can I get away from this castle?’
“He threw a rope ladder up to her. ‘Make it fast to the bar,’ he said, ‘and let yourself down.’
“She let herself down into the garden. ‘We can easily climb the wall with this,’ he said; ‘but before you come I must tell you that if you will be my bride your life will be hard and full of misery. Think before you come.’
“‘Rather all the misery in the world,’ she said, ‘than the awful doom that awaits me here. Besides which I love you, and we shall be very happy.’
“They scaled the wall, and on the other side of it the fiddler had two horses, waiting tied to the gate. They galloped through many villages, and by the dawn they had reached a village far beyond the Count’s lands. Here they stopped at an inn, and they were married by the priest that day. But they did not stop in this village; they sought a further country, beyond reach of all pursuit. They settled in a village, and the fiddler earned his bread by his fiddling, and Elisinde kept their cottage neat and clean. For awhile they were as happy as the day was long; the fiddler found favour everywhere by his fiddling, and Elisinde ingratiated herself by her gentle ways. But one day when Elisinde was lying in bed and the fiddler had lulled her to sleep with his music, some neighbours, attracted by the sound, passed the cottage and looked in at the window. And to their astonishment they saw the fiddler sitting by a bed on which lay what seemed to them to be a sleeping princess; and the whole cottage was full of dazzling light, and the fiddler’s face shone, and his hair and his eyes glittered like gold. They went away much frightened, and told the whole village the news.
“Now there were already not a few of the villagers who looked askance on the fiddler; and this incident set all the evil and envious tongues wagging. When the fiddler went to play the next day at the inn men turned away from him, and a child in the street threw a stone at him. Presently he was warned that he had better swiftly fly or else he would be drowned as a sorcerer.
“So he and Elisinde fled in the night to a neighbouring village. But soon the dark rumours followed them, and they were forced to flee once more. This happened again and again, till at last in the whole country there was not a village which would receive them, and one night they were obliged to take refuge in a barn, for Elisinde was expecting the birth of her child. That night their child was born, a beautiful little boy, and an hour afterwards Elisinde smiled and died.