03 The Dwarf 05
At first the Dwarf did not seem very comfortable in the castle. He kept looking round and sniffing and saying,“H’m. Looks a bit spooky after all. Smells like ghosts, too.”But he cheered up when it came to lighting the fire and showing them how to roast the fresh pavenders in the embers. Eating hot fish with no forks, and one pocket-knife between five people, is a messy business and there were several burnt fingers before the meal was ended; but, as it was now nine o’clock and they had been up since five, nobody minded the burns so much as you might have expected. When everyone had finished off with a drink from the well and an apple or so, the Dwarf produced a pipe about the size of his own arm, filled it, lit it, blew a great cloud of fragrant smoke, and said,“Now.”
“You tell us your story first,”said Peter.“And then we’ll tell you ours.”
“Well,”said the Dwarf,“as you’ve saved my life it is only fair you should have your own way. But I hardly know where to begin. First of all I’m a messenger of King Caspian’s.”
“Who’s he?”asked four voices all at once.
“Caspian the Tenth, King of Narnia, and long may he reign!”answered the Dwarf.“That is to say, he ought to be King of Narnia and we hope he will be. At present he is only King of us Old Narnians—”
“What do you mean by old Narnians, please?”asked Lucy.
“Why, that’s us,”said the Dwarf.“We’re a kind of rebellion, I suppose.”
“I see,”said Peter.“And Caspian is the chief Old Narnian.”
“Well, in a manner of speaking,”said the Dwarf, scratching his head.“But he’s really a New Narnian himself, a Telmarine, if you follow me.”
“I don’t,”said Edmund.
“It’s worse than the Wars of the Roses,”said Lucy.
“Oh dear,”said the Dwarf.“I’m doing this very badly. Look here: I think I’ll have to go right back to the beginning and tell you how Caspian grew up in his uncle’s court and how he comes to be on our side at all. But it’ll be a long story.”
“All the better,”said Lucy.“We love stories.”
So the Dwarf settled down and told his tale. I shall not give it to you in his words, putting in all the children’s questions and interruptions, because it would take too long and be confusing, and, even so, it would leave out some points that the children only heard later. But the gist of the story, as they knew it in the end, was as follows.
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