Page:The Children Who Followed the Piper.djvu/127

 he came to the surface of the Nixie's pool. Still he held his sword in his hand. He flung it beyond the pool and he sprang out of the water.

He looked back and he saw the Nixie standing in her pool, white and soft and smiling. Her hair was like the winter sunset through the pine trees.

"Come back to me, come back," the Nixie said.

"I have to find a way through the Dark Forest," said Valentine.

"You cannot go through the Dark Forest," the Nixie said. "Come back to me. The pool is safe and I will be kind to you. Oh, I have sweeter things to give you than I have yet given."

"No, Nixie. I go, " said Valentine. He sprang away from the Nixie's pool. As he went he heard her wailing like the bird that dives into and rises out of the water of a lake.

Oh, how dark and lonely and terrible was the Dark Forest! More lonely and more dark and more terrible than it had been when Valentine