The Legend of the Bleeding-heart | Page 3

And then she sat all day by the spring, refusing to spread the linen on the grass to bleach.
She was discontented with the old life of toil, and pouted crossly because duties called her when she wanted to do nothing but sit idly dreaming of the gay court scenes in which she had taken a bright brief part. The old Flax-spinner's fingers trembled as she spun, when she saw the frowns, for she had given of her heart's blood to buy happiness for this maiden she loved, and well she knew there can be no happiness where frowns abide. She felt that her years of sacrifice had been in vain, but when the Oak wagged his head she called back waveringly, "My little Olga will not be ungrateful and forgetful!"
That night outside the castle gate, Olga paused. She had forgotten the charm. The day's discontent had darkened her memory as storm-clouds darken the sky. But she grasped her necklace imperiously.
"Deck me at once!" she cried in a haughty tone. "Clothe me more beautifully than mortal maid was ever clad before, so that I may find favour in the Prince's sight and become the bride of the castle! I would that I were done for ever with the spindle and the distaff!"
But the moon went under a cloud and the wind began to moan around the turrets. The black night hawks in the forest flapped their wings warningly, and the black bats flitted low around her head.
"Obey me at once!" she cried angrily, stamping her foot and jerking at the necklace. But the string broke, and the beads went rolling away in the darkness in every direction and were lost--all but one, which she held clasped in her hand.
Then Olga wept at the castle gate; wept outside in the night and the darkness, in her peasant's garb of tow. But after awhile through her sobbing, stole the answering sob of the night wind.
"Hush-sh!" it seemed to say. "Sh-sh! Never a heart can come to harm, if the lips but speak the old dame's charm."
The voice of the night wind sounded so much like the voice of the old Flax-spinner, that Olga was startled and looked around wonderingly. Then suddenly she seemed to see the thatched cottage and the bent form of the lonely old woman at the wheel. All the years in which the good dame had befriended her seemed to rise up in a row, and out of each one called a thousand kindnesses as with one voice: "How canst thou forget us, Olga? We were done for love's sweet sake, and that alone!"
Then was Olga sorry and ashamed that she had been so proud and forgetful, and she wept again. The tears seemed to clear her vision, for now she saw plainly that through no power of her own could she wrest strange favours from fortune. Only the power of the old charm could make them hers. She remembered it then, and holding fast the one bead in her hand, she repeated humbly:
"For love's sweet sake, in my hour of need, Blossom and deck me, little seed."
Lo, as the words left her lips, the moon shone out from behind the clouds above the dark forest. There was a fragrance of lilies all about, and a gossamer gown floated around her, whiter than the whiteness of the fairest lily. It was fine like the finest lace the frost-elves weave, and softer than the softest ermine of the snow. On her long golden hair gleamed a coronet of pearls.
So beautiful, so dazzling was she as she entered the castle door, that the Prince came down to meet her, and kneeling, kissed her hand and claimed her as his bride. Then came the bishop in his mitre, and led her to the throne, and before them all the Flax-spinner's maiden was married to the Prince, and made the Princess Olga.
Then until the seven days and seven nights were done, the revels lasted in the castle. And in the merriment the old Flax-spinner was again forgotten. Her kindness of the past, her loneliness in the present had no part in the thoughts of the Princess Olga.
All night the old Oak, tapping on the thatch, called down, "Thou'rt forgotten! Thou'rt forgotten!"
But the beads that had rolled away in the darkness, buried themselves in the earth, and took root, and sprang up, as the old woman knew they would do. There at the castle gate they bloomed, a strange, strange flower, for on every stem hung a row of little bleeding hearts.
One day the Princess Olga, seeing them from her window, went down to them in wonderment.
"What do you here?" she cried, for in her forest life she'd learned all speech of bird and beast and plant.
"We bloom for love's sweet sake," they answered. "We