George MacDonald: At the Back of the North Wind

Diamond soon made great friends with an old woman who kept a toyshop, for his mother had given him twopence for pocket-money before he left, and he had gone into her shop to spend it, and she got talking to him. She looked very funny, because she had not got any teeth, but Diamond liked her, and went often to her shop, although he had nothing to spend there after the twopence was gone.

One afternoon he had been wandering rather wearily about the streets for some time. It was a hot day, and he felt tired. As he passed the toyshop, he stepped in.

“Please may I sit down for a minute on this box?” he said, thinking the old woman was somewhere in the shop. But he got no answer, and sat down without one. Around him were a great many toys of all prices, from a penny up to shillings. All at once he heard a gentle whirring somewhere amongst them. It made him start and look behind him. There were the sails of a windmill going round and round almost close to his ear. He thought at first it must be one of those toys which are wound up and go with clockwork; but no, it was a common penny toy, with the windmill at the end of a whistle, and when the whistle blows the windmill goes. But the wonder was that there was no one at the whistle end blowing, and yet the sails were turning round and round—now faster, now slower, now faster again.

“What can it mean?” said Diamond, aloud.

“It means me,” said the tiniest voice he had ever heard.

“Who are you, please?” asked Diamond.

“Well, really, I begin to be ashamed of you,” said the voice. “I wonder how long it will be before you know me; or how often I might take you in before you got sharp enough to suspect me. You are as bad as a baby that doesn’t know his mother in a new bonnet.”

“Not quite so bad as that, dear North Wind,” said Diamond, “for I didn’t see you at all, and indeed I don’t see you yet, although I recognise your voice. Do grow a little, please.”

“Not a hair’s-breadth,” said the voice, and it was the smallest voice that ever spoke. “What are you doing here?”

“I am come to see my aunt. But, please, North Wind, why didn’t you come back for me in the church that night?”

“I did. I carried you safe home. All the time you were dreaming about the glass Apostles, you were lying in my arms.”

“I’m so glad,” said Diamond. “I thought that must be it, only I wanted to hear you say so. Did you sink the ship, then?”

“Yes.”

“And drown everybody?”

“Not quite. One boat got away with six or seven men in it.”

“How could the boat swim when the ship couldn’t?”

“Of course I had some trouble with it. I had to contrive a bit, and manage the waves a little. When they’re once thoroughly waked up, I have a good deal of trouble with them sometimes. They’re apt to get stupid with tumbling over each other’s heads. That’s when they’re fairly at it. However, the boat got to a desert island before noon next day.”

“And what good will come of that?”

“I don’t know. I obeyed orders. Good bye.”

“Oh! stay, North Wind, do stay!” cried Diamond, dismayed to see the windmill get slower and slower.

“What is it, my dear child?” said North Wind, and the windmill began turning again so swiftly that Diamond could scarcely see it. “What a big voice you’ve got! and what a noise you do make with it? What is it you want? I have little to do, but that little must be done.”

“I want you to take me to the country at the back of the north wind.”

“That’s not so easy,” said North Wind, and was silent for so long that Diamond thought she was gone indeed. But after he had quite given her up, the voice began again.

“I almost wish old Herodotus had held his tongue about it. Much he knew of it!”

“Why do you wish that, North Wind?”

“Because then that clergyman would never have heard of it, and set you wanting to go. But we shall see. We shall see. You must go home now, my dear, for you don’t seem very well, and I’ll see what can be done for you. Don’t wait for me. I’ve got to break a few of old Goody’s toys; she’s thinking too much of her new stock. Two or three will do. There! go now.”

Diamond rose, quite sorry, and without a word left the shop, and went home.

It soon appeared that his mother had been right about him, for that same afternoon his head began to ache very much, and he had to go to bed.

He awoke in the middle of the night. The lattice window of his room had blown open, and the curtains of his little bed were swinging about in the wind.

“If that should be North Wind now!” thought Diamond.

But the next moment he heard some one closing the window, and his aunt came to his bedside. She put her hand on his face, and said—

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