Lynne Banks - The Adventures of King Midas

Midas swallowed again. It meant giving up his one special claim to fame and glory (apart from being a king, which really wasn’t his doing). But if he had his wish –! What else mattered?

“All of them, for ever,” he said.

The little man gave a tiny, thoughtful nod.

“A bargain,” he said.

With a sudden movement he pulled the king’s hands towards him and held them tightly by the fingers. Now his eyes were not twinkly any more. They seemed to bore into Midas’s brain.

“Listen carefully,” he said. “I cannot give you gold. But I can work a spell so that everything your hands touch becomes gold.”

The King thought he might lose consciousness. It was too wonderful to be borne.

“Oh, yes!” he said faintly. “Oh, please!”

“Think,” said the magician.

“Th-th-think?” the king stammered.

“Yes! Think, man! Think whether you want it or not!”

“I want it! I want it!” cried Midas without thinking for even one second.

“Because the spell is permanent. No way back.”

“If I could have this, I would have everything any man could want. It is my one dream of happiness.”

“Your dream of happiness! You have your child – you have royal blood – you have the love of your people. You even have wealth. And this is your dream of happiness?”

“Do you think it so awful?” asked the King, his hands still firmly held in front of him.

“It is of no importance what I think. Decide.”

“I have decided,” said the King. “I can’t come so close to it and reject it. I want it.”

Even as he said these words, he felt a charge, like a bolt of electricity, shoot through his fingers and through his hands, stopping short at his wrists. It shocked him so that he cried out and everything went black for a moment.

When he opened his eyes, things were apparently back to normal. The little man was yawning.

“That’s it,” he said. “Where’s my rose?”

Feeling rather dazed, the king pointed out to him the special rose bush. Not that you could miss it. The roses on it were double the size of any other rose in the garden. They glowed with a special, deep red which seemed to hold all other reds within it. For several yards around the bush the perfume wafted and played in the air, so delicious you could almost see it.

“Ah! Ah!” exclaimed Nandan. “A treasure from the far side of magic! And this is to be mine alone!”

Reverently, he plucked one of the huge roses, attached it to his leather waistcoat, drew in a deep breath of its scent, and gave Midas one long look of – what? Admiration? Gratitude? Whatever it was, Midas felt that for the first time since the magician had appeared, they were equals.

Suddenly the little man made a grasping pass with his hand.

The whole rose bush, covered with Midas roses, vanished.

In another split second, the bush, now a tiny miniature, complete with its roots, reappeared in the little man’s hand. He was taking it with him! The Midas rose was no more for this world. The magician gave a high-pitched laugh.

“I’ve had the best of our bargain,” he cried. “Goodbye, King Midas!”

He disappeared into the air, and the roses with him. But after a second, he came back.

“If I were less pleased with my fee, I would not bother to say this,” he said. “But if you should ever want to see me again, come to this spot where my rose once grew and say, ‘Red Rose, bloom again’. But make sure it’s not raining!”

He let out another eldritch chuckle and vanished once more.

The King looked around him.

He wondered if he had been dreaming. He definitely felt dizzy. So he put out his hand and leant against a tree to steady himself.

The rough, warm bark changed instantly under his hand to something hard and smooth and cold. The King took his hand away quickly and looked up at the tree.

At first he couldn’t credit what his eyes told him. From its roots to its topmost branches, the tree was made of shining gold. Every tiny leaf was like a golden mirror that shone so brightly it dazzled the King’s eyes.

He broke off a leaf and stared at it. He broke off some more, until he had a whole handful. On a sudden impulse, he flung them into the air. Sending out sparks of dancing light, they fell heavily, scattering around his feet.

“It’s true,” he breathed, gazing at the tree in a befuddlement that trembled on the brink of absolute happiness. “It’s TRUE!” he shouted, jumping into the air, grasping a low-hanging golden bough in both hands and swinging on it like a schoolboy. “IT’S TRUE IT’S TRUE IT’S TRUE!” he yelled at the top of his lungs, dropping from the branch and capering around the base of the tree.

“I have it! It’s mine! The golden touch is mine!”

He couldn’t stay still. He left the heavy shade of the tree and ran to another, and another. Each one froze to his touch into brilliant, solid, flawless gold. The branches stopped swaying and the leaves stopped whispering. The birds that had been resting in the trees flew away in chirping, frightened clouds. Squirrels fled down the trunks, slipping and sliding. Though they couldn’t be seen, a myriad of insects also made their escape, or tried to, though many were trapped inside and could no longer gnaw their way out.

But King Midas noticed nothing but that his magic touch worked perfectly, and had already made him the most gold-rich person in the world.

At last he had to stop dashing about. He came, puffing, to rest by a rose bush. Not a Midas bush, of course, that was gone for ever, but a beautiful bush all the same. He was so happy he felt he must pick a rose to put in his button hole; but as he broke the flower off, the petals became stiff and shiny, and the King found he was holding a perfect golden rose.

His face broke into a grin. “This takes some getting used to!” he exclaimed. And then he did another silly thing. Without thinking, he bent his head to smell the flower.

Of course it had no scent. That had disappeared as soon as the rose became gold.

The King became very still for a moment. Roses were his great love … But then he pushed away the tiny regret that had come into his mind. He threw away the golden rose and, with his magic hands firmly out of the way, smelt some others to make himself feel all right again.

The next thing he thought of was some cash that was in his pocket – common coins of the realm, made of copper and bronze and nickel. He would change those into gold at once – gold like the pirates in his old storybooks used to have – doubloons! And he reached into the pocket of his jacket.

Instantly a heavy weight fell onto his shoulders so that he was almost pressed to the ground.

“Good heavens! The jacket’s turned into gold now! I keep forgetting!”

He had to break the buttons away to get the jacket off, and as it lay all stiff and cold in the grass, gleaming like a suit of armour, the King almost thought for a moment that it had been nicer before.

He shook himself, feeling the chill breeze without his dear old tweed jacket, his favourite gardening one that he’d had since his wife’s time, and exclaimed aloud, “But how absurd! Now I have all the gold I want, I can buy a new jacket for every day of the year! But of course,” he added thoughtfully, “I shall have to get someone to dress me. H’m. Wonder what old Biffpot’s going to think about all this?”