V

A long time passed. After a while, I raised my eyes to the window – but of course the window was no longer a window but a mirror. There I was confronted once again with the strange reflection of myself. Immediately the pain in my chest flared up and caused me to cry out in desperation. Clearer and clearer grew the image in the glass. I could see that the princess’s robe was open in front, revealing a deep wound in her heart, and I saw that she, too, wept. But she did not seem to weep as one without hope.

Perched alongside the mirror was the small gray bird. In the depths of his blue eyes burned two tiny, clear, red flames. He looked at me, and the warm, comforting glow welled up in my heart, though curiously the pain did not subside in the least. On the contrary, it remained steady, mingling strangely with the warmth.

But the oddest of all these odd things was yet to come. For out of the corner of my eye I now saw lying on the floor beside me the form of a body, dark and still as the night outside. When I stooped down to examine the face, I was astonished to find that it was my own. At this discovery, the warmth and pain swelled and mingled in my breast once again. But I was not unprepared this time.

Though I could not recall the passage, I felt certain that something I’d read in the little book had forewarned me of this: I was dead, and yet I lived. At the thought, I laughed out loud. So hard did I laugh that the tears ran down my face. Or perhaps I should say that I wept hysterically. Which, I cannot tell.

The little gray bird cocked his head at me and nodded solemnly. Then he sprang from the window sill and flew three times around the room. At the end of the last circuit he made straight for the mirror which had once been my bedroom window. To my amazement, he passed clean through. Without thinking, I bent down, lifted the body that lay on the floor, and carried it after him.

 * * * * * * * * * *

IV

At length I awoke, shocked to discover that I was alive. Beside me where I lay on the floor was a little book. Taking it up and opening it, I found myself looking into a small mirror attached to the inside of the front cover.

How strange was the image I saw reflected there! In one sense it seemed plain and ordinary enough – easily recognizable as myself. But in another way it was not like me at all. It was marked by a beauty, a depth, and a radiance which I found nothing short of astonishing. At the same time, it was laced with an ugliness I cannot describe except to say that it left me with a feeling of foreboding.

I turned away from the book and looked to the window. Outside all was dark. Gone were the moon and the star. There on the sill sat the small gray bird with still blue eyes. I stared at it dully for a moment, then caught my breath at a sudden new discovery: where I had expected to see shards of broken glass, I found instead bars of iron across my window.

I spun around to face the opposite wall. It also held a large mirror in which I discerned the same disturbing reflection of myself. It was the image of a princess, a beautiful princess whose loveliness had been marred in some way – precisely how, I could not tell. I think it was in her eyes that I saw it.

Again I turned away, but it was no use. All of the walls were hung with mirrors. They had, in fact, become large mirrors themselves, as had the ceiling and the floor. Above, below, and on every hand I was surrounded by disturbing images of myself. Even the window offered no relief. When I looked in that direction, I found that it, too, had become a sheet of bright reflective glass.

Alone with these awful reflections, I again became aware of the little book. Picking it up, I began to turn its pages and to read what was written there.

This led to a new discovery. I had quite forgotten about the deadly wound I had received from the Firebird, but now it came rushing back into my consciousness. For as I read, a burning sensation began to grow within my chest, low and smoldering at first, but increasing by the moment. I noticed that as I pondered certain passages in the book this burning became a mellow glow that filled my heart with warmth and comfort; but as I read others, it turned instead to a hot stinging pain, so that I could not help but cry out because of it. In spite of this, the words of the book so held me that I read on and on.

* * * * * * * * * *

III

 Once more he reached into the sack.  When he withdrew his hand, I saw perched upon his finger a small gray bird with eyes of piercing blue.  It was not a pretty bird.  But for its eyes it seemed to me quite drab.  I did not understand the still depths in its eyes.

“Do you know this bird?” he asked.

“No,” said I.

“This bird,” he said, “will serve quite well to bring you out to me.  For he is the Persuader.”

At that he gave a sudden jerk with his arm.  The bird fluttered upwards and burst into flames above his head.  I was dazed by a loud crack and a bright flash as of lightning.  The glass of the window shattered and I was thrown back violently into the room.

When next I looked up I saw the bird dazzlingly transformed.  To look upon it was as to look upon the sun.  It was huge and bright, like the legendary Firebird.  Its wings were two outstretched flames, its beak large and sharp as a sword.  I saw it hovering, poised in mid-air just outside my window.

Beyond it, at a safe distance, the moon and star timidly peeped out from behind the bank of clouds.  I could not speak; I could not utter a sound.  In an instant the flaming bird was upon me.  Already with its terrible beak it had pierced my heart.  I was stricken with a deadly pain.  Smoke and red fire filled my eyes and then gave way to darkness.  I knew no more.

* * * * * * * * * *

II

Then he opened up his sack.  It was filled with gifts, and somehow I knew that they were all meant for me.  I wished with all my heart that I might get a better look at them; but still I would not go out to him.

He beckoned to me kindly, saying, “Come and see for yourself.”  The things I saw there through the glass were not such as I would have asked for myself, nor could I ever have envisioned them even in my wildest dreams, yet I felt as if I had always wanted them.  Nothing in that sack was anything you have ever seen or imagined.  I was filled with wonder, but did not understand what I was seeing.

I turned my face away from the window.  “I will come another time,” I said.  “I am not dressed for the out-of-doors.  See – I am in my night things.  I will come with you when I am better prepared.”

“Better prepared,” he said to me, “you will never be.”

 * * * * * * * * *

The Firebird:  A Christmas Fantasy

I

On Christmas Eve I did not sleep, but stayed up late to watch.  The moon was high and bright and one star shone low in the sky.  At my window I watched them rise up from the black trees.  But for the candle in the corner the room was softly dark.

A little breeze stirred the dry dead leaves outside, but nothing else moved.  I watched the star shiver alone in the moonlight.  I saw the moonlight playing in the treetops.  I sat like this, alone, for a long, long time.

The candle burned low and dim.  Halfway up the sky the lonely star chased the moon, and I knew that the night had grown older and deeper.  The breeze died and the leaves outside my window fell still.  I watched and waited.

At length I saw him coming, up through the shadows on the lawn.  Slowly he came, bent beneath his heavy sack.  A light of neither moon nor star was all about him and clung to him as he came.  The candle in the corner grew suddenly bright.

The star peeped out through a window in a cloudbank behind which the moon had taken cover.  He came and laid a hand upon the window sill.  I faced him through the glass.

“Come out and follow me,” he said.

But I was afraid.

 *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *  *

VIII

The little dancer woke to see the city skyline standing black against a red-gold glow in the east. Directly above her head the Morning Star still shone bright. Behind her, in the west, the silver sliver of a new and waxing moon hung like a bright scythe in the sky. Beside her lay her friend, still, cold, and pale as the snow in which she lay. The dancer touched her hand. It was cold, cold as clay, cold as the pavement beneath her.

Not one thought of any kind crossed her mind. Not the slightest ripple of motion stirred the stillness of her heart. Not one tear fell from her eye as she sat holding her friend’s hand and watching the light in the eastern sky.

Suddenly one bright shaft of gold shot out from behind a distant spire. Then up jumped the sun’s topmost curve and a thousand rooftops flashed in the instant brightness.

An indescribable calm lay upon the dancer’s heart. The winter sun rose with quiet thunder. And as she sat gazing at it, there within the circle of its glory she saw a face – the face of her friend.

And now the Voice came to her once more, but still and soft this time, and full of quiet peace.

“Dance!” it almost whispered.

The little dancer stirred. She looked from the face in the sun to the face in the snow beside her.

“Was it you all along?” she asked. “Was it your voice I heard in the green hills and in the misty glens?”

“No,” came the gentle answer. “In dancing with the little girl you danced with me. And yet I am not the little girl, nor is her voice my voice.”

“Who are you, then?” she asked in amazement.

“I am the Dance!” came the reply. “Together you have danced well. Together you have won the prize. Very soon now you shall see my face.”

The sun was well above the rooftops now. Bright and blue grew the wide sky and all the earth sparkled in the new light.

The dancer smiled, contented. And then she too lay down and slept in peace.

THE END

VII

Night was falling. A snowflake touched the dancer’s cheek. Once again the two of them sat weeping together in the quiet and the dark. And so they sat for what seemed a long, long time.

But as they sat crying on the cold stone pavement, as the snow began to fall in flurries around them, all at once, like the clear note of a silver trumpet out of the mournful gray sky, came a shout:

“Dance!”

The Voice was like that of a great bell. Its sound was like the rising of the dawn. The dancer and her new friend looked up and gazed at one another in surprise. Suddenly their weeping was turned into laughter. Up they jumped, and together they began to dance with all their might.

Down dark alleys they danced as the poor and homeless watched them wordlessly. They danced along the narrow streets while those who walk the night stood staring in wonder. They danced with the dancing snowflakes and the fragile mist of their own warm breath as it hung in the frosty air. They danced past banks and shops, past theaters and concert halls, past courthouses and market places and office buildings, all standing bleak and empty in the silent winter’s night.

They danced all night long until the snow stopped falling, the clouds dispersed, and the early morning stars appeared.

They danced until, exhausted, they fell together to the ground and slept.

* * * * * *  *

VI

She woke to find herself lying cold and stiff in the ashen snow. It was dusk. Footsteps were receding down the darkened street. She staggered to her feet.

Alone she wandered the bleak and snowy streets of the city, stumbling and stopping often to rest, for she was tired, hungry, and weak. Dirty and ragged now, she no longer presented a very pretty sight. Only the dancing shoes remained as bright and beautiful as at the first.

She stopped to rest on a cold stone step and to comfort herself with the thought of her lovely shoes. But their comfort too had now grown cold.

“These dancing shoes are lovely beyond words,” she thought. “And yet of what use are the shoes without the dance? And now that the Voice has left me, I feel that I shall never dance again.”

Suddenly she looked up at the sound of a muffled sob close by. There, not an arm’s length away, huddled in the angle where the stair met the wall of the building, was another little girl. She too was ragged and dirty and thin, and her bare feet were soiled and red with the cold. Her weeping was very bitter.

“What’s the matter?” asked the dancer. “Why do you weep so?”

“Because I am lost and all alone,” the girl answered, “and have no place to stay.”

“Ah!” sighed the little dancer. “I too am lost and alone, nor have I any place in this city to call my own. Otherwise I would take you home with me.”

And so the two of them sat and wept together in silence.

Presently the dancer raised her head and said, “But is this the only reason you are crying? Is there nothing else I can do to help you?”

“I am so hungry!” answered the child. “I haven’t had anything to eat for days!”

“Ah!” sighed the little dancer. “I too am nearly starved and very weak with hunger. I have nothing to share with you. Otherwise you can be sure that I would.”

Again the two of them sat silently weeping together.

At last the dancer spoke for the third time. “Surely,” she said, “there must be something else. Your crying is so very bitter.”

“Yes,” said the girl. “My feet are so cold that I can no longer walk; and so I am afraid.”

The little dancer looked down at her own feet. For a long time she stared at her beautiful dancing shoes.

“Of what use are these shoes – or my feet, for that matter – without the dance?” she thought.

Then, stooping down, she carefully undid the graceful silken laces and slipped the shoes from her feet. Kneeling in the snow, she bound them on the feet of the little girl.

* * * * * *  *

V

For a moment she stood listening, listening for the Voice, but there was only a wintry silence.

“My feet are so cold!” she thought.

“And beautiful dresses,” she heard the stranger saying, “and jeweled gowns. You will be the loveliest dancer of them all!”

She made a slight movement forward. From deep inside her a still, small voice seemed to say, “Stop!”

“My mind again,” she told herself.

The stranger’s smile continued unfading. She hesitated. Then she took a step toward him. Then another and another. With each step the still, small voice inside grew fainter and her movements became easier. At last she reached out and took the shoes from his hand.

“Beautiful!” he whispered as he bound the laces up over her calves and tied them just below her knees.

“Now dance!” he shouted with a laugh – a triumphant laugh that sounded in her ears with the ring of cold steel.

She tried to ignore the feelings his laugh brought up from within her. She looked again at her feet.

“They are lovely shoes,” she thought. “The loveliest I’ve ever seen.”

Then, poising herself once more, she began to dance.

The stranger danced too, but not as her partner. Instead, he came behind her, pushing her, driving her down the glen, up through the trees, over the tops of the green hills, and down the other side toward the city. On and on they danced until she felt she would drop.

They danced until dancing became for her a terrible, almost unbearable burden. Yet still she fought to keep her spirits up.

“Though dancing has become such a burden,” she told herself, “to dance in shoes such as these is a great delight, and it has also become my life.”

They danced into the city as the first snowflakes of winter began to fall. They danced down dark streets crowded with nameless faces, step after weary step, her feet jarring against the pavement, her limbs trembling with fatigue. He drove her through a litter-strewn alley where lean cats howled and the snow was gray with ash, then down a narrow corridor that stank of dark and damp.

They danced until her legs were numb as two sticks; until her lungs felt as if they would burst; until her fevered head throbbed with the pounding of the blood behind her ears. They danced until the grim, gray buildings rocked and reeled before her eyes; until blackness overwhelmed her and she fell in a heap upon the cold, cold pavement.

* * * * * * *

IV

One morning in late autumn when the trees were nearly bare, she danced in a meadow as the sun rose. Over all was a hush which seemed to whisper that winter was near. And as she danced, she became aware of a presence at the edge of the meadow: a stranger who sat watching her in silence at the foot of a spindly tree.

Frightened, she stopped dancing and stood staring at him. A thought crossed her mind: could this be the One whose voice she had come to know so well?

She let her gaze drop to her feet – her poor, cold, bare feet.

“Go on,” said the stranger. “Continue. Your dancing pleases me well.”

She raised herself on tiptoe. Then, lifting her right foot, she held it poised in mid-air for one breathless, graceful moment.

Suddenly she heard the Voice.

“Do not dance for this man,” it said.

Immediately she let her foot fall to the ground.

“I too am a dancer,” the stranger said smoothly and easily. “In fact, I am Master of a Dance Troupe in the city. You shall have the leading part if you come away and dance for me.” He smiled and nodded. “Proceed,” he said.

She stood staring at her feet. Again the Voice whispered to her:

“Do not dance for this man.”

“Of course,” the stranger continued, “you will need a fine pair of shoes.” And with that he put his hand into his coat and drew out the most beautiful dancing shoes the little dancer had ever seen.

She caught her breath at the sight. “Oh!” she softly exclaimed.

“Would you like to try them on?” coaxed the stranger. “Come. They are yours to keep if you come and dance for me.”

She stood as if under an enchantment. For what seemed a very long time she was unable to move or speak.

“Do not take the shoes!” The Voice was urgent now. “Do not dance for this man!”

She stared down at her feet, cold and bare in the frosted grass.

“My mind is playing tricks on me,” she told herself.

 *  *  *  *  *  *  *

III

In autumn she danced with the falling leaves and with the brisk flurries and eddying gusts of the wind’s breath that carried them along. Barefoot she danced over the morning frost in the glens and through the hills above the meadows as the warming fingers of the rising sun reached down to touch her through the trees. She danced until the daylight, chill but bright, faded early from the late afternoon sky.

“To dance with the leaves in the wind, with the frost in the glens, and with the fading daylight,” said the Voice, “is to dance with me. And yet I am not to be found in the leaves nor in the wind; not in the frost nor in the trees of the field; neither in the cold stillness of the fading light of day.”

“To dance with you,” she answered back, “is all my joy and has also become my life.”

And so she passed her days in wonder and contentment.

* * * * * * * *

II

In summer she danced down to the seashore, gracefully skimming white sands and skirting the foamy water’s edge. From rock to rock she skipped and fairly flew like the seabirds that wheeled and skirled their song above her head. She danced with the noonday heat that shimmered on the sand and with the seaweed swaying tangled in the tide. She danced with the sunset as it splayed itself upon the face of the water, and with the stars that followed in its wake.

She danced and danced until she fell each night, exhausted but happy, into her bed. And each morning she woke feeling contented and whole.

“To dance with the foam and the sands, with the rocks and the birds, and with the sun as it sets at the world’s edge,” said the Voice, “is to dance with me. And yet I am not in the foam, nor am I in the sands; neither in the rocks nor in the song of the birds, nor yet in the beauty of the sunset.”

Again she asked, “Who then are you? And where are you to be found?”

But the answer was a command, a happy imperative, and a solemn invitation:

“Come, dance! Dance with me!”

And so she did.

* * * * * * *

I

In a green land beside the misty sea lived a poor little girl who had no shoes.

One morning in spring as she walked in a foggy glen through which a sparkling brook ran joyously from the meadow to the sea, she heard a sudden voice:

“Dance!”

The mists dispersed and the sunrise glittered through the dark leaves and branches of an oak tree, adorning it with a thousand tiny red-gold stars.

“Dance!” she thought. “And what do I know of dancing?”

“Dance with me!” the Voice said again. And it was as if strong and sweet music rose up from within her, and she was carried away, caught up into something larger and more powerful than herself.

From that moment, then, she was a dancer. Her feet moved quickly and lightly over the jeweled grass, her movements reflected in each crystal dewdrop.

She danced with the last wisps of mist as they floated on the air and vanished. She danced with the fragrance of the flowers carried along on the morning breezes. She danced to the music of the brook and the silent song of the trees.

“To dance with the mist and with the flowers, with the brook and with the trees,” said the Voice, “is to dance with me. And yet I am not in the mist, nor am I in the flowers, nor in the brook, nor yet in the trees.”

“Who are you then?” she asked breathlessly.

But the only answer that came was, “Come, dance with me!”

* * * * * * *

X

When I realized it was only a dream, I was glad – at least for an hour, perhaps for as long as a day.  But in time, just as the shadow of the cross faded from my bedroom wall, so the shadow of the dream returned and lengthened and stretched itself over me again like a huge and menacing bird; so that the truth of the matter is that I am sometimes uncertain whether I am in fact awake or whether I continue to walk in this same dark dream.

There are moments – usually in the freshness of the early morning – when the light is clear and I see the cross cast clearly upon my wall, and I rise wakeful and confident and seize the moment’s joy.  And yet the dream still clings to me, so that I am often prevented from seeing anything else.  And so, my friends, my earnest request is that you will pray for me and intercede for me, that one day I may at last fully awake and shed the last stubborn strands of this persistent web of shadow.

For my part, I will pray for you as well, for I have no doubt but that your case is often similar to my own.  Surely every man walks about in a vain show.  But we may trust that the day is coming, and is not far off, when the sun shall rise with such light and such force that all these vanities and phantoms will at last be burned away like chaff and dispersed like smoke.  That, I say, is our one great hope:  for if our dreams should in the end come true, then we are indeed of all men most to be pitied.

THE END