The Nutcracker Read online

  “What did all that about a Confectioner mean, dear Mr Drosselmeier?” asked Marie.

  “My dear Mademoiselle Stahlbaum,” said Nutcracker, “Confectioner is the name given here to a great, unknown power believed to be able to melt people down and make them into whatever it likes. That is the fate hanging over the heads of these merry little folk, and they fear it so much that the mere mention of the name Confectioner can calm the utmost disorder, as the Lord Mayor demonstrated just now. At that name no one thinks of earthly things, of punching anyone in the ribs or knocking him on the head, but they look into their hearts and say: ‘Alas, what is man, and what may yet become of him?’”

  Now Marie could not suppress a loud cry of wonder and the greatest astonishment when she found herself suddenly in front of a castle with a hundred airy towers, shining brightly and surrounded by a rosy shimmer. Here and there bunches of richly coloured violets, daffodils, tulips and stocks adorned the walls, their dark colours emphasising the dazzling white of the background as it shaded to delicate pink. The great dome of the central building and the pointed rooftops of the towers had a thousand little sparkling gold and silver stars scattered over them.

  “And now here we are at Marzipan Palace,” said Nutcracker. Marie was spellbound by the sight of the magical palace, but it did not escape her notice that the roof of one of the tall towers was missing entirely, and little men, standing on scaffolding made of cinnamon sticks, seemed to be about to rebuild it. Even before she could ask Nutcracker about that, he went on. “A little while ago terrible devastation, if not total destruction, threatened this beautiful palace. Giant Sweet-Tooth came this way, bit off the roof of that tower, and was already tucking into the great dome, but the people of Candyburg brought him a whole district of the city as tribute, along with a large part of Fruit Preserves Grove, and he took the bribe and went away again.”

  At that moment soft music was heard, the gates of the castle opened, and out came twelve little pages carrying lit stems of cloves in their hands like torches. Their heads were pearls, their bodies were made of rubies and emeralds, and they walked on beautiful little feet made of pure gold. They were followed by four ladies almost as big as Marie’s doll Clara, but so wonderfully and finely dressed that Marie could not for a moment fail to see that they were princesses born. They embraced Nutcracker in the most affectionate way and cried with wistful delight, “Oh Prince—dearest Prince—oh, my dear brother!” Nutcracker seemed to be much moved. He wiped away the tears that fell profusely from his eyes, took Marie’s hand and said in tones of great emotion, “This is Mademoiselle Marie Stahlbaum, the daughter of a highly esteemed medical man, and she has saved my life! If she hadn’t thrown her slipper just in time, if she had not procured me the retired colonel’s sword, I would be lying in my grave bitten in two by the terrible Mouse King. And can Pirlipat, princess born though she may be, equal Mademoiselle Stahlbaum for beauty, kindness and virtue? No, say I, no!”

  All the ladies cried, “No!” and flung their arms round Marie, sobbing as they cried, “Oh noble saviour of our beloved brother the Prince’s life—most excellent Mademoiselle Stahlbaum!”

  Then the ladies led Marie and Nutcracker into the palace, and so to a hall with walls made of crystal sparkling in many colours. But what Marie liked best were the many dear little chairs, tables, chests of drawers, desks and so on standing around, all of them made of cedar or brazil wood adorned with golden flowers. The Princesses made Marie and Nutcracker sit down and said they were about to prepare a meal themselves. They brought out a quantity of little pots and dishes made of the finest Japanese porcelain, with spoons, knives and forks, as well as graters, casseroles and other cooking utensils made of gold and silver. Then they carried in the finest fruits and sweetmeats that Marie had ever seen, and with graceful gestures of their little snow-white hands they set to work squeezing the juice from fruits, grinding spices and grating sugared almonds. They did it all so well that Marie could see how much they understood about cookery, and she knew what a delicious meal it was going to be. With a strong feeling that she herself knew just as much about such things, she secretly wished that she could join the Princesses in preparing it. Then, just as if she had guessed Marie’s secret wish, the most beautiful of Nutcracker’s sisters handed her a little gold pestle and mortar saying, “Sweet friend, dear saviour of my brother, would you pound a little sugar candy for us?”

  And as Marie happily pounded the candy, Nutcracker began telling his sisters at length about the terrible battle between his army and the forces of the Mouse King, how he had been defeated because of the cowardice of his troops, and then the Mouse King had been going to bite him in two, so that Marie had to sacrifice a number of his subjects who had entered her service, with all the rest of the story. As he told the tale it seemed to Marie that his words and even her own pounding of the candy in the mortar were retreating far away, it was harder and harder to hear them, and soon she saw silvery gauze rising like thin mist and enveloping the Princesses, the pages, Nutcracker and she herself. She heard a strange singing and humming and whirring dying away as if in the distance, and now Marie was rising higher as if on surging waves, higher and higher—higher and higher—higher and higher …

  CONCLUSION

  BUMP! MARIE FELL from a great height. Oh, what a jolt! But when she opened her eyes she was lying in her own bed, it was bright daylight, and her mother was standing there saying, “My goodness, how can you sleep so soundly? Breakfast was ready a long time ago!”

  I am sure, my highly esteemed audience, you will realise that Marie, dazed by all the wonderful things she had seen, had fallen asleep in the great hall of the Marzipan Palace, and the Moors or the pages or even the Princesses themselves had carried her home and put her to bed.

  “Oh Mother, dear Mother, where do you think young Mr Drosselmeier took me last night? I saw such lovely things!” And she told the story almost exactly as I have just told it to you, while her mother looked at her in surprise. When Marie had finished, her mother said, “You’ve had a long and very pleasant dream, dear Marie, but now you must put it all out of your head.”

  Marie insisted that she hadn’t been dreaming, but had really seen it all, and then her mother led her to the glass-fronted cupboard, took out Nutcracker, who was standing on his usual shelf, and said, “You silly girl, how can you believe that this wooden doll from Nuremberg can really come to life and move?”

  “Dear Mother,” Marie interrupted, “I know very well that little Nutcracker is young Mr Drosselmeier from Nuremberg, Godfather Drosselmeier’s nephew.” At that both Doctor Stahlbaum and his wife laughed heartily. “Oh,” Marie went on, almost in tears, “now you’re laughing at my Nutcracker, dear Father! And he spoke so well of you, for when we came to Marzipan Palace and he introduced me to his sisters the Princesses, he called you a highly esteemed medical man!”

  Her parents laughed louder than ever, and Luise and even Fritz joined in. Then Marie ran to her own room, quickly opened her little box of trinkets, took out the Mouse King’s seven crowns, and handed them to her mother saying, “There, look at these, dear mother. They are the Mouse King’s seven crowns, and young Mr Drosselmeier gave them to me last night as a token of his victory.”

  In great surprise, Mrs Stahlbaum looked at the little crowns, which were made of some unknown but sparkling metal, and so neatly worked that they looked as if no human hands could have made them. Doctor Stahlbaum stared hard at the little crowns too, and both of them, her father and her mother, urged Marie very gravely to tell them how she had come by them. She could only repeat what she had said already, and now, when her father spoke to her severely and even called her a little liar, she began shedding floods of tears and wailed, “Oh, poor me, what am I to say, poor child that I am?”

  At that moment the door opened and in came Councillor Drosselmeier, crying, “What’s this, what’s this? My goddaughter Marie sobbing and weeping? What’s all this?”

  Doctor Stahlbaum told him abo
ut it, and showed him the little crowns. No sooner had the Councillor set eyes on them than he said, “What a fuss, what a fuss you’re making! These are the little crowns I wore on my watch chain years ago. I gave them to Marie on her birthday when she was two, don’t you remember?”

  Neither Doctor Stahlbaum nor his wife could recollect any such thing, but when Marie saw her parents’ faces looking kindly at her again she ran to Godfather Drosselmeier and cried, “Oh, you know all about it, Godfather Drosselmeier, do tell them yourself that my Nutcracker is your nephew young Mr Drosselmeier from Nuremberg, and it was he who gave me the little crowns!”

  But the Councillor’s expression was very dark, and he muttered, “Silly idle chatter!” Doctor Stahlbaum drew Marie over to him and said very seriously, “Now listen, Marie, you must stop imagining these silly fancies! If you talk about them again I shall take not only Nutcracker but all your other dolls, including Mamzell Clara, and throw them out of the window!”

  So now of course, although Marie’s mind was still full of her adventures she had to keep quiet about them, for you will understand that she couldn’t abandon such a fine, beautiful doll as Mamzell Clara in a hurry. Even your own comrade, my dear reader or listener Fritz, even your own comrade Fritz Stahlbaum immediately turned his back on his sister when she began telling him about the wonderful kingdom where she had been so happy. It is said that he actually muttered under his voice, “Silly goose!” from time to time, but I cannot believe such a thing of him, good-natured as he usually is. However, it is certain that he no longer believed what Marie had told him about the battle, and he paraded his hussars and apologised for the injustice he had done them, gave them tall, fine goose-feather plumes for their caps to replace the insignia they had lost, and allowed them to play the Hussars’ March. Hm, well, the fact is that we know best about the courage of those hussars when the cannonballs left dirty marks on their red coats!

  So Marie couldn’t talk to anyone about her adventures, but the idea of that wonderful fairyland lingered on. She thought she heard murmurs of sweet sound, she saw it all again the moment she let her mind dwell on it, and so it was that instead of playing as usual she could sit still, never moving but deep in her own thoughts, with the result that she was scolded for being a little dreamer.

  It so happened that one day the Councillor came to repair one of the Stahlbaums’ clocks. Marie was sitting by the glass-fronted cupboard, far away in her dreams, looking at Nutcracker, and as if involuntarily she exclaimed, “Oh, dear Mr Drosselmeier, if you were only really alive I wouldn’t be like Princess Pirlipat and scorn you because, for my sake, you were no longer a handsome young man.”

  “Hey, hey—silly chatter!” cried the Councillor. But at that moment there was such a crash and a jolt that Marie fell off her chair in a faint. When she woke up again, her mother was fussing around her and said, “How could you go falling off your chair like that, a big girl like you? Here’s the Councillor’s nephew from Nuremberg come to call on us, so behave nicely!”

  She looked up. The Councillor was wearing his glass wig on his head again and had on his yellow coat, and he was holding the hand of a rather small but very well-formed young man. The young man’s face was like mingled milk and blood, he wore a beautiful red coat trimmed with gold lace, white silk stockings and shoes, he had a pretty nosegay of flowers in his buttonhole, he was very neatly shaved, his hair was powdered, and he had a fine pigtail hanging down behind his head. The little sword he wore at his side glittered as if it were made of jewels, and the hat under his arm was pure silk. The young man immediately showed what beautiful manners he had by giving Marie a number of wonderful toys that he had brought and also, nicest of all, marzipan and sugar figures like those the Mouse King had eaten up, while he also had a present of a lovely sword for Fritz. At table the young man cracked nuts for everyone, not the hardest shell could withstand him. He put the nuts in his mouth with one hand, pulled his pigtail with the other, and crack! The shell was broken into pieces!

  Marie had blushed rosy red when she saw that nice young man, and she blushed even more, after they had finished the meal, when young Drosselmeier invited her to go into the sitting room with him and over to the glass-fronted cupboard.

  “Play nicely together, children, I’ve nothing against it now that all my clocks are in order,” called the Councillor.

  But no sooner was young Drosselmeier alone with Marie than he went down on one knee and said, “Oh, most excellent Mademoiselle Stahlbaum, here you see at your feet the happy Drosselmeier whose life you saved on this very spot! You were kind enough to say that you would not scorn me, like nasty Princess Pirlipat, if I had lost my looks for your sake. As soon as you said that I ceased to be a mere contemptible Nutcracker and was restored to my previous and not unpleasant shape. Oh most excellent lady, make me happy by giving me your dear hand, share my kingdom and my crown, and rule my country with me in Marzipan Palace, for I am king there now!”

  Raising the young man from the floor, Marie said softly, “Dear Mr Drosselmeier, you are so kind and good-hearted, and since you also rule a charming country with very pretty and amusing people I will accept you as my bridegroom!”

  So now Marie was betrothed to Drosselmeier, and after a year and a day, as the saying is, he came for her in a golden carriage drawn by silver horses. Two-and-twenty thousand guests danced at the wedding, all decked in brilliant pearls and diamonds, and it is said that to this day Marie is queen of a country of sparkling Christmas-tree woods and translucent marzipan palaces, a land where the most beautiful of sights are to be seen by those who have eyes to see them.

  And so ends the tale of Nutcracker and the Mouse King.

  THE STRANGE CHILD

  SIR THADDEUS VON BRAKEL

  ONCE UPON A TIME there was a nobleman called Sir Thaddeus von Brakel who lived in the little village of Brakelheim, which he had inherited from his late father the former lord of the manor of Brakelheim, so consequently the village was now his property. The four farmers who were the only other householders of Brakelheim called him “your lordship”, although he went about, like them, with his hair plainly combed, and only on Sundays, when he went to church in the neighbouring larger village with his wife and his two children Felix and Christlieb, did he wear not his plain frieze jacket but a fine green coat and a red waistcoat with gold braid, which suited him very well. The same farmers, if asked by visitors, “Where do I find Sir Thaddeus of Brakel hereabouts?” used to say, “Straight ahead through the village, up the hill where the birch trees grow, and then you’ll come to his lordship’s castle!”

  Of course they all knew that a castle ought to be a big, tall building with a great many windows and doors, maybe even turrets and bright banners blowing in the wind, but there was nothing like that on the hill where the birch trees grew, only a low-built little house with a few small windows. You hardly even saw it until you were nearly there. But when you reach the tall gates of a real huge castle, it can happen that you suddenly stop and, as icy-cold air streams out, feel yourself rooted to the spot by the dead eyes of the strange stone statues standing around the walls like grim guards. Then you suddenly lose all desire to go in, preferring to turn and retrace your steps, whereas nothing of the kind was the case with the little house where Sir Thaddeus of Brakel lived. For while the leafy branches of the wood of beautiful slender birch trees waved to you in friendly fashion, as if greeting guests with open arms, and whispered, cheerfully murmuring and rustling, “Welcome, welcome to this place!” then when you reached the house itself it was as if clear voices came through the brightly polished windows, through the thick, dark vines that covered the walls right up to the roof, all of them calling in sweetly musical tones, “Come in, dear weary wanderer, come in, this pretty house is a hospitable place!” So too said the swallows twittering merrily in their tiers of nests, and the dignified old stork looked down with a grave and wise expression from the chimney and said, “I have lived all summer in this place for many a happy year, a
nd if only I could overcome my inborn desire to travel, if it wasn’t so cold here in wintertime and firewood so expensive, then I would never move from this spot!” For Sir Thaddeus von Brakel’s house, while it might not be a castle, was very pleasant and attractive.

  One morning Lady von Brakel got up very early to bake a cake, adding far more almonds and raisins than she even put into the Easter cake, which made it very much nicer. Meanwhile Sir Thaddeus shook out and brushed his green coat and his red waistcoat, and Felix and Christlieb put on their best clothes. “Now then,” said Sir Thaddeus to his children, “you can’t go running around the wood as usual today, you must sit quiet in the parlour so that you’ll still look neat and clean when his lordship your uncle arrives.”

  Out-of-doors the sun was shining brightly now that its friendly face had emerged from the mist. Its golden rays came through the window, the morning breeze was murmuring in the little wood, the finch, the siskin and the nightingale were singing in happy competition with each other, striking up the most cheerful of ditties. Christlieb sat quietly at the table, deep in her own thoughts; sometimes she straightened the red ribbon bows on her dress, sometimes she tried to do some more of her knitting, but somehow it wouldn’t go right today. Felix, whose Papa had given him a lovely picture book to look at, let his eyes stray from the pictures and gaze out at the beautiful birch wood, where he was usually allowed to run and romp about to his heart’s desire for a couple of hours every morning.

  “Oh, how nice it is out there,” he sighed to himself, but when their big farmyard dog, whose name was Sultan, jumped up outside the window barking and growling, then ran a little way towards the wood, turned, and came back to growl and bark outside the window again, as if calling to little Felix, saying, “Aren’t you coming out into the wood? What are you doing in the musty parlour?”—well, then Felix could hardly master his impatience. “Oh, dear Mama,” he called, “do let me go out, just a little way!”