Chapter 18

When George found himself on the earth where he was born, the first person he met was John, the old master tailor, carrying on his arm a scarlet suit for the steward of the castle. The old fellow gave a great cry at the sight of the young lord.
“St. James!" he said, “if it is not his Highness George of the White Moor, who was drowned in the lake seven years ago, then it is his ghost or the devil himself! "
"It is not a ghost or a devil, my good John, but it is that George of the White Moor who used to slip into your shop and ask you for little bits of cloth to make dresses for the dolls of my sister Bee."
But the old fellow exclaimed:
"So you were not drowned, your Highness? I am very pleased. You look quite well. My grandson, Peter, who used to climb up into my arms of a Sunday morning to see you go by on horseback next to the Duchess, has become a good workman and a fine, handsome lad. He is, I am glad to say, just as I tell you, your Highness. He will be glad to know you are not at the bottom of the water, and that the fish have not eaten you as he thought. He is accustomed to say about this the most amusing things in the world; for he is full of wit, your Highness. And it is a fact that everybody regrets you in the Clarides. You were such a promising little boy. I will remember to my last day how once you asked me for my needle, and as I would not give it to you, because you were not old enough to handle it without danger, you answered me that you would go into the wood and pick the fine needles of the pines. This is what you said, and it still makes me laugh. Upon my word this is what you said. Our little Peter used also to make excellent answers. He is a cooper at present, at your service, your Highness."
"I will employ none other but him. But, Master John, give me some news of Bee and the Duchess."
“Alas, where have you been, your Highness, not to know that Princess Bee was carried off, seven years ago, by the dwarfs of the mountain? She disappeared the very day you were drowned; and it can be said that on that day the Clarides lost their two sweetest flowers. The Duchess has mourned greatly ever since. This always makes me say that the great people of this world have their trouble like the poorest workmen, and this is a sign that we are all children of Adam. Accordingly a cat may look at a king, as they say. By the same token the good Duchess saw her hair grow grey and lost all her gaiety. And when, in the spring, she walks about in a black dress under the grove where the birds sing, the smallest of these birds is more enviable than the sovereign of the Clarides. Her sorrow, however, is not hopeless, your Highness; for, if she has no news of you, at least she knows by dreams that her daughter Bee is alive."
Old John said these things and many others, too; but George was not listening to him since he had heard that Bee was a prisoner of the, dwarfs.
He reflected:
“The dwarfs detain Bee under the earth; a dwarf got me out of my crystal prison. These little men have not all the same habits; my deliverer surely does not belong to the tribe of those who carried off my sister."
He did not know what to think, unless it was that Bee must be released.
Now they were going through the town, and, as they passed, the old women standing at their thresholds asked each other who this young stranger was, and they agreed his appearance was handsome.
The more wary, having recognised the Lord of the White Moor, thought they saw a ghost, and fled, crossing themselves vigorously.
“Holy water ought to be cast at him," said an old woman, “and he would vanish leaving a disgusting smell of sulphur. He is carrying off Master John, the tailor, and quite certainly he will plunge him all alive into the flames of hell."
“Gently, old woman," a burgess replied, "the young lord is alive and a good deal more so than you and me. He is as fresh as a rose, and rather seems to have come from some noble court than from the other world. Men come back from far, my good woman; witness the squire Freeheart, who came back to us from Rome last Candlemas."
And Mary, the armourer's daughter, having admired George, went up to her maiden room, and kneeling then before the image of the Holy Virgin: "Holy Virgin," she said, " grant me a husband like this young lord."
Every one spoke in their own way of the return of George, so much so that the news flew from mouth to mouth to the ears of the Duchess, who was then walking in the orchard. Her heart beat high, and she heard all the birds in the grove sing:
Teewhit, teewhit, teewhit,
Teewhit, teewhit, teewhit,
George of the White Moor,
Teewhit, teewhit, teewhit,
Whom you brought up,
Teewhit, teewhit, teewhit,
Is here, here, here, here.
Freeheart respectfully approached her, and said to her:
“Your Grace, George of the White Moor, whom you thought to be dead, has returned. I am going to make a song about it."
Still the birds sang :
Teewhit, teewhit, twit, twit
Is here, here, here,
Is here, here, here,
And when she saw the child coming she had brought up as a son she opened her arms and fell in a swoon.

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