Beauty and the Beast

 CHAPTER 3

AN UNEXPECTED ADVENTURE 

Two days later, they loaded their cart, hitched up Phillipe, and Maurice was off to the festival in hopes that the whole world would want automatic wood choppers. Belle waved goodbye until Maurice and Phillipe were out of sight. 

That first day alone passed quickly and quietly. She tended to washing clothes and scrubbed the floorboards. She swept out the fireplace and mucked out Phillipe’s stall. She fed the chickens and pulled some carrots. At the end of the day, she smiled as she lay her apron across the back of the wooden chair. Their little cottage was simple but homey and she was satisfied with her day’s work. She lit a lamp and read two more chapters before bed. 

The next morning after breakfast, Belle sat at the table reading when there was a knock on her front door. “Whoever could that be?” she muttered, quickly tying her hair back and tucking her book away. She looked out the window. “Baxter.” She groaned and rolled her eyes, but he had seen her through the window, so she opened the door just a crack. “Bonjour, Monsieur Baxter. Can I help you?”

“You certainly can.” He said as he pushed past her, tracking mud all over her freshly cleaned floor. “When we’re married, you will be able to clean up after me and our ten strapping boys, instead of living in this little dump with no one to notice you.”

Belle huffed. “Baxter! Get out. I told you I’m not going to marry you. I’m not staying in this tiny provincial town forever.”

“Why not? Have you never heard of being a big fish in a small pond? We’ll be the most important couple in town!”

“No, Baxter.” She tried to push him out the door. “I don’t need to be important. I told you, I want to have my own space and see all the wonderful places I’ve read about. She decided to go outside to feed the chickens. He followed her to the barn.

That’s one way to get him out of the house. Belle smirked to herself.

“Why are you always reading, anyway?” He grabbed the book sticking out of her apron pocket and flipped through it. “There aren’t even any pictures in here!”

Belle turned and walked around him, staring him in the face and getting herself between him and the house. She removed her book from his grubby paws with her thumb and forefinger. “I said, NO.” Then she backed through the door and locked him out.

“Ughhh!” Belle flounced into the chair, exasperated.

Twenty minutes later, she heard horse hooves approaching. “Oh no you don’t, Baxter!” Belle pulled the curtains closed and dragged the heavy wooden table in front of the door, but there was no knock this time. Instead, she heard heavy breathing, stamping and whinnying near the barn. She dared a peek out the back door. 

“Phillipe?!” She ran to him before she even thought of how to calm him down. He reared back, but she reached up and as soon as she touched his face, he took a deep breath . . . and then sprayed her with his horsey exhale. She led him to his trough to get a drink and detached the cart. She grabbed a brush and continued to stroke her beloved horse. “It’s all right, Phillipe. You’re so smart and brave to come home by yourself. Where’s Papa? You couldn’t have made it all the way to the exhibition and back by now.” She rested her head against his neck. “Can you take me to him?” 

Phillipe backed away from the trough and let out a loud whinny. He turned and ran to the end of the barn, then stopped, turned and walked back to Belle, nudged her, and turned toward the road again. 

“Yes! Good Boy! Take me to Papa!” Belle ran inside to get her cloak, locked the door from the outside for the first time ever, and climbed onto her trusty steed.

They left the cobblestone paths of the village and traveled for miles through the forest. Belle wasn’t sure whether it was still daylight or if night had fallen. She wished all she could hear was the damp crunching of dead leaves and thatch beneath Phillipe’s hooves, but there were also twigs snapping and animal noises. Finally, she glimpsed a flicker of light and knew it was still day. She breathed a sigh of relief at that moment, but it really was dark outside when they finally broke free of the forested gloom. A few lanterns flickered in small windows, so Belle knew they had reached another town. The ground was soft with no cobblestones and Phillipe’s hooves plodded along silently. 

She yawned and wondered how long they had been traveling. “Where are you taking me, Phillipe?” she whispered into the horse’s right ear. Phillipe’s ear twitched.

The moon came out from behind heavy clouds and showed Belle stone houses, which were larger, with taller fences and wider gates. 

Are we close to a castle? We came from the provinces, through the forest, past small houses, and now large estates. What next? She hugged Phillipe’s neck.

The horse lowered his head and Belle had to duck below a series of low-hanging willow branches. When they looked up again, they stood before a magnificent, but dreadful castle. Nettles covered every wall. Gargoyles stared at them with black stone eyes. The iron gate threatened a miserable death, with its dragon heads, and every window was black. Belle thought it must have been very beautiful once. She shuddered and clicked at Phillipe to keep going, but he arched against the reins and took her to the gate, which opened by itself. 

Belle tried to gulp, but her mouth had gone dry. She shivered inside of her warm cloak. Phillipe kept walking toward the huge front doors, where he stopped. Belle just sat there, afraid to dismount. After several minutes, Phillipe ruffled and she knew if she wanted to find her father, she had to go knock on that giant, creepy door. She climbed down off her trusted horse, but Phillipe took off.

The door opened as she approached it. She stepped inside. The lights were not on in this part of the castle, but it did not seem dark in the cavernous room. 

“Hello?” Belle’s word echoed but she heard a sound other than her own voice reverberating. She was sure it sounded like whispering. It seemed close to her, but as she gazed around, no one was there. 

“Is anybody there? I need help.” More whispering, but no one answered her. “My father may have come this way earlier.” 

Belle continued to call out and whispering followed until finally a faceless voice squeaked out, “He’s in the dungeon!” the voice disappeared abruptly and was followed by some more muffled whispering. 

“Where…” even before she could ask, a candelabra lit ahead of her. As she approached, the light went out and a few seconds later, reappeared farther down a wide corridor; then at the head of a staircase; then at the bottom. Finally, the light stopped in front of a prison-like cell, from which Belle could hear coughing. 

“Papa! What happened to you? Who did this?”

“Oh, Belle, it was a monster! A horrible beast! Picked me up with one hand and threw me in here."  Maurice coughed again and reached through the bars to caress his daughter’s face. A gust of wind blew through the dungeon.

“Run, Belle! Get away from here as fast as you can! I don’t know how you ever found me but you can’t be here!” 

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING DOWN HERE?!”

Maurice cowered in his cell, but Belle clenched her fists and stood up. “How dare you do this to my father?! Release him this instant, you brute! You…you BEAST!” She stamped her foot and yelled into the dark.

“QUIET! He’s my prisoner. You want to be in there, too? What are you doing here? How did you get into my castle?”

Belle had thought the way she had gotten into the castle was rather strange, as well, and the question made her stop and think for a moment. “I just . . . walked right in. I think someone opened the gate and the door, and led me down here, but I never saw them.” 

The Beast grunted loudly and a rush of many voices whispering filled the darkness. 

“You must let my father go. He’s too old to suffer this. His hands are freezing. He won't survive." Belle knelt next to her father and reached through the bars to rub his hands. Maurice coughed again. “Please let him out.”

“I can’t.” The Beast seemed a little bit calmer for a moment. “He took a rose from my garden which is a crime and can’t go unpunished!”

“Then...” Belle hesitated for a long time. “...take me instead.” 

First draft of this chapter was written by my mom. 

Illustrated and Edited by me.