The Bureau of Dreams to be Continued by Edward Drobinski - HTML preview

The Bureau of Dreams to be Continued

Page 514

The Little Mermaid lives in an underwater kingdom with her father, the Sea King, her paternal grandmother, and her five older sisters, each one of them born a year apart. Fascinated by the world above the sea and human beings, The Little Mermaid keeps a statue of a human boy in her garden in the palace.

When a mermaid turns fifteen, she is permitted to swim to the surface for the first time to catch a glimpse of the world above. When the six mermaids become old enough, each of them visits the upper world one at a time every year. As each returns, the Little Mermaid listens to their various descriptions of the world inhabited by human beings. The elder sisters soon become jaded of the world above and are content to remain below the sea.

When the Little Mermaid's turn comes, she rises up to the surface, watches a birthday celebration being held on a ship in honor of a prince, and falls in love with him from a distance. A violent storm then hits, sinking the ship, and the Mermaid saves the prince from drowning. She delivers him unconscious to the shore near a temple. Here, the Mermaid waits until a young woman from the temple and her ladies in waiting find him. The prince never sees the Little Mermaid or even realizes that it was she who had originally saved his life.