Part 25 (2/2)

”You may stay with me until you're well,” the old woman said.

The girl was young and healthy and in a day or two had recovered the ill treatment she had suffered at the hands of the Blackamoor.

”Won't you let me live with you awhile, granny?” she said to the old woman. ”I'll cook and scrub and work and you won't have to regret the little I eat.”

”Can you cook? Because if you can perhaps you know a dish that would tempt the appet.i.te of our poor young Prince,” the old woman said. ”You know the poor boy has had a terrible disappointment in love and he refuses to eat. The heralds were out this morning proclaiming that the King would richly reward any one who could prepare a dish that would tempt the Prince's appet.i.te.”

”Granny!” the girl said, ”I know a wonderful way to prepare beans! Let me cook a dish of beans and do you carry them to the palace.”

So the girl cooked the beans and placed them prettily in a dish and on one side of the dish she put a tiny little ringlet of her own golden hair.

”If he sees the hair,” she thought to herself, ”he'll know the beans are from me.”

And that's exactly what happened. To please his father the Prince had consented to look at every dish as it came. He had already looked at hundreds of them before the old woman arrived and turned away from them all. Then the old woman came. As she pa.s.sed before the Prince, she lifted the cover of the dish, held it towards him, and curtsied. The Prince was just about to turn away when he saw the tiny ringlet of hair.

”Oh!” he said. ”Wait a minute! Those beans look good!”

To the King's delight he took the dish out of the old woman's hand, examined it carefully, and when no one was looking slipped the ringlet into his pocket. Then he ate the beans--every last one of them!

The King gave the old woman some golden ducats and begged her to prepare another dish for the Prince on the morrow.

So the next day the girl again sent a tiny ringlet of her hair on the side of the plate and again the Prince after scorning all the other food offered him took the old woman's dish and ate it clean.

On the third day the Prince engaged the old woman in conversation.

”Where do you live, granny?”

”In a little tumble-down house beside the nettles,” she told him.

”Do you live alone?”

”Just now,” the old woman said, ”I have a dear girl living with me. I found her one morning lying in the nettles where some ruffians had left her for dead. She's a good girl and she scrubs and bakes and cooks for me and lets me rest my poor old bones.”

Now the Prince knew what he wanted to know.

”Granny,” he said, ”to-morrow's Sunday. Now I want you to stay home in the afternoon because I'm coming to see you.”

In great excitement the old woman hurried home and told the girl that the Prince was coming to see them on Sunday afternoon.

”He mustn't see me!” the girl said. ”I'll hide in the bread trough under a cloth and if he goes looking for me you tell him that I've gone out.”

”Foolish child!” the old woman said. ”Why should you hide from a handsome young man like the Prince?”

But the girl insisted and at last when Sunday afternoon came the old woman was forced to let her lie down in the bread trough and cover her with a cloth.

The Prince arrived and when he found the old woman there alone he was mightily disappointed.

”Where's that girl who lives with you?” he asked.

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