Part 33 (2/2)

So they talked on together, the Poor Man and the Beggar, until it was late afternoon and the Beggar said:

”And now, dear friend, you will sup with me as I once supped with you.”

”Thank you,” the Poor Man said, ”I will. But let me first go out and see how my donkey is.”

”Very well,” the Beggar said, ”go. But be sure to come back for I shall be waiting for you.”

So the Poor Man went out the garden gate and looked for his donkey. But the donkey was gone.

”He must have started home,” the Poor Man thought. ”I'll hurry and overtake him.”

So he started back afoot the way he had come. He went on and on but saw no donkey. He crossed the golden bridge and the silver bridge and the copper bridge and the iron bridge and the stone bridge and last of all the wooden bridge, but still there was no donkey.

”He must have got all the way home,” he thought.

When the Poor Man reached his native village things looked different.

Houses that he remembered had disappeared and others had taken their places. He couldn't find his own little house at all. He asked the people he met and they knew nothing about it. And they knew nothing about him, either, not even his name. And n.o.body even knew about his sons. At last he did meet one old man who remembered the family name and who told him that many years before the last of the sons had gone to another village to live.

”There's no place here for me,” the Poor Man thought. ”I better go back to my friend the Beggar and stay with him. No one else wants me.”

So once again he followed the silver tracks all that long way over all those bridges and when at last he reached the garden gate he was very tired, for he was old and feeble now. It was all he could do to give one faint little knock. But the Beggar heard him and came running to let him in. And when he saw him, how tired he was and how feeble, he put his arm around him and helped him into the Garden and he said:

”You shall stay with me now forever and we shall be very happy together.”

And the Poor Man when he looked in the Beggar's face to thank him saw that he was not a beggar at all but the Blessed Christ Himself. And then he knew that he was in the Garden of Paradise.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

THE END

STORIES TO TELL

IT'S PERFECTLY TRUE AND OTHER STORIES. _By Hans Christian Andersen._ Twenty-eight stories translated from the Danish by Paul Leyssac.

13 DANISH TALES. _By Mary C. Hatch._ A baker's dozen of robust, humorous folk tales.

MORE DANISH TALES. _By Mary C. Hatch._ Fifteen rollicking folk tales retold from Sven Grundtvig's _Folkaeventyr_.

A BAKER'S DOZEN. _Selected by Mary Gould Davis._ Thirteen stories which are especially successful in storytelling.

THE TREASURE OF LI-PO. _By Alice Ritchie._ Six original fairy tales set in China and told with beauty and distinction.

THE SHEPHERD'S NOSEGAY: Stories from Finland and Czechoslovakia. _By Parker Fillmore._ Children and storytellers alike will welcome these rich and robust folk tales, long unavailable.

ROOTABAGA STORIES. _By Carl Sandburg._ An omnibus volume including all the stories originally published in the two books _Rootabaga Stories_ and _Rootabaga Pigeons_.

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