Part 16 (1/2)

Yes, indeed, that would suit her right down to the ground; she would gladly give him two kisses with every dollar, and feel grateful, besides.

So she got the whistle, but when she reached the castle, the whistle disappeared all of a sudden. Esben had wished it back again, and toward evening he came along, driving his hares like a herd of sheep. The king reckoned and counted and added, but all to no purpose, for not the least little hare was missing.

When Esben was herding his hares the third day, they sent the princess to him to get away his pipe from him. She was tickled to death, and finally offered him two hundred dollars if he would let her have the whistle, and would also tell her what she had to do in order to fetch it safely home with her.

”Yes, it is a very valuable whistle,” said Esben, ”and I will not sell it,” but at last, as a favor to her, he said he would let her have it if she gave him two hundred dollars, and a kiss for every dollar to boot.

But if she wanted to keep it, why, she must take good care of it, for that was her affair.

”That is a very high price for a hare-whistle,” said the princess, and she really shrank from kissing him, ”but since we are here in the middle of the forest, where no one can see or hear us, I'll let it pa.s.s, for I positively must have the whistle,” said she. And when Esben had pocketed the price agreed upon, she received the whistle, and held it tightly clutched in her hand all the way home; yet when she reached the castle, and wanted to show it, it disappeared out of her hands. On the following day the queen herself set out, and she felt quite sure that she would succeed in coaxing the whistle away from him.

She was stingier, and only offered fifty dollars; but she had to raise her bid until she reached three hundred. Esben said it was a magnificent whistle, and that the price was a beggarly one; but seeing that she was the queen, he would let it pa.s.s. She was to pay him three hundred dollars, and for every dollar she was to give him a buss to boot, then she should have the whistle. And he was paid in full as agreed, since as regards the busses the queen was not so stingy.

When she had the whistle in her hands, she tied it fast, and hid it well, but she fared not a whit better than either of the others; when she wanted to show the whistle it was gone, and in the evening Esben came home, driving his hares as though they were a well-trained flock of sheep.

”You are stupid women!” said the king. ”I suppose I will have to go to him myself if we really are to obtain this trumpery whistle. There seems to be nothing else left to do!” And the following day, when Esben was once more herding his hares, the king followed him, and found him at the same place where the women had bargained with him.

They soon became good friends, and Esben showed him the whistle, and blew into one end and the other, and the king thought the whistle very pretty, and finally insisted on buying it, even though it cost him a thousand dollars.

”Yes, it is a magnificent whistle,” said Esben, ”and I would not sell it for money. But do you see that white mare over yonder?” said he, and pointed into the forest.

”Yes, she belongs to me, that is my Snow Witch!” cried the king, for he knew her very well.

”Well, if you will give me a thousand dollars, and kiss the white mare that is grazing on the moor by the big pine, to boot, then you can have my whistle!” said Esben.

”Is that the only price at which you will sell?” asked the king.

”Yes,” said Esben.

”But at least may I not put a silken handkerchief between?” asked the king.

This was conceded him, and thus he obtained the whistle. He put it in the purse in his pocket, and carefully b.u.t.toned up the pocket. Yet when he reached the castle, and wanted to take it out, he was in the same case as the women, for he no longer had the whistle. And in the evening Esben came home with his herd of hares, and not the least little hare was missing.

The king was angry, and furious because he had made a fool of them all, and had swindled the king's self out of the whistle into the bargain, and now he wanted to do away with Esben. The queen was of the same opinion, and said it was best to behead such a knave when he was caught in the act.

Esben thought this neither fair nor just; for he had only done what he had been asked to do, and had defended himself as best he knew how.

But the king said that this made no difference to him; yet if Esben could manage to fill the big brewing-cauldron till it ran over, he would spare his life.

The job would be neither long nor hard, said Esben, he thought he could warrant that, and he began to tell about the old woman with her nose in the tree-trunk, and in between he said, ”I must make up plenty of stories, to fill the cauldron,”--and then he told of the whistle, and the chamber-maid who came to him and wanted to buy the whistle for a hundred dollars, and about all the kisses that she had had to give him to boot, up on the hillock by the forest; and then he told about the princess, how she had come and kissed him so sweetly for the whistle's sake, because no one could see or hear it in the forest--”I must make up plenty of stories, in order to fill the cauldron,” said Esben. Then he told of the queen, and of how stingy she had been with her money, and how liberal with her busses--”for I must make up plenty of stories in order to fill the cauldron,” said Esben.

”But I think it must be full now!” said the queen.

”O, not a sign of it!” said the king.

Then Esben began to tell how the king had come to him, and about the white mare who was grazing on the moor, ”and since he insisted on having the whistle he had to--he had to--well, with all due respect, I have to make up plenty of stories in order to fill the cauldron,” said Esben.

”Stop, stop! It is full, fellow!” cried the king. ”Can't you see that it is running over?”