Page:Fairy tales and stories (Andersen, Tegner).djvu/365

Rh Billy-goat-legs, but she sobbed so bitterly and kissed her little chimney-sweep, so that he could not do anything but humor her, although it was wrong. And so, with great difficulty, they crawled down the chimney again; they crept through the drum and the pipe, which was anything but pleasant, and at last they stood inside the dark stove. They stopped behind the door to listen to what was going on in the room. They peeped out — alas! there, in the middle of the floor, lay the old Chinaman. He had fallen down from the table when he tried to run after them, and lay there broken into three pieces. The whole of his back had come off in one piece, and the head had rolled over into a corner. The major-and-lieutenant-general-war-commander-sergeant of the Billy-goat-legs stood where he had always stood, and seemed to be buried in thought. "It is terrible," said the little shepherdess; "my old grandfather is broken to pieces and it is all our fault! I shall never survive it!" And then she wrung her tiny little hands.

"He can still be mended," said the sweep. "He can very well be riveted — only take things quietly. If they cement his back and give him a strong rivet in the neck, he will be as good as new, and be able to say a good many unpleasant things to us."

"Do you think so," she said. And they climbed up again on to the table where they had stood before.

"Well, this is as far as we have got," said the chimney-sweep; "we might as well have saved ourselves all the trouble."

"If only we had old grandfather mended!" said the shepherdess. "Would it be very expensive?" And he was mended. The people in the house had his back cemented and he got a strong rivet in the neck, and he was as good as new, but he could no longer nod.

"You seem to have become rather proud since you broke in pieces," said the major-and-lieutenaut-general-war-commander-sergeant of the Billy-goat-legs; "but I don't think it is anything to be so proud of. Shall I have her, or shall I not?"

And the chimney-sweep and the little shepherdess looked so pathetically at the old Chinaman. They were afraid he would nod his assent; but he could not, and besides it was unpleasant to him always to have to tell strangers that he had a rivet in his neck, and so the little porcelain people were left to themselves, and they blessed the rivet in grandfather's neck and loved one another till they broke to pieces.