Page:Fairy tales and stories (Andersen, Tegner).djvu/58

26 in peace in his coffin, but wanted to throw him outside the church door — poor, dead man!

"Why do you do that?" asked Johannes; "it is very bad and wicked! Let him rest in Christ's name!"

"What nonsense!" said the two wicked men; "he has made a fool of us! He owes us money, which he could not pay, and now that he is dead, we shall not get a penny. Therefore we will have our revenge; he shall lie like a dog outside the church door!"

"I have no more than fifty dollars," said Johannes, "that is the whole of my inheritance; but I will willingly give you the money if you will promise me on your honor to leave the poor dead man in peace. I shall be able to get on without the money; I have strong and sound limbs, and God will always help me."

"Well," said the horrible men, "if you will pay his debt, we shall not do anything to him, that you may be sure of!" And so they took the money that Johannes gave them, laughed quite loudly at his good-hearted-ness and went their way; but Johannes put the dead body right again in the coffin, folded its hands, took leave of it, and went away quite contentedly through the great forest.

Round about him, where the moon shone in between the trees, he saw graceful little elves playing about quite merrily; they did not let themselves be disturbed, for they knew he was a good, unoffending creature. It is only wicked people who are not allowed to see the elves. Some of them were not bigger than one's finger, and had their long, golden hair fastened up with golden combs; they were rocking, two and two, on the large dewdrops, which had settled on the leaves and the long grass. Sometimes the dewdrops rolled off, when the elves would fall down between the stalks of the long grass, and then there was a regular outburst of laughter and merriment among the tiny little people. It was a rare frolic! They were singing, and Johannes plainly recognized all the pretty songs which he had learned when a little boy. Large and gaudy-colored spiders, with silver crowns on their heads, were spinning from one hedge to another long, hanging bridges and palaces which, when the fine mist settled on them, looked like shining crystal in the clear moonlight. This lasted until the sun rose. Then the little elves crept into the flower buds, and the wind caught hold of their bridges and palaces, which then sailed off through the air like big cobwebs.

Johannes had just got out of the forest when a strong, manly voice called out just behind him, "Hullo, comrade! Where are you going?"

"Out into the wide world," said Johannes. "I have neither father nor mother; I am only a poor boy, but God will help me."

"I'm also going out into the wide world," said the strange man. "Shall we two keep each other company?"

"Yes, certainly!" said Johannes, and so they went on together. They