Page:Fairy tales and stories (Andersen, Tegner).djvu/60

28 "No, they are not clouds," said his traveling companion, "they are mountains, beautiful, great mountains, where you can get high up above the clouds into the pure air! It is delightful, I can assure you! Tomorrow we shall be a good bit on our way out into the world!" They were not so near to them as they thought; they had to walk a whole day before they reached the mountains, where the dark forests grew straight up toward the heavens, and where there were stones as big as a whole town; it certainly was hard work to get right across them, and therefore Johannes and his traveling companion went into an inn to get a good rest and gather strength for the journey on the morrow.

Down in the large bar parlor in the inn a great many people were assembled, tor there was a man there with a puppet-show; he had just put up his little theater, and the people sat all round the room to see the play, but right in front of all an old fat butcher had taken a seat, the best of all; his big bulldog (ugh! how fierce he looked) sat by his side and stared like everybody else.

Now the play began; it was a pretty piece with a king and a queen in it; they sat on a velvet throne and had golden crowns on their heads and long trains to their robes, which, of course, they could very well afford. The most beautiful wooden dolls with glass eyes and big mustaches were standing at all the doors, and were opening and shutting them, so that some fresh air could get into the room. It was a beautiful play, and it was not at all tragic, but just as the queen stood up and walked across the floor, the big bulldog, — goodness knows what he could have been thinking about, — but as he was not kept back by the fat butcher, he made a spring right on to the stage, seized the queen round her slender waist, and one could hear her going "crick-crack!" It was really terrible! The poor man, who managed the whole show, became very frightened, and was so sorry for his queen, for she was the most beautiful doll he had, and now that ugly bulldog had bitten her head off; but afterward when the people had gone away, the stranger, who was in Johannes's company, said he would soon put her right, and so he brought out his jar and rubbed the doll with the salve, with which he helped the poor old woman that broke her leg. No sooner had the doll been rubbed than she was all right again; yes, she could even move all her limbs of her own accord; it was not at all necessary to pull her by the string; the doll was just like a living being, except that she could not speak. The man who owned the little puppet-show was greatly pleased; now he need not hold this doll at all by the string, for she could dance by herself. None of the other dolls could do that.

Afterward, when night came on and all the people had gone to bed, some one began to sigh so heavily, and continued sighing so long, that everybody got up to see who it could be. The man who had the show went to his little theater, for it was from there the sighing came. All