Page:Fairy tales from Hans Christian Andersen (Walker).djvu/305

Rh flew home again; and, as before, the travelling companion followed her closely and beat her so hard with the birch rod that she groaned at the terrible hailstorm and hurried back as fast as she could to her bedroom window. The travelling companion flew back to the inn, where he found John still fast asleep. He took off his own clothes and went to bed too, for he had good right to be tired.

John woke quite early in the morning, and the travelling companion got up at the same time, and told him that he had had a wonderful dream about the Princess and her shoe; and he begged John to ask the Princess if she had not thought of her shoe. This was of course what he had heard the ogre say in the mountains, but he did not want to tell John anything about that, and so he merely told him it was a dream.

"I may just as well ask that as anything else!" said John; "perhaps your dream will come true, for I always think God will help me! All the same I will say good-bye, for if I guess wrong you will never see me again."

So they kissed each other, and John went to the town and up to the Palace. The hall was full of people; the judges were seated in their armchairs, and they had down pillows under their heads, for they had so much to think about. The old King stood near wiping his eyes with a white pocket handkerchief. Then the Princess came in, greeting every one very pleasantly, and she was even lovelier than yesterday. She shook hands with John and said, "Good-morning to you." Now John had to guess what she had thought of. She looked at him most sweetly, but as soon as she heard him say the word shoe, she turned as white as a sheet and trembled all over; but that was no good, for he had guessed aright.

Preserve us! how pleased the old King was. He turned head over heels without stopping, and everybody clapped their hands both on his account and on John's, whose first guess had been right.

The travelling companion beamed with delight when he