Page:Tales from the Fjeld.djvu/127

Rh away from the King's Grange, out into the wide world, and the bride was lost.

The King got both wroth and sorrowful, and began to wonder if it wasn't Peik again that had a finger in this pie.

So he mounted his horse and rode out, for he thought it dull work staying at home; but when he got out among the ploughed fields, there sat Peik on a stone playing on a Jew's harp.

"What! are you sitting there, Peik?" said the King.

"Here I sit, sure enough," said Peik; "where else should I sit?"

"Now you have cheated me foully time after time," said the King, "but now you must come along home with me, and I'll kill you."

"Well, well!" said Peik, "if it can't be helped it can't; I suppose I must go along with you."

When they got home to the King's Grange they got ready a cask which Peik was to be put in, and when it was ready they carted it up to a high fell; there he was to lie three days thinking on all the evil he had done, then they were to roll him down the fell into the firth.

The third day a rich man passed by, but Peik sat inside the cask and sang—

"I'd sooner far stay here and not be made an angel."

When the man heard that, he asked what he would take to change places with him.