Page:Tales from the Fjeld.djvu/78

56 she could not catch them, she fell to drinking the lake dry, and she drank and drank, till the water in the lake fell; but she could not drink the sea dry, and so she burst.

When they came to shore, Grumblegizzard sent a message to the king, to come and fetch his sword. He sent four horses. No! they could not stir it; he sent eight, and he sent twelve; but the sword stayed where it was, they could not move it an inch. But Grumblegizzard took it up alone, and bore it along.

The king could not believe his eyes when he saw Grumblegizzard again; but he put a good face on it, and promised him gold and green woods; and when Grumblegizzard wanted more work, he said he had better set off for a haunted castle he had, where no one dared to be, and there he must sleep till he had built a bridge over the Sound, so that folk could pass over. If he were good to do that he would pay him well; nay, he would be glad to give him his daughter to wife.

"Yes! yes! I am good to do that," said Grumblegizzard.

No man had ever left that castle alive; those who reached it lay there slain and torn to bits, and the king thought he should never see him more, if he only got him to go thither.

But Grumblegizzard set off; and he took with him his scrip of food, a very tough and twisted stump of a fir-tree, an axe, a wedge, and a few matches, and besides, he took the workhouse boy from the king's grange.