Page:The Children Who Followed the Piper.djvu/150

THE CHILDEEN high and too smooth for him to climb to the rim.

He called, "Golden Hood, Golden Hood," but no sign came from within the nest; he listened, and there was no stir within. No matter how he did it he would have to climb, he thought, over the rim of the nest.

With his sharp sword he began to hack out steps; he climbed up and up the steps he had made. He came to the rim of the nest and he looked over it.

There was Golden Hood, and she was sleeping. She was lying on the Fleece of Gold, and beside her were the golden apples that the golden bird had carried from off the golden tree, and the golden slipper that the eagle had carried off from Rhodope, and the golden egg that the golden goose had laid. Golden Hood was sleeping and her dark lashes spread under her pale eyelids, and her dark tresses curled over her white forehead, and her red lips were opened to the snowdrops of her teeth.