Page:The shoemaker's apron (1920).djvu/297

 But this time he was too clever to look in the window. He didn’t even come near the cottage. Instead he stood off in the garden under the pear-tree and called out:

“Ho, there, shoemaker! Your time has come and I am here to get you! Are you ready?”

“I’ll be ready in a moment,” the shoemaker said. “Just wait until I put away my tools. If you feel like it, shake yourself down a nice ripe pear.”

The devil shook the pear-tree and of course when he tried to stop he couldn’t. He shook until all the pears had fallen. He kept on and presently he had shaken off all the leaves.

When the shoemaker came out and saw the tree stripped and bare and the devil still shaking it, he pretended to fall into a fearful rage.

“Hi, there, you! What do you mean shaking down all my pears! Stop it! Do you hear me? Stop it!”

“But I can’t stop it!” the poor devil cried.

“We’ll see about that!” the shoemaker said.

He ran back into the cottage and got a long leather strap. Then he began beating the devil unmercifully over his head and shoulders.

The devil made such an outcry that all the village