Part 20

"Listen!" said the old woman. "Oh would gladly keep your son with him as a husband for his daughter, and if you do not bring the lad away with you this time, you will never have him back. This time Oh will show you a flock of doves, and one of them will be your son. Look closely at them, and the one that has tears in its eyes is he, for only a human soul can weep."

The father thanked the old woman and hurried back home again, and very soon after it was time to set out for Oh's house.

The man travelled along till he came to the wood and the place where he had come twice already, and he stood there and cried, "Oh! Oh!"

Then Oh appeared before him. "Here I am," said Oh, "ready and waiting for you. This time, as before, I tell you that if you know your son when you see him you shall take him away with you, but if, this time, you do not know him, then he is mine forever."

"Very well," said the man, "that is a bargain."

Then Oh took him down to the underworld. He called to a flock of doves that was perched on the roof and scattered a handful of peas on the ground for them. The doves flew down all about them and began to peck up the peas; but one dove would not eat but sat mournfully on a low bough and looked at them, and its eyes were full of tears.

"This one is my son," cried the man, pointing to the dove that wept.

As soon as he said this the dove changed its shape and became a young man, and this was the son, though he had become so fine and tall and handsome in these three years that his father could scarcely recognize him.

Then Oh was in a fine rage. He danced with fury and tore his beard.

"Very well," he cried, "he is yours now, but you shall not keep him long, and when I once get him back again he is mine forever."

But the lad paid no heed to his threats. He and his father were soon on the upper earth again, and they set out for home, one foot before the other.

On the way the father told the lad how badly it had gone with him and the mother in the past years; of how poor they were, and of how their hut was tumbling to pieces, and how their cow had died.

"Never mind," said the lad. "I learned quite a bit of magic from the Green One, and that should help us out now. Do you hear the huntsmen winding their horns farther on in the open?"

Yes, the father heard them.

"I will turn myself into a greyhound," said the lad. "The hunt is coming this way, and when the huntsmen see me they will want to buy me. Ask them three hundred dollars for me; no more, no less, but when they take me do not leave the leash on me, whatever you do. Take it off and put it in your pocket, and then all will be well with me. Fail to do this, and misfortune will surely overtake me."

The father promised to do as the son said, and then the lad turned himself into a greyhound, and he was so sleek and handsome that the man could not admire him enough; but about his neck was an old, worn leash that did not look as though it were worth a penny. It seemed a pity to leave it on the neck of such a handsome dog.

The man went on a little further and then he came to where a grand nobleman and his friends were hunting a hare. They had a pack of dogs with them but the hare had outrun them.

When the nobleman saw the man and the greyhound he stopped his horse.

"That is a fine greyhound you have there."

"Yes, it is," answered the man.

"Do you think it could course down the hare we are chasing?"

Yes, the man was sure it could.

"Then let me have it and I will pay you a good price for it."

Very well, he could have it for three hundred dollars, but that was without the leash; the leash was not for sale.

The nobleman laughed aloud, "when the dog is mine," he said, "he shall have a golden leash, for that one you have is fit for nothing but the ash heap."

The nobleman then paid the man three hundred dollars and unfastened the leash from the dog's neck.

Away he flew like the wind and soon caught the hare. But when the hunters reached the spot where the hare lay they could see nothing of the dog. Only a tall and handsome youth stood there, and he was flushed and hot as though he had been running.

"Have you seen my greyhound, a sleek and handsome dog?" asked the nobleman.