Part 39

Then Boots sat up, and shook the hair out of his eyes and blew on the wrong end of the pipe. Immediately there was the whole herd before him, drawn up in ranks just like soldiers. Not even one of the smallest leverets was missing.

"That is well," said Boots. "And now we'll be going home again."

Off he set for the palace, driving the hares before him, and as soon as he came near enough he could see the King standing on the steps waiting for him with a stout cudgel in his hand,--for he had no thought but that Boots would fail in his task.

When he saw the whole herd come hopping home, as tame as sheep, and turning into the paddock, he could hardly believe his eyes. He hurried after and began to count them. He counted them over and over again, and not one was missing.

Well, Boots had brought them all back safely that time, but the question was whether he could do it again.

Boots thought he could. Indeed, he was sure he could. So the next afternoon he set out for the hills, whistling merrily as he tramped along with the hares hopping before him.

That day things happened just as they had before. As soon as the hares began to stray Boots took his pipe and blew them away as though they were so much chaff. He lay down and slept until it was time to take them home again, and then he blew them together with the wrong end of the pipe.

When the King found the lad had brought the whole herd home again for the second time he was greatly troubled, for he had no mind to give the Princess to Boots for a bride. So the third day he bade the Princess go out to the hills and hide herself among the bushes and watch and see how it was that Boots managed to keep the hares together.

This the Princess did. She hid back of the bushes; she saw Boots come tramping up the hill with the hares frisking before him; she saw him blow them away with his pipe as though they had been so many dry leaves in the wind, and then, after he had had a nap, she saw him blow them together again.

Then the Princess must and would have that pipe. She came out from the bushes and offered to buy it. She offered ten dollars for it.

"No."

"Fifty!"

"No!"

"A hundred!"

"No." Boots had no wish to sell, but as it was the Princess, and as she seemed so set and determined on having it, he would tell her what he would do; he would sell the pipe for a hundred dollars if she would give him a kiss for every dollar she paid.

The Princess did not know what to say to that. It was not becoming that a Princess should kiss a herdsman; still she wanted the pipe and as that was the only way to get it she at last agreed. She paid the lad a hundred bright silver dollars, and she also gave him a hundred kisses out there on the hillside, with no one to look on but the hares.

Then she took the pipe and hastened home with it.

But small good the pipe did her. Just as she reached the palace steps the pipe slipped out of her fingers as though it had been buttered, and look as she might she could not find it again.

That was because the lad had wished it back to himself. At that very moment he was on his way home with the pipe in his pocket and the hares hopping before him in lines like soldiers.

When the King heard the story he thought and pondered. The Princess had told him nothing of the kisses. He thought she had bought the pipe for a hundred dollars, so the next day he sent the Queen out to the hillside with two hundred dollars in her pocket.

"The Princess is young and foolish," said he. "She must have lost the pipe on the hillside, and no doubt the lad has it back by this time. Do you go out and see if you can buy it from him and if you once have your fingers on it you'll not lose it, I'll wager."

So the Queen went out to the hillside and hid herself in the bushes, and she saw Boots blow the hares away and lie down to sleep and afterward blow them together again in a twinkling.

Then she came out from the bushes and offered to buy the pipe. At first the lad said no, and again no, and then no for the third time, but in the end he sold the pipe to the Queen for two hundred dollars and fifty kisses to go with them, and the Queen hoped the King would never hear of it. She took the pipe and hastened home with it, but she fared no better than the Princess, for just before she reached the palace the pipe disappeared from her fingers, and what had become of it she did not know.

When the King heard that he was a wroth and angry man. Now he himself would go out to the hill and buy the pipe, for there was no trusting the womenfolk. If he once had the pipe in his hands there would be no losing it again, and of that he felt very sure. So he mounted his old mare Whitey and rode over to the hillside. There he hid himself among the bushes, and he hid old Whitey there with him, and he watched until he had seen all that the others had told him about. Then he came out and tried to strike a bargain with the lad. But this time it seemed as though Boots would not sell the pipe,--neither for love nor money. The King offered him three hundred dollars, and four hundred dollars, and five hundred dollars for it, and still Boots said no.

"Listen!" said Boots suddenly. "If you'll go over there in the bushes and kiss old Whitey on the mouth five-and-twenty times, I'll sell you the pipe for five hundred dollars, but not otherwise."

That was a thing the King was loath to do, for it ill befitted a king to kiss an old horse, but have the pipe he must and would; and besides there was nobody there to see him do it but Boots, and he did not count. "May I spread a handkerchief between old Whitey's mouth and mine before I do it?" asked the King.

Yes, he might do that.

So the King went back into the bushes and spread his handkerchief over old Whitey's mouth and kissed her through it five-and-twenty times. Then he came back and the lad gave him the pipe, and the King mounted and rode away with it, and he was well pleased with himself for his cleverness, and he held the pipe tight in one hand and the bridle in the other. "No danger of my losing it as the Queen and the Princess did," thought he. But scarcely had the King reached the palace steps when the pipe slipped through his fingers like water, and what became of it he did not know.