"Now tell him where your wand is," said the River God.
"I have left it behind me in the dell," she said, blushing and hanging her head.
"What! are you not going back to the Queen?" asked the Goblin, in astonishment. "Are you to become a river sprite?"
"You have guessed it," said the River God. "This night we are to be married at the bottom of the river. Farewell, you little tell-tale Goblin. I hope your silver cap fits your peaked little head."
The Goblin watched the Fairy and her lover as they slowly sank from sight, and then he ran off as fast as he could to the dell to tell the Queen what he had seen. "I'll get a red coat, too," he said. "I did not promise not to tell to-night."
The tell-tale Goblin was so bent on telling the Queen what he knew that he quite forgot his new silver cap until he reached the dell where the fairies were dancing; then throwing away his old cap, he clapped the silver cap on his head so hard he cried out with pain.
For a second he saw stars, and the cold silver felt very different from his soft, warm peaked cap which he had tossed aside.
The little fairies, seeing the Goblin hopping about in the moonlight, called to the Queen: "Oh, look, dear Queen. Drive away the Goblin; he acts quite mad and may mean mischief."
The Queen, knowing that Goblins, when they were quite sane, were not friendly to her fairies, held up her wand and cast a ray of light straight into the Goblin's eye. "Leave our dell," she said, "or something will happen to you that you will not like."
"Oh, wait, wait and hear what I have to tell!" called the Goblin. "I know a secret you must hear."