In a few minutes the water was calm again, and the old man in the chariot stood a little way off, surrounded by the nymphs and other creatures, holding the three-pronged wand high over his head.
“I release you; you are wed; be gone from my sight,” said the old man, and as the trumpet-bearer sounded his loud call, the old man and his chariot passed into the deep water, followed by all his nymphs and the others.
Cantilla looked toward the dwarf, wondering if ever any one had such a strange wedding, but to her surprise he was gone and by her side stood a handsome man, who said: “My Princess, behold in me your husband. I am free from the spell of the old man of the sea, who wanted me to become a sea monster and live under the ocean.
“I was changed into the shape of the ugly dwarf because I would not marry a mermaid who happened to fall in love with me one day while I was bathing, and she called upon a sea witch to change me into a sea monster, but I escaped before I took on the sea shape, but not before I was changed into the ugly dwarf you saw this morning.
“A kind fairy interceded with her Queen to save me, and she went to the old man, who is Neptune, the God of the Waters. He told the Queen if I could find a princess who would consent to marry me he would release me from the spell the sea witch had cast over me.
“You know how that was accomplished, my Princess, and if you think you can accept me in place of the dwarf for your husband we will return to the castle, where your father is still sleeping, I expect, for the Fairy Queen said she would watch until sunrise for our return.”
Cantilla, no longer looking sad, but smiling and happy, put her hand in her husband’s and told him she was the happiest girl in the world.
“And I am the happiest man in the world,” said her husband, “for I not only am freed from the spell of the sea witch, but I have won the one woman in the world I could ever love for my wife.”
Three times he clapped his hands together, and the little fairy in the pink gauze dress appeared.
“The Queen sends her love to you and this message, ‘Bless you, my children,’ and now I will take you home to the castle.”