Huathia earnestly assured him that he had no wish to do other than to make music, and he ended by saying: “There is, I am sure, some enchantment in this place, for though the sun is warm I feel a chill, as if some clammy thing enfolded me.”
He shivered as he spoke, though he was a lad whose blood ran warm; not afraid, not given to idle fancies. Of a sudden his eyes fell upon a large grindstone that lay near by. It was a stone so great that two men could hardly make shift to raise it, and so it had been left there for years and grasses had grown about it. But when Huathia saw it, there leaped into his mind the song that he had heard:
“The toad, our queen, lies hid unsought
Beneath the stone that men have wrought.”
It had meant little in the night, but in a flash he saw that the grindstone was a stone wrought by men. So fitting an arrow to his bow he handed the weapon to Suso, telling her to shoot whatever evil thing was discovered when he lifted the stone. With a great effort he raised the stone suddenly, heavy though it was, lifting it high above his head, and there, in a hollow place where the stone had been, sat a large, white, double-headed toad.
“Shoot, Suso, shoot!” commanded the father. “Let not that evil thing escape. It is the creature that torments me at night.”
Swift flew the arrow and it pierced the body of the toad. At the same moment there fell from the roof of the house two monstrous white serpents where they had lain hidden. Like lightning Huathia, having seized the bow, sent two arrows flying, and each serpent was cut into halves. In less than three moments three evil things died, and it was like the sun coming from a cloud-veil, the way in which joy came to that place. The weakness of the father fell from him like a cloak. The bodies of the toad and the snakes withered and shrivelled, and as a light breeze sprang up, what was left of them was blown away as dust. There were soft stirrings in the thicket and the whole world burst into song. So both father and daughter knew then that the witcheries were gone and the evil creatures vanished for ever, and that all the trouble that had been upon that place came from the wicked stepmother.
So youth and maiden were married, and the father soon regained his health and strength, and in all the world there were no happier people than they.
