“Come!” said he. “Get up and we will talk it over.” And when they had risen to their feet, he said, “This much I will require of you; let each of you take half of his wealth and go with it to the bank of a certain river. There you will find a poor man who has nothing in all the world save only one cow. Give him the treasure that you have brought, and say to him, ‘Your son, Massang, sends you wealth and prosperity with his love.’ Do [[74]]this faithfully, and I will freely forgive you.”
The men readily promised to do all that Massang had bidden them, and in a few days he saw for himself the three starting forth at the head of a great train of mules laden with wealth and treasure of every sort.
“And did they find the poor man with the one cow?” asked the Khan’s son. “Go on! You haven’t finished!”
“Yes, they found him,” said the Siddhi-kur, with a laugh. “And they poured out their wealth before him, and when Massang came shortly afterwards, you may be sure the old man received him and kept him as a well loved son.
“But you, O Prince, you have forgotten the words of the wise Nagarguna! You have broken silence on the homeward way, and so now you have no further power over me.” With a shout of joy, the Siddhi-kur leaped from the bag on the [[75]]Prince’s back and sped away into the distance. Nor did the Khan’s son set eyes on him again until he had retraced his steps through all the dangers and hardships he had met before and stood once more under the mango tree in the cool grove beside the garden of ghost children.
Seeing him so persistent in his mission, the Siddhi-kur made no objections to being taken again, and allowed himself to be tied into the magic bag with the cord of a hundred threads and tossed once more on to the Prince’s back. After they had traveled a long time in silence and were both grown weary, he suggested again that some wonder tale be told, and receiving no answer from the Prince but a nod of agreement, he began at once. [[76]]