"I always suspected something like that," interrupted the king.
José looked at him in surprise.
"Were you there?" he asked.
The king nodded. "Go on with your story, my boy," he said.
José told all the circumstances of his mother's escape from the tower, just as she had so often described them to him. Tears were running down the king's cheeks when at last the story was ended.
"My lad, you are my own grandson!" cried the king as he took him in his arms. "Proud am I, too, that I have a grandson like you! Where is your mother now?"
"My mother is in the house in the forest," replied José. "It is she who told me to carry the money to the king."
"Why did she never come to me?" asked the father.
"I think she was afraid she'd be punished for running away from the tower without any door," was José's reply.
When the princess was brought home to the royal palace there was a great feast held which lasted for three days and three nights. Then the king sent his men with José into the forest to the cave where the giant had lived. They brought home so many bags of gold that it required the entire royal army to transport it.