“Indeed,” replied the boys, quite respectfully.
“Yes, that I tell you; and, moresoever, over there beyond at the wood border, in a pond, is your other grandfather, and he is a great warrior, too.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed the boys, as though they did not know that already, also.
“Yes, and you must go to see him, too; for you can’t get along without him any more than without the other. Now, you boys go to sleep, for you will want to get up very early in the morning, and you must go down the path and straight over the little hills to where your grandfathers live, and not up into the Master Cañon to gather your sticks, for if you do you will forget all I’ve told you. You are creatures who pass comprehension, you two grandchildren of mine.”
So the two boys lay down in the corner together under one robe, like a man and his wife, for they did not sleep apart like our boys. But, do you know, those two mischievous boys giggled and kicked one another, and kept turning about, just as though they never dreamed of the morning. Then they fell to quarrelling about who could turn over the quicker.
“I can,” said the elder brother.
“You can’t!”
“I can!”
“No, you can’t!”
“Yes, I can, and I’ll show you”; and he was about to brace himself for the trial when the old grandmother strode over with her pudding-stick, lifting it in the air, with her usual expression of “Blood! my grandchildren both,” when they quieted down and pretended to sleep; but still they kept giggling and trying to pull the cover off each other.