"Is he rude about it?"
"Not exactly rude, but he is all the more annoying because he is so polite, and I always feel that he wants something different."
"He must not do that," said the man. "He must learn to want what you wish."
"But how can he learn what I wish? I do not always know that myself."
"It may be difficult," said the man, "but all the same he must learn it for your sake. I will deal with him."
So he took the unruly sprite out into the desert and gave him a sound beating with thorn branches. The blood ran down the poor little creature's arms and legs, and the teats down the man's cheeks. But the only words that he said were: "You must learn to want what she wishes —do you hear?—you must want what she wishes." At last the sprite whimpered and said: "Yes, I hear; I will wish what she wants." Then the man stopped beating him, and went back to his house, and wrote a little story that was really good.
But the sprite lay on his face in the desert for a long time, sobbing as if his heart would break. Then he fell asleep and laughed in his dreams. When he awoke it was night and the moon was shining silver. He rubbed his eyes and whispered to himself, "Now I must find out what she wants." With that he leaped up, and the moonbeams washed him white as he passed through them to the lady's house.
The next afternoon, when the man came to read her the really good story, she would not listen.
"No," she said, "I am very angry with you."
"Why?"