'You shall have your wish,' said the King, 'though I fear your lover is not worthy of you. But first your eyes shall be unveiled, and you shall tell me whether, amidst this assembly, you can find the man who called himself the Lord High Sheepstealer of England.'
And now a wonderful thing happened.
When the six courtiers, in their white dominoes, heard the command of the King that the maiden's eyes should be unveiled they all got behind one another, and cowered down, shaking in their shoes. And when the maiden's glance rested on them they cowered down still more, as if they were trying to hide their heads in their necks and their necks in their shoulders. Still they shrivelled and shrunk, until they no longer appeared like six tall courtiers, but like half a dozen ugly little dwarfs, barely three feet high. And when they saw how small they had become they uttered a cry of terror, and seemed to rush into one another's arms. And with that—though how it came about would be impossible to say—there stood only a single dwarf, a great deal stouter and uglier than the six, but with precisely the same cast of features and general appearance.
'That is the creature that called itself the Lord High Sheepstealer of England,' said the maiden.
'What have you to say for yourself, sirrah?' said the King sternly.
'Mercy! spare my life!' cried the dwarf, falling on his knees. 'And bethink yourself that we are brothers, and that in destroying me you would unmake yourself.'
'That is the very thing that decides me to show you no mercy,' answered King Yellow-cap. 'I am sick of all this stage-play.'
'Have a care what you do, Sire,' said Silvia, with a frown on her face, which looked much older and less pretty than it had done hitherto. 'He is your brother, and you are bound to him by the vows of the Order.'
'I shall know how to break those bonds,' Yellow-cap replied. 'In the first place, let my guards loose all the prisoners who are in the cart and let them go free.'
When this had been done he turned to the village maiden.