“That’s one!” cried Barney.
Then he untied the little creatures and called for a table and set them upon it, and he drew out the harp and stool and gave it to the cockchafer. It seated itself and tuned the harp, while the princess and all her ladies stared and stared. Then it began to play and the mouse and the bumblebee began to dance; you’d have thought they’d had wings to their feet.
At that the princess let out a laugh that was twice as loud as the other.
“Thank you, princess,” said Barney, “that’s two.”
At that the princess stopped laughing and looked as glum as the grave. The cockchafer played, the others danced, faster and faster, but not a third laugh could they get out of the princess, and it seemed as though Barney were to lose his head after all. But the little mouse saw as well as Barney what was like to happen, and all of a sudden he whirled around and brought his tail, whack! across the bumblebee’s mouth. That set the bumblebee to coughing. It coughed and coughed as though it would cough its head off. Then the princess began to laugh for the third time. The more it coughed the more she laughed till it seemed as though she might die of laughing.
“That makes the third time,” cried Barney, “and now I think you’ll own I’ve fairly won the princess.”
Well, no one could deny that, so he was taken to another grand room in the palace and there he was washed and combed and dressed in fine clothes, and when that was done, he looked so brave and straight and handsome that the princess was glad enough to have him for a husband.
They were married the next day, and a coach and four were sent to bring the old mother to the wedding. When she came and saw her own son, Barney, dressed in that way and holding a royal princess by the hand, she could hardly believe her eyes, and almost died of joy as the princess had of laughing. A great feast was made, and the little man in green was there, too, and feasted with the best of them, but nobody saw him for he had his red cap on his head, and that made him invisible.
