If the Yellow Rose was in a rage on the two days before, she was in a far greater rage now. She said she wouldn’t sit there to listen. She told Jack that Hookedy-Crookedy was in her eyes a far more handsome and beautiful man than he or than any king’s son she had ever seen. She said to Jack, that if he were ten times as handsome and a hundred times as wealthy, she wouldn’t give Hookedy-Crookedy’s little finger for himself, or for all his wealth and possessions, and then she got up to leave the room.
“Well,” says Jack, says he, “I admire your spirit very much, and,” says he, “I would like to make you a little present. Here is a comb,” he said, “and it will comb out of your hair a bushel of gold and a bushel of silver every time you comb with it, and, besides,” says he, “it will make handsome the ugliest man that ever was.”
When the other sisters heard this they rushed to snatch the comb from her, but Jack threw them backwards so very roughly that their husbands sprang at him. With a back switch of his two hands Jack knocked the husbands down senseless. The King flew into a rage, and said, “How dare you do that to the two finest and bravest men of this world ?”
“Fine and brave, indeed!” said Jack. “One and the other they are worthless creatures, and not even your lawful sons-in-law.”
“How dare you say that ?” says the King.
“Strip their backs where they lie and see far yourself.” And there the King saw written, “An unlawfully married man.”
“What is the meaning of this?” says the King. “They were lawfully married to my two daughters, and they have the golden tokens of the marriage.”
Jack drew out from his pocket the golden balls and handed them to the King, and said, “It is I who have the tokens.”
The Yellow Rose had gone off to the garden in the middle of all this. Jack made the King sit down, and told him all his story, and how he came by the golden balls. He told him how he was Hookedy-Crookedy, and that it reflected a great deal of honor on his youngest daughter that she whom the King thought so worthless should refuse to give up Hookedy-Crookedy for the one she thought a wealthy prince. The King, you may be sure, was now highly delighted to grant him all he desired. A couple of drops of loca brought the King’s two sons to their senses again, and at Jack’s request, they were ordered to go and live elsewhere. Jack went off, left his mare in the wood, and came into the garden as Hookedy-Crookedy. He told the Yellow Rose he had been gathering bilberries.
“Oh,” says she, “I have something grand for you. Let me comb your hair with this comb.”