“I thought I was travelling through a country where all the people were panting for want of water, and as I passed along, they all gathered round me, and desired me to tell them, what had stopped their water from flowing, saying, ‘You are the Devil’s wife, so you must know!’ and when I couldn’t tell them, they threw stones at me, so that I seemed to have a hard matter to escape from them.”
The Devil burst out into a loud laugh, which absorbed all his ill-humour, as he heard this story, and Giuseppa made a sign to Clamer to pay attention to what was to follow.
“You see, you never tell me any thing,” she continued, pretending to cry; “I never know any thing about your business, and, you see, all those people expected I knew every thing my husband knew, as other wives do.”
“I didn’t suppose you’d care to know any thing about it,” replied Luxehale, trying to soothe her; “and really there was nothing to tell! It’s an every-day matter. There was a pilgrimage chapel near the city, to which the people used to go in procession every year; and as long as they did that, I never could get past to get at the fountains. But now they have left off the procession, and so I got by, and had the fun of stopping the water.”
Clamer winked to Giuseppa, to show he understood what the remedy was, and Giuseppa said no more, so that the Devil very soon fell off to sleep again.
When he began to snore again very soundly, she lifted the bed-clothes, and made the agreed sign to Clamer. Clamer came forward, and applied his stick with a hearty will in the right place, and the Devil woke with a shout of fury.
“Oh, my dear husband!” cried Giuseppa, deprecating his wrath by her tone of alarm; “I have had another dreadful dream!”
“What was it?” growled the Devil.
“I thought I was going through a great city where all the people were in sorrow, and sat with ashes on their heads. And when they saw me pass, they said they sat so because the king’s son was at the point of death, and no one could tell what ailed him, and all the doctors were of no use; but that as I was the Devil’s wife, I must know all about it. When I couldn’t tell them, they began pelting me; as they kept putting fresh ashes on their heads each had a pan of fire by his side, in which they were making, and they actually took the red-hot cinders out of the pan of fire to pelt me with, and my clothes were all on fire; so you may believe if I tried to run away fast—and it is no wonder if I knocked you a little.”
The Devil’s fancy was more tickled than before with this story, and he laughed fit to split his sides, as she proceeded, so that he forgot all about the beating.