Hop-o’-my-Thumb heard all they had said; for when he heard, as he lay in bed, that they were talking of their affairs, he got up softly and slipped under his father’s stool, to hear without being seen. He went to bed again, but did not sleep a wink all the rest of the night, thinking of what he should do. He got up early in the morning, and went to the bank of a brook, where he filled his pockets full of small white pebbles, and then went back home.
They all set out, but Hop-o’-my-Thumb did not say a word to any of his brothers about what he had heard. [[121]]
They went into a very thick forest, where they could not see one another ten paces apart. The fagot-maker began to cut wood, and the children to gather up the sticks to make fagots. When their father and mother saw them busy at their work, they slipped away from them little by little, and then made their escape all at once by a winding bypath.
When the children found that they were alone they began to cry bitterly. Hop-o’-my-Thumb let them cry on, knowing very well how he could get home again; for, as he came, he had dropped the little white pebbles he had in his pockets all along the way. Then he said to them, “Do not be afraid, my brothers; father and mother have left us here, but I will lead you home again,—only follow me.”
They followed him, and he brought them home through the forest by the very same way by which they had come. At first they dared not go in, but stood outside the door to listen to what their father and mother were saying. [[122]]
Just as the fagot-maker and his wife reached home, the lord of the manor sent them ten crowns, which he had owed them for a long time, and which they had never expected to get. This gave them new life, for the poor people were almost famished with hunger. As it was a long while since they had eaten, the woman bought as much meat as would satisfy six or eight persons. When they had satisfied their hunger she said: “Alas! where are our poor children now? they would make a good feast of what we have left here. It was you, William, who wished to lose them; I told you we should repent of it. What are they doing now in the forest? Alas! perhaps the wolves have already eaten them up! You are very cruel to have lost your children in this way.”
The fagot-maker grew very impatient at last, for she repeated more than twenty times that they should repent of it, and that she had told him so. He threatened to beat her if she did not hold her tongue. The fagot-maker was, perhaps, even more sorry than [[123]]his wife, but she teased him, and he could not endure her telling him that she was in the right all the time. She wept bitterly, saying, “Alas! where are my children now,—my poor children?”
She said this once so very loud that the children, who were at the door, heard her and cried out all together, “Here we are! here we are!”
She ran quickly to let them in, and said, as she embraced them: “How happy I am to see you again, my dear children! You must be very tired and very hungry. And you, little Peter, you are dirt all over! Come in and let me get you clean again.”