The blood rushed to Martin's head, and a singing sound filled his ears. "A pond!" he cried. "A common fishpond! And how am I to earn my living now? And what is to become of my wife and little Lionel?"
In his anger and despair, Martin sprang blindly forward, and kicked the standard roses, and wrung the necks of the beautiful purple iris that bloomed in the shade of some laurel bushes. His eye caught the spellbound lauristinus, and, forgetting his late good master's commands, he fell on it furiously with both hands, and tore, and wrenched it from the earth.
Then suddenly, as the roots and fibres of the ill-omened plant with a crackling noise were released from the soil, a wonderful being, which had been buried underneath it—a wicked fairy with an evil eye—uncoiled herself, and rose up straight and tall before him. She gave a malicious smile, and simpered out flattering words to the half-bewildered labourer.
"A thousand thanks, O noble knight, for relieving a spell-bound lady! Pray let me know, is there aught that I can do to indicate my gratitude?"
"Tell me how I can earn my daily bread?" stammered forth poor Martin.
"Daily bread!" cried the fairy, tossing her head contemptuously. "I can tell thee, gallant sir, where to find gold, ay, more real yellow gold than the king and all his court ever dreamed of! I have not been pent up under that lauristinus all these years for nothing! I know a secret or two."
Martin's eyes grew dilated, and his breath came and went, and he seized the fairy by the wrist. "Answer me," he gasped out hoarsely, "where's all that gold to be got? No palavering, or I'll bury you up again, and plant that same lauristinus-bush on your head!"
The fairy rolled her evil eye, and gave a forced laugh. "At the back of yonder mountain!" she cried, pointing with her thin, long hand to a hill whose summit overlooked the park. "The way thou must take is through the forest, till thou comest to the charcoal-burners' huts. Then follow a crooked path leading to the left, round to the back of the hill. Thou wilt find an opening in the earth. The gold is there!"
Martin scarcely waited for the last words. He loosened his grasp of the fairy's wrist, and hastened full speed home to his wife and child.
"To a hole at the back of the mountain to look for gold!" Poor Dame Ursula was sorely puzzled when her good-man arrived all excited, and bade her make a bundle of what clothes she possessed, bring the baby Lionel, and follow him to push their fortune at the back of the mountain.