"I must go," he cried, "and bring them here! I must be off to search for them, away ... away ... at the back of the mountain."
Then the old wives insisted on his waiting and resting the night there; for he had need of sleep, he was so tired after walking and bathing, dancing and weeping. And they gave him a nice, spruce, dimity-curtained bed to sleep in; and presented him with a beautiful suit of new garments for the morrow; "for," they said, "they had been at his christening, and it was easy to see that the good Dame Ursula, wherever she had been all these years, had brought her boy up well."
Lionel was fatigued, and shut his eyes at once for the night; but, ere slumber overtook him, he heard distinctly the old wives' gossip by his bedside.
"What a shame it was," said they, "of My Lord Lackaday to turn away poor Martin as he did, and then transform the magnificent palace garden into a fishpond!"
"But he was punished for it," whispered another. "They say an 'evil spell' hangs over his only child, the lovely princess—the 'Lady Lilias' as she is called. They say some creature from below the cursed fishpond is to marry her—some dreadful beast no doubt. And the king is in terror, and spends his time fishing there day and night."
The words awakened a strange curiosity in Lionel's heart; they rang in his ears, and mingled with his dreams the whole night through; and it seemed to him as if he and his parents were, in some way, bound up with the fate of this poor young princess and her unhappy father, the king.
The following morning he donned the brave new garments they had given him, and went forth to look at the park and the palace he had so often heard of, before starting back to the gold-mine.
He discovered the royal entrance without assistance. But what was his surprise to see, crouched on the roadside near it, a being which looked this time just what she was, a wicked fairy with an evil eye! She uncoiled herself, and stood up, straight and tall, before him. She gave a malicious smile, and simpered forth these words: "Beware, young man, of entering in there! That is the royal demesne, and no stranger intrudes unpunished. None so poor and so mean as thou art dares be seen within those precincts."
"My parents have taught me that to tell lies is mean! And thou hast told me enough!" cried Lionel, indignantly.
At his words the creature vanished from before him; and on the spot where she had stood he saw an ugly bush of deadly nightshade.