Three days did Vasilissa the Wise await him. On the fourth day she clad herself like a beggar, went into the capital, and took up her quarters in an old woman’s house. But the Prince was preparing to marry a rich Princess, and orders were given to proclaim throughout the kingdom, that all Christian people were to come to congratulate the bride and bridegroom, each one bringing a wheaten pie as a present. Well, the old woman with whom Vasilissa lodged, prepared, like everyone else, to sift flour and make a pie.
“Why are you making a pie, granny?” asked Vasilissa.
“Is it why? you evidently don’t know then. Our King is giving his son in marriage to a rich princess: one must go to the palace to serve up the dinner to the young couple.”
“Come now! I, too, will bake a pie and take it to the palace; may be the King will make me some present.”
“Bake away in God’s name!” said the old woman.
Vasilissa took flour, kneaded dough, and made a pie. And inside it she put some curds and a pair of live doves.
Well, the old woman and Vasilissa the Wise reached the palace just at dinner-time. There a feast was in progress, one fit for all the world to see. Vasilissa’s pie was set on the table, but no sooner was it cut in two than out of it flew the two doves. The hen bird seized a piece of curd, and her mate said to her:
“Give me some curds, too, Dovey!”
“No I won’t,” replied the other dove: “else you’d forget me, as the Prince has forgotten his Vasilissa the Wise.”
Then the Prince remembered about his wife. He jumped up from table, caught her by her white hands, and seated her close by his side. From that time forward they lived together in all happiness and prosperity.