“I have been to the city,” said Spy, “and could see nothing. These are hard times for us—everybody minds his business so contentedly since that cobbler came. But here is a leathern doublet which his page threw out of the window; it’s of no use, but I brought it to let you see I was not idle.” And he tossed down Spare’s doublet, with the merry leaves in it, which he had been carrying like a bundle on his little back.
To explain how Spy came by it, it must be said that the forest was not far from the great city where Spare lived in such high esteem. All things had gone well with the cobbler till the King thought that it was quite unbecoming to see such a worthy man without a servant. His Majesty therefore appointed one of his own pages to wait upon him. The name of this youth was Tinseltoes, and nobody in all the court had grander notions. Nothing could please him that had not gold or silver about it, and his grandmother feared he would hang himself for being appointed page to a cobbler. As for Spare, the honest man had been so used to serve himself that the page was always in the way, but his merry leaves came to his assistance.
Tinseltoes took wonderfully to the new service. Some said it was because Spare gave him nothing to do but play at bowls all day on the palace green. Yet one thing grieved the heart of Tinseltoes, and that was his master’s leathern doublet, and at last, finding nothing better would do, the page got up one fine morning earlier than his master, and tossed the leathern doublet out of the window into a lane, where Spy found it.
“That nasty thing!” said the old woman. “Where is the good in it?”
By this time Pounce had taken everything of value from Scrub and Fairfeather—the looking-glass, the silver-rimmed horn, the husband’s scarlet coat, the wife’s gay mantle, and, above all, the golden leaves, which so rejoiced old Buttertongue and her sons that they threw the leathern doublet over the sleeping cobbler for a jest, and went off to their hut in the heart of the forest.
The sun was going down when Scrub and Fairfeather awoke from dreaming that they had been made a lord and a lady, and sat clothed in silk and velvet, feasting with the King in his palace hall. It was a great disappointment to find their golden leaves and all their best things gone. Scrub tore his hair, and vowed to take the old woman’s life; while Fairfeather lamented sore. But Scrub, feeling cold for want of his coat, put on the leathern doublet without asking whence it came.
Scarcely was it buttoned on when a change came over him. He addressed such merry discourse to Fairfeather that, instead of lamentations, she made the wood ring with laughter. Both busied themselves in setting up a hut of boughs, in which Scrub kindled a fire with a flint of steel, which, together with his pipe, he had brought unknown to Fairfeather, who had told him the like was never heard of at court. Then they found a pheasant’s nest at the root of an old oak, made a meal of roasted eggs, and went to sleep on a heap of long green grass which they had gathered, with nightingales singing all night long in the old trees about them.
In the meantime Spare had got up and missed his doublet. Tinseltoes, of course, said he knew nothing about it. The whole palace was searched, and every servant questioned, till all the court wondered why such a fuss was made about an old leathern doublet. That very day things came back to their old fashion. Quarrels began among the lords, and jealousies among the ladies. The King said his subjects did not pay him half enough taxes, the Queen wanted more jewels, the servants took to their old bickerings and got up some new ones. Spare found himself getting wonderfully dull, and very much out of place, and nobles began to ask what business a cobbler had at the King’s table; till at last his Majesty issued a decree banishing the cobbler forever from court, and confiscating all his goods in favor of Tinseltoes.
That royal edict was scarcely published before the page was in full possession of his rich chamber, his costly garments, and all the presents the courtiers had given him; while Spare was glad to make his escape out of the back window, for fear of the angry people.
The window from which Spare let himself down with a strong rope was that from which Tinseltoes had tossed the doublet, and as the cobbler came down late in the twilight, a poor woodman, with a heavy load of fagots, stopped and stared in astonishment.