It was, once more, his god-mother, the same who had offered him shelter in her forest cottage when he was carrying the King's treacherous message.
"Tell me what brings you here, from so far off?"
"The King will not have me for his son-in-law without being paid for it; so he has sent me here to fetch for him three gold hairs from the head of Dede-Vsevede."
His god-mother burst into laughter, saying:—
"The Dede-Vsevede? Why, I am his mother—he is the shining Sun in person! Every morning he is a child; at noon he becomes a man; at evening he withers to the likeness of a decrepit, hundred-year-old man. But I will contrive to get you three gold hairs from his head, so that you may know that I am not your god-mother for nothing. For all that, however, you cannot remain here any longer as you are. My son, the Sun, is endowed with a charitable soul; but, on returning home, he is always hungry, and it would not astonish me if, as soon as he comes back, he ordered you to be roasted for his supper. To hide you I will overturn this empty box, under which you must creep."
Before obeying, Plavacete begged his god-mother to obtain from Dede-Vsevede answers to the three questions which he had promised to get from him.
"I will put the questions to him, but you must carefully listen to the answers he returns."
Suddenly the wind was unchained without, and, through a window on the western side of the castle, arrived the Sun—an old man with a head of gold.
The old man sat down to supper. After the meal was finished, he placed his head of gold upon his mother's knees and fell asleep.
As soon as she saw that he was sleeping soundly, she plucked from his head one of his gold hairs and threw it upon the floor: in falling the hair made a metallic sound, like the string of a guitar when struck.