The nurse had heard all that had passed, and she goes and tells it
immediately to the king. The young lady was cured, and goes to carry
the dinner to Fidel. Fidel had a habit of always giving the first
spoonful of the soup to the dog. He gives it him that day too, and
as soon as the dog has eaten it he falls stark dead. When the young
lady saw that she goes and tells it to her father. The father sends
for a big dog, and gives him some of the soup, and as soon as he has
eaten it he falls dead. Judge of the anger of that young lady. She
goes and takes this old witch and has her burnt. She goes to look
for Fidel in a little house which was at the bottom of the garden,
and she sees his head bare. [113] It was shining like the sun, and
she entirely lost her own head for it, and she said to him, that he
must marry her. As she left him no peace, her father said to her:
"If you will marry him, do so; but I will not give you anything. You
must go and live in a corner of the mountain with your husband;
there is a house there, and there you must stop. You may come only
one day a week to see me."
That was all the same to this young lady, (and they are married),
and go off there. As the king had given her no money, when Fidel's
hair grew she went from time to time to the goldsmiths, who said to
her that they had not money enough belonging to them to pay for the
gold that she brought them. And they lived there very happily.
One day Fidel heard that the king was engaged in a great war, and he
told his wife to go to her father and tell him that he too wished to
go to this war. This young lady goes to tell her father her husband's
commission. Her father says to her:
"What is the use of a young man like that who has never killed anything
but mole-crickets? Let him stop at home."