Meanwhile the King and the Prince , who knew that their sister must have arrived , had made themselves smart , and sat expecting every minute to be summoned to greet her . So when the gaoler came with soldiers , and carried them down into a black dungeon which swarmed with toads and bats , and where they were up to their necks in water , nobody could have been more surprised and dismayed than they were . ` This is a dismal kind of wedding , ' they said ; ` what can have happened that we should be treated like this ? They must mean to kill us . ' And this idea annoyed them very much . Three days passed before they heard any news , and then the King of the Peacocks came and berated them through a hole in the wall . ` You have called yourselves King and Prince , ' he cried , ` to try and make me marry your sister , but you are nothing but beggars , not worth the water you drink . I mean to make short work with you , and the sword is being sharpened that will cut off your heads ! ' ` King of the Peacocks , ' answered the King angrily , ` you had better take care what you are about . I am as good a King as yourself , and have a splendid kingdom and robes and crowns , and plenty of good red gold to do what I like with . You are pleased to jest about having our heads cut off ; perhaps you think we have stolen something from you ? ' At first the King of the Peacocks was taken aback by this bold speech , and had half a mind to send them all away together ; but his Prime Minister declared that it would never do to let such a trick as that pass unpunished , everybody would laugh at him ; so the accusation was drawn up against them , that they were impostors , and that they had promised the King a beautiful Princess in marriage who , when she arrived , proved to be an ugly peasant girl . This accusation was read to the prisoners , who cried out that they had spoken the truth , that their sister was indeed a Princess more beautiful than the day , and that there was some mystery about all this which they could not fathom . Therefore they demanded seven days in which to prove their innocence , The King of the Peacocks was so angry that he would hardly even grant them this favour , but at last he was persuaded to do so . While all this was going on at court , let us see what had been happening to the real Princess . When the day broke she and Frisk were equally astonished at finding themselves alone upon the sea , with no boat and no one to help them . The Princess cried and cried , until even the fishes were sorry for her . ` Alas ! ' she said , ` the King of the Peacocks must have ordered me to be thrown into the sea because he had changed his mind and did not want to marry me . But how strange of him , when I should have loved him so much , and we should have been so happy together ! '
And then she cried harder XXXXX ever , for she could not help still loving him .
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