'I hope I have not kept your Majesty waiting.'
'Not at all,' the monarch replied. 'But, stay! surely I cannot be mistaken. Are not you the gallant prince whom I had the pleasure of meeting yesterday, and who vanished so strangely just when we were about to exchange hats?'
'Your Majesty's memory is not at fault,' Yellow-cap answered.
'Bless my soul! my dear fellow,' the King exclaimed with much heartiness, 'allow me to give you a hug!'
At this there was a great outburst of applause from the audience, which his Majesty acknowledged by bowing and smiling. After it was over he continued--
'And now tell me, where on earth did you vanish to? I could have sworn you were beside me--when, almost while I was looking at you, you were gone; and in your place was a dirty, impertinent varlet who tried to snatch my crown out of my very hands.'
'Ah, but he got his deserts. Ha! I flatter myself he will never again try _that_ game. No, by my faith!'
'I grappled with him, and, after a tremendous struggle, I managed to get him by the throat and bowed him backwards to the earth. I say "to the earth," because the villains who should have upheld my platform had let it fall. Never mind--I had all their heads before supper-time.'
'There was not much left of him,' replied his Majesty, with a hearty laugh. 'After I had strangled him I flung his carcass to my retainers, who made mincemeat of it in no time. But all this is by the way. You have not told me what became of you.'
Now, Yellow-cap had a good imagination; and seeing that the King had made up a clever story, he resolved to do his best to tell another as good.
'Your Majesty must know,' he said, 'that among my other modest gifts I include that of making myself invisible at pleasure and transporting myself to distant places by the force of a wish. Just at the moment when we were about to exchange hats I happened to remember that I had important business elsewhere; and since I had a long way to go, and very little time to go in, I was obliged to leave your Majesty without ceremony. But, as you see, I have lost no time in again presenting myself before you.'
There was a round of applause at this speech, but neither so long nor so loud as at that of the King.