ather's palace,
where he found a strange man standing behind the throne with the
peacock's feathers. This was his wife's brother, whom the king had taken
into high favour, though, of course, the prince was quite ignorant of
what had happened.

For a moment the king and queen stared at their son, as if he had been
unknown to them; he had grown so thin and weak during his illness that
his shoulders were bowed like those of an old man.

'Have you forgotten me so soon?' he asked.

At the sound of his voice they gave a cry and ran towards him, and
poured out questions as to what had happened, and why he looked like
that. But the prince did not answer any of them.

'How is my wife?' he said. There was a pause.

Then the queen replied:

'She is dead.'

'_Dead!_' he repeated, stepping a little backwards. 'And my child?'

'He is dead too.'

The young man stood silent. Then he said, 'Show me their graves.'

At these words the king, who had been feeling rather uncomfortable, took
heart again, for had he not prepared two beautiful tombs for his son to
see, so that he might never, never guess what had been done to his wife?
All these months the king and queen had been telling each other how good
and merciful they had been not to take her brother's advice and to put
her to death. But now, this somehow did not seem so certain.

Then the king led the way to the courtyard just behind the palace, and
through the gate into a beautiful garden where stood two splendid tombs
in a green space under the trees. The prince advanced alone, and,
resting his head against the stone, he burst into tears. His father and
mother stood silently behind with a curious pang in their souls which
they did not quite understand. Could it be that they were ashamed of
themselves?

But after a while the prince turned round, and walking past them into
the palace he bade the slaves bring him mourning. For seven days no one
saw him, but at the end of them he went out hunting, and helped his
father rule his people as before. Only no one dared to speak to him of
his wife and son.

* * * * *

At last one morning, after the girl had been lying awake all night
thinking of her husband, she said to her friend the snake:

'You have all shown me much kindness, but now I am well again, and want
to go home and hear some news of my husband, and if he still mourns for
me!' Now the heart of the snake was sad at her words, but he on