"Thank you, dear sir," he said; "it's a bargain, and I agree to it. My wife hears us, and is witness. Wife! wife!" he cried, running into the kitchen, "I am to have anything under the sun that I choose to ask for. I think of asking for neighbour Merryweather's estate, but this is a chance never likely to happen again, and I should like to make a wise choice, and that is not easy at a moment's notice." "You will have a week to think it over in," said the dwarf, who had come in behind him; "I must be off now, so give me my flour, and come to the hill behind your house seven days hence at midnight, and you shall have your share of the bargain." So the farmer tied up the flour-sack, and helped the dwarf with it on to his back, and as he did so he began thinking how easily the bargain had been made, and casting about in his mind whether, he could not get more where he had so easily got much. "And half a stone of flour is half a stone of flour," he muttered to himself, "and whatever it may do with thriftless people, it goes a long way in our house. And there's the bag--and a terrible lot spilled on the larder floor--and the string to tie it with, which doubtless he'll never think of returning--and my time, which must be counted, and nothing whatever for it all for a week to come." And the outlay so weighed upon his mind that he cleared his throat and began: "Not for seven days, did you say, sir? You know, dear sir, or perhaps, indeed, you do not know, that when amongst each other we men have to wait for the settlement of an account, we expect something over and above the exact amount. Interest we call it, my dear sir." "And you want me to give you something extra for waiting a week?" asked the dwarf. "Pray, what do you expect?" "Oh, dear sir, I leave it to you," said the farmer. "Perhaps you may add some trifle--in the flour-bag, or not, as you think fit--but I leave it entirely to you." "I will give you something over and above what you shall choose," said the dwarf; "but, as you say, I shall decide what it is to be." With which he shouldered the flour-sack, and went his way. For the next seven days, the farmer had no peace for thinking, and planning, and scheming how to get the most out of his one wish. His wife made many suggestions to which he did not agree, but he was careful not to quarrel with her; "for," he said, "we will not be like the foolish couple who wasted three wishes on black-puddings. Neither will I desire useless grandeur and unreasonable elevation, like the fisherman's wife. I will have a solid and substantial benefit." And so, after a week of sleepless nights and anxious days, he came back to his first thought, and resolved to ask for his neighbour's estate. At last the night came. It was full moon, and the farmer looked anxiously about, fearing the dwarf might not be true to his appointment. But at midnight he appeared, with the flour-bag neatly folded in his hand.