"Take care, my young knight, that I am not an elf in reality!" cried Aasé, playfully, as she embraced him. "Seest thou not my blue kirtle, and brown two-peaked hood? Ay, right! look in my eyes and not to my back, for I am as hollow there as a dough-trough.[32] Away, now--out with thee! save thy king and master, or thou deservest never to be a knight, and I will have nothing more to say to thee." Skirmen embraced her hastily, and hurried out, accompanied by his sweetheart and the old man. Shortly afterwards he was riding through the wood at a gallop, and Henner Friser re-entered the cottage with his granddaughter. Neither of them spoke. He barred the door, cast his spear into a corner, and sat down musingly on his rush-cushioned seat. Aasé took her distaff, and sat down to work by the window, for the interior of the room was now quite dark. "Light the lamp, Aasé," said the old man, at length, breaking the silence, and rising with uneasiness. "It is still too early to go to rest in the hole inside, and thou knowest I cannot bear to sit in the dark." "But were it not better to-night, dear grandfather?" replied Aasé. "If even I were to hang my apron before the window, the light would still shine through; and, if we would keep concealed, were it not advisable--" "I am not a carlin," exclaimed Henner. "I am not so much afraid of man, that I must sit in the dark, and be tormented by the devil. The living I fear not: would only that the restless dead would grant me peace!" "Dost thou again think of the dead, dear grandfather?" said Aasé, with a sigh, as she lighted the lamp and hung it on an iron hook attached to the low rafters; having first, however, taken care to hang her thin light blue apron before the horn-window that looked out on the wood. "It is not the dead, but the living, that persecute us, dear grandfather," she continued, sitting down to her work opposite his chair. "It is only the storm tearing the dry boughs from the trees, and the wild birds hooting dismally in the woods, that sometimes make thee uncomfortable at night." "It seems always to come from Gottorp," muttered the old man, who had resumed his seat: "'tis there he lies, with the stake through his heart--the accursed king, who caused his brother to be cast into the river Sley!--and he it is who hunts through the forest at midnight. I long regarded it as a delusion and a superstition, but now I must believe it, since I have myself seen it." "The rood save us!" exclaimed Aasé; "when didst thou see it?"