The red shoes, carrying the dead man, walked over, and Lubin followed them. When they were at the other side they turned, facing toward the plank that they had crossed, and Lubin seemed to read in the dead man’s eye what he was to do. Then he turned and lifted the plank away from over the moat, so that there was no longer any entrance or exit to the place. Through the window of the house he could see the three fiddlers quarrelling over the dead man’s gold. The red shoes went on, carrying their dead owner, till they got to the threshold, and there stopped. Then Lubin came and clicked up the latch, and pushed open the door, and in walked the dead man with the dagger sticking out of his heart. The three fiddlers, when they saw that sight, dropped their gold and leapt out of the window; and as they fled, shrieking, thinking to cross the moat by the plank-bridge that was no longer there, one after the other they fell into the water, and, clutching each other by the throat, were drowned. But the red shoes stayed where they were, and, tilting up his feet, let the traveller go gently upon the ground; and when Lubin held down the lantern to his face, on it lay a good smile, to tell him that the dead man thanked him for all he had done. So in the morning Lubin went and fetched a priest to pray for the repose of the traveller’s soul, and to give him good burial; and to him he gave all the dead man’s money, but for himself he took the red shoes with the pointed toes, and set out to make his fortune in the world. Walking along he found that however far he went he never grew tired. When he had gone on for more than a hundred miles, he came to the capital where the King lived with his Court. All the flags of the city were at half-mast, and all the people were in half mourning. Lubin asked at the first inn where he stopped what it all meant. “You must indeed be a stranger,” said his host, “not to know, for ’tis now nearly a year since this trouble began; and this very night more cause for mourning becomes due.” “Tell me of it, then,” said Lubin, “for I know nothing at all.” “At least,” returned the innkeeper, “you will know how, a little more than a year ago, the Queen, who was the most beautiful woman in the world, died, leaving the King with twelve daughters, who, after her, were reckoned the fairest women on earth, though the King says that all their beauty rolled into one would not equal that of his dead wife; and, indeed, poor man, there is no doubt that he loved her devotedly during her life, and mourns for her continually now she is dead.” “Only a small part of all this have I known,” said Lubin.