And then chuckling, she put on her bonnet, and took her stick and
came out of her cottage door, not noticing Jack peering around the
corner. And away she went over the hill to the giant's house. When she
got there she pulled open a shutter and climbed in, after which she
scattered corn over the floor, and presently into the room scampered
the magic hen and after it had eaten the corn it began to lay one
golden egg after the other until the ogress had her apron full.
And Jack, watching through the shutter, was awfully astonished and
understood what she meant by singing about chickens coming home to
roost. Evidently the stolen hen had come back and no one knew it but
Goog, and she was getting rich on the eggs it laid.
"My," said Jack to himself, "wouldn't the giant be mad if he knew?"
So when the ogress had gone back to her cottage to put away her golden
eggs, Jack pulled open the shutter and climbed into the room where the
magic hen was going about clucking proudly because she had laid so many
eggs. And before the hen knew what was going to happen he grabbed her,
tucked her under his arm, climbed out of the window again and ran off
to see if he could find where the grapevine was.
"Gee whiz!" he chuckled, "if I can only get home with this hen we'll be
so rich my father won't have to work again. We can have automobiles and
steam yachts and everything."
And then all of a sudden he remembered that the hen did not belong to
him and that if he took it he would be stealing, so after thinking
over the matter a moment he decided it would not do and turned back to
the giant's house to replace what he had taken. But before he had gone
half way he heard a trampling sound and saw the giant coming toward him
carrying the Duke's castle in his hand with the roots of it dragging on
the ground, and with the Duke, and the Duchess, and Mrs. Blunderbuss
hanging out of the windows, wailing and wringing their hands.
Quick as a wink Jack thrust the hen beneath his blouse, and presently
the giant stood towering over him.
"So," shouted Blunderbuss, dropping the castle to the ground with a
bang, "you ran away, did you? Well, now, I think I'll give every one
of you to the ogress to put in her pot. And I think," he continued,
looking at Jack more closely, "that you'll please her especially, for
you certainly are fatter than when I saw you last."
"All right," said Jack, feeling dreadfully frightened, but trying his
best not to show it, "do as you like, but if you do you'll be sorry,
for I know where your magic hen is and I shan't tell you if you give me
to the ogress."
"Well," shouted the giant, "where is my hen?"
And then Jack told him how he had followed the ogress and watched her
take the golden eggs, and maybe the giant was not furious when he heard
_that_.
"Right in my own house," he bellowed. "Well, it won't take me long to
get my hen _now_."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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