After a while he came to the town where the king lived, and there was a great buzzing and gossip, and this was why: all the folks were talking about how the tinker and the shoemaker had brought back the princess from the ugly little troll, and of how the king had promised that whoever did that was to have her for his wife and half of the kingdom to boot; but here were two lads, and the question was who was to have her. For before they had left the pit over yonder, the tinker and the shoemaker had made the princess vow and promise that she would say nothing about how they had treated the fiddler, and now each fellow was saying that he had brought her up out of the troll’s den. And the princess did nothing but sit and cry and cry; but, as for marrying, she vowed and declared that she would not do that till she had a pair of slippers of pure gold, and a real diamond buckle on each slipper; and nobody in all of the town was able to make the kind that she wanted. When the fiddler heard all this he went straight to a shoemaker’s shop. “Will you take a journeyman shoemaker?” says he. “What can you do?” says the master shoemaker. “I can make a pair of slippers such as the princess wants, only I must have a room all to myself to make them in,” says the fiddler. When the master shoemaker heard this, he was not long in making up his mind, so the bargain was closed and that settled the business. [Illustration: The Fiddler and the little, black mannikin.] As soon as the fiddler was alone he drew out his fiddle and began to play a bit of a jig, and there stood the little black fellow, just as he had done before. “What do you want?” says he. “I should like,” said the fiddler, “to have a pair of slippers such as the princess asks for, but I only want one buckle to the pair, and that must be made of real diamonds.” Oh! that was an easy thing to have, and there were the slippers just as the fiddler had ordered. “But there is only one buckle,” says the master shoemaker. “Tut!” says the fiddler, “turn no hairs grey for that, brother. Just tell the princess that the fiddler has the other, and matters will be as smooth as cream.” Well, the master shoemaker did as the fiddler said, and you may guess how the princess opened her pretty eyes when she heard that her sweetheart was thereabouts. Nothing would suit her but that she must see that journeyman shoemaker. But when they sent to fetch him, he was gone. And now the shoemaker and the tinker began to talk again; the princess had been promised to the man who saved her from the troll, and so she must and should choose one of them. But no; the princess was not ready yet; she would never marry till she had a pair of gloves of the finest silk, all embroidered with silver and pearls and with a ruby clasp at the wrist of each.