"And the king said, 'Oh, unkind friend! Why will you not do as I ask you, now that I am dying and can do nothing for myself? Go back and throw the sword into the lake, as I told you.' "And the knight went back, and once more he lifted the sword to throw it into the water but it looked so beautiful that he _could_ not throw it away. There would be nothing left, he thought, to remember the king by when he was dead if he threw away the sword; so again he hid it among the rushes, and then he went back to the king. And again the king asked, 'What did you see by the lake?' and again the knight answered, 'I saw nothing except the water and the mountains.' "'Oh, unkind, false friend!' cried the king, 'you are crueller to me than those who gave me this wound. Go back and throw the sword into the water, or, weak as I am, I will rise up and kill you.' "Back went the knight, and this time he seized the sword without looking at it, so that he should not see how beautiful it was, and then he swung it once, twice, thrice, round his head, and away it went into the lake. And as it fell, up rose a hand and arm in a long white sleeve out of the water, and the hand caught the sword and drew it down under the water. And then for a moment, all round the lake, the knight fancied he heard a sound of sobbing and weeping, and he thought in his heart that it must be the water-fairies weeping for the king's death. "'What did you see by the lake?' asked the king again, when he came back, and the knight told him. Then the king told him to lift him up and carry him on his back down to the edge of the lake, and when they got there, what do you think they saw?" But the children could not guess, and Milly pressed Aunt Emma's hand hard to make her go on. "They saw a great black ship coming slowly over the water, and on the ship were numbers of people in black, sobbing and crying, so that the air was full of a sound of weeping, and in front sat three queens in long black dresses, and with gold crowns on their heads, and they, too, were weeping and wringing their hands. "'Lift me up,' said the king, when the ship came close beside them, 'and put me into the ship.' And the knight lifted him up, while the three queens stretched out their hands and drew him into the ship. "'Oh, king! take me with you,' said the knight, 'take me too. What shall I do all alone without you?' But the ship began to move away, and the knight was left standing on the shore. Only he fancied he heard the king's voice saying, 'Wait for me, I shall come again. Farewell!' "And the ship went faster and faster away into the darkness, for it was a fairy ship, till at last the knight could see it no more. So then he knew that the king had been carried away by the fairies of the lake--the same fairies who had given him the sword in old days, and who had loved him and watched over him all his life. But what did the king mean by saying, 'I shall come again'?"