“Husband, I see that our guest is weary with travelling and his eyes heavy with sleep. I myself will show him the guest-chamber, and assure myself that the servants have made his bed well.” So saying, she led the youngest brother to the room prepared for him, walking before him with the lights. As he went he could not cease admiring the fine plaits of dark hair which hung down her back and regretting that the evening was over and he would be so soon deprived of her company. When they got to the bedchamber, she made every pretext to remain away from the dining-room as long as possible, smoothing the pillows and drawing the window-curtains close, that the starlight might not disturb his sleep. When she had bidden him good-night, she went downstairs as slowly as she could. [Illustration: “THEN THE BIRD TOLD HER THE WHOLE PLOT.”] “I had no notion it was so late!” she exclaimed as she entered. “Now that my part is done, I may tell you two gentlemen that the longer you sit here burning our oil and occupying our best room, the more you will be charged for it. Now, tell me if you are satisfied with my performance, and then take my advice and go to bed for the sake of your pockets. There is a good room ready for you upstairs.” The brothers congratulated her on the way she had played her part, and went off. Nothing could have suited them better, for they meant to slip out of the house and be gone long before dawn broke. When the girl had showed them the way, she ran downstairs to the magpie’s cage. “Quick, quick!” she cried, “tell me everything those knaves said to each other while I was taking the stranger to the guest-chamber.” “Oh, mistress,” exclaimed he, “we have indeed dined in evil company!” “You have not dined at all,” she said, “and never shall if I hear not every word of their talk.” Then the bird told her the whole plot, for the brothers had discussed it openly in her absence. “Besides all this,” he concluded, “they mean to run away in the night and leave the young man to pay the reckoning.” At this the girl ran straight upstairs and locked the two brothers in; she took off her shoes and turned the key so softly that they heard nothing. Afterwards she slipped out into the yard, and, taking a harrow which lay in the outhouse, drew it under their window and turned it with the spikes uppermost, to deter them from jumping out. She then knocked at the door of the guest-chamber. “Come out!” she cried through the keyhole; “there is knavery afoot!” When the youngest brother opened the door she told him all, and when he had hurried on a few clothes he came down to the dining-room to hear what the magpie had discovered. “I shall be out of this as quick as I can,” he remarked when the bird had finished. “My only grief is that I shall never see you again. I am really very glad you are not my brother’s wife, for I had much rather you were mine.” “So had I,” said the girl. So they determined to depart together.