The King went from the palace in despair and returned to his lodging. He had hoped so fiercely and so long that life seemed almost to have come to an end. He mounted his horse, and, bidding the old man farewell, determined to return to his kingdom and his soldiers, putting the thought of the Princess from him for ever. Before he went he gave him a thousand gold pieces, and made him promise to return to the Tree of Pride and cut it down. As the city walls faded behind him, he looked back at them with a sigh. For the first time he had lost interest in everything, and he knew that it was no longer his pleasure to which he was returning; but he had not forgotten that it was still his duty. Now, it chanced that, while the Princess refused the crown, there stood by the chair a certain lady-in-waiting. She was no longer young, but she had been a beauty in her day and had seen much of men and matters. She had been at the Court for years and her heart was heavy at the change she saw in her mistress. She was a shrewd woman, and it did not escape her notice that the person who offered the crown wore a hood like those she had seen on the heads of magicians; besides this, she marvelled that two strangers, one of whom did not even show himself, should wish to give the Princess what any one of her servants might pluck from the hedge. The old man had scarcely disappeared before she made up her mind that here was some mystery she did not understand. Unobserved, she gathered up the broken flowers, and that evening she sent a page secretly to discover where he lived, and to desire him to meet her, after dark, at the foot of the palace garden. She also sent the key of a little door by which he might enter unobserved. When the page found him, the old man was on the point of leaving the city. He was sad, for he had just parted from the King; but he was resolved, when he should have destroyed the Tree of Pride, to follow him to his own country and spend the rest of his life in his service. When he received the lady’s commands, he did not hesitate to obey them. The watchmen were crying ten o’clock as he stood in the starlight inside the little door. He trembled, for he suspected the summons might lead him into some trap; but to serve the King he was ready to venture all, and he only hoped the morning might not find him at the bottom of a dungeon. He was considering these things when the lady appeared. He was about to speak when she held up her hand. “I am the Princess’s chief lady-in-waiting,” she began, “and her welfare is to me as my own. I have sent for you that I may ask you, for her sake, what reason you had for bringing such a gift. She has everything the world can offer, and I am certain that you would not have brought her such a present as a common flower wreath if there had not been some hidden virtue in it.” The old man fell down before her, clinging to her skirt and kissing its hem.