第50章 CLEVER ALICE(2)

Meanwhile the husband waited for his wife's return; but at last he felt so very thirsty that he said, "I must go myself down into the cellar and see what is keeping our Alice." As soon as he entered the cellar, there he found the four sitting and crying together, and when he heard the reason, he also exclaimed, "Oh, what a clever Alice we have!" and sat down to cry with the whole strength of his lungs.

All this time the bridegroom above sat waiting, but when nobody returned, he thought they must be waiting for him, and so he went down to see what was the matter. When he entered, there sat the five crying and groaning, each one in a louder key than his neighbor.

"What misfortune has happened?" he asked.

"Ah, dear Hans!" cried Alice, "if you and I should marry one another, and have a child, and he grew up, and we, perhaps, send him down to this cellar to tap the beer, the hatchet which has been left sticking up there may fall on his head, and so kill him; and do you not think this is enough to weep about?""Now," said Hans, "more prudence than this is not necessary for my housekeeping; because you are such a clever Alice, I will have you for my wife." And, taking her hand, he led her home, and celebrated the wedding directly.

After they had been married a little while, Hans, said one morning, "Wife, I will go out to work and earn some money; do you go into the field and gather some corn wherewith to make bread.""Yes," she answered, "I will do so, dear Hans." And when he was gone, she cooked herself a nice mess of pottage to take with her. As she came to the field, she said to herself, "What shall I do? Shall I cut first, or eat first? Aye, I will eat first!" Then she ate up the contents of her pot, and when it was finished, she thought to herself, "Now, shall I reap first or sleep first?

Well, I think I will have a nap!" and so she laid herself down among the corn, and went to sleep.

Meanwhile Hans returned home, but Alice did not come, and so he said, "Oh, what a prudent Alice I have! She is so industrious that she does not even come home to eat anything." By and by, however, evening came on, and still she did not return; so Hans went out to see how much she had reaped; but, behold, nothing at all, and there lay Alice fast asleep among the corn! So home he ran very fast, and brought a net with little bells hanging on it, which he threw over her head while she still slept on. When he had done this, he went back again and shut to the house door, and, seating himself on his stool, began working very industriously.

At last, when it was nearly dark, the clever Alice awoke, and as soon as she stood up, the net fell all over her hair, and the bells jingled at every step she took. This quite frightened her, and she began to doubt whether she were really Clever Alice, and said to herself, "Am I she, or am I not?" This was a question she could not answer, and she stood still a long while considering about it. At last she thought she would go home and ask whether she was really herself--supposing somebody would be able to tell her.

When she came up to the house door it was shut; so she tapped at the window, and asked, "Hans, is Alice within?" "Yes," he replied, "she is." At which answer she became really terrified, and exclaiming, "Ah, heaven, then Iam not Alice!" she ran up to another house, intending to ask the same question. But as soon as the folks within heard the jingling of the bells in her net, they refused to open their doors, and nobody would receive her. So she ran straight away from the village, and no one has ever seen her since.