ust to let them walk in the garden he could see
the tears in their eyes. And after all, he thought, there were high
walls to the garden.

So he called up his army, and set soldiers all round the garden, and a
hundred soldiers to each gate, so that no one should come in. And then
he let the princesses come up from their underground palace, and step
out into the sunshine in the garden, with ten nurses and maids to each
princess to see that no harm came to her.

The princesses stepped out into the garden, under the blue sky,
shading their eyes at first because they had never before been in the
golden sunlight. Soon they were taking hands, and running this way and
that along the garden paths and over the green grass, and gathering
posies of shining flowers to set in their girdles and to shame their
golden crowns. And the King sat and watched them with love in his
eyes, and was glad to see how happy they were. And after all, he
thought, what with the high walls and the soldiers standing to arms,
nothing could get in to hurt them.

[Illustration: It caught up the princesses and carried them up into
the air.]

But just as he had quieted his old heart a strong whirlwind came down
out of the blue sky, tearing up trees and throwing them aside, and
lifting the roofs from the houses. But it did not touch the palace
roofs, shining green in the sunlight, and it plucked no trees from the
garden. It raged this way and that, and then with its swift whirling
arms it caught up the three lovely princesses, and carried them up
into the air, over the high walls and over the heads of the guarding
soldiers. For a moment the King saw them, his daughters, the three
lovely princesses, spinning round and round, as if they were dancing
in the sky. A moment later they were no more than little whirling
specks, like dust in the sunlight. And then they were out of sight,
and the King and all the maids and nurses were alone in the empty
garden. The noise of the wind had gone. The soldiers did not dare to
speak. The only sound in the King's ears was the sobbing and weeping
of the maids and nurses.

The King called his generals, and made them send the soldiers in all
directions over the country to bring back the princesses, if the
whirlwind should tire and set them again upon the ground. The soldiers
went to the very boundaries of the kingdom, but they came back as they
went. Not one of them had seen the three lovely princesses.

Then the King cal