Italian Folktales (27 page)

Their first night together, after kisses, embraces, and caresses, she jumped up, saying, “But do tell me just how your palace sprouted all of a sudden like a mushroom?”

He wasn't sure whether he should tell her, but then he thought, She's my wife, and you don't keep secrets from your wife. He therefore told her about the ring. Then they fell asleep in bliss.

But while he was sleeping, his wife slipped the ring off his finger, then got up, called all the servants, and said, “Leave this palace at once; we are returning to my parents' house!” When she was safely home she turned the ring, saying, “Let my husband's palace be removed to the highest and steepest peak of the mountain in the distance!” And the palace vanished as though it had never existed. She looked at the mountain and saw the castle now poised on the peak.

The youth awakened in the morning, found his wife gone, threw open the window, and beheld the void. Taking a closer look, he made out deep ravines down below, and mountains all around him blanketed in snow. He went to touch the ring, and it too was gone. He called the servants, but no one answered. Instead, the dog and cat ran in. They had stayed there, because he'd told his wife only about the ring and said nothing of the two animals. Completely baffled at first, he gradually realized his wife had cruelly betrayed him, but the truth was little consolation to him. He peered out to see if he was going to be able to get down the mountain, but the doors and windows, alas, opened onto empty space, with the ravines plunging straight downward. The supplies in the palace would last only a few days, and the terrible thought struck him that he would then starve to death.

Seeing their master so downcast, the animals approached, and the dog spoke. “Don't give up hope yet, master. The cat and I will find our way down these cliffs, and then we'll get the ring for you.”

“My dear pets,” said the youth, “you're my only hope. Were it not for you, I'd jump off these cliffs rather than starve to death.”

The dog and cat climbed out of the house, leaped down the cliffs, and came to the foot of the mountain. They raced across the plain to a river, where the dog took the cat on his back and swam to the other bank. When they arrived at the faithless wife's palace, it was already night and the whole house was sound asleep. In through the cat door they tiptoed, and the cat told the dog, “You stay here now and keep watch while I go upstairs and see what can be done.”

Without a sound the cat rushed up the stairs and down the hall to the room where the false-hearted woman was sleeping, but the door was shut and he couldn't get in. While he thought frantically what to do, a rat ran by. The cat grabbed him. It was a big fat rat, who began begging and pleading with the cat to spare him. “I will,” said the cat, “but you must gnaw a hole in this door big enough for me to crawl through.”

The rat began to gnaw at once. He gnawed until he was blue in the face, but the hole was still too little, not only for the cat, but for the rat himself to get through.

So the cat said, “Do you have any little ones?”

“I should say so! I have seven or eight, each one as rambunctious as can be.”

“Run get one,” said the cat, “and if you don't come back, I'll catch you and eat you alive wherever you are.”

The rat ran off and was back in a trice with a little rat. “Listen, little one,” said the cat, “if you are clever you'll save your father's life. Go into this woman's room, crawl up on her bed, and pull off the ring she has on her finger.”

The little rat ran inside, but was back in no time, quite upset. “She has no ring on,” he said.

The cat, however, didn't lose heart, “That means she has it in her mouth,” he said. “Go back, slap her nose with your tail and she'll sneeze, opening her mouth. The ring will drop out, you'll pick it up quickly, and run back here with it.”

Everything happened the way the cat said. In a little while the rat returned with the ring. The cat took it and bounded down the steps.

“Do you have the ring?” asked the dog.

“Of course.”

They plunged through the front door and headed back the way they had come. But down deep, the dog was consumed with jealousy because the cat had been the one to get the ring.

Arriving at the river, the dog said, “Give me the ring, and I'll ferry you across.” The cat refused, and they started arguing. During the quarrel the cat let go of the ring, and it fell into the water, where a fish swallowed it. In a flash the dog grabbed the fish in his mouth, and then
he
had the ring. He carried the cat to the other bank, but they didn't make up and continued to argue all the way to their master's palace.

“Do you two have the ring?” he asked eagerly. The dog spit out the fish, the fish spit out the ring, but the cat said, “Don't believe him; I got the ring myself, and the dog stole it from me.”

“But if I'd not caught the fish, the ring would have been lost forever.”

Then the youth petted them both, saying, “My dears, don't argue so much, you're both very dear and precious to me.” For a half-hour he caressed the dog with one hand and the cat with the other, until the animals were again as good friends as ever.

He took them into the palace, turned the ring on his finger, and said, “Let my palace take the place of my false-hearted wife's while she and her entire palace come here where I now am.” At that, the two palaces sailed through the air and changed places with one another. His landed right in the middle of the plain; and hers, with her inside screaming like an eagle, perched on the sharp peak.

The youth sent for his mother and made her last years as joyous as he had promised. The dog and cat remained with him, always quarreling about something or other, but all in all everyone lived in harmony. And the ring? He used it occasionally, but not too much, thinking (and how truly!), It's not good for man to get everything he wants without effort.

When they went up the mountain, they found his wife cold and dead. She had starved to death. It was a bitter end, but she deserved none better.

 

(
Trentino
)

43

It was the custom in a certain village, whenever a man died, for his sister to keep watch over his grave three nights in a row. If a girl should die, the watch would be kept by her brother. A certain maiden died, and her brother, a strapping youth who was afraid of nothing under the sun, went to the cemetery for the usual vigil.

At the stroke of midnight three dead men arose from their graves and asked, “How about a game?”

“Why not?” he answered. “But where do you want to play?”

“We always play in church.”

They entered the church and showed him to an underground crypt packed with rotting coffins and a jumble of human bones. They picked up some of the bones and a skull and went back upstairs into church, where they stood the bones in a straight line on the floor. “These are our ninepins.” They picked up the skull. “This is our ball.” And they began bowling.

“Do you want to play for money?”

“Certainly!”

The young man bowled with the skull and was so good at it that he won each time and took every cent the dead men had. As soon as they ran out of money they carried ball and ninepins back to the crypt and retreated to their graves.

The second night the dead men wanted to play the return game, staking rings and gold teeth, and again the youth won everything. The third night they played still another round, at the end of which the men said, to the youth, “You've won again, and we have nothing left to give you. But since gaming debts are settled on the spot, we shall give you this dead man's arm, which is well preserved although a bit dry and will come in handier than a sword. No matter what enemy you touch with it, the arm will grab him around the chest and throw him down dead, even if he is a giant.”

The dead men departed and left the young man standing there with that arm in his hand.

The next morning he took to his father the money and the gold won at ninepins and said, “Dear Father, I'm going out into the world and seek my fortune.” His father gave him his blessing and the young man departed, with the dead man's arm hidden under his cloak.

He came to a large city, where the walls of the houses were draped in black crepe; the people all wore mourning and had even draped their horses and carriages in black. “What has happened?” he asked a sobbing passer-by, who explained, “Near that mountain, mind you, is a black castle occupied by sorcerers who exact from us a human being a day, and that is the end of the poor soul who goes to them. First they called for the girls, and the king was obliged to send them every last one of the chambermaids, housewives, baker girls, and weavers; then all the maids of honor at the court and all the noble ladies, and most recently his only daughter as well. And not a one of them has come back. Now the king is sending soldiers there three by three, but they fare no better. If only somebody could deliver us from the sorcerers, we would reward him with anything he wanted.”

“I shall see what I can do about all this,” said the youth and asked to be taken to the king at once. “Majesty, I will go to the castle all by myself.”

The king looked him in the eye. “If you succeed, and if you free my daughter, I'll give her to you in marriage and you shall inherit my kingdom. You need only spend three nights at the castle for the spell to be broken and the sorcerers to vanish. On the battlements of the castle stands a cannon. If you're still alive tomorrow morning, fire one shot, day after tomorrow two, and the third morning three.”

When night fell, the young man went to the black castle, with the dead man's arm under his cloak. He ascended the stairs and entered a room where a table had been set and laden with food, but the chairs were turned with their backs to the table. He left everything just as it was, entered the kitchen, lit the fire, and sat down next to the hearth, holding the dead man's arm ready. At midnight a chorus of voices cried down the chimney:

 

“Many, many have we slain,

You will be the next to wane!

Many, many have we slain,

You will be the next to wane!”

 

Then bang! out of the chimney dropped one sorcerer. Bang! another, and bang! a third. They all had frightfully ugly faces and long, long noses that wavered like octopus tentacles and clutched at the youth's arms and legs. Realizing it was vital to stay clear of those noses, he began brandishing the dead man's arm as though he were fencing. He tapped one sorcerer's chest with it, but nothing happened. He tapped a second one on the head, but still nothing happened. Then he tapped the third one on the nose, and the dead man's hand grabbed that nose and gave it a yank that left the sorcerer dead on the spot. Fully aware now that the noses were both dangerous and sensitive, the young man took aim. The dead man's arm seized the second sorcerer by the nose and finished him off. Then it took care of the third one. The young man rubbed his hands together in contentment and went off to bed.

In the morning he climbed to the battlements and fired the cannon: Boom! Down in the town below, where everyone anxiously waited, a crowd of handkerchiefs bordered in black waved in response.

When he went into the dining room in the evening, some of the chairs had been turned around and properly faced the table. Through other doors filed noble ladies and maids of honor, downcast and clad in mourning. They addressed the young man: “Please persevere and free us!” Then they sat down to the table and dined. After dinner they all bowed low and departed. He went into the kitchen and took a seat by the hearth to wait for midnight. When the twelfth chime had struck, voices were again heard in the chimney:

 

“Three of our brothers you slew,

Now we're coming after you!

Three of our brothers you slew,

Now we're coming after you!”

 

And bang! bang! bang! three sorcerers with long noses plummeted down the chimney. Brandishing the dead man's arm, the young man had them each by the nose in a flash, and in no time they were corpses themselves.

The next morning he fired two cannon shots: Boom! Boom! Down in the town a crowd of white handkerchiefs waved back: the black mourning strip had been removed from them.

The third evening he found still more chairs turned to the table in the dining room, and the black-clad maidens entered in greater numbers than the evening before. “Just one more night,” they entreated, “and we'll all be free!” Then they dined with him and again departed. He sat down in his customary place in the kitchen. At midnight the voices set up a howl in the chimney like a whole choir:

 

“Six of our brothers you slew,

Now we're coming after you!

Six of our brothers you slew,

Now we're coming after you!”

 

And bang! bang! bang! bang! down rained sorcerers by the dozens, all with their long noses sticking out, but the youth whirled the dead man's arm round and round and killed them off as fast as they came. It was no trouble at all, since the only thing that shriveled paw had to do was grab them by the nose, and they were corpses themselves. He went to bed thoroughly satisfied, and the minute the cock crowed the whole castle came back to life. A procession of maidens and noble ladies dressed in gowns with trains entered the kitchen to thank him and pay him honor. In the middle of the procession came the princess. When she got up to the youth, she threw her arms around his neck and said, “I want you to be my husband!”

Three by three entered the freed soldiers and saluted.