Atondido Stories
“Now, old man, what have you got to say? As sure as I’m
alive that good-for-nothing boy is gone and that precious daugh-
ter of yours has gone with him!”
“No, no,” the old man said. “I don’t think so.”
Then they both got up and sure enough neither Raduz nor
Ludmila was to be found.
“What do you think now, you old booby!” Yezibaba shouted.
“A mighty good and loyal and obedient girl that daughter of
yours is! But why do you stand there all day? Mount the black
steed and fly after them and when you overtake them bring
them back to me and I’ll punish them properly!”
In the meantime Raduz and Ludmila were fleeing as fast as
they could.
Suddenly Ludmila said: “Oh, how my left cheek burns! I
wonder what it means? Look back, dear Raduz, and see if there
is any one following us.”
Raduz turned and looked. “There’s nothing following us,” he
said, “but a black cloud in the sky.”
“A black cloud? That’s the old man on the black horse that
rides on the clouds. Quick! We must be ready for him!”
Ludmila struck the ground with Yezibaba’s wand and changed it
into a field. She turned herself into the growing rye and made
Raduz the reaper who was cutting the rye. Then she instructed
him how to answer the old man with cunning.
The black cloud descended upon them with thunder and a
shower of hailstones that beat down the growing rye.
“Take care!” Raduz cried. “You’re trampling my rye! Leave
some of it for me.”
“Very well,” the old man said, alighting from his steed, “I’ll
leave some of it for you. But tell me, reaper, have you seen any-
thing of two young people passing this way?”
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