The king did not believe even his own eyes when Plavachek brought him those three golden hairs of Grandfather Know-All, and his daughter wept, not for grief, but for joy, that he had again returned. “And where hast thou acquired these fine horses and this great treasure?” enquired the king. “I deserved it,” said Plavachek, and related how he had helped this king to grow his regenerating apples again, which made young people out of old ones, and that king to set his living water going again, which made sound people out of sick, and living out of dead. “Youth-giving apples! living water!” the king kept repeating quietly to himself. “If only I could eat one I should be young again; and even if I were dead, with this water I should come to life again.” Without more ado he set out upon a journey to get the youth-giving apples and the water of life—and as yet he has not returned.
And so the woodcutter’s son became the king’s son-in-law, and as for the king, perhaps he is still hard at work ferrying people across the black sea.
