Every afternoon the merry notes of the pipes of Old Pipes sounded down into the valley and over the hills and up the mountain-side; and every afternoon when he had echoed them back, the little dwarf grew more and more angry with the Dryad.  Each day, from early morning till it was time for him to go back to his duties upon the rocky hill-side, he searched the woods for her.  He intended, if he met her, to pretend to be very sorry for what he had said, and he thought he might be able to play a trick upon her which would avenge him well.  One day, while thus wandering among the trees, he met Old Pipes.  The Echo-dwarf did not generally care to see or speak to ordinary people; but now he was so anxious to find the object of his search, that he stopped and asked Old Pipes if he had seen the Dryad.  The piper had not noticed the little fellow, and he looked down on him with some surprise.

“No,” he said; “I have not seen her, and I have been looking everywhere for her.”

“You!” cried the dwarf, “what do you wish with her?”

Old Pipes then sat down on a stone, so that he should be nearer the ear of his small companion, and he told what the Dryad had done for him.

When the Echo-dwarf heard that this was the man whose pipes he was obliged to echo back every day, he would have slain him on the spot had he been able; but, as he was not able, he merely ground his teeth and listened to the rest of the story.

“I am looking for the Dryad now,” Old Pipes continued, “on account of my aged mother.  When I was old myself, I did not notice how very old my mother was; but now it shocks me to see how feeble and decrepit her years have caused her to become; and I am looking for the Dryad to ask her to make my mother younger, as she made me.”

The eyes of the Echo-dwarf glistened.  Here was a man who might help him in his plans.

“Your idea is a good one,” he said to Old Pipes, “and it does you honor.  But you should know that a Dryad can make no person younger but one who lets her out of her tree.  However, you can manage the affair very easily.  All you need do is to find the Dryad, tell her what you want, and request her to step into her tree and be shut up for a short time.  Then you will go and bring your mother to the tree; she will open it, and every thing will be as you wish.  Is not this a good plan?”

“Excellent!” cried Old Pipes; “and I will go instantly and search more diligently for the Dryad.”

“Take me with you,” said the Echo-dwarf.  “You can easily carry me on your strong shoulders; and I shall be glad to help you in any way that I can.”

“Now, then,” said the little fellow to himself, as Old Pipes carried him rapidly along, “if he persuades the Dryad to get into a tree,—­and she is quite foolish enough to do it,—­and then goes away to bring his mother, I shall take a stone or a club and I will break off the key of that tree, so that nobody can ever turn it again.  Then Mistress Dryad will see what she has brought upon herself by her behavior to me.”