" So he shouldered his gun, and started away into the
world to learn to be as clever a huntsman as the Herr Mayor had said.
He plodded on and on until at last he fell in with a tall stranger
dressed all in red.
"Where are you going, Jacob?" said the tall stranger, calling him by his
name, just as if he had eaten pottage out of the same dish with him.
"I am going," said Jacob, "to learn to be so clever a huntsman that I
can shoot the whiskers off from a running hare without touching the
skin."
"That is a hard thing to learn," said the tall stranger.
Yes; Jacob knew that it was a hard thing; but what one man had done
another man could do.
"What will you give me if I teach you to be as clever a huntsman as
that?" said the tall stranger.
"What will you take to teach me?" said Jacob; for he saw that the
stranger had a horse's hoof instead of a foot, and he did not like his
looks, I can tell you.
"Oh, it is nothing much that I want," said the tall man; "only just sign
your name to this paper--that is all."
But what was in the paper? Yes; Jacob had to know what was in the paper
before he would set so much as a finger to it.
Oh, there was nothing in the paper, only this: that when the red one
should come for Jacob at the end of ten years' time, Jacob should
promise to go along with him whithersoever he should take him.
At this Jacob hemmed and hawed and scratched his head, for he did not
know about that.
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