"Yes," he admitted, smoothing his beard, "the boat seems to be the one I'd imagined. My word's a king's word and I won't take it back. But there's one little thing, a mere nothing, to look after before the wedding. The heat's rather soured the wine in my cellar. It would be wrong to throw the wine away, and it wouldn't be right, either, to serve it for my daughter's wedding. So you or one of your men," he said to the lad, "must drink it all up before nightfall. Tomorrow I want my barrels filled with good, new wine!"

The lad, hat in hand, listened respectfully. When he'd heard the king out he gave a sign to River-Drinker.

River-Drinker started in as though he hadn't drunk for nine hundred years. The job was quickly done. Of course the king's cellar was impressive. What vast stores of wine it held, what leagues of tunnels and chambers, what rows and rows of hogsheads and barrels! But River-Drinker swallowed all the wine, and he'd have swallowed the barrels too if anyone had asked him.

Folktales

Text copyright©1989 Random House, from the Pantheon book French Folktales