Without saying a word, for he knew no one would believe him any more than he had believed the princess, he followed the thread with his finger, contrived to give Lootie the slip, and was soon out of the house and on the mountainside--surprised that, if the thread were indeed the grandmother's messenger, it should have led the princess, as he supposed it must, into the mountain, where she would be certain to meet the goblins rushing back enraged from their defeat.

But he hurried on in the hope of overtaking her first.

When he arrived, however, at the place where the path turned off for the mine, he found that the thread did not turn with it, but went straight up the mountain.

Could it be that the thread was leading him home to his mother's cottage?
Could the princess be there?
He bounded up the mountain like one of its own goats, and before the sun was up the thread had brought him indeed to his mother's door.

There it vanished from his fingers, and he could not find it, search as he might.
The door was on the latch, and he entered.