"Excuse me, miss – would you be the frog-kisser I’ve heard so much about?"

The young woman, dressed in thigh-high boots and rough, practical shirt and trousers, turned to face the mounted questioner.

"I don’t know what you’ve heard, but yes, my profession is kissing frogs. Why do you ask?"

"Well, I heard you’ve been, ah, successful at your trade..."

"You could say that, yes."

"Um – well, surely you’ve married your prince by now. Why are you going back to the swamp?"

She looked squarely at him. "One, I don’t have a prince. And two, I’m not planning on marrying anyone."

His face turned from merely rubicund to red. "Well, uh, I suppose princes pay well for being released from enchantments?"

"I wouldn’t know. If I ever found a prince in the swamp, he’d probably be a lot more interested in getting home than paying anyone anything."

By the time he got sorted out enough to call, "But then how did you make your fortune?" – she had vanished into the shadows of Hecady Swamp.

"Crazy tourist," the frog-kisser told the fat green frog in her hand. "What makes him think a prince would have anything to do with a frog-kisser?" She gave the frog a quick businesslike peck.

The frog stayed a frog. Undaunted, she put it down and picked up another. This time, her kiss turned the fat green frog into a fat white pearl.

The frog-kisser smiled. "I’d rather find pearls than princes any day." She slid the pearl into a hip pouch and looked around for the next frog.

(c) 2001
By Annie McAndrew
All Rights Reserved
Biography