Mother Trudy

Once upon a time there was a little girl who was headstrong and cheeky, and when her parents told her something, she disobeyed them: how could she do well? One day she said to her parents, "I've heard so much about Mrs. Trude, I want to go and see her: people say she has such a strange house, and there are such strange things in her house, I'm very curious. Her parents strictly forbade her to go there, saying "Mrs. Trude is a wicked woman who does ungodly things, and if you go to her, you are no longer our child." But the girl did not comply with her parents' prohibition and went to Frau Trude after all. And when she came to her, Frau Trude asked, "Why are you so pale?" "Oh," she answered, her body trembling, "I was so frightened by what I saw." "What did you see?" "I saw a black man on your stairs." "That was a charcoal burner." "Then I saw a green man." "That was a hunter." "After that I saw a blood-red man." "That was a butcher." "Ah, Frau Trude, I was afraid, I looked through the window and did not see you, but I saw the devil with a fiery head." "Oho," she said, "so you saw the witch in her right adornment: I have been waiting for you for a long time, and have been longing for you, you shall shine for me." So she turned the girl into a block of wood and threw it into the fire. And when it was in full blaze, she sat down beside it, warmed herself with it, and said, "this shines brightly for once!"