that was. And as for the five skeins, when the time came, there'd be
plenty of ways of getting out of it, and likeliest, he'd have
forgotten all about it.

Well, so they were married. And for eleven months the girl had all she
liked to eat, and all the gowns she liked to get, and all the company
she liked to keep.

But when the time was getting over, she began to think about the
skeins and to wonder if he had 'em in mind. But not one word did he
say about 'em, and she thought he'd wholly forgotten 'em.

However, the last day of the last month he takes her to a room she'd
never set eyes on before. There was nothing in it but a spinning-wheel
and a stool. And says he: "Now, my dear, here you'll be shut in to-
morrow with some victuals and some flax, and if you haven't spun five
skeins by the night, your head'll go off."

And away he went about his business.

Well, she was that frightened, she'd always been such a gatless girl,
that she didn't so much as know how to spin, and what was she to do
to-morrow with no one to come nigh her to help her? She sat down on a
stool in the kitchen, and law! how she did cry!

However, all of a sudden she heard a sort of a knocking low down on
the door. She upped and oped it, and what should she see but a small
little black thing with a long tail. That looked up at her right
curious, and that said: