"Since then, I've been as if bewitched. I haven't chanced across a bit of game and I feel like a fool. Something happened to me about twilight--the devil take it, one can't help believing in spirits. Mother, I saw a beautiful horse, and no one was on it. If it had only been a real horse, one that would fetch money! But I, like a fool, was frightened when it galloped past me, with its flying mane and clattering hoofs. But, before I'd made up my mind that it was a real horse and that ghost stories were stupid stuff--heigho, it was gone."
"Nay, Thomas, take care! There's something in those stories after all. Come, stand here, hold your hand over the fire and swear that you'll keep quiet, and I'll tell you something."
"What do you happen to know?"
"More than your thick head can hold. I tell you there are spirits, and the Lady of the Lake is lying on the bed in there."
"Mother, you've gone crazy."
"Take care! she's ordered me to cook some soup for her."
"And so the water-fairies eat soup. I'm not afraid of any creature that eats cooked victuals. I'd like to take a look at the Lady of the Lake."
The old woman tried to keep him back, but he forced his way into the room. When he beheld Irma, he stood still, as if rooted to the spot. Suddenly he exclaimed:
"She's a woman like yourself, only she's much handsomer. If she were the Lady of the Lake, she'd have swan's feet, as far as I know. Mother, who is it?"
"I don't know."