But, one day, when there was a blazing sun and the spider had crawled as far as she could into the shade of the leaf, the parsley bent down to the mouse’s hole and whispered:
“Psst!... Mousie!...”
“What is it?” asked the mouse and came out.
“It’s only the goat’s-foot and I who have something to ask you,” said the parsley. “Tell me—you’re so clever—don’t you believe that it’s possible that the spider may become a different person when she begins to lay her eggs?”
“I believe nothing now,” said the mouse. “I shall never believe that that woman will ever lay eggs.”
But she did, for all that.
One fine morning, she began and behaved in such a way that no one in the hedge ever forgot the story:
“Ugh!” she said. “That one should be bothered with this nonsense with children now!”
She laid a heap of ten eggs and stood looking at them, angrily.
“Build a nest for your eggs,” said the parsley. “All that we have and possess is at your disposal.”