And as she came, so she went, and she vanished as if the ground had swallowed her.
At first Betty was afraid to peep into the basket, but when she was halfway home, she could not restrain herself. She lifted the cover and peeped, and, oh! how disappointed she was when she saw that the basket was full of birch leaves! She began to cry, and threw out two handfuls of the leaves, and was going to shake them all out of the basket, but she thought to herself: “They’ll make good litter for the goats.”
When she reached home her mother was waiting for her at the door.
“What sort of a spindle did you bring home to me yesterday?” cried she. “After you left this morning I began to reel. I reeled and I reeled, and the spindle remained full. One skein! two skeins! three skeins! and the spindle was yet full! ‘What evil spirit has spun you?’ grumbled I; and at that instant the yarn vanished from the spindle. Tell me the meaning of this.”
So Betty confessed how she had danced with the beautiful maiden who had given her the full spindle, and who had said: “Reel and grumble not.”
“That was a Wood-Fairy!” cried her mother in astonishment. “About noon in the Spring-time, the Wood-Ladies dance. Lucky for you that she did not tickle you to death! It’s a pity that you did not tell me before, for I might have had a room full of yarn, if I had reeled and grumbled not.”
Then Betty bethought herself of the basket of leaves. She lifted the cover and peeped in again.
“Look! Look! Mother!” she cried.
Her mother looked and clapped her hands. The birch leaves were turned to gold!
“She told me not to peep until I reached home,” said Betty, “but I disobeyed and threw two handfuls of the leaves away.”