When the other little girl came up, she cried and screamed so that the room rang with her lamentations, and the widow's child laid down her needle and ceased working.
"Why don't you go on darning?" asked the Ogress.
"Alas! dear mother," said she, "the little sister's cries make my heart beat so that I cannot darn evenly."
"Then she must go back to the cellar for a bit," said the Ogress. "And meanwhile I'll sharpen the knife."
So after she had taken back the crying child, and had watched the little girl, who now darned away as skilfully as ever, the Ogress took down a huge knife from the wall, and began to sharpen it on a grindstone in a corner of the kitchen. As she sharpened the knife, she glanced from time to time at the little maid, and soon perceived that she had once more ceased working.
"Why don't you go on darning?" asked the Ogress.
"Alas! dear mother," said the child, "when I hear you sharpening that terrible knife my hands tremble so that I cannot thread my needle."
"Well, it will do now," growled the Ogress, feeling the edge of the blade with her horny finger; and, having seen the darning-needle once more at work, she went to fetch up one of the children. As she went, she hummed what cookmaids sing—
"Dilly, dilly duckling, come and be killed!"
But it sounded like the wheezing and groaning of a heavy old door upon its rusty hinges.