"And did you really see that enchanted Prince with your very own eyes?" she asked.
"Oh, yes; we knew him well while he was a bear. Many and many a time has he lain there before that very stove snoring away. But after he once began going to the widow's house he stopped coming here. The widow was the mother of Snow-White and Rose-Red.
"Perhaps it was just as well though, anyway. He might have frightened our own beautiful Snowdrop, for she was keeping house for us then."
"Who was Snowdrop?" asked Ellen.
"She was the daughter of a king, but she had a wicked stepmother who hated her. The stepmother gave her to a huntsman bidding him kill her, but the man had pity on the poor child. He helped her to escape and then killed a deer and took its heart to the wicked stepmother, pretending it was Snowdrop's heart. Then Snowdrop came here to live with us. We sheltered her and loved her, but the wicked stepmother hunted her out and came here to take the poor child's life."
"Oh, I know," cried Ellen eagerly. "It's the story of the magic mirror."
But the dwarf went on as though he had not heard her. His thoughts were all of those past days when Snowdrop had made their little house bright with her beauty. "Yes, she came here, that wicked Queen. She came in disguise while we were away, pretending to have laces and stays for sale. We had warned Snowdrop to beware of all strangers, but the child was so good and innocent herself that she could not think harm of any one.
"She talked to the stepmother and looked at her wares without knowing her. She bought a beautiful pair of stays, too. Then the wicked Queen said she would lace them up for her. She laced them, and suddenly drew the cord so tight that Snowdrop could not breathe, but fell down as though dead.
"She was not dead, however, and when we came home we cut the cord so she could breathe, and so we saved her.