No sooner, however, had Kora watched him out of sight, than she ran into the wood that skirted the meadow, and kept on running till she was so tired and out of breath that she had to sit down and rest. Then she noticed that something underground was shovelling up the earth at her feet, throwing it about in all directions. She expected to see a mole emerge, but when the creature did at last appear it proved to be a little brown gnome, with a sack flung across his shoulder.
“Tell me, good gnome,” cried Kora, “how I may escape from my husband the troll. He has a magic crystal by means of which he is able to find all lost and missing things, so that I cannot think of a safe enough hiding-place.”
“You must take another shape,” replied the gnome, and he turned her into a crystal that twinkled on the edge of a jagged rock.
When the troll came home and missed his wife, he was very angry, and went straight to his magic crystal; and there, sure enough, he not only saw the sparkle in the rock, but also recognised his wife under her assumed shape. Immediately he hurried into the wood, carrying a hammer, and having broken away the splinter of rock, he took it home in triumph, and no sooner had he crossed his own threshold than his wife stood before him. After that the troll treated her very hardly, and Kora hated him more than ever.
“PRESENTLY AN ELF CAME PAST HER, RIDING ON A LIZARD.”
Page [96]
The Fairy Latchkey.
Now one day the troll was going fishing, and this time he said to his wife: “You shall play me no second trick, madam; I will lock you in till I come back.” So saying he turned the key upon her, and went his way. But Kora did not despair. She hurried into her husband’s private closet, and took the keys of all the various caskets in which he kept his treasure. Then with trembling hands she tried them one by one in the lock of the door, and as good luck would have it, the last key fitted. The next thing she did was to try to destroy the magic crystal. She dashed it on to the floor and against the wall, but finding that she could not break it, she went and hid it inside the hollow tree in the field, beneath which in former days she had been wont to sit and watch her geese. Then she fled into the forest, and ran as fast and as far as she could. Presently an elf came past her, riding on a lizard.
“Tell me, kind elf,” said she, “how I may escape from the cruel troll, my husband, for I have hidden his magic crystal which tells him where to find all lost and missing things.”
“I will do the best I can for you,” replied the elf, and turning Kora into a dockleaf by the brook, he rode on.
When the troll returned home from his fishing, and found that his wife had escaped a second time, he was much enraged, and made his way at once to the place where he kept his crystal. But when he saw that this had also disappeared, he was in a greater rage than ever, and began to hunt for it all over the house. At last he thought of the hollow tree, and there, inside the trunk, and smothered in dry leaves and moss, he found his missing talisman. No sooner had he looked into it, than he saw the dockleaf growing by the brook, and once more recognised his wife. Immediately he went into the wood, and having picked the dockleaf, he took it home in triumph, and when he had crossed his own threshold his wife stood before him. After that he treated her yet more hardly, and Kora hated him even more than before.