Later in the day she sat down under the castle windows and began carding with her golden carding-comb, and then the same thing happened again. The princess asked her what she wanted for the carding-comb, and she told her that it wasn't for sale, neither for gold nor money, but if she might get leave to sit in the arm-chair by the prince's bedside that night, she should have it. But when she came up into the bedroom she found him fast asleep again, and for all she cried and shook him, for all she wept, he slept so soundly that she could not get life into him; and when the day dawned in the early morning, in came the princess with the long nose and turned her out of the room again.
So as the day wore on, she sat down under the castle windows and began spinning on the spinning-wheel, and that the princess with the long nose wanted also to have. She opened the casement and asked the girl what she wanted for it. The girl told her, as she had done twice before, that it was not for sale, either for gold or money, but if she might sit in the arm-chair by the prince's bedside that night, she should have it. Yes, she might do that. But there were some Christian people who had been carried off and were imprisoned in the room next to the prince's, and they had heard that some woman had been in his room and wept and cried and called his name two nights running, and this they told the prince.
In the evening, when the princess came and brought him his drink, he made appear as if he drank, but he threw it over his shoulder, for he felt sure she had put a sleeping draught in his drink.
So when the girl came into his room that night she found the prince wide awake, and then she told him how she had come there. "You have just come in time," said the prince, "for to-morrow I was to be married to the princess; but I won't have that Long-nose, and you are the only one that can save me. I will say that I want to see what my bride can do, and if she is fit to be my wife; then I will ask her to wash the shirt with the three tallow stains on it. She will try, for she does not know that it is you who dropped the tallow on the shirt; but that can only be done by Christian folks, and not by a pack of trolls like we have in this place; and so I will say that I will not have anybody else for a bride except the one who can wash the shirt clean, and I know you can do that." And they felt very glad and happy, and they went on talking all night about the joyful time in store for them.
The next day, when the wedding was to take place, the prince said: "I think I must see first what my bride can do!"—"Yes, quite so!" said the stepmother.
"I have got a very fine shirt, which I am going to use for my wedding shirt; but there are three tallow stains on it which I want washed out; and I have made a vow that I will not take any other woman for a wife than the one who is able to do that; if she cannot do that, she is not worth having," said the prince.
"Well, that was easy enough," said the stepmother and agreed to this trial. Well, the princess with the long nose set to washing the best she could, but the more she washed the bigger grew the stains. "Why, you cannot wash," said the old witch, her stepmother; "let me try!"—but no sooner did she take the shirt than it got still worse, and the more she washed and rubbed the bigger and blacker the stains grew.
So did the other trolls try their hands at washing, but the longer they worked at it the dirtier the shirt grew, till at last it looked as if it had been up the chimney. "Ah, you are not worth anything, the whole lot of you!" said the prince; "there's a poor girl under the window just outside here, and I am sure she can wash much better than any of you. Come in, my girl!" he shouted out to her.—Yes, she would come in.—"Can you wash this shirt clean?" asked the prince.—"Well, I don't know," she said, "but I will try."