LITTLE TOM AND CHRYSOMELA BETAKE THEMSELVES
TO TOM'S GODMOTHER.
THEY REST UNDER THE DOG-ROSE.
THE WIND SWEEPS THEM INTO A FURROW.
THEY WANDER IN THE DARK AND MEET A HAMSTER.
IN THE HAMSTER'S BURROW.
CHRYSOMELA FALLS ILL AND DIES. THE FUNERAL.
THE HAMSTER TAKES LITTLE TOM THROUGH THE SNOW
TO THE CHAPEL.
LITTLE TOM LEARNS, FROM A MOUSE, ABOUT THE
DEATH OF HIS GODMOTHER AND VISITS HER TOMB.
HE RETURNS WITH THE HAMSTER.
THE SLEDGE OF QUEEN FAIRY.
Tom walked with Chrysomela along the edge of the stubble field, down the road; that was all they knew of their direction—that they must always be going down. They expected that the way would not be long, for they remembered that, in one day, the ants had brought all their possessions from the Godmother's house to the wood. They forgot that the ants knew the direction and therefore walked straight over everything, while they, not knowing where to go, had to travel the path of the humans and therefore traveled in a wide circle.
Chrysomela was well wrapped up in her cloak and over her head she had pulled a cobweb veil, so that her golden hair should not fly around, but on her feet she had only little, light shoes of birch bark. After she had gone a little way, she felt how heavily she was walking over the clods by the stubble field and stumbled so that she had to lean on Tom's strong arm.
Tom tried to encourage her by telling her that they would soon see the human dwellings. He decided that if they should see any human being he would speak and ask that they be carried to the Godmother, so that Chrysomela should not suffer. She was very weak by the time the sun had gone down and fogs were coming over the woods. Day after day she had been sinking. Sorrowing over Tom's captivity had only made her worse, but she was of a brave heart and therefore went on uncomplaining, not wishing to trouble Tom. She wondered what she would find at the Godmother's house.