Thumbelina stole out again the next night. “Would the swallow look at her,” she wondered.
Yes, he opened his eyes and looked at little Thumbelina, who stood there with a tiny torch of tinder-wood.
“Thanks, thanks, little Thumbelina,” he twittered feebly. “Soon I shall grow strong and fly out in the bright sunshine once more; thanks, thanks, little maiden.”
“Oh! but it is too cold, it snows and freezes, for now it is winter,” said Thumbelina. “Stay here and be warm, and I will take care of you,” and she brought the swallow water in a leaf.
And the little bird told her all his story—how he had tried to fly to the warm countries, and how he had torn his wing on a blackthorn bush and fallen to the ground. But he could not tell her how he had come to the underground passage.
All winter the swallow stayed there, and Thumbelina was often in the long passage, with her little torch of tinder-wood. But the mole and the field-mouse did not know how Thumbelina tended and cared for the swallow.
At last spring came, and the sun sent its warmth down where the swallow lay in the underground passage.
Little Thumbelina opened the hole which the mole had made in the ceiling, and the sunshine streamed down on the swallow and the little girl.
How the swallow longed to soar away, up and up, to be lost to sight in the blue, blue sky!
“Come with me, little Thumbelina,” said the swallow, “come with me to the blue skies and the green woods.”