The very next morning it happened.  The old man went off to pay a visit to some friends of his in the next village, just as I go off sometimes to see old Fedor, God be with him.  And as soon as the old man was out of sight the wicked stepmother called the little girl.

“You are to go to-day to your dear little aunt in the forest,” says she, “and ask her for a needle and thread to mend a shirt.”

“But here is a needle and thread,” says the little girl.

“Hold your tongue,” says the stepmother, and she gnashes her teeth, and they make a noise like clattering tongs.  “Hold your tongue,” she says.  “Didn’t I tell you you are to go to-day to your dear little aunt to ask for a needle and thread to mend a shirt?”

“How shall I find her?” says the little girl, nearly ready to cry, for she knew that her aunt was Baba Yaga, the bony-legged, the witch.

The stepmother took hold of the little girl’s nose and pinched it.

“That is your nose,” she says.  “Can you feel it?”

“Yes,” says the poor little girl.

“You must go along the road into the forest till you come to a fallen tree; then you must turn to your left, and then follow your nose and you will find her,” says the stepmother.  “Now, be off with you, lazy one.  Here is some food for you to eat by the way.”  She gave the little girl a bundle wrapped up in a towel.

The little girl wanted to go into the shed to tell the mouseykin she was going to Baba Yaga, and to ask what she should do.  But she looked back, and there was the stepmother at the door watching her.  So she had to go straight on.

She walked along the road through the forest till she came to the fallen tree.  Then she turned to the left.  Her nose was still hurting where the stepmother had pinched it, so she knew she had to go straight ahead.  She was just setting out when she heard a little noise under the fallen tree.  “Scratch—­scratch.”

And out jumped the little mouse, and sat up in the road in front of her.

“O mouseykin, mouseykin,” says the little girl, “my stepmother has sent me to her sister.  And that is Baba Yaga, the bony-legged, the witch, and I do not know what to do.”

“It will not be difficult,” says the little mouse, “because of your kind heart.  Take all the things you find in the road, and do with them what you like.  Then you will escape from Baba Yaga, and everything will be well.”

“Are you hungry, mouseykin?” said the little girl

“I could nibble, I think,” says the little mouse.

The little girl unfastened the towel, and there was nothing in it but stones.  That was what the stepmother had given the little girl to eat by the way.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” says the little girl.  “There’s nothing for you to eat.”

“Isn’t there?” said mouseykin, and as she looked at them the little girl saw the stones turn to bread and jam.  The little girl sat down on the fallen tree, and the little mouse sat beside her, and they ate bread and jam until they were not hungry any more.