And Gerda told it again from the beginning; and the Wood Pigeons cooed above them in their cage, and the other pigeons slept.  The little robber girl put her arm round Gerda’s neck, held her knife in the other hand, and slept so that one could hear her; but Gerda could not close her eyes at all—­she did not know whether she was to live or die.

The robbers sat round the fire, sang and drank, and the old robber woman tumbled about.  It was quite terrible for a little girl to behold.  Then the Wood Pigeons said:  “Coo! coo! we have seen little Kay.  A white owl was carrying his sledge; he sat in the Snow Queen’s carriage, which drove close by the forest as we lay in our nests.  She blew upon us young pigeons, and all died except us two.  Coo! coo!”

“What are you saying there?” asked Gerda.  “Whither was the Snow Queen traveling?  Do you know anything about it?”

“She was probably journeying to Lapland, for there they have always ice and snow.  Ask the Reindeer that is tied to the cord.”

[Illustration:  The reindeer ran as fast as it could go]

“There is ice and snow yonder, and it is glorious and fine,” said the Reindeer.  “There one may run about free in great glittering plains.  There the Snow Queen has her summer tent; but her strong castle is up toward the North Pole, on the island that’s called Spitzbergen.”

“O Kay, little Kay!” cried Gerda.

“You must lie still,” exclaimed the robber girl, “or I shall thrust my knife into your body.”

In the morning Gerda told her all that the Wood Pigeons had said, and the robber girl looked quite serious, and nodded her head and said, “That’s all the same, that’s all the same!”

“Do you know where Lapland is?” she asked the Reindeer.

“Who should know better than I?” the creature replied, and its eyes sparkled in its head.  “I was born and bred there; I ran about there in the snow fields.”

“Listen!” said the robber girl to Gerda.  “You see all our men have gone away.  Only mother is here still, and she’ll stay; but toward noon she drinks out of the big bottle, and then she sleeps for a little while; then I’ll do something for you.”

Then she sprang out of bed, and clasped her mother round the neck and pulled her beard, crying: 

“Good morning, my own old nanny goat.”  And her mother filliped her nose till it was red and blue; and it was all done for pure love.

When the mother had drunk out of her bottle and had gone to sleep upon it, the robber girl went to the Reindeer, and said: 

“I should like very much to tickle you a few times more with the knife, for you are very funny then; but it’s all the same.  I’ll loosen your cord and help you out, so that you may run to Lapland; but you must use your legs well, and carry this little girl to the palace of the Snow Queen, where her playfellow is.  You’ve heard what she told me, for she spoke loud enough, and you were listening.”