Mother Holle

Once upon a time there lived a widow who had two daughters. Her own daughter, Marta, loved to sleep till noon and nibble on pies. But her stepdaughter, Olenka, was up before the roosters and got straight to work.

The stepmother praised Marta, but she kept Olenka running: off to fetch water, then to the oven, then to the spinning wheel. Every day she sat Olenka down by the well at the roadside and made her spin until it grew dark.

One day Olenka spun for so long that her little fingers were rubbed sore and red, and the spindle turned red too. She leaned over the well to rinse it, and plop! The spindle slipped out of her hands and sank to the bottom.

Olenka burst into tears and ran to her stepmother.

“You dropped it, so you fetch it!” the stepmother snapped. “And don’t come home without that spindle.”

The girl went back to the well and looked down into the dark water. So cold, so deep… She squeezed her eyes shut and jumped.

When she opened her eyes, she was lying in a green meadow. The sun was warm, the flowers smelled sweet and the bees were humming. What a wonder!

Olenka set off down a path, and soon she came to an oven full of bread. The bread was calling out:

“Oh, take us out, take us out! We’ve been baked for ages, and we’ll burn!”

Olenka picked up the bread paddle and, one, two, three!, pulled out every loaf. They were golden-brown and hot, with steam curling off them.

She walked on, and there stood an apple tree, simply covered in apples.

“Shake me, shake me!” begged the apple tree. “My apples are all ripe!”

Olenka gave the branches a shake, and thump, thump, thump! Down came the apples like rain. She stacked them in a neat pile and went on her way.

At last she came to a little cottage. An old woman was peering out of the window. Her hair was as white as snow, and her teeth were big, really enormous! Olenka got such a fright that she nearly ran away.

“Don’t be afraid, child,” the old woman said kindly. “Stay with me. Keep my house well and you won’t be sorry. Only remember this: every morning, make my bed and shake out my featherbed so hard that the feathers fly. When my feathers fly, it snows down on the earth. For I am Mother Holle.”

At the sound of that kind voice, Olenka’s fear melted away. She stayed.

She did everything just as she was told. Every morning she opened the window, took the featherbed by its corners and shake, shake! She fluffed it so hard that the little feathers whirled through the air like white butterflies. And far below, on the earth, people looked up at the sky and cheered:

“Oh, look, it’s snowing!”

Children built snowmen and went sledding, and dogs caught the fluffy snowflakes in their mouths. Snap!

Olenka was happy at Mother Holle’s. Nobody scolded her. Every day there was steaming soup on the table, and every evening there were apple pies. But after a while the girl began to feel sad.

“I want to go home,” she admitted one day. “It’s a hundred times nicer here, but my heart still pulls me back there.”

“It’s a good thing to miss your own home,” Mother Holle said with a smile. “And you’ve served me with all your heart, so I’ll see you off myself.”

She took Olenka by the hand and led her to a tall gate. The gate swung open, and at that very moment a shower of gold came pouring down! Ting-a-ling! The gold clung to Olenka’s dress, to her braid and to her sleeves, until she shone all over like the sun.

“This is for all your hard work,” said Mother Holle, and she handed Olenka her spindle, the very one that had fallen into the well.

The gate closed, and Olenka found herself back on the earth, not far from home. A rooster was perched on the edge of the well. When he saw her, he flapped his wings:

“Cock-a-doodle-doo! Our golden girl is here!”

When the stepmother saw all that gold, she suddenly turned as sweet as honey. She asked about every last little detail and thought, “My Marta should find good fortune like that too.”

So she sat Marta down by the well to spin. But Marta didn’t feel like spinning. She pricked her finger on a briar thorn and smeared the spindle so it would turn red like Olenka’s. Then she tossed it into the well, splash!, and jumped in after it.

Marta landed in the very same meadow and set off down the very same path. The bread in the oven called out to her:

“Take us out, take us out, or we’ll burn!”

“Not likely!” Marta sniffed. “And get myself all covered in soot?”

And she walked right past. Then the apple tree begged:

“Shake me, my apples are ripe!”

“Oh, sure, so an apple can bonk me on the head!”

And again she didn’t stop.

Marta came to Mother Holle’s cottage. She wasn’t scared of the big teeth, because her sister had already told her all about them, and she asked to be taken on right away.

On the first day Marta worked hard, because all she could think about was the gold. On the second day she was already dawdling. And on the third she wouldn’t get out of bed at all. She didn’t make the bed, and she didn’t shake the featherbed. No feathers flew, and down on the earth there wasn’t a single snowflake.

Mother Holle put up with it and put up with it, and at last she said:

“I think you’d better go home, child.”

Marta jumped for joy. “Here comes the gold!” She stood under the gate and held out her hands… and from above came, splosh!, a whole bucket of sticky black tar.

“This is for the work you did,” said Mother Holle, and she shut the gate.

At home that evening, Olenka sat by the window, wrapped in a warm shawl. Every evening since Marta left, she had watched the sky. On the first day it snowed, and after that there wasn’t a single snowflake. But now big, fluffy flakes were falling again.

“Someone’s shaking out the featherbed again,” Olenka whispered. “But who is it? Marta, or Mother Holle herself?”

The garden gate creaked. Marta was home, black from head to toe. When the rooster on the well saw her, he flapped his wings:

“Cock-a-doodle-doo! Our grubby girl is back!”

Marta scrubbed and scrubbed at the tar with soap, with sand and with hot water. But it was no use! That tar never came off, for as long as Marta lived.