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Victor gazed at her sadly, for he knew that she had told him an untruth. But he followed her. There was something extraordinary about her walk, and all at once the whole of his left side grew as cold as ice.

When they had proceeded a little further, Victor stopped again.

“Give me your hand,” he said. “No, the left one.” He saw that she was not wearing her engagement ring.

“Where’s your ring?” he asked.

“I’ve lost it,” she replied.

“You are my Anna, and yet you are not,” he exclaimed. “A stranger has taken possession of you.”

As he said these words, she looked at him with a side-long glance, and all at once he realised that her eyes were not human, but the blood-shot eyes of a bull; and then he understood.

“Begone, witch!” he cried, and breathed into her face.

If you could only have seen what happened now! The would-be Anna was immediately transformed, her face grew green and yellow like gall, and she burst with rage; at the next moment a black rabbit jumped over the bilberry bushes and disappeared in the wood.

Victor stood alone in the perplexing, bewildering forest, but he was not afraid. “I will go on,” he thought, “and if I should meet the devil himself, I will not be afraid; I shall say the Lord’s Prayer, and that will go a long way towards protecting me.”

He trudged on and presently he came to a cottage. He knocked; the door was opened by an old woman; he inquired whether he could stay the night. He could stay, if he liked, but the old dame had nothing to offer him but a small attic, which was only so so.

Victor did not mind what it was like, as long as it was a place where he could sleep.

When they were agreed about the price, he followed her upstairs to the attic. A huge wasp’s nest hung right over the bed, and the old dame began to make excuses for harbouring such guests.

“It doesn’t matter in the least,” interrupted the pilot, “wasps are like human beings, quite inoffensive until you irritate them. Perhaps you keep snakes, too?”

“Well, there are some, of course.”

“I thought so; they like the warmth of the bed, so we shall get on. Are they adders or vipers? I don’t very much mind which, but on the whole I prefer vipers.”

The old dame watched him breathlessly while he arranged his bed, and in every way betrayed his firm resolution to spend the night in her cottage.

All at once an excited buzzing could be heard outside the closed window, and a huge hornet bumped against the glass.

“Let the poor thing come in,” said the pilot, opening the window.

“No, no, not that one, kill it!” yelled the old dame.

“Why should I? Perhaps its young ones are in this room, and would starve. Am I to lie here and listen to the screaming of hungry babies? No, thank you! Come in, little wasp!”

“It will sting you!” shrieked the old dame.

“No, indeed it won’t. It only stings the wicked.”

The window was open now. A big hornet, as large as a pigeon’s egg, flew in; buzzing like a bass string, it flew at once to the nest. And then it was still.

The old dame left the attic, and the pilot got between the sheets.

When he came downstairs into the parlour on the following morning, the old dame was not there. A black cat sat on the only chair and purred; cats have been condemned to purr, because they are such lazy beasts, and they must do something.

“Get up, pussy,” said the pilot, “and let me sit down.”

And he took the cat and put it on the hearth. But it was no ordinary cat, for immediately sparks began to fly from its fur, and the chips caught file.

“If you can light a fire, you can make me some coffee,” said the pilot.

But the cat is so constituted that it never wants to do what it is told, and so it began at once to swear and spit until the fire was out.