Then it seemed to her as if she were forced to say to him, “Come with me,” and she opened the lid of the chest and said, “Take out an apple for thyself,” and while the little boy was stooping inside, the Devil prompted her, and crash! she shut the lid down, and his head flew off and fell among the red apples. Then she was overwhelmed with terror, and thought, “If I could but make them think that it was not done by me!” So she went upstairs to her room to her chest of drawers, and took a white handkerchief out of the top drawer, and set the head on the neck again, and folded the handkerchief so that nothing could be seen, and she set him on a chair in front of the door, and put the apple in his hand.

After this Marlinchen came into the kitchen to her mother, who was standing by the fire with a pan of hot water before her which she was constantly stirring round. “Mother,” said Marlinchen, “brother is sitting at the door, and he looks quite white and has an apple in his hand. I asked him to give me the apple, but he did not answer me, and I was quite frightened.”

“Go back to him,” said her mother, “and if he will not answer thee, give him a box on the ear.”