of his buttons.
He went his way, but she remained where she was, unrolling the
ball. When she had unrolled the whole of it, she ran after the
thread to find out where her betrothed lived. At first the thread
followed the road, then it stretched across hedges and ditches,
and led Marusia towards the church and right up to the porch.
Marusia tried the door; it was locked. She went round the
church, found a ladder, set it against a window, and climbed up
it to see what was going on inside. Having got into the church,
she looked--and saw her betrothed standing beside a grave and
devouring a dead body--for a corpse had been left for that
night in the church.

She wanted to get down the ladder quietly, but her fright prevented
her from taking proper heed, and she made a little noise.
Then she ran home--almost beside herself, fancying all the
time she was being pursued. She was all but dead before she
got in. Next morning her mother asked her:

"Well, Marusia! did you see the youth?"

"I saw him, mother," she replied. But what else she had
seen she did not tell.

In the morning Marusia was sitting, considering whether she
would go to the gathering or not.

"Go," said her mother. "Amuse yourself while you're
young!"

So she went to the gathering; the Fiend[20] was there already.
Games, fun, dancing, began anew; the girls knew nothing of
what had happened. When they began to separate and go
homewards:

"Come, Marusia!" says the Evil One, "see me off."

She was afraid, and didn't stir. Then all the other girls
opened out upon her.

"What are you thinking about? Have you grown so bashful,
forsooth? Go and see the good lad off."

There was no help for it. Out she went, not knowing what
would come of it. As soon as they got into the streets he began
questioning her:

"You were in the church last night?"

"No."

"And saw what I was doing there?"

"No."

"Very well! To-morrow your father will die!"

Having said this, he disappeared.

Marusia returned home grave and sad. When she woke up
in the morning, her father lay dead!

They wept and wailed over him, and laid him in the coffin.
In the evening her mother went off to the priest's, but Marusia
remained at home. At last she became afraid of being alone in
the house. "Suppose I go to my friends," she thought. So
she went, and found the Evil One there.

"Good