s like this: scratch--scratch. It was just that, a little gray
mouse who lived in a hole.

Out he came, his little pointed nose and his long whiskers, his little
round ears and his bright eyes. Out came his little humpy body and his
long tail. And then he sat up on his hind legs, and curled his tail
twice round himself and looked at the little girl.

The little girl, who had a kind heart, forgot all her sorrows, and
took a scrap of her crust and threw it to the little mouse. The
mouseykin nibbled and nibbled, and there, it was gone, and he was
looking for another. She gave him another bit, and presently that was
gone, and another and another, until there was no crust left for the
little girl. Well, she didn't mind that. You see, she was so happy
seeing the little mouse nibbling and nibbling.

When the crust was done the mouseykin looks up at her with his little
bright eyes, and "Thank you," he says, in a little squeaky voice.
"Thank you," he says; "you are a kind little girl, and I am only a
mouse, and I've eaten all your crust. But there is one thing I can do
for you, and that is to tell you to take care. The old woman in the
hut (and that was the cruel stepmother) is own sister to Baba Yaga,
the bony-legged, the witch. So if ever she sends you on a message to
your aunt, you come and tell me. For Baba Yaga would eat you soon
enough with her iron teeth if you did not know what to do."

"Oh, thank you," said the little girl; and just then she heard the
stepmother calling to her to come in and clean up the tea things, and
tidy the house, and brush out the floor, and clean everybody's boots.

So off she had to go.

When she went in she had a good look at her stepmother, and sure
enough she had a long nose, and she was as bony as a fish with all the
flesh picked off, and the little girl thought of Baba Yaga and
shivered, though she did not feel so bad when she remembered the
mouseykin out there in the shed in the yard.

The very next morning it happened. The old man went off to pay a visit
to some friends of his in the next village, just as I go off sometimes
to see old Fedor, God be with him. And as soon as the old man was out
of sight the wicked stepmother called the little girl.

"You are to go to-day to your dear little aunt in the forest," says
she, "and ask her for a needle and thread to mend a shirt."

"But here is a needle and thread," says the little girl.

"Hold your tongue," says the stepmother, and sh