ng, asleep among them.

'Then the mother thought of another way to get rid of her; and she bade
her to go to the son's grave and to spend the night there. So she went
as she was told; and she was crying on the grass. And then the young
man came up out of it, and it is what he said: "My mother thought I
would harm you if you came here, but I will not harm you; I will help
you. And take these three gray hairs from my head," he said, "and bring
them back with you. And for every one of them my mother will have to
grant you a request. And it is what you will ask her, to open my room
that she has locked up for a day and a night. And at the end of a year,
you will ask the same thing of her, and again at the end of another
year."

'So the girl went back, and she asked to have the door opened, and she
went in and stopped there for a day and a night. And at the end of the
year she did the same, and again at the end of the third year.

'And after a while the mother said one day: "I wonder what she wanted in
that room, and what she was doing in it." And she opened the door, and
there she saw a fire on the hearth, and the girl sitting one side of it,
and a child in her lap, and the son sitting the other side, and two
children in his lap. For she had brought him back from the grave.

'And the son said: "What is wanting to me now is someone that will go
and spend seven years in hell for my sake, to save my soul." "I will do
that for you," said the mother. "It would be no use you going," he said.
"I will do it," said the girl.

'So he said she might go; and he gave a spoon that would give her drink,
and a ring that would give her food, so long as she would keep them.

'So she went down to hell, and she stopped there seven years; and
through all that time she got no rest, only on Sundays.

'And at the end of the seven years, she was going out, and she heard a
voice saying: "Will you stop another seven years to save your father's
soul?" "I will do that," she said. "Do not," they said; "for your father
gave you no care, and did nothing for you." "No matter," she said; "I
will give another seven years to save his soul."

'And at the end of the second seven years she was going out; and her
mother, that had done nothing for her, asked her to stop another seven
years for her soul; and she did that. And at the end of the twenty-one
years, they gave her the three souls in a napkin, and she went out.

'And as she was going home, she met