As soon as they were alone, the negro whispered to Udea, 'If you dare to tell your brothers that I made you walk, or that I smeared you with pitch, I will kill you.'
'Oh, I will be sure to say nothing,' replied the girl, trembling, and at that moment the six elder brothers appeared in sight.
'I have some good news for you,' said the youngest, hastening to meet them; 'our sister is here!'
'Nonsense,' they answered. 'We have no sister; you know the child that was born was a boy.'
'But that was not true,' replied he, 'and here she is with the negro and his wife. Only-she too is black,' he added softly, but his brothers did not hear him, and pushed past joyfully.
'How are you, good old Barka?' they said to the negro; 'and how comes it that we never knew that we had a sister till now?' and they greeted Udea warmly, while she shed tears of relief and gladness.
The next morning they all agreed that they would not go out hunting. And the eldest brother took Udea on his knee, and she combed his hair and talked to him of their home till the tears ran down his cheeks and dropped on her bare arm. And where the tears fell a white mark was made. Then the brother took a cloth and rubbed the place, and he saw that she was not black at all.
'Tell me, who painted you over like this?' cried he.
'I am afraid to tell you,' sobbed the girl, 'the negro will kill me.'
'Afraid! and with seven brothers!'
'Well, I will tell you then,' she answered. 'The negro forced me to dismount from the camel and let his wife ride instead. And the stones cut my feet till they bled and I had to bind them. And after that, when we heard your castle was near by, he took pitch and smeared my body with it.'
Then the brother rushed in wrath from the room, and seizing his sword, cut off first the negro's head and then his wife's. He next brought in some warm water, and washed his sister all over, till her skin was white and shining again.
'Ah, now we see that you are our sister!' they all said. 'What fools the negro must have thought us, to believe for an instant that we could have a sister who was black!' And all that day and the next they remained in the castle.
But on the third morning they said to their sister: 'Dear sister, you must lock yourself into this castle, with only the cat for company. And be very careful never to eat anything which she does not eat too. You must be sure to give her a bit of everything. In seven days we shall be back again.'
'All right,' she answered, and locked herself into the castle with the cat.
On the eighth day the brothers came home. 'How are you?' they asked. 'You have not been anxious?'
'No, why should I be anxious? The gates were fast locked, and in the castle are seven doors, and the seventh is of iron. What is there to frighten me?'
'No one will try to hurt us,' said the brothers, 'for they fear us greatly. But for yourself, we implore you to do nothing without consulting the cat, who has grown up in the house, and take care never to neglect her advice.'
'All right,' replied Udea, 'and whatever I eat she shall have half.'
'Capital! and if ever you are in danger the cat will come and tell us-only elves and pigeons, which fly round your window, know where to find us.'
'This is the first I have heard of the pigeons,' said Udea. 'Why did you not speak of them before?'
We always leave them food and water for seven days,' replied the brothers.
'Ah,' sighed the girl, 'if I had only known, I would have given them fresh food and fresh water; for after seven days anything becomes bad. Would it not be better if I fed them every day?'
'Much better,' said they, 'and we shall feel any kindnesses you do towards the cat or the pigeons exactly as if they were shown to ourselves.'
'Set your minds at ease,' answered the girl, 'I will treat them as if they were my brothers.'
That night the brothers slept in the castle, but after breakfast next morning they buckled on their weapons and mounted their horses, and rode off to their hunting grounds, calling out to their sister, 'Mind you let nobody in till we come back.'
'Very well,' cried she, and kept the doors carefully locked for seven days and on the eighth the brothers returned as before. Then, after spending one evening with her, they departed as soon as they had done breakfast.
Directly they were out of sight Udea began to clean the house, and among the dust she found a bean which she ate.
'What are you eating?' asked the cat.
'Nothing,' said she.
'Open your mouth, and let me see.' The girl did as she was told, and then the cat said 'Why did you not give me half?'
'I forgot,' answered she, 'but there are plenty of beans about, you can have as many as you like.'
'No, that won't do. I want half of that particular bean.'
'But how can I give it you? I tell you I have eaten it. I can roast you a hundred others.'
'No, I want half of that one.'
'Oh! do as you like, only go away!' cried she.
So the cat ran straight to the kitchen fire, and spit on it and put it out, and when Udea came to cook the supper she had nothing to light it with. 'Why did you put the fire out?' asked she.
'Just to show you how nicely you would be able to cook the supper. Didn't you tell me to do what I liked?'
The girl left the kitchen and climbed up on the roof of the castle and looked out. Far, far away, so far that she could hardly see it, was the glow of a fire. 'I will go and fetch a burning coal from there and light my fire,' thought she, and opened the door of the castle. When she reached the place where the fire was kindled, a hideous man-eater was crouching over it.
'Peace be with you, grandfather,' said she.
'The same to you,' replied the man-eater. 'What brings you here, Udea?'
'I came to ask for a lump of burning coal, to light my fire with.'
'Do you want a big lump or a little lump?'
'Why, what difference does it make?' said she.
'If you have a big lump you must give me a strip of your skin from your ear to your thumb, and if you have a little lump, you must give me a strip from your ear to your little finger.'
Udea, who thought that one sounded as bad as the other, said she would take the big lump, and when the man-eater had cut the skin, she went home again. And as she hastened on a raven beheld the blood on the ground, and plastered it with earth, and stayed by her till she reached the castle. And as she entered the door he flew past, and she shrieked from fright, for up to that moment she had not seen him. In her terror she called after him. 'May you get the same start as you have given me!'
'Why should you wish me harm,' asked the raven pausing in his flight, 'when I have done you a service?'
'What service have you done me?' said she.
'Oh, you shall soon see,' replied the raven, and with his bill he scraped away all the earth he had smeared over the blood and then flew away.
In the night the man-eater got up, and followed the blood till he came to Udea's castle. He entered through the gate which she had left open, and went on till he reached the inside of the house. But here he was stopped by the seven doors, six of wood and one of iron, and all fast locked. And he called through them 'Oh Udea, what did you see your grandfather doing?'
'I saw him spread silk under him, and silk over him, and lay himself down in a four-post bed.'
When he heard that, the man-eater broke in one door, and laughed and went away.
And the second night he came back, and asked her again what she had seen her grandfather doing, and she answered him as before, and he broke in another door, and laughed and went away, and so each night till he reached the seventh door. Then the maiden wrote a letter to her brothers, and bound it round the neck of a pigeon, and said to it, 'Oh, thou pigeon that served my father and my grandfather, carry this letter to my brothers, and come back at once.' And the pigeon flew away.
It flew and it flew and it flew till it found the brothers. The eldest unfastened the letter from the pigeon's
