Compared to a lot of people, the witch is being very nice about this. The ogre in “The Master-maid” threatened to eat the hero if he didn’t finish by sunset. I’m surprised the witch isn’t bringing him a pillow and some Dr. Scholl’s inserts.
The soldier took the entire day to do this, and that evening the witch proposed that he remain a third night. “Tomorrow I have only a small task for you. Behind my house there is a dry well into which my light has fallen. It burns blue and never goes out. I want you to get it for me.”
I am pretty sure you are not supposed to go into tunnels when the lights start burning blue.
The next day the old woman led him to the well and lowered him down it in a basket. He found the blue light and gave a sign that she should pull him up again. And she did pull him up, but when he was close to the edge, she wanted to take the blue light from him. “No,” he said, sensing her evil thoughts, “I shall not give you the light until I am standing on the ground with both feet.”
Then the witch became furious, let him fall back into the well, and walked away. The poor soldier fell to the damp floor without being injured. The blue light continued to burn, but how could that help him?
I am not sure if this was a radical about-face by the witch, or if she was planning on killing him the whole time and thought she’d at least get some manual labor out of the bargain first. In some of the other versions, the witch is replaced by a charcoal burner who conveniently dies in his sleep, and in at least one, the witch is a perfectly nice person who gave him piles and piles of money, and the soldier hacks her head off when she won’t tell him what the light is for. But we’ll go with strange soldier telepathy for the moment.
He saw that would not be able to escape death. He sadly sat there for a while. Then he happened to reach into his pocket and found his tobacco pipe, which was still half full. “This will be your last pleasure,” he thought, pulled it out, lit it with the blue light, and began to smoke.
You lit a fire in a tunnel where the flames were burning blue. By rights you should be spread all over the landscape in an inch-thick layer of goo.
After the fumes had wafted about the cavern, suddenly there stood before him a little black dwarf, who said, “Master, what do you command?”
“Why should I command you?” replied the bewildered soldier. “I must do everything that you demand,” said the dwarf.
The plot thickens!
“Good,” said the soldier, “then first help me out of this well.”
The dwarf took him by the hand and led him through an underground passage, and he did not forget to take the blue light with him. Along the way he showed him the treasures that the witch had collected and hidden there, and the soldier took as much gold as he could carry.
In some of the other versions, the dwarf is replaced by a man made of iron, and in about half of them, it’s a trio of dogs, with eyes as big and round as a series of big round things. (Millstones, towers, etc.) My mental image of the dogs with huge eyes involved a series of mutant pugs and was a trifle unsettling. Pugs already have that problem with their eyes popping out when they sneeze too hard or get whacked in the back of the head, and if you’ve got eyes like millstones, I imagine you don’t even dare swallow hard. And good luck catching THAT in a wet towel and taking the dog to the vet. They’d have to be like those freaky Margaret Keane animals. Let’s stick with the dwarf.
When he was above ground, he said to the dwarf, “Now go and bind the old witch and take her to the judge.”
Not long afterward she came riding by on a tomcat-as-fast-as-the-wind and screaming horribly. And not long after that the dwarf was back. “It is all taken care of,” he said. “The witch is hanging on the gallows. Master, what do you command now?”
Well, I’ll give the soldier some credit for having the witch sent to the judge instead of having the dwarf kill her out-right. We’ll assume there was a fair trial, as Vaguely Medieval Europe was always so good about that with witches.
I would have liked to know more about the tomcat-as-fast-as-the-wind, though.
“Nothing at the moment,” answered the soldier. “You can go home, but be ready when I call you.”
“It is only necessary,” said the dwarf, “for you to light your pipe with the blue light, and I will be with you.” With that he disappeared before his very eyes.
The soldier returned to the city from which he had come. He moved into the best inn and had beautiful clothes made for himself. Then he told the innkeeper to furnish his room as luxuriously as possible. When it was finished he summoned the black dwarf and said, “I served the king loyally, but he sent me away to starve. For this I now want revenge.”
“What am I to do?” asked the little man.
“Late this evening, when the king’s daughter is lying in bed, bring her here to me in her sleep. She shall do maid service for me.”
I see we’re just going to abandon the moral high ground right away.
The dwarf said, “That is an easy thing for me, but a dangerous thing for you. If you are found out, it will not go well for you.”
The dwarf may be the only person in this story with any sense.
At the strike of twelve the door opened, and the dwarf carried
