Page:Russian Fairy Book (N. H. Dole).djvu/31

Rh pushed her out of the gates. Then she took down from the fence one of the skulls with the lighted eyes, put it on a stick, and gave it to her, saying: "Here is the light for your stepsisters. Take it! That is what they sent you here for."

Vasilisa hastened home on the run, by the light of the skull, and it did not go out till the next morning. At last toward the evening of the second day she reached her home. As she went through the gates she was going to throw the skull away.

"Why, of course," she said to herself, "they won't need the light now." But suddenly she heard a quiet voice from the skull saying: "Don't throw me away! Take me to your stepmother."

She looked up at her stepmother's house, and not seeing a light in any window, she resolved to go in with the skull. The first persons she met spoke kindly to her, and told her that since she had been away they had had no light in the house. They could n't make anything burn, and the fire which they tried to bring from the neighbours went out the moment it was brought into the house.

"Perhaps your light will keep!" said the stepmother. They carried the skull into the house,