Where was it? Above him and over the old trees hundreds of crows flew crying, “Fly from here, from here!”

And he walked from the garden over the manor’s moat, and into the grove of alders. There was a little six-sided house here and a hen and duck yard. In the middle of the room sat the old woman who ruled all of this. She knew about every egg that was laid, and every chick that came from the egg, but she was not the fairy tale the man was looking for. She could prove that with a Christian baptism certificate and a vaccination certificate, both lying in the chest of drawers.

Outside, not far from the house, was a hill filled with red hawthorn and laburnum. There’s an old tombstone there that had come from the churchyard in the market town. It was carved to honor one of the town’s councilmen. His wife and his five daughters, all with folded hands and ruffed collars, were standing around him, chiseled from stone. If you looked at it long enough, it somehow affected your thoughts, and those thoughts in turn affected the stone so that it told about the old times. Anyway, that’s how it happened for the man searching for the fairy tale. As he arrived here now, he saw a liv ing butterfly sitting on the forehead of the carved councilman. It fluttered its wings, flew a short distance, and then landed again right by the tombstone as if to show him what was growing there. It was a four-leaf clover, and there were seven of them, side by side. When luck comes, it comes in earnest! He picked the clovers and put them in his pocket. Good luck is just as good as ready money, although a new lovely fairy tale would have been even better, thought the man. But he didn’t find it there.

The sun set, red and huge. Fog rose from the meadow. The bog witch was brewing.

011

It was late in the evening. He stood alone in his room, looking out over the garden and meadow, the moor and the seashore. The moon was shining clearly and there was a mist hanging over the meadow as if it were a big lake. There had been one there once, according to legend, and in the moonlight you could see for yourself. Then the man thought about what he had read in town, how William Tell and Holger the Dane had not existed, but in folklore they became, like the sea out there, living visions for legend. Yes, Holger the Dane would return!

As he was standing there and thinking, something hit the window quite strongly. Was it a bird? A bat or an owl? Well, you don’t let them in if they knock! The window sprang open by it self, and an old woman looked in at the man.

“What’s this?” he said. “Who is she? She’s looking right into the second story. Is she standing on a ladder?”

“You have a four-leaf clover in your pocket,” she said. “You actually have seven, one of which is a six-leaf clover!”

“Who are you?” asked the man.

“The bog witch!” she said. “The bog witch, and I’m brewing. I was in the process of doing that, and the tap was in the barrel, but one of the frisky little bog children drew the tap out in fun and flung it up here against the house where it hit the window. Now the beer’s running out of the barrel, and that’s not a good thing for anyone!”

“Well, but tell me—” said the man.

“Wait a moment,” said the bog witch.