of the Hunter-King. She would have been happy
if her husband's sisters had been kind. But they were jealous and they
made everything in the Castle unfriendly to her. And often they talked
before her brother saying that Sheen was not noble at all, and that the
reason she did not speak was because her language was a base one. They
watched her when she went out to gather bog-down in the daytime, and
they watched her when she spun by herself at night. Sheen longed for the
days and nights to pass so that the last threads might be spun and woven
and the last stitches put in the seventh shirt. Then her brothers would
be with her. She could tell the King about herself and silence the bad
talk of his sisters. But as she neared the end of her task she became
more and more in dread.

The threads were spun and woven for the seventh shirt. The cloth was
made and the first stitches were put in it. Then Sheen's little son was
born. The King was away at the time, gathering his men together at far
parts of the Kingdom, and he sent a message saying that Sheen and her
baby were to be well-minded, and that his sisters were not to leave the
chamber where she was until he returned.

On the third night, while Sheen was in her bed with her baby beside her,
and while her sisters-in-law were in the room, a strange music was heard
outside. It was played all round the King's house. Whoever heard it fell
into deep slumber. The kern that were on guard slept. The maids that
were whispering together fell into a slumber. And a deep sleep came upon
Sheen and her child and on her three sisters-in-law who watched in the
chamber.

Then a gray wolf that had been seen outside sprang in through the window
opening. He took Sheen's child in his mouth. He sprang back through the
window opening and was seen about the place no more. Her sisters-in-law
wakened while Sheen still slept. They went to tend it and found the
child was gone. Then they were afraid of what their brother would do to
them for letting this happen. They made a plot to clear themselves,
and before Sheen wakened they had killed a little beast and smeared its
blood upon the pillows of the bed.

When the King came into his wife's chamber he saw his sisters on the
ground lamenting and tearing the hairs out of their heads. He went to
where his wife was sleeping and saw blood upon her hands and upon the
pillows. He turned on his sisters with his sword in his hand. They cried
out that they could