all," said the Master-Maid. "There is only one
way to do the task. You must cut me up into small pieces and take out
my bones, and out of the bones you must make a ladder, and with that
ladder you can reach the top."

"That I will never do," said the Prince. "You've been so good to me,
shall I do you harm? Before that, I should suffer whatever punishment
the giant will give me for not carrying out the task."

"But all will be well," said the Master-Maid. "As soon as you have
brought down the nest, all that you will have to do is to put the
bones together and sprinkle on them the water from this flask, and
then I shall be whole again just as before."

After much persuasion the Prince agreed to do what the Master-Maid
had told him, and made a ladder out of her bones and climbed up to the
top of the tree and took the birds' nest with the six eggs in it, and
then he put the bones together, but forgot to put one little bone in
its proper place.

So when he had sprinkled the water over the bones the Master-Maid
stood up before him just as before, but the little finger of her left
hand was not there. She cried and said:

"Ah, why did you not do what I told you--put all my bones together in
their place? You forgot my little finger; I shall never have one all
the days of my life."

When the giant came home, he asked the Prince:

"Where is the birds' nest?"

And the Prince brought it to him with the eggs all safe within it. And
then the giant said:

"Ah, you have spoken to my Master-Maid."

"Whom do you mean by your Master-Maid?" said the Prince. "There are
your eggs, what more do you want?"

But the giant said: "Well, as the Master-Maid has helped you so far
she can help you always. You shall marry her today and sleep in my own
four-poster."

The Prince was well content with that arrangement and went and sought
the Master-Maid and told her what the giant had said.

The Master-Maid wept and said: "You know not what he means. His
four-poster rolls up and would crush us and we would be dead before
the morning. Let me think, let me think."

So the Master-Maid took an apple and divided it into six parts and put
two at the foot of the bed and two at the door of the room and two at
the foot of the stairs.

When night came, the Master-Maid and her Prince went up into the room
with the four-poster, but as soon as it was dark crept down the stairs
and went out to the stable and chose two of the swiftest horses there