Scotland's Storybook: stories in English (1.1 - Education Scotland

The old woman pointed at the baby boy that the woman was carrying in her
arms and said, ‘I’ll take that wee son of yours. That is my price.’
The goodwife’s face went as white as a swan’s wing, and she let out a
scream, as she clutched the child to her breast.
‘No, please, have mercy!’ begged the goodwife of Kittlerumpit, ‘don’t take
my wee boy.’
The tears ran down her cheeks as the awful truth dawned on her. This old
woman was a fairy, and a bad fairy at that. She begged and she pleaded, but the
old fairy woman was unmoved.
‘Quit your wailing woman,’ she snapped, ‘for I don’t care a hoot about your
suffering. But, by the laws of my land, I have to make you this offer. I will come
for your wee son in three days time, but if you can tell me what my name is
when I come back, then the child is yours to keep.’
The old woman turned on her heels and set off down the brae again and out
of sight.
What could the poor woman do? How could she get out of the terrible
bargain that she had made? She didn’t sleep much that night, and the next day
she decided to take the wee boy out for a walk in the fir-woods, to clear her
head and to spend some time with her baby boy, for she wouldn’t have many
days left to enjoy his company.
The cool, greenness of the fir-woods was soothing to the goodwife, and the
sunlight filtering through the trees almost made her forget her sorrows. Deep in
the woods was an old abandoned quarry where long ago people had levered up
big slabs of stone with which to make their houses. It was deep, and was now
overgrown with moss and ferns, and right in the middle of it was a clear, clean,
fresh water spring. As the Goodwife of Kittlerumpit drew near to this quarry she
could hear the sound of a voice singing something strange, and the whir of a
spinning-wheel. She carefully placed the sleeping baby in a clump of ferns and
she crawled on her belly to the edge of the quarry and looked in. There sat the
old fairy woman, dressed in green, and she was spinning and singing this rhyme
over and over again:
‘Little kens our goodwife at hame,
That WHUPPITY STOORIE is my name,’
The goodwife was overjoyed; she now knew the fairy’s name. She crept back
to where her baby was lying sleeping and she set off home. Now the goodwife
thought that this old fairy needed to be taught some manners, and she decided
to have a bit of fun with her. On the appointed day the goodwife set the baby
behind the knocking stone, and she sat down on it to wait for the old fairy
woman. She pulled her bonnet down over her left ear, and she screwed her
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