"Forward, then!" he said, "in the name of Koshchei." And thereafter
Jurgen permitted the horse to choose its own way.

Thus Jurgen came through a forest, wherein he saw many things not
salutary to notice, to a great stone house like a prison, and he
sought shelter there. But he could find nobody about the place,
until he came to a large hall, newly swept. This was a depressing
apartment, in its chill neat emptiness, for it was unfurnished save
for a bare deal table, upon which lay a yardstick and a pair of
scales. Above this table hung a wicker cage, containing a blue bird,
and another wicker cage containing three white pigeons. And in this
hall a woman, no longer young, dressed all in blue, and wearing a
white towel by way of head-dress was assorting curiously colored
cloths.

She had very bright eyes, with wrinkled lids; and now as she looked
up at Jurgen her shrunk jaws quivered.

"Ah," says she, "I have a visitor. Good day to you, in your
glittering shirt. It is a garment I seem to recognize."

"Good day, grandmother! I am looking for my wife, whom I suspect to
have been carried off by a devil, poor fellow! Now, having lost my
way, I have come to pass the night under your roof."

"Very good: but few come seeking Mother Sereda of their own accord."

Then Jurgen knew with whom he talked: and inwardly he was perturbed,
for all the Leshy are unreliable in their dealings.