Hansel and Gretel and the Path of Pebbles
A bedtime story to read aloud, about five minutes, told with the Story Path tiles: the wood, the crossroads and the cottage.
Once upon a time, at the edge of a great wood, there lived a woodcutter and his two children, Hansel and Gretel. Times were hard, and one evening the woodcutter said, “Tomorrow we'll go deep into the wood to gather sticks.”
Hansel was clever. That night he filled his pockets with white pebbles that shone like little moons.
As they walked into the wood, Hansel dropped a pebble, and another, and another, all along the path. When the sun went down and the woodcutter could not find the way home, Hansel only smiled.
The moon came up, the pebbles shone, and the three of them followed the shining path all the way home.
The next time, Hansel had no pebbles, only a crust of bread, so he scattered breadcrumbs instead. But the birds of the wood were hungry too, and by nightfall every crumb was gone.
Hansel and Gretel came to a place where the path split in two, and the signpost had nothing written on it at all. “Which way?” said Gretel. “That way,” said Hansel, though he did not really know.
They walked and walked until they smelled something warm and sweet. There, between the trees, stood a little cottage made of gingerbread, with a roof of cake and windows of clear sugar, and smoke curling from a candy chimney.
“Nibble, nibble, little mouse,” said a voice from inside, “who is nibbling at my house?”
Out came an old woman with a stick. “Come in, come in,” she said, and gave them pancakes and milk and two soft beds. But she was not as kind as she seemed. In the morning she locked Hansel in the woodshed and set Gretel to work.
“Fetch the water! Sweep the floor! Light the oven!” she croaked. For she meant to keep them both for ever.
But Gretel was clever too. “I don't know how to light the oven,” she said. “Show me.” And while the old woman bent to show her, Gretel pushed her in, and slammed the door, and turned the key.
Then she ran to the woodshed and set Hansel free, and the two of them danced round and round the gingerbread garden.
In the cottage they found pockets full of treasure, pearls and gold and shining stones, enough for a lifetime of suppers. They filled their pockets and set off home.
At the crossroads the signpost still said nothing at all. But this time a white duck swam past on a little stream, and carried them across, one at a time, towards home.
Their father was sitting by the fire, missing them terribly. When he saw them at the door he hugged them so hard that pearls fell out of their pockets and rolled all over the floor.
And they never went hungry again. But Hansel always kept a few white pebbles in his pocket, just in case. The End.
The End
