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Jack began to work, and
because nobody had milled for a long time, many people came
from the village to have their corn ground into flour.
In fact, so many people came that it was dusk before
Jack finished.
When the last person had
gone, he went back inside and began to make his supper;
ash cake and a piece of fried meat.
But as he looked out his window, he saw an old man
with a long, gray beard carrying a bag of corn coming to
the mill. Even
though it was late and Jack hadn’t eaten, he stopped making
dinner and ground the corn. In appreciation, the man gave Jack a gift:
a very fine knife.
Jack went back to his room
and started cooking dinner again.
Then he realized there was a black cat in the window.
He kept on cooking his dinner, turning
the sizzling meat with his knife, when suddenly the cat
jumped down and tried to steal the meat, Jack shooed the
animal away.
Moving back to the fire,
he resumed cooking his dinner.
After a minute, the cat jumped down again and reached
for the skillet one more time.
This time, though, Jack took his knife and whipped
it at the cat’s paw, cutting it off. The cat howled in pain and ran meowing from the room. But when Jack looked in his skillet, he found
not a cat’s paw but a woman’s left hand, with a ring around
one finger.
The next morning, when
the farmer came down to the mill, Jack explained what had
happened and showed him the severed hand. His wife was still
asleep, so the farmer went back into the house and looked
under the bedcovers at her left arm. Her hand was missing.
Jack and the farmer then got two torches, locked the door,
and set the house on fire.
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Retold by C.J.R.
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