The prince and princess helped her into the carriage and wished her good luck. The wild crow who was now married drove with her for the first three miles; the other crow could not come because she had a bad headache. ‘Good-bye, good-bye!’ called the prince and princess; and little Gerda cried, and the crow cried. When he said good-bye, he flew on to a tree and waved with his black wings as long as the carriage, which shone like the sun, was in sight. They came at last to a dark wood, but the coach lit it up like a torch. When the robbers saw it, they rushed out, exclaiming, ‘Gold! gold!’ They seized the horses, killed the coachman, footmen and postilions, and dragged Gerda out of the carriage. ‘She is plump and tender! I will eat her!’ said the old robber-queen, and she drew her long knife, which glittered horribly. ‘You shall not kill her!’ cried her little daughter. ‘She shall play with me. She shall give me her muff and her beautiful dress, and she shall sleep in my bed.’ The little robber-girl was as big as Gerda, but was stronger, broader, with dark hair and black eyes. She threw her arms round Gerda and said, ‘They shall not kill you, so long as you are not naughty. Aren’t you a princess?’ ‘No,’ said Gerda, and she told all that had happened to her, and how dearly she loved little Kay. The robber-girl looked at her very seriously, and nodded her head, saying, ‘They shall not kill you, even if you are naughty, for then I will kill you myself!’ And she dried Gerda’s eyes, and stuck both her hands in the beautiful warm muff. The little robber-girl took Gerda to a corner of the robbers’ camp where she slept. All round were more than a hundred wood-pigeons which seemed to be asleep, but they moved a little when the two girls came up. There was also, near by, a reindeer which the robber-girl teased by tickling it with her long sharp knife. Gerda lay awake for some time. ‘Coo, coo!’ said the wood-pigeons. ‘We have seen little Kay. A white bird carried his sledge; he was sitting in the Snow-queen’s carriage which drove over the forest when our little ones were in the nest. She breathed on them, and all except we two died. Coo, coo!’ ‘What are you saying over there?’ cried Gerda. ‘Where was the Snow-queen going to? Do you know at all?’ ‘She was probably travelling to Lapland, where there is always ice and snow. Ask the reindeer.’ ‘There is capital ice and snow there!’ said the reindeer. ‘One can jump about there in the great sparkling valleys. There the Snow-queen has her summer palace, but her best palace is up by the North Pole, on the island called Spitzbergen.’ ‘O Kay, my little Kay!’ sobbed Gerda. ‘You must lie still,’ said the little robber-girl, ‘or else I shall stick my knife into you!’ In the morning Gerda told her all that the wood-pigeons had said. She nodded. ‘Do you know where Lapland is?’ she asked the reindeer.