The Little Match Girl

 

It was last day of the old year. Light spilled from every window in the town as people gathered to bid goodbye to the old year and welcome to the new. The sounds of cheerful laughter and music filled the air and sometimes, through an uncurtained window, passers by glimpsed gaily-dressed ladies, and tables laden with fine china and silverware. The tables groaned under the weight of joints of meat, savouries and rich desserts.

 

Outside, the streets were still and quiet, the only sound to be heard was the crunch of snow as a late guest hurried on his way. It was bitterly cold, and snowflakes fell steadily.

 

Through the desserted streets a lonely, frail figure moved. It was a young girl, dressed in tattered rags. Snowflakes clung to her hair, and she was very cold and hungry.

 

All day long she had walked through the city streets, barefoot, her hands blue with cold. She clutched small bundles of matches which she had been trying to sell. But no one had wanted to buy matches, and now, as the streets became more and more desserted, she realised that there would be no customers.

 

Though she could hardly walk with cold and exhaustion, the little match girl dared not return to her home. She knew that she would be beaten if she returned with unsold matches.

 

Eventually the little match girl had to rest, and she sat down in a corner where two houses met, drawing her feet under her for warmth, and rubbing her cold hands. She dropped the bundlels to matches to the ground when a thought struck her. The light of even one match might warm her cramped fingers, so she struck a match on the wall.

 

It flared with a bright light, and the girl looked deep into the flame. As she looked she saw a firelit room, with blazing logs burning in the hearth. She could almost feel the heat of the fire warming her frozen body.

 

But in a second the match's flame flickered and died, and the little girl was back in the cold street.

 

She lit another match, and now, as she looked into its flame, she was back in the firelit room, this time standing by a table laden with meats and fruits. She stretched out her hand towards the food...but as she did so the flame flickered and died.

 

 

The light from hte third match revealed a tall christmas tree. The green branches were laden with golden balls and gaily - wrapped parcels, and on the end of each branch flickered a tiny candle. The little match girl stretched out her hand to touch the tree...but as she did so the match went out, and the tree disappeared.

 

As the little match girl looked up into the dark night sky, one of the stars fell, the light streaming behind it like a fiery tail. The little girl sighed sadly. ''Somewhere, someone is dying, '' she whispered.

 

Her grandmother, who has died some years before but who was remembered by the little girl as being kind and gentle, had told her that whenever a star fell from the sky it meant that someone had died. The match girl had never forgotten her grandmother's words.

 

She struck another match, and this time in its flame she saw her grandmother, smiling kindly as she always had.  '' Don't leave me when the flame dies, Grandmother!'' the match girl pleaded. ''Stay with me, for I am cold and lonely.''

 

As the flame flickered she lit match after match, so that the image of her grandmother would not dissappear.

From the pool of light that glowed around her, Grandmother grasped her cold, numbed fingers, and pulled the little girl into the sky. They did not stop until they were high above the clouds, in a safe place where neither hunger nor cold would ever trouble the little match girl again. As her frail body disaapeared into the heavens, the bells of the city rang out. They rang farewell to the old year, and welcome to the new year. In the cold morning of New Year's Day the body of the little match girl was found, huddled between two houses. Around her were her unsold matches, and the spent matches lay here and there, black against the white snow.

''Poor child, she was trying to warm herself with matches!'' the people who found her said. ''Poor little match girl.''

But they were puzzled by the happy smile on her lips. How could they know that she had gone t a happier place?

 

Your Decoder

 

Story 1-

 

 

The Little Match Girl