Week 15 Story: The Nurturer
In a certain village there lived a young couple that was known by all to be happy, peaceful and madly in love. The town was thankful to have a young couple like them that represented all that people should strive for in a relationship. The town was devastated to learn that the wife passed away while attempting to undergo natural childbirth in the comfort of her home, leaving her husband to be a widower. The people of the town sent their condolences. The people of the town volunteered to help the man and his new child by sending food and helping around their house any way that they could.
The widower was stressed and decided the best course of action was to hire an old woman to look after his child. This was to fill the empty spot of nourisher that the late mother left. Unfortunately the baby was ill-behaved, refusing to eat, and crying constantly. There appeared to be no way to calm the small child. There was a great part of the night where it appeared that the baby would suddenly become calm and fall peacefully to sleep. The old woman decided to pay more attention to this moment in the night. The next night, the old woman hid in the baby's closet and could hear the door of the room open, and someone come into the room. The person went up to the cradle and the baby became still and fell asleep.
The old woman reported this to the widower who was astonished. He devised a plan where he and his brothers, along with the old woman would hide in the child's room again. The plan was to find out who the person sneaking into the child's room was. So that night the gang hid in the child's closet until they heard the bedroom door open and the child grow quiet. At this moment the three brothers and the old lady jumped out of the closet to discover who the intruder was. The old lady was shocked to discover that the woman appeared to be none other than the dead mother! The woman was nursing the child to sleep as it lay in its cradle. As the group stood shocked, the widower suddenly began to attack the wife. The men were finally able to restrain him but they caused such a ruckus that the police were eventually called and arrived at the scene. As the police interrogated everyone involved the truth began to unfold.
It became clear that the husband had been having an affair with the wife's twin sister in the neighboring town. The twin sister became pregnant and the evil husband decided the only thing to do, in order to save face, was to murder his beautiful bride and claim that she died during childbirth. He made a deal with the twin sister, resulting in her being paid to stay far away from him and his child. Clearly the mother could not resist seeing and nursing her child which infuriated he wicked husband. The husband was immediately sentenced to prison while the twin sister would await her day in court. The old woman decided to raise the child as her own, and loved it tenderly, as all children should be.
Baby Image
Bibliography: This story is part of the Russian Folktales unit. Story source: Russian Fairy Tales by W. R. S. Ralston (1887).
Author's Note: I used The Dead Mother as inspiration for this story. In the original, everything was the same except for the fact that there was no affair/twin sister. Instead, the lady coming back actually was the dead mother nursing her child, which as a result killed the infant as well. I used the same old lady and original death of the mother that this story did. I tried to make it more realistic and give it a slight modern twist.
The widower was stressed and decided the best course of action was to hire an old woman to look after his child. This was to fill the empty spot of nourisher that the late mother left. Unfortunately the baby was ill-behaved, refusing to eat, and crying constantly. There appeared to be no way to calm the small child. There was a great part of the night where it appeared that the baby would suddenly become calm and fall peacefully to sleep. The old woman decided to pay more attention to this moment in the night. The next night, the old woman hid in the baby's closet and could hear the door of the room open, and someone come into the room. The person went up to the cradle and the baby became still and fell asleep.
The old woman reported this to the widower who was astonished. He devised a plan where he and his brothers, along with the old woman would hide in the child's room again. The plan was to find out who the person sneaking into the child's room was. So that night the gang hid in the child's closet until they heard the bedroom door open and the child grow quiet. At this moment the three brothers and the old lady jumped out of the closet to discover who the intruder was. The old lady was shocked to discover that the woman appeared to be none other than the dead mother! The woman was nursing the child to sleep as it lay in its cradle. As the group stood shocked, the widower suddenly began to attack the wife. The men were finally able to restrain him but they caused such a ruckus that the police were eventually called and arrived at the scene. As the police interrogated everyone involved the truth began to unfold.
It became clear that the husband had been having an affair with the wife's twin sister in the neighboring town. The twin sister became pregnant and the evil husband decided the only thing to do, in order to save face, was to murder his beautiful bride and claim that she died during childbirth. He made a deal with the twin sister, resulting in her being paid to stay far away from him and his child. Clearly the mother could not resist seeing and nursing her child which infuriated he wicked husband. The husband was immediately sentenced to prison while the twin sister would await her day in court. The old woman decided to raise the child as her own, and loved it tenderly, as all children should be.
Bibliography: This story is part of the Russian Folktales unit. Story source: Russian Fairy Tales by W. R. S. Ralston (1887).
Author's Note: I used The Dead Mother as inspiration for this story. In the original, everything was the same except for the fact that there was no affair/twin sister. Instead, the lady coming back actually was the dead mother nursing her child, which as a result killed the infant as well. I used the same old lady and original death of the mother that this story did. I tried to make it more realistic and give it a slight modern twist.
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