The Stolen Pennies
by the Brothers Grimm
Once upon a time there was a couple who invited a friend to dinner. He arrived late and it was nearly midnight when they finished eating. Suddenly, the friend saw a girl in the room. She was completely white. She floated in the air. She did not look around and did not speak. She floated through the wall and disappeared.
“Look, a girl!” he said. But the girl disappeared. She was on the other side of the wall.
“What girl? There is no girl here,” said the man. The man looked sad.
The next night, the friend came for dinner again. He saw the girl again! “Look, it’s that girl again! She just floated through the wall!” But the man and woman were not interested. There was no girl.
The next night, the friend returned once more. When the girl reappeared, he told the couple, “Look, look!” Finally, the man said, “There is no girl! Please stop saying that!”
The friend inspected the wall. In the wall, there was a door to another room. The friend went inside. He saw the girl in the room. She was sitting on the ground. She was hitting the boards on the floor with her hands. When she saw the friend, she tried to hide in the corner, then she disappeared.
The friend shouted “I could see the girl! She was real! She was hitting the floor. She was in this room.” The friend lifted up the carpet where the girls was hitting the floor. Then he picked up the floorboards. Under the boards, he found two pennies. The he went back to the couple.
Sadly, the woman said, “That room was my little girl’s room. She was my baby, but she died a month ago.”
“I think your daughter was looking for these two pennies. I found them under the floorboards,” said the friend.
The father looked had tears in his eyes. “My daughter found those on the street. I told her to give them to charity, but she said she wanted to buy chocolate. But she was too sick. She never got to use the two pennies.”
The friend told the couple to donate the two pennies to the poor. After that, they never saw the girl again. Finally, she was at peace.