Once there was a poor miller who, to make himself seem grander than he was, boasted to the king that his daughter could spin straw into gold. The king, who was fond of gold above all things, sent for the girl at once, and shut her in a room heaped with straw, and set a spinning wheel before her. “Spin this into gold by morning,” he said, “or you shall die.” And he locked the door and left her alone.
The poor girl had no more notion of how to spin straw into gold than of how to fly, and she sat down and wept. But suddenly the door opened, and in stepped a strange little man. “Good evening, miller’s daughter,” he said. “Why do you weep?” “I must spin all this straw into gold,” she said, “and I do not know how.” “And what will you give me,” said the little man, “if I spin it for you?” “My necklace,” she said. He took the necklace, sat down at the wheel, and whirr, whirr, whirr, three times round, and the bobbin was full of gold; and so it went until morning, when all the straw was spun and the room was bright with it.
The king was delighted, and greedy for more. He put her in a larger room, with more straw, and gave the same command. Again she wept, and again the little man appeared. “What will you give me this time?” “The ring from my finger.” And again he spun the straw to gold.
But the king was greedier still. He put her in a room larger yet, piled higher with straw. “Spin this by morning,” he said, “and you shall be my queen.” When the girl was alone, the little man came a third time. “What will you give me now?” But she had nothing left to give. “Then promise me,” he said, “that when you are queen, you will give me your first child.” And in her fear, seeing no other way, she promised; and the little man spun the straw to gold once more.
In the morning the king found the gold, and kept his word, and married the miller’s daughter, and she became queen. A year later she bore a beautiful child, and had quite forgotten the little man, when one day he stepped into her chamber. “Now give me what you promised.” The queen was horrified, and offered him all the riches of the kingdom if he would only leave her the child. The little man shook his head. But at her tears, he relented a little. “I will give you three days,” he said. “If in that time you can guess my name, you shall keep your child.”
All night the queen lay awake, turning over every name she had ever heard, and she sent messengers throughout the land to gather more. On the first day she tried every name she knew, and to each the little man said, “That is not my name.” On the second day she tried the strangest names she could find, and still, “That is not my name.”
But on the third day a messenger returned and told her a curious thing. Deep in the forest, by a little house, he had seen a strange little man dancing round a fire and singing:
“Today I bake, tomorrow I brew, the day after that the queen’s child comes; and oh, how glad I am that nobody knows that Rumpelstiltskin is my name!”
When the little man came that evening, the queen made a show of guessing. “Is your name Tom?” “No.” “Is it Harry?” “No.” “Then is it, perhaps,” she said, “Rumpelstiltskin?”
“A witch told you! A witch told you!” shrieked the little man, and in his rage he stamped his foot so hard that it drove into the ground up to his waist; and then he seized his other leg and tore himself clean in two, and that was the end of him. And the queen kept her child, and was troubled by him no more.
A promise made in fear is a heavy debt; but a secret name, once spoken aloud, has no power left to hold.