A Little Match Girl
A story about life, death, emotions and the will to attain the most basic of comforts in the world..
Written By: Suchismita Sahu
Most terribly cold it was….
It snowed, and was nearly quite dark, and evening—
The last evening of the year, many expensive cars were rushing towards the most expensive clubs, bars, hotels and pubs of the city…the cute small babies were sitting inside those air conditioned cars covered with very expensive winter clothes and having cakes and chocolates…
In this cold and darkness there went along the street a poor little girl, of same age of those babies, bareheaded, and with naked feet.
When she left home she had slippers on, it is true; but what was the good of that?
They were very large slippers, which her mother had previously worn; so large were they; and the poor little thing lost them as she scuffled away across the street…
So the little maiden walked on with her tiny naked feet, those were quite red and blue from cold. She carried a quantity of matches and candles in an old torn out dress, and she held a bundle of them in her hand.
Nobody had bought anything of her the whole livelong day; no one had given her a single penny.
She crept along trembling with cold and hunger--a very picture of sorrow, the poor little thing!
“Fischhh…” someone threw away a piece of cake from the running car!!!
She ran near to that to have it….but before she arrived there, a street dog had already had it.
She went to the common corner of two houses and sat down on the floor, leaning towards the wall of a house. Her little feet she had drawn close up to her, but she grew colder and colder, and to go home she did not venture, for she had not sold any matches and for what her father would certainly get her blows, and at home it was cold too, for above her she had only the roof, through which the wind whistled, even though the largest cracks were stopped up with straw and rags.
Her little hands were almost numbed with cold.
Oh! A match might afford her a world of comfort, if she only dared take a single one out of the bundle and warm her fingers by it.
She drew one out.
"Rischt!" how it blazed, how it burnt! It was a warm, bright flame, like a candle, as she held her hands over it: it was a wonderful light.
The little girl had already stretched out her feet to warm them too; but--the small flame went out, she had only the remains of the burnt-out match in her hand.
She rubbed another against the match box: it burned brightly, and where the light fell on the wall and she was able to see the scenes behind the window curtains on which this rays of light was falling… On the table, various kinds of delicious food were decorated… A chocolate cake with red cherry, many fruits and drinks…
Then match went out and nothing but the thick, cold, damp wall was left behind.
She remembered her mother, who was preparing puddings, sweet dishes and stitching new dress for her on her birthday…
She drew another match against the wall: it was again light, and in the lustre there stood her mother, so bright and radiant, so mild, and with such an expression of love.
"Mama!" cried the little one.
"Oh, take me with you!
And she rubbed the whole bundle of matches quickly against the wall, for she wanted to be quite sure of keeping her mother near her. And the matches gave such a brilliant light that it was brighter than at noon-day: never formerly had the mother been so beautiful and so tall. She took the little maiden, on her arm, and both flew in brightness and in joy so high, so very high, and then above was neither cold, nor hunger, nor anxiety--they were with God.
But in the corner, at the cold hour of dawn, sat the poor girl, with rosy cheeks and with a smiling mouth, leaning against the wall--frozen to death on the last evening of the old year.
"She wanted to warm herself," people said in the morning!!!.