The light from the porch guided him halfway to the church and he managed most of the rest in the darkness. For the last bit, the full moon came out from behind the snow-covered hills causing the snow to glimmer, but the walls of the old wooden church remained black.

At the church door Lennart noticed strange tracks in the snow, which didn't seem to be from animals but were more like those from tiny human feet, the small people.

Perhaps somebody wants to play a trick on me, he thought.

He unlocked the creaking iron door and went inside. But there he got an unpleasant feeling of damnation, which seemed to hover in the air like an evil spirit. It didn't disappear even when he turned on the lamps.

He walked up the aisle, filled with deep uneasiness, and sat down in the middle of one of the rows. Even the red colour of the psalm-books had a strange appearance and he regretted he had got out of bed in order to come there. But as he was certainly no funk he decided to stay.

The angels and devils in the murals watched the trembling old man and their piercing looks seemed to follow him. Suddenly, Lennart heard faint singing, which came from the darkest corners of the church and he began to wonder whether, despite everything, there was some truth in all the tales about the small people, the elves.