But Grandma Baba was no fool. She saw straight through his tricks and proposed a bargain instead. If he made her lentils grow seven times as large and thirteen times as many, she would deliver to him the first maiden he met on the night of the next full moon. The Devil agreed, and so the lentils were sown (track 3). Before long they began to sprout, swelling with strange, otherworldly vigour. Down in the village, the people busied themselves with their spring preparations, unaware of the pact sealed in the meadow.

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One night, a beautiful young woman from the village could not sleep. She wandered out into the fields, and there — to her great astonishment — she encountered the Devil. He swept her into a wild, whirling chase, a dance that spun faster than the wind itself. Yet as the dance slowed, the Devil realised something he had never felt before: he had fallen deeply, hopelessly in love with the girl.

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Summer came, and the lentils grew enormous, juicy, and plentiful, even as fierce storms rolled across the land.
By autumn, Grandma Baba gathered her harvest. The lentils were so vast and so abundant that the whole village had to lend a hand. From this mighty crop they cooked a great cauldron of lentil soup, and soon a boisterous village feast began. Everyone danced in great swirling circles around the steaming pot — even the Devil and the maiden.

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But the Devil, greedy as ever, ate far too much. His infernal stomach was not accustomed to such honest, earthly food. His rumbling and roaring became so dreadful that the ground itself split open, and with a thunderous blast he was hurled straight back down to Hell by the force of his own mighty farts.

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And so, they say, that is why the fields around Grandma Baba’s village still grow the finest lentils in all the land — and why the Devil has never again dared to meddle with a pot of soup.​​