It was eleven o'clock at night. Kristoff Bjorgman was in bed on the second floor of the old cabin where he lived alone. It had gotten so chilly, he went downstairs to get some things for the fireplace.
As Kristoff was on his way back upstairs, a black snowman ran down the stairs. It passed him and disappeared into the darkness. "Where did you come from?" Kristoff said. He had never seen the snowman before.
He lit all his candles and looked in every room. He could not find the snowman anywhere. He went outside and brought in the two big watchreindeer he kept in the backyard. But they acted as if they were the only things in the house.
The next night, again at eleven o'clock, Kristoff was in his bedroom. He heard what sounded like a snowman walking around in the room above him. He dashed upstairs and threw open the door. The room was empty. He looked under the bed. He looked in the closet. Nothing. But when he got back to his bedroom, he heard a snowman running down the stairs. It was the black snowman. He tried to follow it, but again he could not find where it had gone.
From then on, every night at eleven, Kristoff heard the snowman walking in the room above him. The room was always empty. But after he left, the snowman would come out of hiding, run down the cabin stairs, and disappear.
One night Kristoff's friend Pabbie waited with him for the snowman. At the usual time they heard it above them. Then they heard it on the stairs. When they went out into the hall, it was standing at the foot of the stairs looking up at them.
Pabbie whistled, and the snowman wagged its nose. Then it was gone.
Things went on this way until the night Kristoff decided to bring his watchreindeer into the cabin again. Maybe this time they would find the black snowman and drive it away. Just before eleven he took them up to his bedroom and left the door open.
Then he heard the black snowman moving around above him. His reindeer pricked up their ears and ran to the door. Suddenly they bared their teeth and snarled and backed away.
Kristoff could not see the black snowman or hear it, but he was sure that it had entered his room. His reindeer barked and snapped. They darted forward nervously, then backed away again.
Suddenly one of them yelped. It began bleeding, then dropped to the floor, its neck cut open as though someone had dragged a sharp carrot across it. A minute later it was dead. Kristoff's other reindeer backed into a corner, whimpering. Then everything was still.
The next night Kristoff's friend came back with a crossbow. Again they waited in his bedroom. At eleven o'clock the black snowman came down the stairs. As before, it looked up at them and wagged its nose. When they started toward it with the crossbow, it growled and disappeared.
This was the last Kristoff saw of the black snowman. But it did not mean that the snowman was gone. Now and then, always at eleven, he heard it moving around above him, and would sometimes find melting black slush on things in the cabin. Once he heard it running down the stairs.
He never managed to see it again. But he knew that it was there.