Decades ago, my partner and I happened on what is perhaps the most riveting and well-kept secret of the throne. But at the time, the stories and papers only spoke of an unnamed little man, found torn in two pieces in the catacombs of the royal castle, who was revealed to be the notorious royal-baby smuggler guilty of jeopardizing the future of the kingdom.

After initial interview of their royal highnesses the Queen and the King, the messenger, and the royal guards of the Throne Room, the story itself had seemed pretty cut and dry. A young woman, caught between a father greedy for reputability and a king greedy for wealth, finds herself at a crossroads between a life of luxury and an untimely death. In her desperation, she strikes a series of deals with a mysterious little man, a männelein if you will, to spin straw to gold for her. The first night, she offers him her necklace, the next her ring, and finally she promises to him her firstborn child.

But something about the story did not fit. How did a poor, lowly miller have the means to speak privately with the King about his daughter and her alleged ability to spin gold? How did Rumpelstiltskin just happen upon the miller’s desperate daughter, who was under lock and key in the heavily fortified castle? Why would the little man want a baby? If he did want the child, how could a man with the ability to spin gold not have the ability to steal away a tiny, defenseless baby? And why would a man so clearly desperate for a child suddenly have a change of heart, giving the Queen not one, but three chances to win her child back?

The story simply did not make sense. Fueled by these pressing questions, my partner and I decided to engage in an investigation of our own. Of course, our first inclination was to turn to the people of this beloved kingdom.

“I can’t remember his name, exactly. Caspar? Melchior? Balthazar? It’s hard to say. But, anyway, I heard he was a nasty bloke, was into some disturbing things, you know, stealing babies away from their mothers and such. And he lived by himself, all the way in the middle of the forest. Only came out once a week, always at night, to stock up on supplies, and then he was gone again. Didn’t have any friends, nothing. Nasty guy, deserved what he got.” The town baker said.

When asked about the Queen, the baker’s wife said, “Oh, poor thing, her father got her all mixed up in the miserable business, spinning gold! Can hardly blame him though, he was dirt poor, like us all. And I suppose it ended well for the girl too, married to the King! She didn’t end up losing the child either, so all’s well that ends well, I suppose. There was the funny business about the meeting with the King. Don’t know how her father arranged for a private audience. That’s no easy task, and certainly not a cheap one. He must ‘of had some connection… I should ask him about that… Could do us well… ”

The town seamstress agreed. “It was nasty business as a whole, to get stuck in that horrible arrangement between the King and her father, and that blasted little man. What was his name? Something horrid, Shortribs or Sheepshanks or something. Ah, what does it matter? In any case, there were rumors about the girl. Rumors that she was pregnant, but I suppose we’ll never know, it all happened so fast. It was probably the typical slander the gossip mill churns out, just trying the ruin the good name of our Queen.”

Pregnant? Before she met the King? We decided to go to the only real authority on such matters, a local midwife. After initially denying our requests, the midwife finally obliged to answer our questions, under the condition of anonymity. “You mustn't tell anyone that I told you this, or the King will have my head! It was a week or so before the King took her for himself, but the Queen - well, she was the miller’s daughter then - came to me one night. She was so distressed, she didn’t know what to do with herself. She thought she was pregnant. I checked her thoroughly, and it was true - pregnant! And not yet married. A horrible fix. It was incredible luck that her father handed her off to the King. Any other circumstance, it would have been awful, but at the time it was a wonderful chance at maintaining her dignity and then some. Lucky girl, the Queen. Not everyone has such fortune.”

This certainly explained some of the Rumpelstiltskin story. Why the miller’s daughter was exceptionally desperate to spin gold for the King, why the miller lied about his daughter’s spinning ability to pique the interest of the King. But how did Rumpelstiltskin fit into this increasingly complex story? So it was back the the good townspeople of the kingdom.

The young locksmith’s wife, a good friend of the miller’s daughter, had a lot to say. “The Queen and I are fast friends. We grew up together, you know. Other than that horrid baby-snatching scare - What was the bastard's name? Henry? Conrad? - such a fairytale ending, married to the King! And it all happened so fast, one day she was the miller’s daughter, the next the Queen. Just magical!”

We asked her if she knew anything about the Queen’s pregnancy. “Oh. You know about that? I… I shouldn’t say. All I can tell you is that for weeks, she kept gushing about this amazing little man. Please don’t tell anyone I said this, but I always thought she was talking about the King!”

Which brings us to the well known, but carefully handled ‘secret’ of our great kingdom. The King was, among other things, a little man. The fact served as a matter of much shame for the King, and so anyone who spoke of his tiny stature was promptly sentenced to death. This explained the locksmith’s wife’s fear, and her unwillingness to comment much more on the subject. Clearly, however, she assumed the King had met the miller’s wife before their official encounter weeks later in the castle. Perhaps she thought that the story about the miller’s daughter spinning gold was a clever guise for the real, much more ordinary story of the King and Queen’s torrid romance. Another explanation for a happy story. But it doesn't explain why the miller would have gone to the king in the first place. And it still fails to explain Rumpelstiltskin.

So the King was not the Queen’s beloved little man. And there not many little men in our kingdom for the Queen to fall in love with. Who then was the Queen’s lover? Everything points to one man, and one man alone. Rumpelstiltskin.

Suddenly it all falls into place. The miller’s daughter, pregnant with the child of the outcast little man. The little man, who refuses to tell her his real name, his true identity, and why he stays in exile in the forest. Her father, desperate to protect both his and his daughter’s dignity, entices the only little man he knows, the King, with the promise of his gold-spinning daughter. Rumpelstiltskin, desperate to get her back, searching for his love, only to find her trapped in the castle he had been exiled from all those years ago. He begs her to run with him. She stalls, worried for her safety. She gives him tokens of affection, her necklace, her ring, swearing he is her only love, but unable to go with him, for fear of discovery. That fateful third night, where she chooses between a life on the run with her beloved and a life of loveless security. And finally, to sooth Rumpelstiltskin’s ailing heart, the promise to give him their child.

There are not many little men in our kingdom. DNA tests on the bodies of Rumpelstiltskin and the King only confirmed our suspicions. The two little men shared a father, yet another little man. Rumpelstiltskin was the bastard son of the throne. The King had exiled his half brother Rumpelstiltskin from the castle immediately after ascending the throne, securing his position of power. So Rumpelstiltskin lived his days in the depths of the forest, and it was only chance that led him to fall for the miller’s beautiful daughter. For her protection, he never told her his name, or who he really was.

His heart shattered when the miller’s daughter refused to leave with him, but his love for her understood her fears, and so he helped her marry his half-brother. A year later, with a heavy heart, he headed for the castle to collect his young son. But in her year at the castle, the Queen had learned much about her role. She had kept the secret of her child, the secret of her gold-spinning abilities. And she had learned quickly that her son, the heir to the throne, was also her only security to remain protected in the castle. And as a mother, she could not give up her child, not even to his father.

So when Rumpelstiltskin requested audience with the Queen, she quietly agreed, making sure the King would never know. And when Rumpelstiltskin wavered in his resolve to take his child, allowing the Queen three days to find his name, she sent her private messenger to every corner of the kingdom in search of the answer. She did not know to ask the King, both for fear of discovery and because she did not know Rumpelstiltskin’s true identity. And on the third day, when her messenger discovered the little man’s real name, she was able to maintain her secret. But the Queen could not leave any loose ends to her real story. She ordered the little man dead, and her royal guards ripped poor Rumpelstiltskin in half. To ensure her safety, she buried the little man under a slew of accusations. Calling him a baby smuggler, a threat to the throne, creating the story everyone has heard until today.

We will never know if the King ever did find out about his Queen's scandalous secret. And if he did, we are sure he would have felt nothing but a flood of relief knowing no other potential claimant to the throne was alive. And as far as the world knew, the Queen's son was also his son. For all the King cared, Rumpelstiltskin's remains lay slowly rotting in the catacombs of the castle, all secrets rotting away with him.

For our own protection, we waited until both the King and Queen had died of old age to share the true story of Rumpelstiltskin, whose only true crime was love. We did, however, hear the servants talking about the Queen's strange final words: “I’m sorry, Little Man.” One can only imagine who they were for.