Page:MU KPB 022 Cinderella - Arthur Rackham.pdf/110

 “Will you please sit down, madam,” said he, “and try this slipper on?”

“Madam, indeed!” sniffed Euphronia. “What next, I wonder!”

But the courier took no notice of her, for at the very first trial the slipper glided on to Cinderella’s dainty foot with the greatest ease.

How the sisters stared! Euphronia’s face turned almost green with rage and envy, while Charlotte glared. But their surprise was as nothing to the shock they received the next moment, for Cinderella calmly took the other shoe from her pocket and put it on the other foot. These were the pair of them, gleaming and flashing so that her feet seemed shod with light.

“Well I never!” muttered Euphronia. “Of all the deceitful little-”

And then she stopped suddenly, for another figure had come into the room—out of nowhere, as it appeared; for one moment she wasn’t there and the next she stood smiling behind Cinderella’s chair. It was the figure of an old woman dressed in a red petticoat, with a pointed hat on her head.

She lifted her stick and touched the girl lightly on the shoulder. In that moment Cinderella’s rags dropped away, and she appeared dressed in the beautiful gown of white silk in which she had first gone to the ball. She looked so lovely as she sat there that the courier fell on his knees and kissed her hand, as one kisses the hand of a queen.