Page:MU KPB 022 Cinderella - Arthur Rackham.pdf/58

 on her head was a queerly shaped hat, with a high pointed crown and a wide brim. There she stood, leaning heavily on a big crooked stick, while Cinderella gazed at her and wondered where she had seen her before.

And then the woman smiled. Have you ever seen a ray of sunshine light up the shadows of a gloomy place? Well, the strange woman’s smile was like that. She no longer appeared old, but as young and radiant as a spring morning, and her eyes glowed deep and pure and true.

“I know, I know!” cried Cinderella. “You are the woman who was in the garden that night when my mother died. The moon pointed you out to me, and I wanted to come down to you, but when I looked again you had disappeared.”

“Because the time was not ripe,” said the woman. “You only saw me that once, but many is the time that I have seen you. I have watched you at your work day after day, and I know all that you have endured through the malice of your stepmother and your stepsisters. At night, when you sat here brooding among the cinders and thought yourself all alone, I was never very far away. When you went to your garret and lay down on your straw bed, it was I who watched over your sleep.”

“Why,” said Cinderella, “who then can you be?”

“I am your godmother,” answered the old woman.

“Your mother and I were friends when she was a girl, and I promised her before she died that I would make your welfare my care. You were crying when I came in. Tell me what was the matter?”