Page:Nine Unlikely Tales.djvu/158

150 down, the Great White Rat came out from his house and spoke. “You’ve come for it, then?”

“For what?”

“The Magic Cat’s-eye. I’ve guarded it some thousands of years. I knew there would be a use for it at last. He may be saved yet, if some one should love him well enough to die for him.”

“I do that,” said the little Kitchen-Maid, and took the Cat’s-eye in her hands.

“Swallow it,” said the White Rat, “and you’ll turn into a mouse.”

The little maid swallowed it at once, and, behold! she was a little mouse.

“What am I to do?” she asked.

“I can’t tell you,” said the Great White Rat, “but Love will tell you.”

So the little Kitchen-Maid, in the form of the mouse, ran up one of the horse’s legs, and held tight on to the saddle with all her little claws.

And as the great horse galloped back towards the palace in the moonlight, she thought and thought, and at last she said to herself—

“The witch is in cat’s shape, and she must have cat nature, so she will run after a mouse.