""Round here," the cat replied.
"I don"t see him," said the Prince, with a start, as he looked about him on all sides.
"No?" said the cat. "That"s because you can"t see through me."
"How very strangely you talk, cat!" exclaimed Vance. "I don"t know what you mean."
"Well," returned the cat, "you know those funny bonbons?"
"Yes," murmured the Prince, hanging his head a bit and blushing.
"One rolled under the sofa," the cat observed thoughtfully.
"Yes," said Vance, "I remember that one was dropped and I couldn"t find it."
"After the telegram reached me from the Crushed Strawberry Wizard,"
remarked the cat, "I rolled the bonbon out into the middle of the floor. It was a pretty pink bonbon, and the King, coming into the room, saw it and gobbled it up."
"Well," exclaimed the Prince, breathlessly, "what then?"
The cat put out her tongue and licked her chops.
"He was very tender," she said.
"You ate him?" he asked breathlessly.
The cat placidly nodded her head, her whiskers twitching with the remembrance of her feast.
"Then," cried Prince Vance, joyously, "my father is King again, or will be when he is made big enough. You say you had a telegram from the Crushed Strawberry Wizard. Tell me, do tell me, dear cat, what it said."
"I can"t till midnight," said the cat, "or all will be spoiled, and the charm won"t work."
XIX
Before he left home the Prince would have stamped about and made a great uproar at being obliged to wait even a minute for anything he wanted; but of late he had learned, among other lessons, the lesson of patience; so he neither stormed nor cried, but entering the palace seated himself where he could see the great hall-clock and watch for midnight.
He was so weary, however, that he could not keep his eyes open, and presently he was as sound asleep as a dormouse. At length the cat touched him on the shoulder, her claws p.r.i.c.king him so that he sprang up in a hurry.
"Wake up!" said the cat; "the clock will strike twelve in seven minutes."
"Why, have I been asleep?" asked the Prince, rubbing his eyes.
"It looks like it," replied the cat. "Why did you leave the Court shut up in the box?"
"To tell the truth," the Prince confessed, "I was afraid they might be running about the floor in the dark and--something might eat them by mistake."
"Well," the cat answered, with a look as near a blush as a cat can come to such a thing, "you may be right. One never can tell what may happen.
It is now almost on the stroke of twelve, and we must make haste. Run out to the terrace and see if the peahen has laid an egg. If she has, bring it in here to me; and be very quick!"
Rubbing the sleep from his eyes, the Prince hastened to do as he was bid. He found an egg, indeed, and rushing back to the palace reached the hall just as the clock sounded the first stroke of twelve.
"Break it exactly across the middle, and do it with three blows," the cat commanded.
The Prince obeyed, and from the shattered fragments of the sh.e.l.l, just as the last stroke of twelve ceased, out stepped the Fairy Copetta, as sharp, fresh, and brisk from top to toe as if she had just been made, and not in the least as if she had found her quarters in the peahen"s egg either close or confining. She shook out her petticoat with a brisk little flirt, hopped lightly down from the table, and hit the Prince a tap on the head with her cane.
[Ill.u.s.tration]
"Well," she said sharply, "how about the Blue Wizard? Do you like him as well as you thought you should?"
"I don"t know," stammered the poor Prince, decidedly taken aback by his G.o.dmother"s sudden appearance. "Did I say I liked him? I had forgotten--I mean I don"t like him at all, if you please, G.o.dmother."
"Oh!" exclaimed the old lady, mockingly, "don"t you, really? Yet, if I remember rightly, you quite longed for a visit from him a while ago.
Well, then, how about the giant of Bogarru and the Funny Man, both intimate friends of mine--did you like them, eh? Did you find them witty and agreeable? Did they treat you with great respect because you were a real live prince, eh?"
"You know they did not," cried the Prince. "I must say, G.o.dmother, that you have strange taste in choosing friends."
"Each to his liking," responded Copetta, lightly. "I dare say, now, that you found more pleasure in that stupid jelly-fish, or that dismal bra.s.s monkey, or that crooked man,--and _he"s_ a beauty, by the way!"
"I did like them," replied the Prince, stoutly; "they were so good to me. Are they, too, friends of yours, G.o.dmother?"
"Why, yes," said the fairy, her bright eyes twinkling elfishly, "I think I may say that they"re rather intimate with me."
"I didn"t know," ventured Vance, rather timidly, "but they might all be you, G.o.dmother."
"Perhaps you think," she answered tartly, "that I am a sort of living multiplication-table, or that I have as many lives as a cat. By the way, can you bound the kingdom now?"
"I ought to be able to bound it," the Prince replied; "I have been quite around it on foot."
"Well," returned his G.o.dmother, acidly, "I dare say it hasn"t hurt you.
That reminds me; have you had enough of it?"
"Oh, please, G.o.dmother," cried the Prince, "I have had enough of everything but kindness; and oh, G.o.dmother, if you only would tell me how to turn my people back again, indeed, there is nothing I wouldn"t do. Believe me, dear G.o.dmother, I"m a very different sort of boy from the one who wouldn"t learn the boundaries, and wanted to know the Blue Wizard; I am, indeed."
"Humph!" sniffed the fairy, though secretly she was not ill pleased with him, "you"re a much dirtier one, at all events. Have you washed your face since you"ve been gone?"
"I"m afraid I haven"t washed it very often," confessed the humbled Prince. "You see, I"ve had so much else on my mind, G.o.dmother."
"Bah!" exclaimed the fairy. "Go take a bath!"
"But the Court, G.o.dmother," pleaded the Prince, timidly; "they must be very tired of being small."
"Tut, tut," cried the G.o.dmother, sharply, "how you do harp on one string, to be sure! "Tis very ill bred of you. However, as it"s not for yourself, I don"t mind telling you that it"s a very simple matter when you once know how to do it. They were facing each other when they shrank, were they not?"
"Yes," said the Prince, blushing.