you live. Have you not said but now
that, though she be myriads of miles away among the stars, she
answers you when you whisper? Does she not hear? Do not her lips
move in speech as you whisper?"

"That is true," said I. "And will she always hear?"

"She will always hear," said the Singing Mouse. "So this sorrow
will not come as you fear."

"And shall I reach out and touch her hair as it lies spread and
dark?" This I asked of the Singing Mouse.

"You shall touch it, spread and dark, and fragrant as when you
were young," said the Singing Mouse, "if so you wish."

So then it seemed that perhaps all sorrows, even very great
ones, are a part of life. Although I know that, if I could no
longer know the fragrance of her hair, or hear the whisper of
her answer, then that sorrow would be more than I could bear.

[Illustration]

[Illustration: The Shoes of the Princess]

[Illustration]

THE SHOES OF THE PRINCESS

Once I was in a place where there were those who had opened many
tombs, and had taken from the tombs, that had been in Egypt,
and were very old, many things that had been placed there
for silence and repose thousands of years ago. There were
grave-clothes and grave-caskets, the one embroidered, the other
graven; and the colors of both were as they were thousands of
years ago. There were signs over which men pondered, not knowing
their own writing, and their own thoughts, and their own fate.
There were also, a sad thing to see, the bodies of those that
had died long ago, that had lain down for rest and silence; and
of these some were called kings, and some were called queens and
others princesses; and all had once been young, and some had
once been beautiful. For here, after thousands of years, was
praise of their beauty, and love and care for it. So I pondered
very long and sadly. But most I looked at two little golden
shoes.

These little shoes had once been the shoes of one who lay here,
a princess, dead thousands of years, and once very beautiful,
as these carven symbols told. They were small and dainty and
threaded with fine gold, and laced across with care about the
feet of her who was once a woman and a princess and owner of
much beauty, and who was in her life beloved, and in her death
mourned; as these graven symbols said. A thousand years this
love reached out its arms to her to-day; although for a thousand
years Death had enfolded her in his grasp, that does not yield.
She who had l