"I know! I know!" said a voice.
The Queen-mother was much startled; though she had not spoken aloud, the words seemed an answer to her thought. She looked over the low wall of the garden into the road. There an old woman hobbled, leaning on a stick, and muttering to herself. She was poor and ragged, and bent with age. "I know, I know!" she said again.
"What do you know?" asked the Queen-mother gently.
The old woman looked up at her. "Go to Westroyal," she said; and she hobbled away.
"Ah, a witch!" thought the Queen-mother; "and she is right. The Queens of the West have undoubtedly some secret means of making their people love them. I will find out what it is."
She prepared for a visit to Westroyal, and arrived a few days later at the palace of the reigning queen. Here she was welcomed and feasted and treated right lovingly, but though she kept her eyes and her ears as wide open as it was possible for eyes and ears to be, she could not discover the secret. She grew sad with disappointment.
"She led the way to her own lovely sleeping-chamber."
The young queen saw that she was sorrowful. "You are not happy here. What is the matter?" she asked. "What can I do to make you glad?"