"Oh, dear! Oh, dear me! I shall never be able to reach it! Never, never, never!" Susie looked around, and what should she see but a nice, little old lady, trying to break off a stem of goldenrod.
"Oh, dear me suz-dud!" cried the old lady again, and then Susie saw that she was very little indeed, hardly larger than a ten-cent plate of ice cream after it's all melted. So she couldn't reach the goldenrod, she was so little.
"What is the matter?" asked Susie very politely. "Can I help you?"
"Thank you, my dear child," went on the little old lady. "If you would be so kind as to reach me down a stem of goldenrod, I would be very much obliged to you."
"What do you want with it?" asked Susie, wondering who the little old lady could possibly be.
"Why, I want it for a fairy wand," she answered. "I have lost mine."
"Are you a fairy, too?" asked the little rabbit girl, and she began to wonder what would happen next as she broke off a stem for the old lady.
"Indeed I am," replied the little old lady. "I am a fairy godmother. I have charge of all the other fairies, the blue fairy and the red fairy and the green fairy, and all the other colors, including the fairy prince, who used to be a mud turtle."
"But, if you are a fairy," asked Susie, "why couldn't you make that goldenrod come down to you, when you weren't tall enough to reach up to it?"
"Hush!" exclaimed the fairy godmother, for she really was one, as you shall see. "Hush, my dear child! It's a great secret. Don't tell any one," and she put her right hand over her mouth and her left hand over her ear, and held the goldenrod under her arm. "You see, I lost my magic wand," she went on, "and I couldn't do any more magic until I got a new one. Now I am all right, and to reward you you may come with me."