Suddenly the strange happenings began.
A mouse appeared among the pots and pans on the table. It sat an instant, with alert eyes and fidgety nose and whiskers, and then it scrambled down the leg of the table and crossed the floor in the direction of the grandfather's clock. An instant later there it was again, climbing up the white face of the clock!
The clock ticked more severely than ever. The mouse disappeared amid the works of the clock: and presto! The clock loudly struck one.
The mouse darted into sight again, slipping down across the face of the clock. Then it disappeared.
The vibrations of the clock, filling the room as with a great clamor, slowly died away.
Then there was another sound: a nervous rattling of the latch on the door opening to the highway. The door opened rather abruptly, and Cinderella, panting and pale, stood on the threshold.
For an instant she seemed afraid to enter; yet plainly she was also afraid to remain standing there on the threshold. She glanced swiftly about the room and then she entered and closed the door sharply behind her. She stood for a moment, panting and leaning against the door.
There was something very strange about her; for although she was weary and frightened, and clad in the shabbiest old dress imaginable, her face nevertheless shone with rapture.
Need I tell you what had occurred to her? She had forgotten what the good fairy had told her about coming home before one o'clock; and as a result her coach-and-four and her coachman had been changed back to what they had originally been: a pumpkin, a rat, and four mice. What a disaster!
Yet after she had stood against the door long enough to catch her breath she advanced into the room, thrusting her arms upward and forward as if she were embracing a lovely vision. Her eyes burned with a glorious light.