Everychild had too little time just then to marvel at the strange feat which had been performed by the giant. He was lost in amazement at the house before which he stood.
It was really an immense, dilapidated shoe, patched and broken. The toe was about to gape open, though it was held here and there by a few threads. The laces were gone and the whole upper sprawled shapelessly. In brief, it was precisely like any old shoe you will see on a vacant lot, save for its immense size. Its size was prodigious. It was as large as a small house.
A stovepipe stuck out where the little toe would be, and smoke was pouring out of the pipe just as if some one had been putting a supply of fuel on the fire. It was woodsmoke and had a pleasant smell. It seemed that perhaps some one was preparing supper.
Not a soul was in sight about the house—or the shoe—nor about the premises. Yet you could see that some one had been hard at work only a short time before. The wash had been hung out to dry and it was still damp. It hung from a line which was suspended from the highest point of the shoe—where the strap is that you pull it on by—to the limb of a nearby tree. You could tell by the garments that there were a lot of children about. There were best shirts and every-day shirts and petticoats and trousers. There were many colors, so that they all made a rather gay spectacle. And some were of ordinary size, and some were quite tiny.
There were many trees in the background; and one of these cast its shade over the immense shoe in a very pleasing way. There was a table under the tree, and a kind of dinner-bell hanging from a limb of the tree. There were chairs about the table. Finally, there was a ladder standing against the shoe, so that you could climb up and get in at the top.
"And so," said Everychild in a tone of wonder, "this is where you live!" He had taken the little boy by the hand.
The little boy was about to reply when something almost alarming happened. The little boy slipped his hand away from Everychild's and shrank back until he was hiding behind Cinderella's skirt. An astonishing head and shoulders appeared above the top of the shoe!
The Old Woman who Lived in the Shoe had heard them. She remained perched in her place, glaring severely about the yard below.
Nor was this all. Other individuals inside the shoe had evidently heard the voice of Everychild. And now they began to peep out in the most extraordinary fashion. Three pairs of eyes appeared at the broken toe of the shoe. And up the double row of eye-holes, all the way up the front of the shoe, startled faces were to be seen. You could see excited eyes with hair hanging down before them.
All this proved too much for the little black dog, who had gone forward from Tom's side to inspect the shoe. Now he began barking excitedly at the half-hidden faces.