He had trouble finding the right words; but at length he began, "Your
mother--does she whip you? You know, you were running so, and you
seemed so frightened . . ."

Cinderella looked beyond him. She seemed to speak to herself rather
than to Everychild. "She doesn't whip me," she said. "If it were only
being whipped I shouldn't mind so much. A whipping . . . it's soon
over and little harm done. No, she doesn't whip me."

"Or perhaps she tries to lose you," said Everychild. "You were really
in a dreadful state, you know, as you came running along the road."

But Cinderella continued to speak musingly, as if to herself. "She
doesn't whip me. But to know that you're never to be praised or loved;
to have your mother look at you coldly, and say nothing--or just to
have her pay no attention at all, but to act as if a wrong had been
done her somehow . . . a whipping would be easy, compared with that."

Everychild took her up with swift comprehension. "I know what you
mean," he declared. "Not to have them listen when you speak, as if you
were in the way . . ."

Cinderella gazed at him darkly. "Child, what do you know of such
things?" she demanded.

Everychild answered simply, "Our mothers were like that too. I know
what it means."

Cinderella said, "Your mothers?"