she was grown
up, she was the wonder of the world. Now, near the Palace where this
Princess lived, there was a cottage in which there was a poor little
tiny woman, who lived all alone by herself.'

'An old woman,' said Maggy, with an unctuous smack of her lips.

'No, not an old woman. Quite a young one.'

'I wonder she warn't afraid,' said Maggy. 'Go on, please.'

'The Princess passed the cottage nearly every day, and whenever she went
by in her beautiful carriage, she saw the poor tiny woman spinning at
her wheel, and she looked at the tiny woman, and the tiny woman looked
at her. So, one day she stopped the coachman a little way from the
cottage, and got out and walked on and peeped in at the door, and there,
as usual, was the tiny woman spinning at her wheel, and she looked at
the Princess, and the Princess looked at her.'

'Like trying to stare one another out,' said Maggy. 'Please go on,
Little Mother.'

'The Princess was such a wonderful Princess that she had the power of
knowing secrets, and she said to the tiny woman, Why do you keep it
there? This showed her directly that the Princess knew why she lived
all alone by herself spinning at her wheel, and she kneeled down at
the Princess's feet, and asked her never to betray her. So the Princess
said, I never will betray you. Let me see it. So the tiny woman closed
the shutter of the cottage window and fastened the door, and trembling
from head to foot for fear that any one should suspect her, opened a
very secret place and showed the Princess a shadow.'

'Lor!' said Maggy. 'It was the shadow of Some one who had gone by long
before: of Some one who had gone on far away quite out of reach, never,
never to come back. It was bright to look at; and when the tiny woman
showed it to the Princess, she was proud of it with all her heart, as
a great, great treasure. When the Princess had considered it a little
while, she said to the tiny woman, And you keep watch over this every
day? And she cast down her eyes, and whispered, Yes. Then the Princess
said, Remind me why. To which the other replied, that no one so good and
kind had ever passed that way, and that was why in the beginning. She
said, too, that nobody missed it, that nobody was the worse for it, that
Some one had gone on, to those who were expecting him--'

'Some one was a man then?' interposed Maggy.

Little Dorrit timidly said Yes, she believed so; and resumed:

'--Had gone on to those who were expecti