She turned to Curdie and smiled.
"Ma'am," said Curdie, "may I ask
questions?"
"Why not, Curdie?"
"Because I have been told, ma'am, that
nobody must ask the king questions."
"The king never made that law," she
answered, with some displeasure. "You may ask me as many as you
please - that is, so long as they are sensible. Only I may take a few
thousand years to answer some of them. But that's nothing. Of all things
time is the cheapest."
"Then would you mind telling me now, ma'am,
for I feel very confused about it - are you the Lady of the Silver
Moon?"
"Yes, Curdie; you may call me that if you
like. What it means is true."
"And now I see you dark, and clothed in
green, and the mother of all the light that dwells in the stones of the
earth! And up there they call you Old Mother Weatherwop! And the Princess
Irene told me you were her great-great-grandmother! And you spin the
spider threads, and take care of a whole people of pigeons; and you are
worn to a pale shadow with old age; and are as young as anybody can be,
not to be too young; and as strong, I do believe, as I am."
The lady stooped toward a large green stone bedded
in the rock of the floor, and looking like a well of grassy light in it.
She laid hold of it with her fingers, broke it out, and gave it to
Peter.
"There!" cried Curdie. "I told you
so. Twenty men could not have done that. And your fingers are as white and
smooth as any lady's in the land. I don't know what to make of
it."
"I could give you twenty names more to call
me, Curdie, and not one of them would be a false one. What does it matter
how many names if the person is one?"
"Ah! But it is not names only, ma'am. Look at
what you were like last night, and what I see you now!"
"Shapes are only dresses, Curdie, and dresses
are only names. That which is inside is the same all the time."
"But then how can all the shapes speak the
truth?"
"It wouuld want thousands more to speak the
truth, Curdie; and then they could not. But there is a point I
must not let you mistake about. It is one thing the shape I
choose to put on, and quite another the shape that foolish talk and
nursery tale may please to put upon me. . . ."
- The Princess and Curdie, by George MacDonald