CINDERELLA GOES TO THE BALL

A long time ago, in a far away land, there lived a very rich family named the LeMans.
There was Lady LeMan, and her twin daughters, Stacy and Priscilla.
The twins owned a cat, called Ella, which they renamed Cinderella, because she spent all her time sleeping by the fire. Cinderella was one lazy cat.
One day, Cinderella was ordered to chase out a family of mice which had moved in the LeMan household the day before. If she didn't succeed, she would be thrown out. However, Lady LeMan also said:
"If you succeed in chasing out the mice, you shall get a nice reward."
Cinderella, very much in love with food, thought at once of a bowlful of tuna cat food. But, being a lazy cat, she simply couldn't be bothered to go chase out the mice. She decided to go and meet them, to decide or not whether they deserve to be chased out of the house.
Getting off her fat bottom, Cinderella stretched and yawned, and waddled off to find out where the mice had moved into.
She went into the living-room, where she saw a hole just big enough for a mouse to squeese through in the wall.
'Ah ha!' thought Cinderella. 'That's where the mice live.'
She walked to the wall, and stuck a paw in the hole, and took it out again. Soon afterwards, a male mouse came out to greet her.
"Ah, so you must be Cinderella, the housecat. I heard those two ghastly children speak of you just now. From what I heard, you are a lazy, fat cat!"
"That is true," said Cinderella. "I am very proud of that fact. I cannot be bothered to chase you out of the house. So would you mind moving back out?"
"Why would we want to do that? It's nice and cosy here."
"Well, you see, Lady LeMan, who owns me, has ordered me to chase you out. But I have this deep, dark secret. I am a vegetarian cat, and I hate catching and killing small creatures like mice and birds."
"You! A vegetarian cat! Never!"
"It's true. Now, I've come here to make a deal with you. You promise to stay in the hole all the time, and I shall never hurt you."
The mouse thought about it. "Deal," he said at last.
"Now, there's one more thing," said Cinderella.
"What's that?"
"Well, I need a bit of your fur. To make Lady LaMan think I've chased you out."
"Hold on. I'll go get my wife's wig. Her hair's grown back nice. She doesn't need it anymore."
The mouse went into his home, and came back with a small bit of fur.
Cinderella showed the bit of fur to Lady LeMan, fooling her into thinking Cinderella had chased the mice out of the house. The mice (who Cinderella found out were the GussJack family) stayed all the time in their home, and became firm friends with Cindrella, who made sure they stayed alive by bringing them leftovers from her dinner.
And Lady LeMan was so happy with Cinderella, she gave her a large ball of purple yarn to play with, as much as she wanted.

The End by Charlene Samm