By Teri Ong
Once upon a long ago, there was a dowdy scullery maid named Cinder-Teri. She was assigned to work in the kitchen in a beautiful kingdom called Camp-of-the-Woods. All in all, she was very happy there. The work was not unpleasant, and the kingdom was ruled by a wise and benevolent king and queen who loved and cared for all of their subjects.
The king and queen were the blessed parents of two handsome princes and two beautiful princesses. Many of the working lads and lasses in the kingdom of Camp-of-the-Woods aspired to be deemed worthy to be princes or princesses themselves someday. Needless to say, Cinder-Teri had her aspirations as well.
Cinder-Teri, knowing that the way to come to the attention of the prince, or any prince, was to bake things the prince was fond of, succeeded in turning out a continuous stream of goodies such as Lemon Fluff, extra large baking powder biscuits, cinnamon buns, oatmeal cakes, and the lightest cream puffs that could be made in a wood-fired oven. The wood-fired oven was not only how Cinder-Teri hoped to win her reputation with the prince, it was how she got her name. Every Saturday the wood stove had to be cleaned and rubbed with stove black. It was not many weeks before all of Cinder-Teri’s clothes bore the marks of her occupation. Even though she was not the prettiest or best dressed of the lasses in the kingdom, she was gratified by the commendations of the king himself, and of the princes, for the excellence of her cooking and her character. 
One summer, the older of the two princes was elevated to being king-in-training. He was put in charge of the kingdom for an entire month. He made for himself a special scepter which he called “Equalizer.” It looked something like a half-size cricket bat that was charred on the business end– to emulate the heat of battle, you know. The prince explained, “All of you campers against one prince isn’t fair, but this paddle makes things more equal.” The prince was seldom seen without the sign of his royal power, even when getting his dinner in the serving line with the rest of his subjects.
Now, it so happened that the lovely kingdom of Camp-of-the-Woods was a rather primitive country. That is to say, it did not have, uh-hmm, “modern conveniences.” It had little shacks in out-of-the-way places that were affectionately known as “biffies.” Everyone in the country used the biffies, but no one wanted to been seen doing so. The common manners of the country demanded that if one saw someone going in or coming out of a biffy, one was to act as though he or she hadn’t seen.
One day, Cinder-Teri needed to go into a biffy. When she wanted to come out of the biffy, with much chagrin she determined that someone had turned the wooden latch on the outside of the door to lock her in. It was a not uncommon prank played by some of the youngsters in the country on those older and wiser than they. Unfortunately, there was little that the “older and wiser” ones could do to prevent such a prank (except have an armed guard posted outside). And there was little that could be done to prevent total humiliation after the fact.
The only hope was that someone with a modicum of discretion would need to enter, and would consequently let the humiliated party out without making a scene. Cinder-Teri waited some time, but no one happened along. She waited some more. It was very hot and stuffy, and she needed to get back to her kitchen labors. She checked her watch in the dim light. She looked around to see if she had anything she might slip through the crack in the door to move the latch. She did not.
Soon she was desperate enough to begin knocking on the door from the inside to attract someone’s attention. Happy day! She heard footsteps coming up the dirt path. She began to call out, “Is someone out there? Can anyone hear me? Can you let me out? Please! Let me out.”
Just then the latch moved and the door opened. As Cinder-Teri’s eye’s adjusted to the bright outside light, she saw that her rescuer was the prince himself, with “Equalizer” tucked regally under his arm. “How in the world did you get stuck in there?!” he asked, trying to disguise a chuckle.
Cinder-Teri blushed deeply in abject embarrassment. “A camper locked me in.”
“How long have you been in there?” 
“Uh, I have to get back to the kitchen. Thanks anyway,” she replied hastily as she trotted toward the kitchen.
She knew that forever more when the prince saw her, he would not be thinking of cream puffs and cinnamon rolls. Her dreams of being a princess someday had flown away as surely as the smoke from her stove. “Oh, well. C’est la vie.” [Did I mention the kingdom was bilingual?] Knowing that her pumpkin would never turn into a royal carriage, she set to work to turn it into a pie. It was almost time for supper.
