road runs they could not feel the keen wind that was blowing up on
Exmoor. The waters of the Sym, whose windings they followed, gurgled
over their stones almost as quietly as in summer. There was a fresh
wet smell, consoling and delicious after the train, the smell of
country puddles and country mud and dank dead leaves that had been
rained upon all day. Fritzing sat with the Princess on the back seat
of the dog-cart, and busied himself keeping the rug well round her,
the while his soul was full of thankfulness that their journey should
after all have been so easy. He was weary in body, but very jubilant
in mind. The Princess was so weary in body that she had no mind at
all, and dozed and nodded and threatened to fall out, and would have
fallen out a dozen times but for Fritzing's watchfulness. As for
Annalise, who can guess what thoughts were hers while she was being
jogged along to Baker's? That they were dark I have not a doubt. No
one had told her this was to be a journey into the Ideal; no one had
told her anything but that she was promoted to travelling with the
Princess and that she would be well paid so long as she held her
tongue. She had never travelled before, yet there were some
circumstances of the journey that could not fail to strike the most
inexperienced. This midnight jogging in the dog-cart, for instance. It
was the second night spent out of bed, and all day long she had
expected every moment would end the journey, and the end, she had
naturally supposed, would be a palace. There would be a palace, and
warmth, and light, and food, and welcome, and honour, and appreciative
lacqueys with beautiful white silk calves--alas, Annalise's ideal, her
one ideal, was to be for ever where there were beautiful white silk
calves. The road between Ullerton and Symford conveyed to her mind no
assurance whatever of the near neighbourhood of such things; and as
for the dog-cart--"_Himmel_," said Annalise to herself, whenever she
thought of the dog-cart.