I was a fine runner, and started for the pawpaw thicket. Once
there, I paused only one minute to see whether the way to the
stream was clear, and while standing tense and gazing, I heard
something. For an instant it was every bit as bad as at the dry
creek. Then I realized that this was a soft voice singing, and I
forgot everything else in a glow of delight. The Princess was
coming!

Never in all my life was I so surprised, and astonished, and
bewildered. She was even larger than our Sally; her dress was
pale green, like I thought a Fairy's should be; her eyes were
deep and dark as Laddie had said, her hair hung from a part in
the middle of her forehead over her shoulders, and if she had
been in the sun, it would have gleamed like a blackbird's wing.
She was just as Laddie said she would be; she was so much more
beautiful than you would suppose any woman could be, I stood
there dumbly staring. I wouldn't have asked for any one more
perfectly beautiful or more like Laddie had said the Princess
would be; but she was no more the daughter of the Fairy Queen
than I was. She was not any more of a Princess. If father ever
would tell all about the little bauble he kept in the till of his
big chest, maybe she was not as near! She was no one on earth
but one of those new English people who had moved on the land
that cornered with ours on the northwest. She had ridden over
the roads, and been at our meeting house. There could be no
mistake.

And neither father nor mother would want her on our place. They
didn't like her family at all. Mother called them the
neighbourhood mystery, and father spoke of them as the Infidels.