blown out the sun. Was it
really evening? Had he been asleep? Only his watch could answer that,
and never had he loved it more dearly. No--it was daytime. Twenty past
twelve--and he would be late----

A long rumbling growl, that seemed to shudder through the wood, so
startled him that it set little hammers beating all over his body. Then
the wind grew angrier--not whispering secrets now, but tearing at the
tree-tops and lashing the branches this way and that. And every minute
the wood grew darker, and the sky overhead was darkest of all--the
colour of spilled ink. And there was Tara--his forgotten
Princess--waiting for him in her high tower; or perhaps she had given up
waiting and gone home.

"Come on, Prince," he said, "we must run!"

The sound of his own voice was vaguely comforting: but the moment he
began to run, he felt as if some one--or Something--was running after
him. He knew there was nothing. He knew it was babyish. But what could
you do if your legs were in a fearful hurry of their own accord?
Besides, Tara was waiting. Somehow Tara seemed the point of safety. He
didn't believe she was ever afraid----

All in a moment the eerie darkness quivered and broke into startling
light. Twigs and leaves and bluebell spears and tiny patterns of moss
seemed to leap at him and vanish as he ran: and two minutes after, high
above the agitated tree-tops, the thunder spoke. No mere growl now; but
crash on crash that seemed to be tearing the sky in two and set the
little hammers inside him beating faster than ever.

He had often watched storms from a window: but to be out in the very
middle of one all alone was an adventure of the first magnitude. The
grandeur and terror of it clutched at his heart and thrilled along his
nerves as the thunder went rumbling and grumbling off to the other end
of the world, leaving the wood so quiet and still that the little
hammers inside seemed almost as loud as the plop-plop of the first big
raindrops on the leaves. But, in spite of secret tremors, he wanted
tremendously to hear the thunder speak again. The childish feeling of
pursuit was gone. His legs that had been in such a fearful hurry, came
to a sudden standstill; and he discovered, to his immense surprise, that
he was back again----

There lay the rug and the cushions under the downward sweeping branches
with their cascades of bright new leaves. No sign of Tara--and the heavy
drops came faster, though they hardly amounted to a s