mouth. She had believed that she knew the world;
it was all yet a mystery; the older she grew the less she understood.
Wasn't anybody good? Was everybody to be distrusted? Which way should
she turn now? The world was beautiful enough; it was the people in it.
Poor Betty! She had her troubles, too; but somehow she refused to
confide them. She acted very much as if she were in love.

She gazed at the hawk enviously. How proud and free he was, so high up
there, circling and circling. Even the fox was freer than she; the
forests were his, and he might go whither he listed. And the fish that
leaped in frolic from the water, and the blackbird in the rushes! She
could not understand.

She would never marry Doppelkinn--never.

But how should she escape--how? On Wednesday night she would be given
her quarterly allowance of a thousand crowns, and on Thursday she must
act. . . . Yes, yes, that was it! How simple! She would slip over
into Doppelkinn, where they never would think to search for her. She
knew a place in which to hide. From Doppelkinn she would go straight
to Dresden and seek the protection of her old governess, who would hide
her till the duke came to his senses. If only she had an independent
fortune, how she would snap her fingers at them all!

She was distracted by the sound of jangling steel. Artemis had cast a
shoe. How annoying! It would take ten minutes to reach old Bauer's
smithy, and ten minutes more to put on a shoe. She brought the filly
down to a walk.

What was the use of being a princess if one was not allowed to act in a
royal fashion? It wasn't so terrible to wear men's clothes, and,
besides, they were very comfortable for riding a horse; and as for
riding a bicycle in the public streets, hadn't that ugly Italian
duchess ridden through the streets of Rome, and in knickerbockers, too?
Nobody seemed to mind it there. But in Barscheit it had been little
short of a crime. She recalled the flaming fagots and the red-hot wire
of her unfortunate wheel. A smile rippled over her face, but it passed
quickly. There was nothing left to smile over. They were going to
force her to marry a tomb, a man in whom love and courage and joy were
as dead things. Woe to Doppelkinn, though--woe to him! She would lead
him a dance, wild and terrible.

If only she were Betty, free to do what she pleased, to go and come at
will! She wasn't born to be a princess; she wasn't commonplace enough;
s