orth an ear-piercing
yell that would have done credit to Erebus herself.

All her life the princess had been starved of affection; her mother had
died when she was in her cradle; her father had been immersed in his
pleasures; no one had been truly fond of her; and she had been truly
fond of no one. It is hardly too much to say that she was coming to
adore the Terror. Even at their most violent and thrilling moments his
care for her never relaxed. He rubbed the ache out of her bruises; he
plastered her scratches. He saw to it that she came out of the pool
the moment that she looked chill. He picked out for her the tidbits at
their meals. He even brushed out her hair, for the thick golden mass
was quite beyond the management of the princess; and Erebus firmly
refused to play the lady's-maid. Since the Terror was one of those who
enjoy doing most things which they are called upon to do, he presently
forgot the unmanliness of the occupation, and began to take pleasure in
handling the silken strands.

It was on the fifth day, after a bath, when he was brushing out her
hair in the sun on the top of the knoll that he received the severe
shock. Heaven knows that the princess was not a demonstrative child;
indeed, she had never had the chance. But he had just finished his
task and was surveying the shining result with satisfaction, when, of a
sudden, without any warning, she threw her arms round his neck and
kissed him.

"Oh, you _are_ nice!" she said.

The Terror's ineffable serenity was for once scattered to the winds.
He flushed and gazed round the wood with horror-stricken eyes: if any
one should have seen it!

The princess marked his trouble, and said in a tone of distress: "Don't
you like for me to kiss you?"

The Terror swallowed the lump of horror in his throat, and said,
faintly but gallantly: "Yes--oh, rather."

"Then kiss me," said the princess simply, snuggling closer to him.

The despairing eyes of the Terror swept the woods; then he kissed her
gingerly.

"I _am_ fond of you, you know," said the princess in a frankly
proprietary tone.

The Terror's scattered wits at last worked. He rose to his feet, and
said quickly:

"Yes; let's be getting to the others."

The princess rose obediently.

But the ice was broken; and the kisses of the princess, if not
frequent, were, at any rate, not rare. The Terror at first endured
them; then he came rather to like them. But he strictly enjoined
discre