Wiggins greeted the princess politely; and then he said reproachfully: “You might have told me that she was coming here.”
“You ought to have known as soon as you heard she was missing,” said Erebus sternly.
“So I should, if I’d known you knew her at all,” said Wiggins.
“That’s what nobody knows,” said Erebus triumphantly.
“And look here: she’s here incognita,” said the Terror. “She’s taken the traveling name of Lady Rowington; and she’s not the princess at all. So if you’re asked if the princess is here, you can truthfully say she isn’t.”
“Of course—I see. This is a go!” said Wiggins cheerfully; and he spurned the earth.
“The only chance of her being found is for somebody to come up when we’re not expecting them and see her,” said the Terror. “So I’m going to block the path with thorn-bushes; and any one who comes up it will shout to us. But there’s no need to do that yet; nobody will think about us for a day or two.”
“No; of course they won’t. I didn’t,” said Wiggins.
The active life persisted throughout that day and the days that followed. It kept the princess always beside the Terror. Always he was using his greater strength to help her lead it at the required speed. Never in the history of the courts of Europe has a princess been so hauled, shoved, dragged, jerked, towed and lugged over rough ground. On the second morning she awoke so stiff that she could hardly move; but by the fifth evening she could give forth 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.