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goodness,” cried Clorinda. “I must fly! Good-bye.”
    “Good-bye,” called the Ordinary Princess.
    She stood at the edge of the forest waving her hand until Clorinda was out of sight. Then she turned and looked up at the walls and towers of the palace.
    “Dragons!” said the Ordinary Princess. “I’ll give them dragons. So they think they can push me off on to any silly prince who kills a dragon, do they!” And she stamped her foot and stuck out her tongue at the palace walls just to relieve her feelings. “Well, you just wait and see!” she said.
    When she was safely back in her room, she took off Clorinda’s dress and apron and Clorinda’s buckled shoes and cotton stockings and hid them behind the amethyst-colored tapestries on the walls. Then she put on one of her own embroidered gowns and went demurely down to supper.
    After supper she said she was tired and would go to bed early. But as soon as Nurse Marta and the ladies-in-waiting had gone, she got up again, lit one of the scented wax candles, and wrote a short letter.
    She propped the letter up in a conspicuous place on the mantel and dressed herself in Clorinda’s clothes. And because it was rather cold, she took her plainest cloak as well. Then she climbed out of the window for the last time.
    There was a full moon, and the forest looked all black and silver and mysterious in the moonlight. But it did not frighten the Ordinary Princess, because she knew it too well and was so fond of it.
    She stopped where the trees began, to wave her hand at the turrets and towers and glistening walls of her home. Then, turning her back on it, she plunged into the forest and was gone.
     
     
    The next day the uproar in the palace was beyond description.
    The flight of the Princess Amy had been discovered by her two ladies-in-waiting, whose duty it was to wake her each morning. But on that particular morning they found that there was no one to wake. The big golden four-poster bed with its amethyst satin draperies was not only empty but had obviously not been slept in, while on the carved marble mantel stood a square white envelope on which was written in large block capitals:
    TO WHOM IT MAY CONCERN
    The ladies-in-waiting evidently thought that it concerned them, or perhaps it was just that their curiosity became too much for them. Anyway, they opened it at once, and when they read the letter inside they both screamed at the top of their voices, and one of them fainted away. The one who didn’t faint called for help and then ran as fast as she could to the Queen.
    The King and Queen were having breakfast together in the sun parlor when the lady-in-waiting burst in on them. She was breathless with excitement and also because she was rather plump and had been running very fast down a great many corridors. “Oh, Your Majesty!” gasped the lady-in-waiting, panting like a goldfish out of water, “Oh, Your Majesty!”
    “Good gracious!” exclaimed the King, dropping his spectacles into the butter. “Is the place on fire?”
    But the lady-in-waiting merely burst into tears and handed the princess’s letter to the Queen.
    It was a very short letter, and this is what it said:
     
    Dear Everyone,
    I think this dragon idea is simply silly and I won’t be shut up in a tower, and what’s more I won’t marry any stupid dragon-slaying prince. In fact I’ve decided that I don’t think I’ll marry anyone ever, so I’ve run away and it’s no use trying to find me, and please don’t worry because I shall be quite all right.
    Love and kisses
Amy.
     
    There were several spelling mistakes.
    The Queen read it, and when she came to the end, she screamed even louder than the two ladies-in-waiting put together and went off into a fit of hysterics. The King knocked over the coffeepot and spilled a new jar of marmalade in his agitation, and search parties were rushed off in every direction with orders to find the princess and bring her back immediately.
    But nobody saw so much