charge should spend her time in the open air, but was
doing her best to bring it about that the practise should do her as
little good as possible by choosing the sultriest and most airless spot
on the estate because it was so admirably adapted to her own
comfortable sleeping.

The baroness added nothing to the old-world charm of the garden. Her
eyes were shut, her mouth was open, her face was most painfully
crimson, and from her short, but extremely tip-tilted nose, came the
sound of snoring which the Terror had ascribed to some distant pig.

The princess was warmly--very warmly--dressed for the sweltering
afternoon and sweltering spot; little beads of sweat stood on her brow;
the story-book she had been trying to read lay face downward in her
lap; and she was looking round the simmering garden with a look of
intolerable discomfort and boredom on her pretty pale face.

Then a moving object came into the range of her vision, just beyond the
end-of the wall of pear tree--a moving object against the garden wall.
She could not see clearly what it was; but it seemed to her that a
peach rose and vanished over the top of the wall. She stared at the
part of the wall whence it had risen; and in a few seconds another
peach seemed to rise and disappear.

This curious behavior of English peaches so roused her curiosity that,
in spite of the heat, she rose and walked quietly to the end of the
wall of pear-tree. As she came beyond it, she saw, leaning over the
wall, a fair-haired boy. Even as she saw him something rose and
vanished over the wall far too swiftly for her to see that it was a
landing-net.

Surprise did not rob the Terror of his politeness; he smiled amicably,
raised his cap and said in his most agreeable tone: "How do you do?"

He did not know how much the princess had seen, and he was not going to
make admission of guilt by a hasty and perhaps needless flight, provoke
pursuit and risk his peaches.

"How do you do?" said the princess a little haughtily, hesitating.
"What are you doing up there?"

"I'm looking at the garden," said the Terror truthfully, but not quite
accurately; for he was looking much more at the princess.

She gazed at him; her brow knitted in a little perplexed frown. She
thought that he had been taking the peaches; but she was not sure; and
his serene guileless face and limpid blue eyes gave the suspicion the
lie. She thought that he looked a nice boy.

He gazed at her with growing