cloves, and
all, for the remainder of the morning. Only one escape was left her.
With the swiftness and accuracy of movement which is possible in a
moment of excitement to senses and faculties habitually deft and true,
Diana changed her dress, put on the grey, thick, coarse wrappings which
were very necessary for any one going sleigh-riding in Pleasant Valley,
took her hood in her hand, and slipped down the stairs as noiselessly
as she had gone up. It was not needful that she should go through the
kitchen, where her mother and her visitor were; there was a side door,
happily; and without being seen or heard, Diana reached the barn.

The rest was easy. Prince was fast by his halter, instead of wandering
at will over the sunny meadow; and without any delay or difficulty,
Diana got his harness on and hitched him to the small cutter which was
wont to convey herself and her mother to church and wherever else they
wanted to go in winter time. Only Diana carefully took the precaution
to remove the sleigh bells from the rest of Prince's harness; then she
led him out of the barn where she had harnessed him, closed the barn
doors securely, remembering how they had been left on another occasion,
mounted, and drove slowly away. It had been a dreamy piece of work to
her; for it had so fallen out that she had never once harnessed Prince
again since that June day, when she, indeed, did not harness him, but
had been about it, when somebody else had taken the work out of her
hand. It was very bitter to Diana to handle the bridle and the traces
that _he_ had handled that day; she did it with fingers that seemed to
sting with pain at every touch; her brain got into a whirl; and when
she finally drove off, it was rather instinctively that she went slowly
and made no sound, for Will and his hopes and his wooing and his
presence had faded out of her imagination. She went slowly, until she,
also instinctively, knew that she was safe, and then still she went
slowly. Prince chose his own gait. Diana, with the reins slack in her
hand, sat still and thought. There was no need for hurry; it was not
near church time, not yet even church-going time; Will would be quiet
for a while yet, before it would be necessary to make any hue-and-cry
after the runaway; and she and Prince would be far beyond ken by that
time. And meanwhile there was something soothing in the mere being
alone under the wide grey sky. Nobody to watch her, nothing to exert
herself a