If Madame Misset felt some concern at the thought of the impending journey‒if not for her own sake, at least for that of her husband, she expressed none, except on her Highness’s account. However, her Highness gaily laughed at hardship and difficulty, and was not at all depressed at having left her mother in the castle-prison. Her only fear was that she should be missed from the castle before she had got clear of Innsbruck. But matters were too well arranged for so speedy a termination of the romance. By two o’clock of the windy spring morning the travelling carriage was ready, the Tyrolese landlord and landlady little suspecting, as they sped their parting guests, that the second lady who entered it in cloak and mask was any other than that sister of the Comtesse de Cernes who had arrived four days before. ‘Oh, my good Papa Wogan!’ exclaimed the latest addition to the party of pilgrims, as they were rolled into the darkness of that wild night, ‘how delighted I am to be free again, and about to join my royal consort! I owe more than I can express to all, but most to you!’ Which she might well say, seeing that it was ‘Papa Wogan’ who had selected her as the bride of this consort to whom her devotion was so great. She chattered brightly away, with the natural vivacity of eighteen in an adventure, rejoicing in her new-found freedom however cold it might be; and the only clouded face in the carriage was that of the Comtesse de Cernes. She was anxious on account of the vivacious little man who had formerly been postillion, and who was now riding far behind the carriage with his tall companion, to keep at bay possible couriers, who might soon be hurrying to the border fortresses with news that a prisoner had escaped the vigilance of General Heister at the Castle of Innsbruck. The two gentlemen in the carriage assured her that no harm would happen to two such dashing cavaliers; but perhaps the comtesse thought that to those who are safe it is easy to talk of safety. Not that any of the party were really safe, but the cheerfulness of the young lady, whose passport was shewn at all the towns as made out for the sister of the Comtesse de Cernes, seemed to preclude the idea of peril to her companions. At Venice the mind of the comtesse was finally set at ease by the reappearance of the outriders, telling a funny unscrupulous sort of story about having fallen in on the road with a courier from Innsbruck, to whom they made themselves very agreeable, and whom they finally left hopelessly tipsy at an inn near Trent. ‘It was very wrong of you, Messieurs,’ said the escaped fugitive, ‘to make him drink so much; you ought to have tied him up somewhere. But I thank you very much for all the dangers you incurred for my sake; and I assure all of you, my good friends, that your king and queen will never forget you.’