“It has sometimes struck me,” she began hurriedly, “that it was very ill-mannered of me to run away from you. I—I—I escaped by a little door in the stable wall.” A very curious silence followed this remark; then Rosalie continued: “The country beyond was very beautiful—at least, I thought it was. It—it led me to a white house, with a low verandah and a pretty garden. It took me a whole day to go, and the sun was setting when I got there. In the house I met a youth—at least, I thought he was young; but afterwards he told me he was nearly as old as you. But he seemed to grow very quickly in the time that I was staying there. He took me to his father. At first I thought he was very old, because his hair was white. I had just one day’s holiday when I was there, and then I went to live in a little hut all alone, with a plantation in front of it. I sowed a basket of seeds in the ground that the Governor (that is the name I knew him by) had given me. But first I had to dig in the soil, and I didn’t like digging at all; I hated it. After that, everything went by the rule of contrary. The seeds never came up; they grew underneath, and looked to me like very beautiful jewels. But they took a great deal of digging out and freeing from the soil. I took them to the Governor, and he sent them somewhere, I think he said it was to the city, to be tested and valued. But every time they were sent back and marked as rubbish. I’ve never felt quite the same since. I used to feel young before, but ever since I’ve felt as old as old. And I do nothing but pretend all day long, in little and big things alike. I pretend least with you of anyone, and that night I ran away from you in the street (you remember it?) I felt quite surprised, and in one way just a little happy. It made me feel just a little more alive. But after a while the Governor said I had better come back again into the world. I didn’t want to, because there was nowhere to go to, and I did not want to come back to this house again. I was tired of prisons. But when he told me to come back into the world I was obedient, because I knew he was much wiser than anyone that I had ever met before. He was kind to me in some ways, although he never threw kindness away. So one morning I started on the return journey, and Brightcoat came along with me for company.