Everilda instantly slapped them both, and they were so surprised that they let the cat go. It scuttled and scurried off, and so did the Princess. The boys threw stones after her and also after the cat, but fortunately they were both very bad shots and nobody was hit. Even then the Princess would have got safely away, but she saw a boy sitting on a doorstep crying. So she stopped to ask what was the matter. 'I'm hungry,' said the boy, 'and father and mother are dead, and my uncle beat me, so I'm running away----' 'Oh,' said the Princess, 'so am I. What fun! And I've got a horrid uncle, too. You come with me, and we'll find my nurse. _She's_ running away, too. Make haste, or it'll be too late.' But when they got to the corner, it _was_ too late. The revolutionary crowd caught them; they shouted 'Liberty and Soap!' and they sent the boy to the workhouse, and they put the Princess in prison; and a good many of them wanted to cut off her pretty little head then and there, because they thought she would be sure to grow up horrid like her uncle the Regent. But all the people who had ever been inside the palace said what a nice little girl the Princess really was, and wouldn't hear of cutting off her darling head. So at last it was decided to get rid of her by enchantment, and the Head Magician to the Provisional Revolutionary Government was sent for. 'Certainly, citizens,' he said, 'I'll put her in a tower on the Forlorn Island, in the middle of the Perilous Sea--a nice strong tower, with only one way out.' 'That's one too many. There's not to be any way out,' said the people. 'Well, there's a way out of everything, you know,' said the Magician timidly--he was trembling for his own head--'but it's fifty thousand millions to one against her ever finding it.' So they had to be content with that, and they fetched Everilda out of her prison; and the Magician took her hand and called his carriage, which was an invention of his own--half dragon, and half motor-car, and half flying-machine--so that it was a carriage and a half, and came when it was called, tame as any pet dog. He lifted Everilda in, and said 'Gee up!' to his patent carriage, and the intelligent creature geed up right into the air and flew away. The Princess shut her eyes tight, and tried not to scream. She succeeded. When the Magician's carriage got to the place where it knew it ought to stop, it did stop, and tumbled Everilda out on to a hard floor, and went back to its master, who patted it, and gave it a good feed of oil, and fire, and water, and petroleum spirit. The Princess opened her eyes as the sound of the rattling dragon wings died away. She was alone--quite alone. 'I won't stay here,' said Everilda; 'I'll run away again.'