Her mind was at once made up.
There was no time to ask permission of the Queen.

She knew the surgeon's messengers by sight, this one was in the usual livery, and his master's name was duly signed.

In haste she made herself ready, and went forth into the night with the messenger, her heart beating hard, a pitiful anxiety shaking her.

Her steps were fleet between the lodge and the palace.

They were challenged nowhere, and the surgeon's servant, entering a side door of the palace, led her hastily through gloomy halls and passages where they met no one, though once in a dark corridor some one brushed against her.