“Not a cent, so long as you are queen. I’d as lief be hired girl as not, so’s I can fix it that I wait on you. They won’t turn you into a statue while I’m around.” It was only when she was alone with Félicia that Maimie ventured to speak thus freely nowadays. She had fallen quite naturally into the position of her friend’s confidential lady-in-waiting, and had profited by the teachings of Baroness Radnika a good deal more readily than Félicia herself. Her influence was invaluable, said the Baroness, and no one dreamed of the absolute equality to which the two girls returned when they were unobserved. When Princess Amalie arrived, she took a great fancy to Maimie. Félicia was just a little difficult to manage sometimes, she admitted, “but that good creature Logan” could nearly always persuade her to see reason. Princess Amalie was a cheerful old lady, whose temper did not seem to have been soured by the fact that her lack of beauty had driven her family to provide for her by making her a canoness. The semi-conventual title ensured her a position of independence, a sufficient income, and a home at the Stift, or Institution, whenever she was not visiting her relations, which was very seldom, for she made up for not possessing a family of her own by taking the keenest interest in the affairs of her large circle of nephews and nieces. In nearly all the Courts of Europe she was “everybody’s aunt,” and every one confided in her, although she had a perfect genius for betraying secrets to the very people to whom they ought not to be told. Very soon after her arrival at Nice Félicia knew of all the discourteous and uncomplimentary remarks her uncle Don Ramon had made when he found himself forced to acknowledge an American niece, and Maimie had heard a second time that Cyril had advised King Michael to get rid of her before he married Félicia. Both of them had drunk in with keen delight Princess Amalie’s account of the disgust felt by all the younger branches of the Schwarzwald-Molzau family and their relations over Helene’s marriage, and the almost total lack of wedding-presents and royal guests. It was this which pleased Félicia most, but Maimie took an even greater pleasure in the further resolution which seemed to have been generally formed by King Michael’s family, that they would not attend his wedding if Count Mortimer was to be present. Any slight inflicted upon the man who had tried to separate her from Félicia she accepted as a boon to herself, and it happened that there was another person who felt with her.