It was not unkind of Mrs Thistleton. It was right and suitable. Who should not come out to dinner, but stay and mind the children? Who save Fräulein—Fräulein Friedenburg? It would have been a ludicrous position for Her Royal Highness Princess Vera of Boravia. Leave it to Fräulein Friedenburg!
So, as Fräulein Friedenburg, she passed into our ordinary lives, and out of our ordinary thoughts, as is the way with things when they become familiar. Mrs Thistleton’s courage and talent had saved the situation—and her own face. The Princess was forgotten, and the Thistletons’ nursery governess little heeded. Who does heed a nursery governess much?
But one night, as I turned over the atlas looking for something else, I came on the map of Boravia and saw the city of Friedenburg set astride the great river, dominating the kingdom, a sentinel at the outposts of Western Europe. If Divine Right were not out of fashion, the key of that citadel should have been in the hand which ruled exercise-books for the Thistleton children. For a few moments after that I went on thinking about the nursery governess.
IV
SO Fräulein—she soon came to be called just “Fräulein”—was not at my dinner-party; but two or three weeks later I had a little talk with her. I went up to the Manor one afternoon in October, seeking a game of croquet with Bessie Thistleton—such are our mild delights at Southam Parva—but found the whole family gone off to a Primrose League bazaar at Beechington. Only Fräulein was at home, said the parlour-maid; and Fräulein was visible in the garden, sitting under a tree, turning over the leaves of a big book. I used the privilege of a friend of the house, strolled out on to the lawn, and raised my hat to the—I mean to Fräulein. She smiled brightly and beckoned to me to come and sit by her; her words were beyond reproach, but her gestures were sometimes obstinately un-Fräuleinish, if I may so express myself. I sat down in the other deck-chair and said that it was very fine for so late in the year.
She made no reply and, raising my eyes to her face, I found her looking at me with an unmistakable gleam of amusement.
“Do you think this very funny?” she asked.
“I think it’s deplorable,” I answered promptly.
“It’s very simple. I owe Mr Thistleton two hundred pounds. I do this till I have worked it off.”
“How many years?”