"Liebes Kind, are your promises of no value? Did you not promise to keep your mouth shut, and not betray the Princess's confidence? Did she not seek you out from all the others for the honour of keeping her secrets? And you will, after one week, divulge them to a stranger? You will leave her service? You will return to Kunitz? Is it well so?"
"C'est l'amour, c'est l'amour," sang Annalise, swaying.
"Is it well so, Fräulein?" repeated Fritzing, strangling a furious desire to slap her.
"Did you speak?" inquired Annalise, pausing in her song.
"I am speaking all the time. I asked if it were well to betray the secrets of your royal mistress."
"I have been starved," said Annalise.
"You have had the same fare as ourselves."
"I have been called names."
"Have I not expressed—regret?"
"I have been treated as dirt."