Poor foolish Little Sweetheart!  It did not take her many seconds to slip into the ragged old stuff gown; then she crept out, keeping close to the walls, so that she could hide behind the furniture if any one saw her.

She listened cautiously at each door before she opened it, and turned away from some where she heard sounds of merry talking and laughing.  In the third room that she entered she saw a sight that arrested her instantly and made her cry out in astonishment,—­a girl who looked so much like her that she might have been her own sister, and, what was stranger, wore a brown stuff gown exactly like her own, was busily at work in this room with a big broom killing spiders!  As the Little Sweetheart appeared in the doorway, this girl looked up, and said:  “Oh, ho! there you are, are you?  I thought you’d be out before long.”  And then she laughed unpleasantly.

“Who are you?” said the Little Sweetheart, beginning to tremble all over.

“Oh, I’m a Prince’s Sweetheart!” said the girl, laughing still more unpleasantly; and, leaning on her broom, she stared at the Little Sweetheart from top to toe.

“But—­” began the Little Sweetheart.

“Oh, we’re all Princes’ Sweethearts!” interrupted several voices, coming all at once from different corners of the big room; and, before the Little Sweetheart could get out another word, she found herself surrounded by half a dozen or more girls and women, all carrying brooms, and all laughing unpleasantly as they looked at her.

“What!” she gasped, as she gazed at their stuff gowns and their brooms.  “You were all of you Princes’ Sweethearts?  Is it only for one day, then?”

“Only for one day,” they all replied.

“And always after that do you have to kill spiders?” she cried.

“Yes; that or nothing,” they said.  “You see it is a great deal of work to keep all the rooms in this Court clean.”

“Isn’t it very dull work to kill spiders?” said the Little Sweetheart.

“Yes, very,” they said, all speaking at once.  “But it’s better than sitting still, doing nothing.”

“Don’t the Princes ever speak to you?” sobbed the Little Sweetheart.

“Yes, sometimes,” they answered.

Just then the Little Sweetheart’s own Prince came hurrying by, all in armor from head to foot,—­splendid shining armor, that clinked as he walked.

“Oh, there he is!” cried the Little Sweetheart, springing forward; then suddenly she recollected her stuff gown, and shrunk back into the group.  But the Prince had seen her.

“Oh, how d’ do!” he said kindly.  “I was wondering what had become of you.  Good-bye!  I’m off for the grand review to-day.  Don’t tire yourself out over the spiders.  Good-bye!” And he was gone.

“I hate him!” cried the Little Sweetheart, her eyes flashing, and her cheeks scarlet.

“Oh no, you don’t!” exclaimed all the spider-sweepers.  “That’s the worst of it.  You may think you do; but you don’t.  You love him all the time after you’ve once begun.”