I advise you, dear Lillie, to do as their Majesties desire.  The Crown Princess always wears the sleeves when in Stockholm, and I think it would be more polite and less awkward if you wore them also.

Therefore I had them made.  Thursday came:  my dress was ready and the obnoxious sleeves in their places, I quite admired them, and would not have minded wearing them every day.  Still, I could not but think how a whole ballroom of ladies with them on must have appeared in Queen Christina’s time.

Although it was the duty of the Baroness to accompany me, I was not surprised when I received a long letter explaining how a severe headache had suddenly swooped down on her and would deprive her of that pleasure.

That was her way of getting over this impasse.

The situation was awkward.  This refusal at the eleventh hour was very annoying.  I was not expected alone, but alone I should have to go.  There was no alternative, and the absence of the doyenne must explain itself as best it could.

I arrived in solitary grandeur, and was conducted in state to the salon, where the grande matiresse—­with the sleeves, of course!—­was ready to receive me.  She did not seem in the least surprised at seeing me alone; possibly the doyenne had written her own account of the headache.  I could see that she applauded the stand I had taken, so I felt that if I had lost favor with my colleagues I had gained it at court.

We went together to the salon, where we found the Queen.  She rose and gave me her hand, and I bowed low over it.  She was dressed all in black, with the white satin sleeves conspicuous under a long lace veil which hung from her head.  She is very fine-looking, tall, and imposing, with a quiet and serious manner.  She looks the personification of goodness.

I gave her the letter the Queen of Denmark had sent her.  Then she talked of her brother (Duke of Nassau), and said he had written about me and my singing, when we were both guests at Chateau Furstenberg.  The Queen added, “My brother is not musical” (indeed he was not), “but he said no singing had ever pleased him like yours.”  I bowed and tried not to look incredulous.  “The King,” she said, “is looking forward with great pleasure to seeing you again.  He remembers a certain song you sang.  Was it not ‘Beware,’ or something like that?”

I did not think it unlikely.  I had sung it often enough, goodness knows.

I replied I did sing a song called that.

The dire step had been taken, and as far as sleeves were concerned the incident was closed.

When I reached home I changed my dress and drove to the house of the “suffering” doyenne.  She had not expected such quick inquiries, for she looked the picture of health; and I met on the staircase a court lackey evidently bent on the same errand.  She stammered a great many things about her headache, and how, when she had that particular kind of headache, she was incapacitated from any effort.  I sympathized deeply with her.