“I know. It’s such fun.” She blew me a kiss. “Enjoy your clothes session. If the other bridesmaids are anything like Matty used to look, you’ll be the star and all the men will notice you. Toodle-pip.”

She blew me a kiss.

I found the small salon where a bevy of seamstresses were working away with a clatter of sewing machines while a formidable and unmistakably French little woman in black stalked up and down, waving her arms and yelling. A cluster of young girls stood and sat near the fire, some of them in their underslips, while the little woman took measurements. The other girls seemed to know each other and nodded politely to me. Matty came over, took my hand and introduced me in German, then in English.

“My dearest friend from school” she called me, although this was a slight exaggeration. But I didn’t correct her and returned the smile she gave me. Why was I suddenly so popular when she hadn’t contacted me once since we left Les Oiseaux?

The dresses turned out to be quite lovely and frightfully Parisian chic—a sort of creamy white, long, simple and elegant with a smaller version of the bride’s train behind them. What’s more, contrary to Belinda’s prediction, the other bridal attendants were attractive girls, cousins from German royal houses. One of them was a tall, slim blond girl who looked at me with interest as if she knew me and came over to me.

“You are Georgiana, ja? I was supposed to go to England last summer but I became sick.”

“You must be Hannelore,” I said, light dawning. “You were supposed to stay with me.”

“Ja. I heard about this. It must have been shocking for you. When we are alone you must tell me all.”

I was glad to find that her English in no way sounded like an American gangster movie.

Matty came over to us, wearing her bridal gown, still pinned along the sides. “How do you like the dresses?”

“Lovely,” I said, “and your bridal gown is absolutely gorgeous. You’ll be the prettiest bride in Europe.”

“One has to have some compensations for getting married, I suppose,” she said.

“Don’t you want to get married?”

“If I had my way I’d like to live the bohemian life of an artist in Paris,” she said. “But princesses aren’t allowed any say in the matter.”

“But Prince Nicholas seems really nice, and he’s good-looking too.”

She nodded. “Nicky is all right, as princes go. He’s kind and you’re right. It could certainly have been worse. Think of some of the absolutely awful princes there are.” Then she chuckled. “I gather my brother asked you to marry him.”

“I turned him down, I’m afraid,” I said.