of the
name of 'clothes.' And I know enough about people to help you in other
ways. Million, I should be well worth the fifty or sixty pounds a year
you'd pay me as wages."

"Me pay you wages?" little Million almost shrieked. "D'you mean it, Miss
Beatrice?"

"I do."

"You mean for you, a young lady that's belonged to the highest gentry,
with titles and what not, to come and work as lady's-maid to me, what's
been maid-of-all-work at twenty-two pounds a year in your aunt's house?"

"Why not?"

"But, Miss----It's so--so--Skew-wiff; too topsy-turvy, somehow, I
mean," protested Million, the soldier's orphan, in tones of outrage.

I said: "Life's topsy-turvy. One class goes up in the world (that's your
millionaire uncle and you, my dear), while another goes down (that's me
and my aunts and uncles who used to have Lovelace Court). Won't you even
give me a helping hand, Million? Won't you let me take this 'situation'
that would be such a good way out of things for both of us? Aren't you
going to engage me as your maid, Miss Million?"

And I waited really anxiously for her decision.

CHAPTER VIII

I BECOME MILLION'S MAID

THE impossible has happened.

I am "Miss Million's maid."

I was taken on--or engaged, or whatever the right term is--a week ago
yesterday.

I've surmounted all objections; the chief being Million--I mean "Miss
Million"--herself. Her I have practically bullied into letting her
ex-mistress come and work for her. After much talk and many protests, I
said, finally, "Million, you've got to."

And Million finally said: "Very well, Miss Beatrice, if you will 'ave it
so, 'ave it so you will. It don't seem right to me, but----"

Then there was my Aunt Anastasia, the controller of my destiny up to
now. Her I wrote to from that hostelry in Kensington, which was
Million's first "move" from No. 45, the Putney villa. And from Aunt
Anastasia I received a letter of many sheets in length.

Here are a few of the more plum-like extracts:

"When I received the communication of your insane plan,
Beatrice, I was forced to retire to the privacy of my own
apartment"--

(Not so very "private," when the walls are so thin that she can hear the
girls in the adjoining room at No. 46 rustling the tissue-paper of the
box under the bed that they keep their nicest hats in!)

"and to take no fewer than five aspirins before I was able to