"I must have overlooked that house on my house-hunting expeditions in the spring."
"Clearly, or you would have taken it. There is a little clay figure standing on a lawn near the garden hedge."
"Can't remember. But do you know, Therese, it is really nice of you to have taken all this trouble for us, as well as your mother. More than nice." He thought of adding "when one takes your strenuous life into consideration," but suppressed it.
"Why are you surprised?" asked Therese. "I am very fond of Anna."
"Do you know what I once heard some one say about you?" replied George after a short pause.
"Well, what?"
"That you would either finish up on the scaffold or as a princess."
"That's a phrase of Doctor Berthold Stauber. He once told it me himself, you know. He is very proud of it, but it is sheer nonsense."
"The betting at present is certainly more on the princess."
"Who says so? The princess dream will soon be over!"