Ilse was equally rejoiced when her father wrote to her:
"Ilse, are you a witch? An order has been given to begin building the road immediately; the surveyor is already here to mark it out."
At dinner Ilse took the letter out of her pocket with great delight, saying:
"Read, you incredulous man, and see what our little Prince has been able to accomplish; after all we did him injustice. My poor gray excited his pity, and he wrote everything to his dear father."
The next time that Ilse met the Hereditary Prince, she began, after the first greeting, in a low voice:
"My home owes warm thanks to your Highness, who has had the kindness to exert yourself for our road."
"Is it to be built?" asked the Prince, surprised.
"Does not your Highness know it? Your intercession has induced his Grace, your father, to have it made."
"My intercession would have had little effect," continued the Prince. "No, no," he added, earnestly disowning it. "I did not write to my father. It was altogether his own decision."
Ilse remained silent: she could not understand what should prevent the son of a Prince from openly laying before his father a request on a matter of business, the fulfillment of which would be beneficial to many; that he should disown all participation in what he had evidently done, appeared to her a quite inappropriate display of modesty.