“The people riot, sir; is it because of the war?” she asked timidly.
“It is the Prince’s faction,” he answered abstractedly. “He is extraordinarily beloved by the people, Agneta.”
“He hath done nothing,” she said simply. “Why do they riot?”
“He would be Captain General … and it may not be.”
A colour came into her fair face. “I fear and mislike him!”
John de Witt turned his soft gaze on her.
“Nay, Agneta—do not say that, nor think it.”
Once more the white linen she sewed sank into her lap.
“Sir, the other day on the Voorhout there was a man wearing an orange favour—he had others with him—I was with my aunt Johanna, and when they saw us, these men, they called after us insolently—my Aunt Johanna asked one of them ‘Why?’ He said, ‘We are for the Prince and you are John de Witt’s women’—and the crowd were with them, sir.”
John de Witt frowned and coloured.