Reassured as to this by a glance, he climbed to his chair. “We’re all very happy, aren’t we?” he observed. “It’s quite a party. When I grow up I shall ask you both to tea every day.”
That evening the Princess Hedwig went unannounced to her grandfather’s apartment, and demanded to be allowed to enter.
A gentleman-in-waiting bowed deeply, but stood before the door. “Your Highness must pardon my reminding Your Highness,” he said firmly, “that no one may enter His Majesty’s presence without permission.”
“Then go in,” said Hedwig, in a white rage, “and get the permission.”
The gentleman-in-waiting went in, very deliberately, because his dignity was outraged. The moment he had gone, however, Hedwig flung the door open, and followed, standing, a figure of tragic defiance, inside the heavy curtains of the King’s bedroom.
“There is no use saying you won’t see me, grandfather. For here I am.”
They eyed each other, the one, it must be told, a trifle uneasily, the other desperately. Then into the King’s eyes came a flash of admiration, and just a gleam of amusement.
“So I perceive,” he said. “Come here, Hedwig.”
The gentleman-in-waiting bowed himself out. His hands, in their tidy white gloves, would have liked to box Hedwig’s ears. He was very upset. If this sort of thing went on, why not a republic at once and be done with it?
A Sister of Charity was standing by the King’s bed. She had cared for him through many illnesses. In the intervals she retired to her cloister and read holy books and sewed for the poor. Even now, in her little chamber off the bedroom, where bottles sat in neat rows, covered with fresh towels, there lay a small gray flannel petticoat to warm the legs of one of the poor.