For a German
princess of that time she was highly accomplished; she was ardent,
whimsical, with a flashing mentality which rounded out and perfected her
physical loveliness. Above and beyond all this, she had suffered, she
had felt the pangs of poverty, the smart of unrecognized merit; she had
been one of the people, and her sympathies would always be with them,
for she knew what those about her only vaguely knew, the patience, the
unmurmuring bravery of the poor. Never would she become sated with power
so long as it gave her the right to aid the people. Never a new tax was
levied that she did not lighten it in some manner; never an oppressive
law was promulgated that she did not soften its severity. And so the
populace loved her, for it did not take the people long to find out what
she was trying to do for them. And perhaps they loved her because she
had lived the greater part of her young life as one of them.
To-night there was love in the duke's eyes as he looked down the table's
length; there was love in the old chancellor's eyes, too; and in
Carmichael's. And there was love in her eyes as she gazed back at the
two old men. But who could read her eyes whenever they roved in
Carmichael's direction? Not even Gretchen's grandmother, who lived in
the Krumerweg.
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