She had no
eyes for her surroundings, but thought only of her business and what
she wanted to say to the king; suddenly her number, called loudly,
broke in upon her reverie; Panna did not know how it happened, but the
next moment she found herself in a room, which seemed to her fabulously
magnificent, before her stood a figure in the uniform of a general,
which she could not see distinctly because everything swam before her
eyes; she faltered a few words about justice, and fell upon her knees;
the figure bent over her, raised her, said a few gentle, pleasant
words, and took the petition from her trembling hand; then she was once
more in the ante-room, with a hundred confused voices buzzing in her
ears like the roar of distant surf. When the gardener and her father
afterwards asked her for details, she was compelled to answer that she
knew nothing, remembered nothing, had seen and heard nothing clearly;
she only knew that the king had been very kind and took the petition
from her.
From this time Panna was remarkably quiet and composed. She went about
her usual work, attended to her household duties with her usual care,
and seemed to think of the past no longer; at least she did not mention
the painful incidents of which we are cognizant, either to her father
or the gardener, who sometimes visited her, and when the latter once
turned the conversation to them, she replied:
"Let us drop that; the matter is now in the right hands; another head
is considering it, and we need no longer rack our brains about it.
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