Gradually, he had ceased to care about that bunch of pigs but had continued felling because it made him feel better, restoring his sense of achievement. At first he had imagined the logs his enemies, the poltroons who had betrayed him and urged him to flee so that they could grab power for themselves. Nearly every day since his exile in 1918 he had chopped or sawn. At eighty, it was an achievement to split a log at all-to see it, even-let alone do it daily. His strokes were regular but the pauses were longer now. They could relax, he thought, and be happy, or busy about their work, which was to his mind the same thing. So long as they could hear him, they would know that all was well with their Kaiser that morning. In the summer air his strokes echoed through the trees, across the park and gardens and into Huis Doorn itself, where those of the household would be listening.
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