"Yes, Prince. I have gained confidence in you latterly."

"There you are! Thank heaven! Didn't I say that I must succeed in the long run? And so you think now that I am in earnest, real, serious earnest about you and about us?"

"Yes, Prince; latterly I have thought that I can think so."

"At last, at last, irresolute little Imma! Oh, how I thank you, I thank you! But in that case you're not afraid, and will let the whole world know that you belong to me?"

"Let them know that you belong to me, Royal Highness, if it's all the same to you."

"That I will, Imma, loudly and surely. But only on one condition, namely, that we don't only think of our own happiness in a selfish and frivolous way, but regard it all from the point of view of the Ma.s.s, the Whole. For the public weal and our happiness, you see, are interdependent."

"Well said, Prince. For without our studies of the public weal I should have found it difficult to decide to have confidence in you."

"And without you, Imma, to warm my heart, I should have found it difficult to tackle such practical problems."

"Right; then we'll see what we can do, each in our own place. You with your folk and I--with my father."

"Little sister," he answered quietly, and pressed her more closely to him in the dance. "Little bride."

Undoubtedly a peculiar plighting of troth.

To be frank, everything was not yet settled, or nearly settled. Looking back, one must say that, if one factor in the whole had been altered or removed, the whole would have been in imminent danger of coming to nothing. What a blessing, the chronicler feels tempted to cry, what a blessing that there was a man at the head of affairs who faced the music firmly and undaunted, indeed not without a dash of rashness, and did not judge a thing to be impossible just because it had never happened before.

The conversation which Excellency von k.n.o.belsdorff had about eight days after the memorable Court Ball with Grand Duke Albrecht II in the Old Schloss belongs to the history of the times. The day before, the President of Council had presided over a session of the Cabinet, about which the _Courier_ had been in the position to report that questions of finance and the private affairs of the Grand Ducal family had been discussed, and further--added the newspaper in s.p.a.ced type--that complete unanimity of opinion had been reached among the Ministers. So Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff found himself in a strong position towards his young Monarch at the audience; for he had not only the swarming ma.s.s of the people, but also the unanimous will of the Government at his back.

The conversation in Albrecht's draughty study took scarcely less time than that in the little yellow room at Schloss "Hermitage." A pause was made while the Grand Duke had a lemonade and Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff a gla.s.s of port and biscuits. The long duration of the conversation was due only to the importance of the material to be discussed, not to the Monarch's opposition; for Albrecht raised none. In his close frock-coat, with his thin, sensitive hands crossed on his lap, his proud, refined head with its pointed beard and narrow temples raised and his eyelids sunk, he sucked gently with his lower lip against his upper, and accompanied Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff's remarks with an occasional slight nod, which expressed agreement and disagreement at the same time, an uninterested formal agreement without prejudice to his una.s.sailable personal dignity.

Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff plunged straight into the middle of things, and spoke about Prince Klaus Heinrich's visits to Schloss Delphinenort.

Albrecht knew of them. A subdued echo of the events which kept the city and the country on tip-toe had penetrated even into his loneliness; he knew, too, his brother Klaus Heinrich, who had "rummaged" and gossiped with the lackeys, and, then he knocked his forehead against the big table, had wept for sympathy with his forehead--and in effect he needed no coaching. Lisping and reddening slightly, he gave Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff to understand this, and added that, seeing that the other had not intervened, but had caused the millionaire's daughter to be introduced to him, he concluded that Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff approved of the Prince's behaviour, although he, the Grand Duke, could not clearly see what it would lead to.

"The Government," answered Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff, "would set itself in prejudicial and estranging opposition to the will of the people if it thwarted the Prince's projects."

"Has my brother, then, definite projects?"

"For a long time," corrected Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff, "he acted without any plan and merely as his heart dictated; but since he has found himself with the people on terms of reality, his wishes have taken a practical form."

"All of which means that the public approves the steps taken by the Prince?"

"That it acclaims them, Royal Highness--that its dearest hopes are fixed on them."

And now Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff unrolled once more the dark picture of the state of the country, of its distress, of the serious embarra.s.sment.

Where was a remedy to be found? Yonder, only yonder, in the Town Park, in the second centre of the city, in the house of the invalid Money-Prince, our guest and resident, round whose person the people wove their dreams, and for whom it would be a small matter to put an end to all our difficulties. It he could be induced to take upon himself our national finances, their recovery would be a.s.sured. Would he be induced?

But fate had ordained an exchange of sympathy between the mighty man's only daughter and Prince Klaus Heinrich. And was this wise and gracious ordinance to be flouted? Ought one for the sake of mulish, out-of-date traditions to prevent a union which embraced so immeasurable a blessing for the country and its people? For that it did was a necessary hypothesis, from which the union must draw its justification and validity. But if this condition were fulfilled, if Samuel Spoelmann were ready, not to mince words, to finance the State, then this union was not only admissible, it was necessary, it was salvation, the welfare of the State demanded it, and prayers rose to heaven for it, far beyond the frontiers, wherever any interest was felt in the restoration of our finances and the avoidance of an economic panic.

At this point the Grand Duke asked a question quietly, with a mocking smile and without looking up.

"And the succession to the throne?" he asked.

"The law," answered Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff, unshaken, "places it in your Royal Highness's hand to put aside dynastic scruples. With us the grant of an advance in rank and even of equal birth belongs to the prerogatives of the monarch, and when could history show a more potent motive for the exercise of these privileges? This union bears the mark of its own genuineness, preparations have been long in making for its reception in the heart of the people, and your entire princely and State approval would signify to the people nothing more than an outward satisfaction of their inmost convictions."

And Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff went on to speak of Imma Spoelmann's popularity, of the significant demonstration in connexion with her recovery from a slight indisposition, of the position of equal birth which this exceptional person a.s.sumed in popular fancy--and the wrinkles played round his eyes as he reminded Albrecht of the old prophecy current among the people, which told of a prince who would give the country more with one hand than others had given it with two, and eloquently demonstrated how the union between Klaus Heinrich and Spoelmann's daughter must seem to the people the fulfilment of the oracle, and thus G.o.d's will and right and proper.

Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff said a great deal more which was clever, honest, and good. He alluded to the fourfold mixture of blood in Imma Spoelmann--for besides the Anglo-Saxon, Portuguese and German, some drops of ancient Indian blood were said to flow in her veins--and emphasized the fact that he expected the dynasty to benefit greatly by the quickening effect of the mixture of races on ancient stocks. But the artless old gentleman made his greatest effect when he talked about the huge and beneficial alterations which would be caused in the economical state of the Court itself, our debt-laden and sore-pressed Court, through the heir to the throne's bold marriage.

It was at this point that Albrecht sucked most proudly at his upper lip.

The value of gold was falling, the out-goings were increasing--increasing in pursuance of an economic law which held for the Court finances just as much as for every private household; and there was no possibility of increasing the revenues. But it was not right that the monarch's means should be inferior to those of many of his subjects; it was from the monarch's point of view intolerable that soap-boiler Unschlitt's house should have had central heating a long time ago, but that the Old Schloss should not have got it yet. A remedy was necessary, in more than one way, and lucky was the princely house to which so grand a remedy as this offered itself.

It was noteworthy in our times that all the old-time modesty as to busying oneself in the financial concerns of the Court had vanished.

That self-renunciation with which princely families used formerly to make the heaviest sacrifices, so as to keep the public from disenchanting glimpses into their financial affairs, was no longer to be found, and law-suits and questionable sales were the order of the day.

But was not an alliance with sovereign riches preferable to this petty and bourgeois kind of device--a union which would exalt the monarch for ever high above all economic worries and place him in a position to reveal himself to the people with all those outward signs for which they longed?

So ran Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff's questions, which he himself answered with an unqualified Yes! In short, his speech was so clever and so irresistible that he did not leave the Old Schloss without taking with him consents and authorizations, delivered to him with a proud lisp, which were quite comprehensive enough to warrant unprecedented conclusions, if only Miss Spoelmann had done her share.

And so things ran their memorable course to a happy conclusion. Even before the end of December names were mentioned of people who had seen (not only heard tell of) Lord Marshal von Buhl zu Buhl in a fur coat, a top-hat on his brown head, and his gold pince-nez on his nose, get out of a Court carriage at Delphinenort, at 11 o'clock on a snow-dark morning, and disappear waddling into the Schloss. At the beginning of January there were individuals going about the town who swore that the man who, this time also in the morning and in fur coat and top-hat, had pa.s.sed by the grinning negro in plush, through the door of Delphinenort, and, with feverish haste, had flung himself into a cab which was waiting for him, was undoubtedly our Finance Minister, Dr. Krippenreuther. And at the same time there appeared in the semi-official _Courier_ the first preparatory notices of rumours touching an impending betrothal in the Grand Ducal House--tentative notifications which, becoming carefully clearer and clearer, at last exhibited the two names, Klaus Heinrich and Imma Spoelmann, in clear print next each other.... It was no new collocation, but to see it in black on white had the same effect as strong wine.

It was most absorbing to notice what att.i.tude, in the journalistic discussions which ensued, our enlightened and open-minded press took up towards the popular aspect of the affair, namely, the prophecy, which had won too great political significance not to demand education and intelligence to deal satisfactorily with it. Sooth-saying, chiromancy, and similar magic, explained the _Courier_, were, so far as the destiny of individuals was concerned, to be relegated to the murky regions of superst.i.tion. They belonged to the grey middle ages, and no ridicule was too severe for the idiots who (very rarely in the cities nowadays) let experienced pick-pockets empty their purses in return for reading, from their hands, the cards, or coffee-grounds, their insignificant fortunes, or for invoking sound health, for a h.o.m.oeopathic cure, or for freeing their sick cattle from invading demons--as if the Apostle had not already asked: "Doth G.o.d take care for oxen?"

But, surveyed as a whole and restricted to decisive turns in the destiny of whole nations or dynasties, the proposition did not necessarily repel a well-trained and scientific mind, that, as time is only an illusion and, truly viewed, all happenings are stationary in eternity, such revolutions while still in the lap of the future might give the human brain a premonitory shock and reveal themselves palpably to it. And in proof of this the zealous newspaper published an exhaustive composition, kindly put at its disposal by one of our high-school professors, which gave a conspectus of all the cases in the history of mankind in which oracle and horoscope, somnambulism, clairvoyance, dreams, sleep-walking, second-sight, and inspiration had played a role, a most meritorious production, which produced the due effect in cultured circles.

So press, Government, Court, and public closed their ranks in complete understanding, and a.s.suredly the _Courier_ would have held its tongue had its philosophical contributions been premature and politically dangerous at that time--in a word, had not the negotiations at Delphinenort already advanced far in a favourable direction. It is pretty accurately known by now how these negotiations developed, and what a difficult, indeed painful, task our Counsel had in them: the Counsel, to whom as proxy of the Court the delicate mission had fallen of preparing the way for Prince Klaus Heinrich's courtship, as well as the Chief Financial a.s.sessor, who, notwithstanding his infirm state of health, insisted on nursing his country's interests by a personal interview with Samuel Spoelmann.

In this connexion account must be taken firstly of Mr. Spoelmann's fiery and excitable disposition, and secondly of the fact that to the prodigious little man a favourable termination to the business from our point of view seemed far less important than it did to us. Apart from Mr. Spoelmann's love for his daughter, who had opened her heart to him and told him of her pretty wish to make herself useful in her love, our proxies had not one trump to play against him, and he was the last man to whom Dr. Krippenreuther could dictate conditions in virtue of what Herr von Buhl had to offer. Mr. Spoelmann always spoke of Prince Klaus Heinrich as "the young man," and expressed so little pleasure at the prospect of giving his daughter to a Royal Highness to wife, that Dr.

Krippenreuther, as well as Herr von Buhl, were more than once plunged into deadly embarra.s.sment.

"If he'd only learnt something, had some respectable business," he snarled peevishly. "But a young man who only knows how to get cheered ..." He was really furious, the first time a remark was dropped about morganatic marriage. His daughter, he declared once for all, was no concubine, and would be no left-handed wife. Who marries her, marries her.... But the interests of the dynasty and the country coincided at this point with his own. The obtaining of issue ent.i.tled to succeed was a necessity, and Herr von Buhl was equipped with all the powers which Herr von k.n.o.belsdorff had succeeded in extracting from the Grand Duke.

As for Dr. Krippenreuther's mission, however, it owed its success not to the envoy's eloquence, but simply to Mr. Spoelmann's paternal affection, the complaisance of a suffering, weary father, whose abnormal existence had long ago made him a paradox, towards his only daughter and heiress, whom he allowed to choose for herself the public funds in which she wished to invest her fortune.

And so came into existence the agreements, which were at first shrouded in deep secrecy and only came to light bit by bit, as events developed themselves, though here they can be summarized in a few plain words.

The betrothal of Klaus Heinrich with Imma Spoelmann was approved and recognized by Samuel Spoelmann and by the House of Grimmburg.

Simultaneously with the publication of the betrothal in the _Gazette_ appeared the announcement of the elevation of the bride to the rank of countess--under a fancy name of romantic sound, like that which Klaus Heinrich had borne during his educational tour in the fair southern lands; and on the day of their wedding the wife of the heir-presumptive was to be given the dignity of a princess. The two rises in rank, which might have cost four thousand eight hundred marks, were to be free of duty.

The wedding was to be only preliminarily a left-handed one, till the world had got used to it: for on the day on which it appeared that the bride was to be blessed with offspring, Albrecht II, in view of the unparalleled circ.u.mstances, would declare his brother's morganatic wife to be of equal birth, and would give her the rank of a princess of the Grand Ducal House with the t.i.tle of Royal Highness. The new member of the ruling House would waive all claim to an appanage. As for the Court ceremony, only a semi-Court was appointed for the celebration of the left-handed marriage, but a Processional Court, that highest and completest form of showing allegiance, was fixed for the celebration of the declaration of equal birth. Samuel Spoelmann, for his part, granted the State a loan of three hundred and fifty million marks, and on such fatherly conditions that the loan showed all the symptoms of being a gift.

It was the Grand Duke Albrecht who acquainted the Heir Presumptive with these conclusions. Once more Klaus Heinrich stood in the great, draughty study under the battered ceiling-paintings, in front of his brother, as once before when Albrecht had delegated to him his representative duties, and standing in an official att.i.tude received the great news. He had put on the tunic of a major in the Fusiliers of the Guard for this audience, while the Grand Duke had lately added to his black frock-coat a pair of dark-red wool mittens, which his aunt had made him to protect him from the draught through the high windows of the Old Schloss.

When Albrecht had finished, Klaus Heinrich stepped one pace sideways, closed his heels with a fresh salute, and said: "I beg, dear Albrecht, to offer my heart-felt and respectful thanks, in my own name and that of the whole country. For it is you in the long run who make all these blessings possible, and the redoubled love of the people will be your reward for your magnanimous resolutions."

He pressed his brother's thin, sensitive hand, which he kept close to his chest, and extended to him only to the extent of moving his forearm.

The Grand Duke had thrust forward his short, round underlip, and his eyelids were half-closed. He answered softly with a lisp:

"I am the less inclined to entertain illusions about the people's love, as I can, as you know, dispense with such questionable love without a pang. So question whether I deserve it is scarcely worth notice. When it's time to start, I go to the station and give the signal to the engine-driver, which is silly rather than dutiful, but it's my duty. But you're in a different position. You're a Sunday child. Everything turns out trumps for you.... I wish you luck," he said, raising the lids from his lonely-looking, blue eyes. And it was clear at this moment that he loved Klaus Heinrich. "I wish you happiness, Klaus Heinrich--but not too much, and that you may not repose too comfortably in the love of the people. I have already said that everything turns out trumps for you.

The girl of your choice is very strange, very undomesticated, and, most important of all, very original. She has a mixture of blood, I've been told that Indian blood flows in her veins. That's perhaps a good thing.

With a wife like that, there's less danger, perhaps, of your having too easy a time."

"Neither happiness," said Klaus Heinrich, "nor the people's love will have the effect of making me cease to be your brother."

He left to face a difficult interview, a _tete-a-tete_ with Mr.