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CHAPTER XX
"AUNTIE MAJESTY" AND HER FROCKS

Bertha on Her Dignity – On Thin Ice – Barbara Wants to Know – The Empress's Toilette

"And now for a good talk," said Barbara, with a look upon the tirewoman who had accompanied Bertha to Court. "Tell me all about Auntie Majesty's 'Martha.'"

"Oh, she's far more important than this one," Bertha replied, patting the "Frau's" cheek; "a Baroness like Mamma and in the Almanach de Gotha."

"Better looking too than our Martha, is she not?" mocked Barbara.

"I won't go as far as that. She is too tall and angular and spinster-like, and has a nose like Herr Krause – always red."

"Does she drink?" inquired Barbara.

"No," said Martha, thrusting out her formidable bosom; "she laces too tight, poor thing!"

It was after ten p.m., and Barbara ought to have been in one of two white-and-pink beds gracing the Young Misses' Chamber in Villa Huegel, but Frau Krupp was away in Cologne and Martha the most indulgent of governesses. Hence it had not been necessary for Bertha to exert her authority to gain an hour out of bed for sister.

Bertha, who was sitting on a low "pouf," was convulsed with laughter at Martha's pantomime. Shrieking, she knocked her forehead against her knees, Barbara joining.

"And Auntie Majesty's Martha – the Baroness, I mean – does she put out the linen and mend silk stockings and serve tea on the waitress's day out?" continued Barbara her inquiries.

"Why not ask whether she makes the help's beds?" demanded Martha; and then, in her drastic manner: "You are a baby, Fraulein Barbara."

But the Krupp heiress treated the question seriously. "No," she replied, assuming an air of superiority. "The Baroness tells the Empress what is fit to wear."

"Unfit, Fraulein means to say," whispered Martha.

"And besides – " continued Bertha.

"She tyrannises over the lower servants, such as Lenchen and me." Barbara laughed heartily at Martha's sallies, but Bertha "had an attack of dignity," as Barbara put it, and said to Martha: "Come now, who was in Auntie Majesty's confidence, you or I?"

"Fraulein certainly had the run of Her Majesty's rooms, and I do hope they were nicer and cleaner than Fraulein's," bristled up Martha.

"Don't quarrel," pleaded Barbara. "Soon it will be eleven, and then both of you will shout 'bed' until you are hoarse. Do go on, Bertha, and don't you dare interrupt her again, Martha."

"Well," said Bertha, "I promised – " She settled down in the big velvet fauteuil nearest the fire and assumed an oldish mien.

"I was sometimes present when the Baroness and Auntie Majesty discussed new frocks and hats," she continued, "and I think if Mamma was in Madame von H.'s place, Her Majesty would be – what shall I say? – more tastefully dressed.

"Once she persuaded Auntie Majesty to accept a hat that made her look seventy to a day: Gold lace and heliotrope velvet. I will buy Granny one like it next time I go to Düsseldorf. At first Auntie did not seem to care for it at all, but the Baroness made such a fuss. 'Majesty looks enchanting,' she kept saying."

Here Martha dropped the courtliest of curtsies, "flapping her arms like wings" – Barbara's description.

"'Charming,' 'ever youthful,' continued Bertha, imitating the Baroness.

"The right sort of talk too," said Martha. "Tell a woman of our age – mine and Auntie Majesty's – that we look like sweet sixteen, with a teapot for a bonnet, and we will wear it even at the opera."

"Well, did Auntie get Granny's hat?" asked Barbara.

"She did, and wore it when we went to the children's matinée at the theatre in the Neues Palais; and I heard her sister, Princess Frederick Leopold, tell her: 'Thank your stars that Will is not coming. He would certainly advise you to send your new chapeau to – '" Bertha stopped short.

"To?" asked Barbara, flipping a slipper in the air and catching it on her naked foot.

"I can't tell," said Bertha; "it was not intended for me anyhow."

Barbara looked at Martha. "You say it."

"It commences with an 'H.'"

"Hohenlohe – Grandma Hohenlohe," explained Bertha quickly.

Barbara was thinking hard. "No, she did not say Hohenlohe; and, besides, she is dead."

"Getting warm," murmured Martha.

"Now you stop." Bertha looked very serious. "The Princess Leopold referred to their grandmother, of course. What else should she have in mind?"

The tirewoman bent low over Barbara's ear. "Majesty's Jaeger told me that the War Lord is in the habit of consigning old lady relatives of his to a hot place, whether dead or alive."

Barbara clapped her hands. "I know," she laughed; "you need not try and keep things from this child, Bertha. I was not born yesterday."

"I shall tell Mamma, and you will get it too, Martha." The Krupp heiress was on her dignity once more.

"Why not put me across your knee and spank me?" said Barbara derisively. Then, coaxingly: "Do go on, Bertha; it is all so interesting; and if Martha does not behave (stamping her foot) she will leave the room this minute. Did you hear what I said, Martha?"

"Indeed, Your Majesty, and the other Majesty will now proceed," mocked the tirewoman, who was unimpressed, having known the girls "all their born days."

"Well," began Bertha anew, "there were a few days of Court mourning while I was in Berlin, and I had to wear all white, no jewellery, no flowers. All the gentlemen had mourning-bands around their left arm, and Uncle Majesty wore the uniform of Colonel of Artillery – black and velvet."

"Auntie was in black too – silk, of course, and heavy enough to stand by itself; but at her throat I saw a large diamond brooch."

"'That will get Mother into trouble if the old man peeps it,' observed the Crown Prince, who took me in to dinner, and who knows all the English and French slang."

"How perfectly delightful he must be!" cried Barbara.

Bertha continued: "'Why?' I asked."

"'Mourning and brilliants – absurd,' whispered Wilhelm Wiseacre. But Uncle Majesty either did not see, or knew less than his talented son, and Auntie escaped a scolding that time."

"Scolding a Queen. You are joking," cried Barbara.

Before the Krupp heiress could speak, Martha delivered herself of a few "Mein Gotts."

"Oh," she said, "royal ladies are just like other girls' mammas."

"Like Aunt Pauline and Rosa?"

"Well, yes. They have a husband, children and an allowance."

"An allowance? I thought they were wallowing in gold pieces like you, sister," said Barbara, loojving up admiringly at the older girl.

"I suppose Auntie Majesty has about a million per year to dress on," said Bertha loftily.

"A million," repeated Frau Martha contemptuously. "Fraulein ought to have heard some of the stories the maids told me about Auntie Majesty's lingerie. One of them used to be dresser to a French diva, whatever that is, and on the Q.T. – "

Bertha was anxious to change the subject, and remarked, with a hard look upon Martha: "And the troubles they have with servants! One afternoon on Bal-Paré night Auntie's coiffeur did not show up – sickness, or something of the kind – and the Baroness did her hair. 'How very frail,' I thought, particularly as Auntie was going to wear the grand tiara with the Regent diamond. However, the head-dress, being so very heavy, is put on only before she enters the royal box.

"Her Majesty was fully dressed when Uncle's Jaeger handed in a dispatch from Queen Victoria, asking about Prince Joachim. She immediately sat down to write an answer, and as she leaned over the paper – for she is rather short-sighted – the whole coiffure came down in a heap. I never saw her cross before, but I tell you – " Bertha checked herself.

"Now about the jewellery," cried Barbara. "She has wagon-loads of them, has she not?"

"Of her own, no more than Mamma, I guess, for those you read so much about on festive occasions belong to the State, and the Baroness is responsible for their safety. Once, I was told, she left a valise containing several Crown jewels and some of Auntie's own in the Imperial saloon carriage when they were going to Stuttgart. Through the stupidity of a guard the valise got misplaced, and was discovered only a month later in an out-of-the-way railway station. That time Uncle Majesty himself lectured the Baroness, ordering her at the same time to use her own baronial fingers to sew the diamond buttons on Her Majesty's dresses. Furthermore, to make sure that the fastenings of ear-rings, brooches, bracelets and chains, etc., were intact."

Barbara wanted to know whether the Berlin Crown jewels were as fine as Queen Victoria's in the Tower of London.

"Not quite," said Bertha thoughtfully.

The child nodded. "I know, for when I asked Miss Sprague whether the Regent was as beautiful as the Koh-i-noor, she said: 'You might as well liken your shabby German South-West Africa to the Indian Empire, Miss Barbara.'"

"Don't let the War Lord hear that!" Frau Martha raised a warning finger.

"Now about the dresses! She wears a new one every day, doesn't she?"

"At least she never wears the same twice unaltered."

"What jolly shopping!" cried Barbara. "Does she go round herself? I would."

"That's the ladies' – the Baroness and the Mistress of the Robes – business, of course. She sees the fashion through their eyes and, when Auntie is ill-dressed, the blame really attaches to her women. One morning Auntie called me in and said: 'Bertha, what do you think of my dinner toilet for to-night?'

"The gown on the mannequin was of light red silk with white flounces and blue train, set off by rosebuds."

"Kakadoo!" laughed Barbara.

"That's how it struck me," said Bertha. "But there stood the Baroness pleased as Punch about the new 'creation,' and certainly expected me to say something nice. I was in despair, but Auntie Majesty came to my rescue. 'It's quite impossible,' she said, 'isn't it? Tell Schwertfeger and Moeller – '

"She did not finish, but took up the Alnumach de Gotha lying on the dressing-table. 'I thought so – Wilhelmina's colours. If Wilhelm had seen me in this, he would have said: "You are rushing things, Dona. Wait till we annex Holland."' Then she turned to the Baroness: 'Have it unripped at once. The silks shall be used any way except in this absurd combination. I will wear white this evening.'"

"To bed at once; enough for to-night," ordered Frau Martha, turning back the clothes on Barbara's bed.

CHAPTER XXI
THROTTLING BAVARIA

The Etiquette of Dress – Bülow in a Fix – That "Place in the Sun" – "That Idiot Bismarck" – Prussianize the British Empire

In the grandchamber where Bismarck sat so long enthroned and Caprivi, the general "commanded to the office," as he might have been ordered to occupy a bastion, spent troublesome years; at the desk where Prince Hohenlohe's thoughtful face shone between colossal oil-lamps; in the very chair where the Iron One swore lustily at petty kings, sat Bernhard von Bülow, Chancellor and Major-General.

Don't forget the Major-General, for the War Lord had more trouble making him that than conferring the Imperial Chancellorship. Military titles are sadly embroidered with precedents and rules and things.

Frederick the Great used to own silk mills, therefore his ministers of State were compelled to wait upon him in satin breeches and long-tailed satin coats, and no man who loved his job would appear more than six times in the same garments before the Majesty, since the royal merchant would have considered himself cheated out of the sale of so many ells. Frederick's descendant, the War Lord, is interested in army cloth – hence his dislike for mufti.

Jovial, talkative, on good terms with himself, Bernhard felt quite guilty in his velvet jacket – a present from the Princess, his wife – when he heard a sharp voice call out his name. It came from the garden path adjoining the high French windows.

"Must be coming from the War Ministry. What's up?" thought the Chancellor, ringing frantically for a dress coat. If those sentinels would only challenge Majesty, there might be time to change.

In the summer of 1905 the proverbial Bülow luck was still in full swing. At the moment it sent Phili Eulenburg to the rescue, for the ex-ambassador, still undisgraced, was, as usual, in attendance upon the War Lord.

"Fine chap, that," said Phili, pointing to one of the sentinels who guarded the inner court of the Chancellor Palace; "may I put him through the paces just to show I did not get my epaulettes for form's sake?"

"Anything as long as you don't make me ridiculous, Phili." Maybe the War Lord was curious to see whether his friend had any military talents. Perhaps he remembered that Bismarck, talking to Maximilian Harden or Moritz Busch, let drop a remark to the effect that persons of the Eulenburg type made great generals – sometimes, vide Alcibiades, Cæsar, Peter the Great, Frederick, etc. – good diplomats never!

"Advance," "retreat," "right," "left," "charge," "about face," crowed Phili, repeating the last order several times.

"Pack ein" ("Cheese it!"), said the War Lord, "if these are the only commands you remember." However, when the pair entered through the glass doors, Bernhard, to his intense satisfaction, was resplendent in a frock-coat, with the ribbon of the Red Eagle in buttonhole, Majesty missing the chance to scold him for a sybarite. To Wilhelm's mind, male humanity is "nude" when unaccoutred with knapsack and bayonet, or else unshrouded in evening dress at nine a.m. Bülow had flatly refused to array himself en fracin daytime, and in his hussars' breeches he always fidgeted "in a nerve-racking way." So he must be allowed a Prince Albert coat – Chancellor's exclusive privilege, of course! Bismarck used to ride to the old Kaiser's palace in a fatigue cap, but at the door donned the steel helmet. But let none of lesser rank and importance imitate these worthies.

"Here's a pretty kettle of fish," said the War Lord, acknowledging Bülow's respectful greetings by a wave of the hand. "Phili tells me that Victor will require pretty strong proof it's defensive before he joins our war. And Udo has secured tell-tale correspondence to the same effect, which will be sent to you presently."

"Italy making demands before she has even lost a battle?" cried Phili, without indicating quotation marks.

Bülow knew of course that the bon mot was Bismarck's, but the War Lord thought it original. "Don't repeat that to the Princess, please," he said to Bülow, "lest she put our Phili on her index. As to Victor, what do you think of the ingrate?"

"With Your Majesty's permission, I rather think that the information" (Bülow looked straight at Eulenburg, then thought better of it) "of – Count Wedell is not well founded. Your Majesty knows how such rumours arise. Maybe King Victor has, at one time or another, expressed himself to the effect that he meant strictly to adhere to the stipulations of the Triple Alliance, whereupon some person in the secret found out that the Triple Alliance obliges Italy to take up arms only in case Germany or Austria are attacked. Presto, the mischief-maker concludes that King Victor is not in sympathy with Germany's world politics, etc. etc."

"Maybe, but Udo's and Phili's reports must be sifted to the bottom," commanded the War Lord. "I told Wedell to put a man of pronounced political instinct on the work – an Italian, of course; there shall be a wrestling match between Dago cunning and German political shrewdness."

Up to then the War Lord had spoken quite to the point. Now he indulged in one of those saltomortales of uncontrolled thought that tends to incoherency.

"We must get rid of Otto," he said abruptly, pounding his knee with his terrible right.

Prince Bismarck's Christian name had been Otto, and Wilhelm got rid of him. Count Bülow, perceiving no connection with matters discussed, wondered whether the War Lord had reference to the former occupant of the Chancellor Palace, or maybe to a dog or horse. So, to be on the safe side, he smiled broadly and asserted: "Precisely, Your Majesty."

"Of course, there is that Schweinhund (pig-dog) Ruprecht."

Bülow began to scent a connection; however, the War Lord saved him further cogitation by doing all the talking.

"A madman, this Ruprecht; thinks his petty State an Indian Empire. Period: Thirteenth century, or thereabout. Dwells longingly on such scenes as Mohammed Toghlak enacted, having hundreds of rebels tossed about by elephants on steel-capped ivories, and then trampled to death to the sound of trumpets and beating of drums. 'I would like to treat our Socialists that way,' he told me time and again."

"Using wild boars instead of elephants, I suppose," said Phili. The sally caused the War Lord much merriment.

"Egad," he laughed, "your mileage from Liebenberg is not thrown away; you liquidate the bill by bons mots every time."

"I dare you tell the Reichstag," cried Phili.

"Bülow shall," said the War Lord; "but" – facing the Chancellor once more – "those muttons! With Italy a possible quantité négligeable, we must make doubly sure of Bavaria's unquestioned and enthusiastic support of Berlin. Now, Phili, who has been living there many years, tells me that the Bavarian people as a whole – "

"The great unwashed," put in Phili, who will live up to his reputation as a wit or burst – in Germany one need not be a Mark Twain to succeed.

"The Bavarian unwashed," repeated the War-Lord, "do not like Prussia. The only means of gaining national support for our war in Bavaria, then, is by favour of the Crown. Otto's is a harlequin's cap, and you can't ask people to rally around a War Lord more beast than man, and certainly as crazy as a march-hare. It follows: we need a sane man in Munich, Bülow – nothing short of a sane man will serve our purpose. I understand that Maximilian Joseph, 'the creature of that upstart, Napoleon,' had a royal diadem built which has never been used. Pull it from the vaults of the Munich Hofburg, Bülow, and place it on Luitpold's head, and if he persists in his silly refusal, on Ludwig's."

"Majesty knows these gentlemen's objections: 'There can be no real king in Bavaria, they say, until the constitutional incumbent is dead,'" spoke the Chancellor gravely.

"Then kill Otto," cried the War Lord. "What, miss our place in the sun for a madman! Not if I know Wilhelm, Imperator Rex. Briefly, Bülow, as there is no king in Bavaria, we must make one – one who recognises that he is Rex Bavariæ par la grace de Roi de Prusse and, accordingly, is willing to do the King of Prussia's bidding."

"But the people, will they rally to a standard bearer of that kind?" asked the Chancellor.

"The mob," cried the War Lord. "What has the mob to do with it? We show him a puppet in ermine and purple with Maximilian Joseph's unused crown on his silly pate, and 'hurrah,' 'Heil Dir im Siegeskranz.'"

"With the aid of the loyal Press," suggested Phili.

"Of course, the Press bandits are part and parcel of the plebs; let Königgrätzerstrasse see to them at once. And, Bülow," continued the War Lord, "the Norddeutsche Allgemeine– not a word!"

"That's where Majesty shows his wisdom," said Phili, nearly doubling up in a profound bow. And as the War Lord seemed to enjoy the compliment, he added: "I am not the bird to befoul his own nest; but if it be true, as the London papers sometimes assert, that Germany produces no real diplomats, I point to Your Majesty and say: Here stands the greatest of them all, greater than Cavour and Bismarck, Talleyrand and Wotton."

"Talleyrand was a great liar," mused the War Lord.

"And preserved Prussia." This from the Chancellor.

"My motto," said Wilhelm, "is: 'Keep a silent tongue where one's own interests are concerned, lest the itch of controversy produce a scab that even the unknowing may perceive.' He was boldly plagiarising Wotton, but if his auditors noticed the theft they were wise enough to keep it to themselves.

"Your Majesty's idea is that, in case Italy prove disloyal, Bavaria must act the buffer, the people offering stubborn resistance."

" – stubborn!" cried the War Lord, striding toward the great wall where a series of maps were displayed on rollers. Of course Phili got ahead and pushed the button. " – stubborn!" repeated Wilhelm. "Look at the Bavarian frontier – as naked of fortresses as a new-born babe of a dinner dress – no defensive works to speak of. If the Italians make good their threats against Austria and reach Innsbruck, good-bye Munich! The whole of Bavaria would be at the mercy of the Dago dogs of war! Bülow," cried the War Lord, "Phili brought documents to show that the Italian General Staff is mapping out a road to Berlin via Munich, Leipzig, Potsdam. That idiot Bismarck," he added, with an oath, "the question of collars and epaulettes was not the only one he decided in favour of the Bavarians. Four years previously he failed to squeeze Bayreuth out of them – Bayreuth, one of the Hohenzollerns' earliest possessions. With small pressure he might have regained the principality in 1866 in place of the miserable few millions of thalers as war indemnity that the Bavarians had to pay. We could have made Bayreuth-land an armed camp, a second Heligoland, as it-is-to-be!"

The "collars and epaulettes affair," to which the War Lord referred, cropped up in November, 1870, during the pourparlers for the Bavarian-Prussian treaties. King Ludwig insisted that Bavarian army officers should continue to wear the badge of their rank on their collar, while King Wilhelm said their shoulder straps were the correct place. The Chancellor, Bismarck, saved the situation by arguing: "If in ten years' time, perhaps, the Bavarians are arrayed in battle against us, what will history say when it becomes known that the present negotiations miscarried owing to collars and epaulettes?"

No wonder Prince Pless (Hans Henry XI., late father-in-law of Princess Mary, néeCornwallis-West) said to the Iron Chancellor: "Really, if at the time we were discussing the criminal code we had known what sort of people these Sovereigns are, we should not have helped to make the provisions against lèse-majesté so severe."

"Now if Bayreuth were in our hands," continued the War Lord, "the Italians could whistle for the new road to Berlin, as the English can for the promenade to Hamburg, since Salisbury, good old man – God rest his soul – presented us with that little islet in the North Sea."

"Maybe Bavaria could be induced to fortify her frontiers on the Austrian border," suggested the Chancellor.

"And I postpone my war until half a dozen Liéges and Namurs and Metzs and Strassburgs are built – man alive," thundered the War Lord. "Life is short, and the longer England and France are left in possession of the best colonies, the harder it will be for us to Prussianise them when things are being adjusted to our liking."

"Prussianise England and France, excellent idea, très magnifique!" crowed Phili the irrepressible.

"Not quite so fast," said the War Lord. "I was thinking of India and Ceylon, of Cochin China and Tonking, of Algeria, Hongkong, the Straits Settlements and the French Congo, of Madagascar and Natal, of Rhodesia, Gibraltar, the Senegal and other dainties in the colonial line."

"Even so – a jolly mouthful for Prussianisation, Majesty."

"You don't suppose I would tolerate the loose discipline encouraged by Downing Street and Quai d'Orsay," cried the War Lord. "Subject peoples and tribes must have a taste of the whip and spur. Where would Poland be without them – yes, and Alsace-Lorraine! But those Bavarians, Bülow. I hope I made it perfectly clear that Otto must go and that severest pressure must be brought on Luitpold."

"Together with the Italian problem, the matter shall have my closest attention," said the Chancellor.

"And don't forget that they are a crazy lot at best, and hand and glove with Franz Ferdinand's black masters."

"Matters can't be hurried, though," ruminated Bülow, "and I am afraid there is little store to be set by Luitpold."

"His ambition is to go thundering down the ages as the man who refused a crown," sneered Phili.

"Thank Heaven he is eighty-four," said the War Lord piously.

"And Ludwig tickled to death with the idea of becoming king," added Eulenburg.

The War Lord was making his adieux, when he suddenly turned upon Bülow. "What are you going to do with Ruprecht?"

"Promise him a field marshal's baton in our war."

"The right bait," assented Wilhelm, "but I pity the country under his supreme command. Do you know," he added, "that the lowest of his subjects would not permit him to cross his threshold?"