I BECOME AN ANCESTOR
True to the promise she had extracted from me, I laid off my workmen
the next morning. They trooped in bright and early, considerably
augmented by fresh recruits who came to share the benefits of my
innocuous prodigality, and if I live to be a thousand I shall never
again experience such a noisome half hour as the one I spent in
listening to their indignant protests against my tyrannical oppression
of the poor and needy. In the end, I agreed to pay them, one and all,
for a full day's work, and they went away mollified, calling me a true
gentleman to my face and heaven knows what to my back.
I spoke gently to them of the sick baby. With one voice they all
shouted:
"But _our_ babies are sick!"
One octogenarian--a carpenter's apprentice--heatedly informed me,
through Schmick, that he had a child two weeks old that would die
before morning if deprived of proper food and nourishment. Somewhat
impressed by this pitiful lament, I enquired how his wife was getting
along. The ancient, being in a placid state of senility, courteously
thanked me for my interest, and answered that she had been dead for
forty-nine years, come September. I overlooked the slight discrepancy.
During the remainder of the day, I insisted on the utmost quiet in our
wing of the castle. Poopendyke was obliged to take his typewriter out
to the stables, where I dictated scores of letters to him. I caught
Britton whistling in the kitchen about noon-time, and severely
reprimanded him. We went quite to the extreme, however, when we tiptoed
about our lofty halls. All of the afternoon we kept a sharp lookout
for the doctor, but if he came we were none the wiser. Britton went
into the town at three with the letters and a telegram to my friends
in Vienna, imploring them to look up a corps of efficient servants for
me and to send them on post-haste. I would have included a request for
a competent nurse-maid if it hadn't been for a report from Poopendyke,
who announced that he had caught a glimpse of a very nursy looking
person at one of the upper windows earlier in the day.
I couldn't, however, for the life of me understand why my neighbour
enjoined such rigid silence in our part of the castle and yet permitted
that confounded dog of hers to yowl and bark all day. How was I to
know that the beast had treed a lizard in the lower hall and couldn't
dislodge it?
Britton returned with news. The ferrymen, with great joy in the telling,
informed him that the season for tourists parties was just beginning
and that we might expect, with them, to do a thriving and prosperous
business during the next month or two. Indeed, word already had been
received by the tourists company's agent in the town that a party of
one hundred and sixty-nine would arrive the next day but one from
Munchen, bent on visiting my ruin. In great trepidation, I had all of
the gates and doors locked and reinforced by sundry beams and slabs,
for I knew the overpowering nature of the collective tourist.
I may be pardoned if I digress at this time to state that the party
of one hundred and sixty-nine, both stern and opposite, besieged my
castle on the next day but one, with the punctuality of locusts, and
despite all of my precautions, all of my devices, all of my objections,
effected an entrance and over-ran the place like a swarm of ants. The
feat that could not have been accomplished by an armed force was
successfully managed by a group of pedagogues from Ohio, to whom "Keep
off the Grass" and "No Trespass" are signs of utter impotence on the
part of him who puts them up, and ever shall be, world without end.
They came, they saw, they conquered, and they tried to buy picture
postcards of me.
I mention this in passing, lest you should be disappointed. More anon.
Punctually at nine o'clock, I was in the balcony, thanking my lucky
stars that it was a bright, moonlit night. There was every reason to
rejoice in the prospect of seeing her face clearly when she appeared
at her secret little window. Naturally, I am too much of a gentleman
to have projected unfair means of illuminating her face, such as the
use of a pocket electric lamp or anything of that sort. I am nothing
if not gallant,--when it comes to a pinch. Besides, I was reasonably
certain that she would wear a thick black veil. In this I was wrong.
She wore a white, filmy one, but it served the purpose. I naturally
concluded that she was homely.
"Good evening," she said, on opening the window.
"Good evening," said I, contriving to conceal my disappointment. "How
is the baby?"
"Very much better, thank you. It was so good of you to stop the
workmen."
[Illustration: I sat bolt upright and yelled; "Get out!"]
"Won't you take off your veil and stay awhile?" I asked, politely
facetious. "It isn't quite fair to me, you know."
Her next remark brought a blush of confusion to my cheek. A silly
notion had induced me to don my full evening regalia, spike-tail coat
and all. Nothing could have been more ludicrously incongruous than my
appearance, I am sure, and I never felt more uncomfortable in my life.
"How very nice you look in your new suit," she said, and I was aware
of a muffled quality in her ordinarily clear, musical voice. She was
laughing at me. "Are you giving a dinner party?"
"I usually dress for dinner," I lied with some haughtiness. "And so
does Poopendyke," I added as an afterthought. My blush deepened as I
recalled the attenuated blazer in which my secretary breakfasted,
lunched and dined without discrimination.
"For Gretel's benefit, I presume."
"Aha! You _do_ know Gretel, then?"
"Oh, I've known her for years. Isn't she a quaint old dear?"
"I shall discharge her in the morning," said I severely. "She is a
liar and her husband is a poltroon. They positively deny your existence
in any shape or form."
"They won't pay any attention to you," said she, with a laugh. "They
are fixtures, quite as much so as the walls themselves. You'll not be
able to discharge them. My grandfather tried it fifty years ago and
failed. After that he made it a point to dismiss Conrad every day in
the year and Gretel every other day. As well try to remove the mountain,
Mr. Smart. They know you can't get on without them."
"I have discharged her as a cook," I said, triumphantly. "A new one
will be here by the end of the week."
"Oh," she sighed plaintively, "how glad I am. She is an atrocious cook.
I don't like to complain, Mr. Smart, but really it is getting so that
I can't eat _anything_ she sends up. It is jolly of you to get in a new
one. Now we shall be very happy."
"By Jove!" said I, completely staggered by these revelations. Unable
to find suitable words to express my sustained astonishment, I repeated:
"By Jove!" but in a subdued tone.
"I have thought it over, Mr. Smart," she went on in a business-like
manner, "and I believe we will get along much better together if we
stay apart."
Ambiguous remarks ordinarily reach my intelligence, but I was so stunned
by preceding admissions that I could only gasp:
"Do you mean to say you've been subsisting all this time on _my_ food?"
"Oh, dear me, no! How can you think that of me? Gretel merely cooks
the food I buy. She keeps a distinct and separate account of everything,
poor thing. I am sure you will not find anything wrong with your bills,
Mr. Smart. But did you hear what I said a moment ago?"
"I'm not quite sure that I did."
"I prefer to let matters stand just as they are. Why should we
discommode each other? We are perfectly satisfied as we--"
"I will not have my new cook giving notice, madam. You surely can't
expect her--or him--to prepare meals for two separate--"
"I hadn't thought of that," she interrupted ruefully. "Perhaps if I
were to pay her--or him--extra wages it would be all right," she
added, quickly. "We do not require much, you know."
I laughed rather shortly,--meanly, I fear.
"This is most extraordinary, madam!"
"I--I quite agree with you. I'm awfully sorry it had to turn out as
it has. Who would have dreamed of your buying the place and coming
here to upset everything?"
I resolved to be firm with her. She seemed to be taking too much for
granted. "Much as I regret it, madam, I am compelled to ask you to
evacuate--to get out, in fact. This sort of thing can't go on."
She was silent for so long that I experienced a slow growth of
compunction. Just as I was on the point of slightly receding from my
position, she gave me another shock.
"Don't you think it would be awfully convenient if you had a telephone
put in, Mr. Smart?" she said. "It is such a nuisance to send Max or
Rudolph over to town every whip-stitch on errands when a telephone--in
your name, of course--would be so much more satisfactory."
"A telephone!" I gasped.
"Circumstances make it quite unwise for me to have a telephone in my
own name, but you could have one in yours without creating the least
suspicion. You are--"
"Madam," I cried, and got no farther.
"--perfectly free to have a telephone if you want one," she continued.
"The doctor came this evening and it really wasn't necessary. Don't
you see you could have telephoned for me and saved him the trip?"
It was due to the most stupendous exertion of self-restraint on my
part that I said: "Well, I'll be--jiggered," instead of something a
little less unique. Her audacity staggered me. (I was not prepared at
that time to speak of it as superciliousness.)
"Madam," I exploded, "will you be good enough to listen to me? I am
not to be trifled with. To-morrow sometime I shall enter the east wing
of this building if I have to knock down all the doors on the place.
Do you understand, madam?"
"I do hope, Mr. Smart, you can arrange to break in about five o'clock.
It will afford me a great deal of pleasure to give you some tea. May
I expect you at five--or thereabouts?"
Her calmness exasperated me. I struck the stone balustrade an emphatic
blow with my fist, sorely peeling the knuckles, and ground out:
"For two cents I'd do it to-night!"
"Oh, dear,--oh, dear!" she cried mockingly.
"You must be a dreadful woman," I cried out. "First, you make yourself
at home in my house; then you succeed in stopping my workmen, steal
my cook and men-servants, keep us all awake with a barking dog, defying
me to my very face--"
"How awfully stern you are!"
"I don't believe a word you say about a sick baby,--or a doctor! It's
all poppy-cock. To-morrow you will find yourself, bag and baggage,
sitting at the bottom of this hill, waiting for--"
"Wait!" she cried. "Are you really, truly in earnest?"
"Most emphatically!"
"Then I--I shall surrender," she said, very slowly,--and seriously,
I was glad to observe.
"That's more like it," I cried, enthusiastically.
"On one condition," she said. "You must agree in advance to let me
stay on here for a month or two. It--it is most imperative, Mr. Smart."
"I shall be the sole judge of that, madam," I retorted, with some
dignity. "By the way," I went on, knitting my brows, "how am I to get
into your side of the castle? Schmick says he's lost the keys."
A good deal depended on her answer.
"They shall be delivered to you to-morrow morning, Mr. Smart," she
said, soberly. "Good night."
The little window closed with a snap and I was left alone in the smiling
moonlight. I was vastly excited, even thrilled by the prospect of a
sleepless night. Something told me I wouldn't sleep a wink, and yet
I, who bitterly resent having my sleep curtailed in the slightest
degree, held no brief against circumstances. In fact, I rather revelled
in the promise of nocturnal distraction. Fearing, however, that I might
drop off to sleep at three or four o'clock and thereby run the risk
of over sleeping, I dashed off to the head of the stairs and shouted
for Britton.
"Britton," I said. "I want to be called at seven o'clock sharp in the
morning." Noting his polite struggle to conceal his astonishment, I
told him of my second encounter with the lady across the way.
"She won't be expecting you at seven, sir," he remarked. "And, as for
that, she may be expecting to call on you, instead of the other way
round."
"Right!" said I, considerably dashed.
"Besides, sir, would it not be safer to wait till the tourist party
has come and gone?"
"No tourists enter this place to-morrow or any other day," I declared,
firmly.
"Well, I'd suggest waiting just the same, sir," said he, evidently
inspired.
"Confound them," I growled, somehow absorbing his presentiment.
He hesitated for a moment near the door.
"Will you put in the telephone, sir?" he asked, respectfully.
Very curiously, I was thinking of it at that instant.
"It really wouldn't be a bad idea, Britton," I said, startled into
committing myself. "Save us a great deal of legging it over town and
all that sort of thing, eh?"
"Yes, sir. What I was about to suggest, sir, is that while we're about
it we might as well have a system of electric bells put in. That is
to say, sir, in both wings of the castle. Very convenient, sir, you
see, for all parties concerned."
"I see," said I, impressed. And then repeated it, a little more
impressed after reflection. "I see. You are a very resourceful fellow,
Britton. I am inclined to bounce all of the Schmicks. They have known
about this from the start and have lied like thieves. By Jove, she
must have an extraordinary power over them,--or claim,--or something
equally potent. Now I think of it, she mentioned a grandfather. That
would go to prove she's related in some way to some one, wouldn't it?"
"I should consider it to be more than likely, sir," said Britton, with
a perfectly straight face. He must have been sorely tried in the face
of my inane maunderings. "Pardon me, sir, but wouldn't it be a tip-top
idea to have it out with the Schmicks to-night? Being, sir, as you
anticipate a rather wakeful night, I only make so bold as to suggest
it in the hopes you may 'ave some light on the subject before you close
your eyes. In other words, sir, so as you won't be altogether in the
dark when morning comes. See wot I mean?"
"Excellent idea, Britton. We'll have them up in my study."
He went off to summon my double-faced servitors, while I wended my way
to the study. There I found. Mr. Poopendyke, sound asleep in a great
arm-chair, both his mouth and his nose open and my first novel also
open in his lap.
Conrad and Gretel appeared with Britton after an unconscionable lapse
of time, partially dressed and grumbling.
"Where are your sons?" I demanded, at once suspicious.
Conrad shook his sparsely covered head and mumbled something about
each being his brother's keeper, all of which was Greek to me until
Britton explained that they were not to be found in their customary
quarters,--that is to say, in bed. Of course it was quite clear to
me that my excellent giants were off somewhere, serving the interests
of the bothersome lady in the east wing.
"Conrad," said I, fixing the ancient with a stern, compelling gaze,
"this has gone quite far enough."
"Yes, mein herr?"
"Do you serve me, or do you serve the lady in the east wing?"
"I do," said he, with a great deal more wit than I thought he possessed.
For a moment I was speechless, but not for the reason you may suspect.
I was trying to fix my question and his response quite clearly in my
memory so that I might employ them later in the course of a conversation
between characters in my forthcoming novel.
"I have been talking with the lady this evening," said I.
"Yes, mein herr; I know," said he.
"Oh, you do, eh? Well, will you be good enough to tell me what the
devil is the meaning of all this two-faced, underhanded conduct on
your part?"
He lowered his head, closed his thin lips and fumbled with the hem of
his smock in a significantly sullen manner. It was evident that he
meant to defy me. His sharp little eyes sent a warning look at Gretel,
who instantly ceased her mutterings and gave over asking God to bear
witness to something or other. She was always dragging in the Deity.
"Now, see here, Conrad, I want the truth from you. Who is this woman,
and why are you so infernally set upon shielding her? What crime has
she committed? Tell me at once, or, by the Lord Harry, out you go
to-morrow,--all of you."
"I am a very old man," he whined, twisting his gnarled fingers, a
suggestion of tears in his voice. "My wife is old, mein herr. You would
not be cruel. We have been here for sixty years. The old baron--"
"Enough!" I cried resolutely. "Out with it, man. I mean all that I
say."
He was still for a long time, looking first at the floor and then at
me; furtive, appealing, uncertain little glances from which he hoped
to derive comfort by catching me with a twinkle in my eye. I have a
stupid, weak way of letting a twinkle appear there even when I am
trying to be harsh and domineering. Britton has noticed it frequently,
I am sure, and I think he rather depends upon it. But now I realised,
if never before, that to betray the slightest sign of gentleness would
be to forever forfeit my standing as master in my own house. Conrad
saw no twinkle. He began to weaken.
"To-morrow, mein herr, to-morrow," he mumbled, in a final plea. I shook
my head. "She will explain everything to-morrow," he went on eagerly.
"I am sworn to reveal nothing, mein herr. My wife, too, and my sons.
We may not speak until she gives the word. Alas! we shall be turned
out to die in our--"
"We have been faithful servants to the Rothhoefens for sixty years,"
sobbed his wife.
"And still are, I suspect," I cried angrily.
"Ach, mein herr, mein herr!" protested Conrad, greatly perturbed.
"Where are the keys, you old rascal?" I demanded so sternly that even
Poopendyke was startled.
Conrad almost resorted to the expediency of grovelling. "Forgive!
forgive!" he groaned. "I have done only what was best."
"Produce the keys, sir!"
"But not to-night, not to-night," he pleaded. "She will be very angry.
She will not like it, mein herr. Ach, Gott! She will drive us out, she
will shame us all! Ach, and she who is so gentle and so unhappy and
so--so kind, to all of us! I--I cannot--I cannot! No!"
Mr. Poopendyke's common sense came in very handily at this critical
juncture. He counselled me to let the matter rest until the next
morning, when, it was reasonable to expect, the lady herself would
explain everything. Further appeal to Schmick was like butting one's
head against a stone wall, he said. Moreover, Conrad's loyalty to the
lady was most commendable.
Conrad and Gretel beamed on Poopendyke. They thanked him so profoundly,
that I couldn't help feeling a bit sorry for myself, a tyrant without
a backbone.
"Jah, jah!" Conrad cried gladly. "To-morrow she will explain. Time
enough, Herr Poopendyke. Time enough, eh?"
"Well," said I, somewhat feebly, "where do I come in?"
They caught the note of surrender in my voice and pounced upon their
opportunity. Before they had finished with me, it was quite thoroughly
established that I was not to come in at all until my neighbour was
ready to admit me. They convinced me that I was a meek, futile suppliant
and not the master of a feudal stronghold. Somehow I was made to feel
that if I didn't behave myself I stood in considerable danger of being
turned off the place. However, we forced something out of Schmick
before his stalwart sons came tramping up the stairs to rescue him.
The old man gave us a touch of inside history concerning Schloss
Rothhoefen and its erstwhile powerful barons, not to minimise in the
least sense the peculiar prowess of the present Amazon who held forth
to-night in the east wing and who, I had some reason to suspect, was
one of the family despite the unmistakable flavour of Fifth Avenue and
Newport.
About the middle of the nineteenth century the last of the real
barons,--the powerful, land-owning, despotic barons, I mean,--came to
the end of his fourscore years and ten, and was laid away with great
pomp and glee by the people of the town across the river. He was the
last of the Rothhoefens, for he left no male heir. His two daughters
had married Austrian noblemen, and neither of them produced a male
descendant. The estate, already in a state of financial as well as
physical disintegration, fell into the hands of women, and went from
bad to worse so rapidly that long before the last quarter of the century
was fairly begun the castle and the reduced holdings slipped away from
the Rothhoefens altogether and into the control of the father of the
Count from whom I purchased the property. The Count's father, it
appears, was a distiller of great wealth in his day, and a man of
action. Unfortunately he died before he had the chance to carry out
his projects in connection with the rehabilitation of Schloss
Rothhoefen, even then a deserted, ramshackle resort for paying tourists
and a Mecca for antique and picture dealers.
The new Count--my immediate predecessor--was not long in dissipating
the great fortune left by his father, the worthy distiller. He had run
through with the bulk of his patrimony by the time he was twenty-five
and was pretty much run down at the heel when he married in the hope
of recouping his lost fortune.
The Schmicks did not like him. They did not approve of him as lord and
master, nor was it possible for them to resign themselves to the fate
that had put this young scapegrace into the shoes, so to speak, of the
grim old barons Rothhoefen, who whatever else they may have been in
a high-handed sort of way were men to the core. This pretender, this
creature without brains or blood, this sponging reprobate, was not to
their liking, if I am to quote Conrad, who became quite forceful in
his harangue against the recent order of things.
He, his wife and his sons, he assured me, were full of rejoicing when
they learned that the castle had passed from Count Hohendahl's hands
into mine. I, at least, would pay them their wages and I might, in a
pinch, be depended upon to pension them when they got too old to be
of any use about the castle.
At any rate, it seems, I was a distinct improvement over the Count,
who had been their master for a dozen very lean and unprofitable years.
Things might be expected to look up a bit, with me at the head of the
house. Was it not possible for a new and mighty race to rise and take
the place of the glorious Rothhoefens? A long line of Baron Schmarts?
With me as the prospective root of a thriving family tree! At least,
that is what Conrad said, and I may be pardoned for quoting him.
I am truly sorry the old rascal put it into my head.
But the gist of the whole matter was this: There are no more
Rothhoefens, and soon, God willing, there would be no more Hohendahls.
Long live the Schmarts! Conrad invariably pronounced my name with the
extra consonants and an umlaut.
All attempts on my part to connect the lady in the east wing with the
history of the extinct Rothhoefens were futile. He would not commit
himself.
"Well," said I, yawning in helpless collusion with the sleepy Gretel,
"we'll let it go over till morning. Call me at seven, Britton."
Conrad made haste to assure me that the lady would not receive me
before eleven o'clock. He begged me to sleep till nine, and to have
pleasant dreams.
I went to bed but not to sleep. It was very clear to me that my
neighbour was a disturber in every sense of the word. She wouldn't let
me sleep. For two hours I tried to get rid of her, but she filtered
into my brain and prodded my thoughts into the most violent activity.
She wouldn't stay put.
My principal thoughts had to do with her identity. Somehow I got it
into my head that she was one of the female Rothhoefens, pitiable
nonentities if Conrad's estimate is to be accepted. A descendant of
one of those girl-bearing daughters of the last baron! It sounded very
agreeable to my fancy's ear, and I cuddled the hope that my surmise
was not altogether preposterous.
My original contention that she was a poor relation of old Schmick and
somewhat dependent upon him for charity--to say the least--had been
set aside for more reliable convictions. Instead of being dependent
upon the Schmicks, she seemed to be in an exalted position that gave
her a great deal more power over them than even I possessed: they
served her, not me. From time to time there occurred to me the thought
that my own position in the household was rather an ignoble one, and
that I was a very weak and incompetent successor to baronial privileges,
to say nothing of rights. A real baron would have had her out of there
before you could mention half of Jack Robinson, and there wouldn't
have been any sleep lost over distracting puzzles. I deplored my lack
of bad manners.
It was quite reasonable to assume that she was young, but the odds
were rather against her being beautiful. Pretty women usually adjure
such precautions as veils. Still, this was speculation, and my reasoning
is not always sound, for which I sometimes thank heaven. She had a
baby. At least, I suppose it was hers. If not, whose? This set me off
on a new and apparently endless round of speculation, obviously silly
and sentimental.
Now I have humbly tried to like babies. My adolescent friends and
acquaintances have done their best to educate me along this particular
line, with the result that I suppose I despise more babies than any
man in the world. My friends, it would appear, are invariably married
to each other and they all have babies for me to go into false ecstasies
over. No doubt babies are very nice when they don't squawk or pull
your nose or jab you in the eye, but through some strange and prevailing
misfortune I have never encountered one when it was asleep. If they
are asleep, the parents compel me to walk on tip-toe and speak in
whispers at long range; the instant they awake and begin to yawp, I
am ushered into the presence, or vice versa, and the whole world grows
very small and congested and is carried about in swaddling clothes.
There is but one way for a bachelor to overcome his horror of babies,
and he shouldn't wait too long.
I went to sleep about four o'clock, still oppressed by the dread of
meeting a new baby.
My contact with the one hundred and sixty-nine sight-seers was brief
but exceedingly convincing. They invaded the castle before I was out
of bed, having--as I afterwards heard--the breweries, an art gallery
and the Zoological gardens to visit before noon and therefore were
required to make an early start. The cathedral, which is always open
to visitors and never has any one sleeping in it, was reserved for the
afternoon.
I was aroused from my belated sleep by the sound of mighty cataracts
and the tread of countless elephants. Too late I realised that the
tourists were upon me! Too late I remembered that the door to my room
had been left unlocked! The hundred and sixty-nine were huddled outside
my door, drinking in the monotonous drivel of the guide who had a
shrill, penetrating voice and not the faintest notion of a conscience.
I listened in dismay for a moment, and then, actuated by something
more than mere fury, leaped out of bed and prepared for a dash across
the room to lock the door. On the third stride I whirled and made a
flying leap into the bed, scuttling beneath the covers with the speed
and accuracy of a crawfish. Just in time, too, for the heavy door swung
slowly open a second later, and the shrill, explanatory voice was
projected loudly into my lofty bed chamber.
"Come a little closer, please," said the morose man with the cap. "This
room was occupied for centuries by the masters of Schloss Rothhoefen.
It is a bed chamber. See the great baronial bed. It has not been slept
in for more than two hundred years. The later barons refused to sleep
in it because one of their ancestors had been assassinated between its
sheets at the tender age of six. He was stabbed by a step-uncle who
played him false. This room is haunted. Observe the curtains of the
bed. They are of the rarest silk and have been there for three hundred
years, coming from Damascus in the year 1695. Now we will pass on to
the room occupied by all of the great baronesses up to the nineteenth--"
A resolute beholder spoke up: "Can't we step inside?"
"If you choose, madam. But we must waste no time."
"I do so want to see where the old barons slept."
"Please do not handle the bedspreads and curtains. They will fall to
pieces--"
I heard no more, for the vanguard had pushed him aside and was swooping
down upon me. A sharp-nosed lady led the way. She was within three
feet of the bed and was stretching out her hand to touch the proscribed
fabrics when I sat bolt upright and yelled:
"Get out!"
Afterwards I was told that the guide was the first to reach the bottom
of the stairs and that he narrowly escaped death in the avalanche of
horrified humanity that piled after him, pursued by the puissant ghost
of a six-year-old ancestor.