THE CURE
"Le _Schein_ et le _Wesen_ sont, pour l'esprit allemand, une seule
et meme chose."--Jacques Riviere.
"The only decent whisky," said the doctor, "is Irish whisky."
Whereupon he helped himself to a generous allowance of Scotch
whisky, and as they had just been talking about Ludendorff's coming
offensive, he began to discourse upon the Germans.
"One of the most astounding things about German psychology," he said,
"is their passion for suggesting the appearance of results which they
know they are powerless to attain. A German general who is not in a
position to undertake a real offensive deludes himself into believing
that he will strike terror into his opponent by describing an absurd
and appalling attack in his reports; and a Solingen cutler, if he
cannot manufacture really sharp blades at the required price, will
endeavour to invoke a sort of metaphysical blade which can give its
owner the illusion of a useful instrument.
"When once this trait of the national character is properly
understood, all the German shoddy which is so much talked about seems
no longer the swindling practice of dishonest tradesmen, but is
simply the material expression of their ingrained Kantianism, and
their congenital inability to distinguish Appearance from Reality.
"At the sanatorium at Wiesdorf, where I was working when the war
broke out, this method was practised with quite unusual rigour.
"Doctor Professor Baron von Goeteburg was a second-rate scientist,
and he knew it. He had made a lifelong study of the expression,
clothes and manners which would most successfully impress his clients
with the idea that he was the great physician he knew he could never
be.
"After innumerable careful experiments, which do him the greatest
credit, he had decided on a pointed beard, a military expression, a
frock coat and a baron's title.
"Everything in his admirable establishment bore the impress of the
kind of scientific precision which is the most striking hall-mark of
ignorance. The Wiesdorf sanatorium extracted from the human carcase
the maximum amount of formulae, scientific jargon and professional
fees which it could possibly yield. The patients felt themselves
surrounded by a pleasant and luxurious apparatus of diagnoses,
figures and diagrams.
"Each patient had a suite of rooms furnished, in spite of a rather
obvious Munich atmosphere, with a sense of real comfort and order.
Each floor was under the supervision of a doctor, a lean, athletic
Swedish _masseur_ and a qualified nurse in a white apron. The nurses
were nearly all daughters of the nobility, whose happiness had been
sacrificed to the extravagance of their brothers, who were generally
captains in the Guards. The one attached to the floor I was in charge
of was a French Alsatian with an innocent, obstinate face, whom the
Germans called 'Schwester Therese,' and who asked me to call her
'Soeur Therese.'
"The place was only opened in the spring of 1914, and from the very
first season its success had testified to the excellence of the
system. Photographs were published in all the fashionable papers, and
wealthy clients rushed in with alarming and automatic rapidity.
"On my floor I had an old American, one James P. Griffith, an English
lady, the Duchess of Broadfield, and a Russian, Princess Uriassof.
None of these three patients displayed symptoms of any illness
whatsoever; they just complained of depression--nothing could amuse
them--and of an appetite which no dish could tempt. When the American
arrived, I considered it my duty to inform the professor of the
excellent health in which I found him.
"'O'Grady,' he said, staring hard at me with his brilliant,
commanding eyes, 'kindly give yourself less trouble. Your patient is
suffering from congestion of the purse, and I think we shall be able
to give him some relief.'
"The Duchess of Broadfield longed to put on flesh, and wept all day
long. 'Madam,' Sister Therese said to her, 'if you want to get
stouter, you ought to try and enjoy yourself.' That caused a nice
scene! I was obliged to explain to the nurse that the Duchess was on
no account to be spoken to before eleven in the morning, and that it
was improper to address her without calling her 'Your Grace!'
"As to Princess Uriassof, she had been preceded by a courier, who had
burst into indignant exclamations at the sight of the Munich
furniture and had demanded genuine antiques. The professor smiled,
and summoned a furniture dealer and his cashier. Followed the
princess with twenty-three boxes and six servants. She was enormously
stout, cried the whole day long, and yearned to reduce her figure.
"When the lift that was to take her down to the bathroom was not in
front of her door at the very second when she left her room, she used
to stamp her foot in anger, pull her maid's hair and shout:
"'What? _I_ have to wait; _I_, Princess Uriassof?'
"That was the kind of patient we had. Only once there came to my
floor a young fellow from the Argentine who really had something
wrong with his liver. I said to him, 'You are not well; you would do
better to go and see a doctor.'
"Towards the 24th of July the newspapers seemed to cause the noble
clients of Wiesdorf sanatorium considerable anxiety. The note to
Servia, the letters they received from their homes, the clatter of
arms which was beginning to be heard throughout Europe, all began to
point to a vague danger which could not, of course, affect their
sacred persons, but might possibly hinder them from peacefully
cultivating the sufferings which were so dear to them.
"The Duchess of Broadfield telegraphed to her nephew at the Foreign
Office and got no answer. Princess Uriassof began to hold mysterious
confabulations with her courier.
"The German doctors soon restored every one's confidence; '_Unser
Friedens-Kaiser_ ... our peace-loving Emperor ... he is cruising on
his yacht ... he has not the slightest thought of war.'
"The barometers of refreshment vendors are always at 'set-fair,' and
Professor von Goeteburg temporized with such authority and diplomacy
that he managed to keep his international _clientele_ for another
six days.
"However, the peace-loving Emperor returned only to send threatening
telegrams, and on the 27th the danger became evident even to our
guests' bird-like intellects.
"Princess Uriassof announced her departure, and sent her courier to
the bank to cash an enormous cheque. He came back with the message
that the bank no longer cashed foreign cheques; whereupon he
disappeared, and was never heard of again. The Princess was beside
herself with rage, and cried that she would have him knouted. She
summoned her German valet, but he was busy buckling on his
_Feldwebel_ uniform. She ordered her French chauffeur to be ready to
start instantly; I went down to the garage with the message myself so
as to get away from her, and discovered that the fellow was a
reservist from Saint-Mihiel, and had left with Her Highness' car to
join his regiment.
"That morning for the first time, the Duchess and the Princess
condescended to notice the presence of James P. He had a magnificent
100 H.P. American car, and represented their only hope of getting
across the frontier. But James P. had no more petrol, and the Germans
refused to supply him with any, because his car had already been
earmarked for General von Schmack's Staff.
"The same evening these first three victims of the war sat and
childishly discussed the situation in an untidy room on a bed which
nobody came to make. Their telegrams were no longer forwarded, their
money was worthless, and the German servants in the sanatorium
treated them more as prisoners than as patients. It seemed as though
their fortune and their greatness had suddenly abandoned them at the
first breath of war, like a slender veil torn by the wind from a
woman's shoulders.
"James P. went to interview Dr. von Goeteburg, who answered him with
ironical politeness, and depicted the pitiable plight of a Germany
surrounded and attacked by a world of enemies. If, however, they were
willing to leave him the princess's pearl necklace as security, he
would consent to lend them the few marks they needed to cross the
frontier.
"Towards midnight I entered the room where this Twilight of the Gods
was drawing to an end, and saw an astounding spectacle. The Duchess
of Broadfield and Princess Uriassof were attempting to pack their own
trunks. Their lack of experience was only too conspicuous. In every
corner there lay hats which had been crushed by their clumsy
attempts; the badly folded dresses swelled awkwardly and refused with
disgraceful obstinacy to allow the Princess to lock her trunks.
Vanquished at last by the stress of events against which she was
contending for the first time in her life, she sat down on a
portmanteau and burst into tears. The Duchess, who came of a less
fatalistic race, was still struggling, aided by James P., with two
rebellious valises.
"I went and called Sister Therese, and with her made ready for their
departure. Hoping that England would declare war, I informed the
professor of my intention to accompany my patients.
"The little Alsatian girl went and asked the German servants to
carry the luggage to the station for the last civilian train, which
was to leave at six in the morning.
"I don't mind carrying anything for you, _Schwester_," said the hall
porter, "but I won't do a thing for those dogs of Russians and
English."
"The Sister came back and said timidly, 'If the doctor and Your Grace
don't mind helping me, we might perhaps take at least some of these
things together.'
"So Wiesdorf station beheld the extraordinary sight of the Duchess
pulling an enormous portmanteau and perspiring freely, and behind her
Princess Uriassof, James P., and myself, each pushing a wheelbarrow.
The station was already thronged with soldiers in _Feldgrau_. We were
ravenously hungry. I asked the young Alsatian girl to accompany me to
the refreshment-room, and she was able, thanks to her nurse's
bonnet, to obtain two pieces of extremely dry bread from the military
canteen.
"I found my patients ensconced in a fourth-class carriage. Their eyes
were shut, they were leaning against the duty wooden back of the
seat, and on their faces was a smile of indescribable bliss.
"The Princess greedily seized the piece of bread I handed her, took
an enormous bite out of it, and said to the Duchess:
"'What nice bread!'
"'What nice seats!' replied Her Grace, leaning voluptuously against
the hard, greasy boards."