1. Under the War Lord's Thumb
2. Weaving the Toils Round Bertha Krupp
3. A Mother's Reflections
4. Bertha Krupp, War Lady, Asserts Herself
5. How the War Lady was Cajoled
6. Fraulein Krupp Invited to Court
7. In the Crown Prince's Private Room
8. Stories of Court Life
9. What the Maid Saw and Heard
10. The Entangling of Archduke Franz Ferdinand
11. The Crown Prince on a Lark
12. The Fortune Teller sees Bertha in a Haze of Blood
13. "We will Divide the World Between Us"
14. Getting Even with the War Lord
15. "Auntie Majesty" and Bertha
16. How Franz Ferdinand was Fooled
17. Diamond Cut Diamond
18. A Secret Service Episode
19. Bertha and Franz
20. "Auntie Majesty" and her Frocks
21. Throttling Bavaria
22. Paying the Price
23. How Von Bohlen was Chosen
24. The War Lord's Day in Essen
25. A Royal Liar
26. Explaining "The Day"
27. Bertha's Wedding Day
28. A Foreshadowing of "Lusitaniaism"
29. Some More Secret History
30. Browbeating the War Lady
31. A Great State Secret
*THE SECRET MEMOIRS OF
BERTHA KRUPP*
_*Si Krupp nobiscum, quis contra nos?*_
*CHAPTER I*
*UNDER THE WAR LORD'S THUMB*
The Real War Lord--Putting on the Screw--The Kaiser's Plot
Revealed--Disinheriting the Baroness--A Startler for the War
Lord--Bertha to be Sole Heiress--Frederick Makes His Will--The
War Lord Loses his Temper--A Base Suggestion
On a bright August day of 1902 the neighbourhood of Villa Huegel,
overlooking the forest of smoke-stacks, cranes, masts and other
erections that silhouette the town of Essen, was like an armed camp.
Its master, Frederick Krupp, cannon king and war promoter, while not
entitled to household troops, has an army of firemen as large as the
contingent of the mighty potentate of Reuss-Greiz-Schleiz-Lobenstein,
and this was pre-eminently the season and hour of military display.
The Krupp warriors resemble Prussian infantry in dress. In discipline
and aggressiveness they are second to none serving under the eye of the
"All Highest," as the Kaiser fondly calls himself. Give their master a
dark look as he passes, and one or more of them will pounce upon you and
pound you to jelly before you can say Jack Robinson; reach for your
handkerchief or pencil in your back trouser-pocket, where a revolver
might be, and they will spit you on their fire-axe.
To-day Krupp firemen were everywhere. They lined the roads, guarded
crossings and bridges, looked up at every window, sentinelled gates and
doors. They were posted, too, in the tree-tops and on telegraph and
signal posts, while indoors, along the corridors of the villa, you met
them at every turn. Right royal arrangement that! Yet why at Huegel?
On this particular day Essen was alive with colour. Hussars in green
and silver--the Duesseldorf brand--galloping round and round the villa
circuit, kept their eyes keenly alert for suspicious characters; in
Essen, indeed, every stranger is looked upon as a double-crossed
suspect. Dragoons were there, too, from East Prussia, to watch the
hussars, for one never knows, you know. And, of course, there were
bodyguards--white tunic and breeches, black cuirass and silver helmet,
surmounted by the "bird of poisonous glare," as Heine described the
Imperial eagle. Many other uniforms, too--uhlans, chasseurs, mounted
infantry for the War Lord likes to strut abroad to the tune and clank of
a variety of arms. He would have horse marines if he were not so deadly
afraid of Mr. Punch.
Before the library door of the Villa Huegel two giant cuirassiers, sabre
in hand, revolver in belt, dull men and dangerous, of the sort that
always do their duty not as they see it, but as their superior officer
sees it.
Suppose that earthling orders a death-dealing blow for anyone attempting
to enter the room under guard. It follows, as a matter of course, that
the person is a dead man or dead woman, or maybe a dead
child--militarism rampant, but discipline triumphant! Who cares for a
corpse more or less?
A much-bedizened personage is standing in the centre of the
high-ceilinged, wainscoted room. A gewgawed War Lord; but how
unimposing he looks on foot and unprepared to meet the gaze of admiring
multitudes! He is not much taller than the average grocer's clerk, and
until Father Time sprinkled his straight, wiry hair with grey was a
decided red-pate.
The War Lord's clothes are Berlin pattern: all straight and right
angles, like the tunics of the impossible marbles that spoil his Avenue
of Victory. He wears jewellery of the kind the late mad King of Bavaria
used to decorate his actors with: a watch-chain thick and strong enough
to hold a two-year bull, a timepiece bulging like an alarum clock, and a
profusion--or confusion--of gold-mounted seals and medals. But the
finishing touch: sky-blue garters, set with rosettes of diamonds and
pearls alternating.
We know his public face--stern, haughty, cast-iron, forbidding--and his
official demeanour has been brought home to us a thousand times and more
in statue and photograph, in colour and black and white, throned, on
horseback, or standing alone in Imperial self-glory under a purple
canopy--he knows how to stage-manage himself in uniform.
The London tailor who skimped his coat in front, he hates with a deadly
hatred, for padding, plenty of it, is essential to his _mise en scene_.
See him on his well-trained, high-stepping horse, and you have the ideal
camera subject: broad shoulders, prominent chest (laden with seventy-odd
medals), strong limbs, jingling spurs, bronzed face, skyscraping
moustachios and all.
But in the drawing-room, and in mufti--what a difference! Heavy set,
somewhat short-limbed, and the face that looks strong when framed in
military cap or helmet now seems to possess only brute force.
At this moment his left hand sought the seclusion of a trouser-pocket,
while his right, studded with gems like a chorus-girl's, sawed the air
with coarse assertiveness.
"My dear Frederick," he addressed his host, balancing himself on his
right foot, "while you are here to execute my orders, all's well. But
suppose something happened to you. You are not in the best of health
and"--lowering his voice--"a careless boy. Don't deny," he added
quickly when Frederick Krupp ventured to protest. "Both my Roman
ambassador and our envoy at the Holy See heard about your peccadilloes
in the island." The speech, begun in a bantering tone, terminated
shrilly.
The Ironmaster alternately blushed and blanched. "I hope you do not
believe all you hear," he faltered.
"Never more than a third of what I'm told," replied the War Lord,
softening his voice; "but, even so, things must not be left too entirely
to chance."
Frederick Krupp went to the window, marking each step for the benefit of
possible listeners, then tiptoed to the great folding doors. He opened
the off wing suddenly and looked out. "All's safe," he said, returning;
"and what fine brutes those outside."
"Fancy them?" laughed the War Lord jovially, for he knows how to unbend
when he wants to carry a point. "Now to business. We are all liable to
die almost any moment, and you, dear Frederick, are no more an exception
to the rule than I am--or those brutes."
Frederick Krupp looked uncomfortable, and to hide his embarrassment or
gain time dropped into courtly jargon. "And what may be your Majesty's
pleasure?"
"Make a satisfactory last will, sir--a last will guaranteeing the
Krupps' goodwill for ever and a day--likewise satisfactory
dividends--for the chief stockholder, if you please."
Frederick Krupp bowed low. "Please?" he repeated. "Why, I lie awake
nights planning wars for your benefit. If there were not a Persian
Gulf, I would have invented one to pave the way for the little scrap
with England you are aching for."
"Hold your horses!" cried the War Lord. "That Bagdad railway must be
finished first. What I want is a guarantee, and a most binding
guarantee, that the Krupp works be conducted in all future as now,
according to my Imperial will and pleasure, in the interest of the
Fatherland and--our pocket," he added flippantly.
Frederick Krupp surveyed himself in the glass. "You talk as if I had one
foot in the grave," he said in the careless manner of addressing a boon
companion, or like one intimate putting things pleasant, or the reverse,
to another. Frederick Krupp died in the odour of eccentricity. There
was certainly something eccentric in his relations with the War Lord.
But the latter tolerates familiarity only so long as it suits him; and,
presently observing the clouds gather on his guest's brow, Frederick
Krupp changed his tone.
"At your Majesty's commands, I am all ears," he murmured, as, obedient
to a sign from the Emperor, he drew up an arm-chair for him.
"Sit down yourself," the Emperor ordered curtly, pointing to a tabouret.
Then, sneeringly: "Your idea was----"
"To leave everything to my wife."
The War Lord slapped his knees hard, as he always does when excited.
"So would Herr Mueller and Herr Schulze," he cried, without attempting
to conceal the insult. "Her Ladyship--chief of the Krupp works--of what
use would the Baroness Marguerite be to _my_ interests?"
Mrs. Frederick Krupp was _nee_ von Ende, and the War Lord, always eager
to use titles of nobility, chose to call her by her maiden name and
style.
Frederick Krupp, who, despite his irregularities, was genuinely fond of
his wife, moved uneasily on his low chair. "Your Majesty is
pleased----"
"To have his head screwed on tightly and in the right place," declared
the War Lord, bringing his fist down on a table at his elbow and making
the Chinese ivories jump. "Now then, without further palaver, I don't
choose to see the Baroness heiress of the Krupp works. She shall not
control my interests, do you hear? nor those of the Fatherland."
The War Lord talked as if addressing a parcel of raw recruits. His
withered left hand had pulled from the trouser-pocket, and was making
spasmodic attempts to clutch the lapel of his coat. He has the curious
taste to give this poor hand a liberal coating of rings, and his
enormous emeralds seemed to gleam more poisonously than usual upon the
cringing form of poor Frederick.
"Willy," gasped the Ironmaster pleadingly.
The War Lord was not to be cajoled.
"As I said, her Ladyship gets a pension. Leave her as big a share of
your fortune as you please," he added on second thought. "Yes, the
larger the better; it will avert suspicion--I mean forestall criticism,
of course."
"But," remonstrated Frederick, in a weak way, "Marguerite and I have an
understanding."
"Understanding," scowled the War Lord, brutality written all over him as
if he were rehearsing his pretty phrase: "Those opposing me I smash."
He contemplated Frederick for a while as a big mastiff might a King
Charles before mangling and killing it. At last he remembered there are
two ways in most things. "Of course," he began rather soothingly,
"understandings among subjects are null and void when opposed to the
Imperial will. Explain to Lady Marguerite with my compliments, if you
please," the last phrase emphasised three times by hand cutting the air
vertically.
Frederick Krupp, thoroughly cowed by this time, nodded assent. This
man, used to bull-dozing Governments the world over, a terror before his
board of directors, and a demigod to his workmen, felt a mere atom with
the eyes of the War Lord flashing wrath and contempt upon his yielding
self.
"I will; but what may be your Majesty's precise commands?" he stammered
meekly.
The War Lord perceived that his victim had become like wax under the
lash of his tongue. He could afford, then, to be magnanimous. "You
forget etiquette," he replied, with a half-smile; "since when is it
customary to question a majesty? Still, I am no Eulenburg" (referring to
the Grand Marshal of the palace), "and will overlook your _faux-pas_
this time. Listen, Frederick." He softened his speech with a "dear
Frederick," and then issued his mandate: "The Baroness eliminated----"
Herr Krupp raised his eyes supplicatingly, but the War Lord paid no
attention. "Eliminated," he repeated, accentuating each syllable.
Then, in pitying style: "Too bad you haven't got a son. However, the
Salic Law does not apply to commoners."
The Ironmaster made bold to show annoyance at the word. "Commoner by my
own free will," he protested. "Haven't I declined Earldoms and Dukedoms
even?"
"More's the pity that you remain plain Krupp, like a grocer or the
ashman, when you might be Prince of Essen," cried the War Lord, jumping
up. The Ironmaster rose as well.
Courtly usage, of course, but also a measure of precaution. He meant to
be on hand in case his august guest suffered a fall, and there is always
a possibility of that when the War Lord labours under excitement, for
his whole left side, from ear to toe, is weak and liable to collapse if
the full weight of the body is thrust suddenly upon it. As a rule, the
War Lord remembers, but when carried away by passion, or for other
reasons loses control of himself, he is prone to forget or even fall in
a heap with no warning. Such a _contretemps_ happened once at Count
Dohna's, when Frederick was one of the house party, and long remained in
his memory.
Visiting at Proeckelwitz in the summer of 1891, the War Lord had deigned
to be pleased with a pair of blacks. "Buy two more of them for a
four-in-hand, as befits the Sovereign," he said to his host.
The hint, dropped with charming German delicacy, was a command, of
course, and a year later, in June, the War Lord started for the castle
in right royal style; but he did not get far that way, since the
four-in-hand shied and bolted when the villagers burst into patriotic
song, to the waving of a thousand and one flags. As an eye-witness put
it: The leaders rose on their hind legs, the cross pieces came loose and
began knocking against their pasterns, and off they were at a furious
rate. Count Dohna let the reins of the runaways slip, and hung the more
heavily on to those of the shaft horses, who were trying to follow the
others. He let the blacks run for a while but without losing control,
and as they were about to plunge into a bed of harrows he succeeded in
checking them.
Then, for a mile or so, he gave them a run on freshly ploughed ground.
After that they went steadily.
The War Lord had put his arm around his host's shoulders when the horses
started off, and, the danger past, pressed the Count's hand, but did not
say a word. Then came the collapse. He had to be helped down from his
seat, and took no notice of the greetings of the ladies awaiting him.
Leaning upon his chasseur and Adjutant Von Moltke (now Field Marshal),
he crept to his room, his face pale as death and lips compressed.
Dinner was set back an hour, but the War Lord had not recovered his
speech when, with difficulties, he put his feet under the mahogany. His
body physician, Doctor Leuthold, was sitting opposite the august person,
and upon a sign from the medical man the War Lord rose from table after
vainly trying to swallow a spoonful of soup. Nor did he come down to
breakfast, but attended luncheon, still looking pale and haggard. Then,
for the first time, he greeted the ladies of the house, and spoke a few
words to his host; but when a forward young miss referred to the
accident he bade her keep silent by an imperious gesture, while a tremor
seemed to run through his body. He would not hear of hunting, and left
next day without having fired a shot.
Frederick Krupp, remembering Proeckelwitz, moved as near to his Imperial
guest as politeness permitted, ready to catch him in his arms if need
be, but the War Lord no sooner perceived his intention than he became
more infuriated than ever. "For Heaven's sake no heroics, Frederick!" he
roared, sitting down again. "Draw up a stool and listen."
"One second," pleaded the Ironmaster, "I will set the miniature
orchestrella going." He pressed a button, and almost simultaneously a
music-box near the door, sheathed in tortoise-shell and gold bronze,
began trilling out melodies, so as to confuse, if not obscure,
conversation to possible listeners if it waxed overloud again.
The War Lord nodded. "Not half bad. You may send me one of those
things to put in Buelow's office. There are always some Italians
lurking about--to report to Madame la Princesse, I fancy--and put the
W.I.R. on the box.
"Well, let's get back to things," he added, quickly changing his tone to
drill-ground clangour. "Madame eliminated and there being no son----"
"Your Majesty desires me to leave the business jointly to Bertha and
Barbara?" asked Krupp.
"Are there six crown princes or one?" inquired the War Lord in his turn,
with affected calmness.
"I don't follow," said Herr Krupp.
The War Lord could hardly master his impatience. Still more raising his
voice, he demanded abruptly: "Is Prussia to be divided into six petty
Kingdoms when I die because I happen to have six sons, and a small
principality besides for my daughter?"
Herr Krupp opened his eyes wide: "Your Majesty wants me to disinherit
one of my children?"
"I want you to proclaim my godchild Bertha Crown Princess of the Kingdom
of Cannon."
"But my other daughter----"
"Bertha is _my_ goddaughter!" (with the emphasis on the "my").
"Can I ever forget the honour conferred upon my humble house?"
"I trust not," said the War Lord, who is careful not to let people
forget any small favours he may bestow.
His brain works in fits and starts, in bounds and leaps, and when he
wants a thing it jumps at once to the conclusion that his fancy is a
_fait accompli_. Persuading Frederick had been easy with its bits of
browbeating and flashes of cajolery. Now, flushed with the triumph
gained, he launched forth the details. "Bertha, Crown Princess, trust
me to find the right consort for her."
"She is only a child."
"The very age when she ought to be taken in hand and moulded." The War
Lord illustrated the intended process by kneading the air with grasping
fingers, his "terrible right" alternately pushing and squeezing,
attacking, relaxing and coaxing, with the father looking on,
terror-stricken.
Such, then, was to be the fate of his little girl: a vice round her
white neck, spurs to her sides. The man before him came into the world
accoutred to ride, and seventy millions of people his cattle!
The jewels on the War Lord's ring-laden hand flashed and threatened.
That twenty-carat ruby on his little finger meant blood, and the
emerald, linked to it, might denote the poison-tongue eager to corrupt
the childish mind into an instrument of high politics. Diamonds stand
for innocence. There were diamonds galore. Oh, the farce of it! Opals,
too, a rare collection, but the stone sacred to October tells at least
an honest tale--tears.
The War Lord stripped off a gold hoop with a large turquoise. "Wear it
in remembrance of this hour, dear Frederick," he said. "The turquoise
signifies prosperity, you know."
He walked towards one of the windows and, standing within its deep
embrasure, pointed to the towering chimneys. "_My_ brave guardsmen," he
exulted, half to himself, "outposts of my Imperial will, avant-guard of
my seven millions of warriors; it will be great fun, old fellows, to
make you dance as I whistle!"
Then, with a broad smile to Frederick: "That being settled, the Minister
of Justice shall draw up your testament at once. I brought him to Essen
for that. Now, don't look frightened, boy. 'Last will' does not mean
'last legs.' You will outlive us all, I bet. Let's think of a Prince
Consort now."
"But, as said, Bertha is much too young," faltered Frederick.
"Herr," staccatoed the War Lord, "I already had the honour to inform you
that Bertha is my godchild--m-y g-o-d-c-h-i-l-d. Do you hear?" he
yelled, while startled Frederick looked anxiously towards the door.
The War Lord took the hint and resumed conversational tone. "Come now,"
he ordered, "roll call. Some of our dear friends are still in the
marriage mart." (Reflectively): "Too bad; Fritzie got married."
Bertha's father shuddered at the mentioning of a certain Count, who,
though brother-in-law of a reigning Grand Duke, was prisoner Number 5429
at Siegen jail, in Rhineland, a few years later for crimes unspeakable.
In 1902, however, the dashing Colonel of Horse had not yet been publicly
disgraced, and the War Lord launched into a panegyric of his friend.
"Yes, indeed, Fritz would have made a first-class master here. Not
overburdened with brains, but knows enough to obey orders. No humming
and hawing for him when the War Lord has spoken. But the Suien girl
caught him. The kind of son-in-law you want, Frederick."
Krupp shook his head.
"I respectfully beg to differ; none of these for my little girl."
"_These?_" The War Lord again raised his voice, but dropped into a
hoarse whisper when he heard the officer _de jour_ address the sentinels
in the corridor. "One can't say a word without being overheard," he
grumbled; "nearer, Frederick, still closer." As he continued speaking
he laid his massive right hand on Frederick's knee and hissed between
his teeth: "These? You forgot that you were referring to _my_ friends."
"I did not, most assuredly I did not," returned the Ironmaster,
disengaging himself by a swift movement and jumping up.
"You dare!" hissed the War Lord, again losing control of himself.
"I dare anything for my child!" cried Krupp, his face livid with rage;
"and I tell you to your face none of your free-living friends for my
Bertha!"
"Insolence!" roared the War Lord. "Take a care that I don't send you to
Spandau."
"I would endure Schlusselburg rather than suffer my child to marry one
of _these_," insisted the Ironmaster doggedly.
The War Lord gazed at the speaker for twenty or more seconds, then said
in a tone of command: "You can go. Send in Moltke" (referring to his
adjutant, later chief of the general staff).
With the latter he remained closeted a quarter of an hour--quite a long
space of time for a person of the War Lord's character--and it is said
that he tried to persuade the blond giant (Moltke was blond and blooming
then) that Krupp was a madman, as crazy as the Mad Hatter. Otherwise he
would never have dared oppose his plebeian will against that of the
supreme master. Of course not!
Of Moltke's counter-arguments we know naught, but the War Lord's visit
to Essen wound up with a grand banquet of sixty covers, and in the
course of it host and Imperial guest toasted each other in honeyed
words.
* * * * *
Less than two months later Frederick Krupp died by his own hand, and
Bertha Krupp--sixteen, homely and already prone to embonpoint--mounted
the throne of the Cannon Kings, as the War Lord had willed.
And, as he had insisted, she became automatically a pawn in his hand,
his _alter ego_ for destruction and misery.
Ever since his intimacy with Frederick, the War Lord had looked upon the
Krupp plant as the power house for the realisation of his ambition--the
conquest of the world; and to a very considerable extent Frederick had
aided and abetted his plans by employing his genius for invention and
business to commercialise war, and making it fit in with the general
scheme of high finance.
"Want a loan?" the Cannon King used to ask governments. "May we fix it
for you? But first contract for so many quick-firing guns."
The loan being amply secured, and the quick-firers paid for, then the
suggestion would come along: "Have some more Bleichroder or Meyer funds
on top of our latest devices in man-killers." And so on, and so on; an
endless chain.
Yet, while so eager to provide death with new-fangled tools wholesale,
Frederick could not, or would not, divest himself from the shackles of
business honesty--and his inheritance.
He wouldn't play tricks on customers. The steel and work he put into
guns for, say, Russia or Chili were as flawless and expert as in the
guns bought by his Prussian Majesty. And that was the "besetting sin of
Frederick," the damning spot on the escutcheon of their friendship, as
the War Lord viewed it. It followed, of course, that when one hundred
of the Tsar's Krupp guns faced one hundred Krupp guns of the Government
of Berlin, they would be an even match so far as material went--a thing
and condition in strict contradiction to the Potsdam maxim: "Always
attack with superior force."
How often the War Lord had argued with Frederick: Soft lining for enemy
howitzers; a well-concealed, patched-up flaw in the barrel of
quick-firers.
"I know no enemy, only customers," was Frederick's invariable rejoinder,
garbed in politest language.
Customers! Decidedly the War Lord wanted customers--plenty of them,
since, as we know, he had invested largely in Krupp stock; but to take
customers' money was one thing, and to provide them with means for
spoiling the War Lord's game was another.
When that pistol-shot startled Villa Huegel on November 22nd did it
portend the death-knell of what the War Lord called "Krupp
molly-coddledom"?
Even during Frederick Krupp's lifetime--just as if his early demise had
been a foregone conclusion--technical experts of the Berlin War Office
had been instructed to make extensive experiments with steel on the
lines ordered by Wilhelm the War Lord.
The test would be the Day!
*CHAPTER II*
*WEAVING THE TOILS ROUND BERTHA KRUPP*
"Your Play Days are Over"--The Baroness Speaks Out--In the Grip
of the Kaiser--A Room Apart
"The makings of the true German heifer," that astute Frenchman,
Hippolyte Taine, would have said of the young girl who was busy in her
garden behind Villa Huegel on the 24th of November, 1902. For her
blooming youth was full of the promise of maternity--broad shoulders,
budding figure, generous hands and feet, plenty of room for brains in a
good-sized head. Pretty? An Englishman or American would hardly have
accorded her that pleasing descriptive title, but comely and wholesome
she was, with her air of intelligence and kindly eyes.
An abominable German custom makes scarecrows out of children at a
parent's death. So Bertha Krupp was garbed in severest black, awkwardly
put together. Her very petticoats, visible when she bent over her
flowers, were of sable crepe; not a bit of white or lace, though it
would have been a relief, seeing that the young woman's complexion was
not of the best.
"Bertha--Uncle Majesty----" cried a child's voice from outside the
house, "wants you," it added, coming nearer.
"To say good-bye?" called Bertha in return. One might have discerned an
accent of relief in the tone of her voice.
"Not yet," replied her sister, running up, as she tugged at Bertha's
watering-can. "Adjutant von Moltke said something about a con-con----"
"Conference, I suppose," completed the older girl. "Will you never
learn to speak, child?"
"Uncle Majesty uses such big words," pleaded little Barbara. "Hurry,
sister, he is waiting, and you know how crazy he gets----"
"But what have _I_ got to do with him? Let him speak to Mamma. Tell
them I am busy with my flowers."
"Bertha!" cried a high-pitched voice from the direction of the villa.
"Mamma," whispered the younger girl; "hurry up, now, or you will catch
it." At the same moment one of the library windows in Villa Huegel
opened, disclosing the figure of the War Lord, accoutred as for
battle--gold lace, silver scarf, many-coloured ribbons, metal buttons
and numerals. His well padded chest heaved under dozens of medals and
decorations, his moustachios vied with sky-scrapers. With his
bejewelled right hand he beckoned imperiously.
"My child, my goddaughter," he said with terrible emphasis when Bertha
entered the room, breathing hard, "once and for all you must understand
that your play-days are over; at this moment you enter upon the service
of the State." He turned abruptly to Bertha's mother, adding in tones
of command: "You will put her into long dresses at once, Baroness. It
isn't fitting that the heiress of the Krupp works shows her legs like a
peasant girl."
"But I don't want to wear long dresses, Uncle Majesty," pouted Bertha.
The War Lord took no notice of the childish protest, but looked
inquiringly at Bertha's mother.
"Surely in matters of dress, at least, the child's wishes should be
consulted," said the Baroness half defiantly.
"But I insist," fumed the War Lord.
"And I respectfully submit that your Majesty must not meddle with
matters of toilette in my house."
The War Lord pulled a high-backed, eagle-crowned chair of silver-gilt up
to the late Cannon King's desk and pushed Bertha into it. It was the
fauteuil he had once designated as "sacred to the All Highest
person"--meaning himself, of course. As a rule its gold and purple
upholstery had a white silk cover, which was removed only when the War
Lord visited the great house.
"Cardinal fashion," he said to the astonished child, without taking
notice of his hostess's remark. "Cardinals, Bertha, are princes of the
Roman Church, and each has a throne in his house. While the See of St.
Peter is occupied, the emblem of power is turned to the wall. So,
heretofore, this throne of mine was obsolete while I was away from
Essen, but since your father, as his testament shows, appointed you his
successor under my guardianship, you shall have the right and privilege
to sit in my place. A throne for the War Lady while the War Lord is
away!"
The bewildered child was slow to avail herself of the grand privilege.
Shoulders bent forward, she wriggled to the edge, hardly touching the
seat, while her eyes sought her mother's with mute appeal.
However, the War Lord was determined to do all the talking himself. "As
I pointed out, under Papa's will, you are sole owner of the Krupp
business and mistress here," he declaimed, with a disdainful glance at
the child's mother. The Purple-born did not scruple to exult over his
victim before her daughter.
Happily, the young girl did not observe his ruthlessness, nor would she
have understood her godfather's motive.
"Mistress here," repeated the War Lord; "responsible to no one but God's
Anointed."
Bertha, now thoroughly frightened, burst into tears. "Don't cry,"
ordered the War Lord brusquely. But Frau Krupp jumped to her feet, and,
placing herself in front of the child, exclaimed with flaming eyes:
"Such language to a little girl and on the day of her father's burial!"
The War Lord saw that he had gone too far. "Come, now," he said
soothingly, "I meant your Uncle Majesty, of course. Uncle has always
been kind and considerate to his little Bertha, hasn't he?"
He asked the Baroness to be seated, while he patted Bertha's shoulder
and hair. "God-daughter," he said softly, "be a brave girl and listen."
And, with the child's eyes showing increasing bewilderment every moment,
he burst into a panegyric of himself and his sublime mission on earth,
such as even his dramatic collaborators, von Wildenbruch and Captain
Lauff, had never conceived in their most toadying moments.
He was on the most elaborately intimate terms with God, and every act of
his was approved by "his" God beforehand. "His" God had appointed him
vicar on earth, instrument of His benevolence and of His wrath.
"My child," he sermonised in accents of fanaticism, "think of the
honour, the unheard-of honour in store for you; you, the offspring of
humble parents, shall do my bidding as my God directs."
Bertha was stiff with astonishment, but the Baroness moved uneasily in
her chair and was about to speak, when the War Lord, who had paused to
observe the effect of his words, resumed:
"The Krupp business, _your_ business, my dear Bertha, is unlike any
other in the world. All other manufacturers and merchants cater to the
material welfare of man, more or less; the Krupp works alone are
destined to traffic in human life for God's greater glory and at His
behest.
"For fourteen years God has listened to my prayers for peace; for
fourteen long years I have beseeched Him, morning, noon and night, in
every crisis that arose throughout the world to permit me to keep my
sword sheathed--God's sword. But all these years myself and your
father, Bertha, have kept our powder dry, never relaxing armed
preparedness, doubling it rather, to be ready for God's first
bugle-call."
And so the blasphemous vaingloryings went on.
The War Lord strode over to the long wall of the room, dragging his
sword over the marble floor and giving his spurs and medals an extra
shake. He pushed a button, whereupon an illuminated map of Europe shot
into a frame where, a second before, a Watteau shepherdess had
impersonated _les fetes galantes du Roi_. Drawing the sword, he
delineated with its point the Central Empires, the Italian boot-leg, and
Turkey's European possessions. Then he double-crossed France, Russia
and Great Britain. "The enemy!" he cried. "Enemies of German
greatness, of German expansion, of German _kultur_--therefore, enemies
of the God of the Germans and of mine.
"But with your help I will smash them, pound them into a jelly, Bertha."
As if overcome by horror, the child glided from the impromptu throne of
the self-appointed _Godgeissel_ (the Lord's scourge) to the rug, and
buried her face in her mother's lap.
"Uncle Majesty," she sobbed, "you mean to say that I must help you make
war? The Commandment says, 'Thou shalt not kill.'"
"But the Lord also said, 'Vengeance is mine,'" quoted her Uncle Majesty;
"and God wreaks His vengeance through me, His elect, His chosen
instrument.
"Still, these matters you will understand better as you grow older," he
continued. "For the present remember this: under your father's will, I
am your chief guardian, and you must obey me in everything. While
nominally, even legally, you are sole proprietress of the Krupp works
and their numerous dependencies, you hold these properties, as a matter
of fact, in trust for me. It follows, my child, that you must leave the
direction of the works to your Uncle Majesty and his subordinates, the
directors and business managers. Do you agree to that?"
There was something hypnotic in the War Lord's delivery. As the
Baroness explained afterwards, he talked like one possessed. Add to
this his necromantic manoeuvring, his Machiavellian gestures, his
grandly weird eloquence--inherited from an uncle who died in a
strait-jacket--small wonder he prevailed upon the grief-stricken child,
when, alternately, he threatened, cajoled and flattered.
As a matter of fact, the War Lord's words seemed to have a peculiar
appeal to the richest girl in the world, who neither divined nor
imagined their sinister purpose. What pierced her comprehension
appealed to a youngster's love of independence, of shaking off mother's
leading-strings. In the avalanche of phrases that assailed Bertha's ears
this stood out: "Your mother doesn't count; you are mistress in your own
right." Very well, she would put the promise to the test. "I don't
quite understand," said the Cannon King's heiress; rising from her
knees, and without looking at her parent, added, "but I leave it all to
you, Uncle Majesty--everything."
"Do you hear?" cried the War Lord, addressing Frau Krupp.
"I have heard, and Bertha will go to her room now," replied the Baroness
firmly; and though the War Lord made an impatient gesture indicating
that he meant the child to remain, she conducted her daughter to the
door, kissed her on the forehead, and let her slip out.
When she turned round she saw the War Lord in the _Godgeissel_ chair
before the desk, resting his right arm on the blotter, his left hand on
the hilt of his sword.
"Any further commands for the mistress of the house?" she queried in no
humble tones.
The War Lord, seemingly absorbed in a document he had taken up, replied
without looking at his hostess: "Send in Moltke," whereupon the Baroness
retreated backward towards the door. She was about to drop a curtsy to
signify her leave-taking, when the War Lord cried out: "One thing more,
Madame la Baronne. From now on this room is _my_ room, and none but
myself or the Krupp heiress has the _entree_. My goddaughter may see my
representatives here, but no one else--no one."
*CHAPTER III*
*A MOTHER'S REFLECTIONS*
The Baroness and Franz--The Power-Drunk War Lord--A Pawn in the
Game--The Sweets of Power--Germany Above All--The War Lord's
Murder Lust--Fighting the Frankenstein--At the War Lord's Mercy
The Baroness's boudoir in Villa Huegel is a spacious apartment, hung in
blue and silver, the colours of her noble house. Everything that
riches, mellowed by refinement, could command enhanced its luxurious
comfort. In the home of Baroness Krupp are trophies of her visits to
foreign shores: cut glass, coins, bronzes and curios of all kinds.
Silver-gilt caskets hold royal presents, precious stuffs and monstrous
ornaments from German kings and kinglets--articles of jewellery for the
most part, too big for a woman of taste. All are crowned and initialled,
but few hall-marked. Since a prince is supposed to give away the real
thing, why bother about carats? Numerous paintings, English landscapes,
French and Italian decorative art and figures. An English grand piano
in one corner. Britishers prefer German makes, but the much-travelled
Baroness wouldn't tolerate the home product.
She is seated before a spindle-legged table with a crystal top over a
velvet-lined drawer, where Madame's royal orders and decorations
repose--crosses and stars, quadrupeds and birds of various _outre_ forms
and degrees. Pointing to one of them bearing the name of a queen famous
for her beauty and misfortunes, she murmured: "How proud I was when he
gave it to me! At that time I thought him chivalrous and believed him
sincere in his religious professions. Since he intrigues to make my
little girl the accomplice of his murderous desires, never more will I
wear it."
"Master Franz desires to speak to your ladyship," said a manservant from
behind the portieres covering the doorway.
"Show him up."
Franz was a distant relative who had lived much in the Krupp household
after he finished his studies at the late Frederick Krupp's expense. At
this time he was chief electrical engineer of the establishment,
destined for still higher honours, for experts held that the mantle of
the great Edison had descended upon Franz's broad shoulders. He was
like a big brother to the Krupp girls, and looked upon the Baroness as a
mother, having never known his own.
Tall and good-looking, Franz, as a rule, dressed like an Englishman of
distinction, but to-day he had chafed under the obligation of wearing
evening dress for breakfast, lunch and tea, because of the War Lord's
presence. Even now his nether garments belonged to the ceremonial
variety, but he wore a jacket tightly buttoned over the wide expanse of
his shirt-front.
"So it is proposed to make two kinds of steel in future," he whispered,
after closing the door and drawing the curtains. "Has that your
approval, Frau Krupp?"
The Ironmaster's widow heard only the first part of the sentence; she
was too amazed to listen further.
"What is that you say, Franz?"
The young man kissed the Baroness's hand.
"Acting without your leave or consent--I thought so," he said. "I would
have staked my life on it that you would permit no such infamy." Seeing
the Baroness's questioning eyes focused on his, he explained:
An hour before the War Lord left the Director-General had sent for
him--"to explain certain technical details," ran the message. He had to
wait a considerable time in the ante-room of the conference chamber
before being admitted, and while there could not help overhearing what
was going on inside, as the War Lord was arguing in drill-ground
accents.
This was the gist of his peroration, defended with consummate sophistry:
It was a crime against the Fatherland to supply possible enemies with
arms that at one time or another might be used against the War Lord's
Majesty. That sort of thing--treason, to call it by its proper
name--had been permitted long enough, too long, in fact; and now that
the life-long defender of misguided business honesty had been removed by
God's Hand--G-o-d-'s H-a-n-d--there must be an end of it. He (the War
Lord), ever on guard against the Fatherland's enemies, had instructed
his scientists to discover a substitute for hard steel with which to
line enemy guns and armour. These substitutes were forthwith to be
experimented with, and, if the results were satisfactory, must be
employed, instead of the real steel, whenever the War Lord so directs.
"And Frederick hardly cold in his shroud!" gasped the Baroness.
"But you," cried Franz, "you can prevent this fraud, this disgrace! You
must, you will, I am sure of it!"
The Baroness had risen and stared vacantly into the fire.
"God punish me if I would hesitate a moment to do as honour dictates,
Franz, but Frederick Krupp left his widow bound hand and foot," she
replied bitterly.
"You mean to say that you submit to the power-drunk War Lord? Abdicate
your sacred trust? Make your children and your workpeople accomplices
of fraudulent practices?"
"Haven't you heard about the stipulations which were made in your Uncle
Frederick's last will and testament?"
"Not a word," replied Franz.
"I thought Bertha would tell you."
"I was busy all the afternoon, and then came the Director-General's
order, which prevented me from saying good night to the children."
"Sit down then and listen," said the Baroness. "As Uncle Frederick often
told you, the War Lord has tried for years to obtain control of the
Krupp works. In particular he was for ever preaching against the policy
of business integrity, the proudest of the Krupp inheritances; but
though my husband allowed himself to be dominated by him in many
respects, in this, the Krupp honesty, he remained adamant, partly thanks
to my advice and strenuous opposition, I dare say. Up to now the Krupps
have never played any government false, as you know."
"But, Uncle Frederick dead, the War Lord is moving heaven and earth to
flog the firm into submission." There was suppressed rage in the tone
of the young man's voice.
"Let me finish," demanded the Baroness. "Convinced that I would refuse
to be the tool of his ambition, the War Lord persuaded your Uncle to
ignore me as his legitimate successor, and the testament appoints Bertha
sole heir and, again ignoring me, the War Lord her guardian and
executor."
"_Gott!_" cried Franz.
The Baroness went on: "His position as supreme overlord of the Krupp
business he made perfectly clear to us."
"Us? You mean the heads of the business?"
"I referred to the child and myself. He talked to the directors
afterwards." The discrowned Cannon Queen told Franz the story of the
Imperial interview. "He is the master," she said in conclusion, "Bertha
his pawn, myself nobody."
"And we, the heads of the business, and our workmen, his slaves," added
the chief electrician gloomily.
These two people, suddenly confronted by the unexpected--a wife shorn of
her rights and wounded in her holiest maternal sentiments; an honest man
commandeered to debase his genius and become an accessory to murder most
foul--sat for a while in silence, brooding over their misfortune and the
disasters threatening mankind as a consequence.
At last the Baroness roused herself. "And what did they want with you
at the conference, Franz?"
"I was admitted after the War Lord had left to be closeted with the
Director-General," replied the engineer, "and the directors seemed to me
extraordinarily perturbed--far more than the master's death warrants
among equals. Herr Braun acted as spokesman. He said the War Lord
wanted the firm to experiment with a new steel lining for guns intended
for foreign countries.
"'Foreign countries! What does that mean?' I asked, as if I had not
been an involuntary listener to the War Lord's speech.
"'Majesty's orders--it behoves subjects to obey, not to ask questions,'
said Herr Braun, with unusual severity. 'To the point, sir, acting upon
the War Lord's orders to entrust the business to expert hands, we have
decided to turn over the job to you.'"
Franz stopped short, then burst out: "What am I doing, Frau Krupp? You
just told me that you are not the head of the firm, and I am about to
reveal matters of the gravest importance confided to my keeping. I made
a mistake--I was led away by filial reverence for my benefactor's widow.
Pray forget what I have said."
Franz was about to withdraw, when a voice outside called: "Mamma, can I
come in?"
"You said good night once. I thought you were in bed and asleep,
Bertha."
The door opened, and a hand rustled the portieres.
"Are you alone?"
"Only Franz."
"Oh!"
Bertha's blonde head thrust itself through the centre of the curtains,
while she paused on the threshold. Then a naked foot in a blue velvet
slipper with a golden heel: a vision in floating white rushed in and
nestled childishly at the Baroness's feet.
"Howdy, Franz?" said Bertha, drawing her kimono tighter over her bosom.
And to her mother: "I couldn't sleep after what Uncle Majesty told us
to-night. So I came down. You are not angry, Mamma? Don't scold,
Mamma," she added, observing her mother's stern face.
Frau Krupp patted the child's head. "Fate!" she said to Franz.
"_Voila_, the head of the Krupp firm. Continue."
The engineer bowed. "With your permission, my chief," he said,
addressing Bertha.
"Anything you please, you big booby," laughed the child. Then,
seriously: "I am your chief, indeed I am. Think of bossing a big chap
like you and that arrogant Herr Braun, too!" She motioned Franz to bend
down, and whispered in his ear, "Wouldn't it be fun to sack him?"
"No nonsense, child, if you want to stay up," Frau Krupp was very much
in earnest, and to Franz she said: "Go on; I am impatient to hear the
rest."
"I was telling your mother about some business Herr Braun wants to
entrust me with," explained Franz, looking at the child.
"How very interesting," yawned Bertha; "but you can't get me to listen.
Ah, there, I see one of Barbara's dolls. I will play with it till you
get through; then supper. I didn't eat dinner with Fraulein," she
added, looking at her mother, "and there's such a goneness here,"
touching her abdomen. The greatest force for destruction in the world,
yet a child to all intents and purposes!
"Proceed," said the Baroness to Franz.
"With the chief's permission," began Franz formally; then, as if trying
to make his disclosure as indefinite as possible: "You heard about the
order from King Leopold, secured by the War-Lord's Brussels ambassador?"
The Baroness nodded, and Bertha took her eyes momentarily from her
plaything. "Big, big guns," she said, describing a circle in the air by
turning the doll's arm and hand round and round; "my apanage, poor Papa
said. Glad you reminded me. I must tell Herr Braun about it. All the
profits are to go to my children's hospital." She sat the doll astride
her knee, bobbing her up and down, then burst out laughing. "See that
head-dress, Franz, and her gown and apron--the Belgian colours. Looks
like a coincidence, doesn't it?"
Bertha embraced the doll tenderly. "Thank your King for me, Dolly. The
more guns he orders, the better for our little children here. German
interests first," laughed Bertha, looking up. "Uncle Majesty told me so
ever so often."
The "Germany-above-all" spirit, spelling moral and physical
ruthlessness, spoke out of the child. The Fatherland first, second and
third; perdition for the rest of the world, if Germany's interests be
served thereby!
Whether the heiress had an inkling of what the War Lord really intended,
it is impossible to decide; neither can there be any positive knowledge
as to the attitude she might have assumed if, perchance, she did
understand Franz's pregnant words.
Pupil of the War Lord, firmly believing in his preachings, saturated
with his theories, and over-awed by his claims of Divine mission, his
vapourings were gospel to her, and "Germany-above-all" was one of the
commandments, even though it conflicted with all the others.
A monstrous case of _folie a deux_, "deux" standing for the German
nation. Here we have a man decked out in ornate regimentals travelling
about his country telling four millions of men: "You must die for Me,"
and immediately each man says to his wife: "I wonder if there is a
special heaven for patriots like your husband?"
And to a certain class of persons he points out that science is but the
handmaiden of wholesale murder, and that they must employ their
God-given inventive genius, all their brains, all their time, to devise
new ways and means for killing as many men, women and children as there
are in the world outside of the German Empire. And they do.
And to a woman he says: "You were born to suffer. Give me your husband;
I want him for the fighting." And she forthwith tells her man to make
one more for the shambles.
And to the golden-haired girl he says: "A truce to your vanity, off with
your locks, that I may buy more rifles; and your lover I want, too. His
manly breast will make an excellent scabbard for a French or Russian
lance."
And the golden-haired one raves that she is thrice happy to be allowed
to sacrifice her beauty and the idol of her dreams for the War Lord.
"I want your fathers," he says to a playground full of children, "and
your uncles and big brothers and cousins." And the little ones cry:
"Hurrah! Long live the Emperor!"
"Would ye live for ever?" he queries of men between fifty and
sixty-five. "To the barracks with you, even if you are but good for
cannon fodder."
Someone tells him of a bunch of boys playing marbles in an alley; not
one of them has finished his education. The War Lord examines them
critically and sniffs. "You are big enough to stop a bullet somehow,"
he allows, and they are led to slaughter.
The All Highest looks upon the earth and boasts of his winged legions of
man-killers. He declaims that Englishmen and Frenchmen and Italians and
Belgians have turned out to fight God's Anointed; but adds with a sly
smile they left their women at home and their brood, that he may
out-Herod Herod. In his mind he feels the earth trembling under the
heavy tread of his armed millions and the weight of his artillery.
This Dancing Dervish of universal slaughter, this man given over to
murder-lust is the object of veneration not only of those whom he
addresses in person, because of their mistaken sense of duty and
patriotism; a whole nation, seventy millions strong, acclaim him
Saviour--Messiah of the Fatherland's destinies.
One can understand individual sacrifice, but seventy millions of people,
every mother's son and daughter, turning beasts of prey! It baffles
psychological speculation. Everywhere the "Evangelium of German
superdom," as the War Lord sees it, is loud.
Small wonder Bertha, born of man-killer stock and suckled on the breasts
of militarism, which nourished her kith and kin and their hundreds of
thousands of dependents, believes unconditionally in the doctrines
pronounced by her godfather, to her the God-head of power infinite,
omniscience incarnate!
Hence the implied rebuke to Franz: "German interests first." After that
she returned to the nursery--her Belgian doll.