"My orders are to experiment with the War Lord's new formula for steel
on those guns for Liege."
Franz buried his head in his hands, elbows planted on knees, leaning
forward heavily, while the Baroness sat looking at him, her nimble mind
weighing the pros and cons. At last she reached out a hand and touched
the young man's shoulder.
"Franz," she said solemnly.
The young man's head shot up and he stared at Frau Krupp as if she was a
ghost. Answering the question in her eyes, he almost shouted, "Never!"
holding up his right hand as if under oath.
The Baroness placed his hand on Bertha's head. "Swear that you will
stand by this child."
"I swear, with all my heart, so help me, God," pronounced Franz, with
severe emphasis.
A peculiar look came into the Baroness's eyes, half satisfied, half
cunning, as with a sort of imperious finality she said: "It is well."
Then, turning to the child: "Bertha, run along now and tell them to
serve in the small dining-room in five minutes."
"Make it ten, Mamma, so I can put on my new _negligee_."
"All right, ten; but hurry," agreed Frau Krupp, looking at the pendule.
When the curtain had fallen behind Bertha the Baroness turned a white,
severe face upon Franz. Then, abandoning all pretence of loyalty to the
Grand War Lord, she told the terrible secrets long locked in her bosom,
secrets imparted by her late husband or gathered from his lips during
long, sleepless nights while he tossed on his pillow.
"It's the Frankenstein we have to fight," she said, "the pitiless,
heartless, soul-less Evil One, intent upon setting the world afire
through my child's inheritance. The plotting has been going on ever
since the crowned monster was enthroned. Almost the first communication
he made to Frederick, as head of the Empire, was: 'Now we must bend all
energies to get ready. And when we are, I will set my foot upon the
neck of the universe, Charlemagne redivivus!'
"Previous to that, Frederick and myself had agreed gradually to drop
cannon- and ammunition-making. The Krupps were to create, instead of
facilitating destruction. No longer was Essen to be a place upon which
a merciful God looked with abhorrence. Engines of death had made us
rich and powerful; henceforth the coined results of war were to be
employed to make waste land arable, to drain morasses, to dig canals, to
prosecute every peaceful endeavour promising to enhance the German
people's chances of happiness and prosperity. The old saw of turning
swords into ploughshares was to be enacted by the firm that had made war
thrice deadly. Then the tempter came. 'I rely upon you, Frederick!
You are the Fatherland's only hope, for Germany can achieve its
destinies only through blood and iron.'
"'One more supreme effort, Frederick, then the War Lord will turn
husbandman, making you manager-general of his great farm stretching from
the Arctic Circle to the Mediterranean, from the Atlantic to Siberia.'
"As you know, the War Lord is an insinuating talker," continued Frau
Krupp, "and his autocratic manner, enhanced by occasional flurries of
condescension and persuading Frederick to join in his social
relaxations. Ah!" she cried, striking the table with her hand, "it was
these that forged the bullet which killed my husband!"
There was a shrill tone of rage and defiance in the last words. Then
emotion mastered Frau Krupp's strength. She tottered, swayed, and would
have fallen had not Franz caught her. He knew what she had suffered
through her husband's intimacy with the War Lord and his cronies, and
shuddered.
"Mother," he said unconsciously, as her head touched his breast. The
Baroness let it rest there a moment; here was a tower of strength, of
reserve force.
"Alas!" she continued, after a tense silence, "in the long run they
ensnared Frederick. He succumbed to their ensnaring wiles as a foolish
man might to the flatteries of a flirt. My counsel was no longer
sought; the promises he had made--which I had exacted in happier
days--were forgotten or denied. The very ploughs and ploughshares we
were manufacturing then were thrown into the melting-pot for guns."
She picked up a book lying on the mantel. "'Vital Statistics of the
German Empire,'" she read aloud; "'Steady Increase of Population.'" She
flung the volume on the hearth. "Multiply like the Biblical sands; it
only means that Essen works the harder to put you under the sod."
Frau Krupp dropped her voice and went on in a whisper: "Do you
understand now what your threatened retirement would mean? It would
mean that, excepting France and Great Britain, the whole of the world,
all the smaller nations, would be practically at the War Lord's mercy,
because their guns wouldn't shoot, their swords and lances wouldn't
pierce.
"Such is the goal he has been striving for, the goal he wants to attain
through my little girl. 'Have them all inadequately armed, and it will
be a walk-over for German arms,' he calculates."
"And how can I prevent the world's debacle?"
"By fighting fire with fire. You cannot fight the War Lord
openly--pretend obedience, fall in with his plans apparently, be an
enthusiastic faker, as far as he can see; but don't smirch my little
girl's business honour and submerge the world under a tidal wave of
blood by making other nations defenceless. I have your promise, Franz?"
"It's a vast prospect," answered the young engineer, "but I have sworn
to stand by Bertha----"
"I thank you," said the Baroness, as the portieres were noisily pushed
aside and a child's voice cried: "Supper's ready."
*CHAPTER IV*
*BERTHA KRUPP, WAR LADY, ASSERTS HERSELF*