Mr. Standfast Part 24

He pointed out two names. The writing was a set of key-words we did not know, but two names stood out which I knew too well. They were 'Bommaerts' and 'Chelius'.

'My G.o.d!' I cried, 'that's uncanny. It only shows that if you chew long enough--'

'd.i.c.k,' said Mary, 'you mustn't say that again. At the best it's an ugly metaphor, and you're making it a plat.i.tude.'

'Who is Ivery anyhow?' I asked. 'Do you know more about him than we knew in the summer? Mary, what did Bommaerts pretend to be?'

'An Englishman.' Mary spoke in the most matter-of-fact tone, as if it were a perfectly usual thing to be made love to by a spy, and that rather soothed my annoyance. 'When he asked me to marry him he proposed to take me to a country-house in Devons.h.i.+re. I rather think, too, he had a place in Scotland. But of course he's a German.'

'Ye-es,' said Blenkiron slowly, 'I've got on to his record, and it isn't a pretty story. It's taken some working out, but I've got all the links tested now ... He's a Boche and a large-sized n.o.bleman in his own state. Did you ever hear of the Graf von Schwabing?'

I shook my head.

'I think I have heard Uncle Charlie speak of him,' said Mary, wrinkling her brows. 'He used to hunt with the Pytchley.'

'That's the man. But he hasn't troubled the Pytchley for the last eight years. There was a time when he was the last thing in smartness in the German court-officer in the Guards, ancient family, rich, darned clever-all the fixings. Kaiser liked him, and it's easy to see why. I guess a man who had as many personalities as the Graf was amusing after-dinner company. Specially among the Germans, who in my experience don't excel in the lighter vein. Anyway, he was William's white-headed boy, and there wasn't a mother with a daughter who wasn't out gunning for Otto von Schwabing. He was about as popular in London and Noo York-and in Paris, too. Ask Sir Walter about him, d.i.c.k. He says he had twice the brains of Kuhlmann, and better manners than the Austrian fellow he used to yarn about ... Well, one day there came an almighty court scandal, and the bottom dropped out of the Graf's World. It was a pretty beastly story, and I don't gather that Schwabing was as deep in it as some others. But the trouble was that those others had to be s.h.i.+elded at all costs, and Schwabing was made the scapegoat. His name came out in the papers and he had to go .'

'What was the case called?' I asked.

Blenkiron mentioned a name, and I knew why the word Schwabing was familiar. I had read the story long ago in Rhodesia.

'It was some smash,' Blenkiron went on. 'He was drummed out of the Guards, out of the clubs, out of the country ... Now, how would you have felt, d.i.c.k, if you had been the Graf? Your life and work and happiness crossed out, and all to save a mangy princeling. "Bitter as h.e.l.l," you say. Hungering for a chance to put it across the lot that had outed you? You wouldn't rest till you had William sobbing on his knees asking your pardon, and you not thinking of granting it? That's the way you'd feel, but that wasn't the Graf's way, and what's more it isn't the German way. He went into exile hating humanity, and with a heart all poison and snakes, but itching to get back. And I'll tell you why. It's because his kind of German hasn't got any other home on this earth. Oh, yes, I know there's stacks of good old Teutons come and squat in our little country and turn into fine Americans. You can do a lot with them if you catch them young and teach them the Declaration of Independence and make them study our Sunday papers. But you can't deny there's something comic in the rough about all Germans, before you've civilized them. They're a pecooliar people, a darned pecooliar people, else they wouldn't staff all the menial and indecent occupations on the globe. But that pecooliarity, which is only skin-deep in the working Boche, is in the bone of the grandee. Your German aristocracy can't consort on terms of equality with any other Upper Ten Thousand. They swagger and bluff about the world, but they know very well that the world's sn.i.g.g.e.ring at them. They're like a boss from Salt Creek Gully who's made his pile and bought a dress suit and dropped into a Newport evening party. They don't know where to put their hands or how to keep their feet still ... Your copper-bottomed English n.o.bleman has got to keep jogging himself to treat them as equals instead of sending them down to the servants' hall. Their fine fixings are just the high light that reveals the everlasting jay. They can't be gentlemen, because they aren't sure of themselves. The world laughs at them, and they know it and it riles them like h.e.l.l ... That's why when a Graf is booted out of the Fatherland, he's got to creep back somehow or be a wandering Jew for the rest of time.'

Blenkiron lit another cigar and fixed me with his steady, ruminating eye.

'For eight years the man has slaved, body and soul, for the men who degraded him. He's earned his restoration and I daresay he's got it in his pocket. If merit was rewarded he should be covered with Iron Crosses and Red Eagles ... He had a pretty good hand to start out with. He knew other countries and he was a dandy at languages. More, he had an uncommon gift for living a part. That is real genius, d.i.c.k, however much it gets up against us. Best of all he had a first-cla.s.s outfit of brains. I can't say I ever struck a better, and I've come across some bright citizens in my time ... And now he's going to win out, unless we get mighty busy.'

There was a knock at the door and the solid figure of Andrew Amos revealed itself.

'It's time ye was home, Miss Mary. It chappit half-eleven as I came up the stairs. It's comin' on to rain, so I've brought an umbrelly.'

'One word,' I said. 'How old is the man?'

'Just gone thirty-six,' Blenkiron replied.

I turned to Mary, who nodded. 'Younger than you, d.i.c.k,' she said wickedly as she got into her big Jaeger coat.

'I'm going to see you home,' I said.

'Not allowed. You've had quite enough of my society for one day. Andrew's on escort duty tonight.'

Blenkiron looked after her as the door closed.

'I reckon you've got the best girl in the world.'

'Ivery thinks the same,' I said grimly, for my detestation of the man who had made love to Mary fairly choked me.

'You can see why. Here's this degenerate coming out of his rotten cla.s.s, all pampered and petted and satiated with the easy pleasures of life. He has seen nothing of women except the bad kind and the overfed specimens of his own country. I hate being impolite about females, but I've always considered the German variety uncommon like cows. He has had desperate years of intrigue and danger, and consorting with every kind of scallawag. Remember, he's a big man and a poet, with a brain and an imagination that takes every grade without changing gears. Suddenly he meets something that is as fresh and lovely as a spring flower, and has wits too, and the steeliest courage, and yet is all youth and gaiety. It's a new experience for him, a kind of revelation, and he's big enough to value her as she should be valued ... No, d.i.c.k, I can understand you getting cross, but I reckon it an item to the man's credit.'

'It's his blind spot all the same,' I said.

'His blind spot,' Blenkiron repeated solemnly, 'and, please G.o.d, we're going to remember that.'

Next morning in miserable sloppy weather Blenkiron carted me about Paris. We climbed five sets of stairs to a flat away up in Montmartre, where I was talked to by a fat man with spectacles and a slow voice and told various things that deeply concerned me. Then I went to a room in the Boulevard St Germain, with a little cabinet opening off it, where I was shown papers and maps and some figures on a sheet of paper that made me open my eyes. We lunched in a modest cafe tucked away behind the Palais Royal, and our companions were two Alsatians who spoke German better than a Boche and had no names-only numbers. In the afternoon I went to a low building beside the Invalides and saw many generals, including more than one whose features were familiar in two hemispheres. I told them everything about myself, and I was examined like a convict, and all particulars about my appearance and manner of speech written down in a book. That was to prepare the way for me, in case of need, among the vast army of those who work underground and know their chief but do not know each other.

The rain cleared before night, and Blenkiron and I walked back to the hotel through that lemon-coloured dusk that you get in a French winter. We pa.s.sed a company of American soldiers, and Blenkiron had to stop and stare. I could see that he was stiff with pride, though he wouldn't show it.

'What d'you think of that bunch?' he asked.

'First-rate stuff,' I said.

'The men are all right,' he drawled critically. 'But some of the officer-boys are a bit puffy. They want fining down.'

'They'll get it soon enough, honest fellows. You don't keep your weight long in this war.'

'Say, d.i.c.k,' he said shyly, 'what do you truly think of our Americans? You've seen a lot of them, and I'd value your views.' His tone was that of a bashful author asking for an opinion on his first book.

'I'll tell you what I think. You're constructing a great middle-cla.s.s army, and that's the most formidable fighting machine on earth. This kind of war doesn't want the Berserker so much as the quiet fellow with a trained mind and a lot to fight for. The American ranks are filled with all sorts, from cow-punchers to college boys, but mostly with decent lads that have good prospects in life before them and are fighting because they feel they're bound to, not because they like it. It was the same stock that pulled through your Civil War. We have a middle-cla.s.s division, too-Scottish Territorials, mostly clerks and shopmen and engineers and farmers' sons. When I first struck them my only crab was that the officers weren't much better than the men. It's still true, but the men are super-excellent, and consequently so are the officers. That division gets top marks in the Boche calendar for sheer fighting devilment ... And, please G.o.d, that's what your American army's going to be. You can wash out the old idea of a regiment of scallawags commanded by dukes. That was right enough, maybe, in the days when you hurrooshed into battle waving a banner, but it don't do with high explosives and a couple of million men on each side and a battle front of five hundred miles. The hero of this war is the plain man out of the middle cla.s.s, who wants to get back to his home and is going to use all the brains and grit he possesses to finish the job soon.'

'That sounds about right,' said Blenkiron reflectively. 'It pleases me some, for you've maybe guessed that I respect the British Army quite a little. Which part of it do you put top?'

'All of it's good. The French are keen judges and they give front place to the Scots and the Australians. For myself I think the backbone of the Army is the old-fas.h.i.+oned English county regiments that hardly ever get into the papers Though I don't know, if I had to pick, but I'd take the South Africans. There's only a brigade of them, but they're h.e.l.l's delight in a battle. But then you'll say I'm prejudiced.'

'Well,' drawled Blenkiron, you're a mighty Empire anyhow. I've sojourned up and down it and I can't guess how the old-time highbrows in your little island came to put it together. But I'll let you into a secret, d.i.c.k. I read this morning in a noospaper that there was a natural affinity between Americans and the men of the British Dominions. Take it from me, there isn't-at least not with this American. I don't understand them one little bit. When I see your lean, tall Australians with the sun at the back of their eyes, I'm looking at men from another planet. Outside you and Peter, I never got to fathom a South African. The Canadians live over the fence from us, but you mix up a Canuck with a Yank in your remarks and you'll get a bat in the eye ... But most of us Americans have gotten a grip on your Old Country. You'll find us mighty respectful to other parts of your Empire, but we say anything we d.a.m.n well please about England. You see, we know her that well and like her that well, we can be free with her.

'It's like,' he concluded as we reached the hotel, 'it's like a lot of boys that are getting on in the world and are a bit jealous and stand-offish with each other. But they're all at home with the old man who used to warm them up with a hickory cane, even though sometimes in their haste they call him a stand-patter.'

That night at dinner we talked solid business-Blenkiron and I and a young French Colonel from the IIIeme Section at G.Q.G. Blenkiron, I remember, got very hurt about being called a business man by the Frenchman, who thought he was paying him a compliment.

'Cut it out,' he said. 'It is a word that's gone bad with me. There's just two kind of men, those who've gotten sense and those who haven't. A big percentage of us Americans make our living by trading, but we don't think because a man's in business or even because he's made big money that he's any natural good at every job. We've made a college professor our President, and do what he tells us like little boys, though he don't earn more than some of us pay our works' manager. You English have gotten business on the brain, and think a fellow's a dandy at handling your Government if he happens to have made a pile by some flat-catching ramp on your Stock Exchange. It makes me tired. You're about the best business nation on earth, but for G.o.d's sake don't begin to talk about it or you'll lose your power. And don't go confusing real business with the ordinary gift of raking in the dollars. Any man with sense could make money if he wanted to, but he mayn't want. He may prefer the fun of the job and let other people do the looting. I reckon the biggest business on the globe today is the work behind your lines and the way you feed and supply and transport your army. It beats the Steel Corporation and the Standard Oil to a frazzle. But the man at the head of it all don't earn more than a thousand dollars a month ... Your nation's getting to wors.h.i.+p Mammon, d.i.c.k. Cut it out. There's just the one difference in humanity-sense or no sense, and most likely you won't find any more sense in the man that makes a billion selling bonds than in his brother Tim that lives in a shack and sells corn-cobs. I'm not speaking out of sinful jealousy, for there was a day when I was reckoned a railroad king, and I quit with a bigger pile than kings usually retire on. But I haven't the sense of old Peter, who never even had a bank account ... And it's sense that wins in this war.'

The Colonel, who spoke good English, asked a question about a speech which some politician had made.

'There isn't all the sense I'd like to see at the top,' said Blenkiron. 'They're fine at smooth words. That wouldn't matter, but they're thinking smooth thoughts. What d'you make of the situation, d.i.c.k?'

'I think it's the worst since First Ypres,' I said. 'Everybody's c.o.c.k-a-whoop, but G.o.d knows why.'

'G.o.d knows why,' Blenkiron repeated. 'I reckon it's a simple calculation, and you can't deny it any more than a mathematical law. Russia is counted out. The Boche won't get food from her for a good many months, but he can get more men, and he's got them. He's fighting only on one foot, and he's been able to bring troops and guns west so he's as strong as the Allies now on paper. And he's stronger in reality. He's got better railways behind him, and he's fighting on inside lines and can concentrate fast against any bit of our front. I'm no soldier, but that's so, d.i.c.k?'

The Frenchman smiled and shook his head. 'All the same they will not pa.s.s. They could not when they were two to one in 1914, and they will not now. If we Allies could not break through in the last year when we had many more men, how will the Germans succeed now with only equal numbers?'

Blenkiron did not look convinced. 'That's what they all say. I talked to a general last week about the coming offensive, and he said he was praying for it to hurry up, for he reckoned Fritz would get the fright of his life. It's a good spirit, maybe, but I don't think it's sound on the facts. We've got two mighty great armies of fine fighting-men, but, because we've two commands, we're bound to move ragged like a peal of bells. The Hun's got one army and forty years of stiff tradition, and, what's more, he's going all out this time. He's going to smash our front before America lines up, or perish in the attempt ... Why do you suppose all the peace racket in Germany has died down, and the very men that were talking democracy in the summer are now hot for fighting to a finish? I'll tell you. It's because old Ludendorff has promised them complete victory this spring if they spend enough men, and the Boche is a good gambler and is out to risk it. We're not up against a local attack this time. We're standing up to a great nation going bald-headed for victory or destruction. If we're broken, then America's got to fight a new campaign by herself when she's ready, and the Boche has time to make Russia his feeding-ground and diddle our blockade. That puts another five years on to the war, maybe another ten. Are we free and independent peoples going to endure that much? ... I tell you we're tossing to quit before Easter.'

He turned towards me, and I nodded a.s.sent.

'That's more or less my view,' I said. 'We ought to hold, but it'll be by our teeth and nails. For the next six months we'll be fighting without any margin.'

'But, my friends, you put it too gravely,' cried the Frenchman. 'We may lose a mile or two of ground-yes. But serious danger is not possible. They had better chances at Verdun and they failed. Why should they succeed now?'