Upton Sinclair - Dragons’s teeth

So Lanny received a demonstration of what it meant to be a master of men. Perhaps that was what the Führer intended; for not until he had received the submission of his Reich Organization Leader Number 1 and had dismissed him did he turn again to his guest. "Well, Mr. Budd," he said, "you see what it takes to put people to work for a cause. Wouldn’t you like to come and help me?"

Said Lanny: "I am afraid I am without any competence for such a task". If there was a trace of dryness in his tone the Führer missed it, for he smiled amiably, and seemed to be of the opinion that he had done a very good afternoon’s work.

Long afterward Lanny learned from Kurt Meissner what the Führer thought about that meeting. He said that young Mr. Budd was a perfect type of the American privileged classes: good-looking, easy-going, and perfectly worthless. It would be a very simple task to cause that nation to split itself to pieces, and the National Socialist movement would take it in charge.

IN THE month of December Irma and Rahel completed the tremendous feat they had undertaken; having kept the pact they had made with each other and with their families, they were now physically and morally free. The condition of two lusty infants appeared to indicate that Rousseau and Lanny had been right. Little by little the greedy sucklings learned to take the milk of real cows instead of imitation ones; they acquired a taste for fruit juices and for prune pulp with the skins carefully removed. At last the young mothers could go to a bridge party without having to leave in the middle of it.

Marceline with her governess had returned to Juan at the end of the yacht cruise, and her mother had promised to join her for Christmas. Farewells were said to the Robin family, and Beauty and her husband went by train, taking the baby, Miss Severne, the nursemaid, and Madame. The General Graf Stubendorf’s invitation to Lanny and Irma had been renewed, and Kurt had written that they should by all means accept; not only would it be more pleasant for Irma at the Schloss, but it would advantage the Meissners to have an old friend return as a guest of Seine Hochgeboren. Lanny noted this with interest and explained it to his wife; what would have been snobbery in America was loyalty in Silesia. The armies of Napoleon having never reached that land, the feudal system still prevailed and rank was a reality.

Stubendorf being in Poland, the train had to stop, and luggage and passports to be examined. The village itself was German, and only the poorer part of the peasantry was Polish. This made a situation full of tension, and no German thought of it as anything but a truce. What the Poles thought, Lanny didn’t know, for he couldn’t talk with them. In Berlin he had shown his wife a comic paper and a cartoon portraying Poland as an enormous fat hog, being ridden by a French army officer who was twisting the creature’s tail to make it gallop and waving a saber to show why he was in a hurry. Not exactly the Christmas spirit!

Irma Barnes Budd explored the feudal system, and found it not so different from the South Shore of Long Island. She was met at the train by a limousine, which would have happened at home. A five-story castle didn’t awe her, for she had been living in one that was taller and twice as broad. The lady who welcomed her was certainly no taller or broader than Mrs. Fanny Barnes, and couldn’t be more proud of her blood. The principal differences were, first, that the sons and daughters of this Prussian family worked harder than any young people Irma had ever known; and, second, there were uniforms and ceremonies expressive of rank and station. Irma gave close attention to these, and her husband wondered if she was planning to introduce them into the New World.

Visiting his father’s home in Connecticut, Lanny had discovered that being married to a great heiress had raised his social status; and now he observed the same phenomenon here. Persons who through the years had paid no particular attention to him suddenly recognized that he was a man of brilliant parts; even the Meissner family, whom he had known and loved since he was a small boy, appeared to be seized with awe. Whereas formerly he had shared a bed in Kurt’s small room, he was now lodged in a sumptuous suite in the castle; the retainers and tenants all took off their hats to him, and he no longer had to hear the gräflichen ideas explained second-hand by Herr Meissner, but got them from the horse’s mouth, as the saying is.

It was unfortunate that the ideas no longer impressed him as they did in the earlier years. The General Graf was a typical Junker, active in the Nationalist party; his policies were limited by the interests of his class. He did not let himself be influenced by the fact that his estate was now in Poland; that was a temporary matter, soon to be remedied. He supported a tariff on foodstuffs so that the German people would pay higher prices to landowners. He wanted his coal mined, but he didn’t want to pay the miners enough so that they could buy his food. He wanted steel and chemicals and other products of industry, which required swarms of workers, but he blamed them for trying to have a say as to the conditions of their lives, or indeed whether they should live at all.

Fortunately it wasn’t necessary to spend much time discussing politics. There was a great deal of company, with music, dancing, and feasting. If the country products couldn’t be sold at a profit they might as well be eaten at home, so everyone did his best, and it was astounding how they succeeded. Modern ideas of dietetics, like Napoleon, hadn’t penetrated the feudalism of Upper Silesia. It was the same regimen which had startled Lanny as a boy: a preliminary breakfast with Dresdener Christstollen, a sort of bun with raisins inside and sugar on top; then at half-past ten the "fork breakfast," when several kinds of meat were eaten—but without interfering with anybody’s appetite for lunch. An afternoon tea, only it was coffee, and then an enormous dinner of eight or ten courses, served with the utmost formality by footmen in satin uniforms. Finally, after cards, or music and dancing, it was unthinkable that one should go to bed on an empty stomach. That meant six meals a day, and it produced vigorous and sturdy young men, but when they came to middle age they had necks like bulls' and cheeks like pelicans' and eyes almost closed by fat in the lids.

One discovery Lanny made very quickly: this was the life for which his wife had been created. Nobody shouted at her, nobody confused her mind with strange ideas; everybody treated her as a person of distinction, and found her charming, even brilliant. A world in which serenity and poise counted; a world which didn’t have to be changed! The Grafin became a second mother to her, and she was invited to visit so many distinguished families, she might have been carried through the entire winter without spending any of her money. One aspect of the feudal system appeared to be that most of its ruling members were bored on their estates, and eager for visitors, provided they were of proper station. They all had bursting larders, with a host of servants trained to put meals on tables. Do come and enjoy your share!

What Lanny really wanted was to spend the time with his boyhood chum. Kurt now lived with his own family in a stone cottage on the outskirts of the village of Stubendorf, all of which belonged to Seine Hochgeboren. Lanny met for the first time Kurt’s gentle and devoted young wife, and three little blond "Aryans" produced according to the Schicklgruber prescription. Irma went along on the first visit as a matter of courtesy, and also of curiosity, for she had heard how this wonderful Komponist had been Beauty Budd’s lover for some eight years; also, she had heard enough about Kurt’s adventures in Paris during the Peace Conference to make him a romantic figure.