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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!

III

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.

Kurt hadn't changed much in the four years since Lanny had seen him. The war had aged

him prematurely, but from then on he seemed to stay the same: a grave and rather silent man,

who chose to speak to the world through his art. He worshiped the classic German composers,

especially the "three B's." Each of these had written a few four-hand piano compositions, and

in the course of the years others of their works had been arranged in this form, so now there

were more than a hundred such available. Lanny had ordered a complete collection from one of

the dealers in Berlin; not often can one make a Christmas present which will give so much

pleasure to a friend! The two of them wanted to sit right down and not get up even for meals.

Irma couldn't see how it was possible for human fingers to stand the strain of so much

pounding; she couldn't see how human ears could take in so many notes. She had to remind

them of an engagement at the Schloss; whereupon Kurt leaped up at once, for Seine

Hochgeboren must not be kept waiting, even for Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms.

In return for his pension and his home it was Kurt's duty to play for his patron, and to

assemble, rehearse, and conduct a small orchestra for special occasions such as this Christmas

visit. He did this with scrupulous fidelity, as the young Haydn had done for the great Prince

Esterhazy of Vienna. It wasn't an onerous job, for of late years Seine Hochgeboren came only

rarely. To his people living under the Poles he made a formal address, full of Christmas cheer,

but also of quiet unbending faith that God would somehow restore them to their Fatherland.

Deutsche Treue und Ehre acquired a special meaning when used by those living in exile.

That was what the National Socialist movement meant to Kurt Meissner. He and his young

wife listened with eager attention while Lanny told about his meeting with Adolf Hitler; then

Herr Meissner asked to have the story told to his family, and later on the lord of the Schloss

wanted his friends to hear it. They questioned the visitor closely as to just what Adi's program

now was; and of course Lanny knew what was in their minds. Had the Ftihrer of the Nazis

really dropped that crazy Socialist stuff with which he had set out on his career? Could he be

depended upon as a bulwark against Bolshevism, a terror so real to the people on Germany's

eastern border? Would he let the landowners alone and devote himself to rearming the

country, and forcing the Allies to permit the return of Stubendorf and the other lost provinces,

the Corridor and the colonies? If the Germans in exile could be sure of these things, they

might be willing to support him, or at any rate not oppose him actively.

IV

Kurt had composed a symphony, which he called Das Vaterland. He and his adoring wife

had copied out the parts for an orchestra of twenty pieces, and Kurt had engaged musicians

from the near-by towns, of course at the Graf's expense. They had been thoroughly drilled, and

now played the new work before a distinguished company on Christmas night. This was the

high point of Lanny's visit, andindeed of his stay in Germany. In his boyhood he had taken

Kurt Meissner as his model of all things noble and inspiring; he had predicted for him a shining

future, and felt justified when he saw all the hochgeboren Herrschaften of Kurt's own district

assembled to do him honor.

During the composer's time in Bienvenu his work had been full of bitterness and revolt, but

since he had come home he had apparently managed to find courage and hope. He didn't write

program music, and Lanny didn't ask what the new work was supposed to signify; indeed, he

would rather not be told, for the military character of much of the music suggested it was meant

for the Nazis. It pictured the coming of a deliverer, it portrayed the German people arising and

marching to their world destiny; at its climax, they could no longer keep in march tempo, but

broke into dancing; great throngs of them went exulting into the future, endless companies of

young men and maidens, of that heroic and patriotic sort that Heinrich Jung and Hugo Behr

were training.

The music didn't actually say that, and every listener was free to make up his own story.

Lanny chose to include youths and maidens of all lands in that mighty dancing procession. He

remembered how they had felt at Hellerau, in the happy days before the war had poisoned the

minds of the peoples. Then internationalism had not been a Schimpfwort, and it had been

possible to listen to Schubert's C-major symphony and imagine a triumphal procession shared

by Jews and Russians, by young men and maidens from Asia and even from Africa.

Irma was much impressed by the welcome this music received. She decided that Kurt must be

a great man, and that Beauty should be proud of having had such a lover, and of having saved

him from a French firing-squad. She decided that it was a distinguished thing to have a private

orchestra, and asked her husband if it wouldn't be fun to have one at Bienvenu. They must be

on the lookout for a young genius to promote.

Lanny knew that his wife was casting around in her mind for some sort of career, some way

to spend her money that would win his approval as well as that of to point out that this was a

difficult thing to do, for it was better to have no salon at all than to have a second-rate one, and

the eminent persons who frequent such assemblages expect the hostess not merely to have read

their books but to have understood them. It isn't enough to admire them extravagantly—

indeed they rather look down on you unless you can find something wrong with their work.