BOOK TWO
A Cloud That’s Dragonish
6. Deutschland Erwache!
I
THE autumn storms begin early on the North Sea, and judging from his text the poet Heine had stayed to witness them. The storm rages and whips the waves, and the waves, foaming with fury and leaping, tower up, and the white water mountains surge with life, and the little ship mounts upon them, hasty-diligent, and suddenly plunges down into black wide-gaping abysses of flood. О sea! Mother of beauty, arise from the foam! Grandmothers of love, spare mine!
But when you are running a floating dairy farm you cannot take chances of your stock’s becoming seasick; you must put them on dry land before the equinoctial season and learn about storms from the pages of a book. Hansi and Bess had a concert tour, Freddi was going to apply the economic knowledge he had gained, and Lanny wanted to examine some pictures which might come on the market. Lanny, his wife, his mother, and her husband were urged to confer distinction and charm upon an oversized Berlin palace. "What else did I buy it for?" argued the proprietor.
To Lanny the young wife said privately: "Do you think it is a good thing for us to be associating with Jews all the time?"
The husband smiled. "You can meet anybody you want in that house. I assure you they will come."
"Maybe so; but won’t they think there must be something wrong with us?"
"I assure you, my dear, they all know exactly what you are worth."
"Lanny, that’s a horrid view to take of people!"
"You can save yourself a lot of unhappiness by taking my word about Europe. I have lived here most of my life." Lanny might have added: "Remember Ettore!" But he rarely permitted himself to mention the dashing Italian duca with whom she had once fancied herself in love.
"But, Lanny, we have been living off the Robins for nearly five months! Am I never going to spend any of my own money?"
"If your conscience worries you, give Freddi a good check for his new school. Nothing will please Johannes more."
"But if he wants that done, why doesn’t he do it himself?"
"I think he may be afraid to; it would make too many enemies. But if you do it, he will have an alibi."
"Is he really that much of a coward, Lanny?"
The young husband chuckled. "Again I tell you, take my word about Europe!"
II
The German-Jewish money-lord had several of his guest-suites opened up, dusted, aired, and supplied with fresh flowers. He would have had them redecorated if there had been time. The one assigned to Irma and Lanny had a drawing-room with a piano in it; also a bedroom, dressing-room, and bath for each. Each dressing-room had a clothes closet which was almost a room and would hold all the imitations of Paris costumes which the couturiers of Berlin might persuade Irma to purchase. She didn’t have gold bathroom fixtures and Lanny didn’t have silver—one had to go to America for styles such as that; but they had drawings by Boucher and Fragonard, Watteau and Lancret on their walls, and Lanny knew these were genuine, for he and Zoltan had purchased them and divided a ten per cent commission. Irma found that rather embarrassing, but Lanny said: "It was what enabled me to dress properly while I was courting you!"
Next door to their suite was one for the baby and the dependable Miss Severne. Feathers had been telegraphed for, and was on hand to take charge of Irma’s affairs: writing her letters, paying her bills, keeping track of her appointments. Johannes had provided an English-speaking maid, ready to serve her from the moment of her arrival; indeed, he would have ordered a baby giraffe from the Hagenbeck zoo if he had thought that would have added to her happiness.
Feathers had only to telephone to the steward’s office downstairs and a car would be at the door in a minute or two. There were theaters, operas, concerts, and cabaret entertainments for every sort of taste, high or low. The palace was in the fashionable district, convenient to everything, so the two young mothers had no trouble in keeping their schedules; lying back in the cushions of a limousine, they had time to recover from any excitement and thus avoid displeasing the head nurse. Their babies, being so well cared for, rarely cried at night, and, anyhow, that was the night nurse’s affair. In the early morning hours this nurse would steal into Irma’s bedroom, bringing Baby Frances for her first meal, and Irma would suckle her while still half asleep. Oh, yes, modern science can make life pleasant for those fortunate ones who have the price! Fond dreamers talk about making it that way for everybody, but the daughter of a utilities magnate would repeat an ancient question: "Who will do the dirty work?" She never found out who would, but she knew quite certainly who wouldn’t.
Each member of the visiting party had his or her own idea of happiness. Miss Severne inquired concerning the English church in Berlin, and there she met persons near enough to her social station so that she could be happy in their company. Mr. Dingle discovered a New Thought group with a lecturer from America, and thus was able to supply himself with the magazines he had been missing. It is a fortunate circumstance about Christian Science and New Thought publications, that dealing with eternal truths they never get out of date. The only trouble is that, saying the same things, they are apt to become monotonous. Undeterred by this, Mr. Dingle began escorting Madame to a spiritualist church; they knew only a few words of the German language, but the spirits were international, and there were always living persons willing to help two foreigners.
III
The great city of Berlin, capital of the shattered Prussian dream. Triumphal arches, huge marble statues of Hohenzollern heroes, palaces of old-time princes and new-time money-lords; sumptuous hotels, banks that were temples of Mammon, department stores filled with every sort of luxury goods—and wandering about the streets, hiding in stone caves and cellars, or camping out in tents in vacant spaces, uncounted hordes of hungry, ill-clothed, fear-driven, and hate-crazed human beings. Out of a population of four million it might be doubted if there were half a million really contented. There was no street where you could escape the sight of pinched and haggard faces; none without beggars, in spite of the law; none where a well-dressed man could avoid the importunities of women and half-grown children, male or female, seeking to sell their bodies for the price of a meal.
Shut your eyes to these sights and your mind to these thoughts. The city was proud and splendid, lighted at night like the Great White Way in New York. The shop windows were filled with displays of elegance, and there were swarms of people gazing, and some buying. Tell yourself that the stories of distress were exaggerated; that the flesh of boys and girls had been for sale in Nineveh and Baghdad, and was now for sale in London and New York, though perhaps they used a bit more Anglo-Saxon hypocrisy. Prostitution has been the curse of great cities ever since they began; swarms of people come piling into them, lured by the hope of easy wealth, or driven from the land by economic forces which men have never learned to control.