“No. Any news? Not—not a defeat?”
“The Prime Minister has made certain promises ... there have been more anti-German riots over this Lusitania business——”
“Conceited fools, who haven’t the brains to win a victory at the Front, think themselves patriots if they break a few shop-windows,” growled Marcus from his corner.
Richard flushed darkly, and his hands clenched in his pockets: “They’d be doing the same, and much worse, to us in Germany, if we’d established ourselves all over the place there, as they have here. And the sinking of the Lusitania was a foul, cowardly affair; no wonder we’ve lost control of our tempers, hearing about it.”
“We?” echoed the old Bavarian, with a sarcastic inflexion; “and you as German as I, my boy! You won’t be allowed to forget it as easily, in the future.”
“Rubbish!” said Richard shortly. He had no desire to quarrel with his grandfather, who, as a lonely but unyielding unit in enemy country, demanded a certain chivalry of treatment.—But no fellow was going to stand being called a German, nowadays! “Have you done with me, dad? I’m sorry about the fuss in the papers, but it will all blow off presently. I don’t think they’ll do anything to the naturalized Germans, anyway; not to those who have been settled in England as long as you.” He sauntered towards the door; then halted to add in a sudden inspiration of diplomacy: “The sooner I’m fighting, dad, the better for you, all of you. A son in the army makes a huge difference to public feeling.”
“That depends on which army ...” threw in Hermann Marcus. And Ferdie said, with a stupendous effort: “You can’t fight for England in this war, Richard. I’m sorry, as you are so dead nuts on it,” carefully negotiating the idiom. “But they will not take you. You are a German.”
Richard burst into a great shout of laughter. “What rot, dad! How can I be a German? I’m as English as they make ’em.”
“You were born in Germany. And I was not naturalized at that date.”
“Born—in—Germany?”