"My dear Frederick," he addressed his host, balancing himself on his right foot, "while you are here to execute my orders, all's well. But suppose something happened to you. You are not in the best of health and"—lowering his voice—"a careless boy. Don't deny," he added quickly when Frederick Krupp ventured to protest. "Both my Roman ambassador and our envoy at the Holy See heard about your peccadilloes in the island." The speech, begun in a bantering tone, terminated shrilly.
The Ironmaster alternately blushed and blanched. "I hope you do not believe all you hear," he faltered.
"Never more than a third of what I'm told," replied the War Lord, softening his voice; "but, even so, things must not be left too entirely to chance."
Frederick Krupp went to the window, marking each step for the benefit of possible listeners, then tiptoed to the great folding doors. He opened the off wing suddenly and looked out. "All's safe," he said, returning; "and what fine brutes those outside."
"Fancy them?" laughed the War Lord jovially, for he knows how to unbend when he wants to carry a point. "Now to business. We are all liable to die almost any moment, and you, dear Frederick, are no more an exception to the rule than I am—or those brutes."
Frederick Krupp looked uncomfortable, and to hide his embarrassment or gain time dropped into courtly jargon. "And what may be your Majesty's pleasure?"
"Make a satisfactory last will, sir—a last will guaranteeing the Krupps' goodwill for ever and a day—likewise satisfactory dividends—for the chief stockholder, if you please."
Frederick Krupp bowed low. "Please?" he repeated. "Why, I lie awake nights planning wars for your benefit. If there were not a Persian Gulf, I would have invented one to pave the way for the little scrap with England you are aching for."
"Hold your horses!" cried the War Lord. "That Bagdad railway must be finished first. What I want is a guarantee, and a most binding guarantee, that the Krupp works be conducted in all future as now, according to my Imperial will and pleasure, in the interest of the Fatherland and—our pocket," he added flippantly.
Frederick Krupp surveyed himself in the glass. "You talk as if I had one foot in the grave," he said in the careless manner of addressing a boon companion, or like one intimate putting things pleasant, or the reverse, to another. Frederick Krupp died in the odour of eccentricity. There was certainly something eccentric in his relations with the War Lord. But the latter tolerates familiarity only so long as it suits him; and, presently observing the clouds gather on his guest's brow, Frederick Krupp changed his tone.