Bettermann's eyes narrowed at him. "Yes," he said. "You're right.
Only this time it is he that must bring the whip!"
Herr Haase's intelligence, following like a shorthand-writer's pencil, ten words behind the speaker, gave a leap at this. Till now, the matter had been for him a play without a plot; suddenly understanding, he cast a startled glance at Von Wetten.
The captain sat up alert.
"Certainly!" The old baron was replying to young Bettermann. "And stand to attention! And salute! I told you that I would agree to your terms, and I agree accordingly. Captain that is, Colonel von Specht shall be here, with the whip, as soon as the telegraph and the train can bring him. And then, I assume, the machine."
"Pardon!" Captain von Wetten had risen. "I have not understood." He came forward between the two, very erect and military, and rather splendid with his high-held head and drilled comeliness of body. "There has been much elegance of talk and I am stupid, no doubt; but, in plain German, what is it that Colonel von Specht is to do?"
Bettermann swooped at him again, choking with words; the captain stood like a monument callous to his white and stammering rage, the personification and symbol of his caste and its privilege.
It was the Baron who answered from his seat on the parapet, not varying his tone and measured delivery.
"Colonel von Specht," he said, "is to bring a whip here and stand to attention while Herr Bettermann cuts him over the face with it. That is all. Now sit down and be silent."
Captain von Wetten did not move. "This is impossible," he said. "There are limits. As a German officer, I resent the mere suggestion of this insult to the corps of officers. Your Excellency."
The Baron lifted that quiet hand of his. "I order you to sit down and be silent," he said.