So press, Government, Court, and public closed their ranks in complete understanding, and assuredly the Courier would have held its tongue had its philosophical contributions been premature and politically dangerous at that time—in a word, had not the negotiations at Delphinenort already advanced far in a favourable direction. It is pretty accurately known by now how these negotiations developed, and what a difficult, indeed painful, task our Counsel had in them: the Counsel, to whom as proxy of the Court the delicate mission had fallen of preparing the way for Prince Klaus Heinrich's courtship, as well as the Chief Financial Assessor, who, notwithstanding his infirm state of health, insisted on nursing his country's interests by a personal interview with Samuel Spoelmann.
In this connexion account must be taken firstly of Mr. Spoelmann's fiery and excitable disposition, and secondly of the fact that to the prodigious little man a favourable termination to the business from our point of view seemed far less important than it did to us. Apart from Mr. Spoelmann's love for his daughter, who had opened her heart to him and told him of her pretty wish to make herself useful in her love, our proxies had not one trump to play against him, and he was the last man to whom Dr. Krippenreuther could dictate conditions in virtue of what Herr von Bühl had to offer. Mr. Spoelmann always spoke of Prince Klaus Heinrich as “the young man,” and expressed so little pleasure at the prospect of giving his daughter to a Royal Highness to wife, that Dr. Krippenreuther, as well as Herr von Bühl, were more than once plunged into deadly embarrassment.
“If he'd only learnt something, had some respectable business,” he snarled peevishly. “But a young man who only knows how to get cheered …” He was really furious, the first time a remark was dropped about morganatic marriage. His daughter, he declared once for all, was no concubine, and would be no left-handed wife. Who marries her, marries her…. But the interests of the dynasty and the country coincided at this point with his own. The obtaining of issue entitled to succeed was a necessity, and Herr von Bühl was equipped with all the powers which Herr von Knobelsdorff had succeeded in extracting from the Grand Duke. As for Dr. Krippenreuther's mission, however, it owed its success not to the envoy's eloquence, but simply to Mr. Spoelmann's paternal affection, the complaisance of a suffering, weary father, whose abnormal existence had long ago made him a paradox, towards his only daughter and heiress, whom he allowed to choose for herself the public funds in which she wished to invest her fortune.
And so came into existence the agreements, which were at first shrouded in deep secrecy and only came to light bit by bit, as events developed themselves, though here they can be summarized in a few plain words.
The betrothal of Klaus Heinrich with Imma Spoelmann was approved and recognized by Samuel Spoelmann and by the House of Grimmburg. Simultaneously with the publication of the betrothal in the Gazette appeared the announcement of the elevation of the bride to the rank of countess—under a fancy name of romantic sound, like that which Klaus Heinrich had borne during his educational tour in the fair southern lands; and on the day of their wedding the wife of the heir-presumptive was to be given the dignity of a princess. The two rises in rank, which might have cost four thousand eight hundred marks, were to be free of duty.
The wedding was to be only preliminarily a left-handed one, till the world had got used to it: for on the day on which it appeared that the bride was to be blessed with offspring, Albrecht II, in view of the unparalleled circumstances, would declare his brother's morganatic wife to be of equal birth, and would give her the rank of a princess of the Grand Ducal House with the title of Royal Highness. The new member of the ruling House would waive all claim to an appanage. As for the Court ceremony, only a semi-Court was appointed for the celebration of the left-handed marriage, but a Processional Court, that highest and completest form of showing allegiance, was fixed for the celebration of the declaration of equal birth. Samuel Spoelmann, for his part, granted the State a loan of three hundred and fifty million marks, and on such fatherly conditions that the loan showed all the symptoms of being a gift.
It was the Grand Duke Albrecht who acquainted the Heir Presumptive with these conclusions. Once more Klaus Heinrich stood in the great, draughty study under the battered ceiling-paintings, in front of his brother, as once before when Albrecht had delegated to him his representative duties, and standing in an official attitude received the great news. He had put on the tunic of a major in the Fusiliers of the Guard for this audience, while the Grand Duke had lately added to his black frock-coat a pair of dark-red wool mittens, which his aunt had made him to protect him from the draught through the high windows of the Old Schloss.
When Albrecht had finished, Klaus Heinrich stepped one pace sideways, closed his heels with a fresh salute, and said: “I beg, dear Albrecht, to offer my heart-felt and respectful thanks, in my own name and that of the whole country. For it is you in the long run who make all these blessings possible, and the redoubled love of the people will be your reward for your magnanimous resolutions.”
He pressed his brother's thin, sensitive hand, which he kept close to his chest, and extended to him only to the extent of moving his forearm. The Grand Duke had thrust forward his short, round underlip, and his eyelids were half-closed. He answered softly with a lisp:
“I am the less inclined to entertain illusions about the people's love, as I can, as you know, dispense with such questionable love without a pang. So question whether I deserve it is scarcely worth notice. When it's time to start, I go to the station and give the signal to the engine-driver, which is silly rather than dutiful, but it's my duty. But you're in a different position. You're a Sunday child. Everything turns out trumps for you…. I wish you luck,” he said, raising the lids from his lonely-looking, blue eyes. And it was clear at this moment that he loved Klaus Heinrich. “I wish you happiness, Klaus Heinrich—but not too much, and that you may not repose too comfortably in the love of the people. I have already said that everything turns out trumps for you. The girl of your choice is very strange, very undomesticated, and, most important of all, very original. She has a mixture of blood, I've been told that Indian blood flows in her veins. That's perhaps a good thing. With a wife like that, there's less danger, perhaps, of your having too easy a time.”