Royal Highness

by Thomas Mann

Then began a scene of bustle and confusion round and in the Schloss, which daily attracted crowds to the northern side of the park. Delphinenort was improved and partly reconstructed inside by a swarm of workmen. For quick, quick, was the order of the day, that was Spoelmann's wish, and he had only allowed five months' respite for everything to be ready for him to enter into possession. So a wooden scaffold with ladders and platforms shot up at lightning speed round the dilapidated old building, foreign workmen swarmed all over it, and an architect came with carte blanche over the seas to superintend the work. But the greater part of the work fell to our native manual workers to perform, and the stone-masons and tilers, the joiners, gilders, upholsterers, glaziers, and parquet-layers of the city, the landscape gardeners and heating and lighting experts, had plenty of remunerative work all through the summer and autumn.

When his Royal Highness Klaus Heinrich left his window in the “Hermitage” open, the noise of the work at Delphinenort penetrated right through to the Empire room, and he often drove past the Schloss amid the respectful greetings of the public, in order to satisfy himself of the progress of the restoration. The gardener's cottage was painted up, the sheds and stables, which were destined to accommodate Spoelmann's fleet of motors and carriages, were enlarged; and by October, furniture and carpets, chests and cases full of stuffs and household utensils had been delivered at Schloss Delphinenort, while it was whispered among the bystanders that inside the walls skilled hands were at work fitting Spoelmann's costly organ, which had been sent from over the sea, with electric action.

There was much excitement to know whether the park belonging to the Schloss, which had been so splendidly cleaned up and trimmed, was to be fenced off from the public by a wall or hedge. But nothing of the sort was done. It was Spoelmann's wish that the property should continue to be accessible, that no restraint should be placed on the citizens' enjoyment of the park. The Sunday promenaders should have access right up to the Schloss, up to the clipped hedge which surrounded the big square pond—and this did not fail to make an excellent impression on the population; indeed, the Courier published a special article on the subject, in which it praised Mr. Spoelmann for his philanthropy.

And behold! when the leaves again began to fall, exactly one year after his first appearance, Samuel Spoelmann landed a second time at our railway station. This time the general interest in the event was much greater than in the preceding year, and it is on record that, when Mr. Spoelmann, in his well-known faded coat and with his hat over his eyes, left his saloon, loud cheers were raised by the crowd of spectators—an expression of feelings which Mr. Spoelmann seemed rather inclined to resent, and which not he but Doctor Watercloose acknowledged with blinking eyes and a broad smile. When Miss Spoelmann too alighted, a cheer was raised, and one or two urchins even shouted when Percy, the collie, appeared springing, leaping, and altogether beside himself, on the platform. In addition to the doctor and Countess Löwenjoul there were two unknown persons in attendance, two clean-shaven and decided-looking men in strangely roomy coats. They were Mr. Spoelmann's secretaries, Messrs. Phlebs and Slippers, as the Courier announced in its report.

At that time Delphinenort was far from ready, and the Spoelmanns at once took possession of the first floor of the chief hotel, where a big, haughty, paunch-bellied man in black, the steward or butler of the Spoelmann establishment, who had preceded them, had made preparations for them, and put the chamber-velocipede together with his own hands. Every day, while Miss Imma with her Countess and Percy went for a ride or a visit to some charitable institution, Mr. Spoelmann hung about his house, superintending the work and giving orders, and when the end of the year approached, just after the first snow had fallen, prospect became fact, and the Spoelmanns took up their abode in Schloss Delphinenort. Two motor cars (their arrival had been watched with interest—splendid cars they were) bore the six members of the party—Messrs. Phlebs and Slippers sat in the hinder one—driven by the leather-clad chauffeurs, with servants in snow-white fur coats and crossed arms beside them, in a few minutes from the hotel through the City Gardens; and as the cars dashed along the noble chestnut avenue which led to the drive, the urchins climbed up the high lamp-posts which stood at all four corners of the big spa-basin, and waved their caps and cheered….

So Spoelmann and his belongings settled down among us, and we basked in the light of his presence. His white-and-gold livery was seen and known in the city, just as the brown-and-gold Grand Ducal livery was seen and known; the negro in scarlet plush who was doorkeeper at Delphinenort soon became a popular figure, and when passers-by heard the subdued rumble of Mr. Spoelmann's organ from the interior of the Schloss they lifted a finger and said: “Hark, he's playing. That means that he's not got colic for the moment.”

Miss Imma was to be seen daily by the side of Countess Löwenjoul, followed by a groom and with Percy capering round, riding, or driving a smart four-in-hand through the City Gardens—while the servant who sat on the back seat stood up from time to time, drew a long silver horn from a leather sheath and wound a shrill warning of their approach; and by getting up early one could see father and daughter every morning go in a dark-red brougham, or, in fine weather, on foot through the park of Schloss “Hermitage” to the Spa-Garden, in order to drink the waters. Imma for her part, as already mentioned, again began a course of visits to the benevolent institutions of the city, though she appeared not to give up her studies for all that; for from the beginning of the half-term she regularly attended the lectures of the Councillor Klinghammer at the University—sat daily in a black dress with white collar and cuffs among the young students in the lecture-theatre, and drove her fountain-pen—with her fore-finger raised in the air, a trick of hers when writing—over the pages of her notebook.

The Spoelmanns lived in retirement, they did not mix in the life of the town, as was natural in view both of Mr. Spoelmann's ill-health and of his social loneliness. What social group could he have attached himself to? Nobody even suggested to him that he should consort with soap-boiler Unschlitt or bank-director Wolfsmilch on confidential terms. Yet he was soon approached with appeals to his generosity, and the appeals were not in vain. For Mr. Spoelmann, who, it was well known, before his departure from America had given a large sum in dollars to the Board of Education in the United States, and had also stated in so many words that he had no intention of withdrawing his yearly contributions to the Spoelmann University and his other educational foundations—he, shortly after his arrival at “Delphinenort,” put his name down for a subscription of ten thousand marks to the Dorothea Children's Hospital, for which a collection was just being made; an action the nobleness of which was immediately recognized in fitting terms by the Courier and the rest of the press.

In fact, although the Spoelmanns lived in seclusion in a social sense, a certain amount of publicity attached to their life among us from the earliest moments, and in the local section of the daily newspapers at least their movements were followed with as much particularity as those of the members of the Grand Ducal House. The public were informed when Miss Imma had played a game of lawn tennis with the Countess and Messrs. Phlebs and Slippers in the “Delphinenort” park; it was noted when she had been at the Court Theatre, and whether her father had gone with her for an act or two of the Opera; and if Mr. Spoelmann shrank from curiosity, never leaving his box during the intervals and scarcely ever showing himself on foot in the streets, yet he was obviously not insensible to the duties of a spectacular kind which were inherent in an extraordinary existence like his own, and he gave the love of gazing its due.

It has been said that the “Delphinenort” park was not divided from the Town Gardens. No walls separated the Schloss from the outer world. From the back one could walk over the turf right up to the foot of the broad covered terrace which had been built on that side, and, if bold enough, look through the big glass door straight into the high white-and-gold garden-room in which Mr. Spoelmann and his family had five-o'clock tea. Indeed, when summer came, tea was laid on the terrace outside, and Mr. and Miss Spoelmann, the Countess and Doctor Watercloose sat in basket chairs of a new-fangled shape, and took their tea as if on a public platform.