Good Old Anna: Historical Thriller. Marie Belloc Lowndes
Her husband interrupted her. “He nothing, Jane, said of the kind! That it ought not any difference to have made was what say he did. I, who have in England lived since the year 1874; I, who England love; I, whose son will soon for England be fighting!”
“My husband said,” began Mrs. Hegner—— And again Mr. Fröhling interrupted rather rudely: “You need not tell me what your husband say,” he remarked. “I know for myself exactly what Mr. Hegner say. If everything could be foreseen in this life we should all be very wise. Mr. Hegner, he does foresee more than most people, and wise he is.”
Mrs. Fröhling drew her hostess a little aside. “Don’t mind him,” she whispered. “He is so unhappy. And yet we should be thankful, for the gentlemen officers are getting up a little testimonial fund for poor Fröhling.”
“I suppose you’ve saved a good bit, too?” said Mrs. Hegner with curiosity.
“Not much—not much! Only lately have we turned the corner——” Mrs. Fröhling sighed. Then her face brightened, and Mrs. Hegner looking round saw that Anna Bauer, Mrs. Otway’s servant, was pushing her way through the crowd towards them.
Now pretty Polly disliked the old woman. Frau Bauer was not a person of any account, yet Manfred had ordered that she should be treated this evening with special consideration, and so Mrs. Hegner walked forward and stiffly shook hands with her latest guest.
Chapter VII
“Sit down, Fröhling, sit down!”
The old barber, rather to his surprise, had been invited to follow his host into the Hegners’ private parlour, a little square room situated behind the big front shop.
The floor of the parlour was covered with a large-patterned oilcloth. There was a round mahogany pedestal table, too large for the room, and four substantial cane-backed armchairs. Till to-day there had always hung over the piano a large engraving of the German Emperor, and on the opposite wall a smaller oleograph picture of Queen Victoria with her little great-grandson, the Prince of Wales, at her knee. The German Emperor had now been taken down, and there was a patch of clean paper marking where the frame had hung.
As answer to Mr. Hegner’s invitation, the older man sat down heavily in a chair near the table.
Both men remained silent for a moment, and a student of Germany, one who really knew and understood that amazing country, might well, had he seen the two sitting there, have regarded the one as epitomising the old Germany, and the other—naturalised Englishman though he now was—epitomising the new. Manfred Hegner was slim, active, and prosperous-looking; he appeared years younger than his age. Ludwig Fröhling was stout and rather stumpy; he seemed older than he really was, and although he was a barber, his hair was long and untidy. He looked intelligent and thoughtful, but it was the intelligence and the thoughtfulness of the student and of the dreamer, not of the man of action.
“Well, Mr. Fröhling, the International haven’t done much the last few days, eh? I’m afraid you must have been disappointed.” He of course spoke in German.
“Yes, I have been disappointed,” said the other stoutly, “very much disappointed indeed! But still, from this great crime good may come, even now. It has occurred to me that, owing to this war made by the great rulers, the people in Russia, as well as in my beloved Fatherland, may arise and cut their bonds.”
A light came into the speaker’s eyes, and Manfred Hegner looked at him in mingled pity and contempt. It was not his intention, however, to waste much time this evening listening to a foolish old man. In fact, he had hesitated as to whether he should include the Fröhlings in his invitations—then he had thought that if he omitted to do so the fact might possibly come to the ears of the Dean. Fröhling and the Dean had long been pleasantly acquainted. Then, again, it was just possible—not likely, but possible—that he might be able to get out of the ex-barber of the Witanbury garrison some interesting and just now valuable information.
“What are you going to do now?” he asked. “Have you made any plans yet?”
“We are thinking of going to London, and of making a fresh start there. We have friends in Red Lion Square.” Fröhling spoke as if the words were being dragged out of him. He longed to tell the other man to mind his own business.
“You haven’t a chance of being allowed to do that! Why, already, on the very first day, every German barber is suspected.” The speaker gave a short, unpleasant laugh.
“I am not suspected. So!” exclaimed Fröhling heatedly. “Not one single person has spoken as if he suspected me in this town! On the contrary, England is not harsh, Mr. Hegner. English people are too sensible and broad-minded to suspect harm where there is none. Indeed, they are not suspecting enough.”
Strange to say, old Fröhling’s last sentence found an agreeable, even a comforting, echo in Mr. Hegner’s heart. He looked up, and for the first time the expression on his face was really cordial. “Maybe you are right, Mr. Fröhling. Most heartily do I desire it may be so! And yet—well, one cannot say people would be altogether wrong in suspecting barbers, for barbers hear a great deal of interesting conversation, is it not so?”
“That depends on their customers,” said the other coldly. “I cannot say that I ever found the conversation of the young English officers here in Witanbury very illuminating.”
“Not exactly illuminating,” said the other cautiously. “But take the last few days? You must have heard a good deal of information as to coming plans.”
“Not one word did I hear,” said the other man quickly—“not one word, Mr. Hegner! Far more from my own intelligent, level-headed German assistant. He knew and guessed what none of these young gentlemen did—to what all the wicked intrigues of Berlin, Petersburg and Vienna, of the last ten days were tending.”
“I have heard to-night—in fact it was the daughter of the Dean who mentioned it—that the British Army is going to Belgium,” said Mr. Hegner casually. “Is your son going to Belgium, Mr. Fröhling?”
“Not that I know of,” said the other. But a troubled look came over his face. He opened his mouth as if to add something, and then tightly shut it again.
Mr. Hegner had the immediate impression that old Fröhling could have told him something worth hearing had he been willing to do so.
“Well, that is all,” said the host with a dismissory air, as he got up from his seat. “I have many to see, many to advise to-night. One thing I do tell you, Mr. Fröhling. You may take it from me that if you wish to leave this place you should clear out quickly. They will be making very tiresome regulations soon—but not now, not for a few days. Fortunately for you, and for all those who have not taken out their certificates, there is no organisation in this country. As for thoroughness, they do not know the meaning of the word.”
“I have sometimes wondered,” observed Mr. Fröhling mildly, “why you, who dislike England so much, should have taken out your certificate, Mr. Hegner. In your place I should have gone back to America.”
“You have no right, no business, to say that I dislike England!” cried his host vehemently. “It is a wicked thing to say to me on such a day as this! It is a thing that might do me great harm in this city of which I am a Councillor.”
“It is not a thing that I should say to any one but you,” returned the old man. “But nevertheless it is true. We have not very often met—but every time we have met you have spoken in a disagreeable, a derogatory, a jeering way of what is now your country.”
“And you,” said Mr. Hegner, his eyes flashing, “have often spoken to me in a derogatory, a jeering, a disagreeable way of Germany—of the country where we were each born, of our real Fatherland.”
“It is