un rabouliste, c’est ça. He sticks to the wildest popular catchwords. He goes with the mob. Now in your Highness’s country”—he turned suddenly to Prince Trivelino—“He is a nationalist, intoxicating Himself with dreams of a great Roman Empire. But take care, your Highness: that’s what He does in the cities, but in the country districts He hobnobs with the parsons and performs miracles at the shrines of the Virgin. He works for the Vatican with one hand and for the Quirinal with the other. Either there is some design in it or . . . I don’t know what. Gentlemen, we can quite frankly admit it: He is making things difficult for us all.”
“In my country,” said Horatio Bumm thoughtfully, leaning on his cue, “He goes in for sport as well. He’s a real big sportsman. He goes in for all sorts of games. He’s made amazing records in sports even among chapel-folk. He’s a Socialist. He’s on the side of the Wets. He changes water into drink. Why, just lately, at a White House banquet, everybody present, everybody, mind you, got frightfully drunk. They didn’t take anything but water, you see, but He changed it into drink after it was down.”
“That’s queer,” said Sir W. O’Patterney. “In my country He strikes one as much more of a Conservative. He behaves like an omnipotent clergyman. Holds meetings, processions, sermons in the streets, and such things. I think He is opposed to us Liberals.”
Baron Yanato then said smilingly: “In my country He is quite at home. A very, very nice God. He has adapted Himself very well. Indeed, a very great Japanese.”
“What do you mean, Japanese?” croaked out General Buchtin. “What are you talking about, batushko? He’s a Russian, a genuine Russian, a Slav. With the great Russian soul, your Excellency. He’s on the side of us moujiks. Not long ago our Archimandrite arranged a procession in his honour: ten thousand candles, and people, gospodin, thick as poppy seeds. All the Christian souls of Mother Russia had gathered together for it. He even performed miracles for us. For He is our Father,” added the General, crossing himself and bowing low.
The German Imperial Chancellor approached, and after listening for a while in silence, he said: “Yes, He knows just how to appeal to the people. In every case, He adopts the mentality of the country He is in. Considering His age, He is . . . hm . . . astoundingly elastic. We notice it in the countries just around us. In Czechoslovakia, for instance, He behaves like a colossal individualist. Everyone there has his own Absolute all to himself, so to speak. We ourselves have a State Absolute. With us the Absolute immediately developed into the higher consciousness of the State. In Poland He acts like a kind of alcohol; with us He acts like . . . like . . . a sort of Higher Command, verstehen sie mich?”
“Even in your Catholic provinces?” asked Prince Trivelino with a smile.
“Those are mere local differences,” replied Dr. Wurm. “Don’t attach any importance to them, gentlemen. Germany is more united than ever before. But I must thank you, Prince, for the Catholic Karburators that you are smuggling over to us. Fortunately they are poorly made, like all Italian products.”
“Come, come, gentlemen,” interrupted Sir W. O’Patterney. “Neutrality in religious questions, please. For my own part, I use a double hook for salmon. The other day I caught one as long as that, look! Fourteen pounds.”
“And what about the Papal Nuncio?” asked Dr. Wurm quietly.
“The Holy See requests us to maintain order at all costs. It wants us to have mysticism prohibited by the police. That wouldn’t do in England, and altogether . . . Well, I assure you it weighed quite fourteen pounds. Heavens, I had all I could do to keep from falling into the water!”
Baron Yanato smiled still more politely. “But we do not wish for neutrality. He is a great Japanese. The whole world can adopt the Japanese faith. We, too, would like to send out missionaries for once, and teach religion.”
“Baron,” said Sir W. O’Patterney gravely, “you know that the excellent relations existing between our Governments . . .”
“England can adopt the Japanese faith,” smiled Baron Yanato, “and our relations will be even better.”
“Stop, batushko,” cried General Buchtin. “We’ll have no Japanese faith. If there’s to be any faith, then it must be the Orthodox faith. And do you know why? First, because it is orthodox, and secondly, because it is Russian, and thirdly, because our Czar so wills it, and fourthly, because we, my friend, have the biggest army. I do everything like a soldier, gentlemen: downright frankly and openly. If there’s to be a religion, then it’s to be our Orthodox religion.”
“But, gentlemen, that is not the question,” cried Sir W. O’Patterney excitedly. “That isn’t what we’re here for!”
“Quite right,” said Dr. Wurm. “We have to agree upon a common line of conduct with regard to God.”
“Which one?” suddenly asked the Chinese plenipotentiary, Mr. Kei, lifting at last his wrinkled eyelids.
“Which one?” repeated Dr. Wurm in astonishment. “Why, surely there’s only one.
“Our Japanese God,” smiled Baron Yanato blandly.
“The Orthodox Greek God, batushko, and none other,” contradicted the General, as red in the face as a turkey-cock.
“Buddha,” Mr. Kei said, and again dropped his lids, becoming the very counterpart of a dried-up mummy.
Sir W. O’Patterney stood up agitatedly. “Gentlemen,” he said, “kindly follow me.”
Thereupon the diplomats again proceeded to the council chamber. At eight o’clock in the evening His Excellency, General Buchtin, rushed out, purple in the face, and clenching his fists. After him came Dr. Wurm, agitatedly arranging his papers. Sir W. O’Patterney, regardless of polite usage, came out with his hat on his head: his face was deep red; M. Dudieu followed him in silence. Prince Trivelino walked away, looking very pale, Baron Yanato at his heels with his perpetual smile. The last to leave was Mr. Kei, with downcast eyes, an exceedingly long black rosary sliding through his fingers.
This concludes the report which I. Sawitt published in the Herald. No official communication concerning this Conference was given out, except the one already mentioned relating to the spheres of interest, and if any decision was taken it was apparently of no great value. For already, to use the familiar gynæcological phrase, unforeseen events were shaping themselves in the “womb of history.”
XXI
THE TELEGRAM
Snow was falling in the mountains. All night through it had come down in great silent flakes; nearly two feet deep of it lay there new-fallen, and still the white starlets of snow floated earthwards without a pause.
Silence lay over the forests, save that now and then a branch would snap beneath too great a load, and the sound would drive itself a little path through the stillness intensified by the snow.
Then it grew colder, and from the direction of Prussia came whistling an icy wind. The soft flakes changed into stinging hail hurling itself straight into your face. The fallen snow rose in sharp needle-points and whirled through the air. White clouds blew down from the trees, swirled madly above the ground, spun about, and soared up to the darkened heavens. It was snowing upwards from the earth to the sky.
In the depths of the forest the branches were creaking and groaning; a tree broke and fell with
