The Girl from Alsace Part 1

The Girl from Alsace.

by Burton Egbert Stevenson.

CHAPTER I

THE THIRTY-FIRST OF JULY

"Let us have coffee on the terrace," Bloem suggested, and, as his companion nodded, lifted a finger to the waiter and gave the order.

Both were a little sad, for this was their last meal together. Though they had known each other less than a fortnight, they had become fast friends. They had been thrown together by chance at the Surgical congress at Vienna, where Bloem, finding the American's German lame and halting, had const.i.tuted himself a sort of interpreter, and Stewart had reciprocated by polishing away some of the roughnesses and Teutonic involutions of Bloem's formal English.

When the congress ended, they had journeyed back together in leisurely fashion through Germany, spending a day in medieval Nuremberg, another in odorous Wurzburg, and a third in mountain-shadowed Heidelberg, where Bloem had sought out some of his old comrades and initiated his American friend into the mysteries of an evening session in the Hirschga.s.se. Then they had turned northward to Mayence, and so down the terraced Rhine to Cologne. Here they were to part, Bloem to return to his work at Elberfeld, Stewart for a week or two in Brussels and Paris, and then home to America.

Bloem's train was to leave in an hour, and it was the consciousness of this that kept them silent until their waiter came to tell them that their coffee was served. As they followed him through the hall, a tall man in the uniform of a captain of infantry entered from the street. His eyes brightened as he caught sight of Bloem.

"_Ach_, Hermann!" he cried.

Bloem, turning, stopped an instant for a burlesque salute, then threw himself into the other's arms. A moment later, he was dragging him forward to introduce him to Stewart.

"My cousin," he cried, "Ritter Bloem, a soldier as you see--a great fire-eater! Cousin, this is my friend, Dr. Bradford Stewart, whom I had the good fortune to meet at Vienna."

"I am pleased to know you, sir," said the captain, shaking hands and speaking excellent English.

"You must join us," Bloem interposed. "We are just going to have coffee on the terrace. Come," and he caught the other by the arm.

But the captain shook his head.

"No, I cannot come," he said; "really I cannot, much as I should like to do so. Dr. Stewart," he added, a little hesitatingly, "I trust you will not think me discourteous if I take my cousin aside for a moment."

"Certainly not," Stewart a.s.sured him.

"I will join you on the terrace," said Bloem, and Stewart, nodding good-by to the captain, followed the waiter, who had stood by during this exchange of greetings, and now led the way to a little table at one corner of the broad balcony looking out over the square.

"Shall I pour the coffee, sir?" he asked, as Stewart sat down.

"No; I will wait for my companion," and, as the waiter bowed and stepped back, Stewart leaned forward with a deep breath of admiration.

Below him lay the green level of the Domhof, its close-clipped trees outlined stiffly against the lights behind them. Beyond rose the choir of the great cathedral, with its fretted pinnacles, and flying b.u.t.tresses, and towering roof. By day, he had found its exterior somewhat cold and bare and formal, lacking somehow the subtle spirit of true Gothic; but nothing could be more beautiful than it was now, shimmering in the moonlight, bathed in luminous shadow, lace-like and mysterious.

He was still absorbed in this fairy vision when Bloem rejoined him. Even in the half-light of the terrace, Stewart could see that he was deeply moved. His face, usually glowing with healthy color, was almost haggard; his eyes seemed dull and sunken.

"No bad news, I hope?" Stewart asked.

Without answering him, Bloem signaled the waiter to pour the coffee, and sat watching him in silence.

"That will do," he said in German; "we will ring if we have need of you." Then, as the waiter withdrew, he glanced nervously about the terrace. It was deserted save for a noisy group around a table at the farther end. "There is very bad news, my friend," he added, almost in a whisper. "There is going to be--war!"

Stewart stared for an instant, astonished at the gravity of his tone.

Then he nodded comprehendingly.

"Yes," he said; "I had not thought of it; but I suppose a war between Austria and Servia _will_ affect Germany more or less. Only I was hoping the Powers would interfere and stop it."

"It seems it cannot be stopped," said Bloem, gloomily. "Russia is mobilizing to a.s.sist Servia. Austria is Germany's ally, and so Germany must come to her aid. Unless Russia stops her mobilization, we shall declare war against her. Our army has already been called to the colors."

Stewart breathed a little deeper.

"But perhaps Russia will desist when she realizes her danger," he suggested. "She must know she is no match for Germany."

"She does know it," Bloem agreed; "but she also knows that she will not fight alone. It is not against Russia we are mobilizing--it is against France."

"Against France?" echoed the other. "But surely----"

"Do not speak so loud, I beg of you," Bloem cautioned. "What I am telling you is not yet generally known--perhaps the dreadful thing we fear will not happen, after all. But France is Russia's ally--she will be eager for war--for forty years she has been preparing for this moment."

"Yes," agreed Stewart, smiling, "I have heard of '_la revanche_'; I have seen the mourning wreaths on the Stra.s.sburg monument. I confess," he added, "that I sympathize with France's dream of regaining her lost provinces. So do most Americans. We are a sentimental people."

"I, too, sympathize with that dream," said Bloem, quickly, "or at least I understand it. So do many Germans. We have come to realize that the seizure of Alsace and Lorraine, however justified by history, was in effect a terrible mistake. We should have been generous in our hour of triumph--that way lay a chance of friendship with a people whose pride remained unbroken by disaster. Instead, we chose to heap insults upon a conquered foe, and we have reaped a merited reward of detestation.

Ironically enough, those provinces which cost us so much have been to us a source of weakness, not of strength. We have had to fortify them, to police them, to hold them in stern repression. Even yet, they must be treated as conquered ground. You do not know--you cannot realize--what that means!" He stared out gloomily into the night. "I have served there," he added, hoa.r.s.ely.

There was something in his tone which sent a shiver across Stewart's scalp, as though he had found himself suddenly at the brink of a horrible abyss into which he dared not turn his eyes. He fancied he could see in his companion's somber face the stirring of ghastly memories, of tragic experience----

"But since France has not yet declared war," he said at last, "surely you will wait----"

"Ah, my friend," Bloem broke in, "we cannot afford to wait. We must strike quickly and with all our strength. There is no secret as to Germany's plan--France must be crushed under a mighty blow before she can defend herself; after that it will be Russia's turn."

"And after that?"

"After that? After that, we shall seize more provinces and exact more huge indemnities--and add just so much to our legacy of fear and hatred!

We are bound to a wheel from which we cannot escape."

Stewart looked dazedly out over the lighted square.

"I can't understand it," he said, at last. "I don't understand how such things can be. They aren't possible. They're too terrible to be true.

This is a civilized world--such things can never happen--humanity won't endure it!"

Bloem pa.s.sed a trembling hand before his eyes, as a man awaking from a horrid dream.

"Let us hope so, at least," he said. "But I am afraid; I shake with fear! Europe is topheavy under the burden of her awful armaments; now, or at some future time, she must come tumbling down; she must--she must--" he paused, searching for a word--"she must crumble. Perhaps that time has come."

"I don't believe it," Stewart protested, stoutly. "Some day she will realize the insane folly of this armament, and it will cease."

"I wish I could believe so," said Bloem, sadly; "but you do not know, my friend, how we here in Germany, for example, are weighed down by militarism. You do not know the arrogance, the ignorance, the narrow-mindedness of the military caste. They do nothing for Germany--they add nothing to her art, her science, or her literature--they add nothing to her wealth--they destroy rather than build up--and yet it is they who rule Germany. We are a pacific people, we love our homes and a quiet life; we are not a military people, and yet every man in Germany must march to war when the word is given. We ourselves have no voice in the matter. We have only to obey."

"Obey whom?" asked Stewart.

"The Emperor," answered Bloem, bitterly. "With all our progress, my friend, with all our development in science and industry, with all our literature and art, with all our philosophy, we still live in a medieval State, ruled by a king who believes himself divinely appointed, who can do no wrong, and who, in time of war at least, has absolute power over us. And the final decision as to war or peace is wholly in his hands.