Stories in Light and Shadow | Page 9

He had again sought
the consular quiet to write a few letters home; he had no chance in the
confinement of the barracks.
"But by this time you must be in the family of a field-marshal, at least,"
suggested the consul pleasantly.
"Not to-day, but next week," said Karl, with sublime simplicity;
"THEN I am going to serve with the governor commandant of
Rheinfestung."
The consul smiled, motioned him to a seat at a table in the outer office,
and left him undisturbed to his correspondence.
Returning later, he found Karl, his letters finished, gazing with childish
curiosity and admiration at some thick official envelopes, bearing the
stamp of the consulate, which were lying on the table. He was evidently
struck with the contrast between them and the thin, flimsy affairs he
was holding in his hand. He appeared still more impressed when the
consul told him what they were.
"Arc you writing to your friends?" continued the consul, touched by his
simplicity.
"Ach ja!" said Karl eagerly.
"Would you like to put your letter in one of these envelopes?"
continued the official.
The beaming face and eyes of Karl were a sufficient answer. After all,
it was a small favor granted to this odd waif, who seemed to still cling
to the consular protection. He handed him the envelope and left him
addressing it in boyish pride.
It was Karl's last visit to the consulate. He appeared to have spoken
truly, and the consul presently learned that he had indeed been
transferred, through some high official manipulation, to the personal

service of the governor of Rheinfestung. There was weeping among the
Dienstmadchen of Schlachtstadt, and a distinct loss of originality and
lightness in the gatherings of the gentler Hausfrauen. His memory still
survived in the barracks through the later editions of his former
delightful stupidities,--many of them, it is to be feared, were
inventions,--and stories that were supposed to have come from
Rheinfestung were described in the slang of the Offiziere as being
"colossal." But the consul remembered Rheinfestung, and could not
imagine it as a home for Karl, or in any way fostering his peculiar
qualities. For it was eminently a fortress of fortresses, a magazine of
magazines, a depot of depots. It was the key of the Rhine, the citadel of
Westphalia, the "Clapham Junction" of German railways, but defended,
fortified, encompassed, and controlled by the newest as well as the
oldest devices of military strategy and science. Even in the pipingest
time of peace, whole railway trains went into it like a rat in a trap, and
might have never come out of it; it stretched out an inviting hand and
arm across the river that might in the twinkling of an eye be changed
into a closed fist of menace. You "defiled" into it, commanded at every
step by enfilading walls; you "debouched" out of it, as you thought, and
found yourself only before the walls; you "reentered" it at every
possible angle; you did everything apparently but pass through it. You
thought yourself well out of it, and were stopped by a bastion. Its
circumvallations haunted you until you came to the next station. It had
pressed even the current of the river into its defensive service. There
were secrets of its foundations and mines that only the highest military
despots knew and kept to themselves. In a word--it was impregnable.
That such a place could not be trifled with or misunderstood in its
right-and-acute-angled severities seemed plain to every one. But set on
by his companions, who were showing him its defensive foundations,
or in his own idle curiosity, Karl managed to fall into the Rhine and
was fished out with difficulty. The immersion may have chilled his
military ardor or soured his good humor, for later the consul heard that
he had visited the American consular agent at an adjacent town with the
old story of his American citizenship. "He seemed," said the consul's
colleague, "to be well posted about American railways and American
towns, but he had no papers. He lounged around the office for a while

and"--
"Wrote letters home?" suggested the consul, with a flash of
reminiscence.
"Yes, the poor chap had no privacy at the barracks, and I reckon was
overlooked or bedeviled."
This was the last the consul heard of Karl Schwartz directly; for a week
or two later he again fell into the Rhine, this time so fatally and
effectually that in spite of the efforts of his companions he was swept
away by the rapid current, and thus ended his service to his country.
His body was never recovered.
A few months before the consul was transferred from Schlachtstadt to
another post his memory of the departed Karl was revived by a visit
from Adlerkreutz. The general