Old Prince Hammerfeldt had left a successor behind him in the person of his nephew, Baron von Bederhof, and this gentleman was now my Chancellor and my chief official adviser. He was a portly man of about fifty, with red cheeks and black hair. He was high in favour with my mother, the husband of a buxom wife, and the father of nine children. As is not unusual in cases of hereditary succession, he was adequate to his office, although he would certainly not have been selected for it unless he had been his uncle's nephew; but, being the depositary of Hammerfeldt's traditions (although not of his brains), he contrived to pass muster. He came at this time to Artenberg, and urged on me the necessity of a speedy marriage.
"The recent danger, so providentially averted," he said, "is a stronger argument than any I could use."
"It certainly is," said I politely. As a fact, it might be stronger than any he would be likely to use, and yet not be impregnable.
"For the sake of your people, sire, do not delay."
"My dear Baron," said I, "send for the young lady to-morrow. I haven't seen her since she was a child, so let her bring a letter of identification."
"You joke!" said he. "There can be no doubt. Her parents will accompany her."
"True, true!" I exclaimed, in a tone of relief. "There will be really no substantial risk of having an impostor planted on us."
"I am confident," observed Bederhof, "that the marriage will be most happy."
Bederhof looked slightly puzzled, but also rather complimented. He cleared his throat (if only he could have cleared his head as often and as thoroughly as he did his throat!) and asked, "Er--there are no complications?"
"I am ashamed to suggest it, but people do talk. I mean--no other attachment?"
"I have yet to learn, Baron," said I with dignity, "that such a thing, even if it existed, would be of any importance compared to the welfare of the kingdom and the dynasty."
"I never suspected you of such a paradox really," I assured him with a smile. "And if the lady should harbour such a thing that would be of equal insignificance."
"Knew all this just as well as we do, my dear Baron," I interrupted. "Come, send for Princess Elsa. I am all impatience."
Even the stupidest of men may puzzle a careful observer on one point--as to the extent of his stupidity. I did not always know whether Bederhof was so superlatively dull as to believe a thing, or merely so permissibly dull as to consider that he ought to pretend to believe it. Perhaps he had come himself not to know the difference between the two attitudes; certain ecclesiastics would furnish an illustration of what I mean. Princess Heinrich's was quite another complexion of mind. She assumed a belief with as much conscious art as a bonnet or a mantle; just as you knew that the natural woman beneath was different from the garment which covered her, so you were aware that my mother's real opinion was absolutely diverse from the view she professed. In both cases propriety forbade any reference to the natural naked substratum. The Princess, with an art that scorned concealment, congratulated me upon my approaching happiness, declared that the marriage was one of inclination, and, having paid it this seemly tribute, at once fell to discussing how the public would receive it. I believe, however, that she detected in me a certain depression of spirits, for she rallied me (again with a superb ignoring of what we were both aware of) on being moped at the moment when I should have been exultant.