Пользователь - WORLD'S END

Lanny accompanied her when he could find time. He realized that Mrs. Emily was performing an important service in bringing people together in gracious ways. When the American delegates and advisers met the French, it was always for business, and too frequently the discussions ended with bitterness. But in the drawing room of a woman of the world they could discuss the same problems with urbanity and humor; their shrewd hostess would be watching, ready to help the conversation past a dangerous corner. Here the women came; and the Americans found it easier to like the French when they met their women.

Mrs. Emily was fond of Lanny Budd, who from childhood had learned to behave in a drawing room. She considered him extraordinarily fortunate in his present role, and permitted him to bring members of the staff to her affairs without special invitation, an honor she granted to few. She came to have lunch with his friends at the Crillon, and this too was a distinction. Professor Alston remarked that many women had money, but few knew how to use it; if there were more persons like Emily Chattersworth in the world there wouldn't be so many like Jesse Blackless.

II

The British and the French were taking unto themselves those portions of Asia Minor which had oil, phosphates, and other treasures, or through which oil pipelines had to travel to the sea. Since the Fourteen Points had guaranteed the inhabitants of these lands the mastery of their own destinies, the subtle statesmen had racked their vocabularies to find some way of taking what they wanted while seeming not to. They had evolved a new word, or rather a new meaning for an old word, which was "mandate." The scholars at the Crillon had an anecdote with which to divert their minds from sorrowful contemplations. Some diplomat newly arrived in Paris had inquired: "What's going to be done about New Guinea and the Pacific islands?" and the answer was: "They are to be administered by mandatories." "Who is Mandatories?" inquired the newcomer.

Mister Mandatories - or was it Lord Mandatories? - was going to take over Syria and Palestine and Iraq, the Hejaz and Yemen and the rest of those hot lands which had been promised to the people of the young Emir Feisal. The brown replica of Christ had taken off his multicolored silk robes, his turban and veil, and put on the ugliest of black morning coats, in the hope of impressing the Peace Conference with his civilized condition - but all in vain. Behind the scenes Grand Officer ZaharofF had spoken, and Clemenceau was obeying; Henri Deterding, master of Royal Dutch Shell, had spoken, and Lloyd George was obeying.

One portion of the former Turkish empire had no oil or other mineral treasures of consequence; it had only peasants, who were being slaughtered daily by Turkish soldiers, as they had been off and on, mostly on, for ages. To stop this slaughter there was needed another Mandatory - a kind, idealistic, high-minded Mandatory, who cared nothing about oil nor yet about pipelines, but who loved poor peasants and the simple life. The British and French brought forward a proposal in the name of humanity and democracy: an elderly gentleman named Uncle Samuel Mandatory was to take charge of Armenia, and doughboys singing "Onward, Christian Soldiers" would drive out the Turks and keep them out.

This proposal was sprung, and President Wilson promised to consider it and give his decision promptly. There was a rush call to the staff for everything they had on Armenia, and a hundred reports on history, geography, language, population, resources, production, trade, government, had to be dug out and read, digested, summarized, headlined, so that a busy statesman could get the whole thing in his mind in ten minutes' reading. Professor Alston had to do his part, and Lanny had to help - which was the reason he missed a musical evening at Mrs. Emily's town house.

Beauty attended; and shortly before midnight she telephoned her son at the hotel. "Lanny, the most amazing thing has happened."

He knew from the tone of her voice that she was upset. "What is it?"

"I can't tell you over the phone. You must come here."

"But I'm not through with my job."

"Isn't it something that can wait till morning?"

"It's for the Big Boss himself."

"Well, I must see you. I'll wait up."

"Any danger?" His first thought, of course, was of Kurt.

"Don't try to talk now. Come when you can."

III

So Lanny rather stinted the Armenians, and maybe let more of them die. So many poor peasants were dying, in so many parts of the world - there came a time when one just gave up. He omitted from his report some of the Armenian charges and some of the Turkish admissions, and slipped into his big trench coat, ran downstairs, and hopped into a taxi.

His fair blond mother was waiting in one of those bright-colored silk dressing gowns from China - this time large golden dragons crawling clockwise round her. She had taken to smoking under the strain of the past year, and evidently had done it a lot, for the air in the room was hazy and close. Beauty deserved her name almost as much as formerly, and never more so than when tenderness and concern were in her sweet features. After opening her door she looked into the passage to see if anyone had followed her son, then led him into her boudoir before she spoke.

"Lanny, I met Kurt at Emily's!"

"Oh, my God!" exclaimed the youth.

"The first person I saw, standing at her side."

"Does she know who he is?"

"She thinks he's a musician from Switzerland."

"Who brought him?"

"I didn't ask. I was afraid to seem the least bit curious."

"What was he doing?"

"Meeting influential Frenchmen - at least that's what he told me."

"You had a chance to talk to him?"

"Just a moment or two. When I went in and saw him, I was pretty nearly bowled over. Emily introduced him as M. Dalcroze. Imagine!"

"What did you say?"

"I was afraid my face had betrayed something, so I said: 'It seems to me I have met M. Dalcroze somewhere.' Kurt was perfectly calm - he might have been the sphinx. He said: 'Madame's face does seem familiar to me.' I saw that he meant to carry it off, so I said: 'One meets so many people,' and went on to explain to Emily why you hadn't come."

"And then?"

"Well, I strolled on, and old M. Solicamp came up to me and started talking, and I pretended to listen while I tried to think what to do. But it was too much for me. I just kept quiet and watched Kurt all I could. By and by Emily called on him to play the piano and he did so - very well, I thought."

"Whatever he does he does well."

Beauty went on to name the various persons with whom she had observed their friend in conversation. One was the publisher of one of the great Paris dailies; what could a German expect to accomplish with such a man? Lanny didn't try to answer, because he had never told his mother that Kurt was handling money. She continued: "Toward the end of the evening I was alone with him for just a minute. I said: 'What are you expecting to accomplish here?' He answered: 'Just meeting influential persons.' 'But what for?' 'To get in a word for our German babies. I pledge you my honor that I shall do nothing that can bring harm to our hostess.' That was all we had time for."

"What do you mean to do?"

"I don't see what I can do. If I tell Emily, I am betraying Kurt. If I don't tell her, won't she feel that I've betrayed her?"

"I'm afraid she may, Beauty."

"But she didn't meet Kurt through us."

"She met him because I told him about her, and he found some way to get introduced to her under a false name."

"But she won't ever know that you mentioned her."

"We can't tell what she'll know. We're tying ourselves up in a knot of intrigue and no one can guess what new tangles may develop."

A look of alarm appeared on the mother's usually placid features. ''Lanny, you're not thinking that we ought to give Kurt up!"

"Telling Mrs. Emily wouldn't be quite the same as giving him up, would it?"

"But we promised him solemnly that we wouldn't tell a soul!"

"Yes, but we didn't give him permission to go and make use of our friends."

A complicated problem in ethics, and in etiquette too! They discussed it back and forth, without getting very far. Lanny said that Mrs. Emily had expressed herself strongly against the blockade of Germany; she would, no doubt, be deeply sympathetic to what Kurt was doing, even while she might disapprove his methods.

The mother replied: "Yes, but don't you see that if you tell her you make her responsible for the methods. As it is, she's just a rich American lady who's been deceived by a German agent. She's perfectly innocent, and she can say so. But if she knows, it's her duty to report him to the authorities, and she's responsible for what may happen from now on."

Lanny sat with knitted brows. "Don't forget," he remarked, "you're in that position yourself. It ought to worry you."

Said Beauty: "The difference is that I'd be willing to lie about it; but I don't believe Emily would."

IV

When in doubt, do nothing - that seemed to be the wise rule. They had no way to communicate with Kurt, and he didn't make any move to enlighten them. Was he arguing the same way as Beauty, that what they didn't know wouldn't hurt them? It was obvious that in trying to promote pro-German ideas among highly placed persons in Paris he was playing a desperately dangerous game, and the fewer dealings he had with friends the better for the friends.

Many ladies in fashionable society become amateur psychologists, and learn to manipulate one another's minds and to extract information without the other person's knowing what they are after - unless, perchance, the other person has also become an amateur psychologist. Beauty went to see her friend in the morning; and of course it was natural for her to refer to the handsome young pianist, to comment on his skill, and to ask where her friend had come upon him. Emily explained that M. Dalcroze had written that he was a cousin of an old friend in Switzerland who had died several years ago, and that he had come to Paris to study with one of the great masters at the conservatory.

"I asked him to come and play for me," said the kindly hostess. "He's really quite an exceptional person. He plans to be a composer and has studied every instrument in the orchestra - he says that you have to be able to play them if you are going to compose for them."

"How interesting!" said Beauty, and she wasn't fibbing. "Where is he staying?"

"He tells me he's with friends for a few days. He's getting his mail at poste restante."

Said the guileless friend: "I only had a chance for a few words with him, but I heard him talking with someone about the blockade of Germany."

"He feels deeply about it. He says it is sowing the seeds of the next war. Of course, being an alien, he can't say much."

"I suppose not."

"It's really a shocking thing, Beauty. The more I hear about it the more indignant I become. I was talking to Mr. Hoover the other day; he has been trying for four months to get permission for a small German fishing fleet to go out into the North Sea - but in vain."

"How perfectly ghastly!" exclaimed Lanny's mother.

"I am wondering if I shouldn't get some influential French people to come here some evening and hear Mr. Hoover tell about what it means to the women and children of Central Europe."

"I've thought of the same idea, Emily. You know Lanny talks about that blockade all the time. The people at the Crillon are so wrought up about it."

"Our French friends just can't bring themselves to realize that the war is over."

"Or perhaps, as Professor Alston says, they're fighting the next one. We women let the men have their way all through, but I really think we ought to have something to say about the peace."