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oneness, yet not really feeling it, working against it all the time! Lanny's friendship was for

Freddi, and Freddi and these two were enemies. With a strange sort of split personality, Lanny

loved all three; his friendship for Kurt and Heinrich was still a living thing, and in his feelings

he went back to the old days in Stubendorf, twelve years ago, when he had first met the

Oberforster's son. To be sure, Heinrich had been a Nazi even then, but Lanny hadn't realized

what a Nazi was, nor for that matter had Heinrich realized it. It had been a vision of German

progress, a spiritual thing, constructive and not destructive, a gain for the German Volk

without any loss for Jews or Socialists or democrats or pacifists—all those whom the Nazis now had

in their places of torture.

The three talked about old times and were at one. They talked about Kurt's music, and were

still at one. But then Heinrich fell to talking about his work, and recent developments in party

and national affairs, and at once Lanny had to start lying. It wasn't enough just to keep still, as he

had done earlier; no, when the young party official went into ecstasies over that marvelous

electoral victory, Lanny had to echo: "Herrlich!" When Kurt declared that the Führer's stand

for peace and equality among the nations was a great act of statesmanship, Lanny had to say: "Es

hat was heroisches" And all the time in his soul he wondered: "Which of us is crazy?"

No easy matter to stick to the conviction that your point of view is right and that all the

people about you are wrong. That is the way not merely with pioneers of thought, with heroes,

saints, and martyrs, but also with lunatics and "nuts," of whom there are millions in the world.

When one of these "nuts" succeeds in persuading the greater part of a great nation that he is

right, the five per cent have to stop and ask themselves: "How come?" Particularly is this true

of one like Lanny Budd, who was no pioneer, hero, or saint, and surely didn't want to be a

martyr. All he wanted was that his friends shouldn't quarrel and make it necessary for him to

choose between them. Kurt and Rick had been quarreling since July 1914, and Lanny had been

trying to make peace. Never had he seemed less successful than now, while trying to act as a

secret agent for Rick, Freddi, and General Göring all at the same time!

They talked over the problem of approaching the Chancellor of Germany, and agreed that Kurt

was the one to do it, he being the elder, and the only one with a claim to greatness. Kurt called

the Führer's secretary at the Braune Haus, and said that he wished not merely to play the piano

for his beloved leader, but to bring the Führer's old friend, Heinrich Jung, and the young

American, Lanny Budd, who had visited the Führer in Berlin several years ago. Lanny would bring

a sample of the paintings of Marcel Detaze, who was then having a one-man exhibition and

had been highly praised in the press. The secretary promised to put the matter before the

Chancellor in person, and the Komponist stated where he could be reached. Needless to say, it

added to his importance that he was staying at the most fashionable of Munich's hotels, with

its fancy name, "The Four Seasons."

IV

Irma invited Kurt into her boudoir for a private chat. She was in a conspiracy with him against

her husband—for her husband's own good, of course; and Kurt, who had had professional training

in intrigue, was amused by this situation. A sensible young wife, and it might be the saving of

Lanny if he could be persuaded to follow her advice. Irma explained that Lanny had been

behaving rationally on this trip, and was doing very well with his picture business, which seemed

to interest him more than anything else; but he still had Freddi on his conscience, and was

convinced that Freddi was innocent of any offense. "I can't get him to talk about it," said Irma,

"but I think somebody has told him that Freddi is a prisoner in a concentration camp. It has

become a sort of obsession with him."

"He is loyal to his friends," said the Komponist, "and that's a fine quality. He has, of course, no

real understanding of what the Jews have done to Germany, the corrupting influence they

have been in our national life."

"What I'm afraid of," explained Irma, "is that he might be tempted to bring up the subject to

the Führer. Do you think that would be bad?"

"It might be very unfortunate for me. If the Führer thought that I had brought Lanny for that

purpose, it might make it impossible for me ever to see him again."

"That's what I feared; and perhaps it would be wise if you talked to Lanny about it and

warned him not to do it. Of course don't tell him that I spoke to you on the subject."

"Naturally not. You may always rely on my discretion. It will be easy for me to bring up the

subject, because Lanny spoke to me about Freddi in Stubendorf."

So it came about that Lanny had a talk with Kurt without being under the necessity of