santest views in Europe, but
John knew very well that the man was thinking little of it. His jaw had
not lost is pugnacious thrust, and he snapped his orders to the waiter
as if he were rebuking a recruit.

Nobody had told John that he was a Prussian, but the young American knew
it nevertheless, and he knew him to be a product, out of the very heart
of that iron military system, before which the whole world stood afraid,
buttressed as it was by tremendous victories over France, and a state of
readiness known to be without an equal.

Herr Simmering, fat, bland and bald, was bending over them, asking them
solicitously if all was right. John always liked this bit of personal
attention from the European hotel proprietors. It established a friendly
feeling. It showed that one was not lost among the swarm of guests, and
here in Germany it invariably made his heart warm to the civilians.

"Can you tell us, Herr Simmering," he asked, "who is the officer alone
in the alcove by the window?"

Herr Gustav Adolph Simmering, the soul of blandness and courtesy,
stiffened in an instant. With the asking of that simple question he
seemed to breathe a new and surcharged air. He lost his expansiveness in
the presence of the German army or any representative of it. Lowering
his voice he replied:

"A captain attached in some capacity to the General Staff in Berlin.
Rudolf von Boehlen is his name. It is said that he has high connections,
a distant cousin of the von Moltkes, in much favor, too, with the
Emperor."

"Do Prussian officers have to come here and tell the Saxons what to do?"

The good Herr Simmering spread out his hands in horror. These simple
Americans surely asked strange and intrusive questions. One could
forgive them only because they were so open, so much like innocent
children, and, unlike those disagreeable English, quarreled so little
about their bills.

"I know no more," he replied. "Here in Germany we never ask why an
officer comes and goes. We trust implicitly in the Emperor and his
advisers who have guarded us so well, and we do not wish to learn the
higher secrets of state. We know that such knowledge is not for us."

Dignified and slow, as became an important landlord, he nevertheless
went away with enough haste to indicate clearly to John that he wished
to avoid any more questions about the Prussian officer. John was
annoyed. He felt a touch of shame for Herr Simmering.

"I wish the Germans wouldn't stand