Page:T.M. Royal Highness.djvu/24

8 was younger than the Finance Minister; he was then in the prime of life, although his close-trimmed moustache and hair smoothly parted in the middle were already beginning to turn grey—for the rest a squat, short-necked man, obviously pinched by the collar of his heavily-laced court dress. He left Herr von Schroder to his perplexity for a minute, and then went on: "Only perhaps it might be to the interests of a prudent administration of the Privy Purse if the distinguished professor had rested content with stars and titles &hellip; to speak bluntly, what may all these delightful works of art have cost?"

Herr von Schröder recovered his animation. The desire, the hope of understanding the Baron, of getting on to intimate and confidential terms with him, excited him. "Just what I was thinking!" said he, turning round to resume his walk through the galleries. "Your Excellency has taken the question out of my mouth. I wonder what this 'Investiture' cost, and all the rest of these wall-pictures. For the restoration of the castle six years ago cost a million altogether."

"At least that."

"A solid million! And that amount was audited and approved by Lord Marshal von Bühl zu Bühl, who is sitting yonder in a state of comfortable catalepsy—audited, approved, and disbursed by the Keeper of the Privy Purse, Count Trümmerhauff."

"Disbursed, or owing!"

"One of the two! &hellip; This total, I say, debited to a fund, a fund &hellip;"

"In a word, the fund of the Grand Ducal settled estates."

"Your Excellency knows as well as I what that means. No, it makes me run cold. &hellip; I swear I am neither a skin-flint nor a hypochondriac, but it makes me run cold when I think of a man, with present conditions staring him in the face, coolly throwing a million away—on what? On a