Page:T.M. Royal Highness.djvu/81

Rh they are. That's the name for them. Do you know what they're good for? They keep the goods back when no tip's forthcoming, keep them back when the tradesman delivers them punctually at the time ordered, and only hand them over days late, so that the tradesman gets blamed, and is considered by the Grand Duke to have failed in his duty and he loses his orders. That's what they do without scrapie, and the whole town knows it.&hellip;"

"That's most annoying!" said Klaus Heinrich. He listened, listened. He hardly realized how much shocked he was. "Do they do anything else?" he said. "I'm quite sure they must do other things of the same kind."

"You bet!" said the man, and laughed. "No, they don't miss a chance, let me tell your Highnesses, they have all sorts of dodges. There's the door-opening joke, for instance.&hellip; That's like this. Your father, our gracious Grand Duke, grants an audience to somebody, let's suppose he's a new hand and it's his first time at Court. And he comes in a frock coat all sweat and shivers, for it is of course no trifle to stand before his Royal Highness for the first time. And the lackeys laugh at him, because they're quite at home here, and tow him into the ante-room, and he doesn't know where he is, and absolutely forgets to tip the lackeys. But then comes his moment, and the adjutant says his name, and the lackeys throw open the double-doors and let him into the room in which the Grand Duke is waiting. Then the new hand stands there and bows and says what he has to say, and the Grand Duke graciously gives him his hand, and so he is dismissed and walks backwards, and thinks the folding-doors are going to open behind him, as he has been definitely promised. But they don't open, I tell your Highnesses, for the lackeys have got their knife into him, because they haven't been tipped, and don't stir a finger for him outside there. But he daren't turn round, absolutely daren't,