Other things were vexing
him in those days. But during the evening, feeling the necessity of
venting on somebody the wrath which had been gnawing at his vitals since
his last trip to Buenos Aires, he interrupted the singer.
"See here, gringo, what is all this nonsense about nobility which you
have been telling my girl?"
Karl left the piano that he might draw himself up to the approved
military position before responding. Under the influence of his recent
song, his pose suggested Lohengrin about to reveal the secret of his
life. His father had been General von Hartrott, one of the commanders
in the war of '70. The Emperor had rewarded his services by giving him
a title. One of his uncles was an intimate councillor of the King
of Prussia. His older brothers were conspicuous in the most select
regiments. He had carried a sword as a lieutenant.
Bored with all this grandeur, Madariaga interrupted him. "Lies . . .
nonsense . . . hot air!" The very idea of a gringo talking to him about
nobility! . . . He had left Europe when very young in order to cast in
his lot with the revolting democracies of America, and although nobility
now seemed to him something out-of-date and incomprehensible, still
he stoutly maintained that the only true nobility was that of his own
country. He would yield first place to the gringoes for the invention
of machinery and ships, and for breeding priceless animals, but all the
Counts and Marquises of Gringo-land appeared to him to be fictitious
characters.
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