The 2 12 Pillars of Wisdom Read Free

and strong, and perhaps should have been an athlete, he had not the slightest interest in athletic matters. Prinzel was, in fact, every bit as intellectual and bookish as was von Igelfeld, and not at all capable of being a hero on, or indeed off, the field. He could not run very fast; he had no interest in rowing; and he regarded ball games as absurd.
    Undeterred, von Igelfeld decided that even if Prinzel were to prove slow to realise his natural prowess, he could be made to appreciate just how fundamentally he had mistaken his destiny. Von Igelfeld began to tell others of Prinzel’s sporting instincts and abilities.
    ‘My friend, Prinzel,’ he would say, ‘is very good at games. I’m not really so accomplished at that sort of thing myself, but you should see him. A consummate athlete!’
    Others believed this, and soon Prinzel had a reputation of being a great sportsman. And if anybody thought it strange that they should never have seen Prinzel on the field, then they reasoned that this must be because he did not deign to do much with the very inferior competition which he found in Heidelberg.
    ‘Is it true that Prinzel represented Germany somewhere at something or other?’ von Igelfeld was asked from time to time.
    ‘Yes, it’s quite true,’ he answered, not deliberately seeking to tell a lie, but replying in this way because he had persuaded himself that Prinzel must indeed be the holder of records of which he was silent. Or, if he were not the holder, then the records could certainly be his for the asking if only he would bother to win them.
    It may all have remained at the level of fantasy, harmless enough, even if somewhat irritating for Prinzel, had it not been for von Igelfeld’s sudden conviction that Prinzel could be a fine swordsman, were he to try the sport. Unprotected fencing amongst students was then strongly discouraged, even if there had been a time when it had flourished greatly in Heidelberg. In spite of this twentieth-century squeamishness, a small group of students obstinately adhered to the view that the possession of a small duelling scar on the cheek made an important statement about one’s values, and was also of incidental value in later advancement in one’s career. It was widely suspected that a man with a scar would always give a job to another man with a scar, even if there was a stronger, unscarred candidate. Of course, this mock duelling was carried out in a spirit of fun, and nobody was meant to be seriously hurt, but the flashing of swords and the graceful thrusts and parries of those unencumbered by clumsy protective jackets was much appreciated by the more reactionary students. These students were unexcited by the heady messages from Paris that made German universities in the nineteen-sixties and -seventies such hotbeds of radicalism and ferment.
    The students who believed in fencing were naturally attracted to von Igelfeld. Not only was it his name that appealed to them, being redolent of an earlier era and lost territories, it was the knowledge of the estate in Austria and the close connection which von Igelfeld enjoyed with noble Bavarian families. For these reasons, von Igelfeld had been invited to take a glass of wine with the fencing faction.
    The members of this group immediately realised that von Igelfeld, for all his background, was an unredeemed intellectual and therefore quite unsuited to any further involvement with their own, rather dark, social activities. At the same time, his background deserved respect and so they listened attentively to him as he spoke to them about his interest in the arid wastes of medieval Latin verse.
    ‘And this Prinzel character,’ one of them said. ‘We see you about with him a great deal. Tell us something about him.’
    ‘Prinzel’s an amazing athlete,’ von Igelfeld said. ‘He’s one of those people who’s just naturally good at sports.’
    This remark was met with silence. Several glances were exchanged.
    ‘Is he a