A very few people, in very high places, and exceptionally well-informed, knew that Baron Stockmar was a most important person: that was enough.

The fortunes of the master and the servant, intimately interacting, rose together.

The Baron's secret skill had given Leopold his unexceptionable kingdom; and Leopold, in his turn, as time went on, was able to furnish the Baron with more and more keys to more and more back doors.
Stockmar took up his abode in the Palace partly as the emissary of King Leopold, but more particularly as the friend and adviser of a queen who was almost a child, and who, no doubt, would be much in need of advice and friendship.

For it would be a mistake to suppose that either of these two men was actuated by a vulgar selfishness.

The King, indeed, was very well aware on which side his bread was buttered; during an adventurous and chequered life he had acquired a shrewd knowledge of the world's workings; and he was ready enough to use that knowledge to strengthen his position and to spread his influence.