Clanks and whistles and a shocking cramp in my old thigh wound awoke me as we pulled in past the Porte de Saverne to Strasbourg station, and when I tried to move, I couldn’t, because Kralta was sleeping on top of me – hence my aching limb, trapped beneath buxom royalty. That’s the drawback to railroad rattling: when you’ve walloped yourselves to a standstill there’s no room to doze off contentedly rump to rump, and you must sleep catch-as-catch-can. Fortunately she soon came awake, and I heard the rustle of her furs as she slipped out into the corridor, leaving me to knead my leg into action, sigh happily at the recollection of a rewarding night’s activity, raise the blind for a peep at the station, and groan at the discovery from the platform clock that it was only ten to five.
The place was bustling even at that ungodly hour, with some sort of reception for our passengers, and I remembered Blowitz had talked of a dawn excursion. There he was, sure enough, well to the fore with Nagelmacker and a gang of tile-tipping dignitaries; he was trying to be the life and soul as usual, but looking desperate seedy after all his sluicing and guzzling, which was a cheering sight. If I’d known then that the Strasbourg river is called the Ill, I’d have called to him to have a look at it, as suiting his condition.
That reminded me that I was in urgent need of the usual offices, and I was about to lower the blind when my eye was caught by a chap sauntering along the platform, valise in hand, a tall youthful figure, somewhat of a swell with his long sheepskin-collared coat thrown back from his shoulders, stylishly tilted hat shading his face, ebony cane, a bloom in his lapel, and a black cigarette in a long amber holder. Bit of a Continental fritillary, but there was something in the cut of his jib that seemed distantly familiar as he strolled leisurely by. Couldn’t be anyone I knew, and I put it down as a fleeting likeness to any one of a hundred subalterns in the past, lowered the blind, drew on shirt and trousers, and hobbled out to seek relief.
When I returned, the little maid had set out a tray of coffee, hot milk, and petit pain, and was plumping the pillows and smoothing the sheets of the berth. Kralta was in the chair, her robe about her, perfectly groomed and bidding me an impersonal good day as though she’d never thrashed about in ecstatic frenzy in her life.
“Early as it is, I thought a petit déjeuner would not be amiss,” says she. “Manon has made up a berth for you in the next cabin, so that you may sleep until a more tolerable hour, as I shall.” The maid poured coffee for me and milk for her mistress, and waited on us while we ate and drank in silence – Kralta poised and dignified as befitting royalty en déshabillé, Flashy half-conscious as usual when rousted out at 5 a.m. I was glad of the coffee, and finished the pot; worn as I was with lack of sleep and Kralta’s attentions, I knew it would take more than a pint of Turkish to keep me awake.
When we’d finished, Manon removed the tray, and I was preparing to take my weary leave when Kralta stopped me with a hand on my sleeve. She said nothing, but put her hands up to my cheeks, appraising me in that shall-I-buy-the-brute-or-not style – and then she was kissing me with startling passion, mouth wide, lips working hungrily, tongue halfway to breakfast. Tuckered or not, I was game if she was, and I was delving under the fur for her fleshpots when she pulled gently away, pecked me on the cheek, murmured “Later … we have Vienna,” and before I knew it I was in the corridor and her lock was clicking home.
I was too tired to mind. The lower berth in the next cabin was turned down and looked so inviting that I dragged off my duds any old how and crawled in gratefully, reflecting that the Orient Express was an Al train, and Kralta, the teasing horse-faced baggage with her splendid assets, was just the freight for it … and Vienna lay ahead. Even as my head touched the pillow the train gave a clank and shudder, and then we were gliding away again, and I was preparing for sleep by saying my prayers like a good boy, their purport being the pious hope that I hadn’t forgotten any of the positions Fetnab had taught me on the Grand Trunk, and which I’d rehearsed with Mrs What’s-her-name in the ruined temple by Meerut, and would certainly demonstrate to Kralta as soon as we found a bed with a decentish bit of romping room in it …
I expected to sleep soundly, but didn’t, for I was troubled by a most vivid dream, one of those odd ones in which you’re sure you’re awake because the surroundings of the dream are those in which you went to sleep. There I was in my berth on the Orient Express, stark beneath the coverlet, with sunlit autumn countryside going past the window, and near at hand two people were talking, Kralta and an Englishman, and I knew he was a public school man because although they spoke in German he used occasional slang, and there was no mistaking his nil admirari drawl. I couldn’t see them, and it was the strangest conversation, in which they chaffed each other with a vulgar freedom which wasn’t like Kralta at all, somehow. She said of course she’d made love to me, twice, and the man laughed and said she was a slut, and she said lightly, no such thing, she was a female rake, and he was just jealous. He said if he were jealous of all her lovers he’d have blown his brains out long ago, and they both seemed amused.
Then their voices were much closer, and Kralta said: “I wonder how he’ll take it?”, and the man said: “He’ll have no choice.” Then she said: “He may be dangerous,” and the man said the queerest thing: that any man whose name could make Bismarck grit his teeth was liable to be dangerous. The dream ended there, and I must have slept on, for when I woke, sure enough I was still in the berth, but somehow I knew that time had gone by … but why was there no feeling in my legs, and who was the chap in the armchair, smoking a black gasper in an amber holder, and rising and smiling as I strove to sit up but couldn’t? Of course! He was the young boulevardier I’d seen on Strasbourg station … but what the hell was he doing here, and what was the matter with my legs?
“Back to life!” cries he. “There now, don’t stir. Be aisy, as the Irishman said, an’ if yez can’t be aisy, be as aisy as ye can. Here, take a pull at this.” The sharp taste of spa water cleared my parched throat, if not my wits. “Better, eh? Now, now, gently does it! Who am I, and where’s the delightful Kralta, and what’s to do, and how’s your pater, and so forth?” He chuckled. “All in good time, old fellow. I fancy you’ll need somethin’ stronger than spa when I tell you. Ne’er mind, all’s well, and when you’re up to par we’ll have a bite of luncheon with her highness – I say, though, you’ve made a hit there! Bit of a wild beast, ain’t she? Too strong for my taste, but one has to do the polite with royalty, what?” says this madman cheerfully. “Care for a smoke?”
I tried again to heave up, flailing my arms feebly, without success – and now my dream came back to me, half-understood, and I knew from the numbness of my limbs that this was no ordinary waking … Kralta, the bitch, must have doctored my coffee, and it had been no dream but reality, and this was the bastard she’d been talking to … about me. And Bismarck …
“Lie still, damn you!” cries the young spark, grinning with a restraining hand on my shoulder. “You must, you know! For one thing, your legs won’t answer yet awhile, and even if they did, you’re ballock-naked and it’s dam’ parky out and we’re doin’ forty miles an hour. And if you tried to leave the train,” he added soothingly, “I’d be bound to do somethin’ desperate. See?”
I hadn’t seen his hand move, but now it held a small under-and-over pistol, levelled at me. Then it was gone, and he was lighting a cigarette.
“So just be patient, there’s a good chap, and you’ll know all about it presently. Sure you won’t smoke? There’s no cause for alarm, ’pon honour. You’re among friends … well, companions, anyway … and I’m goin’ to be your tee-jay and see you right, what?”
D’you know, in all my fright and bewilderment, it was that piece of schoolboy slang that struck home, so in keeping with his style and speech, and yet so at odds with his looks. He couldn’t be public school, surely … not with those classic features that belong east of Vienna and would be as out of place in England as a Chinaman’s. No, not with that perfect straight nose, chiselled lips, and slightly slanted blue eyes – if this chap wasn’t a Mittel European, I’d never seen one.
“Tee-jay?” I croaked, and he laughed.
“Aye … guide, philosopher, and friend – showin’ the new bugs the ropes. What did you call ’em at Rugby? I’m a Wykehamist, you know – and that was your doin’, believe it or not! ’Deed it was!”
He blew a cloud, grinning at my stupefaction, and the feeling that I’d seen him before hit me harder than ever – the half-jeering smile, the whole devil-may-care carriage of him. But where? When?
“Oh, yes, you impressed the guv’nor no end!” cries he. “‘It’s an English school for you, my son,’ he told me. ‘Hellish places, by all accounts, rations a Siberian moujik wouldn’t touch, and less civilised behaviour than you’d meet in the Congo, but I’m told there’s no education like it – a lifetime’s trainin’ in knavery packed into six years. No wonder they rule half the world. Why, if I’d been to Eton or Harrow I’d have had Flashman on toast!’ That’s what the guv’nor said!”
This was incredible. “The … the guv’nor?”
“As ever was! You and he were sparrin’-partners … oh, ever so long ago, before my time, ages! He wouldn’t tell about it, but he thought you no end of a fellow. ‘If ever you run into Flashman … well, try not to, but if you do, keep him covered, for he’s forgotten more dodges than you’ll ever know,’ he told me once. ‘His great trick is shammin’ fear – don’t you believe it, my boy, for that’s when he’s about to turn tiger.’ I remember he fingered the scar on his brow as he said it. I say, did you give him that?” His eyes were alight with admiration, damned if they weren’t. “You’ll have to tell me about that, you know!”
My heart had stopped beating some time before. I could only stare at him appalled as the truth dawned.
“My God! You mean … you’re –”
“Rupert Willem von Starnberg!” cries he, sticking out his hand. “But you must call me Bill!”
It’s a backhanded tribute to the memory of the late unlamented Rudi von Starnberg that my first impulse on meeting his offspring was to look for the communication cord and bawl for help. Time was I’d ha’ done both, but when you’ve reached your sixties you’ve either learned to bottle your panic, sit tight, and think like blazes … or you haven’t reached your sixties, mallum?a I didn’t know what the devil was afoot, or why – but I’d heard his name and his threat and seen his Derringer. No wonder he’d seemed familiar: taller, longer in the jaw, straight auburn hair instead of curls, and clean-shaven, but still unmistakable. Rudi’s son … my God, another of him!
That settled one thing. Whatever the ghastly plot, it didn’t signify beside the urgent need to get off this infernal train in one piece, jildi†b and if this brute was anything like dear papa, I’d have my work cut out. You may think his threat was ridiculous, on a civilised railroad carrying respectable passengers through the heart of peaceful Europe. I did not. I knew the family.
But I must have time to think and find out, so I let him clasp my nerveless hand, assuring me warmly that he’d wanted ever so much to meet me. That was a facer, if you like; Rudi had been as deadly an enemy as I’d ever run from, and dam’ near did for me in the Jotunberg dungeons, and here was this ruffian talking as though we’d been boon companions … and yet, hadn’t that been Rudi all over, carefree villainy with a twinkling eye, clapping your shoulder and stabbing your back together?
Playing for time, I muttered something idiotic about not knowing Rudi had married, and he laughed heartily.
“He had to, you see, when I happened along in ’60. You knew mother – Helga Kossuth, lady-in-waitin’ to the Duchess of Strackenz in your time. I’ve heard her speak of you, but nothin’ to a purpose. Kept her counsel, like the guv’nor.”
They would; imposture and assassination ain’t matters to beguile your infant’s bed-time. I remembered Helga, a lovely red-haired creature whom Rudi had been sparking back in ’48 – evidently with more constancy than I’d have given him credit for. And now the result of their union was watching me with an eye like an epee as I cautiously flexed my toes, feeling the life return to my legs, weighed the distance between us, and asked what time it was.
“Just past noon; Munich in half an hour – but don’t form any rash plans for gettin’ out there.” He eyed me mockingly. “I’m sure you wouldn’t enjoy ten years in a Bavarian prison. Bad as Rugby, I shouldn’t wonder. Oh, yes,” he continued, enjoying himself, “I have it on excellent authority – Prince Bismarck’s in fact – that a warrant still exists for the arrest of one Flashman, a British subject, on a most serious criminal charge, the rape of one Baroness Pechmann at a house in the Karolinen Platz, Munich, thirty-five years ago. Astonishin’ how youthful peccadilloes come home to roost –”
“It’s a lie! A damned infamous lie!” It was startled out of me in a bellow of shock and rage. “It was a trap! A vile plot by that swine Bismarck and Lola Montez and that fat lying whore –”
“So you told the examinin’ magistrate … one Herr Karjuss.” He drew a paper from his breast. “Strangely enough, he didn’t believe you. Of course, there were several witnesses, includin’ the victim herself, and –”
“Your foresworn rat of a father!”
“You took the words from my mouth. Yes, their signed statements are in the files, and would have been used at your trial if you hadn’t absconded. Still, the case can easily be reopened.”
Absconded, my God! Trepanned into that Strackenz nightmare … I felt as though I’d been kicked in the stomach, for it was all true, though I hadn’t given it a thought in half a lifetime – true, at least, that I’d been falsely accused by those fiends, blackmailed with the threat of years in a stinking gaol. And the evidence would still be there, the only falsehood being that I’d raped that simpering sow – why, we’d barely buckled to, and she’d been fairly squealing for it –
“The Baroness, you’ll be happy to know, is in excellent health and eager to testify. Did I say ten years? Strait-laced lot, the Bavarians; it could easily be life.”
“You wouldn’t dare! What, d’you think I’m nobody, to be railroaded by some tinpot foreign court on a trumped-up charge? By God, you’ll find out different! I count for something, and if you think the British Government will stand by while your lousy, corrupt –”
“They stood by while …” he consulted his paper “… yes, while Colonel Valentine Baker went away for twelve months. He was a stalwart hero of Empire, too, it seems, and all he’d done was kiss a girl and tickle her ankle in a railway carriage. I must say,” he chuckled, “the longer I serve Bismarck the more I admire him. It’s all here, you know.” He tapped the paper. “How you’d bluster, I mean, and how to shut you up. I’d never heard of this Baker chap … dear me, flies unbuttoned on the Portsmouth line, what next? I say! We might even work up a second charge against you – indecent assault on the Orient Express, with Kralta sobbin’ in the witness-box! That’d make the cheese more bindin’ in court, what?” He shook his head, mock regretful. “I’m afraid, Harry my boy, you’re cooked.”
I’d known that, for all my noise, the moment he’d recalled the name Pechmann. They’d got me, neck and heel, this jeering ruffian and his icy bitch of an accomplice … and Bismarck. Who else would have thought to conjure up that ancient false charge to force my hand now … but for what, in God’s name? I must have looked like a landed fish, for he gave me a cheery wink and slapped the edge of my berth.
“But don’t fret – it ain’t goin’ to happen! It’s the last thing we want – heavens, you’d be no good to us in clink! I only mentioned the Pechmann business to let you see where you stand if … But see here,” says he, brisk and friendly, “why not hear what we want of you? It ain’t in the least smoky, I swear. In fact, it’s a dam’ good deed.” He came to his feet. “Now then, you’re feelin’ better, I can see, in body if not in spirit. Legs right as rain, eh? Oh, yes, I noticed!” He gave me that cocky Starnberg grin that shivered my spine. “So, I’ll take a turn in the corridor while you put on your togs and have a sluice. No shave just yet, I’m afraid; I took the razor from your valise, just in case. Then we’ll have some grub and come to biznai.” He gave a cheery nod and was gone.
I can’t tell you my thoughts as I rose, none too steadily, and dressed, because I don’t remember. I’d been hit where I lived, and hard, and there was nothing for it but to clear my mind of fruitless speculation, and take stock of what I knew, thus:
Starnberg and Kralta were Bismarck agents, and had trapped me, drugged me, threatened me with firearms and the certainty of years in gaol if I didn’t … do what? “Nothing smoky … a dam’ good deed”? I doubted that, rather … but on t’other hand, they hadn’t shown hostile, exactly. Kralta had let me roger her as part of the trap, but I knew, from a lifetime’s study of well-rattled women, that she’d taken a shine to me, too. And while Starnberg was probably as wicked and dangerous a son-of-a-bitch as his father, he’d seemed a friendly disposed sort of blackmailing assassin … why, latterly he’d been almost coaxing me. I was at a loss; all I knew was that if they were about to force me into some diabolic plot, or preparing to sell me a fresh cargo of gammon, they were going a rum way about it. I could only wait, and listen, and look for the chance to cut.
So I made myself decent, took another pull at the spa, touched my toes, transferred my clasp-knife from my pocket to my boot (you should have frisked my clothes, Bill), decided I’d felt worse, and was in fair parade order when he returned, preceded by Manon with a loaded tray which she set down on a little folding camp table before making brisk work of converting the berth into a sofa.
“What, not hungry?” says he, when I declined sandwiches and drumsticks. “No, I guess lay-me-down-dead ain’t the best foundation for luncheon – but you’ll take a brandy? Capital! Ah, and here is her highness! A glass of champagne, my sweet, and the armchair. ‘It is well done, and fitting for a princess’, as my Stratford namesake has it. She is a real princess, you know, Harry – and I’m a count, and you’re a belted what-d’ye-call-it, so we’re rather a select company, what?”
It might have been Rudi himself, chattering gaily and keeping between me and the door as he bowed in Kralta, very elegant in a fur-trimmed travelling dress and matching Cossack cap. She gave me her cool stare, and then to my surprise held out her hand with a little smile, asking courteously if I’d slept well, damn her impudence. But I took her hand as a little gentleman ought, with a silent bow, as though she hadn’t fed me puggle and we’d never played two-backed beastie in our lives. A still tongue and sharp eyes and ears were my line until I knew what was afoot – after which I’d be even stiller and sharper.
“All glasses charged?” cries Starnberg. “Capital! To our happy association, then!” He lighted one of his cigarettes and settled on the sofa corner by the door; I was seated by the window.
“Now then … biznai,” says he. “First off, Chancellor Prince Bismarck presents his compliments, apologises for any inconvenience caused, and invites your assistance in preservin’ the peace of Europe. And that’s no lie,” he added. “It’s in the balance, and if things go wrong we’ll have the bloodiest mess since Bonaparte.” He’d stopped smiling, and Kralta was watching me intently.
“Why your assistance?” he went on. “Freak of chance, nothing more. You’ve been told that for five years Bismarck wondered how Blowitz got hold of the Berlin Treaty; that’s true, tho’ it didn’t keep him awake. Then a few months ago, idly enough, he suggested to Kralta that she might worm it out of little Stefan. She failed, but here’s the point.” He levelled his cigarette at me. “In talkin’ to her about Berlin, Blowitz chanced to mention your name in passin’ – you know how he gasses about the people he knows – and in reportin’ her failure she, in turn, mentioned it to Bismarck. Now,” says he, looking leery, “I don’t know what you and Bismarck and the guv’nor were up to in Strackenz years ago, but when Bismarck heard the name Flashman, he sat up straight – didn’t he, Kralta?”
She nodded. “He said: ‘That man again! I was right – I did see him in Berlin during the Congress!’ Then he laughed, and said I should trouble no more about Blowitz; he would find out the secret of the treaty for himself, through other agents.”
“And didn’t he just!” cries Starnberg. “All about some courtesan who wormed information out of one o’ the Russians, and you passed it to Blowitz in your hat, and a French diplomat was so impressed by Blowitz’s omniscience that he handed over the treaty. Who was the courtesan, Harry?” says he, with a sly glance at Kralta. “Another of your light o’ loves?”
I’d kept a straight face through this revelation; now I shook my head. Since Bismarck was so dam’ clever, let him find out Caprice’s identity for himself, if he wanted to.
“Well, Bismarck was amused: said he admired Blowitz’s ingenuity. But that was that; havin’ discovered the ploy, Bismarck was content – and none of it matters now; the only important thing about Blowitz and the whole Berlin business was that it brought your name back to Bismarck’s notice, see? So, just by that chance, you were still in his mind a few weeks ago, when he first had word of the threatenin’ crisis I mentioned just now. It struck him that you would be useful – nay, essential – to him in meetin’ that crisis. ‘Flashman is the man,’ were his very words. ‘We must have him.’ The question was, how to enlist you. He thought you might be reluctant.” He glanced at Kralta. “Wasn’t that how he put it?”
“Rather more strongly.” For once there was a glimmer of humour in the cool blue eyes. “He said you would have to be compelled. So I was instructed to entice you to Paris.” She paused, and Starnberg burst out laughing.
“Tell him what Bismarck said! Oh, well, if you won’t, I will! He said you were a lecherous animal governed altogether by lust.” He winked at Kralta. “Which made him irresistible to you, didn’t it, my dear?”
She ignored this. I’d resolved to keep mum, but suddenly the chance to play parfit gentil Flashy seemed sound policy.
“Knowing your parentage, I’m not surprised by your guttersnipe manners,” says I. “Get to the point, and keep your impertinences to yourself.”
He crowed with delight, clapping his hands. “Why, Kralta, I do believe you’ve got a champion! Bless me if you haven’t won his manly heart – or some other part of his anatomy which I shan’t mention, since delicacy seems to be the order of the day.” He grinned from one to other of us. “Lord, what a pair of randy hypocrites you are! The older generation …” He shook his head.
“As I was saying,” says Kralta calmly to me, “I was the lure to attract you. As you know, I used the unsuspecting Blowitz to bring us together. He was most obliging, hinting slyly that if I still wished to know how the Berlin Treaty was obtained, you could be persuaded to tell me. Naturally, I did not tell him that we already knew that little secret, but pretended delight, and urged him to lose no time in bringing you to Paris. You may resent the deception we … I have practised, but I cannot regret it.” The horse face was proudly serene, but with the little smile at the corner of her mouth. “For several reasons. When you have heard what Prince Bismarck proposes, you will understand one of them.” She made a languid gesture to Starnberg to continue.
“Well, thank’ee, ma’am,” says he sardonically, and filled my glass. “But before we come to that, we have a few questions, and ’twill save time if you answer without troublin’ why we ask ’em. You’ll learn, never fear. How friendly are you with the Emperor of Austria?”
“Franz-Josef? Hardly friendly … I’ve met him –”
“Yes, on his yacht off Corfu in 1868, on your return from Mexico, where you had led the unsuccessful attempt to rescue his brother Maximilian from a Juarista firin’ squad. A gallant failure which earned you the imperial gratitude, as well as the Order of Maria Theresa, presented to you …” he cocked a quizzy eyebrow “… by the Empress Elisabeth, and ain’t she a peach, though? I’d call that friendly.”
They’d done their lessons, up to a point. The “gallant failure” had been the biggest botch since the Kabul Retreat, thanks to the idiot Maximilian, who was damned if he’d be rescued, so there, and I’d come off by the skin of my chattering teeth and the good offices of that gorgeous little fire-eater, Princess Aggie Salm-Salm, and Jesus Montero’s gang of unwashed bandits who were on hand only because Jesus thought I knew where Montezuma’s treasure was cached, more fool he. Another fragrant leaf from my diary, that was, and my only regret for Emperor Max was that he’d been a fairish cricketer for a novice, and might have made a half-decent batter, if he’d lived.13 But it was true enough that Franz-Josef had been uncommon civil, for an emperor, and the beautiful Sissi (Empress Elisabeth to you) had given me the glad eye as she’d handed over the white cross. Can’t think what became of it; in a drawer somewhere, I expect.
Kralta asked: “Did the Emperor Franz-Josef shake hands with you?”
A deuced odd question, and I had to think. “I believe he did … yes, he did, coming and going.”
“Then he’s certainly friendly,” says Starnberg. “He only takes the paw of close relatives and tremendous swells, usually. That was the only time you met him … would he be pleased to see you again, d’you think? You know, hospitably inclined, stop over for a weekend, that kind of thing?”
“How the devil should I know? What on earth has this to do –?”
“Bismarck is sure he would be. Not that he’s asked – but your name has been mentioned to the Emperor lately, and he spoke of you most warmly. Gratifyin’, what – from such a cold fish?”
“And the Empress?” This was Kralta. “Was she well disposed towards you?”
“She was very … gracious. Charming. See here, this is –”
“Did you admire her?”
“Of course he did!” laughs Willem. “Who doesn’t? Half Europe’s in love with the beautiful Sissi!”
“You met her again, later,” says Kralta. “In England.”
“I hunted with her, once or twice, yes.”
“Hunted, eh?” Willem’s tongue was in his cheek. “Was that the only … exercise you took with her?”
“Yes, damn your eyes! And if that’s where you’ve been leading with your infernal questions –”
“It had to be asked,” says Kralta sharply. She stared down her nose. “Then there are no grounds at all for the Emperor to feel … jealousy towards you? Where his wife is concerned?”
“Or to put it tactfully,” says Willem, “if you happened along, Franz-Josef wouldn’t bar the door on you just because little Sissi was on the premises?” He gave the snorting little chuckle which I was beginning to detest. “Ve-ry good! D’ye know what, Kralta? Bismarck was right. ‘Flashman is the man’ … I say, Munich already! How time flies in jolly company!” He stood up and consulted his watch. “We stop only five minutes … but you won’t do anythin’ rash, Harry, will you? A German gaol wouldn’t suit, you know.”
He needn’t have fretted. One thought alone was in my mind as we waited, looking out on the orderly bustle of Munich station: the Austrian frontier lay a bare sixty miles off, we’d cross it in two hours, and if (a large if, granted) I could give ’em the slip I’d be beyond the reach of Bavarian law in a country at loggerheads with Germany and as likely to oblige Bismarck by returning a fugitive as I was to take holy orders.
As to what he could want of me, I was no wiser. What could it matter what the Emperor and Empress of Austria thought of a mere British soldier? She had an eye for men, and it was common talk that Franz-Josef had warned her off various gallants with whom her relations had probably been innocent enough, but I hadn’t been among ’em. I dare say I could have added her scalp to my belt, but I’d never tried, for good reason: everyone knew that Franz-Josef, whose ambition seemed to be to bag every chamois and woman in Austria, had given her cupid’s measles, and while the poultice-wallopers had doubtless put her in order again, you can’t be too careful. And while she looked like Pallas Athene, I suspected she was half-cracked – flung herself about in gymnasiums and went on starvation diets and wrote poetry and asked for a lunatic asylum as a birthday present, so I’d been told. She and Franz-Josef hadn’t dealt too well since he’d poxed her, and she’d taken to wandering Europe while he pleaded with her to forgive and forget. Royal marriages are the very devil.
I tell you this because it’s pertinent to the catechism which Willem resumed as soon as we’d pulled out of Munich. He began by asking what I knew of the Austrian Empire. I retorted that they seemed to be good at losing wars and territory, having been licked lately by France, Prussia, and Italy, for heaven’s sake, and that the whole concern was pretty ramshackle. Beyond that I knew nothing and cared less.
He nodded. “Aye, ramshackle enough. Fifty million folk of a dozen different nations bound together in a discontented mass under a stiff-necked autocrat who don’t know how to manage ’em. He’s a dull dog, Franz-Josef, whose blunders have cost him the popularity he enjoyed as the handsome boy-emperor of thirty-five years ago. But his empire’s the heart and guts of Europe, and if it were to suffer any great convulsion … well, it better not. Know anythin’ about Hungary?”
I understood it was the biggest state in the empire bar Austria itself, and that the natives were an ornery lot, but fine horsemen. He grinned.
“Proper little professor of international politics, you are! Well, I’m quarter Hungarian myself, through Mama; rest o’ me’s Prussian. And you’re right, they’re an ornery lot, and don’t care above half for Austrian rule. They’ve declared independence in the past, risin’ in revolt, and Franz-Josef made the mistake of gettin’ the Tsar to put ’em down with Russian troops – they’ll never forgive him that. He’s been at his wit’s end to keep ’em quiet, makin’ concessions, havin’ himself and Sissi crowned King and Queen of Hungary, but there are still plenty of Magyar nationalists who’d like to cut with Austria altogether. People like Lajos Kossuth, regular firebrand who led the uprisin’, now in his eighties and exiled in Italy but still hatin’ the Hapsburgs like poison and dreamin’ of Free Hungary. Believe it or not, he and his nationalist pals have the sympathy of Empress Sissi and the Emperor’s son and heir, Crown Prince Rudolf, who favour constitutional reform.14 And there are others, extremists who’d like to take a shorter way.”
He paused to light a cigarette, blowing out the match and watching its smoke. “Terrorists like the Holnup, which is Hungarian for ‘tomorrow’, ’nuff said. They skulk in secret, plottin’ bloody revolution, but most Hungarians regard ’em as a squalid gang of fanatics not to be taken seriously.” He threw aside the spent match. “So did we … until about a month ago, when Bismarck got word, through his private intelligence service, that the Holnup were about to take the warpath in earnest. Here, let me give you another brandy.”
He poured out a stiff tot, and a cloud must have passed over the sun just then, for the brightness faded from the pretty autumn colours speeding past the window, and to my nervous imagination it seemed that the shadow penetrated into the compartment, robbing the trickling brandy of its sparkle, and that even the rumble of the wheels had taken on a menacing, insistent note.
“The Holnup intend to assassinate Franz-Josef,” says Willem, filling a second glass for himself. “If they succeed, there’ll be civil war. Oh, pottin’ royalty’s nothing new, and usually there’s no great harm done – various lunatics have tried for Franz-Josef before, there have been two attempts on the German Emperor, and the Tsar was blown up a couple of years ago … but this would be different.15 What, Hungarians killin’ the Austrian monarch, at a time when Hungary’s boilin’ with unrest, when it’s known that Sissi supports its independence, and surrounds herself with worshippin’ Magyars, and corresponds with Kossuth, and there’s even been rumour of a conspiracy to bestow the crown of Hungary on Prince Rudolf, who hates Papa and is as pro-Hungarian as his beautiful idiot of a mother?” He gave a mirthless bark of laughter. “Think what use the nationalists could make of those two half-wits, willin’ or not! Casus belli, if you like! Civil war in Austria-Hungary – and how long before France and Germany and Russia, aye, and perhaps even England, were drawn in? And that is what will happen if Franz-Josef stops a Hungarian bullet.”
Kralta spoke. “It must not happen. At all costs it must be prevented.”
She was intent on me, but Willem, as he handed me my glass and sat back, seemed almost amused. There was a look of mischief on the handsome face, like a practical joker about to spring his surprise.
“Fortunately,” says he, “thanks to Bismarck’s earwig in the Holnup, we know precisely when and how and where they intend to strike. Franz-Josef is to be murdered in his huntin’-lodge at Ischl, a charmin’ but secluded resort in the Saltzkammergut, over the hills but not very far away from where we sit at this moment. They’ll do it this week, by night, a small group of well-armed and expert assassins. They have it planned all to a nicety … and all in vain, poor souls.” His smile widened as he clinked his glass against mine. “Because you and I, old son, are goin’ to stop ’em.”
a understand?
b quickly (Hind.)