The Ludwig Conspiracy (17 page)

“Your king has money, believe me.” I tried to look important. But I was seething with anger inside. I knew that jokes about crazy “Herr Huber” with his empty coffers were current among the regulars at any tavern. Nonetheless, I always felt indignant when I heard such comments.

“I’ll make you another offer,” said the old cabby now, pointing to the amulet. “You give me that old nag and this pretty thing, and we’re square. The king can look in and thank me personally, for all I care.” He offered me his dirty paw and grinned like a wolf. Suddenly a small revolver appeared in his other hand. “Or you can hand the amulet over now,” he growled, suppressing another fit of coughing with difficulty. “Shake on it, then, young dandy—before I regret my generosity.”

H
ALF AN HOUR
later I was sitting on a saddled horse that, contrary to my expectations, was not the worst mount in the world. His black coat gleamed, his tail was clean and combed, and he pranced on the spot as if to race all the way to Seville with me.

The old cabby had told me that he had won the horse in a race, but I could tell that he was lying through his teeth. More than likely the old rascal had stolen the horse and was glad to sell him quick and at a good price. Thus it was all the more important for me to leave the city as quickly as possible. Otherwise I would be wanted not only as the king’s agent, but as a horse thief as well. At least by some hard bargaining I had induced the old man to throw his revolver into the deal. I had a foreboding that I would end up needing the little gun sooner or later.

I let the reins drop, and the horse galloped through the narrow streets of the Au district swift as an arrow. When I turned to look back once more, I saw the old cabby grinning as he waved me goodbye in the gathering dusk. He had driven the bargain of his life.

RIJKHQR, EIVOEDITP

I soon left the stinking suburbs of Munich behind. I rode south through the wooded valley of the Isar, with the river on my right, making for the Alps. By now it was full night, and I was alone on my way along the moonlit country roads. The monotonous beat of the horse’s hooves made me feel tired; my eyes kept closing. I turned off into a little thicket to sleep for a few hours.

By the time day dawned, I had nearly reached Kochel. From there, it was only half a day’s ride to Linderhof. All the same, I decided to stop and rest in that little town. My horse and I urgently needed to break our journey. In addition, I was sure that von Strelitz had the roads to the castle watched. If I were to succeed in reaching the king, I was more likely to do it under cover of darkness.

I spent the whole day dozing in the flea-infested bed provided by a small inn, woken abruptly again and again by nightmares in which the Prussian agent held his Derringer to my temple and pulled the trigger. More than once the thought of the ministers’ diabolical intrigue passed through my mind. They couldn’t simply depose the king from office. In fact the opposite was more likely; they must know that His Majesty could dismiss them at any time. But if they declared him insane, he would no longer be considered capable of ruling, and Prince Luitpold, Ludwig’s uncle, would automatically move up a place in the succession to the throne. However, for that the ministers needed an incontestable expert opinion, preferably from one of the most famous psychiatrists in the German Empire: Dr. Bernhard von Gudden, royal medical officer and director of the Upper Bavarian Hospital for the Insane. The plan was watertight.

The well-known psychiatrist had already treated Prince Otto, Ludwig’s pitiable younger brother. Otto was severely demented and spent his monotonous days wailing and giggling in Fürstenried Castle. An aunt of Ludwig was also considered insane. Years earlier she had liked to claim that she had swallowed a glass keyboard. Heaven knows, the Wittelsbachs were not an easy family to understand. But for all his eccentricity, all his fantastic notions, Ludwig was not deranged! The sole aim of the ministers’ intrigue was to oust an increasingly refractory king obsessed by his architectural plans and replace him with a willing marionette.

That evening I fortified myself with half a loaf of bread, butter, and bacon, mounted my horse, and rode along the Loisach River toward Garmisch. In the darkness of night, I finally climbed to the high pass of the Ettal Saddle and galloped past Ettal Monastery. From here, I realized, I must proceed carefully. The road to Linderhof was a narrow one; to the left and right of it lay woods and marshy meadows that I dared not cross on horseback. In von Strelitz’s place, this was exactly where I would have laid an ambush.

Only a few miles to the castle, I was beginning to think myself safe, when branches suddenly snapped to my left. The next moment a loud explosion rang out. I dropped off my horse, rolled away, and crawled into the thicket beside the ditch at the side of the road. I saw a figure hurry out of the wood. The moonlight was bright enough for me to recognize him at once. It was indeed von Strelitz, in his dark coat looking even more like a large bat by night than he did during the day. He held the still-smoking pistol in his hand as he looked searchingly in all directions. But what alarmed me more was the sight of the men with him.

They were four police officers.

Not hired murderers, not Prussian agents, they were instead four good, honest Bavarian officers, clad in green uniforms, who now drew their own pistols and scanned the roadside with them. A cold shudder ran down my back. How far did the power of the ministers reach if even the police were now involved in the attempt to topple Ludwig? These men had certainly been told a false story, probably by von Strelitz, to the effect that I was a murderous anarchist plotting against the king. Nonetheless, my hair stood on end to think that Bavarian officers could so easily be won over to the side of evil.

While the police officers searched the bushes on the other side of the road, von Strelitz approached my hiding place with his firearm at the ready. He was only five paces from me now, and coming slowly closer. In the wan moonlight, I could see the gleam in his eyes; I almost felt that he could smell me. I cautiously fumbled with my coat, trying to get out my own revolver, but I quickly realized that the slightest sound would give me away at once. Finally I abandoned the attempt and prepared to attack.

Von Strelitz was only two paces away when I launched myself at him, like a dark nightmare, yelling at the top of my voice. As I had hoped, the agent swerved aside, and his shot went wide. I turned around and, darting sideways, ran for a little copse of fir trees where I hoped to find at least temporary shelter. Behind me, I heard angry cries, followed by shots. But as if by some miracle, they all missed me.

At last I reached the trees, which were gnarled by wind and weather, and plunged into the darkness of the wood. Birds flew up with hoarse cries, and I soon realized that I had fallen into a trap. The little wood was more of a spinney, a tiny overgrown island surrounded by flat, marshy terrain. The police officers and von Strelitz circled around the group of trees, dividing up at regular intervals. From the cracking sounds in the undergrowth, I realized that they were approaching me in a star-shaped formation. They wanted to drive me out of my hiding place like an old boar.

I thought quickly and decided on a strategy of forward flight. When I heard stealthy footsteps very close, I drew my revolver, leaped out from the cover of a fallen tree, and fired without hesitating.

Von Strelitz stood in front of me.

For a split second, time stood still. I saw the Prussian agent gasping as he clutched his right shoulder, and his own gun fell to the ground with a dull thud. He swayed, fell, and with two fast strides, I was past him and away.

Without another thought, I ran for the distant outskirts of the wood. Beyond them, a gray and seemingly endless expanse of meadowland lay in the moonlight. It was obvious that out there the police officers would be able to pick me off like a rabbit, but I was also in a trap if I stayed in the wood. What ought I to do? Surrender? Von Strelitz would probably give orders for my immediate execution, so that no one would hear about the ministers’ plot. And suppose the agent himself was dead? Then the officers would very likely take instant revenge by shooting me down. I raced across the meadow, expecting a death-dealing bullet in my back at any second.

At that moment a miracle happened.

Only a little way from me, I suddenly saw my horse. He was grazing calmly and peacefully, illuminated by the moonlight like a unicorn in a fairy landscape. He raised his head when he sensed me on the outskirts of the wood.

I took a deep breath and then ran as I had never run before in my life. I could hear shouting and gunfire behind me. However, I took no notice but swung myself up on the horse and dug my heels into his sides. The horse reared up, whinnying, and then raced away over the marshy fields.

The cries behind me died down, and soon I was on the road again. Without looking back, I galloped on and on, until at last a narrow stone bridge appeared before me.

The bridge to Linderhof.

I thundered over it and stopped at the wall around the castle park. Inside it, I could see the Temple of Venus shimmering white on a hill. The castle lay beyond it. I had nearly reached my destination, but at this time of night the iron gate was locked. Jumping off my horse, I shook the bars of the gate frantically.

“Hey there!” I cried, hoarse after my headlong flight. “Open the gate at once! In the name of the king!”

Suddenly I heard the hoofbeats of a galloping horse behind me. They were quickly coming closer. Once again I tugged at the barred gate and shouted for the gatekeeper. At last I caught the sound of dragging footsteps and the clink of a key.

“Coming, in the devil’s name, just coming!” growled a voice inside the gate. “It’s four in the morning—wait a moment, will you?”

At that moment a gigantic figure appeared on the bridge, a monster from a shadowy world. It took me a moment to recognize it as a mounted man with his coattails fluttering in the wind like two great wings.

Von Strelitz.

He had bound up his upper arm and shoulder as best he might with a piece of cloth. Sitting erect on his gray horse, he held his pistol in his left hand, aiming it at me, his face distorted with hatred and pain. Open-mouthed, incapable even of fear and unable to move, I stared into the muzzle of the pistol, expecting to see a jet of fire hiss out of it at any moment.

But it never came.

Squealing, the barred gate opened. Holding my horse’s reins, I reeled through the narrow opening into the park, stumbled, and fell almost fainting into the tall grass. There was a loud bang; I couldn’t have said whether it was the pistol being fired or the gate closing behind me. Then at last everything went black before my eyes. I smelled fallen leaves and felt my horse licking my face.

I was safe. For the time being, anyway.

XOIMLQI

A little later, although still out of breath, I had calmed down enough to hurry after the baffled gatekeeper toward the castle. In the moonlight, with its shimmering white statues and latticework ornamentation, it looked to me like an elf-king’s palace. Two peacocks made of valuable Sèvres porcelain stood to the right and left of the entrance. They announced, as I knew from earlier visits, that the king was in residence.

As I strode toward the building, past the flowering gardens on the terrace and the sparkling fountain in its basin, old Johann from Berchtesgaden, one of the simple old-style Bavarian servants whom Ludwig liked to have around him, came to meet me.

“Why, Herr Marot!” he cried in surprise. “God in heaven, what happened to you?”

“Never mind that now,” I panted. “I must speak to the king at once! It’s a matter of life and death.”

Johann nodded obediently and pointed to the hill behind us. “His Majesty is in the Grotto of Venus. May I take you there?”

I shook my head. “No, thank you, I can get there by myself.”

Making my way along dark paths under canopies of foliage over the terraces behind the castle, I finally reached the music pavilion. From here it was not far to the Grotto of Venus, Ludwig’s favorite spot.

In the darkness that was at its deepest now, just before morning twilight, I could see a narrow strip of light not far away. When I approached, I saw rocks piled on top of one another, and a stone door standing slightly ajar, like the entrance to a magical cavern. Only when I knocked on it cautiously did I realize that it was only a thin layer of cement. Blue light shone through the gap, and I heard the gentle lapping of waves breaking on a shallow bank.

Hesitantly, I opened the imitation rock door and stepped into the grotto.

The magnificent sight of it made me forget my fears for a moment. It was as if I had entered a world so far from all the noise, stink, and busy activity of our modern times that I felt safe, as if held in the earth mother’s lap. After going down a long, narrow passage lined with rocky niches, I finally came to an artificial cave bathed in blue light. Stalactites and plaster garlands of brightly colored flowers hung from the ceiling, and I heard the sound of a waterfall to the right. A small, sparkling lake lay in the middle of the grotto, and two swans with their heads raised swam past me. Farther on, a gilded boat shaped like a huge seashell rocked on the shining surface of the water.

The king was sitting in the boat, with his eyes closed.

I had been here once before with Ludwig, a favor that he bestowed on only a few of his subjects. All the same, a shiver ran down my spine when I saw him there. I was reminded of Emperor Barbarossa, asleep in the Kyffhäuser mountain until the day when danger would threaten the German Empire. But now danger threatened the king himself, and it was for me to warn him.

I cleared my throat tactfully, and Ludwig opened his eyes. A slight smile spread over his face.

“Ah, Theodor,” he said, indicating for me to join him in the boat. “Did Munich upset your digestion so much that you hope to be cured in Linderhof? I’m glad to see you here. You bring light into my dismal thoughts.”