The Radetzky March (6 page)

A Viennese military band, an infantry company, a representative of the Knights of the Order of Maria Theresa, a few officers of the south Hungarian regiment whose modest hero the major had been, all military invalids capable of marching, two officials of the Royal and Cabinet Chancellery, an officer of the Military Cabinet, and a junior officer carrying the Order of Maria Theresa on a black-draped cushion: they formed the official cortège. Franz, the son, walked, black, thin, and alone. The band played the same march they had played at the grandfather’s funeral. The salvos fired this time were louder and faded out with longer echoes.

The son did not weep. No one wept for the deceased. Everyone remained dry and solemn. No one spoke at the grave. Near the constable sergeant lay Major Baron von Trotta und Sipolje, the Knight of Truth. They set up a plain military headstone on which, beneath name, rank, and regiment, the proud epithet was engraved in thin black letters:
THE HERO OF SOLFERINO
.

Now little was left of the dead man but this stone, a faded glory, and the portrait. That is how a farmer walks across the soil in spring—and later, in summer, the traces of his steps are obscured by the billowing richness of the wheat he once sowed. That same week, the Imperial and Royal High Commissioner Trotta von Sipolje received a letter of condolence from His Majesty, which spoke twice about the forever “unforgotten services” rendered by the late deceased.

N
OWHERE IN THE
entire jurisdiction of the division was there a finer military band than that of Infantry Regiment No. Ten in the small district town of W in Moravia. The bandmaster was one of those Austrian military musicians who, thanks to an exact memory and an ever-alert need for new variations on old melodies, were able to compose a new march every month. All the marches resembled one another like soldiers. Most of them began with a roll of drums, contained a tattoo accelerated by the march rhythm and a shattering smile of the lovely cymbals, and ended with the rumbling thunder of the kettledrum, the brief and jolly storm of military music. What distinguished Kapellmeister Nechwal from his colleagues was not so much his extraordinarily prolific tenacity in composing as his rousing and cheerful severity in drilling the music. Other bandmasters had the negligent habit of letting a drum major conduct the first march, only picking up the baton for the second item on the program, but Nechwal viewed that slovenly practice as a clear symptom of the decline of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. By the time the band had stationed itself in the prescribed round and the dainty little feet of the frail music desks had dug into the black soil of the cracks between the wide paving stones on the square, the bandmaster was already standing at the center of his musicians, discreetly holding up his ebony baton with the silver pommel.

Every one of these outdoor concerts—they took place under the Herr District Captain’s balcony—began with “The Radetzky March.” Though all the band members were so thoroughly familiar with it that they could have played it without a conductor, in the dead of night, and in their sleep, the kapellmeister
nevertheless required them to read every single note from the sheets. And every Sunday, as if rehearsing “The Radetzky March” for the first time with his musicians, he would raise his head, his baton, and his eyes in military and musical zeal and concentrate all four on any segments that seemed needful of his orders in the round at whose midpoint he was standing. The rugged drums rolled, the sweet flutes piped, and the lovely cymbals shattered. The faces of all the spectators lit up with pleasant and pensive smiles, and the blood tingled in their legs. Though standing, they thought they were already marching. The younger girls held their breath and opened their lips. The more mature men hung their heads and recalled their maneuvers. The elderly ladies sat in the neighboring park, their small gray heads trembling. And it was summer.

Yes, it was summer. The old chestnut trees opposite the district captain’s house moved their dark-green crowns with rich, broad foliage only mornings and evenings. During the day they remained motionless, exhaling a pungent breath and sending their wide cool shadows all the way to the middle of the road. The sky was a steady blue. Invisible larks warbled incessantly over the silent town. Sometimes a fiacre rolled across the bumpy cobblestones, transporting a stranger from the railroad station to the hotel. Sometimes the hooves of the two horses taking Lord von Winternigg for a ride clopped along the broad road from north to south, from the landowner’s castle to his immense hunting preserve. Small, ancient, and pitiful, a little yellow oldster with a tiny wizened face in a huge yellow blanket, Lord von Winternigg sat in his barouche. He drove through the brimming summer like a wretched bit of winter. On high, soundless, resilient rubber wheels whose delicate brown spokes mirrored the sunshine, he rolled straight from his bed to his rural wealth. The big dark woods and the blond green gamekeepers were already waiting for him. The townsfolk greeted him. He did not respond. Unmoved, he drove through a sea of greetings. His dark coachman loomed steeply aloft, his top hat almost grazing the boughs of the chestnut trees, the supple whip caressing the brown backs of the horses, and at very definite, regular intervals the coachman’s firm-set mouth emitted a
snappy clicking, louder than the clopping of the hooves and similar to a melodious rifle shot.

Summer vacation began around this time. Carl Joseph von Trotta, the fifteen-year-old son of the district captain, a pupil at the Cavalry Military School in Hranice, Moravia, regarded his native town as a summery place; it was as much the summer’s home as his own. Christmas and Easter he spent at his uncle’s. He came home only during summer holidays. He always arrived on a Sunday. This accorded with the wishes of his father, Herr District Captain Franz, Baron von Trotta und Sipolje. At home, summer vacation, no matter when it commenced at school, had to begin on a Saturday. On Sundays, Herr von Trotta was off duty. He reserved the entire morning, from nine to twelve, for his son. Punctually at ten minutes to nine, a quarter hour after early mass, the boy stood in his Sunday uniform outside his father’s door. At five minutes to nine, Jacques, in his gray butler’s livery, came down the stairs and said, “Young master, your Herr Papá is coming.” Carl Joseph gave his coat a last tug, adjusted the waist belt, took off the cap, and, as prescribed by regulations, propped it against his hip.

The father arrived; the son clicked his heels; the noise snapped through the hushed old house. The old man opened the door and with a slight wave of his hand motioned for his son to precede him. The boy stood still; he did not respond to the invitation. So the father stepped through the door. Carl Joseph followed but paused on the threshold. “Make yourself comfortable!” said the district captain after a while. It was only now that Carl Joseph walked over to the large red–plush armchair and sat down opposite his father, his knees drawn up stiffly and the cap and white gloves upon them. Through the narrow cracks of the green Venetian blinds, narrow stripes of sunshine fell upon the dark-red carpet. A fly buzzed, the wall clock began to strike. After the nine golden strokes faded, the district captain began.

“How is Herr Colonel Marek?”

“Thank you, Papá, he’s fine.”

“Still weak in geometry?”

“Thank you, Papá, a little better.”

“Read any books?”

“Yessir, Papá!”

“How’s your horsemanship? Last year, it wasn’t special.”

“This year—” Carl Joseph began, but was promptly interrupted. His father had stretched out his narrow hand, which lay half hidden in the round shiny cuff. The huge square cufflink glittered golden.

“It wasn’t special, I just said. It was—“here the district captain paused and then said in a toneless voice, “a disgrace.”

Father and son remained silent. As soft as the word “disgrace” had been, it was still wafting through the room. Carl Joseph knew that a pause had to be observed after a severe critique from his father. The censure had to be absorbed in its full significance, pondered, stamped upon the mind, and imprinted on the heart and the brain. The clock ticked, the fly buzzed.

“This year it was a lot better,” Carl Joseph began in a clear voice. “The sergeant often said so himself. I also received praise from Herr First Lieutenant Koppel.”

“Glad to hear it,” the Herr District Captain remarked in a doomsday voice. Using the edge of the table, he pushed the cuff back into the sleeve; there was a harsh rattle. “Keep talking!” he said, lighting a cigarette. It was the signal for the start of relaxation. Carl Joseph put his cap and his gloves on a small desk, got to his feet, and began reciting all the events of the last year. The old man nodded. Suddenly he said, “You’re a big boy, my son. Your voice is changing. Are you in love yet?”

Carl Joseph turned red. His face burned like a red lantern, but he held it bravely toward his father.

“So, not yet!” said the district captain. “Don’t let me disturb you. Carry on!”

Carl Joseph gulped, the redness faded, he was suddenly freezing. He reported slowly and with many pauses. Then he produced the reading list from his pocket and handed it to his father.

“Quite an impressive list!” said the district captain. “Please give me a plot summary of
Zriny
.”

Carl Joseph outlined the drama act by act. Then he sat down, weary, pale, with a dry tongue.

He stole a glance at the clock, it was only ten–thirty. The examination would drag on for another hour and a half. It might
occur to the old man to test him in ancient history or German mythology. The father walked through the room, smoking, his left hand behind his back. The cuff rattled on his right hand. The sunny stripes kept growing stronger and stronger on the carpet; they kept edging closer and closer to the window. The sun must be high by now. The church bells started clanging; they tolled all the way into the room as if swinging just beyond the thick blinds. Today the old man tested him only in literature. He articulated his detailed opinion of Grillparzer’s significance and recommended Adalbert Stifter and Ferdinand von Saar as “light vacation reading” for his son. Then the father jumped back to military topics: guard duty, Military Regulations
Part Two
, makeup of an army corps, wartime strength of the various regiments. All at once he asked, “What is subordination?”

“Subordination is the duty of unconditional obedience,” Carl Joseph declaimed, “which every inferior and every lower rank—”

“Stop!” the father broke in, correcting him. “
As well as
every lower rank.” And Carl Joseph went on.

“—is obligated to show a superior when—”

“As soon as,” the old man rectified. “As soon as the latter takes command.”

Carl Joseph heaved a sigh of relief. The clock struck twelve.

Only now did his vacation begin. Another quarter hour, and he heard the first rattling drumroll from the band leaving the barracks. Every Sunday at noontime it played outside the official residence of the district captain, who, in this little town, represented no lesser personage than His Majesty the Emperor. Carl Joseph, concealed behind the dense foliage of the vines on the balcony, received the playing of the military band as a tribute. He felt slightly related to the Hapsburgs, whose might his father represented and defended here and for whom he himself would some day go off to war and death. He knew the names of all the members of the Imperial Royal House. He loved them all sincerely, with a child’s devoted heart—more than anyone else the Kaiser, who was kind and great, sublime and just, infinitely remote and very close, and particularly fond of the officers in the army. It would be best to die for him amid military music, easiest
with “The Radetzky March.” The swift bullets whistled in cadence around Carl Joseph’s ears, his naked saber flashed, and, his heart and head brimming with the lovely briskness of the march, he sank into the drumming intoxication of the music, and his blood oozed out in a thin dark-red trickle upon the glistening gold of the trumpets, the deep black of the drums, and the victorious silver of the cymbals.

Jacques stood behind him and cleared his throat. So lunch was starting. Whenever the music paused, a soft clattering of dishes could be heard from the dining room. It lay three large rooms away from the balcony, at the exact midpoint of the second floor. During the meal, the music resounded, far but clear. Unfortunately, the band did not play every day. It was good and useful; it entwined the solemn ceremony of the luncheon, mild and conciliatory, allowing none of the terse, harsh, embarrassing conversations that the father so often loved to start. One could remain silent, listening and enjoying. The plates had narrow, fading, blue-and-gold stripes. Carl Joseph loved them. He often recalled them throughout the year. They and “The Radetzky March” and the wall portrait of his deceased mother (whom the boy no longer remembered) and the heavy silver ladle and the fish tureen and the scalloped fruit knives and the tiny demitasses and the wee frail spoons as thin as thin silver coins: all these things together meant summer, freedom, home.

He handed Jacques his cape, belt, cap, and gloves and went to the dining room. The old man walked in at the same time, smiling at the son. Fräulein Hirschwitz, the housekeeper, came a bit later in her Sunday gray silk, with her head aloft, her heavy bun at her nape, a huge curved brooch across her bosom like some kind of scimitar. She looked armed and armor-plated. Carl Joseph breathed a kiss on her long hard hand. Jacques pulled out the chairs. The district captain gave the signal for sitting. Jacques vanished and reappeared after a time with white gloves, which seemed to alter him thoroughly. They shed a snowy glow upon his already white face, his already white whiskers, his already white hair. But after all, their brightness also surpassed just about anything that could be called bright in this world. With these gloves he held a dark tray. Upon it lay the steaming soup tureen.
Soon he had placed it at the center of the table, gingerly, soundlessly, and very quickly. Following an old custom, Fräulein Hirschwitz ladled out the soup. She offered the plates, and the diners approached them with hospitably stretching arms and grateful smiles in their eyes. She smiled back. A warm golden shimmer hovered in the plates; it was the soup, noodle soup: transparent, with thin, tender, entwined, golden-yellow noodles. Herr von Trotta und Sipolje ate very swiftly, sometimes fiercely. He virtually destroyed one course after another with a noiseless, aristocratic, and rapid malice; he was wiping them out. Fráulein Hirschwitz took small portions at the table, but after a meal she re-ate the entire sequence of food in her room. Carl Joseph fearfully and hastily swallowed hot spoonfuls and huge mouthfuls. In this way, they all finished in tandem. No word was spoken when Herr von Trotta und Sipolje held his tongue.