The Vienna Melody (9 page)

Gasping, he stood still. The hatred which broke from him was so savage that Henriette gazed at him speechless. Was this the same man who was capable of such gentle and enthralling charm?

Had anyone told her he had lost his reason she would have been prepared to believe it. The twitching around his mouth was incessant now; he could barely hold a cigarette.

She was so frightened she did not dare to move. Reared, like all the Viennese of her generation, in unreserved respect for Francis Joseph, his words were blackest treason to her.

Having calmed himself slightly, he exclaimed: “Forgive me! But sometimes it carries me away.” He threw himself into the chair at his desk.

“I fear you are really ill,” was all she could say.

He smiled sarcastically. “Alas, not ill enough, my dear! With their united forces they have made me ill
—viribus unitis
—according to the exalted motto of our house! But, as bad luck will have it, I'm still well enough to realize what is meant by it. On the twenty-first of August I shall be thirty-one. Do you think I've ever, even once in my life, been allowed to discuss politics with my father? Do you think he has ever so much as asked me, ‘What are your plans?' Never! He asks me, ‘How is your good wife; does she still play Chopin so charmingly?' and sometimes for months on end he does not ask me anything at all. To him I am, at thirty, a very young, untalented boy, with liberal leanings at that, who must be kept in check. That I'm the Crown Prince does not enter his consciousness. That I could do better than he—incomparably better—would never occur to him and his Taaffes and Kalnokys. The idea that he is dooming us all with his dynastic policies is as unknown to him as a person who might tell him the truth!”

“Don't say any more!” she implored.

“Must you go?” His tone was hostile now. Again he searched through his papers.

“Soon.”

“Soon. I see. Tell me—when was that thing about you published in the papers? Four weeks ago, wasn't it?” Now he found what he had been looking for. It was a copy of the semi-official
Fremdenblatt
for May 2, in which the engagement of Miss Henriette Stein was announced in the Personal Notices.

“Four weeks ago,” he went on as he reached for another paper, “or, to be more precise, on the second of May, I sent a communication to Rome. You're in a hurry, I know, but I think this will interest you. I asked the Holy Father to annul my marriage. Here is a copy of the letter carried personally to Rome by my friend Pepi Hoyos. If you have the time may I read it to you?”

He held the sheet of paper with trembling fingers and, without waiting for her reply, read:

“To use the time-worn word ‘unhappy' to describe my marriage would be senseless. From the hour of its inception up to this very day it has been a sequence of incessant torment. I have no intention of blaming anyone, least of all my wife, to whom they bound me for what are known as reasons of State in the case of heirs to the throne.

“Procurement is punished only in the case of bourgeois people,” he said scornfully as he looked up from the letter.

“If there have been cases in which the differences between two individuals joined together by force have not led to catastrophic results, [he continued] mine is not one of them. My wife, affianced when was fifteen because of her Catholic faith and the fact that she was a member of the Belgian royal family, has nothing in common with me. Our one daughter is devoted to me but not to her mother. Loth as I am to state this, it is nevertheless the truth that we are to such a degree intolerable to one another that our being together is absurd and undignified. Neither time nor circumstances can effect any change in this.”

He interrupted himself: “Are you listening?”

“Yes,” she said. Absurd. That our being together is absurd.

He went on:

“Any who possesses, as does Your Holiness, an insight into human relations deeper than that of ordinary mortals will not find this question too bold: What is it that can prevent a man from abandoning his innate and inalienable claim to happiness and human dignity? His duty? I have no faith in any such duty, whether it falls on sovereigns citizens, for I believe no good can be based on any duty which creates good. But if such a duty is laid on crowned heads, then I hereby submit to Your Holiness my solemn declaration that I am prepared to renounce unconditionally my right to the succession to the throne of Austro-Hungarian monarchy and to disappear in the masses as a private citizen if this will enable me to find the path to the freedom of my own personal life. I lay my fate in your hands. It is that of a man who has been taught to believe that he was born with greater rights than most men and who has learned that he must live with fewer than any. Your Holiness can see into my heart, and you will not refuse me your support, on which everything depends. If anyone can have influence over my father's inflexible will it is Your Holiness. As a faithful son of the Church he will accept your decision with submission.”

He threw the paper down.

“His decision! Do you know what he did? He sent the original of my letter on to my father and recommended him to return to my ‘peace of soul.' It happened today. At one o'clock my sent down for me; my great-uncle Albrecht was upstairs. Uncle Karl Ludwig, and Archbishop Rauscher. At the same time as peace was being returned to my soul my father's luncheon was served, for it was one o'clock, and at the stroke of one he eats his boiled beef. Five minutes later he was finished with his boiled beef and my existence. ‘You should be old enough to abandon such childish undertakings,' was the opinion he expressed in a tone only he can use—that frigid, distant, impersonal tone. That was all he had to say.” He kicked back the chair and jumped up. “Did you note the date of my letter?” he asked brusquely.

She did. The letter had been written on the day when her engagement was announced in the newspaper.

“And do you know now why I sent for you today as soon as my audience was over?”

With the last remnant of reason she could still command she struggled against the impelling connection. It was so terrifying to believe! So heavenly! Her thoughts swayed between horror, fear, sympathy, and a passion beyond her reach. She was so stirred that the overwhelmingness of it all paralysed her, and it almost seemed as if she took no part in it.

“Apparently it's not quite clear to you even yet?” he queried bitterly. “Then may I make it so clear that no shadow of doubt will remain?”

No! He must not say it!

“It was because of you that I wanted to get a divorce,” he said.

No!
she remonstrated in silence as he went on.
It was because you were unhappy with your wife! It was not on my account!

“It was for you that I was willing to renounce everything,” he said.

No!
she thought.
It was because you were not in accord with your father, because you couldn't wait for him to make way for you—or some other reason, but not on my account! I am only a simple bourgeois girl; isn't that what you have often called me? An Austrian Crown Prince does not give up a throne for a simple bourgeois girl! It is not true!
She struggled with all her might against such an incredible thought.

“I wanted to marry you,” he said.

She closed her eyes.

“Why did you never say this to me before?” she asked, opening her eyes again.

“Is that a reproach?”

If only he had told me that
, she thought,
I should never have become engaged. But he didn't tell me, because it wasn't true! Frantically she clung to that thought. He said good-bye to me because I would not be the sort of girl the Kasper girl was. That was the truth!

“Perhaps I didn't say it,” he admitted, “but you must have known it!”

God was her witness, she had not known it. It was only a flirtation, a heavenly flirtation, yes, and she had never been so unhappy as she was when it ended. But it had never been anything more, so how could he say such a fantastic thing?

“Why have you never made a sign since then?” she asked.

“Because I could come to you only with a torn-up marriage certificate,” he retorted almost scornfully, and his excitement, which seemed to have abated for a few moments, again carried him away.

“You were not willing to become my mistress—that I understood. And I respected it.”

“By falling in love with that little Vetsera!” she threw back in self-defense.

“The little Vetsera! Yes!” he admitted almost with a scream. It was obvious that he was again on the verge of losing all control over himself.

“If you fell in love with Mary Vetsera immediately after me it couldn't have been such a great love!”

“But you too fell in love. Even became engaged.”

Where did the discrepancy lie? She felt a rift in the overwhelming arguments he was forcing on her.

“So you do love her?” she said, asking the only logical question that came to her mind.

“Are you changing places with my wife? No—if you must know! I don't love her! Shall I call in as witness Miguel Braganza, whom I have often tried to persuade to marry that girl? Do put an end to these disgusting questions! Mary is a little love-crazy youngster! No one takes her seriously!”

“Is that what you said about me when anyone inquired?”

He took both her hands. “Don't pretend to be worse than you are! Look at me!”

But she had been looking at him all the time and had seen something she had never seen before. It was not pleasant, yet it helped her. “Tell me,” she begged, “have you asked Mary the same thing you have asked me today?”

“Present arms!” came the rolling command from the palace courtyard. He had gone over to the window and saw his father drive out of the gate. In the open coach with black-and-yellow wheels Francis Joseph sat on the right side, and on the left, Count Paar, his adjutant-general. The rumble of the military drums, the hoofbeats on the pavement, the cheers of passersby all died away.

“There he goes!” said his son. “Off to inspect something or other. Or to open an exhibition. The sacred routine as ever! At one o'clock boiled beef; at seven Miss Schratt. That he did away my existence at one o'clock has vanished from his mind!”

Then, turning back to her with an expression of glowering bitterness, he answered her question:

“Did I ask Mary? No. I asked you. Because you know—or at least I thought you knew—what goes on inside a human being! If I've made a mistake it won't be the first. But you may be sure at least that I'm convinced it's my last! Now you must probably be going?”

The shadow on the sundial fell across ten minutes before four.

“Rudolf,” she begged, “give me your hand.”

Without moving he looked at her. Then he nodded vehemently, biting his lips, and said, “Adieu.”

All expression left his face: the bitterness, hate, scorn, disappointment. He looked once more as he had in those days when he had been her joy, except that he seemed far, far away and dreadfully lonely.

She was so unspeakably sorry for him that she could not say what she would have liked to. All she could say was, “You will let me know when you need me?”

He made an abrupt gesture. “You're an angel!” he answered, deeply moved. “Thank you.”

The high-ceilinged room was no longer so large. The gold in it no longer shone.

“Mouche!” she heard him whisper.

It was so long since he had called her Mouche! “Adieu,” she said quickly. Then she left.

Once more she went down the ‘back stairs,' once more through the little iron doorway out on to the Albrecht terrace; yet it seemed to her that between her arrival and departure not an hour had elapsed, but years. Everything looked different.

It was past four when she met Franz, who was walking up and down impatiently in front of the Chamber of Commerce. It had been an endless session, he told her, and the only ray of comfort was the clock in the assembly hall, which showed how long it was until four o'clock. At first everything had dragged unbearably, and then, thank goodness, the time began to pass more quickly. Why so silent today? The time, too, until the fourth story will be ready will pass; it will be still three months, or at the most four. Three or four months can seem short when one knows what is coming afterwards, can't they?

If one isn't alone—it is easier. What comes first—and what comes afterwards—if anything comes—

“You're not even listening! What are you thinking about?”

“Nothing. Forgive me.”

 

The four children sat at the ‘kittens' table.' It was laid with damask, silver, and crystal, and decorated with mimosa and violets every bit as handsomely as the banquet table of the grown-up guests; even inscribed cards were laid at each place. On one long side were Christine and Peter, and on the two short sides (to put at least a table's length between them) were Fritz and Otto. On the second long side sat Mademoiselle Leblanc. Both the table for the grown-ups and the ‘kittens' table' stood in the large dining room on the second floor, at last pressed into service again and earning its title of ‘party room,' which the children had never been able to understand. All the maids in the house were present; they wore with gloves and special white caps. Great-aunt Sophie's old Poldi kept wiping her eyes, although her mistress had been dead at least two months. And there were three real waiters in tails who looked exactly as they did in restaurants. In the small dining room there were four more men in tails who provided music.

The dishes just passed to the children consisted of venison trimmed with orange slices, on each of which was a pile of berry conserve; with this were served potato croquettes and a sweet red sauce, which was so thick that one's knife stuck in it. Yet the French governess, who was not really concerned with anything except Cousin Peter, insisted that one must not eat it with a knife. She was the only fly in the ointment for the twins.