Thunder At Twilight: Vienna 1913/1914

by Frederic Morton

  One of them was Nedeljko Cabrinovic, formerly a student, currently an employee of the Belgrade State Printing Office. In the last week of March, Cabrinovic received a letter from Bosnia with no message inside the envelope-only a newspa per clipping. He met Princip for lunch to show it to him. It had been cut out of a Sarajevo daily and contained the news that the Archduke Franz Ferdinand would be visiting that city in the course of the June maneuvers.

  Gavrilo Princip read the story. He said nothing, for a while. Then he asked Cabrinovic to meet him at the Golden Sturgeon again, in the evening. Cabrinovic did. Again they shared a rusty table. Princip ordered mint tea, which he sipped wordlessly, shifting slowly in his chair. After a few minutes he motioned Cabrinovic to walk with him into the adjacent park. He led his friend to a remote bench in the dark. They sat down. Princip spoke at last. Softly he asked his friend whether he would help him kill the Crown Prince of Austria. Silence. Cabrinovic nodded. Silence. In Princip's blue eyes gleamed the light of a distant lantern. "I will find the weapons," Princip said. Silence. They shook hands. Together they walked back to the Golden Sturgeon Cafe.

  This happened on March 27, 1914. Earlier on the same day, some three hundred miles west of that Belgrade park, the Crown Prince of Austria had a difficult encounter.

  The setting seemed pleasant enough: a fine spring morning on the wave-slapped jetty of Miramare, a romantic seaside castle just outside Trieste. Franz Ferdinand was watching the giant snow-white German yacht Hohenzollern steam toward him across the bay. It flew the Kaiser's personal ensign with the motto "Gott mit uns!" A flotilla of German cruisers foamed the waters in its wake. As the Hohenzollern came closer, Wilhelm II became discernible, grasping the rail valorously at the prow. "My God," the Archduke burst out at his adjutant. "He's got that damned carving knife on! I forgot mine!"

  The "carving knife" was a naval dagger with an anchorshaped hilt that Wilhelm had invented as an accessory to his All-Highest naval uniform; he had gifted Franz Ferdinand with a copy. "Fetch it for me!" Franz Ferdinand said to his adjutant. "He'll expect me to wear it! Get that blasted thingright now!"

  The Archduke often let his ill temper fly but hardly ever at the expense of Wilhelm II. If he did now, it was because too many vexations beset him in March of 1914. Some were old and familiar: those little, jeweled, poisoned arrows shot at him by the Vienna court. The very ground on which he stood that moment, the Castle Miramare, had been used against him. As a personal possession of Franz Joseph, Miramare lay under the jurisdiction of Prince Montenuovo, First Lord Chamberlain of the Emperor and foremost enemy of the Crown Prince. Montenuovo could not forbid Franz Ferdinand to use the castle for a spring sojourn or for a setting in which to entertain the German monarch. The Crown Prince's wife, on the other hand, was not the Crown Princess, nor were the couple's children archdukes. According to Montenuovo's malevolently stringent interpretation of Habsburg house rules, Franz Ferdinand's morganatic loved ones did not have the right of residence in one of the dynasty's own manors. After all, their Highnesses were not Imperial but only Serene.

  Naturally the First Lord Chamberlain's spite always came sugared in courtier phrasing. His letter to the Crown Prince had expressed "regret to be unable to make Miramare arrangements for their Serene Highnesses without an express All-Highest command which the undersigned [Montenuovo] devoutly hopes your Imperial and Royal Highness [Franz Ferdinand] will obtain."

  In other words Franz Ferdinand must do once more what he had been forced to do on previous occasions: go to the hum bling length of appealing personally to his All-Highest Uncle Franz Joseph. Only then could his Sophie, his daughter, and his two sons sleep under the same roof with him in Miramare.

  Still, Miramare was a fitting mise-en-scene in which to welcome the most grandiose of all Prussians during this stopover on his Adriatic cruise. The Hohenzollern had docked. A 21-gun salute boomed from the Austrian dreadnought Viribus Unitis. Wilhelm strutted down his gangplank, a naval peacock in white and gold. Braids, froggings, epaulettes, medals, and "carving knife" invoked every variety of overgorgeousness.

  And yet: The same witnesses reporting Franz Ferdinand's earlier frown also speak of the cordiality that marked this dockside meeting just as it did most other encounters of the two men. Franz Ferdinand often referred to Wilhelm as "Europas grosster Mordskerl" (Europe's No. 1 devil of a fellow). Never mind lapses of taste or questions of judgment-the sheer spectacle of the German's bravado impressed the Archduke, a bravado unchecked by any authority above the Kaiser's head or by an astute brain inside it. Franz Ferdinand's mind was saddled with both. He was wary of Wilhelm's sovereign excesses. He also envied and admired them.

  At any rate it was politic to greet fulsomely this fulsome personage. Franz Ferdinand, being chronically embroiled with the Vienna court, needed support from the Berlin Emperor who was Vienna's preeminent ally. And that morning, in the brilliant sunshine on the jetty (with Franz Ferdinand's "carving knife" fetched just in time), there was something else to be gained from the German: The stature of the Archduke's wife benefited from Wilhelm's vanity. The Kaiser fancied himself as graceful a hand-kisser as any Austrian. He loved to prove it on Austrian territory. As he lowered his All-Highest mustache over Sophie's less-than-archducal fingers, she partook of Imperial cachet: Another skirmish had been won against the Montenuovo camarilla.

  But at Miramare loomed other issues of greater relevance to the world at large. The Crown Prince broached them at lunch in the castle's marble dining hall. He was, he confided to Wilhelm, unhappy about all that mbret ado in Albania. His own choice for the Albanian throne, the Duke Wilhelm von Urach, a much more capable candidate, had been turned down by Vienna. This weak, silly mbret worried the Crown Prince because of Serbian repercussions. If the Austrian-backed ruler tottered, the Serbs would try to grab more Albanian territory, even to the point of a confrontation with Austria. And, Ferdinand added, it wasn't just the Albanian situation, it was also the Hungarian attitude that made the Serbs pugnacious. The Hungarians provoked not just Belgrade Serbs but Serbs inside the Austro-Hungarian province of Bosnia; there a Magyar civil administration imposed Hungarian as a teaching language on many schools with a majority of Serbo-Croat students; in other ways, too, the Hungarian hand lay heavy on the land. And to be frank, the Archduke said, taking a deep breath, it was right here that the Kaiser could be of vital help. After all, Wilhelm wielded great influence with Count Stephan Tisza, the Hungarian Prime Minister. Any move to make the Hungarians see a tiny bit of reason would be of tremendous value. Would His Majesty be kind enough to take it under consideration?

  By then guest and host had reached post-prandial liqueurs. The Kaiser savored his brandy. Well, yes, to be sure, he said, those Hungarians could be rascals. And Tisza, whom he had received in audience while coming through Vienna the other day, indeed Tisza was a rascal, too, but an absolutely first class rascal, clever and fast as you had to be in your dealings with all those Balkan bandits, Bulgaria, Serbia, and what not; yes, Tisza was really a true statesman worthy of Franz Ferdinand's trust-in fact, come to think of it, at the German fall maneuvers to which Franz Ferdinand must come as his, the Kaiser's guest, maybe Tisza should be invited, too; the King of Italy had just accepted-what a jolly foursome! It would iron out all sorts of differences. Also show how Germany, AustriaHungary and Italy stood together-England and France better not plan any stupidities against the Central powers. A fall maneuvers foursome-capital idea! Meanwhile, how about enjoying cigars out on the terrace?

  On the terrace the two princes lit Cubans and reclined in wicker chairs. They blew smoke rings across the blue-gold Adriatic. The Kaiser had chosen to bypass Franz Ferdinand's request for help against the Hungarians. Franz Ferdinand was not in a position to press his case. His august caller disliked arguments that clouded good scenery or spoiled the pleasures of tobacco. It would not do to risk a crucial friendship.

  Cigars finished, the Crown Prince accompanied the Kaiser on an inspection tour of an Austrian battleship. Tim
e for the Hohenzollern to steam on to Corfu. Wilhelm kissed Sophie's hand good-bye. Austrian cannon boomed their salute while Wilhelm was piped aboard his yacht. Then Franz Ferdinand could rid himself of his German Grand Admiral's uniform. He could toss away the "carving knife." He could not shed his frustration.

  In Vienna's Hofburg a few days later Franz Ferdinand briefed his monarch on what he called, unsmiling, "an interesting meeting, more fruitful on some difficulties than on others, such as the awful Hungarian problem." Franz Joseph's answer was a cough. He had a cold. He did not ask for amplifications. He did not consider Hungary a more awful problem now than it had been for, say, the last forty years. His nephew was always throwing at him "problems," "difficulties," "awfulnesses." It was one thing for Franz Ferdinand to keep preaching peace with Serbia. That was serviceable. It offset the war cries of General Conrad. But must he preach peace so turbulently? Problematizing Hungary? Exaggerating Serb complications? Discomfiting Franz Joseph's old age? His nephew always rushed at him with one direness or another, no matter how kind Franz Joseph tried to be. Right now he had been kind again: Despite Montenuovo's advice, he had invited the Crown Prince's morganatic family to stay at the Imperial Palace.

  They did not stay there long. At first they planned to remain until the opening of the racing season on Easter Sunday. But within forty-eight hours the Crown Prince had had enough of Vienna; enough of the impassivity of its Emperor; enough of the myopia of its government; enough of the snideness of its court. He summoned his Lord Chamberlain who in turn mobilized his footmen and chauffeurs. Then the Crown Princely caravan of automobiles roared off to Konopiste. They left behind nothing but a dark fierce cloud of dust.

  15

  Vienna's first turf gala of 1914 proceeded without the heir Apparent glooming in the Imperial Box at Freudenau. That in itself added to the verve of the occasion. What's more, the weather smiled. April 12 turned out to be an idyllic Easter Sunday. Not one cloud flawed a sky that was only a nuance paler than the dominant fashion color that spring: Capri blue. The Princess Montenuovo, wife of His Majesty's First Lord Chamberlain, displayed the hue delightfully in her ensemble: a blue gown trimmed with white moire and tango-yellow ribbons, topped by a collar of snowy lace. Many thought it brave of her to subject her generous figure to the narrow cut mandated by Paris.

  Of course the younger, slimmer crowd could better accom modate French couture. But quite a few of them were missing from the aristocrats' boxes or the haut bourgeois grandstands. They'd been seduced by another attraction of newer vogue. At Aspern Airfield an "Aeronautical Parade" had drawn so many of the jeunesse doree that their Rolls-Royces, Austro- Daimlers, Graf & Stifts, and Mercedes-Benzes overflowed the parking space. They all watched the heavens that had become a stage. A fighter plane of the Imperial and Royal Air Force looped the loop, a double-decker towed a flock of gliders, a giant eight-passenger "bus-plane" disgorged parachutists whose green-and-scarlet umbrellas floated down the sunshine.

  The same Easter Sunday in Vienna also featured a third spectacle. It was a dual demonstration on the Ringstrasse against two kinds of unemployment. Some six thousand workers who had recently lost their jobs were marching with placards demanding work. Another crowd protested the dissolution of Parliament. Bickering between German and Czech deputies had slowed down legislative business. This had given Count Karl von StUrgkh, Prime Minister of the Austrian half the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the excuse to invoke the notorious Paragraph Fourteen of the realm's constitution. It allowed him to declare the parliamentarians unable to exercise their function and to suspend the Vienna (as distinct from the Budapest) parliament. Until new elections would be calledin the indefinite future-the Sturgkh administration would be answerable only to the Emperor.

  Paragraph Fourteen had been invoked before. It had caused ructions before that had been shrugged off before, but never with the concision of the remark reportedly made on Easter Sunday at the Freudenau track. It was attributed to the Prime Minister himself and might be just flippant enough to be his. Count von Sturgkh had to watch the early races alone in his box; when the friend he had invited finally appeared, he blamed the lateness on a traffic back-up caused by demonstrators on the Ring. "I suppose," the Prime Minister was much quoted as saying, "I gave them spring fever."

  Once Minister of Education, Count von Sturgkh had started his career as an academic, a frequent resort for impoverished nobility. He was rather pedantic by nature and perhaps for that reason often forced the sort of humor that would make him competitive with the cynical wit of his colleague, Count von Berchtold.

  On that Easter Sunday at the track, Berchtold was spooning coffee ice cream a few boxes away in the Jockey Club enclosure. As we know, Count von Swrgkh was Prime Minister only of Austria while Count von Berchtold's office of Foreign Minister encompassed all of Austria-Hungary, with interests far beyond the yawps of complainers on the Ringstrasse. Perhaps it was a sign of how uncouth the times had become that professional concerns should intrude on his Sunday leisure.

  Friends kept dropping by between races, always on some agreeable pretext. Ladies offered the Berchtolds chocolate truffles from silk-lined boxes; gentlemen kissed the Countess's hand and complimented her on the Capri blue feathers of her hat. And all along they touched on certain questions. The rumors, for example, about the Tsar's daughter being betrothed to the son of the Rumanian king. Would that align Rumania into Russia's pan-Slavic stance against Austria? And the stories about impending Russo-British naval exercises off German ports-was that to develop the encirclement of the Central Powers? And could one include in that category the 250 million francs France recently loaned Serbia for arma ments? And how serious was the Serb-fomented mutiny that had broken out against the mbret, Austria's friend on the Albanian throne? And was it true about a clash between Austrian and Italian advisers on the mbret's Inner Council? And speaking of Italy, in a confrontation between the Triple Entente (Russia, France, Britain) and the Triple Alliance (Austria, Germany, Italy), how reliable would Italy be?

  "And who," Count von Berchtold answered, "will win the Prezednit handicap this afternoon?"

  His friends laughed. His ice-cream-spooning sang-froid reassured them. The Foreign Minister leaned back in his box seat, in black top hat and gray topcoat, one slim knee crossed over another. A grandee with stables of his own, he knew how to document his racing judgment. Sacher (named after the torte) figured as winner of the handicap. The Foreign Minister, who always weighed the latest intelligence, had learned of a slight problem with the favorite's right foreleg. He bet on Radoteur.

  Radoteur came in first. The Foreign Minister ate a chocolate truffle.

  The next day, Monday, April 13, Count von Berchtold boarded his salon car in Panama hat and spats. He was off to a sub-tropical clime: Abbazia, the palm-dotted Habsburg resort on the Adriatic, not too far from Miramare where the Crown Prince had, unsuccessfuly, smoked a cigar with the Kaiser.

  In Abbazia the Foreign Minister would be holding a more felicitous meeting-a conference with his Italian counterpart. A few little points needed to be discussed. One of them concerned Albania: Italy wished to participate in the industrial progress of that brand-new country but found Vienna a shade insensitive to its economic interests there. For its part, Vienna felt occasionally baffled by exaggerations in the Italian press about the "oppression" of Italians in South Tyrol.

  Count von Berchtold did not entirely succeed in smiling away all differences between himself and his colleague, the Marchese Antonio de San Giuliano. But the Count, an impeccable host, did treat the Marchese to a dirigible lunch that offered poached salmon, cold champagne, and the view of a long stretch of Illyrian coastline from the gondola of a Zeppelin cruising fifteen hundred feet high. The Count also gave a great garden party in the Marchese's honor, at a seaside villa hung with Chinese lanterns and filled with the music of strolling violins. To top it all off, he motored with the Marchese to the Imperial and Royal stud farm at Lippiza where the famed white Lippizaner horses per
formed the subtle arts of dressage for his Italian Excellency. After five days of gastronomy, scenery, and politesse, the Austrian Foreign Ministry could announce with satisfaction that Italy remained as firm a member of the Triple Alliance as ever. Then Count von Berchtold returned to Vienna on April 19, in time for another Sunday demonstration on the Ring.

  But what country in Europe did not suffer such bouts of "spring fever"? Austria's potential adversaries were hardly immune. In Serbia, the opposition withdrew all its deputies from the Belgrade parliament, alleging unconstitutional practices by the government in budget matters. In Russia, four thousand workers walked out of the Treugolnik rubber factory in St. Petersburg. They were joined by thousands more at the Siemens electric plant. Comrades in industrial installations in Moscow and Riga followed suit until the strikers numbered nearly one hundred thousand. In France, the elections set for May produced daily clashes between supporters of President Raymond Poincare, who wanted to keep the three-year conscription period, and the followers of the Socialist leader Jean Jaures who insisted on reducing it. Even England was losing the last of its Victorian seemliness in 1914. In April dozens of special Save Ulster! trains rolled almost daily into London. They brought demonstrators who flooded through the streets with shouts of "Ulster will fight and Ulster will be right!" The Protestants' orange banners cursed the Catholic Irish for wanting to reduce Ireland to the Pope's footstool. In Dublin green cadres of the Feinians marched for self-government. By the Thames, Parliament shook with debates over the Home Rule Bill. The issue convulsed the British Isles.

  By comparison, the disturbances in Vienna seemed almost minor. Most played out on the Ringstrasse where the architecture absorbed much of what tumult there was into the histrionics of the facades.