Around the World With Auntie Mame

by Dennis, Patrick

  “Gao naow, quickleh,” Vera said, “Ay heah the othahs coming. Ay shall give yew may ahn-sah tomoddaow!”

  “That’s right,” I bellowed, “get the hell off the back fence and give human beings a chance to sleep! And you on your honeymoon, Vera Charles!” With that I banged the French door shut so hard that one of the panes shattered. “My God,” I said aloud, “the whole world’s gone crazy.” Only later did I realize that Vera was repeating word for word the big love scene from one of her greatest Broadway hits, The Heart of Lalage de Trop .

  After a night of horrible dreams, I was awakened by the sound of something scraping on the floor of my room. I looked up just in time to see a note being slid under my door. Snatching it up, I opened it and read it. There, in Hannes’s carefully drawn Germanic script, was an invitation, of sorts. It read:

  Will you join my brother Maximilian and me on a walk in the mountains? We would be happy to show you the old Schloss Stinkenbach. We can be ready to go when it is convenient for you.

  Faithfully,

  Johannes von Hodenlohern

  Next to attending my own wake, I couldn’t think of many things I’d rather do less, but as dreary as Maxl and Hannes were, at least they weren’t actively in the pay of the Nazis. I opened the door and stepped out into the cold corridor just in time to see Hannes starting down the stairs. “Fine,” I said. “Just swell. I’d love to come with you, just as soon as I get dressed.”

  “Fifteen minutes, then?” Hannes said with one of his rare smiles.

  “Fifteen minutes.”

  THE THREE OF US MADE ANODD PICTURE AS WE SET off. Hannes, all boots, Lederhosen, muscles, and sun tan, looked like a Jugend illustration for the Hitler youth movement. Even Maxl was dressed for the rugged life, his big rear end bifurcated by too-tight leather shorts. He also carried a great long rope, a revolver, and a first-aid kit. “Are we planning to scale Mount Everest or just take a hike in the hills?” I asked. I was less and less enthusiastic about this trip, but it did offer certain advantages in that I could get away from Auntie Mame and her Nazi boy friend long enough to make a few simple plans.

  As we set off, I heard Auntie Mame calling, “Patrick! Patrick! Where are you going?”

  I turned around. She was up on the battlement, leaning over the parapet. “Out,” I said coldly.

  “No, darling. No! We’re going on a picnic—Basil and Vera and Putzi and Friedl. I-I’ll need you to round out the party.”

  “Maybe you can get the Görings to join you—a charming couple. Where are you going, Berchtesgaden?” Maybe I shouldn’t have said that, I thought, because Hannes and Maxl exchanged the fisheye with one another.

  “Patrick. Wait! I forbid you to . . .”

  I turned around and thumbed my nose at her. “Come on,” I said.

  THE OLD, ORIGINAL, RUINEDSCHLOSS STINKENBACH didn’t look terribly much higher up than the fourteenth-century version, but it was quite a hike and almost all of it straight up. It was some climb, and more than once I was grateful for Maxl’s length of rope. Maxl was puffing like a grampus after the first hour, I was parched and winded, and even Hannes, our Strength through Joy boy, was panting a bit.

  “Let’s rest here, shall we?” Hannes said. Again he favored me with a frosty smile and tossed down his rucksack. “You are thirsty?” he asked, taking out two tall thin bottles of wine.

  “A little,” I said.

  “Here.” Hannes poured a tremendous amount into a cup and passed it to me. It looked like quite a lot of wine for so early in the day—especially since they had urged me not to wait for breakfast.

  “Isn’t—isn’t there any water?” I said.

  “Ah, water. Oh, yes, but not until we get up to the old fortress. Drink this now. We are nearly there.”

  I gulped the wine down, and before I could say no, Hannes had filled the cup again.

  “D-don’t you two want any?”

  “Oh, no,” Hannes said, thumping his chest. “I’ll wait until we get to the water. Too much wine is bad for the body. Just look at my brother Maxl.” Maxl was, indeed, a sight, lying there in the shade of some trees and panting like an old mastiff.

  I finished the second cup of wine and wisely refused a third, although I was still very thirsty.

  “Now come look at the view,” Hannes said. “Over here.”

  I was a little weary of looking at views, which seemed to be the sole occupation of Stinkenbach, but I trudged dutifully after Hannes as he strolled athletically to the very lip of an abyss. “See,” he said genially, “all Austria at our feet.” He put his arm around my shoulder affectionately. I rather wished he hadn’t. From time to time Hannes made me think of those rare types who are never happier than when chinning themselves and being manly—except when, behind locked doors, they find solace in a blonde wig and Mother’s old evening wrap. Besides, there was a sheer drop of several hundred feet right at the tips of our shoes.

  “Look,” Hannes said, squeezing my shoulder slightly, “directly below you can see the Schloss and all the people there—like little insects.” I looked down dizzily. What he said was true. There, indeed, was Schloss Stinkenbach, sprawling out in all directions. I could see Poldi putting out a wash behind the castle. Auntie Mame’s Rolls and Basil’s two-seater were standing in the driveway. I could also see fields and outbuildings I had never known existed. “Look,” I said, pointing to two brightly colored specks, “there’s Auntie Mame and there’s Vera—Mrs. Fitz-Hugh, I mean—but what are they doing over there in that field so far from the . . .” I said no more. Hannes’s grip on me tightened and I felt something cold and metallic at the back of my neck. It was sleepy old Maxl with his revolver.

  “Now my fine young socialist friend,” Hannes said, “prepare yourself for an accident while climbing in the mountains of your aunt’s estate. The rope, Maxl. Der Strick.”

  “Hey,” I said, “what do you think you’re . . .”

  “I think I am binding you with this rope,” Hannes said. “We shall wait until they leave for their picnic. Then will be the time for your fatal fall. The poor American drank too much wine, and . . .”

  Realizing that I was dealing with a pair of lunatics, I tried to be reasonable. “But, Hannes, if they find me all tied up they’ll know it wasn’t an accident.”

  “You will be untied—at the bottom. When you are discovered you will look entirely naturalistic. Maxl . . .” Hannes began saying something in rapid, colloquial German as I felt the rope tightening around me. No need to struggle, however. One false step and I’d have been over the edge and dead—quite naturalistically enough.

  “Hannes! Maxl! This is . . .” I said no more. A wide strip of adhesive tape from the first-aid kit was slapped over my mouth. Hannes and Maxl worked with calm efficiency, laughing and joking in German. For such feckless slobs, they were pretty good operators. I was bound and gagged to a fare-thee-well before I even had much time to consider that this was The Bitter End.

  When I was nicely trussed up, Hannes smiled at me and said, “Ah, look down below. See. The cars are leaving.” Then he slapped me calmly back and forth across the face. “This is for good-by. Maxl . . .” Just then there was an explosion that rocked the whole mountain. I mean the impact of it knocked all three of us down. Lying there with my head hanging over the edge of the cliff, I could see smoke and flames belching from one of the outbuildings down at Schloss Stinkenbach. There was another explosion that shook the whole mountainside, and yet another building on the estate went up.

  “Gott!” Hannes screamed. “Der Zeughaus! ”

  Together the two Von Hodenlohern brothers started running down the hill, leaving me there halfway over the edge of the precipice. I struggled, but rather gingerly—considering my delicate position. The second explosion was followed by a third and then a fourth. Then I felt a hand on me, tugging me backward. I flipped over and looked up into the red-brown face of Captain Basil Fitz-Hugh. Well, I thought, it doesn’t really matter who finishes me off—one Nazi is just as g
ood as another.

  “Patrick,” Basil said, ripping the adhesive tape off my mouth. “We’ve been so worried.”

  “You’ve been worried? What about me?”

  “Oh, no harm could have come to you,” he said cutting the ropes. “I’ve been following you as close as seemed provident. And of course I was armed.”

  “Well, why didn’t you shoot? I didn’t feel so provident at the edge of that cliff.”

  “Don’t stop to ask a lot of questions now, old boy. We haven’t a moment to spare.” He started at a dogtrot down the mountainside with me close behind—mystified, but happy to be still alive. Naturally we kept gathering momentum, so that scarcely ten minutes later we were down on the road leading out of Stinkenbach-im-Tirol. Auntie Mame’s Rolls was pulled up at the side, waiting for us. Behind, I saw Basil’s little sports car with Ito at the wheel. Beside him sat Friedl, huddled in Vera’s lynx cape. She looked scared stiff, but at least she looked warm.

  “Patrick, darling,” Auntie Mame cried, bursting out of her car. She gathered me in her arms and held me. She was trembling terribly and her cheeks were streaked with tears. Then Vera, not to be upstaged, threw herself from the car and into Basil’s arms, smothering him in marten furs, anointing him with smudgy mascara tears. “Basil! Oh Basil! My hero! I’m so glad you’re safe. I aged a hundred years while you were up that mountain. Tell me, my darling, what did they . . .”

  “Not now,” Auntie Mame said, trying to light a cigarette. Her hands were trembling too violently. “Let’s get out of this horrid place. We’ve no idea how many . . .”

  “Right you are,” Basil said. He got in behind the wheel and I, knowing the highways and byways of Stinkenbach, got in beside him. He threw the car into gear and we were off, with Ito following.

  Except for having two eyes and two arms, the Hon. Basil looked just like Lord Nelson at the helm of the Rolls as we sped toward Salzburg. Totally mystified by everything that had happened that day, I prodded him for an explanation. “Well, you see, Patrick, your dear Aunt Mame discovered yesterday that Baron Von Hodenlohern—Putzi, that is—was a Nazi when she and Vera were looking out at the valley throught the field glasses.”

  “Well, I could have told her that, only she wouldn’t listen.”

  “It was perhaps better for her to discover it for herself. And discover it she did when quite by chance she happened to see Putzi and his young brother Johannes out on a field drilling all the men and boys of the village. It was quite a shocker, according to Vera. The goose step, the Nazi salute—all that sort of rot. Well, needless to say, that was more than enough for your aunt. And you can just imagine how frightened she was for you when you said all of those unfortunate—but perfectly true—things at dinner last night.”

  “I guess I did shoot off my mouth a bit.”

  “And Mame had every reason in the world to be concerned. I discovered that for myself when I happened to be passing the Herrenzimmer and overheard Putzi instructing his brothers to do away with you on the mountain. If it hadn’t been for those tiresome German lessons from that beastly old Fräulein of mine, I shouldn’t have had the faintest idea what they were talking about. In fact, I couldn’t believe my ears at the time.”

  “Well, you might have warned me.”

  “Patrick, Mame did. But you wouldn’t listen to her. Instead, you went right along with Hannes and Maxl. However, that’s not all the story by half. It seems that Friedl told your Auntie Mame everything last night and even showed her some of the things that are in the locked rooms of Schloss Stinkenbach. Guns. Dynamite. Cases and cases of munitions. And, for a house that doesn’t even have electricity, one of the most elaborate radio stations I’ve ever seen. Those Jerries are damned clever at that sort of thing. You’ve got to hand it to them. Well, as I say, Friedl made everything pretty clear to Mame. She even told her about the ammunition in all the outbuildings. Well, you can jolly well see that Mame was beside herself with worry by then. It was a sticky situation and one that called for decisive action.”

  “Yes indeedy,” I said, shuddering at the thought of what had almost happened to me.

  “So when you set out innocently with those bounders this morning, I followed. Luckily, I know a bit about mountaineering—the World War, you know.”

  “But all those explosions?”

  “Ah yes, jolly good show, what? Mame and Vera saw to that. They simply went round to the various arsenals with a tin of lighter fluid and started fires. It is Mame’s property, after all.”

  “Gee, Basil, you must have been some army man to have thought of all that.”

  “Good God no, dear boy. It was Mame’s idea. It seems that her husband’s great-grandfather, General Lafayette Pulaski Pickett, created the same diversionary action at Second Manassas by blowing up an arsenal there. At least that’s what Mame said. No indeed, she conceived the entire plan. Greatest military strategist since Joan of Arc.”

  “But did Putzi just stand by and . . .”

  “Good God! Putzi! I’d forgotten all about him.”

  “Where is he?”

  “In the boot.”

  “In the what?”

  “The luggage compartment—whatever you Americans call it.” He stopped the car and we all got out.

  “Oh, Patrick, my little love,” Auntie Mame said, wrapping her arms around me. “If anything had happened to you I’d have killed myself. You were so right about Stinkenbach— tatty, sinister little jerkwater town—and I was such a fool; it was almost too late.”

  “Mame,” Basil said, “we’ve got to get rid of your Austrian baron.”

  “Oh, heavens, yes!”

  “What’s Putzi doing back there, Auntie Mame?” I asked.

  “Well, Patrick, I hated to do it, but he simply would not leave Vera and me alone long enough to get our work done this morning. So I knocked him out.”

  “Knocked him out?”

  “Yes, darling, with that ugly cloisonné vase in the salon. He was on his knees proposing to me and the opportunity seemed just too good to pass by. Then Vera and Friedl helped me carry him down and lock him up. I couldn’t think of any place else to put him.”

  Basil opened the luggage compartment, and Putzi, incoherent with rage, unfolded himself and scrambled out. “Mame! If you think this is some sort of amusing joke . . .”

  “Joke, Baron von Hodenlohern? I was never more serious in my life, you despicable little traitor!”

  Putzi looked up toward Schloss Stinkenbach, his face contorted in horror. Great black clouds of smoke drifted up from the hardly visible roofs of the outbuildings. Then there was a horrible thundering roar and we saw the roof fly off the castle itself. Putzi sprang toward Auntie Mame with the speed of a panther. But I was even faster. I put out my foot and he fell with a splat into the road. “I’ll have you in jail,” he shrieked at Auntie Mame. “You’ve set fire to our house.”

  “Your house?” Auntie Mame said. “I have the bill of sale right here. And by the way, my answer to your proposal of this morning is no.”

  “But our munitions, our guns, our . . .”

  “You sold it to me lock, stock, and barrel, Baron von Hodenlohern. I assume that the arsenal and the short-wave radio were included. Anyhow, I should think that your government might take a rather dim view of you and your subversive activities. Now get out of my sight!”

  “Just wait,” Putzi snarled. “You’re the rich American who thinks she can buy a castle and burn it down. Money to burn, eh? But when we take over . . .”

  “It isn’t costing me a penny, Putzi. This fire’s on the Allegemeine Bodenkredit Versicherungs and Handelsgeselschaft.”

  “What in the name of God is that, Mame?” Vera said.

  “The Allegemeine Bodenkredit Versicherungs und Handelsgeselschaft? Why as any child could tell you, it’s the biggest Nazi insurance company in Germany. I wanted to insure the place with Lloyds, but Putzi insisted on this firm. I mailed the premium yesterday. Now, Putzi, there’s no need for you to tarry here a
ny longer. Have a nice walk back to Stinkenbach.”

  “Oh, and would you mind taking a message to your brother Maxl?” Vera said. “Just tell him that he’ll no longer be bothered with having a wife. I’m taking Friedl to England with us. And tell him that I won’t be able to become his mistress. My grandfather, who is a rabbi in Schenectady, wouldn’t like it a bit.”

  WE STOOD THERE IN THE ROADFORJUST A SECOND, Auntie Mame’s arm around my shoulders, watching Schloss Stinkenbach go up in smoke.

  Auntie Mame and Mother Russia

  “SO AFTER THE TWO OF YOU YODELLED AROUND THE Tyrol, where did she take you?” Pegeen asked.

  “To Russia.”

  “To Russia? How could you?”

  “Very simply in those days. Before the war, tourists were more than welcome.”

  “I’ll bet she wasn’t.”

  “On the contrary, my aunt caused a minor sensation in the Soviet.”

  “I can believe that, but why would she want to go to a place like Russia anyhow?”

  “Auntie Mame was a keen student of political science, always interested in learning more. Her Russian, um sojourn was, by and large, an experiment.”

  “What sort of an experiment?”

  “An experiment in living.”

  ARE YOU COMFORTABLE, dushka?” Auntie Mame asked gaily. “That’s Russian for darling, darling."

  “As comfortable as can be expected,” I said balefully surveying the plush and mahogany interior of our compartment aboard the Krasnaye Strela, or the Red Arrow Express, as it made its lumbering, jerking, halting, screeching way across the dismal Russian countryside.

  “Ah, my little love, let those scoffers on Wall Street say what they will about the Socialist Republic, but we have nothing like the October Line in America.”

  “Nothing except, maybe, the Long Island Railroad,” I said. The October Line was really the old Nicholas Line that ran, or limped, from Leningrad to Moscow on the most casual of schedules. The cars were European Wagons-Lits, antedating 1917. The trip took several days. The toilet didn’t work and there was no dining car, although the train stopped every fifteen minutes or so for people to bring on tea and black bread. However, Auntie Mame was In a New Phase and would hear nothing against Russia.