by Eric Flint
The disappearances made the papers in Magdeburg and Frankfurt am Main two days after that—with the stories datelined Nürnberg. The publisher gleefully informed the public that the court in Vienna had attempted to suppress one entire issue of the Vienna newspaper, but that the "entirety" had not been fully successful. The edition had been reprinted in Prague and smuggled into Austria in large quantities.
* * * *
Grantville, State of Thuringia-Franconia
Ed Piazza inspected the collection of newspapers in front of him with some bemusement. The news articles, per se, weren't that bad. The reporters didn't know much, so kept them short and stuck to what they did know. The Case of the Disappearing Archduchess got the most play, with Mary and Veronica a close second. The English Ladies were barely on the horizon. The paper from Frankfurt am Main gave their departure from their house in Munich a two inch notice at the bottom of a column on page three.
The editorials were another matter. Speculation, on a level that amounted to fantasy, was running rampant, especially in France and Venice. Ed's personal favorite was the one which stated that the archduchess, forbidden from following a true religious vocation by the depraved political ambitions of her father, had been saved by the personal intervention of the Virgin Mary, who had transported her to a cloistered convent on the borders of Transylvania, where her diligent prayers would henceforth prove to be a bulwark of Christian civilization against the marauding Turk.
Not bad. Maybe a bit hard to reconcile with the more succinct version which asserted that the archduchess had secretly converted to Calvinism and was known to be making her way to Geneva, but not bad.
A batch of them were sentimental—the archduchess had eloped with, take your pick, a valiant Austrian revolutionary, a member of the lesser nobility who was not of equal birth, or a former tutor. Alternatively, one could have a bit of gruesome. This writer considered it likely that the archduchess had been murdered by Duke Albrecht and Duchess Mechthilde in order to prevent a marriage that would bar their sons from the Bavarian succession.
Ed folded up the pile, wrote "archives" on a piece of paper he put on top of it, and tied the bundle with red tape. Historical documentation. Not of what had happened, but good primary evidence for what people were guessing.
* * * *
USE army camp, outside Luebeck
"I don't believe this shit," grumbled Eric Krenz. Sourly, he studied the battery wagon he'd be riding from the army camp outside Luebeck on the Baltic all the way down to Bavaria. More precisely, one of whose horses he'd be riding, since there was no way a man could ride on the limber for that great a distance. Leaving aside the fact that doing so was against army regulations, he'd probably have a broken back by the time he got there. An injured back, for sure. The suspension on the limber's axle, such as it was, had been designed for metal, not flesh and bones.
Eric didn't like horses much, and he hated riding them.
"Oh, stop grousing," said his commanding officer, Lieutenant Thorsten Engler. "Look on the bright side. Once we get into the Thueringerwald, and from there south except parts of Franconia, the roads are so lousy that you'll probably have to walk most of the time anyway."
Krenz wasn't mollified. He gave the officer's insignia on Engler's uniform a look that was every bit as sour as the one he'd given the battery wagon.
"I can remember you being a friendly and sympathetic fellow, back when you were a mere sergeant."
Thorsten snorted. "Not on this subject. Your memory's rotten. I never had any sympathy for your idiot refusal to learn to ride a horse properly. I warned you back in training camp that you'd come to regret it."
Krenz didn't argue the point, since....
Well, it was the plain and the simple truth.
Instead, he shifted his grousing elsewhere. "And that's not all that's rotten about the situation," he whined. "We're supposed to be heroes. Basking in the glory of our triumph at Ahrensbök. Since when does 'basking' last only a few weeks?"
Grinning, one of the other members of the flying artillery battery gave the inevitable reply. That was Olav Gjervan, one of the gunners. "It's called 'the army,' Eric. Not 'the fairy tale.'"
"I still say it's lousy," insisted Krenz. "Unfair. Unjust. Let one of the green regiments go down there to Bavaria."
"Which syllable in 'the ar-my' don't you understand?" demanded Engler.
"See!" Krenz pointed an accusing finger at the silver bar on Engler's shoulder. The army of the United States of Europe had wound up adopting the rank insignia used by the now-dissolved army of the New United States—now also dissolved, into the State of Thuringia-Franconia—which, in turn, had been taken from the army of a United States of America located in a different universe.
"Back when he just had chevrons like the rest of us grunts"—that word was English, one of many American loan terms adopted by the new Amideutsch dialect that was becoming the common language of the USE—"he wasn't that sarcastic."
"Like the lieutenant says," jeered Olav, "you're memory's rotten. Thorsten never suffered fools gladly."
Engler was looking sour himself, now. "The promotion wasn't my idea, anyway, Eric. As you damn well know. They forced it on me."
Krenz usual good humor returned. "Well, sure. Who can blame them? What could be more silly than 'Sergeant the Count of Narnia?"
Everybody laughed at that. Even Thorsten.
Chapter 46
Servus Mori
Dr. Donnersberger was the first member of the privy council executed. He was not the last. Abegg was gone, too. Both chanceries were in chaos.
Duke Maximilian concluded that those most responsible for the debacle were the members of the privy council who had at first been inclined to oppose his remarriage, but had subsequently changed their minds. They were guilty of not having provided a counterpoise to those who directly urged him to remarry. They were guilty of not having made him listen to the words of his own vow.
The formal charge was misprision of treason.
Their estates, of course, escheated to the duchy, after payment of court costs.
Dr. Richel had performed some rather deft footwork to bring the duke to this point of view. He was now generally regarded as the most influential among the lay councillors, second only to Father Forer. The duke was known to be listening to the Spanish ambassador, as well.
In the week that led up to Dr. Donnersberger's execution, quite a few of the lower nobility who held seats on the privy council sent their families out of Munich, to their country estates. Followed, as quickly as they could make arrangements, by themselves.
Duke Maximilian told the colonel of the garrison and the captain of the guards not to worry about it. They could take care of the problem later, at leisure. There were more immediate and important tasks.
* * * *
It was clear, Duke Maximilian concluded, that Ferdinand II, from the beginning, had intended to make a fool of him. He ordered the members of the archduchess' household who had remained in Munich interned; questioned; then ordered them executed.
With due attention to protocol, of course. Countess Polyxena and the other three ladies-in-waiting who had remained behind were beheaded; the remainder, Frau Stecher among them, hanged in the Schrannenplatz. The seamstress had protested to the last that she had been a faithful informant to the inquisition and had no part in the departure of the archduchess. This was manifestly contradicted by the note from Countess Polyxena that Dekan Golla's associate had found. The countess had first denied writing it, as was to be expected, but had later admitted it under torture.
Their heads were sent to join those of the privy councillors, lining the outer walls of Munich, above the gates.
* * * *
Vienna, Austria
"Mama," Cecelia Renata asked anxiously. "What are we going to do. Papa is practically apoplectic."
Empress Eleonora looked at her stepdaughter wearily. "I know. I have used every soothing and cooling potion that I know, but they are not d
oing him any good. Not even the poultices. I have had snow and ice brought down from the mountains, but even so, it is clear that every day his humors are a little more choleric."
Mariana leaned over and kissed her cheek, giving her a comforting hug.
"I can't nurse him. But I can, and have, written to my Ferdinand. Telling him that he needs to come home from the Hungarian border now. Whether Papa and the privy council authorize him to or not."
She leaned back on the bench in the empress' private garden. "If only it weren't so hot."
* * * *
"Maximilian has done this, you are telling me, in spite of Our official assurances, sent to him in the diplomatic pouch, that these members of the archduchess' household were personally loyal to Us?"
"Yes, Your Majesty."
"They were personally loyal to Us, weren't they?"
Father Lamormaini looked very unhappy. "Most of them, certainly. With the exception of a few, such as Countess Polyxena. I don't believe she was disloyal, as such, if only for the reason that no sane person would have attempted to use her as an agent or informant. Though we could not avoid including her among the appointments, given how essential her husband is to the proper operation of the imperial treasury."
Cardinal Dietrichstein nodded. "She was completely useless—not a thought in her head beyond clothes and getting a high-status position at court. Little idiot. Pretty, though."
"Is it true that We do not have any information at all in regard to the archduchess and the remainder of her household?"
The emperor had ceased to refer to Maria Anna as his daughter.
"Yes. Freiherrin Lukretia, who left Munich a couple of days before the disappearance to return to Vienna for her expected confinement, has taken refuge with the Count of Ortenburg. She is afraid to proceed on to Passau, for fear of being arrested by Maximilian's agents, which is not unreasonable, under the circumstances. Ortenburg sent a courier to Archduke Leopold Wilhelm. According to the Freiherrin, all the other members of the household were going about their usual tasks at the time she left."
"Is that all she knows?"
"It is all the information that was in the letter that the courier brought."
"Is there ambivalence in your sentence?"
"Freiherrin Lukretia is far from being a pretty little idiot. It may well have occurred to her that as long as she stays in Ortenburg, Maximilian cannot question her—but, then, neither can we."
* * * *
Munich, Bavaria
Carafa prudently withdrew from Munich to Passau. From there, he went to Vienna. As Richel noted, it still had not been explained just how the nuncio had happened to leave his mule so conveniently tethered that it had been readily available for use in Doña Mencia de Mendoza's escape from the archduchess' apartments.
The Spanish ambassador did not miss the opportunity to point out to Duke Maximilian that the withdrawal of the nuncio necessarily gave rise to a suspicion that Urban VIII might have been in league with the Austrians. Ungrateful wretch that he was, not to appreciate all that the duke had done for the papacy and for the cause of the church.
The duke was inclined to listen to this theory, especially in view of the pope's recent appointment of a cardinal-protector for the heretical United States of Europe. One of the up-timers, no less.
* * * *
A cardinal-protector from Grantville. Which is where the two damnable women with whom Mechthilde of Leuchtenberg had saddled him came from. He needed to look into that more deeply. It would have been easier if Landgrave Wilhelm Georg had not finally died the week before.
It was entirely proper that Albrecht and Mechthilde, with their sons and much of their household, had left Munich to attend his funeral and arrange for the transportation of his body to Pfreimd, where it would be interred in the family crypt. It would be a normal courtesy for Gustav Adolf's regent to permit the transport of the coffin through the Upper Palatinate to reach it.
It was not entirely appropriate that they had left Munich for Johann Franz Hörwarth von Hohenberg's estate near Planegg a week ago and had not yet returned. Hörwarth, the son of Dr. Donnersberger's predecessor as the Bavarian supreme court chancellor, had been, for some time now, the landgrave's rather unwilling host.
The Leuchtenberger, no matter what Mechtilde said, were the ones who had saddled him with the Grantville women. Possibly witch women. Certainly servants of the Swede.
Maximilian ordered the extension of questioning to those of his brother's servants who remained in Munich. Not, at first, strict questioning.
* * * *
Even without strict questioning, one of the maids provided very troubling testimony. She stated that beginning the day of the archduchess' disappearance, she had been instructed to deliver food, clean towels, soap, and various other amenities to the unused rooms which had served as nurseries for Duke Albrecht's sons. This had continued until the day that the household left Munich, when she was told that they would no longer be needed.
"Surely," Dr. Richel said, "they cannot have been keeping the archduchess imprisoned."
The question returned to Duke Maximilian's mind. "Who would benefit most?"
He ordered one of the guards to bring the maid back. Under a repetition of questioning, still without torture, the maid stated that she had never seen the woman who was apparently staying in the rooms. Whenever she brought supplies, except for the first day, she had left them in the outer nursery. The woman must have been in the small room once used by the wet nurses.
"You are sure that it was a woman?" Father Forer asked.
"Yes, sir." She provided some explanation of the different types of supplies and food that gentlemen and ladies often used. At request, she made a list of everything she had delivered. And everything that she had removed.
"In the brushes, were there curly, black, hairs?"
"No sir. The only hairs that I saw were straight; some were black, others gray. Very long, even for a woman."
"Gray." Richel was thumbing through the list. "What are 'wraps'?"
"Strips of cloth, sir," the maid answered.
"Strips of cloth?"
The court physician leaned forward. "They are often used by people who have injuries or pain in their joints. Bad ankles. Bad knees. They provide some support. In the case of rheumatism or arthritis, they can reduce the swelling somewhat."
"Good God," Richel exclaimed. "Doña Mencia."
"But she was seen to escape," Father Forer exclaimed.
"An old woman dressed in black was seen to escape. No one has heard of her since." The Capuchin frowned.
"But what connection would there have been between Duke Albrecht and Doña Mencia?" Richel meant it as a hypothetical question.
Dekan Golla answered. "The English Ladies. Who stand in the shadow of the inquisition. Duchess Mechthilde was serving as their patron; the archduchess Maria Anna offered to become their patron. There must have been a taint of heresy in both households. And in Vienna, as well; it is widely known that Ferdinand II supports them."
Dr. Richel opened his mouth, then closed it again. This was not a suitable occasion to mention that Duke Maximilian himself and the late Duchess Elisabeth Renata had also supported them. Times had changed.
"Not to mention," the Dominican said, "that many of the families of Munich's patriciate—a class of which Dr. Donnersberger was a member—sent their daughters to the school that the English Ladies conducted. It may be desirable to widen the scope of your investigation."
The Capuchin suggested, on the basis of information received from the man who delivered produce to the English Ladies, that it might be prudent to question their cook.
* * * *
The guard stood quietly behind the maid, listening to the entire conversation. They had forgotten to order him to take her from the room.
He completed his shift on duty and said to his sergeant that he thought he would drop by St. Peter's for vespers. It was something that he did regularly.
The serge
ant waved him away.
He went to St. Peter's for vespers; then, on his way back to the barracks, stopped at his mother's house. Where he gave his brother a note and urged him to take it to Duke Albrecht in the country right away.
* * * *
The English Ladies' cook could not be found. Neighbors stated that she and her family had not been seen for a week. The inquisition noted that as a suspicious circumstance.
Many of the families who had sent their daughters to the English Ladies' school could be found. They were questioned, as were their daughters.
They confirmed the reports of the inquisition's agents. Both Doña Mencia de Mendoza and Duchess Mechthilde had been visitors at the house of the English Ladies with some frequency. Upon several occasions, their visits had overlapped.
The inquisition began an extensive investigation of suspicion of heresy within many of the city's most influential families. It was expected to take some time. The affected families were placed under house arrest. This did not prevent four of them from admitting their guilt by fleeing from the city.
* * * *
Duke Maximilian signed the charges against his brother and Mechthilde. Conspiracy to commit treason. That would suffice for the time being. Dekan Golla was preparing charges that would provide a basis for an investigation in regard to heresy and witchcraft.
He dispatched four full companies of troops to Freiherr Hörwarth's residence near Planegg. That should be more than adequate; he was informed that they had taken only the usual complement of household guards when they left Munich.
Their first task was to secure the boys and bring them back to Munich. Bavaria still needed heirs; he had no others.
Chapter 47
Ad Extrema Descendere
Planegg, Bavaria
Duke Albrecht gave the guard's brother a reward. A substantial one.
Then he took the information to Mechthilde, whose first thought was that Maximilian would try to take her sons.
Albrecht started to protest; then agreed.
