Fear and His Servant Read online

  ‘Will it?’

  ‘And once the Turks were gone the Serbs were expecting the very best.’

  ‘And had their hopes dashed.’

  ‘Yes, but that’s not all, meaning the worst is yet to come …’ Again and again he paused.

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘The Austrians won’t be staying much longer in Serbia. Everyone knows the Turks will be back, and everyone’s expecting the worst.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘What’s it like in Hell?’ asked the regent, as if he had forgotten our conversation of only moments earlier.

  I was caught off guard, but maintained my composure and replied, ‘In Hell it is hot. Further south than south itself. The sun never sets. Everything is lit up, and anything that can burn, burns. The sky is yellow, and there is no shade, no shadows. The sheer light, which never goes out and never diminishes, makes it impossible to see.’

  ‘What kind of punishment is that if you can’t see anything?’ he asked, as if he had never asked before.

  ‘There is no need to see it. Just knowing is enough,’ I answered, playing along.

  ‘But there are any number of fools who only know what they see.’ I couldn’t believe my own ears.

  ‘True, Your Highness, and those fools are all in Hell.’

  ‘The Turks won’t make the same mistake they made fifty years ago,’ my servant cut in, ‘when they took revenge on the Serbs for what happened with Austria. And this time things won’t be anywhere near the worst. Do you understand?’

  ‘Not exactly.’

  ‘Expectations are too high. To the Serbs, the Austrians seemed like ferocious beasts. The Turks will seem like gentle lambs. That’s life for you: you expect the best of good people and are always disappointed; you expect the worst of bad people and always end up pleasantly surprised. It’s no wonder we’re always in such bad company. Goodness is hard to bear. It’s never quite good enough.’

  ‘Are you insinuating something, you impertinent menial?’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ put in Württemberg. ‘How it can be cold and the sun never shines and also hot and the sun never stops shining. And how can there be no fools in Hell and Hell be full of fools? Which is the truth?’

  ‘Both,’ I answered.

  Before us rose the gate that guarded the way into the German part of the city. Just as we were about to cross Prince Eugene’s line, I noticed that the man in crimson was gone.

  FIVE

  The Fortress of Kalemegdan

  1

  I am Maria Augusta, Princess of Thurn and Taxis, wife to Prince Alexander of Württemberg, the former Regent of Serbia. I have three sons, all named Eugene after my husband’s protector, Prince Eugene of Savoy, and one daughter, Katarina. I came to Serbia, to Belgrade, in 1730, and I left at the beginning of 1737. All the children were born after my departure from Belgrade.

  The man you ask about was introduced to me in Belgrade in the autumn of 1736. He was said to have appeared a day earlier, but I saw him for the first time when Baron Schmidlin was taking him around the Kalemegdan Fortress in Belgrade.

  What did he look like? Ordinary, quite ordinary. Medium height, brown hair and eyes with no distinguishing features. No, he didn’t limp. He spoke flawless German, although one sensed it was not his native language, and Serbian and Hungarian besides, as I was told. I know he was reading some books in French and English. No, it didn’t strike me as suspicious – in fact, I thought at the time that it was a rare opportunity to meet an exceptionally well-educated man.

  You want me to tell you everything just as it happened? I am sorry, my hearing is not good.

  Not to leave out a single unimportant detail?

  You’ll decide what’s important and what isn’t?

  It was exceptionally sunny and warm for the lateness of the season, a real Indian summer. I had gone for a walk by myself. I was fond of walking alone around Kalemegdan. I passed through the King’s Gate and climbed to the promontory, to the left of the cistern, and stood looking out over the Sava and the Danube where they meet and at the land on the far side of the rivers. At the time I did not realize, although I know now, that this very spot offers the first and best view of Europe. Shall I explain? I say the first view because it’s where Europe begins, and the best view because you can only appreciate the meaning of Europe, its true vulnerability and its true might, by standing outside it, sometimes regretting that you cannot enter and sometimes glad you’re not inside it. You don’t follow my meaning? No matter.

  As I say, I stood there looking out over the Sava and the Danube. The rivers were different. The Sava was brown, and the Danube had more of a bluish colour. And I wondered whether the colour of rivers depended on their length, whether the water could only be purified by flowing long enough. Or does the clarity depend on the lands through which the river flows, the rocks and soil, and the people who enter its waters? Is purity the result of a long struggle, carving out a channel to flow in, twisting and turning all the while, or does it just come drifting along on the current, carefree and easy? Or does a river remain the same from its source all the way to the end, and nothing along the way can alter it?

  Unimportant details? Well, you’re the one who asked for the whole story.

  As I stood there thinking I was interrupted by Baron Schmidlin, who approached me with four other gentlemen. Three of them were members of the special vampire commission and the fourth was von Hausburg.

  Soon after the first three left with Schmidlin. But von Hausburg, or whatever his name is, stayed behind. He offered to accompany me on a stroll around Kalemegdan, and I agreed. We walked in the sunshine and made small talk. No, we didn’t discuss God. Although … I do remember something von Hausburg said later, on another occasion. He said, ‘There’s nothing to be said about God. He’s already said it all himself.’

  Is that important? Shall I continue?

  I asked him what he meant by that, and he answered, ‘He spoke the world into existence. Let there be light, let there be this, let there be that. He didn’t do anything else, just spoke. Doesn’t the world he’s made tell you quite enough about him and the language he speaks?’

  But that came later. That first time, on our walk around Kalemegdan, we didn’t talk about God.

  He was most courteous, more than was called for. Yes, it did occur to me that his intentions towards me … that his show of goodwill went further than it should have. At one moment he abruptly bowed and seized my hand. And smelled it. I didn’t pull my hand back because I didn’t think he would do any harm. I wasn’t frightened, merely surprised. I was about to ask him the meaning of his gesture, but he told me first.

  ‘There is no odour of brimstone about you.’

  I was at quite a loss, and he took advantage of the moment to bow once again, say goodbye and hurry off. That was the first time I thought the man’s mind might be disturbed.

  I bent down to pick up my fan, which I had dropped in surprise. For tunately, it wasn’t soiled. It was my favourite fan. Chinese. All across one side of it was painted the Great Wall. The artist had rendered it as massive, mighty, impregnable. Near the handle were muddy fields of rice, with peasants wading through the water and bowing before a motley procession. On the other side of the wall was a wonderful landscape of the most beautiful trees, flowers, birds and a crystal-clear river full of fish, flowing swiftly past evergreen forests and snow-capped mountains dotted with monasteries. The people were reading scrolls or conversing …

  What’s that you say?

  I’m not sticking to the point?

  Was I surprised at von Hausburg’s behaviour?

  No, I wasn’t surprised. Nothing surprises me any more. I grew up and ceased to be surprised. Growing up means understanding that things are not the way we were taught, that things are quite often just the opposite, that people go on living and bearing things that are considered unbearable, and God only knows the consequences. Why are we brought up that way? So that we’ll be better people
, striving to achieve the unachievable? Or will we become even worse one day, when we realize that we shall never attain the ideal, and we start hating those who taught us otherwise and those who still stand by their claims?

  But I must ask, dear cousin, why all these questions? And after so many years?

  2

  I never had any interest in the Fortress of Kalemegdan. And why should I? I was tired of sleepless nights, of the regent and his never-ending questions. The man in crimson was a worry. At least I’d laid the vampire business to rest. I wanted to get some sleep.

  The instant I’d dozed off Schmidlin woke me up and dragged me off on his tour. He talked and talked and never stopped talking. First the history of the fortress: the Roman legion of Flavius IV, driven out by the Huns, followed by the Byzantines, who were driven out by the Magyars, then the Serbs, who were driven out by the Turks. And what about us? Who was going to drive us out? I asked Schmidlin. He didn’t answer that one but rattled right along.

  ‘Did you know that Belgrade was a dowry? The Serbs didn’t conquer Belgrade, they received it as the dowry of the Hungarian princess who was given in marriage to King Dragutin.’

  Sometimes it pays to get married. That’s the only point in its favour.

  As for the two types of fortress that exist, and the fact that Belgrade used to belong to the first type, I confess my ignorance. According to Schmidlin, fortified cities (meaning all of them, so I’ll just say ‘cities’) can be divided into the categories of Christian and Crusader. How so? Christian cities have few protective walls and are surrounded by shallow defensive ditches, their bastions are unstrategically placed and their cannon are only good for short-range engagement, but their defenders are numerous, courageous and unbeatable. On the other hand, we have the Crusader type … And this is merely a way of referring to them, the baron warned, and should not be construed as denying the status of Christian to the Crusaders let alone implying that the Crusades themselves were not a Christian undertaking. To continue, the Crusader type of city was surrounded by the strongest, highest, thickest walls with the deepest moats and ditches and the most far-reaching artillery, all of which required great numbers of defenders – numbers that were simply not to be found in the Holy Land, which is why you could hear a pin drop in the streets. Well, Schmidlin didn’t put it quite that way, but the point was that Acre, Jaffa, Ascalon, Safed, Samaria and even Jerusalem itself had no one to defend them and that their very builders had relied more on stone and mortar than on the people within. And such mighty fortresses attracted the very worst mercenaries and cowards, men who trusted in architecture not in themselves. And, least of all, in the good God above (as he put it).

  In the time of Jan Hunyadi, Belgrade was as Christian as Christian can be, the baron informed us, while now – by God (as he said) – it was both Christian and Crusader.

  Then he stuck out his chest as far as his stomach would allow and said, ‘You must see the cistern. It’s a masterpiece of modern architecture. It took us twelve years to build. We completed it five years ago.’

  We passed through the King’s Gate and immediately to the right was the entrance to the cistern. Although the day was sunny and warm, the air inside was damp and stale. We walked down a wide tunnel that had water dripping from the ceiling. In the left-hand wall three semi-circular niches held burning torches. Only steps from the entrance, on the right, there was a small chamber. I looked inside. There were three fountains. I continued down the tunnel and came to a great chamber with a high domed ceiling. Every surface was wet. A dozen torches provided illumination. In the centre was an enormous hole, surrounded by a barrier. A short flight of steps led to a raised walkway that ran around the hole. The three men from the commission were already staring down into the great hole, and Schmidlin was telling them about the dimensions of the cistern. At the bottom of the hole would be water, I presumed, and I declined to climb up and look down.

  ‘If Belgrade should ever find itself under siege, this cistern will do away with any worries about water,’ Schmidlin said. Suddenly there was a strong gust of wind. Out went all the torches. We stood in utter darkness. I thought I would scream.

  Schmidlin spoke. ‘I’ll be right back.’

  He must have felt his way out through the dark. I heard some rustling. I was alone with the three fools. Fortunately I couldn’t see their wigs. But I still somehow felt it would be nice to hear their voices. And so I struck up a conversation.

  ‘Have you learned anything more about those captains?’

  ‘Oh, not a thing,’ said a voice I recognized as Radetzky’s. ‘But Baron Schmidlin has arranged for us to spend tomorrow night in Dedinaberg. But you must know this already.’

  Of course I didn’t know. And I didn’t care either. The vampires were nothing but a hoax perpetrated by two hajduks. But I had to stay in character, and so I said, ‘Yes, I know the place.’

  ‘You’ve already been to the watermill?’ As always, Radetzky was ready to spill the beans.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Did you see them?’

  ‘No.’ I didn’t want to stretch the lie that far. But then I had a wonderful idea. I felt like having a bit of fun with the Austrians. ‘Although some Serbs I spoke to last night did tell me that a vampire has been seen at the mill.’

  ‘I know. Baron Schmidlin has even told me his name,’ said Radetzky’s voice.

  ‘Whose name?’ I asked.

  ‘The vampire’s,’ said Radetzky in hushed awe.

  ‘And what is the vampire’s name?’

  3

  ‘Sava Savanović,’ came the answer, as if a great secret were being revealed. ‘Do you wish to accompany me to the mill?’ Radetzky added.

  ‘No,’ I hastened to answer. ‘I’m supposed to be keeping an eye on things. You understand.’

  Light shone out. It was Schmidlin with a torch. ‘I beg your pardon, gentle men, for the inconvenience. Please, follow me and we shall soon be out.’

  We stepped outside and the first thing I saw was her. The princess, bathed in the late-summer light. In Serbian they call it St Michael’s summer – a name I can’t stand, of course. Nor can I fathom that phrase, ‘bathed in light’. Next thing you know, they’ll have everyone ‘soaped up in sunshine’ or some such nonsense. But she looked even more sublime, even more soulful than on the previous evening when I had seen her by candlelight. Instantly I remembered the gruesome scar her husband sported on his face. No wonder her heart belonged to another. Which was bad news for me. I would have two rivals to contend with: one with a wedding ring and another without.

  ‘Aren’t you going to introduce us to the regent’s wife?’ I asked Schmidlin.

  ‘Oh … of course, Herr Graf.’

  Schmidlin brought us to Maria Augusta. She was facing the rivers and was looking out over the place where they met, or at the land on the other side.

  ‘Your … Your Highness,’ said Schmidlin awkwardly. When she turned around he was completely at a loss. ‘Allow me to introduce you … these gentlemen, the commissioners – I mean the count, the doctor – or rather, not the commission – do forgive me. These gentlemen arrived yesterday. I – they are … Count Radetzky of Vienna and Count von Hausburg and counts, erm, of science, whose names at the moment escape me …’

  Maria Augusta smiled pleasantly and said, in the world’s softest voice, ‘Baron, I beg you, no apologies. It is best to allow the gentlemen to introduce themselves.’

  ‘I am Klaus Radetzky, physician in the service of His Majesty Karl VI. And now you will excuse me. Matters of state await me.’

  It was quite rude of him. Not allowing his two associates to introduce themselves, Radetzky strode away, beckoning them to follow, and leaving me behind with Schmidlin and Maria Augusta. I was surprised. What could be the meaning of such disrespect towards the regent’s wife?

  As soon as they were gone, a servant appeared and spoke to Schmidlin, who made his clumsy apologies and left. At last I was alone with Maria Augusta. The pe
rfect opportunity to win her for myself. Or to throw her into confusion. Which amounts to the same thing.

  ‘Would you like me to keep you company on your stroll?’ I asked her.

  ‘Certainly, Herr Graf.’

  4

  However, the princess was not in a talkative mood. She walked alongside me, deep in her own thoughts, stooping a bit and seeming tired. I know that one of the best ways to get close to a woman is to come right out and ask her what’s wrong. None of them can resist a shoulder to cry on. And once they’ve had a good cry, they feel a bond with the shoulder’s owner. Besides, women like a bit of verbal derring-do. I think they even prefer big talk to big muscles. It stands to reason. Plunging headlong into the fray with a battle cry is the unmistakable mark of a fool, while a direct question always leaves room for doubt in the listener’s mind: is the man asking the question simple-minded, honourable, sincere, curious, cunning or simply lacking in good manners? And women adore a secret.

  ‘I can’t help noticing that you are in low spirits today. And such a mood cannot show even the most beautiful woman to advantage.’

  She glanced at me then continued to look down at the path we were following, not saying a word.

  ‘Yesterday, at the ball, I couldn’t help overhearing something you said to the lady beside you.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘You said that love is the mother of all ills.’

  ‘I did,’ she answered, with a smile that seemed to pain her. I must say, I hadn’t expected her to give in so readily without putting up any fight.

  ‘Then the cause of your indisposition this day is … love?’ I paused just long enough for my apology to seem genuine. ‘I have overstepped the bounds. I beg you to forgive me.’

  ‘But I was mistaken, you know. Love is not the mother of all ills. In fact, of all the things in this world, love is the only one that does no harm.’

  ‘I should not be so sure of that, Your Highness.’