Tyll Page 18

  “But Caesar didn’t defeat his enemies. His enemies stabbed him to death!”

  “Anyone can stab anyone, that doesn’t mean anything! But they are forgotten, and Caesar’s name lives on!”

  “Yes, and do you know where? In the word Kaiser!”

  “When you’re King of Bohemia and I’m Queen, Papa will send us help. And when the Union of Protestant Princes sees that the English are protecting Prague, they will rally around us. The crown of Bohemia is the drop that makes the ocean—”

  “The barrel! A drop makes the barrel overflow. A drop in the ocean, that stands for futility. You mean the barrel.”

  “For God’s sake, this language!”

  “That has nothing to do with German, that’s logic.”

  At that point she had lost her patience and shouted at him to be quiet and listen, and he had murmured an apology and gone silent. And she had said everything once again: Rubicon, the die, God with us, and she noticed with pride that it sounded better the third time; now she had strung the right sentences together.

  “Your father will send soldiers?”

  She looked him in the eyes. This was the moment, now everything was up to her: everything that would happen as of now, all the centuries, the whole immeasurable future, everything hinged on her answer.

  “He is my father, he won’t abandon me.”

  And even though she knew that they would have the same conversation again the next day and the day after that, she also knew that the decision had been made and that she would be crowned in Prague’s cathedral and that she would have a court theater with the best players in the world.

  She sighed. Unfortunately, she had never made it that far. She hadn’t had the time, she thought between the window and the cold fireplace as she watched the flakes falling. The one winter had not been enough. To build a court theater took years. Still, their coronation had been as sublime as she had imagined, and afterward her portrait had been painted by the best artists of Bohemia, Moravia, and England, and she had eaten from golden plates and led parades through the city, and boys dressed as cherubim had carried her train.

  Meanwhile Friedrich had sent letters to Papa: the Kaiser will come, dear Father, he will come without doubt, we need protection.

  Papa had written back and wished them strength and fortitude, he had summoned God’s blessing down upon them, he had given them advice on health, on the decoration of the throne room, and on reigning wisely, he had assured them of his eternal love, he had promised always to stand by them.

  But he had not sent any soldiers.

  And when Friedrich had finally written him beseechingly that he needed help for God’s and Christ’s sake, Papa had replied that never would even a second go by in which his dearest children were not the content of all his hope and trepidation.

  But because he hadn’t sent any soldiers, the Protestant Union hadn’t sent any either, and thus all that remained to them was the Bohemian army, which had gathered outside the city in splendor and steel.

  From the castle she saw them marching, and with cold horror it became clear to her that those flashing lances, those swords and halberds were not simply any mere shiny things but blades. They were knives, sharpened for the sole purpose of cutting human flesh, penetrating human skin, and shattering human bones. The people marching in step down there so beautifully would thrust these long knives into others’ faces, and they themselves would have knives thrust into their bellies and necks, and quite a few of them would be struck by lumps of cast iron flying fast enough to tear off heads, crush limbs, smash through bellies. And hundreds of buckets of blood that was still flowing in these men would soon no longer be in them, it would spray, spill, finally seep away. What did the earth actually do with all that blood, did the rain leach it out, or was it a fertilizer that made special plants grow? A doctor had told her that the last sperm of the dying begat little mandrake men, root creatures trembling with life, which screamed like infants when you pulled them out of the ground.

  And all at once she knew that this army would lose. She knew it with an assurance that made her dizzy. Never before had she seen into the future, nor did she manage to do so ever again, but at that moment it was not a presentiment but the clearest certainty: these men would die, almost all of them, except for those who would be crippled and those who would simply run away, and then Friedrich and she and the children would flee westward, and a life in exile would lie ahead of them, for they wouldn’t be able to return to Heidelberg either, the Kaiser would not allow it.

  And that was exactly what had happened.

  They moved from one Protestant court to the next, with a dwindling retinue and dwindling money, under the shadow of the imperial ban and the revoked electoral dignity, for Friedrich’s Catholic cousin in Bavaria was according to the Kaiser’s will now Elector instead of Friedrich. Under the Golden Bull the Kaiser did not even have the authority to make such a decree, but who was supposed to prevent him? The Kaiser’s commanders won every battle. Papa could probably have helped, and indeed he wrote full of goodwill and concern, regularly and in the finest style. But he didn’t send soldiers. He also advised them not to come to England. Due to the negotiations with Spain the situation was not favorable at the moment. After all, Spanish troops were now stationed in the Palatinate to continue the war against Holland from there—keep waiting patiently, my children, God is with the righteous and fortune with the decent, don’t lose heart, not a day goes by when your father James is not praying for you.

  And still the Kaiser won battle after battle. He defeated the Union, he defeated the King of Denmark, and for the first time it seemed possible that Protestantism would vanish again from God’s world.

  But then the Swede Gustav Adolf, who had not wanted to marry Liz, landed and won. He won every battle, and now he was in winter quarters outside Mainz, and after long hesitation Friedrich had written to him, in a sweeping hand and with a royal seal, and only two months later a letter with an equally large seal had arrived at The Hague: We are pleased to know that you are well and hope that you will visit.

  It was not the best moment. Friedrich had a cold, his back ached. But there was only one person who could get them back to the Palatinate and perhaps even back to Prague, and when he summoned you, you had to go.

  “Do I really have to?”

  “Yes, Fritz.”

  “But he cannot give me orders.”

  “Of course not.”

  “I am a king as he is.”

  “Of course, Fritz.”

  “But do I have to go?”

  “Yes, Fritz.”

  And so he had set off, with the fool, the cook, and Hudenitz. It was about time too that things changed; the day before yesterday there had been groats for lunch and bread for dinner and yesterday bread for lunch and nothing for dinner. The Dutch States General were so weary of them that they hardly gave them enough money to survive anymore.

  She squinted into the snowstorm. It had grown cold. Here I sit, she thought, Queen of Bohemia, Electress of the Palatinate, daughter of the King of England, niece of the King of Denmark, grandniece of the Virgin Queen Elizabeth, granddaughter of Mary, Queen of Scots, and can’t afford firewood.

  She noticed that Nele was standing next to her. For a moment this surprised her. Why hadn’t she gone with her husband, if indeed that’s what he was?

  Nele curtsied, placed one foot pointed in front of the other, spread her arms, and splayed her fingers.

  “There won’t be dancing today,” said Liz. “Today we will talk.”

  Nele nodded submissively.

  “We’ll tell each other things. I’ll tell you, you’ll tell me. What do you want to know?”

  “Madame?”

  She was somewhat unkempt, and she had the coarse build and the crude face of her lowly station, but she
was actually pretty: clear, dark eyes, silky hair, curved hips. Only, her chin was too broad, and her lips a bit too thick.

  “What do you want to know?” Liz repeated. She felt a pang in her chest, half fear, half excitement. “Ask whatever you want.”

  “It’s not my place, madame.”

  “If I say so, it’s your place.”

  “It doesn’t bother me that people laugh at me and Tyll. For that’s our job.”

  “That’s not a question.”

  “The question is, does it hurt Your Majesty?”

  Liz was silent.

  “That everyone is laughing, madame, does that hurt?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Nele smiled.

  “You have decided to ask me something that I don’t understand. As you wish. I have given you an answer. Now it’s my turn. Is the fool your husband?”

  “No, madame.”

  “Why not?”

  “Does there need to be a reason?”

  “There does need to be one, yes.”

  “We ran away together. His father was condemned for witchcraft, and I didn’t want to stay, I didn’t want to marry a Steger—that’s why I went away with him.”

  “Why didn’t you want to marry?”

  “Always filth, madame, and in the evening no light. Candles are too expensive. You sit in the dark and eat groats. Always groats. And I didn’t like the Steger son either.”

  “But Tyll?”

  “I’m telling you, he isn’t my husband.”

  “Now it’s your turn again to ask a question,” said Liz.

  “Is it bad to have nothing?”

  “How should I know? You tell me!”

  “It’s not easy,” said Nele. “No protection, through the land without a home, no house to keep the wind at bay. Now I have one.”

  “If I send you away, you won’t have one anymore. So, then, you fled together, but why isn’t he your husband?”

  “A balladeer took us along. In the next market town we met a traveling entertainer, Pirmin. We learned the trade from him, but he was cruel and didn’t give us enough to eat, and he hit us too. We headed north, away from the war, almost made it to the sea, but then the Swedes landed, and we turned west to avoid them.”

  “You and Tyll and Pirmin?”

  “By then it was the two of us again.”

  “Did you run away from Pirmin?”

  “Tyll killed him. May I ask a question again now, madame?”

  Liz was silent for a moment. Nele spoke a strange peasant German; perhaps she had misunderstood something. “Yes,” she then said, “now you may ask a question again.”

  “How many maids did you used to have?”

  “Under my marriage contract I had forty-three servants for myself alone, among them six noble ladies-in-waiting, each of whom had four maids.”

  “And today?”

  “Now it’s my turn again. Why isn’t he your husband? Don’t you like him?”

  “He is like a brother and parents. He is all I have. And I am all he has.”

  “But you don’t want him as a husband?”

  “Is it my turn again, madame?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Did you want him as a husband, madame?”

  “Whom?”

  “His Majesty. Did Your Majesty want His Majesty as a husband to Your Majesty when Your Majesty married him?”

  “That’s different, child.”

  “Why?”

  “It was an affair of state. My father and two ministers negotiated for months. And therefore I wanted him before I had ever seen him.”

  “And when Your Majesty saw him?”

  “Then I wanted him all the more,” Liz said with a furrowed brow. She was no longer enjoying this conversation.

  “His Majesty is indeed a very majestic gentleman.”

  Liz looked her sharply in the face.

  Nele returned her gaze with eyes wide open. It was impossible to tell whether she was making fun of her.

  “Now you can dance,” said Liz.

  Nele curtsied. Then she began. Her shoes clacked on the parquet floor, her arms swung, her shoulders rolled, her hair flew. It was one of the most difficult dances in the latest style, and she did it so gracefully that Liz regretted not having musicians anymore.

  She closed her eyes, listened to the clatter of Nele’s shoes, and thought about what she should sell next. There were a few paintings left, among them her portrait, painted by that kind man from Delft, and the one by the self-important wretch with the large mustache who had brandished his brush with such pomp; she found his painting somewhat clumsy, but it was probably worth a great deal. She had already given away her jewelry, yet there was still a diadem and two or three necklaces; the situation wasn’t hopeless.

  The clatter had stopped. She opened her eyes. She was alone in the room. Where had Nele gone? How could she be so presumptuous? No one was permitted to leave the presence of a sovereign without having been dismissed.

  She looked outside. On the lawn there was already a thick layer of snow, the branches of the trees bent—but hadn’t it just begun to snow? All at once she was no longer certain how long she had been sitting here, in this chair by the window beside the cold fireplace, the patched blanket on her knees. Had Nele been here just now, or was that a while ago? And how many people had Friedrich taken with him to Mainz? Who had remained with her?

  She tried to count: The cook was with him, the fool too, the second lady’s maid had asked for a week’s leave to visit her ailing parents, she probably would not come back. Perhaps there was still someone in the kitchen, perhaps not, how was one supposed to know, she had never been in the kitchen before. There was a night watchman too—so she assumed, but since she didn’t leave her bedroom at night, she had never seen him. The cupbearer? He was a fine elderly gentleman, very distinguished, but now all at once it seemed to her as if he hadn’t appeared in a long time; either he had remained in Prague or died somewhere on their way from exile to exile—just as Papa too had died without her having seen him again, and suddenly her brother reigned in London, whom she hardly knew and from whom there was even less reason to expect anything.

  She listened. In the next room something rustled and clicked, but when she held her breath to hear better, she could no longer make it out. It was completely silent.

  “Is someone there?”

  No one answered.

  Somewhere there was a bell. When she rang it, someone appeared. So it had always been, as was proper, so it had been her whole life. But where was it, this bell?

  Perhaps everything would change soon. If Gustav Adolf and Friedrich, that is, the man she had almost married and the one she then actually had, came to an agreement, then there would again be celebrations in Prague, then they could return to the high castle, at the end of the winter, when the war resumed. For that was what happened every year: when snow fell, the war took a break, and when the birds came back and the flowers sprouted and the ice released the streams, the war too got going again.

  A man was standing in the room.

  That was odd—for one thing, because she hadn’t rung, and for another, because she had never seen this man before. For a moment she wondered whether she ought to be afraid. Assassins were cunning, they could sneak in anywhere, nowhere was safe. But this man didn’t look dangerous, and he bowed as was proper, and then he said something that was far too strange for a murderer.

  “Madame, the donkey is gone.”

  “What donkey? And who is that?”

  “Who is the donkey?”

  “No, who is that. Who is…that there?” She pointed to him, but the idiot didn’t understand. “Who are you?”

  He spoke for a while. S
he found it hard to understand him, for her German was still not good, and his was especially coarse. Only gradually did it dawn on her that he was trying to explain that he was responsible for the stable and that the fool had returned and taken the donkey. The donkey and Nele—he had taken her too. The three of them had departed together.

  “Just a donkey? The other animals are still there?”

  He answered, she didn’t understand, he answered again, and she comprehended that there were no other animals. The stable was now empty. Which was why, the man explained, he was standing here before her: he needed a new job.

  “But why did the fool come back at all, what about His Majesty? Did His Majesty come back too?”

  Only the fool had come back, said the man who due to the empty stable was no longer a stable master, and then he had gone again, with the woman and the donkey. He had left the letter behind.

  “A letter? Let me see it!”

  The man reached into his right pants pocket, reached into the left, scratched himself, reached into the right again, found a folded piece of paper. He was sorry about the donkey, he said. It had been an unusually clever animal. The fool had had no right to take it. He had tried to prevent him from doing so, of course, but the fellow had played a nefarious prank on him. It was very embarrassing, and he didn’t want to talk about it.

  Liz unfolded the piece of paper. It was crumpled and stained, the black letters were smudged, but she recognized the handwriting at one glance.

  For a moment, in which she had skimmed it with one part of her mind already and with another part not yet, she was inclined to tear the letter up and simply forget that she had ever received it. But she couldn’t do that, of course. She gathered her strength, clenched her fists, and read.

  II

  Gustav Adolf had no right to keep him waiting. Not only because it was impolite. No, he literally wasn’t permitted to do it. How one behaved toward other royal personages was not at one’s discretion, it was governed by strict rules. The crown of Saint Wenceslas was older than the crown of Sweden, and Bohemia was the older and richer of the two lands, thus the ruler of Bohemia enjoyed seniority over a king of Sweden—not to mention the fact that an elector too had royal rank, the Palatine court had once had an official opinion issued on it, it was proven. Now, it was true, he had been placed under the imperial ban, but the Swedish king had declared war on the Kaiser who had imposed the ban, and the Protestant Union had never accepted the revocation of the electoral dignity, therefore the King of Sweden was obliged to treat him as an elector and as such he had equal status to him—an equal status in general princely rank, and if one took into account how far back the family traced its lineage, the Palatine House clearly outranked the House of Vasa. Thus, however you looked at it, it wouldn’t do that Gustav Adolf was keeping him waiting.