good family friends. I met Mueller when he worked in the diplomatic corps. The family were quite big landowners round here.” The professor scanned the oak woodland which fringed the lake, looking for an entry point or pathway.
Then, some way down the narrow beach, they spotted two figures emerging from the woods… and marching towards them purposefully. The larger of the two, a round portly man with a red face, was shouting loudly in German. He was wearing some kind of strange hunting uniform. It included a homburg hat adorned with feathers and a green high-collared jacket from the belt of which were suspended a dagger and, incredibly, a full-length sword. The outfit was completed with breeches and riding boots. His companion was a great deal shorter and thinner, dressed more modestly in a felt jacket, and was struggling to carry a large shotgun in one hand and a brace of rabbits in the other.
The portly man strode confidently towards them, down the shallow bank and on to the pebble beach. The boys had little difficulty guessing what he was saying:
“You cannot land here — no trespassing! No fishing. No hunting… No anything! This is the Mueller estate…!”
The man got closer and his eyes narrowed as he focused on the group. Then, suddenly, the angry red face lightened a little.
“It cannot be… surely not?”
He advanced a little further. The professor also moved forward, his hand out-stretched, smiling, “Herr Mueller?”
“Pinckard-Schnell? I don’t believe it.”
The two men shook hands warmly and Mueller, who was a daunting figure close up, immediately peppered the professor with questions.
“How on earth do you come to be here? It’s been, how many years? Perhaps five? Why did you not tell me you were coming…?” Then he paused for a moment, looking at Jack and Angus, “And who are these young men… and, my, you are wet, what has happened to you?”
The professor thought quickly, “My dear Mueller, we are so sorry to, er, surprise you like this… we, well, these are my cousins from England and we are, well, the family is touring, yes, touring in the Alps. Well, we thought we would come up here for a couple of days. Show them my old holiday haunts. Left the others sightseeing in Vienna. Yes — Vienna. We thought we’d do a spot of early morning fishing, then maybe surprise you… I’m sorry — but we had a bit of a disaster with the boat… I was never much good at sports and that kind of thing, unlike you Mueller…”
Angus and Jack winced at the professor’s story. He had to make it up on the spot — and it wasn’t very convincing. But the truth would have been even less so. Mueller looked at the three of them for a moment in exasperation and then broke into uproarious laughter. In fact, he found the whole thing so funny, he nearly fell over. Meanwhile his servant just stood there and, a bit like his brace of limp rabbits, continued to look miserable. Mueller’s laughter was infectious and soon he had the professor going as well. Between the professor’s high-pitched wheezing squeal and Mueller’s booming guffaw, it was quite a contest. Mueller wiped a tear from his eye.
“Come, my friends, come. No time to waste. Oskar — your jacket, please. At least one of these fine fellows can be kept warm. Now, you must come up to the house at once and we will get you all sorted out. What about your things?”
“At the bottom of the lake…”
Mueller laughed again, “Dear me, dear me. Well, that’s too bad. Come now, Marta will be so excited to see you all…” And with that they plunged into the woods, following Mueller and the long-suffering Oskar, while Mueller chattered away happily, barely pausing for breath or for anyone else to get a word in edgeways.
Mueller’s house was an impressive wooden chalet set in its own grounds, surrounded by woodland and overlooking the southern end of the lake. Larger-than-life Mueller and his diminutive wife, Marta, lived well now that Mueller was retired. Any children had left home, but there were a number of servants around and by all accounts the Muellers had an active social life among the upper class of the Achensee valley.
The most interesting, and Jack thought, rather gruesome, aspect of the chalet, was the stuffed wildlife. Everywhere you looked there were stags’ heads, chamois and ibex heads and other, more exotic stuffed beasts. There were even two hollowed-out elephant hooves near the front door, and a pair of giant elephant tusks adorning the entrance. Jack had read that this kind of slaughter was not thought unethical at the turn of the twentieth century, in fact, it showed sporting prowess. According to Pendelshape, Franz Ferdinand himself had bagged thousands of game in his lifetime — not to mention hundreds of stags. It looked like most of them now hung from Mueller’s walls. Jack realised the irony that in only five days’ time, Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were going to be similarly butchered in Sarajevo.
After some loud introductions, they spent the day recuperating. Marta managed to locate some of her sons’ old clothes, and now Jack and Angus looked ridiculous in traditional Austrian garb, which would not have looked out of place in
By late afternoon, they were sitting in Mueller’s grand conservatory overlooking the lawn that led down to the lake. It was very beautiful; the grand chalet with its flower-laden window boxes was surrounded by its own woodland looking onto the pristine lake with the white-capped mountains in the distance. Jack wondered what would have become of the place in the twenty-first century. Maybe it was a ski chalet, or a rehab clinic for ageing celebs.
The professor and Mueller were trading stories on what had happened since they had last met. The professor had been working briefly on behalf of the German military in a research job at the time and Mueller, before he retired, had been an attache with the Austrian diplomatic service. Mueller was now onto one of his favourite subjects — the ‘problem’ of the Southern Slavs and the Balkans. His small and patient audience was more than happy to nod and listen, whilst picking freely from the large plates of cakes, sandwiches and biscuits that had been laid before them.
“…Of course, we had no option but to annex Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1908, although in so doing we added a million Slavs to the empire — most of them peasants…” Mueller puffed on a large pipe as he held court. “We had to show that we could still act as a great power… and we couldn’t be doing with a strong Serbia on our doorstep. You know it’s not easy for us — a patchwork of so many nationalities — if we show weakness to one group the whole Austro-Hungarian Empire could collapse… and that would be tragic.” Mueller turned to Angus who had just taken a large bite of cake and boomed, “Do you know how long the Habsburgs have ruled, my boy?”
Angus’s mouth was filled with cream cake. He tried to say, “No” but it came out as a sort of ‘Ooarg’ sound, and bits of saliva and cake spluttered out onto the tablecloth. Angus blushed and covered his mouth. “Er, sorry.”
Mueller looked bemused, but pressed on, “Since 1273… 1273 I tell you! You English talk about the British Empire being the empire on which the sun never sets… but that title first belonged to our mighty Habsburg Empire — we stretched across Europe to Spain and even South America!” Another large smoke ring wafted up into the air as Mueller exhaled. Jack nearly gagged.
“You’re a true Schwarzgelb, Mueller,” the professor said.
Mueller snorted in acknowledgement, “But we need to watch out! Now, after the Balkan wars of a couple of years ago, of course, Serbia is much stronger… Turkey has lost most of its possessions in Europe, you know, Professor?” The professor nodded, not wishing to question Mueller. “We have so many Serbs within the empire. Serbia is becoming stronger by the day, egged on by their wretched students and revolutionaries and those damned Russians — they have their eye on Bosnia and Herzegovina next. A direct threat to our empire…”
Mueller took another long puff on his pipe and then exhaled a curling wisp of blue smoke, adding sinisterly, “No, there’s no doubt, we will need to teach Serbia a lesson sooner or later…”
Mueller paused and without warning turned to Jack and Angus, “Politics, I’m afraid, my young friends, a bit boring for you, I think. Anyway, let us change the subject. Tell me now, what did you think of Vienna — isn’t it a
