“Besides, there are among the guests a pair of younger elements: Dr. Bresser, who treated me in my last illness so excellently that I wished to show him the attention of an invitation; and also Lieutenant-Colonel Tilling. Why, you are getting as red as fire! What is the matter with you?”
“Me? It is curiosity. Now, I really must look at what you have brought me.” And I began to take the parcel out of its paper wrapping.
“Oh, that is nothing for you. Don’t expect a pearl necklace. That belongs to Rudi.”
“Yes, I see, a plaything. Ah! a box of lead soldiers! But, father, a little child of four cannot—”
“I used to play at soldiers when I was only three years old. You can’t begin too early. My very earliest impressions were of drums, sabres, manoeuvres, words of command: that’s the way to awaken the love for the trade, that’s the way.”
“My son Rudolf shall never join the army,” I interrupted.
“Martha! I know at least it was his father’s wish.”
“Poor Arno is no more. Rudolf is all I have, and I do not choose—”
“That he should join the noblest and most honourable of professions?”
“The life of my only child shall not be gambled for in a war.”
“I was an only son also and became a soldier. Arno had no brothers, as far as I know, and your brother Otto is also an only son, yet I have sent him to the Military Academy. The tradition of our family requires that the offspring of a Dotzky and an Althaus should devote his services to his country.”
“His country will not want him as much as I.”
“If all mothers thought so—”
“Then there would be no more parades and reviews, no walls of men to batter down, no ‘food for powder,’ as the common expression for them goes. And that would be far from a misfortune.”
My father made a very wry face; but then he shrugged his shoulders.
“Oh, you women,” he said contemptuously. “Luckily the young one will not ask your permission. The blood of soldiers is running in his veins. Nay, and he will surely not remain your only son. You must marry again, Martha. At your age it is not good to be alone. Tell me, is there none of your suitors that finds grace in your sight? For instance, there is Captain Olensky, who is desperately in love with you; he has been just now pouring out his sighs to me again. He would suit me thoroughly as a son-in-law.”
“But not me as a husband.”
“Then there is Major Millersdorf.”
“No; if you run down the whole military gamut to me, it is in vain. At what time does your dinner take place? when shall I come?” I said to turn the subject.
“At five. But come half-an-hour earlier; and now, adieu—I must go. Kiss Rudi for me—the future commander-in-chief of the Imperial and Royal Army.”
A solemn, stiff, sleepy business, that is how my father qualified his proposed dinner, and that is how I should have looked on the ceremony also if it had not been for the one guest whose presence moved me in a singular way.
Baron Tilling came the instant before the meat—so when he saluted me in the drawing-room I had no time for more than the briefest exchange of words; and at table, where I sat between two snow-white generals, the baron was removed so far from me that it was impossible for me to draw him into the conversation carried on at our end of the table. I was pleased at the return into the drawing-room; there I meant to call Tilling to me and question him still further about that battle-scene: I longed to hear again that tone of voice which had at first sounded so sympathetically in my ears.
But no opportunity offered itself to me at first to carry out this intention; the two old generals kept constant to me after dinner too, and sat down at my side when I took my place in the drawing-room to pour out café noir. To them joined themselves in a semicircle my father, the Minister, Dr. Bresser, and, finally, Tilling, but the conversation which arose was on general topics. The rest of the guests—all the ladies among them—had got together in another corner of the drawing-room where smoking was not going on; whilst in our corner smoking was allowed, and even I myself had lighted a cigarette.
“Suppose it should soon break out again?” suggested one of the old generals.
“Hum,” said the other, “I think the next war we shall have will be with Russia.”
“Must there always be a ‘next war’?” I interposed, but no one took any notice.
“With Italy first,” my father persisted; “we must at all events get back our Lombardy. Just such a march into Milan as we had in ’49 with Father Radetzky at our head. I should like to live to see that. It was on a sunny morning—”
“Oh,” I interrupted, “we all know the story of the entry into Milan.”
“And do you know also that of the brave Hupfauf?”
“I do; and I think it very revolting.”
“What do you understand of such things?”
“Let us hear it, Althaus; we do not know the story.”
My father did not wait to be asked twice.
“Well, this Hupfauf, of the regiment of Tyrolese Jaegers, he was a Tyrolese himself; he did a famous piece of work. He was the best shot that can be imagined; he was always king at all the shooting matches; he hit the mark almost always. What did he do when the Milanese revolted? Why, he begged for permission to go on the roof of the cathedral with four comrades, and fire down from thence on the rebels. He got permission and carried out his plan. The four others, each of whom carried a rifle, did nothing else but load their weapons without intermission and hand them to Hupfauf, so that he might lose no time. And in this way he shot ninety Italians dead, one after
