The Accidental Empress (67 page)

They sat opposite one another in the carriage, bouncing over the sunbaked cobblestones in silence. Sisi, staring out the window, noticed the intensity with which Sophie looked at her, but she did not return the gaze.

“So much blood.” Sophie said it like a whisper, barely audible.

“Pardon?” Sisi turned.

Sophie stared at the stains on Sisi’s gown, then into her niece’s eyes. “Those men . . . back at the hospital . . .” Sophie’s voice trailed off as she swallowed, looking back down at Sisi’s bloodstained sleeves. “So many of them. And that was just one hospital.” The archduchess shifted in her seat, smoothing the wrinkles of her heavy brocade gown. Sisi turned her focus back out the carriage window.

After a moment, Sophie cleared her throat. “Elisabeth?”

Sisi looked up, noticed the way Sophie twisted the folds of her dress in her hands. Noticed the scowl that pulled down on her lips, the skin well worn after years of that pinched frown.

“Yes, Sophie?”

Sophie bit on her lower lip, then spoke: “That was admirable. What you did back there. Visiting with those men.” Sophie’s eyes lifted away, glancing distractedly out the carriage window. The evening was a warm one, and people congregated on the streets, their faces bearing the same tense expressions as those worn in the palace halls.

Sisi, stunned by the rare compliment, replied, “Thank you.”

“I know that it was Franz who told you to do it. And I’m not sure why it was you he asked, and not me. I would have been happy to go visit those poor fellows, really I would have.” Sophie said it as if it was she who needed convincing. “But still. It was good of you to do it.”

Sisi scowled. “In fact it was I who asked Franz what I might do to be of service.”

Sophie turned her gaze back on her niece. “Oh?”

“Yes, Sophie,” Sisi answered, too tired to mask her annoyance. “If I, as empress, can give even some small comfort to those men, to my subjects who have given so much for the empire, then I am more than happy to do it. And in fact, I plan to visit the hospitals every day, from now until the war is over.”

Sophie cleared her throat, shifting her seat in the carriage.

Sisi noticed, as she stared at her aunt, just how much older Sophie looked. Yes, Sophie’s was a familiar face. And yet, Sisi saw in that moment how entirely changed she was from the woman who had welcomed them, years ago, to Bad Ischl. The way her eyes, once so sharp, were now hooded in drooping skin. The heavy lines carved into her face, especially around her downturned lips. The way she constantly massaged sore, arthritic fingers. Sophie, without Sisi’s awareness, had become an old woman.

“I’m glad that . . .” Sophie pulled her eyes away. “It’s a relief, for me, that Franz has you by his side in this. He loves you. Even after all of . . . after everything . . .” Sophie faltered, exhaling before she continued. “It’s been . . . difficult.”

Sisi nodded, unsure of what, exactly, they were speaking about. These past few weeks of war? This war that was a direct result of the foreign policy that Sophie had advocated for years. Austrian arrogance. Austria standing alone. Austria needing no one. Austria remaining static, stalwart; lulled into the belief that, with God on the side of the Habsburgs, no one else posed a threat. That policy that now crumbled, melting like the ice cones peddled by the street carts in the hot July evening.

“I just . . . oh, I don’t know,” Sophie said, twisting the folds of her dress as she shifted once more in her seat. “I want what’s best for Franz.” She looked up now, her eyes touched with a softness that Sisi had never before seen in them. “You know that, right? I’ve
always
wanted what was best for Franz, from the moment I first held him in my arms. That is my sacred purpose. You know that, right?”

“Yes, Sophie,” Sisi said, sitting up straight, peeling her hot skin off the sticky seat of the sweltering coach. “I am a mother, too. I know what it’s like to want what is best for one’s children.
You
know that, right?”

It seemed that the night was even hotter than the day had been. Sisi sat in Franz’s study, having just kissed Rudy and Gisela good night. The windows were opened, but no breeze entered. Even the gardens, usually such a pleasant respite from the palace, seemed unwelcoming to her.

Franz sat nearby, scouring a list of papers on his heavy desk. She waited here each night, knowing that, if news came, it would come here first.

Sisi fanned herself, lifting her hair off her neck. Perhaps Franziska was right—perhaps she
should
cut her hair, she mused unhappily.

The minutes passed, announced at each quarter hour by the clock on Franz’s mantel. Just as she was about to rise, to tell Franz she was retiring to her bedchamber, Beust knocked.

“Your Majesty?”

Sisi knew, instantly. She saw it in the tight line of Beust’s jaw, the stiff squeeze of his shoulders. The news was not good.

“Beust, what is it?” Franz beckoned him forward. Beust placed the telegram on the desk, where Franz picked it up.

Beust bit his lip, looking on as Franz read the message. After what seemed like an eternity to Sisi, Franz moved, dropping the paper and propping his elbows on the desk. His head fell into cupped hands.

Beust spoke first. “They’ve broken through our center, Your Majesty.”

Franz smacked the hard surface of the desk, landing his fist with a force that caused Sisi to jump back in her chair. “Retreat,” Franz said, his voice hoarse. “Order the retreat at once, before they’re all slaughtered.”

But Beust did not move, did not race to dispatch this most urgent of responses. Instead, he stood still, looking straight into the emperor’s eyes as he said, “There’s nowhere to retreat to, Your Majesty. The Prussians have us surrounded.”

Franz shut himself in his rooms that night and all the next day. Sophie did the same. A still, eerie calm enveloped the palace. The following evening, Sisi ordered a dinner of light broth for herself in her apartments and sat with the poetry book Andrássy had given her. When the sun went down, she began to prepare for bed, slipping out of her gown and letting her curls fall loose. She stood before the mirror, in the middle of her evening ritual of coating her skin with rich cream, when Ida appeared.

“Empress?”

“Yes, Ida?”

“There’s a visitor outside your chambers.”

“This late?” Sisi looked at the clock and noted that it was past nine in the evening. Whoever it was, this visitor was both late and uninvited; who would dare such a flagrant breach of protocol?

“It’s the Count, Your Majesty.”

“Andrássy?” Sisi dropped her small tub of cream.

“Yes, Majesty.” Ida nodded, looking toward the new mess on the floor. “Shall I ask him to come back tomorrow?”

“Show him into my sitting room.”

“Yes, Empress.” Ida curtsied and left the room.

Sisi greeted Andrássy several minutes later, having slipped into a simple dress of white and lemon-yellow cotton. She had kept her hair down.

“Andrássy.” She extended her gloveless hand and he kissed it. Another gross breach in protocol, she thought.

“Forgive my casual appearance,” she said. He looked formal in a full coat and tails, a top hat in his hands. She wondered, with a pang of jealousy, from where he was coming.

“Sisi.” He looked over his shoulder as if to ensure that they were truly alone. Such a visit would cause a flurry of palace gossip, should it become known; the empress receiving a man in her apartments, alone. And so late at night. But neither one of them said it.

“Would you like to sit?” Sisi asked.

He nodded.

She lowered herself onto the blue silk settee, and he took a chair opposite her. It was the first time he had ever been in her private quarters. “Can I offer you something to eat or drink? Wine? Coffee?”

“Nothing for me, thank you.” His words were clipped and Sisi sensed his distracted, restless manner. Odd, since he was the one who had appeared at her door so late in the evening.

“Have you heard?” Sisi asked. “Franz will officially surrender.”

Andrássy looked up. “Thank you for seeing me so late.”

Without thinking, she answered, “I’m always happy to see you.” She regretted it immediately. It was the truth, yet it sounded unacceptably bold. “Andrássy, is everything all right?”

He nodded, pressing his palms onto his thighs.

“What is it?”

“I had to see you.” He looked directly into her eyes for the first time and she felt her cheeks grow warm in response.

“What for?”

“I had to see you one more time . . . before I leave.”

The news hit her like a fist to the stomach.

“Before you leave? But when are you leaving?”

“Tonight. By train.”

She turned and looked out the window, out over the gardens, cloaked in nighttime. She waited several minutes before she spoke, though she heard that her voice still cracked when she did so. “Why must you go so suddenly?”

“The war is over after today. The battle was decisive, but not in the way we had hoped it would be.”

Sisi understood that much, but not why it meant that he, Andrássy, had to leave her.

“Hungary is now on the verge of outright rebellion. They’ve watched closely these past few years. My people, they have remained loyal and have waited patiently, unlike Italy and the German states. But they are tired of waiting.”

Sisi nodded, knitting her hands together in her lap.

Andrássy continued: “The emperor, your husband, needs us more than ever. Rather than risk losing us, he will finally be willing to negotiate with us. As equals. Deák and I must return. We must prevent our people from declaring outright rebellion. Instead, we must draft our terms. Make our demands plain. And show them that there is another way. That our emperor—but our
empress
, especially—wishes to listen to us, and work with us.”

Sisi saw the hope in his eyes. Saw how, even though she felt exhausted, he was alive and energized opposite her. The cause he had been fighting for his whole life—the cause for which he had been exiled and almost killed—was now finally within reach.

Sisi thought about this and sighed. And then, because she did not know what else to do, she spoke the truth. “Andrássy—” Her voice was filled with yearning, and she wondered if it was obvious to him. “I am so very happy for you. And I shall do whatever I can to help you.” And now, her voice quivered. “But I don’t know how I can stay here, after you are gone.”

“Sisi.” He put his hand on top of hers. She wore no glove, and neither did he. It was the most intimate gesture they had ever shared.

“I mean it, Andrássy. You are my only . . .” Her voice faltered before she finished, and she lowered her eyes.

“I know.” He put his finger under her chin and angled her face upward so that he might stare at her, his lips just inches from her own. She looked into his eyes, dark and earnest, and she wanted to cry. But she could not allow tears.

When Andrássy released her chin, he reached down, lifting her hand and cupping it between his own two hands. Her hand looked so small in his. Without a word, he lifted it to his lips and placed a slow kiss on top of her smooth, white skin. She closed her eyes, savoring the sensation of his lips touching her hand. That was it. That was all he could give her. It was not enough.

When she opened her eyes, he was looking at her, and he spoke. “Perhaps, someday, there will be a way for you to come with me.”

“How?” She asked, her voice a faint whisper.

“I don’t know,” he sighed, looking down at her. For the first time, his eyes were sad. “But I’ve always been a champion of foolish hopes and lost causes.”