The Kaiser’s Last Kiss. Alan Judd

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СКАЧАТЬ the Kaiser held up his hand.

      ‘I, too, have the Iron Cross. Would you like to see it?’

      ‘Thank you, your Highness, I should like to very much.’

      The Kaiser gave orders to someone evidently standing just behind Krebbs, out of sight. Krebbs did not turn to look, feeling it better to stay still. He had let his cigar go out and had ceased to sip his whisky. The man behind him said something and left the room.

      Afterwards, Krebbs convinced himself he had sensed her presence before he saw her. It wasn’t only the rustle of her skirts when she came in bearing the medal on a cushion but a change in the atmosphere of the room, felt as a sensation on the back of his neck and head, like a passing ray of heat. Still he did not turn but watched her come into view carrying the small purple cushion with both hands. She knelt deftly before the Kaiser to show it to him, her tightly-pinned dark hair shining beneath the candelabra. The Kaiser took his medal and indicated that she should put the cushion on the round table before them. She straightened and did so, then stood by with her hands clasped before her. Krebbs sought to catch her eye but her head was bowed. The light fell now on her cheeks, forehead and eyelids. He gazed at the dark arches of her eyebrows.

      With his good hand, the Kaiser held out his medal to Krebbs. ‘The Iron Cross, First Class,’ he said, reverentially.

      Krebbs took it. His father’s was Second Class. The other difference was that his father’s was earned. It was well known that the great Warlord of the Second Reich had never fired a shot in anger, or been shot at, or mined, or shelled. Or gassed. Krebbs handed it back, saying nothing.

      ‘I have many other medals and honours,’ said the Kaiser. His watery blue eyes opened wide, as in astonishment at his own achievement. ‘And I have many, many uniforms, German and foreign. I will show you my uniforms. Come.’ He got to his feet, laid his medal on the cushion, and walked, slow and upright, towards the door, his cigar propped in his unmoving left hand. Unburdened by cigar and whisky, Krebbs left his own chair with reasonable ease this time and stood with arm outstretched, indicating that the girl should precede him, though it was not clear that the invitation had included her. He raised his eyebrows and smiled. She glanced at him without smiling, picked up the cushion and medal and, with a further faint rustle of her skirts, followed the old man.

      They walked in silent procession into the corridor outside the Kaiser’s study. The corridor was lined with books and had a desk and telephone by the study door. From there they went past the stairs and through a large sitting-room to a high, closed door. The Kaiser’s cigar left a thin, vanishing trail of smoke behind him. The girl followed, holding the cushion before her like a crown. Krebbs watched the hem of her black dress as it brushed and swayed against door-jambs and banisters. Once, it lingered on the back of a sofa like a surreptitious caress. He could hear the creaking of his own leather boots and belt. There was no dizziness now, just a little light-headedness. He felt confident that something good was going to happen. An ornate mantel clock tinkled ten as they passed. The rest of the house was already silent.

      The Kaiser paused at the door and addressed Krebbs over the head of the girl. ‘You will never have seen so many beautiful uniforms. All are mine.’

      He turned on the electric light, leading them into a long, high, yellow-patterned room with floor-to-ceiling windows and drawn, heavy gold curtains. High up were pictures of princes and generals, though this time Frederick the Great’s usual dominance was shared with Frederick III, the Kaiser’s father. Throughout the room, on long wooden hangers, were hundreds of uniforms in black, gold, red, yellow, sky blue, white and shades of green. There was a warm, rich smell of expensive cloth. It was a grove of exotic military plants.

      ‘Is it not splendid?’ the Kaiser asked, with a wave of his right hand, in which he once again held his cigar. ‘There is nothing like it, anywhere. So many regiments, so many no longer in existence, of course. But if Herr Hitler runs short of uniforms for his soldiers I, the Kaiser, could help him. I could furnish a regiment from here.’ He laughed, stroking the epaulettes that adorned a colonel of Tsarist cavalry. He walked slowly between the aisles, touching the uniforms and commenting on them as if everyone shared his passion. He was careful to keep his cigar ash away. The girl followed with the medal on its purple cushion. Krebbs caught her eye once more, again without obvious response, while the Kaiser enumerated the vanished Austro-Hungarian regiments of which he had been honorary colonel.

      ‘They were the best at uniforms, Franz-Joseph and his people. They would be still, there would still be an Austrian Empire if only they had taken my advice.’ He stopped, so that they all stood close together. He exhaled smoke in the girl’s face while addressing Krebbs. ‘Well, at first it was the old man’s – Bismarck’s – advice. “Run your empire from Hungary,” he told them. “Get into the middle of it. Vienna is too small, too remote.” I told them so myself, many times. I told Archduke Ferdinand before he was murdered. That was the incident which started the last war, you see, before we expected it. We were dragged into it by Austrian incompetence. If the Archduke had heeded me he would not have been killed.’ He laughed and puffed again on his cigar. There were tears of mirth in his eyes. ‘You know, Ferdinand, he was so fat, they had to sew him into his uniform. This is why, when he was shot, they could not unbutton him. It was his own fault. I always said to him, I said, “You should be grateful you are not English. They would call you Fatty Ferdie there.” He did not like that. Every time I said it, no matter how often, he did not like it.’ He laughed again and walked on.

      Krebbs waved the smoke from the girl’s face with an exaggerated sweep of his arm and a mock bow. This time she smiled.

      ‘And here,’ continued the Kaiser, stopping at the top of the next row and tapping another uniform shoulder, ‘is my colonelcy of the Imperial Russian Guard, awarded me by the hand of my cousin, the Tsar himself. God rest his soul. What happened to him and his family was terrible, you know. Terrible.’ His face was earnest now, almost urgent. ‘They butchered them, those Bolsheviks butchered them, the children too, every last one. These are the people who are now your Herr Hitler’s closest allies. Out of spite, they did it. Malice. Spite.’ He clenched his fist, flattening his cigar between his fingers. ‘That is why England must be destroyed. A word from England at that time would have been enough to prevent it. Only amid the ruins of London will I forgive my cousin Georgie, their king. He is the dog who did not bark, when he alone could have. I could do nothing. I had to flee in case my own family suffered the same at the hands of the German Bolsheviks.’

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