Chapter Seven
A Whisper On The Wind
Drawing Room, Rosenberg, Lower Austria, summer 1933.
But a matter of minutes after Friedrich had left them, the cry came from upstairs.
Understandably alarmed, those here in the Drawing Room looked nervously from one to the other.
"What on earth?" exclaimed Mary.
A moment later all six of them had bolted for the stairs.
Edith's Writing Room, Rosenberg.
Following Max's accident out at the pond, when afterwards the cut on his knee had continued to bleed, it had been Friedrich who had said to Sybil that what they needed was a miracle. And now, with what had happened, it seemed to those here at Rosenberg that this was what had occurred.
However, as Edith herself would readily attest, this was often the way of it with haemophilia. There was no rhyme nor reason to the capriciousness of the disease; who it chose to strike and who it did not. Apparently, from what she herself had read the previous year, in an edition of the Neue Freie Presse, in an article concerning the recently exiled Spanish Royal Family, of King Alfonso XIII's four sons, both the eldest and the youngest had been born haemophiliacs while the other two boys, all of whom were now young men, did not suffer from the disease.
Rather closer to home, despite all possible care being taken to prevent Max injuring himself, with him being an otherwise healthy, rumbustious young boy, blessed, or cursed, depending on one's point of view, with a lively and enquiring mind, accidents still happened. A moment's inattention on his part, leading not to something as potentially lethal as a fall, but instead to a sudden knock or a blow, in Max's case, usually either to one of his knees or elbows. And, while this might result in no harm and all would be well, on other occasions, this would be the start of it. The invisible, slow seepage of blood into the damaged joint, causing Max the most excruciating and terrible pain; leaving the joint swollen and hot to the touch; the affected limb often grotesquely bent and contorted.
Eventually, when the blood had nowhere else to go, the pressure caused the bleeding to cease; then a clot to form. And the infinitely slow process of reabsorption began; something which could take days, while the straightening of a limb, the freeing of a joint, and then regaining the use of the same, might take even longer. Yet, sometimes, there was no discernible cause; an episode of bleeding began simply of its own accord. Yet what then followed, was only all too predictable.
Of course, nosebleeds were something else entirely. And, quite understandably, Edith was always very worried if ever Max caught a cold as a severe bout of sneezing might well burst the delicate blood vessels inside the nose. If that happened ...
Yet, just over a year ago, in the Gare Maritime in Calais, shortly after the whole family had met Max for the very first time, and Mary and Sybil had learned of his condition, when Edith had tried to explain the danger a nosebleed posed for a haemophiliac, to begin with Mary had been disbelieving.
Gare Maritime, Calais, France, August 1932.
"A nosebleed," repeated Mary woodenly. "You left Downton, without even saying goodbye, and went all the way back to Vienna, just because your son had a ruddy nosebleed!"
"Only ..."
"Only what?" persisted Mary.
"Only none of your children will ever die of a nosebleed".
"Die ... of a nosebleed?" asked Mary scornfully. "No-one ever dies of a nosebleed".
She looked at Sybil seeking some kind of reassurance. Found there none. Saw instead that Sybil was regarding their young nephew thoughtfully. And in that look Mary saw something else too which she did not expect; heartfelt pity.
"That's just where you're wrong, Mary," Edith said softly. "My son could".
Edith's Writing Room, Rosenberg, Lower Austria, summer 1933.
Yet, minor abrasions and cuts to Max's skin usually presented no problem; once cleaned, then bandaged tightly, the bleeding eventually stopped.
As seemed now to have happened.
Even so, on hearing Max's voice, turning her head and seeing him standing there in the darkness, framed in the doorway of her Writing Room, supported by Danny and Rob, Edith had to admit that for one brief instant she had thought that both her ears and her eyes were deceiving her. It was only when Max repeated her name that with a distinct sense of shock, Edith had realised that both Max and his two cousins were not figments of her imagination; were real enough. Unlike the mirage she had witnessed out in the desert in Iraq some years ago when Friedrich and she had been excavating near Ur.
When his mother did not move from where she was seated, stretched out on the day bed, Max tried again.
"Mama?" he repeated haltingly. Now, on hearing her son's voice for the second time, with a cry that was indeed heard throughout the entire house, Edith leapt up and a moment later was on her knees in front of Max. Saw that he was still deathly pale, clearly exhausted, standing before her on his good left leg, his injured one bent at the knee and with his right foot held clear of the floor, supported by both Danny and Rob.
"Max! Darling, what on earth are you doing out of bed? And you two, what are you ..."
"We wanted to say goodnight to Max, Aunt Edith," began Danny.
"We knocked at the door but there was no answer ..."
"No answer?"
"So we went in".
"Mama! Look! Look at my knee; it's stopped bleeding!"
Edith's eyes flicked now to her son's injured knee. With the leg of Max's pyjamas rolled up, she could see that what he said was true enough. And, although the knee was still bruised and swollen, it was undeniably the case that the cut itself had stopped bleeding. Even so, the wound was still raw and wet and it would be a day or so at least, if not a while longer, before a scab could be expected to begin to form.
"What on earth's happened to the bandage?"
"It came off, Mama".
"Came off?" echoed Edith. She herself had watched Sybil dress Max's knee several times tonight and then reapply the bandage. She was not at all convinced that without assistance ... from a willing pair - or pairs - of hands ... the bandage could ever have worked loose of its own accord.
Max must have sensed that his mother did not quite believe him.
"It did itch so, Mama!"
"Did it? Well, it's back to bed for you this instant, young man. And since the both of you helped Max here from along the corridor, am I to assume that you will help him back to his bedroom?" Edith looked first at Danny, and then at Rob; both of whom nodded their assent.
"Well then. Do so. And, carefully, mind". The two boys nodded again. "Then I'll have Aunt Sybil come upstairs and re-bandage your knee".
"It really did itch, Mama".
"I'm sure it did".
"I feel a lot better now". Max gave her a brief, but dazzling smile.
"Do you?"
"Yes, Mama. Only ..."
"Only what?"
"I'm sorry for all the trouble I've caused".
Edith shook her head.
"Let's have no more of that. You're the one who has the trouble. Now, let me see ..."
Gently, Edith felt Max''s knee; it was still hot and very swollen. She stood up; placed the back of her hand on Max's forehead, which, despite his waxen pallor was no longer beaded with sweat. Thankfully she found his skin cool to the touch; it seemed his temperature was more or less normal. Well, Sybil could take that again when she re-bandaged his knee.
It was at this point in the proceedings that, like a galleon under full sail, Nanny Bridges hove into view behind the three boys.
"Goodness gracious me! Master Max! Master Daniel, Master Robert! What are you all doing out of bed?"
But before any of the boys could answer her, clearly both embarrassed and flustered by what had occurred, Nanny was apologising profusely to Edith while at the same time Danny and Rob tried again to explain what had happened, this time to Nanny. Not that she was paying either of them the slightest attention.
"I'm sorry, Lady Edith, really I am. I only left Master Max for a matter of minutes". Nanny nodded in the direction from whence she had just come.
As everything now fell into place, Edith nodded.
"I see. Well, no matter. And, as I said a moment ago, it's back to bed for you, young man ..." Edith stopped what she was saying: the corridor outside her Writing Room was full of people, both adults and children, and she found herself addressing a sea of anxious faces.
Max's bedroom, Rosenberg.
Standing beside Max's bed, on hearing the door open, Sybil looked up. Saw it was Edith, who smiled then nodded. A moment later, Sybil had moved to the foot of the bed where she stood looking down at Max now, at last, sleeping peacefully.
"Well, darling, what you were praying for has happened. His temperature is now normal and the bleeding has definitely stopped. I've given him another sedative and he's fast asleep," she whispered.
"And no doubt dreaming of driving a racing car!"
"You know about that, do you?"
"The trip to Bremgarten, next year? Yes. Matthew mentioned it to Friedrich a short while ago, who then told me. And while Friedrich's hinted at something to Max, to try and keep his spirits up, he doesn't yet know all the details".
"Nor, for that matter, does Mary! Poor Matthew!" Sybil grimaced.
"Yes, when Mary finds out, I expect it will be! In which case, my lips are duly sealed. Don't worry, darling, I shan't breathe a word! Although ..." Edith became pensive.
"Although what?"
"I've a private notion that Mary knows already. Or at least suspects something is up".
"Oh? Why's that?"
"Well, earlier today she asked me if the name Bremgarten meant anything".
"I see. What did you say?"
"I told her it was in Switzerland. Not far from Geneva. And that there was a racing circuit there. I asked her why she wanted to know and she spun me some yarn about having heard it mentioned in passing by one of Matthew's friends; by whom I suppose she meant Tom!"
"Oh dear! Not that I suppose it really matters. After all, not much that happens at Downton ever escapes her notice. At least not for long. Do you remember me telling you last year ... about that business of the motorbike in Thirsk? The one Matthew was planning to buy?"
"Now you come to mention it, yes I do!"
"Well, by then you had left Downton, but what I didn't tell you was that despite Mary pretending it to be otherwise, she knew exactly what Matthew and Tom were up to and then worked it to her advantage".
"You mean ..."
Sybil nodded.
"Do you remember what we used to call her when we were little?"
Edith grinned.
"Managing Mary! Some things never change, do they?"
Sybil smiled.
"No, they don't. And more's the pity. Oh, by the way, just to make certain that the bandage on Max's knee doesn't work loose, this time I've tied a double knot".
Edith gave her sister a rueful smile.
"Thank you but I'm sure that without a little help from you-know-who ..." She nodded in the direction of Max.
Sybil smiled.
"Perhaps but all the same it's very odd that the bleeding stopped just like that".
"Sometimes that's what happens and, thankfully, it seems this hasn't been as bad as some episodes".
"All the same, Max's knee is still very swollen and tender to the touch. So, he'll need to rest. And, to be sure and tell him, definitely no more night time excursions along the corridor. At least for now!"
Edith laughed softly.
"No, of course not. And, yes, I will".
Rosenberg, later that same night.
Over Rosenberg later that night the sky was shot with stars.
Save for the faintest rumbles of thunder somewhere northwards over the Alps, the storm had quite died away. Here, outside on the terrace, in the cool of the damp, pine scented air, Friedrich set down his glass of Schnapps on the balustrade. A short while since, having learned discretely from Matthew what it was that he had wanted to discuss earlier, an excursion next year to the motor racing circuit at Bremgarten, taking along Danny and Rob, and, if he was well enough, Max also, it was Manfred's turn to explain himself, which he now did, at the same time repeating his offer of hospitality at Rózsafa.
In the present circumstances, understandably, Friedrich demurred.
"Thank you but no. Not now. How could we? After all, it will be at least a week, perhaps longer even, before Max is able to leave his bed. If then. And, anyway, at the end of this month, I was intending to go back out to the Near East to supervise an excavation at Jericho".
Manfred nodded.
"Could that not wait?"
"A week or so of delay would not matter greatly, no. So, yes, it could. But give me one good reason, other than the health of my son, as to why it should".
"I can think of several".
"Really?"
"Indeed".
"Why the pressing need for all of us to visit Rózsafa?"
Manfred was equivocation itself.
"There's no pressing need. None at all. Merely an offer of hospitality; extended by Eva and myself both to you and Edith and, naturally, of course, to your English and Irish guests".
"Naturally ..." echoed Friedrich. "So naturally, that I'd overlooked it. Just what is it that you're not telling me, Manfred?"
"Nothing, I assure you".
"Then let me put it another way. What is it that you can tell me at Rózsafa but not here?"
"Let me put it another way. There are some people I would like you to meet".
"People? Who exactly?"
"That would be telling. But those who share similar views".
"Similar views? Regarding what exactly?"
"The collapse of the empire, the iniquities of the Trianon treaty, and so forth".
"Indeed. Such as whom?"
"Well, keep this to yourself, but Count István Bethlen de Bethlen for one".
"The former Prime Minister. Yes, a man I admire, certainly. Why, my dear Manfred, you do move in exalted circles".
Manfred smiled thinly.
"And who is, I think, already known to your English brother-in-law, the earl of Grantham. From his work for the League".
"Possibly".
"Rather more than that, I think. And there are those too who would seek ..."
But the conversation between the two men came to an abrupt end when Edith called to them from the Drawing Room to come in and re-join the others to toast young Max's health.
Rosenberg, the following day.
The following day, after luncheon, having yet again renewed their invitation both to the Bransons and to the Crawleys to come and visit them at their estate at Rózsafa in Hungary close to the Roumanian border, Manfred and Eva made their farewells to one and all, including young Max. Shortly afterwards, they left Rosenberg to drive into Vienna; there to catch the Orient Express, eastbound to Budapest where they would stay a few days at their villa on Andrássy út. The Maybach Zeppelin would be left behind at the Westbahnhof in Vienna. There to be collected and driven all the way back to the villa in Budapest by their chauffeur from where Manfred and Eva would be driven home to Rózsafa.
And then in a roar of exhaust, trailing a cloud of dust, they were gone.
"Well, said Friedrich, placing his arm around Edith's shoulders, as the Maybach disappeared off down the drive.
"Well, indeed!"
Friedrich smiled.
"Meaning?"
"There are things to tell me, aren't there?" asked Edith looking her husband squarely in the eye; it being more of a statement than a question.
"Yes," Friedrich said. "But, not now".
And with that, at least for the present, Edith had to be content.
Rosenberg, that evening.
"Would you like me to read you a story?" she asked softly.
At the time, it seemed the most natural thing in the world to suggest; to offer to read Max a story. Something to try and help him take his mind off the pain from his injured knee. That and the fact that, for the time being at least, he could not join in playing with his cousins. And yet, despite this being so, when she came to think about it, Mary realised that never once had she sat and read to either of her own two boys. That duty, as she had always seen it to be, had fallen to Nanny.
Max nodded his head.
"Yes, please, Aunt Mary," he whispered.
"Well then, what shall it be?" she asked breezily, trying to assume a bonhomie which she did not feel.
Scarcely were the words out of Mary's mouth than an aberrant thought now struck her. The offer to read to him had been made in good faith but what if the books here in Max's bedroom were all in German as she supposed they might well be. Rapidly, Mary's eyes scanned the spines of the collection of books. Then breathed a sigh of relief when she saw that, for the most part they were in English. Titles and authors she recognised. Copies of several of which were to be found in the bookcase in the Day Nursery at Downton: "The Wind in the Willows", by Kenneth Grahame; "Swallows and Amazons". by Arthur C Ransome; "Sir Nigel" and "The White Company", by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; and "The Thirty Nine Steps" and "Greenmantle", by John Buchan to name but a few.
Slowly, Max raised his left hand and pointed to a book with a blue spine but before Mary could move to fetch it, there came a light tap at the door.
"Come in".
The door opened, to reveal Danny and Rob in their pyjamas.
"Oh, er, Mama, it's you!" exclaimed Rob, clearly flustered at finding his mother sitting here in Max's bedroom.
"How very observant of you, Robert. Yes, it's me. It's perfectly all right. Contrary to whatever your father and your Uncle Tom may have told you, I don't bite!"
For some reason, Max found this incredibly funny, promptly dissolving into a fit of giggles. His laughter was infectious. The corners of Mary's mouth twitched and a moment later she too was smiling.
"And what do the two of you want?"
"We wanted to say goodnight to Max, Aunt Mary".
"Are you going to read him a story, Mama?" asked Robert.
"That seems to be the general idea".
"May we stay, Mama?"
"Well ..."
"Thanks, Aunt Mary, for sure!"
Not that she had said that they could do so but, seeing the three expectant faces lit in boyish epiphany, Mary hadn't the heart to refuse them.
"Very well. Now, Max, which was the one you wanted me to read?"
"The blue one".
"Would you fetch it for me please, Robert".
Rob did as his mother had instructed.
"This one?"
Max nodded.
Rob duly took the book from its place on the shelf and handed to his mother. Then, following Danny's lead, seated himself on the bed, while Max rested his head against his aunt's shoulder. Mary glanced at the title of the book Max had chosen. Well, at least that made sense: The Three Musketeers by Alexander Dumas.
"... Doubtless! Are you not aware that we are never seen one without the others, and that we are called among the Musketeers and the Guards, at court and in the city, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, or the Three Inseparables?"
Something caused Mary to look up, to find Tom, his eyes upon her, standing in the doorway to Max's bedroom.
"Well," he said softly, "I thought Edith was Scherezade for sure, but I see now that perhaps I was mistaken!"
"Less of the Irish blarney if you please, Mr. Branson!"
But, all the same, Mary laughed.
Rosenberg, the following week.
While he could still not bend his injured knee, Max was on the road to recovery and Matthew had finally let the cat out of the bag as to the fact that Mary was expecting another child. With congratulations ringing in his ears, Matthew found himself slapped heartily on the back by his Irish brother-in-law.
"So, it looks like there's life in the old dog yet, for sure!"
"Apparently so. But, if you don't mind, as you said to me a couple of weeks ago, less of the old!"
"And is Mary ..."
"Pleased about the new arrival? I think resigned to it, rather than pleased. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm late as it is!" Matthew nodded in the direction of the garden where, down on the lawn, he had agreed to umpire a game of cricket between the children. "Are you coming?"
"Yes, when I've found my tin hat!"
"Out!" Robert threw up his arms in glee.
From the other end of the improvised cricket pitch, Saiorse glared at Robert.
"No, I'm not!"
"Yes, you are! In case you didn't realise, Danny ran you out. O...U...T spells out!" yelled Robert.
Saiorse tightened her grip on the cricket bat, stood her ground, and remained exactly where she was.
"No, I'm not!" she repeated through gritted teeth. If Robert had been closer, she would have clobbered him.
"Yes, you are! Father, tell her!"
Matthew smiled. All things considered, any of the weighty matters under deliberation by the League in Geneva such as the on-going dispute between China and the Empire of Japan over the Mukden Incident were as child's play compared to umpiring a cricket match where Robert and Saiorse were captaining opposing sides. As Tom had said many times before, on occasions, Saiorse was just like her mother; intractable and stubborn.
"Well, don't look at me, old chap, for sure," drawled Tom when Matthew chanced a glance in his direction. "You're the diplomat!"
"Oh, thanks!" laughed Matthew.
From where she was sitting reading to Max, Mary glanced over the balustrade of the terrace; shook her head. Despite her aristocratic birth, she had never understood cricket, nor indeed, the English upper class obsession with it.
"Now, where were we, darling?"
Danny and Robert appeared on the terrace.
"Aunt Mary, do you mind if we come and sit with you and Max, for sure?"
"No, not at all. But I thought you two were playing cricket with the others?"
"Yes, we were ... We are. But it's much safer up here. At least for the time being".
"Why safer?"
"Saiorse's batting again!"
Moments later, from somewhere close at hand, came the sound of breaking glass.
Royal Palace, Budapest, Hungary, summer 1933.
Here in the magnificent, opulent rooms of the Krisztinaváros wing of the Királyi-palota, Budapest's Royal Palace, formerly inhabited by the Hapsburgs, His Serene Highness, Miklós Horthy, Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary, in a thoughtful mood, stood gazing towards the magnificent domed Parliament Building on the opposite bank of the River Danube.
The information which had come into his possession, quite recently, said to be from a well informed source in Berlin, had, all the same, been sketchy. And yet, this time, Horthy had the distinct feeling that somewhere, something was stirring.
Little more than a whisper on the wind, blowing across the wheat fields of the Alföld, the Great Hungarian Plain.
Horthy had always been dismissive of attempts to unseat him from the office which he had held ever since March 1920 when the National Assembly of Hungary had asked him to assume the title of Regent, following the bloody suppression of the Red Terror; in Horthy's view the end had fully justified the means. So as he himself saw things, he had parliamentary sanction for the tenure of the post he now held.
That, at the time, officers of the Hungarian National Army had been in occupation of the Parliament Building did not, in his view, invalidate the request made to him to become Regent. After all the victorious Allies would never have accepted the restoration of the former emperor, Karl, now dead and buried in distant Madeira for these past eleven years, as King of Hungary.
Which was how Hungary had become what it was now: a kingdom without a king.
The Regent shook his shoulders; sniffed derisively.
"Opportunists and adventurers, one and all! Will they never learn?"
Author's Note:
Founded in 1864, the Neue Freie Presse was a Viennese newspaper closed down by the Nazis in 1939.
King Alfonso XIII of Spain and his family had gone into exile in April 1931 following the success of the republicans in the Spanish municipal elections. Of the king's four sons, the two who were born suffering from haemophilia would both die in motor car accidents in the 1930s; Infante Gonzalez in Austria in 1934 and Infante Alfonso in Florida in 1938. In each case their injuries were superficial but their haemophilia caused fatal internal bleeding.
There is still no cure for haemophilia although these days it can be managed; most of the advances in its treatment having come to pass after the Second World War. The threat posed to Max by a nosebleed is based on fact. In 1916, when the Tsarevitch Alexei, the son of the last tsar, was twelve years old, he almost died from a nosebleed brought on by a bout of sneezing caused by a heavy cold.
For Tom and Matthew's secret plan to buy a motorbike, see Chapter 5 of my story Reunion.
Count István Bethlen de Bethlen (1874-1946); Hungarian aristocrat and statesman who served as Prime Minister of Hungary from 1921-31.
From his work for the League - the League of Nations, the predecessor of the United Nations.
I thought it was Edith who was Scherezade - see The Rome Express.
Tin hat - a steel helmet worn by soldiers for protection against shrapnel.
The Mukden Incident of September 1931 was used by Japan as an excuse to invade and then occupy the area of north eastern China known as Manchuria where the Japanese set up a puppet state called Manchukuo. The failure of the League of Nations to deal with what was clearly aggression by the Japanese spelt the beginning of the end of the League.