Chapter Thirty Eight
A Dachshund Decidedly Displeased
Finally, having been given the road, it was still dark as, within sight of the foothills of the distant, snow-covered Alps, wreathed in smoke and steam, the powerful 4-8-2 locomotive which had been backed onto the train at Dijon, pulled the gleaming blue and gold carriages of the Rome Express under the arching overall glass roof of the lamp lit station at Aix-les-Bains and came to a gentle stop next to the southbound platform.
While the locomotive took on water, the two men, who with increasing impatience had been pacing the platform, awaiting the arrival of the train, now clambered aboard and with the assistance of the Chef de Bord were, immediately, shown to their sleeping quarters.
In the carriage containing the compartments which had been allotted to the Bransons and the Crawleys all was now silent.
But a short while earlier, before the express resumed its delayed journey and at last began to crawl forward into the station at Aix-les-Bains, in hushed tones, Matthew and Tom continued to chat softly together outside in the corridor as to how best they could ensure that the Meyer children made it safely across the border into Italy at Modane. For her part, at Edith's urgent entreaty, Sybil had gone back down the length of the carriage to look in on young Max while, within the compartment occupied by the two Jewish children, Edith herself began the task of trying to settle the young boy and his sister. A few moments later, Sybil had returned to say that all was well, that Max was sleeping soundly in his bed and which was true enough. At this Edith had breathed a heartfelt sigh of relief and with Sybil's assistance continued the task of settling the two children. Although both Josef and his little sister Emelie were both very tired, it was understandably some time before they both drifted off to sleep but eventually sleep they both did. However, while to all intents and purposes, what Sybil had said was true enough and that Max indeed slumbered on in his bed, had she paid a little more attention, Sybil might just have observed that the other occupant of Edith's compartment was very much awake and now decidedly not in the best of moods.
In fact, and in fairness it must be said, entirely unwittingly on her part, Sybil had contributed somewhat to little Fritz's annoyance. Now in this regard it should be explained that even if it was but for one night, as indeed it was, the little dachshund had not been enamoured at all of the temporary sleeping quarters allotted to him on board the Rome Express and which took the form of a dank, dark, dusty little cupboard situated beneath young Max's bed. And, had he been able to do so, Fritz would doubtless have voiced a strong complaint to the Chef de Bord about what he viewed as the decided shortcomings of his sleeping accommodation.
However, since he was but a dachshund that, of course, was not an option. In any case, for his part, Fritz considered he had been prepared to meet the humans with whom he condescended to reside halfway and thus make the best of things. After all, the dank, dark, dusty little cupboard was a decided improvement upon the damp, dark, disgusting cellar at Rosenberg in which he had once found himself confined, when, during one of his young master's inexplicable absences - and over the years there had been many of those - Fritz had chosen to avail himself of a string of sausages which had been left out on a plate in the kitchen; thereby incurring the wrath of Frau Eder the cook. Little Fritz's incarceration in the cellar had followed swiftly thereafter.
After the singular unpleasantness on the platform back there at Calais, for Fritz, the rest of the day spent on board the speeding train had passed off pleasantly enough and without further incident. The children to whom he had been unwillingly introduced, had done their very best to be kind to him and the girl had done her very best too, to try and make amends for what she had done. Not that any of it altered the small dog's considered canine opinion that both boys and girls were, for the most part, nasty, naughty, noisy little things and at all times best avoided. Nor was Fritz fooled by the seeming kindness of the girl. After all, he had met her type before; indeed, many times.
Nonetheless, even for Fritz, the evening had begun well too. He had been both fed and watered and thereafter, he had stood and barked contentedly while his young master made his basket snug and comfy with Fritz's own favourite blue blanket. And, while the basket had indeed been placed in the afore-mentioned nasty little cupboard, the small door to it had been left ajar, so, well content, the young dachshund had proceeded to settle himself down for the night.
Although the view thus afforded to him by the partially open cupboard door was somewhat restricted, through it Fritz now heard voices, both of which he recognised; that of his young master and also of his mistress. Sitting in his basket he watched contentedly as the young boy and his mother drifted in and out of sight, moving about the lamp-lit room, readying themselves for bed; eventually heard the mattress above him creak as Max lay down for the night.
"Guten Nacht, mein lieber kleiner Frittie", Max whispered softly and a moment later the light in the compartment went out. In the ensuing darkness, Fritz noised an unintelligible reply, unintelligible that was to Max, curled himself into a ball and closed his eyes. Like his master, lulled into slumber by the rhythmic beat of the steel wheels of the heavy train on jointed rails, Fritz too was soon fast asleep and once again dreaming of the kind of delicacies of which only a dachshund could dream.
Sometime later, there came a sudden jolt.
The hitherto almost hypnotic, steady rhythm of the train now changed markedly, at first slowing and thereafter coming eventually to a complete and utter stop at which point, Fritz woke up. Above him, he heard Max moan softly and turn fitfully in his sleep. Minutes later, the door of the compartment softly opened and but a moment or two after closed again just as quietly.
A short while later and hurried footsteps sounded in the corridor; grew louder and stopped outside the door to the darkened compartment. On hearing them, Fritz who had been curled snugly in his basket, now sat up and cocked an ear. The door to the compartment opened quietly and someone else, whose footsteps Fritz did not recognise, came into the room. Whoever it was, leant briefly over the bed above him and at the same time closed the door of the cupboard with the toe of their shoe. Moments later the same person retraced their steps, the door to the compartment opening and then swiftly closing. The sound of their footsteps dwindled and faded into silence.
Beneath the bed, Fritz was decidedly unamused. Being shut in and in the dark reminded him all too much of his temporary incarceration in the cellar at Rosenberg. With this in mind, he began by whimpering his displeasure, puttering about inside the cupboard, scratching at the door, and when all of this failed to produce the desired result, did the only other thing left to him: he began to bark. Above him, the bed creaked and moments later he heard his young master's voice.
"Frittie? Was ist los?"
The light in the compartment was promptly switched on, flooding the room with light and the cupboard door now opened to reveal Max kneeling, as far as his injured leg would permit him to do so, upon the flloor. Fritz gave a delighted little bark, trotted happily out of his erstwhile cell and, notwithstanding his short, stout little legs, as far as it was possible for him to do so, now promptly jumped into the boy's outstretched arms.
While he petted, shushed and soothed the little dog, cradling Fritz to him, Max eyed his mother's empty bed with a boy's unconcern, assuming that she must have gone down the corridor to the bathroom. Then, returning with Fritz to his own berth, he clambered in and switched out the light. Beside him, well content, Fritz gave a delighted bark and settled down to resume his interrupted slumbers alongside his young master.
With the train now at a stand, all was quiet. Lying here in the darkness,with his hands linked behind his head atop the pillow, Max was wide awake and not only on account of the dull ache from his injured knee. He lay staring at up at the white ceiling of the compartment, reflecting on all that had happened so far since his meeting with his uncles, aunts and especially with his cousins at the Gare Maritime in Calais.
All things considered, Max thought the Graf, his Uncle Matthew, to be much more approachable, much more pleasant than he would ever imagined a Graf to be; in fact not really like a Graf at all. On the other hand, his wife, Aunt Mary, was every inch what Max thought a Gräfin should be: cold, haughty and distant. To begin with, he had not liked her at all. Then, strange to relate, it seemed a change had come over her and her attitude towards him, even towards his mother, suddenly softened. As he reflected upon this, Max found he could almost pinpoint when that had occurred. It had been just after Mama had mentioned Dr. Lowenstein, the Jewish specialist from Vienna who had a clinic in Salzburg and shortly before the incident involving Fritz, when Max had tripped over the little dog's lead and so nearly gone sprawling.
As for Uncle Tom, der Jornalist, the newspaperman, the smiling Irishman with the sparkling blue eyes and his pretty dark haired wife, Aunt Sybil, Mama's younger sister and who was eine Krankenschwester, a nurse, or so Mama had said, both of them had been very kind to him. They were so very different from the Graf and the Gräfin; different as well from Papa and Mama's circle of friends, mainly from Vienna, whom Max had been allowed to meet. And he knew too from what Mama had said that she loved both his Uncle Tom and his Aunt Sybil very much indeed.
It was now that Max's thoughts turned to his cousins, in particular, to the two eldest; to Danny and to Robert. Even though he had only met them for the first time but a few hours ago at the railway station in Calais and despite the fact that neither of them spoke any German and Max's command of English was decidedly rather limited, he decided that he liked them a lot; thought they were great fun and knew he wanted to get to know both of them a great deal better.
After all, sitting in the train on the way to Paris, from what they had told him, with his mother translating what it was they were saying, the two boys seemed to have such Spaß, such japes, especially each and every summer, while they were together for the holidays at the big house, where the Graf and his wife lived along with all their children, over there in England. Mama had spoken about it often but Max had only ever seen it in photographs. What was its name? Dow... Down... Downton! Yes, that was it. Nonetheless, reflected Max soberly, large as it was, the big house in York...shire, in England, was not a patch on the splendours of Rosenberg nestling as it did among the dark pine forests of the Wienerwald with its terraced gardens and its wonderful views over the lake towards the distant snow-capped Alps.
Not that for one moment had Max ever been allowed to go climbing in the mountains, even with Papa in attendance, while Mama considered that going for a short hike in the woods of Rosenberg to look for mushrooms to be equally fraught with danger too, in the guise of a tree root, a falling branch, a sudden dip in the path or something as simple as an uneven patch of ground. Nor was Max allowed to learn how to ride, although he knew that other boys of his age and background even had their own ponies while the seemingly innocuous pleasures of a riding a bicycle were forbidden to him; remembered vividly and with embarassment all the fuss that had ensued just last year while he and his parents had been on an extended a visit to friends of Papa, when Max had been caught trying to ride Ernie's bicycle, the seven year old son of Max's father's friends.
To make up for all the restrictions that they had placed upon him, Papa and Mama saw to it that he had all kinds of toys but while that was all very well and good, what Max really missed were boys of his own age with whom to play, who did the kinds of things he himself would so dearly like to do, just like Danny and Robert did; going on all manner of "expeditions", rooting about in the barns on the estate, watching and waving to the trains from the fence bordering the line, spending nights out under canvas in a tent pitched on an island, cooking a meal over a camp-fire, going sailing on a lake and about all of which, with his mother translating Danny's words into German, Max had heard at first hand yesterday, while the train had been en route to Paris.
Oh, how he so wished that he too could do things like that. Have adventures. Of course, Max knew that he had to be careful and why that was so; knew that the slightest knock... He knew equally well that his mother fretted and worried about him constantly but if only, just for once, she would not treat him as if he was still a baby, cosseting him, wrapping him up in cotton wool, then he would promise to take the very greatest care and repay the trust she reposed in him. But then, given what had happened in the library at Rosenberg just a month or so ago, when Max had fallen off the steps reaching for a book on a high shelf, something he had been told not to do, and as a result had injured his knee, perhaps now was not the right time to tackle his mother about being allowed to do some of the things which both Danny and Robert did as a matter of course. Not that, lying there in his bed, that stopped Max from dreaming of all the fun he was certain that he and his new found cousins could have but only if Mama could be persuaded to let him look out for himself.
As for the rest of his cousins, with one exception, they were all younger than Max and, for now at least, he held no particular view upon them one way or the other; apart that was from the girl, the one with the funny sounding name and who thought so much of herself. After that unpleasant business with Fritz on the platform at Calais, Max had been prepared to dislike "Seersha" intensely but now, rather as had been the case with his Aunt Mary, as he spent more time in Saiorse's company, Max's opinion of her changed completely and, somewhat to his surprise, Max now found that in fact he rather liked her and hoped that eventually, just as with Danny and Robert, they might become good friends, the more so since Mama had said something about them all staying together when they reached Florence.
A few minutes passed and then the door to the compartment snicked opened and Mama came back into the room. On the instant, Max closed his eyes and pretended that he was fast asleep. Edith smiled fondly down at her sleeping son. He smelt her perfume and a moment later felt her soft lips brush gently against his forehead; felt her stroke his hair. Not, of course, that Max gave any sign whatsoever of being awake, instead, keeping up the pretence of being sound asleep in his bed.
A moment later Edith saw the blankets of her son's bed heave suspiciously and Fritz's little head poked out from beneath the covers. On seeing her, he gave an excited little bark. Edith smiled. With all the trouble caused by the presence of the Meyer children here on board the Rome Express, she herself was bone weary and hadn't the heart to order the little dog back to his basket. With what came after, perhaps she should have done but while hindsight is a wonderful thing, in reality, it is of no use, either to man or beast. So, instead, Edith simply patted Fritz's head, turned, climbed back into bed, closed her eyes and was soon fast asleep.
By now, the heavy train had pulled out from beneath the overall glass roof of the station at Aix-les-Bains and was fast gathering speed. As it passed over a set of points at the southern end of the station, the carriage lurched and swayed and, in the darkness, unbeknown to Edith, who had failed to see to it that the latch was properly fastened, the door of the compartment now swung open.
In one brief instant, little Fritz's horizons had broadened considerably. He jumped down off Max's bed and trotted happily out into the dimly lit corridor to investigate what lay beyond the open door.