This must be heaven.
Most of Hofburg was quiet, save for the Empress’s Palace.
The greatest bonus of all was that Archduchess Sophie, who tormented me, was absent.
“Your Majesty, how about going out for a walk?”
“Let us.”
Still… one fellow kept nagging at my mind.
“Hmmm….”
A small groan slipped past my lips.
“Your Majesty.”
Esterhazy immediately chided me.
A person can make a little mistake.
This is freedom I haven’t felt in ages.
“Why might His Majesty be so ill at ease in body and mind?”
This time, I really have a feeling.
I even learned from Empress Maria and Empress Eugénie how to have a son.
I may not be able to do anything about the position, but I can change my diet.
“Starting today, have them serve meat, salty foods, and rich grape juice.”
“The chef will be delighted.”
Yes.
During my last pregnancy, I definitely ate rather feminine foods, just as Eugénie and Maria had said.
Fruit, vegetables, milk, sweets, and the like.
Though that was because my usual eating habits were that way.
In any case, if I was to hold this place with my head high, I had to give birth to the final requirement: a crown prince.
They say that if the man’s energy is strong, the chances of having a son are higher… but, well, is there any man in Vienna right now with stronger energy than Joseph?
Relatively speaking, even though he’s wedged between two women, he still says everything he wants to say.
I know that changing my diet has nothing to do with the baby’s sex and is just an old wives’ tale, but if something like this is still alive in the twenty-first century, doesn’t that make it big data?
They say you crave strawberries when you’re pregnant with a daughter, and watermelon when you’re pregnant with a son, don’t they?
Come to think of it, last time I loved strawberries, and I gave birth to Sophie!
“It’s science.”
“Pardon?”
“No, nothing. Keep reading.”
Ferenczy continued reading the book aloud, and I sank into thought as I listened to her voice.
Why had Joseph gotten so sulky?
I did everything Joseph asked me to do.
‘Mother also did it out of consideration for you. If you do well as Empress, she will not say anything.’
So I worked hard to give birth to an heir as Empress.
‘Court events such as balls—when will you….’
I don’t think I did that.
Instead, we did travel together on things like tours of the realm.
‘Sisi, the Russian ambassador will come next week.’
‘Your mother will handle it.’
I think that was what I said.
It was because I was at war with the Archduchess, who only forced obligations on me, but Joseph might have felt as though I did nothing at all.
I did attend things like the Paris Conference and so on, but in Vienna, it seemed true that I was not actually doing anything.
“Your Majesty. Are you all right?”
“Why do you ask?”
Esterhazy sent the maids out and spoke to me.
“…Your Majesty, you did not answer no matter how many times I called you.”
“It seems the fatigue from the journey has not left me.”
“Shall I call the court physician?”
“No, there is no need to go that far. I suppose I am simply tired.”
For now, it was enough to have just enough power to protect the Empress’s Palace.
How am I supposed to beat Bismarck? He’s the protagonist of the nineteenth century.
If you asked whether fighting Bismarck over German unification or maintaining the Austrian Empire was easier, nine out of ten people would choose maintaining the Austrian Empire.
“I should write a letter to Empress Maria.”
At the very least, we have to secure South Germany.
It is Austro-Bavarian, so shouldn’t that much be possible?
I have to somehow make Joseph abandon nationalism, but the problem is that the only way seems to be defeat in the Austro-Prussian War.
***
Not long after Sisi returned to Vienna, a discreet scandal began to rise to the surface.
“You have heard the rumor that Her Majesty the Empress is with child, haven’t you?”
“Of course. But….”
When Joseph deliberately distanced himself from Sisi, other rumors began circulating instead.
“I heard she had quite an enjoyable time in Paris.”
Doubts grew as to whether the child in the Empress’s womb was truly of the Emperor’s bloodline.
“But His Majesty the Emperor seemed pleased, did he not?”
“Pleased? It did not look that way to me at all.”
Another noblewoman joined the conversation.
“From the very first day Her Majesty the Empress returned, His Majesty has not spent a single night in the marital bedchamber. My attendant confirmed it personally!”
“Oh my!”
The rumor that the Empress might be pregnant, though the young Emperor had not even visited her.
The answer implied that she had already been with child in Paris.
“Surely not. Did His Majesty the Emperor not favor Her Majesty the Empress so dearly?”
“Favor? That is an old story.”
The countess smiled like a victor.
“His Majesty must finally have realized it. That she is not suited to the dignity of an Empress. Or perhaps… he does not wish to be close to a wife who may have made some mistake in Paris?”
“Surely, the child in her womb….”
No one spoke the rest aloud, but everyone was thinking the same thing.
“Did you see that loose dress as well? It was a fashion from ages ago, and somehow it seemed suspicious. And then there is how she hurriedly moved her residence to Hofburg as soon as she returned.”
*
“Baron Bach.”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“Society must be very idle. To think such useless rumors are going around.”
Baron Bach, sweating coldly, made an excuse to Archduchess Sophie.
“That is, as for the salons, we….”
“Baron.”
“…”
“I did not place you in that position merely to hear excuses. I placed you there to protect the Empire.”
Apart from Sophie’s dislike of Sisi, the position of Empress was a pillar of the Empire.
“Why does the Emperor not sleep beside the Empress?”
Even when she asked, no answer came back.
Joseph was having his patience tested every day. Rather than lose control of his emotions for nothing, he judged it easier to fall asleep alone.
“I raised him to be a soldier-emperor, but I truly cannot understand His Majesty’s thoughts.”
Sophie murmured coldly.
She could not tolerate this situation, in which her son, swept up in private feelings—be it loss or anger—was undermining the legitimacy of the Empire’s heir with his own hands.
Time could not be the cure.
‘How long did they prattle on about the rumors concerning Maximilian?’
Rumors were not a matter of truth, but of impression, and the longer they were left alone, the more they would harden.
Sophie made a decision.
“Baron Bach. Contact the imperial gazette and the newspapers at once.”
“Your Highness, you intend to announce the pregnancy…!”
“Foolish nonsense!”
Sophie cut off Baron Bach’s words.
“I am not telling you to hang the Empress’s private life in the marketplace! I am telling you to stop this talk that the Emperor does not seek out the Empress, and that the Empress’s pregnancy belongs to some Parisian scoundrel!”
She took one deep breath and continued.
“Silence the noble who has been shouting the loudest. The Baron’s secret police are not decorations, I trust. That countess who spoke of Paris in the salon yesterday—what was her name?”
“…Countess Karolyi.”
“Send a carriage this very evening and return her to her husband’s estate. Inform them that she requires recuperation for reasons of health, and see to it that she never sets foot in Vienna again. The other mouths will naturally close as well.”
“Your Highness, but she is Your Highness’s….”
“Baron. If that lady was on my side, she should not have said such nonsense, if only for the sake of the Empire.”
***
Hofburg Imperial Apartments.
“Franz Joseph Karl.”
Joseph looked at me with startled eyes.
“Sisi…?”
You can sleep at a time like this?
“No, this is the Emperor’s Palace. How did you get all the way here….”
“Do you know that ever since I returned from Paris, we have been sleeping in separate rooms?”
How many years has it been already?
I was certain I had taught the Kaiser properly, but the moment I took my eyes off him, he was forever returning to square one.
“Are you going to refuse to speak again, like when we were newlyweds?”
“That time and now are different matters!”
So what if the problems are different?
“The answer is the same. The only difference is that, unlike in Milan, you do not come to the Empress’s Palace at all.”
Just how bad must it have been for me to infiltrate the Emperor’s bedchamber myself?
“It is what you wanted, is it not?”
Joseph spoke in a voice that sounded somehow wounded.
“I did?”
I doubted my own ears.
I wanted this?
“As soon as you returned, you packed your things and went off to Hofburg. When I went to find you at Schönbrunn, the court minister stopped me, saying you required special care. So I thought you were avoiding me.”
…When did you come looking for me?
I have not met Joseph except that morning.
“The chief lady-in-waiting said that?”
Joseph merely nodded.
Good grief, he is not a child.
“So you got sulky?”
“Sulky! I merely did as you wished.”
Memories from my past life came back to me.
Men are like programming: if you do not input the code properly, the output comes out strange.
Isn’t this exactly that?
I’ll have to add another line to Heart-Pounding Kaiser Maker.
Program him properly.
This broad-minded big sister has no choice but to understand.
“By the way, how did you get in?”
Now, now, changing the subject again.
“A secret passage.”
There are many secret passages in the palace in case of unforeseen events. I came through one of them.
“Why not come by the corridor?”
“Because, if I had, you might have refused me.”
“Have you forgotten that you are pregnant?”
“Surely not.”
I was showing even more than last time. How could I possibly not know?
That was also why I had gone into seclusion earlier than before.
“It is just a feeling.”
I told Joseph alone my secret.
“I think it is twins.”
“Twins?”
I nodded and sat beside Joseph as I spoke.
“Otherwise, there is no way it would already be this obvious.”