“I cannot go.”
Josef made a troubled expression and spoke to me.
“Why?”
Without even stopping the spoon with which he was eating his soup, Josef continued.
“I do not wish to upset our alliance.”
Since the Great Game is in full swing right now, it cannot be helped.
“Besides, the Empire’s situation is not all that favorable. Hungary is still restless, and Lombardy is merely quiet for now—I do not know what might happen if I left the Empire.”
He is not entirely wrong.
“Then, are you not going to send anyone? You know that everyone else will be conducting diplomacy at the Expo.”
“… We can send a minister, I suppose.”
“France will have the imperial couple attend in person. They are already trying to get closer to Britain, are they not? A minister alone will not be enough, surely?”
“But I cannot go.”
Josef looked at me with an embarrassed expression.
“Then, may I go?”
“You?”
“If the Empress goes in person to promote Austria’s art, the British press will take notice as well. Even Queen Victoria would find it difficult to turn me away at the door.”
“It will be arduous. Will you be all right?”
“Do not worry. I shall go and show them the dignity of the House of Habsburg without letting them intimidate me.”
I managed my expression and smiled elegantly.
“Go with Maximilian, that fellow.”
“With His Imperial Highness the Archduke?”
“The Archduchess as well.”
Hmm, not bad.
Since it is time to see the floating batteries of the Crimean War, and Britain is beginning battleship construction.
Charlotte and I may currently be on ignoring terms… but in London, she might be welcomed even more than I am.
“Very well. Ah, Josef. I have a favor to ask.”
“What is it?”
“Can you create just one position for me?”
Josef snickered as he replied.
“As long as it is not adding another guard officer to my retinue.”
“It is a woman.”
“Who is this woman who has captured your heart?”
“They say she is a hairdresser at the Vienna Palace Theater.”
“Madame?”
“No. An apprentice, I believe.”
Josef wiped his mouth with a napkin and nodded.
“Do as you please. Personnel matters of the Empress’s court are your domain. But may I entrust the background check to Baron von Bach?”
“Of course.”
After the meal, my steps were light on the way back to my room.
The heart of the Industrial Revolution, and the Crystal Palace, which I will never be able to see in the future!
I was disappointed that the Eiffel Tower was not there in Paris last time, but this time it is different.
A limited-edition tourist spot that will not exist in the future!
I should do some shopping while I am at it.
Not the old-fashioned dresses of Vienna, but the latest British fashions.
Maximilian will likely be buried in the shipyards, and Charlotte will be busy having teatime with Queen Victoria.
In reality, it is practically a vacation for me.
Since there are still two years left, perhaps I should think about what work to exhibit in the meantime.
“Your Majesty, a telegram has arrived from the Queen of the Two Sicilies.”
As I was heading toward the children, I was caught by Esterházy and made to check the telegram from the Two Sicilies.
“From the Two Sicilies?”
Archduchess Maria Theresa of Austria-Teschen.
The younger sister of Archduke Albrecht, with whom I had previously spoken.
She has little to do with me.
Why would she have sent a letter?
「To my beloved sister.」
What?
“Did you not say she was the Queen of the Two Sicilies?”
I read the telegram once more.
“Ferdinand II has passed away.”
Ah, so my sister has become a queen.
The contents of the letter were somewhat similar to my own situation.
The story of how her father-in-law died and her husband became king, and the interference of her mother-in-law.
I turned around and headed back the way I had come.
“Josef.”
“Sisi? What is it?”
“I was thinking we could have a cup of tea together.”
Count Grünne could not hide his displeased expression, but from what I had heard through Esterházy, it seemed he had already thoroughly fallen out of Josef’s favor.
“Did you not just leave?”
I pulled out the chair across from him and sat down.
“A telegram came from the Two Sicilies.”
“The Two Sicilies?”
It was inevitably intriguing, as it was a place closely related to Lombardy, which Josef was most concerned about right now.
I placed the brief telegram on his desk.
“Ferdinand II is dead. My sister has become queen.”
Josef’s expression hardened instantly.
“Lord Chamberlain.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“What was your analysis of Francesco?”
“He is said to be of a gentle nature, a filial son who would never go against his father’s will, but….”
Grünne hesitated for a moment, gauging Josef’s reaction, before continuing.
“The prevailing assessment is that he lacks decisiveness as a monarch. Furthermore, there are rumors that his piety is excessive and that he devotes himself to prayer more than to state affairs.”
Josef clicked his tongue and denounced him.
“Right now Italy is a powder keg with Sardinia and the Red Shirt rabble prowling about, eager for unification. And now it sounds as though an abbot rather than a king has ascended the throne.”
Josef looked at me for a moment, then shook his head.
“Do not say you will go.”
… How did he know?
“I could tell just by looking in your eyes that you were thinking exactly that. It has only been a week since you underwent the purification rite. From Prague to Naples? Out of the question.”
That uncanny man.
“But you permitted me to go to London.”
He tucked my pouting lip back in as he spoke.
“That is still two years away.”
“I am worried about my sister.”
“I understand how you feel, but your health comes first. If Siyi heard this, he would probably faint.”
Josef drew a firm line.
“Besides, Naples is dangerous right now. The Expo is a peaceful festival, but Naples is a ticking time bomb that could go off at any moment. Knowing that, I cannot send you into harm’s way.”
“Very well. Then I will give up on going.”
When I backed down so easily, Josef showed a relieved expression.
“That was wise. Your health comes first.”
“Instead, write one letter for me.”
I rested my chin on my hand and looked at Josef.
“Do you know who is manipulating that weak Francesco II from behind the scenes?”
“Surely you do not mean to ask me to write a letter to our aunt?”
“That is right. Dowager Maria Theresa. Our aunt from the House of Habsburg.”
Josef furrowed his brows as if troubled.
“That noble Archduchess of Habsburg is apparently hounding my sister, who has only just become queen, relentlessly. Interference in state affairs is the least of it; she finds fault with everything, or so I hear.”
I cast a glance at Grünne.
“Does it not sound like a story you have heard before?”
It must inevitably overlap with the things Archduchess Sophie, my mother-in-law, had done to me.
“Aunt does have a strong personality. She is conservative as well.”
“Josef. If Francesco is weak, then the queen must hold firm and take center stage.”
Just as Josef holds the center and I win the hearts of the people.
“But if a mother-in-law breaks her daughter-in-law’s spirit and wraps her son in the hem of her skirt, what will become of the Two Sicilies?”
“The Papal States would surround it from north and south. Next, it would be our Lombardy-Venetia.”
I nodded.
“But will it not look like interference in internal affairs?”
“She is his stepmother, after all.”
Francesco II was not a son born to Maria Theresa.
And Josef seemed to grasp the meaning contained in those words.
“… Understood. Grünne.”
“Speak, Your Majesty.”
Josef caught his breath for a moment and calmly composed the contents of the letter in his mind.
“If the king’s authority is seen to waver before domestic and foreign eyes, gossips might harbor impious suspicions that the Dowager is perhaps favoring another successor who is not the legitimate heir. This would cast doubt not only upon the honor of the House of Habsburg, but upon your noble piety as well, Aunt. Please give your full support to the king and queen, and take particular care that unnecessary rumors do not leak out.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
I quietly set down my teacup and rose from my seat.
I had done what I could for my sister. Staying any longer would only obstruct Josef’s work.
“I should be going now. I have held you for too long.”
Josef stopped his pen and looked up.
“Already?”
“This nuisance should disappear now so that the Empire’s finest public servant may get to work.”
I leaned slightly over the desk and lightly kissed Josef’s cheek.
“Keep up the good work, my Emperor.”
Josef gave a faint smile and briefly squeezed my hand before letting go.
“I will be able to dine with you this evening as well.”
“I shall wait.”
***
In stark contrast to the boisterous festivities in Prague, even the joy of victory hung heavy over Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna.
“Your Highness, Count von Buol has finally been dismissed.”
Baron Bach’s voice trembled ever so slightly.
Archduchess Sophie silently scanned the personnel file on the new foreign minister that Baron Bach held out to her.
‘Alexander von Hübner.’
Her eyebrows twitched.
“That lowly creature who used to follow Metternich around has become foreign minister?”
A commoner of unclear origins, an ambitious climber who rose by ability alone. A figure far too lowly to be entrusted with the noble diplomacy of the Habsburgs. It was an uncharacteristically bold appointment that the Josef of old would never have made.
It was obvious whose influence was behind this.
“So Hübner has taken the Empress’s hand.”
Sophie threw the document down onto the table.
But something grated on her.
“What has become of the Empress who styled herself a liberal?”
Bach sympathized with the Archduchess’s query.
“Indeed. Taking conciliatory gestures toward Hungary and Italy while seating Metternich’s disciple as the head of diplomacy is ideologically contradictory.”
The Archduchess, lost in thought, arrived at the answer herself.
“No, it is not a contradiction. It must be one of two things. Simply to strengthen Franz’s imperial authority, or the other is….”
Leaving behind the Viennese nobility, to be reborn as a multi-ethnic empire.
Sophie perceived what the Empress desired.
“Or, she intends not to miss either.”
Her hand gripped the armrest of the chair tightly.
“The Empress is trying to turn Franz from the Emperor of the Germans into the father of those motley peoples. While isolating Vienna, the very foundation of our Habsburgs.”
To Sophie, who valued Austria’s identity as the head of the German Confederation, Sisi’s multi-ethnic policy of inclusion looked like a dangerous gamble that shook the very foundations of the Empire.
‘So that is why she chose Hübner. He can only survive by latching onto the power of the Emperor and Empress.’
“The Empress has acquired a starved hunting dog that will wag its tail willingly. A hound that cannot secure a single handful of food through its own strength.”