Josef was gripping the railing tightly with both hands, suppressing his anger.
It would have been better if he had simply shouted or flown into a rage.
“Josef.”
I called his name hesitantly, but he gave no reply.
“I want to be alone.”
His voice dripped with coldness.
But did that really mean he wanted to be alone, or not?
He must be feeling an unbearable sense of humiliation that his authority had been damaged because of Maximilian.
Ugh.
Instead of answering, I slowly approached him and wrapped my arms around his waist from behind his solid back.
I felt his body flinch through his uniform.
Right? This is the answer you wanted, right?
“Max meant no harm. He’s just tactless, that’s all.”
“That’s the bigger problem. For an imperial prince, incompetence is a sin. The nobles of Milan must have laughed inwardly. The Emperor’s brother, dancing with a traitor. They’re sure to take our leniency lightly.”
I felt the tension gradually drain from Josef’s body.
Looks like I got the answer right?
“Tonight, you were the protagonist. People went wild over Don Quixote and applauded your mercy. Max’s dance was just a bit of comic relief.”
He slowly turned around and faced me.
He placed his hand on my cheek and slowly brushed my lips with his thumb.
“Pfft, I’m sorry, but not now.”
“Why?”
“Because you drank.”
“In the old days, you only let me when I’d been drinking.”
That was then.
I rubbed my cheek against Josef’s palm and whispered sweetly.
“If I’m going to the Expo next year, there’s no helping it.”
“Do you have to go? How about I dismiss the governor-general instead and send Maximilian to London?”
“Are you trying to make me Queen of Lombardy-Venetia?”
Thank goodness. He seems to have calmed down a little.
“In any case, you’re right. Max’s conciliatory policy has failed.”
There would be no more conciliation.
The nobles were looking down on us, and the common people liked us.
“Do you remember what I told you when we first came to La Scala?”
“You told me to do it like Versailles.”
“I think it’s time to divide them.”
“You’re telling me to give them the railway concession?”
Josef looked thoroughly displeased.
I suppose it does look no different from a conciliatory policy right now.
“The railway through the Brenner Pass, from Innsbruck down to Verona, is scheduled to be built, isn’t it? Give that to the merchants and industrialists of Milan. Like the Western Railway.”
“Are you ashamed of your name?”
Yes! Extremely ashamed!
What kind of name is Empress Elisabeth Railway?
Still, since it was named after me, I had been collecting shares little by little.
“Westbahn! Not Kaiserin Elisabeth-Bahn!”
No, this isn’t the time to flirt with Josef.
“The coronation is coming soon, isn’t it? Speak of it then. Say that the economy stretching from Bohemia to Milan will bring us wealth.”
“Baron Bruck did suggest as much. Though the subject was a little different.”
Just in case someone was listening, I carefully lowered my voice.
“You know why the nobles of Vienna cherish you, don’t you?”
“Because I can protect them.”
“Exactly. The nobles of Milan don’t need our protection. But the bourgeoisie are different. They need someone to protect them from the nobles of Milan.”
“It isn’t that I don’t know that. But…”
“What’s the problem?”
“No matter how desperate I am, it feels distasteful to join hands with merchants who are not nobles.”
Oh, God.
So it wasn’t that he didn’t do it because he didn’t know.
This is even harder to persuade him about.
“Bohemia…”
No, in Bohemia, the nobles were pro-Emperor, and the bourgeoisie were pro-Emperor too. That was why he had followed my opinion without needing me to say much.
Even originally, if one were to name the most loyal region in the Empire, it would not have been strange for Bohemia to come before Austria.
But this place was a little different. The nobles were enemies, and the bourgeoisie were targets to be won over.
How could I persuade him and bring them to our side?
“The late Emperor Joseph, whose name you call me by, said the same. ‘Everything for the people, nothing by the people.’”
I didn’t know that much. I had only thought of him as an enlightened monarch.
“Reform doesn’t always bring only good results, Sisi.”
“No. Do you remember when our serfs were emancipated?”
“His late Majesty Emperor Joseph II did it.”
Yes, this is the nineteenth century’s serf emancipation.
“Thanks to that, the Hungarian nobles suffered a blow, and the people chose us, Vienna. As you know, the result was that we succeeded in suppressing them.”
“It sounds as though I’m insulting His late Majesty, but historians evaluate him as a failed monarch.”
Josef seemed about to add something, but in the end, he swallowed his words.
I really didn’t want to resort to this method.
Letting out a deep sigh, I pretended my legs had given out and buried my head against his chest.
“Haa…”
“Sisi?”
Josef’s body immediately stiffened. The coolheaded emperor who had been discussing politics just moments ago was nowhere to be found, and only a flustered husband remained.
“What’s wrong? Are you unwell? I knew you overexerted yourself earlier…”
“…When I’m suffering this much?”
“What?”
I lifted my head and looked up at him.
With the most sorrowful, exhausted eyes I could muster.
“You saw them earlier, didn’t you? Those nobles in black. The way they looked at me—no, at us.”
I really didn’t want to go this far…
It feels like the last of my pride is being shaved away.
Josef held me in silence for a long time.
Then, after remaining quiet for quite a while, he said softly,
“The night is cold. Let’s go inside.”
It was spring, so the nights were still chilly.
Before going back, I checked one thing after another while in his arms.
How much strength was in his arms? Weak.
His voice? Higher than before.
His expression was Josef as usual.
Normally, at a time like this, he should take off his cloak and put it around me.
But Josef wore only his uniform even in the depths of winter, so there was none of that.
Unless it was an event like a coronation.
In any case, even afterward, Josef did not take his eyes off Maximilian, but he said nothing in particular, and the banquet ended without any special incidents.
*
Italy’s coronation, like Bohemia’s, was strongly religious in color, so there was not much difference.
“You worked hard.”
“So did you.”
“Mother prepared a gift for you.”
I said this as I handed him the newspaper.
“They say all the capital from the Papal States is now flowing into Piedmont.”
As the person who had practically rebuilt the Habsburgs, there were certainly things to learn from her.
Even if they sided with Sardinia like this, what would eventually come back to them would be nothing but plunder and confiscation.
To deliver the message that if Sardinia won, the next targets would be the entrepreneurs, articles had continued to appear in the official gazette.
“Cavour is forcibly selling off monastery property to make up for his shortage of war funds.”
Josef folded the newspaper and sat down on the sofa opposite me.
“By the way, Max is no longer acceptable. Even if you ask, it’s useless.”
What is he talking about…
I do play with Max often, but it doesn’t absolutely have to be Maximilian, does it?
“I have plenty of close friends. Even when I go to the London Expo next year, I’m going to take my cousin Ludwig with me. Do you know how sensitive that child is?”
If he had seen Don Quixote, he would have given a standing ovation while shedding tears.
“Do you mean the crown prince? It will be fortunate if he doesn’t cause a commotion in London.”
“He wouldn’t cause a commotion over that. And are you going to keep helping the Two Sicilies?”
France and we were fighting a proxy war against each other.
They supported Sardinia, and we supported the Two Sicilies.
“Thanks to that, the treasury is about to run dry.”
Is that why he’s discussing the Zollverein?
It must be quite a headache from Josef’s standpoint too.
“Is the treasury very short on funds?”
“Not to the extent that you need to worry about it.”
Since we won the war against Sardinia, there should be some money, but supporting the Two Sicilies is too much of a burden?
“How can you tell me not to worry? To be honest, everyone knows the aid money going to Naples is ending up in the nobles’ back pockets.”
If it hadn’t been the country where my sister lived, I would never have said this.
If I were to be completely honest, I rather wished Sardinia would absorb the Two Sicilies and then collapse under its own weight.
Since I only knew the rough details, I had assumed they had at least sent a force comparable to a regular army.
How could twenty thousand regular soldiers lose to a thousand militiamen?
“There’s no need for us to help them when our own treasury is on such precarious footing.”
“I’m sorry, but I think we have to stop the support.”
Josef spoke in a voice filled with guilt.
“Do that. I feel sorry for Maria, but…”
Josef looked at me in surprise.
“I thought you would oppose it.”
“Josha, I am your empress. The Empress of Habsburg, not the Empress of Bourbon.”
If a regular army was being hard-pressed by a mere thousand rabble in red shirts, then wasn’t that a problem of will, not money?
“That effectively means control of the strait will pass over to the Italian side, but it can’t be helped.”
Hmm, should I say this or not?
I wasn’t going to say it in case it hurt his pride…
“Josha. If things are difficult, you know. It’s all right if you don’t give me the villa in the Tiergarten as a gift.”
“I told you there’s no need to worry. Thanks to the indemnity we received from Sardinia, we have some leeway.”
Josef concluded it as such and changed the subject.
“Then we will wrap up the schedule in Milan with this, and I will decide the matter of Maximilian after the London Expo. Until then, I’ll keep him in the post of governor-general. However, I will strip him of financial authority.”
“You’ve thought it through well. Max will come to his senses a little once his purse strings are cut.”
“Who are you writing a letter to?”
“The Prince of Wales. He sent me a letter saying he was leaving for Ireland.”
“The Prince of Wales? Why to you?”
“Don’t worry. Bertie is just bored. He was looking gloomy because he’s going to an army unit in Ireland for training soon.”
“The army? He’ll come to his senses if he goes there. But have you become close enough to call each other by nicknames?”
“He’s similar to me in many ways.”
“So what did you write?”
“I told him to be good to his father.”
“Not Queen Victoria?”
Mm, Josef ought to know this.
“Prince Albert’s complexion didn’t look good. It seemed like he covered it a little with makeup, but…”
How should I put it? Like the complexion of a cancer patient you see at the hospital.
As if telling me not to talk about another man any longer, Josef rose from the sofa and strode over to me, wrapping an arm around my waist as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
“Then shall we stop and go rest now?”
I poked his chest with my index finger and pushed him away.
“You know it’s forbidden starting today, don’t you?”
“Why?”
“Because I have to go to London.”
I told you, didn’t I? I’m going to the London Expo next year. Then, of course, I can’t get pregnant from now on.
“The Expo is next spring. There’s still more than half a year left.”
“If I get pregnant now, it means I won’t be able to go in the end.”
Josef muttered as if he felt wronged.
“We can just be careful.”
“How am I supposed to trust you?”
I smiled impishly and slipped into the bedroom.
Of course, I did not close the door. I knew he would come in anyway.