STORIES, AFTER EIGHT

III

Sometimes, when Baltazzi is sitting alone, he finds himself thinking about how he was forced into his retirement. It’s not something he likes to dwell upon, but it’s always there, at the edge of his mind like a nagging, persistent, doubt. He tries not to feel sorry for himself either, but then, life hasn’t always been fair, has it? And who said life was supposed to be fair, he wonders? His sister died three years after her own daughter died. It wasn’t suicide, like some were saying; he believes it’s because she gave up. She let herself become overwhelmed with everything that happened—to her, and around her—that who could blame her, he asks himself? There’s no other word he can think of to describe it, because he knows that life can be overwhelming at times.

What he calls his previous life—his once upon a time nightmare of a life—was a life filled with financial chaos, that involved international land speculation; stocks, bonds, commodities, and investing. He worked fourteen, sixteen, sometimes eighteen hour a day; and his six day work week, was quite often, seven. The world was expanding back then—and it still is, he tells himself with the self assurance of one of life’s nominal bystanders—but the difference is that back then, he thrived on it. Today, even though he doesn’t understand the world around him, or where it’s going, he simply strives to hold on. He once basked in the glory of his success, as much as he despaired in the shortfalls of those around him. Now...now his days are filled with leisure time, and there’s far too much time for him to think, he tells himself as he stands up and pours himself yet another cognac. He looks at the glass and tells himself he should get a bigger one.

The past isn’t there for a man to dwell on too much, he tells himself. He takes a sip of the cognac and looks at the clock standing against the far wall. He listens to the steady ticking of the clock, telling himself that he can hear the seconds ticking away through every part of the house; just like he can hear his heart beating in time—ticking away at the seconds of his life, he thinks. Many nights he’s awakened out of a deep slumber, searching through the darkness for the familiar sound of the clock. That’s when he tells himself the anger he’s suppressed over the years could well boil over into his reality one day, instead of remaining as part of his dreamscape. And then he hears his heart beating a steady tattoo inside his chest, and it reminds him that time is counting itself down.

God protect us should that day ever come, he tells himself as he sits down again. He looks at his cigar sitting in the ashtray beside him and thinks how one day he might say something that could be harmful to the future of the girls. Since marrying the Countess ten years ago, his life has revolved around the girls—all three of them. He picks up the cigar and strikes a match, sucking the flame into the cigar’s end. That’s where his new-found patience has come in to play of late; he thinks the past is something better left behind him whenever he feels those thoughts creeping up on him.

Perhaps that’s why I like being surrounded by my books, and paintings?

He only thinks about the past when he’s alone, waiting, and he knows the future has a trip to Vienna in store for him. He’d much rather stay away from Vienna, but he knows there are times when he’ll have to make small sacrifices for the sake of the girls. Life has a way of being unfair, he reminds himself as he takes another drink of his cognac. But has it really been unfair to me, he wonders?

Baltazzi tries to fill up his days with things he never had the time to do before; things he would’ve never considered in his previous life. He raises horses now, for one thing; it’s something he’s wanted to do since childhood—own a horse—but he was never allowed to because his father saw no practical profit in it. Horses are work animals, not pets, his father told him. What does being practical have to do with raising horses? he wonders. He spends his mornings in the stables, helping the grooms, pitching hay, and shovelling manure before he goes out riding along the shores of lake Belaton. He enjoys riding; he lets his mind slip between the shore and the tall reeds of the lakeside; he relishes the idea of riding through the wide open fields, the muddy trails, and stopping to enjoy one of his thick Havana cigars. It’s one of life’s simple pleasures, he’s discovered, riding the trails and small hills of the estate. He likes the freedom of the gallop; the smell of the horse underneath him; and the sight of the distant azure mountains. He enjoys the openness of the green, verdant fields, watching the endless sway of open faced sunflowers, and the gentle rolling grasses of the steppes where the wind brushes up against it like a man petting his dog. Once, he would’ve invited friends along to his estate in Tyrol for hunting parties, but he finds himself enjoying his newfound solitude. Besides, his friends no longer call on him, and if it’s something that plays on his mind, it’s something easily forgotten out there.

He enjoys feeling the warmth of the rising sun as it breaks over the distant hills, relishes the sight of it, and has often paused to watch the sun come up over the southern most strand of the distant Vienna Woods. He’s seen the trees flourish with the colours of the approaching seasons—and taken delight in the cool morning breeze as it washes over him like a refreshing cordial. For the first time in his life, he’s seen the mists steam up out of the forests and collect into a fog. He’s found himself listening for the sounds of the cuckoos in the trees around him; watching the herons and the ducks sweep across the sky, and feeling at peace with himself, and his life.

This is a place made for reflection, he thinks as he sips his cognac, and reminds himself that fifteen years ago he would’ve never thought to pause and watch the sun rise. The sunrise was something to be taken for granted in his youth. And always, whenever he sits alone and finds himself reflecting on what was, or what might’ve been, he thinks about his first wife, and how she would’ve never taken a sunrise for granted.

During the course of his days, Baltazzi finds himself spending his afternoons here—in this room—either reading, or else composing letters. There was a time when he thought he might put pen to paper—for the sake of posterity, he reminds himself. But who’d want to read what I have to say, he had to ask himself. Were there any earth shattering events in my life that I was responsible for? Did I sin against man, or humanity itself? He once had hopes he’d be remembered as a great diarist, or maybe a journal writer, but it was a thought he dismissed as quickly as the entries he wrote. When he read the words he wrote, he realized the entries appeared arrogant, and conceited, condescending with its narration, and he told himself he didn’t want to remembered that way. That’s when he began to realize he wasn’t the man he once was; the man in the past he left behind wasn’t him, but another man, from another time. It was as if his previous life was a sham, full of futility and idleness, he told himself, or maybe it was the embarrassment of riches? He’d never been embarrassed by his wealth before, it had always been a great comfort to him, but in riding about the countryside, and seeing how others had nothing, and how they lived, he wondered just what it was he was supposed to have given up? He was supposed to be the living example of a man who suffered for the sins of his family, but where was the sin, and where was the suffering, if not in one’s own mind?

There was a time—a long time ago, he’s quick to remind himself—when we were one of the most powerful families in the Empire. I’m Aritstide Baltazzi, I used to say. Second generation banker. We were direct competitors to the House of Rothschild. My father controlled the European banking centre and helped Franz Josef rebuild Austria after the revolution. He carved out his own banking empire as Franz Josef brought Austria into the modern age. It really was an Age of Expansion, wasn’t it—with everything moving from kingdom to Empire? He proved himself quite the ambitious man, my father did.

All that changed with Mayerling. The Baltazzi family holdings took an abrupt nose dive. It was his niece killed by Rudolf in what the official reports were calling a terrible hunting accident. With the press unable to report the truth, Baltazzi made certain the truth came out, telling the story of the murder/suicide to a brash American newspaperman in Berlin—igniting a majestic scandal worldwide. The Emperor needed someone to blame. Never thinking it might be his own son’s failure to deal with whatever issues confronted him, as far as the Emperor was concerned, it was his son who was murdered and the mistress who took her own life. Inconsolable about his loss, angry, and embarrassed, Franz Josef struck out at the only man he felt should be held responsible—someone had to be held accountable at the very least—and he set out to destroy the Baltazzi family empire. Franz Josef succeeded to such degree, that Baltazzi’s sister died of a broken heart just three years later.

His first wife died five years later, in 1893, giving birth to Annette. If he was a lesser man, he might’ve blamed the Emperor for his wife’s death. He wouldn’t allow himself to stoop to such levels and be the bitter man who blamed others for his tragedies. Women died giving birth all the time. It was a fact of life, and only God could answer the questions that haunted those who were left behind—just like there are people who kill themselves, everyday, a part of him reminds himself.

Baltazzi still has lands, and has accumulated a vast amount of wealth over the years; and now he has his prized stallions. A man of his ambition always has secret bank accounts with extra millions no one knows about, or suspects; vaults with hidden deeds to properties acquired years ago, and held on to with the thought of retirement in mind.

When Baltazzi decided it was time to remarry, he found himself enamoured, as he liked to say, of a certain Hungarian Countess: Econstanza Burien. It had been five years since his wife died. The Countess claimed to be a direct heir of the Metternich name, but had lost a large fortune with the economic failure in 1898. People still held her name in good standing, but more important than that, was her spotless reputation at Court.

The love that formed with Baltazzi and the Countess was more than just the creative by-product of a mutual arrangement—after all, she needed his wealth to survive, as much as he needed her good name to assure his daughter’s future—but at the same time, he thought of the love she had for him as more than a signing bonus. He graciously accepted her debts, as well as a household that included two daughters, and three personal secretaries; there was a chef, a gardener, a chauffeur, and thirteen cleaning staff as well. The only possession he brought with him besides his properties, his millions, and his horses, was Annette. Baltazzi kept the cleaning staff, the chef, the gardener, and the chauffeur, but dismissed the three secretaries. He said he would handle the estate’s finances from now on.

Over the next years, the family enjoyed winters in Tyrol; skiing, skating, and sledding from one social function to another; in the summertime, they returned to the estate the Countess had along the shores of lake Belaton outside of Badascony, where they enjoyed the hot springs, and made the occasional sojourn north, to Vienna.

Baltazzi used to enjoy his trips out to Vienna; it gave him time for peaceful speculation, as much as it gave him time to be alone with his wife. There was a day when they’d make the trip in three different carriages—with himself and the Countess in the lead, the girls following behind, and their baggage coming last. But now, with the modern world encroaching, it was possible to make the trip in a matter of hours, instead of the days it took by carriage. There were no more stopovers at wayside inns; no more leisurely hours spent reading, composing letters, or just sitting with the Countess as she distracted herself with her needlepoint.

With the automobile, the world has closed in on itself, he thinks as he takes another sip of his cognac. He finds himself growing nostalgic for the way life used to be—even though his personal investments include more modern inventions like the light bulb, the gramophone, and the automobile—that doesn’t mean he looks to the future with the same anticipation the girls cling to.

He finds the roads they travel are too dusty during the summer months, the heat stifling, and choking. The ruts of a thousand different carriages have worn the narrow lanes into a crisscrossing surface like spiders’ webs. During the spring thaw, the roads are thick with mud, and the journey is no faster than it was by carriage. But the Countess insists on taking the automobile to the city because she doesn’t want to be looked at as being behind the times. There’s an assumed sophistication that comes with owning an automobile; a richness of bearing that needs no explanation, and for the Countess, this is an important point for capturing a husband for her girls.

She used the same feminine wiles on me, he thinks, taking another drink and smiling to himself.