It was in 1885, when the Empress was about to depart upon one of her frequent journeys. “Her kind heart,” writes Countess Marie Larisch, “reproached her when she thought that her husband would perhaps be lonely during her absence.” So she inquired whether any of the ladies about her knew of any other lady who would be willing to “entertain” the Emperor while she was away, but could be trusted not to exercise any undue influence over him:—
“I mentioned several ladies” (Countess Marie continues) “who, I felt sure, would only be too delighted to console the imperial grass widower, but Aunt Cissi did not approve of them, and the matter dropped until she suddenly told me one day that she had discovered the right person in the actress Katrina Schratt, who was always considered to be more interesting off the Burg Theatre than on it.... People rather disapproved of Elizabeth’s attitude, but she was quite right in thinking well of the actress, who has, since the death of my aunt, proved herself to be a devoted friend to Francis Joseph.”
That, assuredly, sounds as improbable as anything in “The Martyrdom of an Empress.” An Empress sallying into the highways and byways to seek a guardian angel for the Emperor, and finally extracting one from the coulisses, and presenting her, with the result that she becomes the friend of the family as well as the Emperor, and the Emperor takes a continual delight in her society for thirty years—that, indeed, is an amazing picture, not to be accepted, even on Countess Marie Larisch’s authority, without corroborative evidence. But the story seems, nevertheless, to be literally true. The corroborative testimony is available, and shall be produced.
In the main, indeed, the Emperor’s attachment is as notorious as his marriage, and stands in as little need of proof. Frau Schratt at once became, and has ever since remained, a national institution—related to Court circles, though not exactly of them. It became the recognised thing that, when the Emperor went to Ischl, she should go to Ischl too; that she should have a cottage there, and that the Emperor should take tea at that cottage daily—entertained by Frau Schratt, but not by her husband, of whom one hears little, though it is understood that he was given an appointment which kept him usefully and profitably occupied at a distance from the tea-parties.
Nor was it at tea-time only that Francis Joseph was to be heard of at Frau Schratt’s domicile. He was occasionally an evening visitor as well; and one of his evening visits concluded with a dramatic incident. He had stayed into the small hours, and desired, in consideration for the feelings of others, to depart without disturbing the household. Being unaccustomed, however, to stealthy movements, he stumbled over the furniture and disturbed the cook, who, suspecting that a burglar had intruded, came courageously downstairs, attired in her nightgown, and carrying a bedroom candle. Her impulse was to scream, but Francis Joseph checked it. “Don’t you see that I’m the Emperor, you silly woman?” he said in a stage whisper. Whereupon the cook, profoundly loyal, but not knowing exactly what course of conduct a manual of etiquette would prescribe in the situation, fell on her knees at her Sovereign’s feet, and began to sing at the top of her voice: Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser!
Such was life in the early days of this interesting relationship, which settled down, as the years passed, into a very peaceable and comfortable domestic alliance. That there have never been any unfavourable comments is more, of course, than can truthfully be said. Rebellious members of the House of Habsburg, anxious to go their own amorous ways without reference to the Habsburg rules, have sometimes felt that the state of the affections of the head of the house gave them a handle, and have sometimes pulled that handle. If the Emperor flaunted his attachment to Frau Schratt, why should not the Archduke Leopold permit himself to love Fräulein Adamovics, and the Archduke John permit himself to love Fräulein Stübel—these ladies, at any rate, not being married women? So they have argued; and the former Archduke once, on a very dramatic occasion, brought the vials of the Emperor’s wrath down upon his head by calling him “Herr Schratt” to his face.
But Francis Joseph, being a strong man and a loyal friend, was not to be moved by such affronts, or turned from the path which he chose to pursue, by the fear of scandal; and presently there was a battle royal on the subject in the House of Habsburg. The Emperor’s daughters—the Archduchesses Valérie and Gisela—expressed themselves as scandalised and shocked, and conceived it to be their duty to wean their aged father, who was now more than seventy years of age, from the society which gave him so much pleasure. They so far succeeded that Frau Schratt left Ischl in a hurry for Brussels, and a wag braved the perils of lèse-majesté by inserting in the “agony colum” of the Neue Freie Presse an advertisement in conspicuous type, running: Katti, come back to your sorrowing Franz.
And she came back, albeit by a circuitous route, honourably attended, and in triumph. The first hint that she was about to do so appeared as exclusive information in the Paris Le Siècle:—
“Everyone in Austria knows of the affectionate relations which bind Frau Schratt, formerly of the Burg Theatre, to the Imperial Family. Some time ago Vienna learned with surprise that she was about to retire, and make a journey from Bavaria that would end in Rome. The journals soon after announced that she had come back from Rome, and that the Pope had given her a lasting benediction. Now it appears, though the affair is not yet wholly unveiled, that the Pope not only vouchsafed to Frau Schratt, who was accompanied by the Comtesse de Trani, sister of the late Empress, a paternal reception, but even yielded to pressing instances, supported by diplomatic action, in granting her prayer to declare the nullity of her marriage with Baron Kisch, by whom she has a son.”
Rumour added that these proceedings were only preliminary to the celebration of a morganatic marriage between the Emperor and the actress; morganatic marriages being, as is well known, contrivances for reconciling the human passion which over-rides the barriers of rank with that family pride which does not over-ride them. But rumour, for once, was wrong. A Berlin paper—the Lokal Anzeiger—sent its representative to ascertain what Frau Schratt had to say on the subject; and Frau Schratt opened her heart freely to the reporter, and, in doing so, supplied the confirmation of the story which we have quoted, with provisional scepticism, from Countess Marie Larisch. All this talk about her marriage with the Emperor, she said, was “nonsense.” Those who engaged in such talk knew neither her nor the Emperor. And then came the allusion, for which we have been looking, to the part played in the matter by the Empress:—