The Left-Handed God (7 page)

Franz did not thank him for his effort.

By then, he knew that he was in Mannheim, the residential capital of His Serene Highness, Karl Theodor, Margrave of Bergen op Zoom, Duke and Count Palatine of Pfalz-Sulzbach, Duke and Count Palatine of Pfalz-Neuburg, and Elector of the Holy Roman Empire.

The fact that Franz did not speak bothered the doctor enough to bring in his colleagues again. They stood over him, tormenting him for days by poking around in his mouth, squeezing his neck, and assigning him all sorts of speech exercises. In the end, the verdict was that the blow to his head must have deranged something in his brain. One of the learned men seemed to think that his intelligence had been destroyed, or at least severely damaged, and that he was an imbecile who should be given a pension. This, Franz knew not to be true, though he made no effort to disabuse him.

He reached his twenty-first birthday a cripple who could no longer speak normally.

His wounds did not affect his ability to write, and one of his military visitors, the same one who had brought him his decoration and a letter of congratulation signed by General Luszinky himself, suggested that Franz should write to his family. This, Franz declined by shaking his head. Lieutenant Killian offered to write for him, and again Franz shook his head.

But his mother and sister heard of his fate anyway. Letters arrived, which Lieutenant Killian gave to Franz. Franz opened and read these when he was alone and immediately tore them into little pieces. He did this not because they made him angry‌—‌they were quite loving epistles, especially his sister’s‌—‌but because they shamed him. He was not the Franz they remembered, believed in, and expected to return to them. He was an altogether different man, one he did not yet know completely but whom he already despised.

His odd behavior lent credence to the opinion of the physician who had thought him an imbecile. Franz glowered at everyone, miserable in the knowledge that an imbecile was at least blessed with ignorance about his condition. He was haunted, sometimes to the point of madness, by what he had become.

He was haunted more by what he had done.

Another parson sat beside him one afternoon, a thin black figure haloed by the golden light of the afternoon sun in the window, and said, “I am told that your father was also a servant of the Lord. You must find great comfort in that.”

Franz turned away his head. After a moment, the parson sighed, patted his arm, and left.

They had raised his rank to second lieutenant‌—‌a small and meaningless gesture, since he was unfit for duty. In that at least, Franz found comfort.

Some aspects of his condition gradually improved, while others deteriorated. The pain lessened, and he got stronger until he could sit up, and look out of the window at the slowly greening trees. He sat for hours doing that. Lieutenant Killian brought him books. When Franz refused them, he offered to read to him. Franz refused that also, and Killian sighed and decided to pen a short letter to Franz’s mother.

He asked, “Shall I tell them that you feel better?”

Franz looked back at the trees and nodded.

“Shall I say that you miss them and hope to see them soon?”

Franz did not answer that.

Killian said, “I think I shall. They will expect it, you know. You don’t want to hurt them, do you?”

Franz shook his head.

“Good. I shall say that you are thinking of them fondly and counting the days.”

One day Franz sorted through his possessions in a small trunk. Somehow, these had been dispatched after him, or with him‌—‌he could not be certain because he had had no desire to look at them before. There was not much. His uniform‌—‌the one he had not worn into battle, a small case containing his razor, comb, soap, and scissors, his decoration, the papers certifying his new rank, a few letters from his mother or Augusta that had escaped his destruction, and one letter that did not belong to him. This letter was fairly thick and stained with a brownish spot on one corner. Franz turned it in his hands and was mystified. It was addressed to someone called Friedrich von Loe, but there was neither a city nor a street. Surely whoever had packed his things had made a mistake. Eventually he put the letter with the others and relocked the trunk.

To Franz’s irritation, the kind Lieutenant Killian came regularly and wrote what he thought a loving son should tell his family, and when he was done, he would read the letter to Franz and look at him with pity and friendship, thinking, no doubt:

There but for God’s Grace, go I!

If Franz had ever had divine grace, he had certainly lost it. As his physical health improved, he was forced to confront who he was, and what his father, a saintly and gentle man, would think of him now. His self-disgust caused him to lash out with angry snarls at anyone who came near him at such times. Not even Lieutenant Killian was spared.

Then, one day Franz remembered the wounded captain. The next day, he asked Lieutenant Killian if he knew a Captain von Loe.

Killian, not used to being spoken to by Franz, was immediately eager to be of use. No, he did not know the name. Could he write it? Franz did. Had von Loe been at Freiberg? Franz nodded.

“W-w-ounded. N-not s-s-sure if a-a-…” Franz choked.

“You want me to find out if he survived?”

Franz nodded.

Killian left happily. He had finally established communication with his difficult patient. He asked everyone among the military staff in Mannheim and then mailed letters to Vienna and Munich. The answers were disappointing. Captain von Loe had indeed died at Freiberg.

Franz was saddened by it. The young captain’s voice been strong and his request fervent. His death left him with a letter to deliver. “H-his f-father? wh-where?” he asked Killian.

But this time Killian’s search brought forth no answer. No one by the name was known in or near Mannheim. Franz pondered this for a few days and eventually decided that he must be mistaken about von Loe’s home. He had been dazed and sick from the blow to his head. It was a wonder he remembered anything at all. In any case, it would have to wait until he was well.

His first struggle to stand‌—‌an effort that brought back an almost forgotten physical agony‌—‌also opened a mental wound. He had to come to grips with his deformity, the misshapen and awkwardly bent leg that could not be hidden in stockings and tight knee breeches. He was a freak in a world that valued physical beauty.

Though he was still doing his best to avoid communication with the living, he could not escape the dead so easily. They came to him at night and haunted his dreams of childhood. His father would look with his blue eyes at the boy Franz, who had drummed too hard and too long on his little drum, and say gravely, “Careful, son, or you may lose your head.” And little Franz, in his Christmas Day finery, would answer, “I’m not afraid, Papa,” and drum some more. Papa would shake his head and keep shaking it until it flew away, a white-haired cannonball, and Franz would stumble around, searching among the bodies of the dead for his father’s head. When he finally found it, his father’s head perched on the body of the Prussian captain, who attacked him with a bloody sword. He would wake up screaming and lie, drenched in sweat, wondering if he would have killed his father or if his father would have slain him.

Not all the dreams were the same, of course. Sometimes his father wore a hussar’s uniform and rode a big black horse, and Franz would raise his bare hands and cry, “Don’t kill me! It’s me, Franzerl.” And sometimes, most dreadful of all, he fought and killed Prussian soldiers who changed into Carl, the drummer boy, before he could stop himself. Then, when he went to kneel beside the boy’s severed head to ask his forgiveness, he saw that he was looking down at his own face.

Speculum Hominis.

*

The city of Mannheim was laid out in a neat grid within the heavy fortifications that guarded the confluence of the Rhein and Main rivers. The palace of the Electors of Kurpfalz dominated the city as the cultural hub of the principality and strove mightily to equal Versailles.

This night, in a steady, drizzling rain, carriages and sedan chairs waited outside the
Hoftheater
adjoining the palace. They carried away those who had attended the latest production of
Olimpie
, M. Voltaire’s tragedy, written specifically for Their Most Serene Highnesses, Karl Theodor and Elisabeth Augusta.

It was close to midnight. One man, in a dark cloak and gold-trimmed cocked hat, emerged from a side door of the
Hoftheater
and hurried past a waiting carriage when its door opened and a familiar voice summoned, “
Herein
!”

The man inside was a power at court, and the pedestrian was the assassin.

The great man clearly did not relish the meeting. He looked as if he had bitten into a lemon and wished to get this over with as quickly as possible.

“You botched it,” he informed the assassin coldly as soon as he had climbed in and closed the door. “The letter exists.”

“That cannot be, my lord. I made certain. Captain‌—‌”

“No names or titles!” snapped the other.

“Your pardon, sir. I’m a good shot, and I made sure afterward. He was dead. I searched him. Then I searched his quarters. There was nothing.”

“He was able to pass it to another before he died.”

The assassin drew in his breath sharply. He had thought himself safe. Months had passed without news. He had assumed that the unknown Austrian officer had been killed and the letter destroyed on the battlefield. “I don’t understand. How can this be?”

“Because of your slovenly work. And don’t doubt for a moment that your life is lost if you cannot correct the mistake.”

The assassin did not doubt it and found that his knees were shaking. He said fervently, “You may count on me, sir. It’s a matter of pride and honor. I did not miss last time, and I shall not miss this time. And this time, I shall make sure I get the letter.”

The great man snorted. “Oh, no. This time there will be nothing to trace this back to us. We know who has the letter, no thanks to you. By a stroke of luck, he talked to one of the officers in the hospital. The patient wanted to know what had happened to a wounded man who had given him a letter for his father. The officer asked around and, by another lucky chance, I overheard him.” He paused to let his heavy sarcasm register. “Fortunately, the man has no idea what he carries. You will get the letter, and this time without using violence and without making him suspicious. But under no circumstances will you approach him here in Mannheim.”

“N-not approach him?”

“He will be leaving shortly. His name is Franz von Langsdorff. He will travel by post to Lindau Tuesday next. You will follow or join him and get the letter in such a way that he doesn’t realize its importance.”

The assassin bit his lip. How much good luck did they hope for? “What if he delivers the letter before he leaves Mannheim?”

“He won’t. No one by that name lives here.”

Apparently luck was still with them, but the assassin did not trust it for a minute. “Might he not throw it away then? Or open it to get more information?”

The great man stamped his foot. “Curse you for an incompetent knave! You will make sure he doesn’t or suffer the consequences. Don’t contact me until you have it.” He did not trouble with farewell courtesies as he opened the door.

The assassin meekly descended into the rainy night and watched the coach drive away.

It was a difficult assignment. A shot from a distance was simpler and safer, but his livelihood depended on the people he served and he was obliged to play it their way. They had given him a second chance when he had no right to expect one.

4

The Journey Home

“Do you think,” said Martin, “that sparrow-hawks have always eaten the pigeons they came across?”

“Yes, of course,” said Candide.

“Well,” said Martin, “if sparrow-hawks have always possessed the same character, why should you expect men to change theirs?”

Voltaire, Candide

R
egardless of how much he wished to delay facing his family, Franz had to leave the hospital in Mannheim. By April, he had protracted his departure past all tolerance. He was the last of the wounded officers from the recent war, and the doctors had declared him fit and washed their hand of him. So he shaved off his mustache and put on his old uniform again, dressing with some difficulty because his breeches would not buckle around the deformed right knee and his boot pinched the barely healed leg.

With the uniform and boots gone, the trunk was nearly empty. He decided to abandon it in favor of a light satchel for a clean shirt, shaving kit, letters, and decoration. The undeliverable letter from the dead captain he tossed away at first. But after a moment, he picked it up again and shoved it into his right boot where the leather bit into his crippled leg. Then he took up his crutches, flung the satchel over his shoulder, and made his slow way to the post station inn
Der Goldene Pflug
where he paid for his coach fare to Stuttgart.

He hated the pitying looks and questions from the passengers and reacted by glowering and ignoring their questions and offers of help. After a while, they left him alone.

The coach traveled south along the Neckar River, through Heidelberg and Heilbronn. Whenever they approached a station, the
postilion
blew his horn, and people came to welcome passengers and mail. In Heidelberg, the old capital of the Kurpfalz, the blackened ruins of the castle loomed large above the city where Franz had spent carefree student years. The castle had been sacked and burned by the French in another war, but the swaggering university students he saw from the coach window were innocent of ugly thoughts of battles and casualties.

In Stuttgart, capital of the dukes of Württemberg, Franz had to spend the night before buying a seat in another coach to Ulm.

A cold rain was falling when he climbed out of the coach in Ulm. The posting inn, called
Goldener
Adler
, stood in the shadow of the looming cathedral. Three beggars huddled against the inn’s wall, stretching their hats and hands toward the travelers who hurried past them through the rain.