VIOLIN SHOP PROPRIETOR Didn’t I tell you he’s a traitor! It’s high treason!
BROCKHAUSEN The crowd is agitated and rightly thinks it is once again on the trail of Serb traitors.
FRIEDJUNG Isn’t it remarkable what a good nose the people have when they get wind of a plot against the inalienable territories represented in the Reichsrat. Unless I’m very much mistaken, documents relating to the Slovensky Jug plot for a Greater Serbia will be found in this hairdresser’s — the plot I started to uncover back in 1908.
BROCKHAUSEN It’s only the way it’s been done I find somewhat problematic.
CROWD Get him! Smash ’im to a pulp! Serbia — we’ll murder ’er!
FRIEDJUNG Perhaps it would be advisable, my dear Brockhausen, faced with this justifiably agitated violin shop proprietor, to make a wide detour around an obvious divergence from the historically proven fact that the Viennese population rejects the cheap and unsavoury patriotism of the howling mob.
CRIES FROM THE CROWD “What are those two Jews doing here?” “They look like they came from the Balkans!” “All they need is a kaftan!” “They’re Serbs!” “Serbs, both of them!” “Traitors!” “Give ’em a hiding!”
(The two historians duck into a doorway.)
(Change of scene.)
Scene 7
Kohlmarkt. Outside the revolving door at the entrance to Café Pucher.
OLD MAN BIACH (very agitated) The simplest thing would be to throw five divisions against Russia, that would soon settle it.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Obviously. Attack is the best defence. Look what the Germans have achieved. What drive! Their breakthrough in Belgium was unparalleled! That’s what we need.
BUSINESSMAN Tell me, what’s happening about your son?
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Exempt — that’s one worry less. But the way things are — the war situation — take it from me, it doesn’t look good out there. Something like that breakthrough in Belgium — some fresh offensive spirit — I’m telling you, that’s what we need—
BUSINESSMAN Give us Belgium down here and we’ll break through too.
INTELLECTUAL We need a Bismarck—
BIACH What good is diplomacy now? Let weapons talk! Can we expose ourselves to the risk of failure? If we don’t break through now—
GRUMBLER (wants to enter the café) Excuse me—
INTELLECTUAL I can see that. But doesn’t the flank attack take precedence as a strategic factor in open warfare—
HABERDASHER Oh you needn’t worry about that, they’re surrounded. Soffi Pollak told me herself.
BIACH Come off it! How can she know, tell me that!
HABERDASHER How? Hasn’t her husband been mobilized with the medical reserves in the Gartenbau?
HONORARY COUNSELLOR I thought he was exempt? Surrounded, that would be marvellous: you know it means we have them in a stranglehold.
BIACH (avidly) They should strangle them till they choke! I’d love to be there when they do!
HABERDASHER Klein will be — he’s in the War Press Bureau. Yesterday he wrote that they’ll bleed them white. He won’t loosen his grip until they do.
BUSINESSMAN What luck to be right in the thick of it! Tell me about this War Press Bureau, sir. Do you only get in if you’re unfit for active service, or if you’re fit?
GRUMBLER Excuse me — (They make way.)
HABERDASHER What do you mean, fit? Anyone who can write can get in if he doesn’t want to shoot, but wants the shooting done by others.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR How d’you mean? Why doesn’t he want to shoot, softhearted?
HABERDASHER No, hardheaded. You can’t be softhearted in the army, and being in the War Press Bureau is as good as being in the army.
BIACH This War Press Bureau must be wonderful! You can see everything. It’s right up close to the front, and the front is where the battle is, so Klein will be almost in the battle and see everything without being in danger.
BUSINESSMAN They always say you see nothing at all on a modern battlefield. So in the War Press Bureau you actually see more than if you’re in the battle itself.
INTELLECTUAL Yes, up to a point, and you can even report on several fronts at once.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR It was Klein who wrote that fascinating press report about how most wounds on our side were superficial ones to hands and feet, from which he deduced that the Russians prefer flank attacks—
HABERDASHER He’s no Roda Roda, that’s for sure! A lot of water will flow under the Dnieper’s bridges before he can write like Roda Roda!
HONORARY COUNSELLOR The thing I like most about Roda Roda is that he’s so full of dash. Says he’s going to observe the battle on the Drina next day, and observe it he does. Class act!
BIACH No two ways about it, once an officer, always an officer — unmistakable, the esprit de corps! My son may be exempt, but is still very interested, he even wants to subscribe to the Streffleur.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR I can’t help but feel very pessimistic.
BIACH What do you mean, pessimistic? In Lemberg we’re still holding on, can you ask for more than that?!
BUSINESSMAN Proves my point!
INTELLECTUAL There’s no cause for pessimism. If it were to be decided right now, at worst it would be a draw.
HABERDASHER And I can tell you — I even have it from a man in the Ministry — it’s virtually all over. We move in from the right, the Germans from the left — a pincer movement, till they choke to death.
HONORARY COUNSELLOR Sounds fine — but what about Serbia?
BIACH (savagely) Serbia? What about Serbia? We’ll brush it aside!
HONORARY COUNSELLOR I don’t know — I can’t help feeling — today’s bulletin — you have to read between the lines, and if you look at the map — even as a mere layman — I can prove to you that Serbia—
BIACH (irritated) Let Serbia go hang, Serbia is a sideshow. Enough already! Let’s go in, I’ll be interested to see what the Ministers have to say today — I suggest, gentlemen, we sit at the table next to theirs. (They go in.)
(Change of scene.)
Scene 8
Suburban street. A milliner’s shop, a Pathéphone record shop, the Café Westminster, and a branch of the cleaners Söldner & Chini. Enter four young men, one of them carrying a ladder, strips of paper, and paste.
FIRST Here’s another one! What does that say? Salon Stern, Modes et Robes. Paper the whole thing over!
SECOND Yes, but we could leave the name, and what kind of shop it is. Here, let me. Watch. (He pastes and reads) “Sal Stern Mode.” That’ll do — it’s German now. On to the next.
FIRST Patephon, look, what’s that? Is that French?
SECOND No, it’s Latin, that can stay. But what’s that there: “German, French, English, Italian, Russian, Hebrew music”?
THIRD What should we do?
FIRST It has to go, all of it!
SECOND No, let’s try this (He pastes and reads): “German — Hebrew music.” That’ll do.
THIRD But what have we here? Look at that! Café Westminster. That’s surely English, isn’t it!
FIRST Yes, but we’d better check with them first. It’s a coffeehouse, the owner might be some celebrity and we’d be in trouble. Let’s get him out here. Wait a minute. (He goes in and returns at once with the proprietor, who is visibly alarmed.) You see the point, don’t you? — a patriotic sacrifice—