“Prince Nicolas Eszterhazy, Baron Wlassics, Count Emil Széchényi and I went there. The Cardinal Primate declined at the last moment.” “How could you bring yourselves to such a step?” “Our intention was to check Károlyi’s machinations, to obtain the resignation of the King, and to persuade his Majesty to stand aside temporarily. At first the King wouldn’t listen to reason. He said he had taken the oath to the Hungarian people; if others wanted to break their oath towards him, let them arrange that with their conscience; he was not going to perjure himself. We explained to him that as he had already transferred, alas, his supreme command to Károlyi, he would safeguard the interests of poor Hungary and of the dynasty better by standing aside during the period of transition, than by hanging on obstinately to his formal right. By this he might frustrate the attempt of those who are fishing in troubled waters to force the nation to face the _fait accompli_ of a deposition by violence. The King stamped his foot and declared several times that whatever might happen he would not stand aside. We explained the advantages of the step from various points of view, and at last made him understand that after the mistakes that had already been made, no other solution was possible. Wlassics edited the document, but we couldn’t make a final draft because no foolscap paper could be found in the whole castle. We sent out for some paper. Then there was no ink, and we had to search for a pen. Time passed, and meanwhile the King went out shooting....” “Went out shooting!” The whole tragedy seemed to be becoming a burlesque. “Yes, we were rather shocked,” said Dessewffy. “But later on we found that there was not a scrap of food in the castle, and the King had to obtain game so that the Queen and the children might not starve. It is all very sad. Their clothes too were left behind in Vienna. When they left Schönbrunn they just threw a few things hurriedly into the car. The children have no change of clothes. They even had to sleep for several nights without bedclothes. It’s no good sending messages to Vienna: the Government Council, which has taken them under its protection, does not even answer.” I thought of the Austrian and Czech nobles, so favoured by the Hapsburgs, of those, who, insisting on their rights based on the Spanish etiquette of older times, were mortally offended if at some festivity at the Vienna Burg they could not stand in the immediate vicinity of the Emperor, or were put by mistake into a position somewhat inferior to their rank. Where were they? Where was the ruler’s General Staff? The generals covered with orders? Where was the bodyguard with its commander, which “dies but never surrenders?” In the last days of Schönbrunn they all had withdrawn like the tide from the forsaken shore. “_Nous étions tout seuls_,” the Queen had said. “And then?” I asked Count Dessewffy.