Monsieur Étienne Dekobra - Your Host
Please permit me to introduce myself
“Bon Soir, good-evening, Messieurs-Dames.
“Please permit me to introduce myself: I am Étienne Dekobra, a dealer in fine art with galleries in Paris, Berlin and Constantinople. Because I’m a frequent traveler in the Orient-Express, I feel somewhat like a host this evening.
“Our real host, Monsieur Commault, Chef de Train of the International Sleeping Car Company, is far too busy just now to engage in any more than perfunctory conversation with his passengers. However, I know many of these people, if not actually, at least by reputation. And so, I hope you’ll permit me to tell you something about them. A few are more than casually interesting and they represent a fair cross-section of European ‘society’, plus a few Americans – there are always a few Americans, aren’t there?
“When I say ‘European society’, I don’t want you to think I mean millionaires or royalty, although there are plenty of those about to board this train. By ‘society’ I mean people at many levels within the nations they represent, because we can never be sure exactly where certain passengers in this train might be found in Europe’s social hierarchy. The train’s crew make no judgements, accepting each person at face value, even though they may recognize someone using an ordinary name to be a grand-duke traveling incognito, or a quietly dressed, well-spoken ‘lady’ may be traveling alone for the purpose of bestowing intimate favors upon another passenger to whom she isn’t married. As long as her ticket is valid and she has her own compartment, no questions will be asked. It is, after all, an all-first-class train, its tickets conveying important expectations – and assurances – of utter discretion.
“Of course, most of these passengers are perfectly straightforward people who are exactly who they claim to be. Others may offer ambiguous identities. Some, it may seem, are more than one person. Others … well, we can’t be entirely sure who they are. Lord and Lady Northhampton, over there, are exactly the people they claim to be: members of the British peerage, a marquess and marchioness in fact, sharing that exalted rank of nobility perched just below a duke. One may say ‘perched’ in English? It’s a funny word, isn’t it? And, of course, his lordship and her ladyship will be changing for dinner. It’s expected every evening of Orient-Express passengers.
“And what of the others? We can be virtually certain that, on every run of the Orient-Express there’s at least one if not several spies working for various intelligence services and, often, for two or even three. I recognize a gentleman on the platform behind me – the one consulting his pocket watch. He claims to be a banker. I know differently because I know who pays him for the information he claims to gather in Turkey but which I know comes from London and Brussels. Such carefully masked intelligence sources can be vital to interested people in – for instance – Saint Petersburg or Paris.
“As for me, I’ll be alighting in Vienna this time. I’m on my way to meet a young Austrian painter by the name of Oskar Kokoschka. I’ve heard good things and bad things about his work, but it’s created enough of a stir to cause me to feel I ought to see it for myself before too many other dealers conspire to elevate his prices beyond reach. Anyhow, it’s always exciting to discover an important new talent – if that’s what he is – before the whole world knows him and collectors are queuing up impatiently to buy his canvases.
“So, I’ll hope to see you en route, perhaps in the dining car at breakfast-time. I have to say that I’m a bit troubled by the news I heard a few minutes ago from our chef cuisinier. He told me that the heir to all of the thrones of the Austro-Hungarian empire was assassinated this morning at Sarajevo, in Bosnia. No one else on this platform seems to have heard about it. I’m afraid it could turn out to be quite serious, if it’s true. Still, it may be nothing more than a silly rumor.”
THE VIENNA TIMES
29 June 1914
His Most Serene Imperial and Royal Highness the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot on the morning of the 28th of June in Sarajevo. Having been gravely wounded, he died soon afterward.