MASH 09 MASH goes to Vienna

by Richard Hooker+William Butterworth

  “For reasons I cannot divulge, especially to a lousy civilian such as yourself, Doctor, the navy just doesn’t park its submarines on the surface in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, where any Ivan, Dmitri, or Sergei can get a good look at them.”

  “I don’t follow you,” Trapper John confessed.

  “In order to take somebody off the Satyriasis, Doctor,” the admiral said, somewhat haughtily, “you’d have to have something to put them on. Right?”

  “He’s got you there, Trapper,” Hawkeye said. “Go on, Admiral.”

  “And what that means is that there would have to be a rendezvous.”

  “I see what you mean,” Hawkeye said.

  “With a ship just as fast as the Satyriasis, so that they could run alongside each other and effect the transfer by breeches buoy.”

  “That’s that rope thing they hang a people-basket on?” Trapper asked.

  “Correct,” Admiral Saltee said. “Which means that the rendezvous ship would have to be as fast as the Satyriasis.’’

  “Tell me, Admiral,” Hawkeye said. “Why would it have to be a ship? I mean, why couldn’t the Satyriasis just pop up on top of the water long enough for a helicopter to pick people off?”

  The admiral looked stricken.

  “Impossible,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “It’s never been done before. Of course," he added, “the aircraft fleet aboard the Enterprise includes a passenger-carrier which is capable of carrying anybody anywhere.” He paused and took a deep breath. “We wouldn’t want the Kremlin to know, of course.”

  “Of course not,” Trapper John said.

  “My, isn’t this interesting?” Hawkeye said. “A pay phone in its own booth right here on the pier. What won’t Ma Bell think of next?” He stepped inside, deposited a dime, dialed the operator, and handed the phone to the Secretary of State. “If Whatsisname is slaloming down the hills, try the other guy in the bank,” he said.

  Thirty-five minutes later, a radiogram flashed out from the Pentagon.

  OPERATIONAL IMMEDIATE

  TO COMMANDING OFFICERS

  USS SATYRIASIS

  USS ENTERPRISE

  AT SEA

  USS SATYRIASIS AND USS ENTERPRISE WILL CHANGE COURSE AND PROCEED AT FLANK SPEED TO THE NEAREST SPOT AT WHICH A HELICOPTER TRANSFER OF THE FOLLOWING OFFICERS FROM SATYRIASIS TO ENTERPRISE MAY BE EFFECTED.

  JONES, LIEUT JG JOANNE PAULINE, USN

  WOODBURN-HAVERSTRAW, MIDSHIPMAN, ROYAL NAVY (TEMPORARY DUTY USN)

  ONCE TRANSFER TO ENTERPRISE HAS BEEN EFFECTED, ENTERPRISE WILL TRANSPORT NAMED OFFICERS BY PASSENGER CARRYING AIRCRAFT TO VIENNA, AUSTRIA. FOR YOUR INFORMATION, THIS OPERATION HAS BEEN ORDERED BY THE PRESIDENT AND COMMANDER IN CHIEF AT THE REQUEST OF THE SECRETARY OF STATE, WHO HAS INFORMED THE PRESIDENT AND COMMANDER IN CHIEF THAT HE WILL EXPLAIN LATER. CONSEQUENTLY, PLEASE DON’T ASK QUESTIONS, JUST DO IT.

  FOR THE COMMANDER IN CHIEF

  THE CHIEF OF NAVAL OPERATIONS

  Chapter Fifteen

  A small intimate “Welcome to Vienna” supper was to be given in the Drei Hussaren Restaurant, just off Karntnerstrasse, in Vienna’s inner city, by His Excellency Franz Schubert von und zu Gurkelhausen, deputy chief of protocol for the Austrian government.

  His Excellency Johannes Brahms von und zu Uberderbrücke, chief of protocol for the Austrian government, who had originally been scheduled to host the little supper, had been at the last minute assigned by His Excellency the Foreign Minister to attend to the needs of two visiting American politicians, and Franzl (Little Franz as he was known to his intimates) was, so to speak, thrust into the breach.

  Frankly, he was delighted. While he felt just a little sorry for his boss, getting stuck with a couple of American politicians, that was the way the schnitzel bounced. The bottom line was that he was to have the great pleasure and distinguished honor of hosting, on behalf of the Austrian government, not only the world’s greatest opera singer, Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov, but also certain members of the Maestro’s intimate entourage, who were, understandably, the creme de la crime of international society.

  There had been, since what His Excellency referred to as the “temporary restructuring of things,”* precious little opportunity to do things properly. He had spent most of his diplomatic career catering to the pedestrian whims of one trade delegation or another, or showing stumblefooted travel agents around the baroque palaces, castles and hunting lodges, in order that they would encourage uncouth hordes of tourists to visit quaint Austria, bringing with them thick folders of traveler’s checks.

  (*He referred to the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of World War I. Like most Austrians, especially bureaucrats and membets of what had been the nobility, he expected to wake up one morning soon to find the king-emperor back on the throne and things back to normal.)

  Franzl had nothing against hordes of free-spending tourists. It was just that he preferred the other Vienna, the Vienna of gentlemen in tails, ladies in floor-length dresses, with champagne flowing and the silver and crystal glimmering in the flickering light of a thousand candles, whilst violins throbbed hauntingly in the background.

  The tourists, and the trade delegates, in His Excellency’s experience, preferred to stand around Vienna’s famed, historic Ring (the broad avenue which circles the inner city) with a frankfurter* in one hand and a bottle of beer in the other, whistling at the girls.

  (* The familiar American delicacy known as the hot dog was actually invented in Europe, almost simultaneously in Frankfurt, Germany, and Vienna. A hot dog served in Vienna is known as a frankfurter; the same thing served in Frankfurt is known as a wiener, Wien being the odd way the Viennese insist on spelling Vienna.)

  Tonight was going to be different. Tonight it was going to be wine and roses.

  There had first been a priority intergovernmental memorandum from the Ministry of Culture. In Austria the Ministry of Culture is an important facet of government, not at all like its American counterpart, the President’s Council on the Arts, which ranks somewhere below the American Committee for Honesty in Government in influence.

  The Minister of Culture had informed the Minister of Foreign Affairs that long, hard work of his staff had succeeded in accomplishing what the Foreign Ministry had failed to do: Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov had agreed to forgive the Austrians for what he considered to be a slanderous review of his last performance published in the Wiener Kourier (Vienna Courier—the most important newspaper). He would sing again at the Vienna State Opera.

  The Minister of Culture wished to inform the Minister of Foreign Affairs that he had every confidence his colleague would see to it that the Maestro was received with appropriate honors and suitable fanfare, and that, so long as he chose to honor Vienna with his presence, the Foreign Ministry would see that the Maestro’s path would be, if not strewn with roses, than at least swept clean of the smallest pebble against which “Lieber Boris” might stub his toe.

  The Minister of Culture’s interest in the happiness of Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov was mingled admiration for his art and enlightened self-interest. In addition to having a set of pipes that were truly extraordinary, Maestro Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov was, in the quaint American phrase, boffo at the box office.

  All it took, any place in the world, was the slightest rumor that Boris was going to sing, and the box office of the local opera house was quite literally besieged by opera lovers (ninety percent of them female) fighting for the privilege of buying a seat, with price no object.

  So popular was the singer with members of the gentle sex that certain extra expenses were incurred whenever he performed. These included the “Korsky-Rimsakov Curtain,” a stoutly constructed device (cyclone fencing reinforced with steel bars) erected from the well of the orchestra pit to the top of the proscenium arch and designed to protect the singer (and other members of the cast) from the hail of heavy hotel keys, bouquets of flowers and items of intimate fem
inine apparel with which his fans bombarded him whenever he paused for breath. It also served to discourage his fans from leaping onto the stage. The best they could do was throw themselves at the curtain. It was easier to pluck them from the curtain like dead moths than it had been to chase them around the stage.

  It was also necessary to reinforce the security personnel, on the order of three-to-one, to protect the singer from his fans and his fans from each other. Other measures were also necessary.

  These extra expenses so disturbed the general manager of the French National Opera in Paris that he had, five years before, announced that a surcharge would be necessary for any performance of the man the French referred to as “Cher Boris.” A twenty-five-percent increase in the price produced not a complaint, and the French, who have a feeling for matters of this nature, upped it to fifty percent. When this, too, was accepted without a murmur from any of Cher Boris’ devoted female legions, it was increased to seventy-five percent, and then, finally, a new category of performances (“Performances Magnifique”) became part of French Opera tradition. A “Performance Magnifique” differed from a run-of-the-mill Performance Ordinaire only in that it included Cher Boris in the cast, and tickets cost exactly twice as much.

  It was shortly after the first season of Performances Magnifique that Mr. Korsky Rimsakov was declared by the president of the Republic, with the advice and consent (indeed, the cheering) of the Chamber of Deputies, a national treasure of the French Republic.

  The other major opera houses (Berlin, the Metropolitan, La Scala, Covent Garden, and, of course, Vienna) were quick to copy the Paris innovation of Performances Magnifique whenever Cher Boris could be prevailed upon to perform. But the singer seldom left Paris.

  “I don’t know what it is,” he once confided to a reporter from the Opera News (a publication of the Metropolitan Opera Guild), “the broads, or the booze or the chow, but there’s a certainly je ne sais quoi about Paris that makes me hate to leave.”

  The singer was originally scheduled to arrive from Paris by air, at Schwechat Airfield, but a last-minute cable had announced that he would, instead, arrive by train.

  “Ach, du lieber Gott!”* said the Minister of Culture to His Excellency Franz Schubert von und zu Gurkelhausen. “What if he has a sore throat?”

  (* Roughly, “Oh, my goodness!*)

  “Look for the silver lining, Excellency,” Franzl replied. “If he comes by train, he’ll arrive at the West Bahnhof. All those crazy women will be at Schwechat.”

  “Not crazy women, Franzl,” the Minister of Culture said. “They’re music lovers. Try to keep that in mind.”

  “Jawohl, Herr Minister,” Franzl said.

  “And find out why he changed his mind and came by train,” the minister said.

  Franzl got on the telephone and telephoned the Austrian Embassy in Paris. They didn’t have the information readily at hand but promised to find out just as soon as they could and sent it by telegram. The telegram arrived forty-five minutes before the train.

  TO HIS EXCELLENCY FRANZ SCHUBERT VON UND ZU GURKELHAUSEN

  DEPUTY CHIEF OF PROTOCOL

  FOREIGN MINISTRY

  VIENNA

  IT HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED BY CONTACT WITH THE ROYAL HUSSID EMBASSY HERE THAT MAESTRO BORIS ALEXANDROVICH KORSKY-RIMSAKOV WILL TRAVEL BY TRAIN BECAUSE HIS PARTY INCLUDES THE DOWAGER DUCHESS OF FOLKESTONE, WHO DISLIKES AEROPLANES, AND HER CONSORT, MR. ANGUS MACKENZIE, V.C. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION, THE SINGER WILL BE ACCOMPANIED BY HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS CROWN PRINCE, HASSAN AD KAYAM, AMBASSADOR EXTRAORDINARY AND PLENIPOTENTIARY TO THE REPUBLIC OF FRANCE AND TO THE COURT OF ST. JAMES’S. IN ADDITION, THE PARTY INCLUDES THE BARONESS D’IBERVILLE AND ESMERALDA HOFFENBURG, THE BALLERINA. THEY ARE TRAVELING ABOARD THE PRIVATE RAILWAY CAR OF THE PRINCE OF LUXEMBOURG.

  MAX SCHULTZ

  CHARGE D’AFFAIRES

  His Excellency Franz Schubert von und zu Gurkelhausen was ecstatic. It was going to be like the old days, private royal railway cars, a baroness, a dowager duchess, and a royal highness.

  He made a hurried call to the Drei Hussaren restaurant, telling them to shine up some extra candelabra and hire three more violin players. He then commandeered the last remaining limousines* at the local rent-a-car to carry the extra, unexpected, but most welcome noble guests.

  (* The word limousine is relative. The cars commandeered were, in fact, repainted Ford sedans which had seen previous service as staff cars of the United States Army in Germany.)

  And then he put on his stiff collar, his morning coat, his striped pants and his silk top hat and was driven to the West Bahnhof. The band was already in place, warming up. The red carpet had already been unrolled.

  And finally, around a bend, the train appeared. Franzl’s eyes watered. He hadn’t ever seen before a train with the flags of royalty snapping from the locomotive except in the movies.

  There hadn’t been time, of course, to learn the official national anthem of the kingdom of Hussid,* much less to rehearse the band in its performance, so Franzl, in his official role, was forced to make a snap decision.

  (*This was probably a good thing. "Guggle-Gotoil,” the Hussidian national anthem, is a monotone composition scored for two one-string guitars and the jawbone of an ass, which instruments were not in the hands of the Vienna Police Force Trumpet, Tuba, Xylophone and Bass Drum Marching Band.)

  “Play ‘The Sheikh of Araby,’ ” he ordered.

  “Jawohl, Excellency,” the bandmaster said and turned to his ensemble. “And uh one, and ah two ...” he began, raising his baton.

  The train slid smoothly into the station. And kept sliding. Instead of stopping where Franzl and the red carpet and marching band stood, it slid another hundred yards down the platform, shooting off clouds of steam.

  Then with Franzl in the lead, the welcoming party marched, at double time, down toward where the train had actually stopped. Franzl saw that the train had arrived somewhat sooner than the Maestro himself had anticipated. The Maestro, attired in a silk dressing gown, was on the observation car, a chicken leg in one hand, a bottle of champagne in the other. As Franzl watched, he shared the champagne, without benefit of glass, with a rather ruddy-faced gentleman wearing what Franzl thought at first was a skirt but quickly recognized to be a Scottish kilt.

  The band suddenly stopped playing, literally in midbeat. Franzl looked over his shoulder and saw that they were running in the opposite direction. He looked at the train. Sixteen flamboyantly robed Arabs, each clutching a submachine gun, had jumped from the stairs of the car preceeding the royal Wagon-Lits and taken up defensive position.

  Franzl, who understood that royal personages travel with a bodyguard, was terribly embarrassed. Then he was terribly confused, for as he watched, the bodyguard scattered toward the station itself, in visible terror.

  Then a motherly appearing woman descended from the stairs of the royal car. She had dog leashes in her hand, and Franzl logically concluded that she was a lady-in-waiting to Her Grace the Dowager Duchess of Folkestone. Dowager duchesses, in Franzl’s experience, had a rather universal (and somewhat revolting) habit of possessing small lapdogs, over whom they gushed and cooed until it was necessary to attend to certain natural functions, whereupon the little animals was turned over to some helpless underling for what was euphemistically referred to as “a walk.”

  As Franzl watched, the motherly lady got a good grip on the leash and gave a mighty heave. Franzl paled. What appeared to be a medium-sized, if somewhat skinny, black bear came down the steps, followed by what bore an extraordinary resemblance to a photograph he had once seen of a black Bengal tiger.

  The band meanwhile had gathered its courage and members (save one tuba player, who had climbed a lamp pole and was stuck there) together again and resumed the welcoming concert.

  According to protocol, to which science Franzl had devoted many hours of study, the national anthem of the senior visiting dignitary was played first, followed in turn by the national anthems of the others, in orde
r of their rank. The dowager duchess of Folkestone was the second ranking personage aboard the train. The band began to play “God Save the Queen.”

  The words, as everyone knows, go, “God save our gracious queen, Long may she reign supreme,” and so on.

  Suddenly, in the instantly recognizable voice of Boris Alexandrovich Korsky-Rimsakov, singing along, so to speak, at full volume came the words:

  “My country, ‘tis of thee, sweet land of liberty!”

  The motherly looking lady-in-waiting stiffened. Franzl was prepared for the to-be-expected British reaction to what, after all, was a parody of their national anthem. But what he expected was, at most, a typical British snort of disgust at the behavior of the barbaric Americans. What he got was a voice, slightly higher pitched, but every bit as loud as that of the Maestro.

  “Boris,” the lady bellowed, “knock that off! I told you I don’t think you’re funny!”

  Boris stopped in midsentence. There was a pause. “Sorry, Florabelle!” he shouted from the observation platform. “I got carried away!”

  The lady-in-waiting taking the animals, whatever they were, for a walk was obviously named Florabelle.

  “Frau* Florabelle,” Franzl said, bowing deeply. “Perhaps you would be good enough to tell Her Grace that I am here.”

  (*The term Frau is applied to married women and to women over a certain age whether or not they have landed a man. Fräulein is applied to young, unmarried women. There is no German equivalent for Ms.)

  “What did you call me?” she asked.

  “A thousand pardons,” Franzl said. This old biddy was a long way the far side of fifty, but if she wanted to insist on publicly proclaiming her unmarried status, far be it from Franz Schubert von und zu Gurkelhausen to call her anything but what she wanted. “Gnädies* Fraulein Florabelle...”