‘As I mentioned, Ludwig wasn’t
officially
the king at the time of his death. A few days prior, the Bavarian government had organized a medical commission to declare Ludwig insane. This gave them the authority to remove him from power. Amazingly, the doctor who had the final say in the matter had never met Ludwig before his ruling. Instead, he based his decision on conjecture and hearsay, not a personal examination.’
‘I’m not positive,’ Jones cracked, ‘but I think that goes against the Hippocratic oath.’
‘Don’t worry, David. The doctor ultimately got punished for his sins.’
‘How? Did they revoke his license?’
‘Actually, they revoked his life. He was murdered next to Ludwig.’
Jones smirked. ‘Really? It was the same doctor?’
Kaiser laughed at the irony. ‘Karma’s a bitch, ain’t it?’
‘More importantly,’ Ulster concluded, ‘it was the perfect way for the new regime to tie up loose ends. What’s that expression: killing two birds with one stone. Not only did they kill the rightful king, but they murdered the man who had effectively ended his reign.’
Payne rubbed his neck in thought, trying to remember how they had got onto this topic to begin with. That was the trouble with Petr Ulster. He knew so much and his stories were filled with so many details that it was tough to separate the wheat from the chaff. Thankfully, on this occasion, Ulster’s ‘bird’ metaphor helped to jumpstart Payne’s memory.
‘Speaking of birds, what does the black swan have to do with this?’
Ulster grinned, as if he suddenly remembered the point he had been trying to make. ‘During the course of his twenty-two-year reign, Ludwig quickly went through his family’s fortune. Whether donating large sums of money to the arts or giving lavish gifts to peasants he had met during his travels, Ludwig lived an extravagant life, one filled with luxury and indulgence. After a while, his spending was so out of control - particularly in the realm of architecture - that his advisors begged him to stop. They feared personal bankruptcy. But the eccentric king lived in a dream world, one in which his wishes were granted. As I mentioned earlier, Neuschwanstein is Ludwig’s most famous castle, a Romanesque fortress that looks like it was pulled off the pages of a fairytale, yet it was far from his most ambitious project. During a ten-year span, Ludwig built or planned over a dozen castles, including a few that would have made Neuschwanstein look like a cottage.’
‘Go on,’ Payne said, still waiting for his answer.
‘Towards the end of his reign, Ludwig started borrowing money from royal families across Europe. Not to pay back the fourteen million marks that he already owed, but to continue moving forward with his personal projects. Dreading the reaction of his finance ministers, Ludwig considered firing his entire cabinet and replacing them with yes-men. Ultimately he decided a mass firing would be attacked by the media, and the last thing he wanted to do was to lose the adulation of his citizens. So he opted to go in a different direction. Desperately broke but unwilling to stop his spending, he hatched a plan to find money from other sources. And let me assure you, it was crazier than Ludwig himself.’
Payne arched an eyebrow. ‘What was the plan?’
Ulster grinned. ‘He created the black swan.’
To this day, Ludwig is beloved throughout Bavaria. They still refer to him as
unser kini
, which means ‘our king’ in the Bavarian dialect. Ironically, Ludwig wasn’t a people person. He was a borderline recluse who spent most of his time in seclusion, whether at his home in the Alps or at one of his many palaces.
By most accounts, Ludwig was a strange man whose odd behaviour slowly worsened over time. Whether he was insane or eccentric at the time of his death depended on who was asked. Early in his reign, his conduct was considered peculiar but relatively harmless. For instance, his hair had to be curled every morning, or he wouldn’t eat his food - even if his favourite meal was served. A lover of animals, Ludwig once invited his favourite grey mare to dinner and insisted her food be served in the dining hall on the palace’s finest crockery. Not surprisingly, the horse ate the meal, then proceeded to smash everything to bits.
As early as 1868 - less than five years into his reign - Ludwig had become nocturnal. This wouldn’t have been an issue if he had worked the late shift at a factory, but it was problematic as king. On most days, he woke up at 7 p.m., had lunch at midnight, and enjoyed dinner around daybreak. When he was in Munich - a city he despised because he hated politics and felt as though he was under a microscope at all time - he spent many nights riding in circles at the court riding school. He picked a random city where he would rather be (for example, Berlin), then he calculated how many laps he had to ride in order to cover the equivalent distance. While imagining the journey, he would often stop at the halfway point to enjoy a picnic. Then he would pack everything up and continue riding until he reached his imaginary destination.
As a well-known pacifist, Ludwig was considered one of the worst military leaders in history. He referred to his officers as ‘clipped hedgehog heads’, and when he saw a tired-looking sentry outside his residence, he would order a sofa brought out to him. Despite his aversion to war, Ludwig thought he looked exceptionally handsome in his military uniform, so he wore it often. When he did, he liked having imaginary conversations with famous generals.
Unfortunately, this type of behaviour became more common towards the end. A strong believer in reincarnation, Ludwig once signed a letter ‘Louis’ and added ‘of our fifth reign’, possibly believing he used to be the king of France. Sometimes his servants would enter the dining hall and hear him having imaginary conversations with members of the French court. His admiration of Marie Antoinette was so extreme he had a statue of her placed on one of his terraces. Anytime he passed it, he would take off his hat and gently stroke her cheek. On occasion, he also liked to dress up as Louis
XIV
, who was known for his exaggerated walking style. In an attempt to imitate him, Ludwig would throw his leg out as far as he could reach, and then he would slam his foot down as if squashing a bug. He would repeat this process again and again, his footsteps echoing in the palace as he moved across the floor like a spastic giraffe.
Nevertheless, in spite of his antics, his enemies wouldn’t have acted so decisively if Ludwig’s biggest sin had been his eccentricities. As peculiar as he was, his behaviour probably would have been overlooked since it had never threatened the future of Bavaria.
But everything changed when he created the black swan.
Ulster explained. ‘One of the reasons Ludwig was such a popular ruler was because he never used government funds to build any of his castles. Instead, he drained his family fortune, spending hundreds of millions of marks on his projects. Ironically, even though it wasn’t his intent, Ludwig’s indulgence actually stimulated the Bavarian economy. Not only did he create thousands of jobs for labourers, but his money slowly trickled throughout the region, one peasant at a time. For many years, the only group that had a valid complaint about Ludwig’s spending habits was his family. After all, he was wasting their inheritance. But as luck would have it, he had only one sibling - his younger brother, Otto - and he was even crazier than Ludwig.’
‘Yeah,’ Jones joked, ‘how lucky can one guy get?’
Ulster instantly regretted his choice of words. ‘Obviously I didn’t mean he was blessed to have a crazy sibling. I meant lucky in terms of the hereditary monarchy. If Otto, his next of kin and potential successor, had been the least bit ambitious, he would have fought for Ludwig’s crown much earlier. And if he had won it, he would have controlled the purse strings. However, since Otto had been declared insane in 1875 - well before Ludwig had gone into debt and started borrowing large piles of money from outside sources - there was no one willing to challenge his authority. Not until he went too far.’
‘Let me guess,’ Payne said. ‘You’re talking about the black swan.’
Ulster nodded. ‘When the royal coffers began to run dry, Ludwig tried to raise funds for his projects through legal means. He asked the Bavarian finance minister to arrange a loan of seven and a half million marks from a consortium of German banks, which temporarily kept him afloat. But Ludwig realized the money wouldn’t last long, especially at the rate he was spending it. With that in mind, he went to the drawing board -
literally
went to the drawing board with a quill and ink - and designed the black swan. As you can see, Ludwig was a talented artist. He figured if he was going to start an organization, he might as well have some fun with it.’
Payne glanced at the symbol on the lid. Admittedly, it did have a certain flair. ‘What type of organization are you talking about?’
‘The secret kind.’
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning he didn’t want people to know about it.’
Payne growled softly. ‘Believe it or not, I know what
secret
means. I meant, what was the function of the organization?’
‘Sorry,’ Ulster said, blushing. He was so excited about the discovery, he was rambling more than usual. ‘Ludwig’s goal was to acquire funds through illicit means.’
Kaiser laughed. ‘He became a thief? That’s awesome!’
Jones was tempted to tease Kaiser, then thought better of it.
Ulster shook his head. ‘Not a thief, per se. More like the head of a new syndicate. Ludwig hatched a series of crazy schemes, then recruited his most loyal followers to carry them out. Unfortunately, most of his men realized that Ludwig was bonkers, so they only pretended to follow his orders - often with comic results.’
‘Such as?’ Jones asked.
Ulster thought of a good example. ‘After being turned down for a loan by a Rothschild bank, Ludwig decided to steal the money instead. Realizing his men might be recognized in Munich, he sent a group of his servants to Frankfurt to rob a bank there. Not soldiers, mind you, but
servants
- cooks, butlers, stable boys and the like. Obviously these men had no intention of robbing a bank, but all of them wanted a free vacation. With that in mind, the group went to Frankfurt for a few days where they spent plenty of the king’s money. Eventually they returned home empty-handed. When asked about their lack of success, they claimed they had been
this
close to finishing the job but a last-minute glitch had prevented it.’
Payne, Jones, and Kaiser laughed. It sounded like the plot of a bad movie.
‘So,’ Payne guessed, ‘the government caught wind of these crazy schemes and decided to remove Ludwig before he did irreparable damage to the crown.’
‘Actually, no. The servants didn’t want to be punished - or ruin a good thing - so most of these stories didn’t surface until long after Ludwig had been murdered.’
‘Really? Then what got him in trouble?’ Payne asked.
Ulster pointed at the gold. ‘Rumours about the black swan.’
Unlike some historians who refused to offer an opinion about anything until every fact had been collected and studied ad nauseam, Ulster tended to develop theories on the wing. Sometimes that resulted in a rambling monologue that went on for ever, but Payne and Jones had been around him enough to understand his process. For Ulster, talking about the subject matter was the key. As he painted the scene for others, pieces of the puzzle fell into place in his own mind.
‘Nine months before his murder,’ Ulster explained, ‘Ludwig summoned the best horsemen in his kingdom to Linderhof - one of his castles - and asked them to deliver a series of letters across Europe. To escape detection, the riders were sent on their journeys in the dead of night. According to a witness who worked in the stables, each of the documents had been sealed in advance, and each had been stamped with an elaborate black swan. Other than that, not much is known about their mysterious quest. No one knows what the letters said, where they were sent, or if they were actually delivered.’
‘Why didn’t someone ask the riders?’ Payne asked.
‘Why? Because the riders never returned.’
‘None of them?’
Ulster shook his head. ‘No one knows if they were shot, captured, or ordered to stay away.’
‘That’s bizarre,’ Jones said. He was familiar with Ludwig and his castles, but he had never heard about the black swan.
‘Trust me,’ Ulster assured them, ‘it gets even stranger. The very next night, Ludwig disappeared - simply vanished without a trace for roughly thirty-six hours. No one knew if he had been kidnapped, killed or lost in the nearby woods. Obviously, it was a scary time for his advisors. Not wanting to start a panic and not wanting to give his opposition any ammunition, they decided to keep things quiet until they figured out where he was. Slowly but surely, they began to understand what had happened. In the middle of the night, Ludwig had snuck out of Linderhof - past a team of armed guards - and departed for Schachen, a small palace less than five miles from here. For some reason, he wanted to be left alone for a week.’
Ulster paused to gather his thoughts. ‘Once he was found, his advisors were relieved. With Ludwig on vacation, they could spin his departure any way they wanted. At least until rumours started to spread about the midnight horsemen and the mysterious letters. Worried that Ludwig had hatched another crazy scheme, they decided to pay him a surprise visit to see what he was plotting. When they got there, he was covered in dirt - as though he had been working in the fields all day. They asked him what he had been doing, but he refused to say.’