Shush-Shush Schuschnigg

Eva and Rudolf, the chubby children of murdered Engelbert Dollfuss, still thought last week that their father was alive. Safe at the Italian beach resort of Riccione in the villa of Dictator Mussolini's sympathetic spouse, they went down to the station with Donna Rachele Mussolini to meet their mother as she returned from-the State funeral in Vienna (TIME, Aug 6).

"Where's Daddy?" they shouted, then, sober-eyed, "Why are you wearing black, Mother? What makes you cry so hard?"

Clutching her children the Chancellor's widow drove home with the Dictator's wife and there she explained as best she could to Rudolf and Eva:

"Your father has gone on a long, long journey and you will not see him for a long time. You must pray for him always on his journey and remember him always."

In Vienna the task of Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg's new Government was not made any easier by his Minister of Interior, rough and imperious Major Emil Fey, long the stormy petrel of Austrian politics. Testifying at the trial of two of the 144 Nazis who seized Chancellor Dollfuss and himself in the Ballhaus fortnight ago, Major Fey changed his previous account of the dying Chancellor's last words to him.

Instead of "Settle this with as little bloodshed as possible," Dr. Dollfuss said, according to Major Fey last week, "Let there be no blood. Rintelen must make peace."

Since the object of the Nazis had been to make Dr. Anton Rintelen, "King Anton" of Nazi Styria, their Chancellor, this was as much as to say that Chancellor Dollfuss had yielded at his last gasp to the Nazi solution.

Testifying further, Major Fey gave the lie to the new Government's claim that Dr. Schuschnigg did not know the Nazis had killed Dollfuss when he promised them safe conduct to Germany, a promise which the Government failed to keep "on the ground that it was conditional on the Ballhaus being evacuated without the death of anyone within." Three times under cross-examination Major Fey stubbornly repeated, "The promise was made without conditions of any kind after those who made it knew that the Chancellor was dead. I repeatedly insisted that this promise should be kept."

Such an attitude could only mean that Major Fey considers the Nazis down but not out in Austria. The fact that he remained Minister of Interior after thrice in effect calling Chancellor Schuschnigg a liar was significant. Finally Austrians noticed that although the actual slayer of Dollfuss and the Nazi gang leader were promptly hanged fortnight ago, President Wilhelm Miklas of Austria commuted to life imprisonment last week the death sentence of another Nazi. Said Chancellor Schuschnigg: "Few if any more of the remaining Nazi prisoners will be hanged."

Dr. Dollfuss was not only Chancellor but also Leader of the only party officially extant under his Dictatorship, the Fatherland Front. Last week Dr. Schuschnigg decided that the Chancellorship was enough for him and with alacrity permitted Vice Chancellor Prince von Starhemberg to assume the title of Leader. Together they announced that as soon as possible they will visit Benito Mussolini, longtime patron of the Austrian Dictatorship. Meanwhile last week Chancellor Schuschnigg received correspondents for the first time and wobbled in his state ments toward something which looked like an effort to replace Dictatorship by Coalition.

"It is far from our minds to consider Dictatorship as an ideal form of government," said worried Dr. Schuschnigg. He admitted that he might let some of the Socialist leaders jailed last winter go free. "We shall be glad later to consult the people and ask their advice within the framework of the Corporative State."

This could only mean that Chancellor Schuschnigg thought of holding an election, something Chancellor Dollfuss was careful not to do, since he feared the Nazis might win. Conceivably the Dollfuss martyrdom may have made it possible for a government of appeasement to win a coalition victory in Austria. Asked flatly, "Are you thinking of holding an election or a plebiscite?" Chancellor Schuschnigg neatly replied, "One might ponder for a long time over what name could be given to what I am thinking of."

Still alive and to be reckoned with in the ultimate Austrian solution was "King Anton" Rintelen, closely guarded in the police hospital last week after his alleged attempt to commit suicide fortnight ago. Boasted his nurse, "Dr. Rintelen is one of the very few men alive today with stitches in his heart. The actual wall of his heart was operated on to save his life."

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