Naïvely I imagined that the story Farewell was about to tell would have something to do with Jünger or with what, in a fit of enthusiasm, I had been saying about Jünger and the spaceship wrecked in the Cordillera, and the heroes setting out for immortality armed only with their writings. But what Farewell told me was the story of a shoemaker, a subject of the Austro-Hungarian Emperor, a merchant who had made a fortune importing shoes from somewhere and selling them somewhere else and then manufacturing shoes in Vienna to sell to the elegant inhabitants of Vienna and Budapest and Prague, and also to the elegant inhabitants of Sofia and Belgrade and Zagreb and Bucharest. An entrepreneur who had started with nothing, or maybe a precarious family business, which he had set on a firm footing and gradually built up, making the brand famous, for this manufacturer’s shoes were prized by all those who wore them both for their exquisite appearance and their remarkably comfortable feel, and that, after all, was the idea, to marry beauty and comfort, a brand of shoes, and boots (both high and ankle), even slippers and mules, that were extremely long-wearing and resistant, shoes that, in a word, you could be sure would never give out on you halfway from A to B, and you could also be sure, no small merit in a shoe, that they would not produce calluses or aggravate existing ones, and as those who have had occasion to visit a podiatrist know, this is no laughing matter, a brand of shoes, in short, that stood as a guarantee of elegance and comfort. And among the clients of the shoemaker in question, the shoemaker of Vienna, was the Austro-Hungarian Emperor himself, and the shoemaker was invited or managed to get himself invited to receptions, at some of which the Emperor was present, along with his ministers and the field marshals or generals of the Imperial army, a number of whom were bound to arrive wearing riding boots or shoes from the workshops of the shoemaker, with whom they deigned to exchange a few words, a few insignificant but always polite phrases, reserved and discreet, tinged with the gentle, almost imperceptible melancholy of autumn palaces, which, according to Farewell, was characteristically Austro-Hungarian, while the Russians, for example, endured a winter-palace melancholy, and the Spaniards, although here I feel he was stretching the analogy somewhat, were afflicted with the melancholy of summer palaces and raging fires, and the shoemaker, encouraged, some say, by those marks of respect, or driven, according to others, by the needs of his disturbed psyche, began to cherish an idea that had germinated in his mind, and when, after careful cultivation, this idea was ready, he did not hesitate to propose it to the Emperor himself, although to gain an audience he had to mobilize every one of his military and political connections, as well as his acquaintances at the Imperial court. And when all the strings had been pulled, the doors began to open and the shoemaker crossed thresholds and passed through vestibules, entering rooms each darker and more magnificent than the one before, although it was a satin darkness, a regal darkness, in which footsteps did not echo, first because of the quality and thickness of the carpets, and secondly because of the quality and suppleness of the shoemaker’s footwear, and when he was led into the final room, there, on an absolutely everyday chair, was the Emperor, accompanied by a number of his advisers, and although these advisers cast a cool and even perplexed gaze upon the shoemaker, as if they were thinking, What on earth is that individual doing here, what bee has got into his bonnet, what crazy plan has hatched in his mind and prompted him to request and obtain an audience with the sovereign of all Austro-Hungarians, the Emperor himself, by contrast, welcomed him with expressions of affection, as a father welcomes his son, and spoke of shoes and shoemakers, Lefebvre of Lyon, whose fine shoes were inferior to those of his dear friend, Duncan & Segal of London, whose excellent shoes were inferior to those of his loyal subject, and Niederle, based in a small German village whose name the Emperor could not remember (Fürth, the shoemaker reminded him), whose shoes were extremely comfortable but nevertheless inferior to those of his enterprising compatriot, and then they spoke of the hunt and hunting boots and riding boots and various kinds of leather and ladies’ shoes, at which point the Emperor firmly steered the conversation towards more wholesome topics, saying, Gentlemen, Gentlemen, a little restraint, as if he had not brought up the subject himself and his advisers were to blame, which imputation they and the shoemaker were only too glad to accept, apologizing profusely, until finally they got down to the real reason for the audience, and while each of those present helped himself to another cup of tea or coffee or refilled his glass with cognac, all eyes turned expectantly towards the shoemaker, who, taking a deep breath, intensely aware of the moment’s gravity, and moving his hands as if caressing the whorled petals of an inexistent but imaginable, indeed a probable, flower, began to explain his idea to the sovereign. And the idea was Heldenberg or Heroes’ Hill. In a valley known to the shoemaker, between one village and another, there rose a hill, a limestone hill, with oaks and larches growing on its slopes and all sorts of bushes on the higher, craggier parts, a green and black hill, although in spring it put on colors worthy of the most exuberant painter’s palette, a hill that was a joy to behold from the valley floor and a sight to meditate upon when viewed from the high ground on either side of the valley, a hill that seemed to have been transported from another world and set down there as a reminder to man, to steady the heart, to soothe the soul, to delight the senses. Unfortunately the hill had an owner, the Count of H., a large landholder in the region, but the shoemaker had already solved that problem by negotiating with the count, who had initially been unwilling to sell even an unproductive piece of his land, it went against his proprietary instincts, explained the shoemaker with a modest smile, as if he could see it from the other man’s point of view, but finally, after a considerable sum had been offered, the poor count came around to the idea. The shoemaker’s plan was to buy the hill and convert it into a monument dedicated to the heroes of the Empire. Not just the heroes of the past and the heroes of the present, but also the heroes of the future. In other words the hill would serve both as a cemetery and as a museum. How would it serve as a museum? Well, each hero the Empire had produced would have his life-size statue erected on the hill, and there would even be statues of certain foreign heroes, but only in very special cases. How would it serve as a cemetery? Well, that was simple: it would be the burial place for the heroes of the Fatherland, as nominated by a committee of army officers, historians and lawyers, all of whose decisions would have to be approved by the Emperor. So the heroes of the past, whose skeletons, or ashes rather, were in all likelihood irrecoverably lost, would rest in peace forever on that hill, represented by statues, which would reflect as accurately as possible what was known about their physical characteristics from history or legends or oral traditions or novels, along with contemporary and future heroes, whose bodies could be got hold of, so to speak, by the civil servants of the Empire. What did the shoemaker ask of the Emperor? First of all, his consent and blessing, a sign that the project met with his approval, secondly, the financial support of the state, since on his own he could not meet all the costs involved in such a pharaonic enterprise. In short, the shoemaker was prepared to pay from his own pocket for the acquisition of Heroes’ Hill, its conversion into a cemetery, the fence that would surround it, the paths that would give every visitor access to its furthest corners, and even the statues of certain heroes who were very dear to his patriotic heart, as well as providing for three gamekeepers already employed on one of his country properties, who could work as cemetery guards and gardeners, single, strong men one could rely on to dig a grave or drive away nocturnal tomb raiders. The rest, that is to say, the hiring of sculptors, the purchase of stone, marble and bronze, the ongoing administration, permits and publicity, shifting the statues, the road connecting Heroes’ Hill to the main Vienna road, the ceremonies that would be have to be organized at the site, transport for families of the deceased and mourners, the construction of a small (or not so small) church, etc., etc., all this was to be paid for by the state. And then the shoemaker expatiated on the beneficial moral effects of such a monument and spoke of the old values, what remained when all else fled, the twilight of human endeavor, thought flickering before the onset of darkness, and when he had finished speaking, the Emperor, with tears in his eyes, took the shoemaker’s hands, leaned close to his ear, and, in a voice that was choked with emotion yet firm, whispered words that nobody else could hear, then he looked into the shoemaker’s eyes with a gaze it was not easy to meet, but the shoemaker, also on the brink of tears, met it without blinking, and then the Emperor nodded his head several times, reaffirming his assent, and looking at his advisers, said, Bravo, perfect, excellent, to which they replied, Bravo, bravo. So that was that, and t