Mozart's Sister: A Novel (23 page)

“Now!” she cried, and disappeared into the wings.

The little door at the rear opened and Victoria appeared; in a fraction of a second she had sat down on the stool and was playing intently. But the first part of the piece was drowned out in a roar of dismay, an outcry on the part of counts, dukes, and marquises (on occasion they could become a mob of fishwives). Katharina, however, was openmouthed, mute, and Frau Mozart’s head was spinning. The self-discipline of Major d’Ippold vanished in an instant, and in a fury he headed toward the stage, ready to drag his daughter off; then, realizing that he would only create a scandal, he returned to his seat near the throne, but he was on burning coals.

Victoria played with determination and passion; the audience seemed to inspire rather than intimidate her. Nannerl, in the wings, had fallen to her knees and was listening, not looking, and all her mental energies were directed to her student, and if she could she would have urged her on aloud, as she did in the cellar. She would not have interrupted her, however, because there was no need. It was going well. It was going well!

Victoria’s father, on the other hand, seemed about to explode. Forced to be still, forced to hide his rage, he squeezed his eyelids and, in an attempt to calm himself, breathed as deeply as he could. And one of those deep breaths struck into his consciousness the memory of she who in life had been so obsessed by music, too much. To the point where she taught her daughter to play even before teaching her to speak. To the point where she was always at home playing and never went out into the light of the sun, so that every time he returned from a mission he found her more haggard. To the point where she died practically on the keyboard, because she had wanted her deathbed to be placed beside the instrument. And yet that vivid memory in Armand was not of death but of life. In Victoria he saw a spark of the woman he had desperately loved, and not only in her body but in her habits, perhaps for the first time; and only in that moment did he understand why his wife had loved not only him but also the piano. Because to penetrate a sheet of music and make it a living thing must be intoxicating. Because to perform in public, something that Monika had seldom been able to do, must be even more exalting: one became a channel of universal emotions capable of transforming an audience into a mass of vibrant humanity. And that was exactly what his daughter was doing at that moment. Armand’s eyes shone, and the officer who had never wept in his life was in danger of doing so in front of his subordinates, his superiors, and the archbishop (who, however, continued to snore placidly).

But he did not dissolve in tears, because there was a thunderous ovation, a deafening clapping of hands, a wild mix of cries and praise. “Brava! Bravissima!” And his daughter was sitting with her hands in her lap, she, too, dazed by acclaim that perhaps she thought she didn’t deserve. Suddenly the usual Victoria returned, his lively and impulsive girl who was nevertheless timorous and fragile. The spectators rose and applauded her, even Joseph Bullinger, even Frau Mozart, if only in imitation; even His Excellency’s two cooks, at the back of the room, jumped up and down, trilling with joy—the least astonished and the most excited.

The noise woke the archbishop with a jerk that banged his old bones against the throne. “How did it go, Major?” he mumbled. “Did Fräulein Mozart play well, as she used to?”

Armand hesitated, embarrassed, and the chamberlain came quickly to his aid: “Very well, Excellency! The public is very satisfied, as you can see for yourself!” And so the decrepit ruler applauded the blurry figure on the stage.

Victoria rose and, rather than move to the front of the stage and thank the audience, went to her teacher in the wings.

“How did I do? How did I do?” she repeated.

Nannerl smiled, filled with emotion. “Very well. No one missed me, Victoria. Be proud of yourself.” The girl impetuously embraced her, but she pushed her gently aside. “Come, come. Go and take your bow. You have to be polite to your public.” Then her expression became ironic. “But if you don’t feel like curtsying, forget it. Believe me, it’s not important.”

Victoria hurried to the center of the stage and at her appearance the applause grew louder. Nannerl, invisible to the crowd, looked at her affectionately, and for the first time in years felt a peaceful warmth envelop her soul.

Suddenly a hand rested on her shoulder. She turned and was startled at the sight of Armand, whose proud features seemed to have cracked and whose eyes were surprisingly bright. The man said nothing and his emotions were not plain. Of one thing Nannerl was certain: there was no trace of hostility.

“Major, I’m sorry,” she murmured, staring at those brown irises, which were large and set in a network of veins. “I didn’t want to cause suffering…If I had known…”

“Call me Armand, that’s all,” he said, and his face opened in a faint smile. While in the hall the applause continued, the two couldn’t take their eyes off each other, bound by an intense, impalpable current of desire and dismay, until a voice startled them.

“I beg your pardon…Oh, have I ruined the mood?”

A young man wearing a large plumed hat had come upon them from behind. He planted himself there, staring at them with mocking intrusiveness, while Nannerl turned to one side, confused; she felt her cheeks burning and tried to hide her blush.

“I would like to speak to you, miss, if you don’t mind,” the young man said. “Or maybe kiss you, seeing that the one who is here, so to speak, doesn’t dare. But I don’t know if it’s suitable. Let me think…”

Suddenly he brought his mouth to Nannerl’s ear, so close that she could feel his breath, and whispered, “Here forever happy…”

“Wolfgang!” she yelled, and embraced him violently. The plumed hat fell onto the stage and rolled down into the first row, as she hugged her brother so hard that it hurt; the contact with his now-adult body seemed to her so strange, but more intense was the joy of having him near.

Armand went silently away. Brother and sister remained enthralled, mute. It was a long embrace accompanied by the fading, finally, of the applause.

Mademoiselle Jeunehomme

I.

“Who was that man in the uniform?”

“No one.”

“He must have a name, this no one!”

“What difference does it make to you, Wolfgang? He’s the father of my student.”

“So, do the fathers of all your students look at your ass?”

Her brother was very changed. He was still shorter than she was, as he always would be, but he had grown a lot; and apart from that, his manner was very physical, his language was crude, and in his behavior toward her he swung between fierce possessiveness and malicious disparagement. He dressed with extreme care and powdered his face and his hair; he walked proudly along the street, gratified by the reverential greetings that the people of Salzburg addressed to him and his beloved father. Leopold leaned on his wife’s arm, a few steps behind; he limped slightly and used a cane. He complained that his leg remained sensitive to changes in temperature, but he did it only to win extra attention from his wife, for in effect he had recovered.

“Italy is full of mediocrity and corruption,” he sighed, sitting at the table of the inn beside his son. “To make it possible for Wolfgang to work I had to maneuver in some repellent games of power. I’m glad to be free of them.”

“What do you mean?” Anna Maria protested. “In your letters you said it’s a marvelous country.”

“It is, certainly, but I fear one has to have been born there to deal with its complexity.”

At that moment Wolfgang slipped one hand under the table, laid it on Nannerl’s thigh, and squeezed, in a gesture between lechery and mockery, and at the same time he whispered, “I love you. I love you so much I’m asking for your hand, and when I have it—I’ll put it on my ass!”

She freed herself from his grasp and murmured, “I see the trip was bad for you.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say bad. I sank into abysses of lechery. Shall I tell you about it?”

“Children, don’t whisper at the table,” their mother interrupted. “What were you saying?”

“I was complimenting her on…Victoria. That’s the girl’s name, isn’t it, dearest sister?”

“And who is this Victoria?” Leopold asked.

“My student who performed the other night.”

“Ah yes, Victoria d’Ippold,” he said, nodding. He looked only at the son beside him and the wife opposite; it was as if Nannerl were not present. Who knows, maybe looking diagonally was hard because of his leg. He leaned his head against his chair back and let his memories flow. “That girl’s mother was an excellent harpsichordist. I heard her a couple of times, years ago, in private concerts; then she stopped performing because of her uncertain health. Her husband never recovered from the loss. A very sad story.”

“So that man in uniform is free!” Wolfgang exclaimed, winking at Nannerl. “And he might even be attractive, if only he were twenty years younger and removed the stick he’s got up his ass.”

She looked at him furiously while Anna Maria giggled. “Come, don’t use bad language, angel.”

But he went on. He put his hands around his mouth to create a kind of trumpet and lowered the volume: “The ass beheld by the stick, the stick stuck up the ass…”

“Stop it, please,” Nannerl hissed, and he said, “I just want to know what’s been going on in my absence, since your letters left something to be desired.”

“Oh really? Shall we talk about your transcriptions, then?”

“Now stop that, will you! Oh shit!” Anna Maria cried, and raised a hand as if to hit someone, but the host arrived with a carafe of wine and she pretended to be brushing off a fly.

Herr Mozart took a swallow of wine and appeared to appreciate it. Then he clicked his tongue and turned to Nannerl, staring at the glass against the light ostentatiously. “I have only one question. Does Major d’Ippold pay regularly for his daughter’s lessons?”

She answered firmly. “So far I’ve been teaching her for nothing. Now we’ll see.”

“We’ll see—who, dear child?”

“The d’Ippolds and I. Why, does it have to do with anyone else?”

“Yes, of course. As long as you live in my house, you will do as I say.”

“As long as I’m the one who’s getting paid, I’ll do what I think is right!”

Leopold began to get irritated; with clenched fists, he stared at the empty plate in front of him. “Very well. Then you will stop giving lessons completely. Since there’s no longer any need. I will return to work and something remunerative will be found at court for Wolfgang. Today I will write to the families of all your students to let them know that you are stopping. Are you happy?”

“But, really, my dear. It would be a pity, don’t you think?” Anna Maria intervened timidly. “The two of us have managed, with some effort, to create a position for ourselves in the fashionable world, and it would be a shame to throw it away.”

“Now that Wolfgang is here in Salzburg, he will provide us all with a position in the fashionable world. And without the least effort.”

The young man seemed satisfied with the direction of the discussion. He took one of Nannerl’s hands and touched the ugly nails patiently. “Sister, I think you should reflect on what our dear father says. If you stopped teaching and started giving concerts again, wouldn’t that be better?”

“I am a mere provincial music teacher. Have you forgotten?”

“Oh, time passes…And we have both grown up. You are better than anyone I’ve ever met, and even that Victoria is only a dilettante compared to you. You know what I’m going to do? I’ll write a concerto for piano and orchestra, just for you! Wouldn’t you like to be the first in the world to play it?”

“It would be an incredible honor,” she answered with a sarcasm that didn’t touch him.

“Shall we order?” Anna Maria urged in a cheery voice and nodded to the host. Then she turned to her husband entreatingly: “My treasure, don’t make decisions in a hurry. If Nannerl has given a few lessons without pay, the rest has gone according to your plans, I assure you. She is the best teacher in Salzburg, and her students can be recognized by their taste and the precision of their touch. This is what all the nobility say.”

“Who have not heard her play for years,” Leopold grumbled. “And I have my doubts that someone who never plays knows how to teach.”

“Theoretically I agree with you,” Nannerl declared. “But every rule has its exceptions; and once upon a time you yourself called me exceptional. If you no longer think so—anyway, it doesn’t much matter to me.”

“Sirrrr!” Frau Mozart cried. The man arrived with a large tray, and the scent of Wiener schnitzel calmed them.

II.

The door of the dark, deserted cellar opened and Victoria’s slender silhouette appeared. In the silence she lighted the candelabra and advanced, carrying with her a tremulous sphere of light. Behind her was Nannerl. Protected by the obscurity, she dared to touch the arm of the man who stood uncertainly on the threshold, for he had never been there and was afraid of violating a sanctuary.

“Come,” she said gently.

Armand entered and closed the door behind him. That storeroom piled with dilapidated furniture seemed to him truly a sacred place, transformed by the women into a practice room. His astonished gaze traced a circle and stopped on the harpsichord.