Mozart's Sister: A Novel (37 page)

“Forgive me. So, the poetic vein. The answer is yes, I have continued to amuse myself. It’s purely a matter of fun, though: I have never recited my verses outside the family circle, nor have I ever had the desire to offer them to a publisher. I have no ambition to be anointed a poet. And, frankly, in my opinion, fame brings only annoyance. Nobility gives me enough already.”

“Do you know any of your compositions by heart?”

“All, Fräulein Mozart.”

“Recite one for me.”

“What would you say to a fable instead?”

She looked at him ironically. “Do you intend to treat me like a child, Baron?”

“Preserving certain childlike traits can be a good thing, I think.” His gaze was lost on the white wall, and with a nostalgic smile he said, “So, I’ll tell you the story of a small animal covered with spines that hadn’t been happy for a long time.”

Nannerl raised her eyebrows. “So you’re really going to do it?”

“Don’t speak. It’s tiring. The little animal had been sick for a long time and couldn’t even move its paws. It had never loved deeply and had never completely opened up. It was pretty to look at, and various male hands were eager to touch it, but it didn’t consider itself worthy.”

“Please, Baron…”

“Let me continue. One day, from among the spines, the hedgehog saw a hand that appeared more interesting than the others and, rolling cautiously, it approached. It began to open up to see it better and, slowly, opened up completely, presenting to the hand of the man its most secret and vulnerable part, its soft, fuzzy stomach and its soul, allowing that hand to touch all its imperfections. The hedgehog became very vulnerable; it grasped the hand tightly. In that one hand, the hedgehog forgot all others, other masculine hands that were certainly warmer and more enveloping. The hand walked about; the hedgehog crept after it.”

Vaguely uneasy, Nannerl pulled up the covers, and the cameo on her breast disappeared under the white of the sheet.

“Then the season changed, and the hedgehog became as brown as the foliage of a plane tree in November. The hand of the man changed, too, and from round and warm it became skeletal: the flesh disappeared under the dry skin, and the skin fell off in flakes, revealing a tough soul. And with anguish, the hedgehog saw that the hand’s desire to dig among its spines had died, for that hand was certain by now that it knew every hair on the hedgehog’s stomach. So, considering itself exemplary in its own perfection, it began to insist that the hedgehog become worthy of it. The animal was imperfect, not unfit: it couldn’t run like a hare or fly like a butterfly or sing like a cicada, and it wasn’t dazzling like a rooster or mysterious like a cat—but how can one compare, may I ask, a cat to a hedgehog?”

He stopped looking at the wall and fixed his eyes on hers. She would have liked to look away but his eyes attracted hers like a magnet.

“But the hand of the man was ruthless with the hedgehog’s stomach. It scratched it and made the blood flow, and then humiliated the hedgehog and left it alone. Its little heart was invaded by a great anger, and it closed up again, depriving the world of its savage beauty. In its isolation, it tried with all its strength not to think anymore of that hand, but the truth is that it didn’t succeed.”

Nannerl had to blink her eyes. She seemed to feel a massive weight on her forehead, and her breath was short.

“Who can say if it had been right to offer itself with such generosity, baring its imperfections, so as to rouse the desire to make up for them. Perhaps that hand had acted with absolute honesty, with its own peculiar way of loving. Maybe it wasn’t able to love. Or maybe it just didn’t love the hedgehog. The creature found no answers. It didn’t understand, but it was aware of that—and one who knows that he doesn’t know has his life in his own hands.”

The tears ran freely down her cheeks, hitting the sheet like a gentle rain. With a slow caress, Baptist wiped them from her face, then tasted their salt on the tips of his fingers.

XI.

In an instant Ebony had escaped. All Martin’s skill had not been enough to stop her. He had taken her out of her stall to clean it, and as soon as they reached the stable yard she tugged so unexpectedly and so violently on the rope that he fell hard on the ground, while she galloped toward the hill.

Sitting on the bench, hot, Nannerl stared at the sundial on the wall, and it seemed to her that the shadow never moved. Martin had gone in search of the filly and hadn’t returned. The baron was offering her a glass of cool water, which she kept refusing. She rose, took a couple of steps, and sat down again. She crushed the grass with her shoes and then tore a handful out of the ground and threw it. Finally the sound of a gallop could be heard, but of one horse only, and at the end of the gravel road Martin appeared. He dismounted, tied his horse to the gate of the stable yard, and came toward the house.

Nannerl ran to meet him. “Did you find her?”

He went right past her with a grim face and headed straight for the door.

“Where are you going? Did you find Ebony or not?”

He went into the house, took a key from a drawer, and put it in the lock of a large wardrobe.

“Can’t you answer me?” said Nannerl, joining him. “What in the world happened?”

“Calm down,” Tresel ordered, wiping her hands on her apron.

“Martin, would you like me to call some of my men?” Baptist asked, with an odd expression on his face.

“That would be very kind, Baron,” he answered. “They’ll have to dig a hole and throw her in. It can be done there, in the place.” Meanwhile he took a gun from the closet and quickly assembled it.

“Do you want to go right away?”

“As soon as possible.”

“Is it far?”

“Not very. Halfway between here and your house.”

“Then I’ll come with you. Ammunition?”

“In the back, on the left.”

Tresel had already taken the case from the closet and handed it to her son.

“You’ll kill her?” Nannerl asked, breathless.

Martin didn’t even look at her. “I should have anticipated it and brought the gun, instead of having to come back.” He slung the gun over his shoulder and left the house.

“But why?” she cried.

“Do you want to come with us, Fräulein Mozart?”

She felt as if she were choking. Baptist and Tresel stared at her, at once decisive and grim. “All right,” she whispered, and the baron took her by the shoulders and they ran to his horse. “I’ll carry you behind me. Don’t worry, the horse is used to it.” He mounted easily, freed the stirrup, and held out his hand. “Come on, Fräulein Mozart, a good jump. Then grip the horse’s back hard with your legs and hold on to me.”

Nannerl found herself in contact with the body of the horse, behind the saddle, and her legs were spread and half uncovered, but there was nothing to be done. She put her arms around Baptist’s broad chest and her head against his back. She felt perfectly secure.

“Are you ready?”

A weak assent and they were off, following Martin, who was already in the distance.

The horse ran furiously and yet the jolting was gentle, and Baptist went with him and she with Baptist. She tried not to resist the motion but to follow it, to stay one with the rider, as if drawn by the irresistible wave of a flood; and she tried to hold in thoughts of the consequences and drive out the fear of falling, the fear of that solid, muscular body to which she clung, and the terror of what would happen to Ebony. The path among the trees narrowed and Baptist shouted, “Get down with me!” She bent over him, crushing her breasts against his body, the branches slapping her, and suddenly the path opened up and they were in a broad clearing.

The pace slowed to a light trot, then to a cautious walk. It seemed to her that Baptist stiffened slightly, and the horse stopped.

“Are we there?”

He murmured, “Poor beast.” Nannerl stretched her head out beyond his shoulder and so doing, she saw the horse.

She was trapped in a hole, covered with saliva and foamy sweat. Her eyes were bulging out of their sockets, and unearthly sounds came from her.

“You have to get down first, Fräulein Mozart.”

She slid to the ground. Martin was already loading the gun. Both Ebony’s front legs were broken, and they seemed to emanate a bony whiteness of death. She was suffering terribly, and she shook her big head and tried to move, and the more she moved the more pain she felt, and the more pain she felt the more she cried out.

“I’m sorry, Nannerl,” said Martin, “but it happens. Even if her legs could be fixed in some way, her life would be terrible. The best thing is to end her suffering immediately.”

With a wild look, Nannerl placed herself between him and the horse. “Wait—I’ll do it.”

He continued to load the weapon. “But if you don’t know how to shoot…”

“I want to be the one to do it.”

“You risk hitting her without killing her. Get out of the way.”

“I think we should let her do it,” the baron said quietly. “Give her the gun, Martin.”

Nannerl took it in two hands. It was massive and heavy, and she thought that to pull that trigger she would have to use four fingers, two on each side. Next to her, Martin shook his head and Baptist looked at her silently.

She raised her arms until she had Ebony’s eye exactly in the gun sight. Her hands were steady. In an instant she could destroy the life of this beast, who was already destroyed. In an instant she saw herself again in the courtyard of the old house on the Getreidegasse throwing her manuscripts onto the fire. In an instant, exactly as it had been then, it would all be over.

“I can’t,” she whispered. “Baptist, you do it.” She gave him the gun, he took aim, and the next minute Ebony was dead.

She turned her back. “Now take me home. Please.”

XII.

She lifted the latch and went into the stall. Her hands were clasped behind her back and her head was bent. Her feet sank into the straw, and she thought of nothing.

“Are you sure you’re all right?”

“Yes, thank you, Baron,” she answered without looking at him.

“You had begun to call me by my name.”

“Really? When?”

“Before. Anyway, you can call me whatever you like. Even by my full family name, if you have enough breath.”

She gave no hint of a smile. She began to walk slowly along the edge of the walls with her head lowered.

“Would you prefer to be alone?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you don’t mind if I stay near you.”

“I don’t even know that.”

Baptist closed the latch and went in. He, too, began wandering through the narrow space, without ever losing sight of Nannerl and always keeping a distance of a few feet between them. They seemed separate yet linked by an invisible bar, and the fulcrum of the bar was the center of the stall.

Suddenly he consumed that distance and pushed her against the wall. He pressed her shoulders against it, sank his face into the hollow of her tanned neck, and breathed in its odor. Then he fell to his knees, raised her skirt, and rubbed the top of his head against her pubic bone.

“Someone might come,” she whispered.

“I closed the gate. If anyone opens it, we’ll hear. Only the horses know we’re here.” And meanwhile he went on rubbing his forehead against her thighs, and a thousand odors hit him: the freshness of undergarments, the dustiness of the flounced skirt, the enveloping scent of her.

“Lie down,” he said.

He took off her shoes and stockings and reached his fingers under the cotton of her long culottes, touching the pale, tremulous skin, and the more she let go, the farther up he went, stopping at the hollow of her knee and on the soft flesh of the inside of the thighs. He tasted her with his tongue and even his teeth, letting his warm breath inflame Nannerl, then he had her lift up her hips and in a quick move he took off the culottes.

Slowly he approached her face and touched the skin of her eyelids, which she immediately closed; he persuaded her to let her head fall back, and with his open hand caressed her from the knee to the groin and down to the other knee, and then again to the groin. He, too, was lying on the floor of the stall, facing her, and he put his arms around her thighs, and rested his head on her stomach, and for a long moment was absolutely still, breathing deeply over her. Then he opened his mouth and tasted the flavor of her, and while she held her breath and trembled, he pressed with the most pleasurable force, and from his throat came low, vibrant sounds. She raised herself on her elbows and looked down, and saw the face of Baptist mingled with her sex, and his blond hair spread on her stomach, and the sight increased her piercing euphoria. Unable to hold herself up she fell back, and just then her limbs tensed; she stopped breathing and squeezed her fists.

Baptist waited until the wave was spent, holding her tight in his arms and stretching out his hands to caress her breasts. Then he lay on top of her and began gently kissing her face, her half-closed eyes, and her parted lips, from which her breath came short and fragrant, and slowly he penetrated her.