The Keeper of Secrets

The

Keeper of Secrets

Julie Thomas

Dedication

To Vicky—for inspiring me

with her passion for classical music;

to my mum—for providing me unconditional support;

and to my musical friends and family—for showing me

that anything’s possible if you work hard enough

and want it badly enough.

Epigraph

Music is the language of the spirit. It opens the secret of life bringing peace, abolishing strife.

—K
AHLIL
G
IBRAN

Acknowledgments

T
he roots of
The Keeper of Secrets
run back to my childhood and I have so many to thank. My best friend at school was Ruth Burns and her parents, Joe and the late Carmel, welcomed me with open arms into their Jewish home and shared their faith with their daughter’s Gentile friend. Ruth, after forty years we’re as close as ever and you’re a true supporter and an honest critic.

This novel would not have happened at all without my late sister-in-law, Vicky Thomas, who was a music teacher with a deep and abiding love of classical music. Vicky’s son, my nephew Paul, played the violin and she encouraged me to keep researching and writing when I felt overwhelmed and underqualified.

The incomparable Sir Michael Hill’s International Violin Competition is held in New Zealand every year and was the basis for the competition chapters. Hill does so much to foster the love of the violin and happily shares his knowledge.

Many thanks to those who read versions along the way and added their opinions and enthusiasm to the project, especially Reuben Aitchison, who is the best beta reader any author ever had.

Heartfelt thanks to my extraordinary mum, Thelma Thomas, who has always believed in my writing and been there through good and bad.

To my delightful editor, Carolyn Marino, and associate editor Amanda Bergeron, your patience and expert help and guidance and your passion for my story are appreciated more than words can express.

Contents

Prologue

Berlin

February 1935

W
hat does it mean when someone calls you swine?” Simon Horowitz asked suddenly, as his father’s black Mercedes-Benz rolled to a stop at the top of a blind alley off the Friedrichstraße.

“Who called you that?” Simon could tell by the tone of his voice that his father was concerned.

“Not me. Joshua told us a story in school. A Nazi official passed his father in the street and said ‘swine’ and Joshua’s father tipped his hat and said, ‘Goldstein, pleased to meet you.’ ”

Benjamin Horowitz roared with laughter as Simon scrambled out of the huge car to join him.

“A very appropriate response. You tell Joshua I think his father is a genius.”

This was a violin excursion. Sometimes his older brother, Levi, came with them but today he’d gone ice-skating with the girl who lived next door. Why would you choose ice-skating with a girl when you could come on a violin excursion? The twins, David and Rachel, were only nine, and they got bored when Papa played the violin. Mama said they were too young to appreciate the family treasures.

“Now come on, or we’ll be late,” his father said as he walked briskly down the alley, the violin case swinging from his hand. At nearly fourteen Simon was years older than the twins, and he was satisfied that these violin excursions made that difference clear. He slowed and let his father go on ahead.

It was midwinter and the shop displays were bursting with colorful and tempting fare. He moved from window to window: books, magazines, and crayons were displayed in one; glistening gold and diamond jewelry in another; and delicious cakes and pastries on round wooden stands in the third.

“Do you remember standing with your nose pressed to the glass watching the gingerbread house being built?” His father’s question surprised him, and he looked up at the man’s round, smiling face. It was Simon’s experience that important men didn’t have time for children and his father’s patience and kindness were unusual. Still, if he had pressed his nose to a shopwindow, it must have been centuries ago.

“I remember the twins wanting to go inside. I’ve always preferred next door.”

Next door was Amos Wiggenstein’s Music Shoppe. Together they moved the few steps to the window. It was full of violins and violas, nestled on bright green satin, with sheet music spread artfully between them.

“Come in when you’re ready,” his father said gently and opened the door, setting off the chimes. They made a tinkling, silvery sound, like cascading water. Simon loved that sound; it meant the entrance to Aladdin’s cave, and he felt the familiar excitement start to bubble.

A stocky boy in a dark blue wool coat that was just too small for him, Simon had black curls cut short and a plump face ending in a deeply cleft chin; his watchful, liquid brown eyes stared back at him from the glass. Finally he tugged the heavy door open and slipped inside.

Violins and violas of all sizes hung from metal hooks in the ceiling and were inserted into slats on the wall-mounted shelving that lined the long, narrow shop. The smells rose in clouds to meet his twitching nostrils—spruce, varnish, maple, beeswax, and dust. Rosin hung thick in the air, and the filtered sunlight formed golden shafts that bounced off the bodies of the instruments.

Simon turned his attention to the nearest violin; it was a rich orange-brown with lighter-colored purfling around the edges. He ran his finger over the body. The wood felt cool and smooth to the touch, yet welcoming and eager to share the music. A stab of intense longing to just pick it up and play almost took his breath away. Beside the violin hung a half size completely covered in gold paint, and farther along the row he could see a viola that was almost black.

When he was younger, he used to pretend he’d come here to choose his own violin, but now he understood that nothing on these shelves could compare with what he saw beneath the glass in the music room at home. The 1742 Guarneri del Gesú violin was one of the most glorious stringed instruments ever made, and the Horowitz family had owned it for one hundred and fifty years. Simon knew his career path, and every visit to this shop cemented it and made the vision clearer; he would play the Guarneri with the Berlin Philharmonic in recital.

Slowly he was drawn down the cluttered aisle. The wood shavings on the floor crunched beneath his feet, and he had to avoid empty violin cases and music stands. Passing the huge pigeonholed shelving, with its cleaners, strings, polishes, and chin rests stuffed into every available crevice, he hesitated in the doorway to the back room.

Amos’s gangly teenaged assistant, Jacob, was bending over the silver saucepan of hide glue on the stove, stirring it gently and observing the two men cautiously. Amos and his father stood at the workbench surrounded by the tools of the luthier’s trade: chisels, jack planes, scrapers, files, and gouges. Amos held the violin up to the light.

“As magnificent as ever. A true masterpiece,” he whispered, seemingly oblivious to everyone else. His old fingers were gentle with the instrument, loving, reverential. Simon was used to this; he’d seen many adults hold the Guarneri that way. The intense oil varnish seemed to sparkle like new in the soft artificial light as Amos turned it over and over.

“I know that, Amos. But can you do it? Is it possible?” Simon could hear unfamiliar notes in his father’s voice, impatience, uncertainty.

“Possible? Yes, certainly. Advisable, I’m not so sure,” the old man said slowly.

Suddenly there was tension, and Simon could sense his father’s indignation. No one questioned him about the instruments.

“When I want advice, I’ll ask for advice. If you can do it, then do it.”

“But you are changing important history, my friend.”

Benjamin Horowitz stiffened. Simon knew that response well; his father was slow to anger, but his precious violin was always able to rouse him.

“It’s my responsibility to keep it safe. The world is changing and we may have to make many pacts with the devil. This lowers the value and, maybe, I can give up other treasures and keep this one.”

A question was forming in Simon’s mind, a dark feeling of foreboding. It frightened him, and before it reached his lips, he turned back to the shop. Sometimes it was better to remember your place. He looked over his shoulder at the two men, oblivious to the world, bent over the violin that now lay on the green covering of the workbench.

Jacob followed him, took a violin down from its hook, picked up a bow, and handed them to Simon. He played a few notes and adjusted a couple of the pegs. Then he played a snatch of music. Jacob watched, delight on his face. Simon fiddled with the pegs again, then played some more, feeling suddenly exhilarated as the clear, sweet sound of Bach cut through the rosin-filled air. Amos and Benjamin emerged from the back room.

“He’s a talented boy, this son of yours,” Amos murmured. Benjamin smiled fondly at Simon.

“He’s a good boy, he practices hard.”

“Maybe so, but he has soft hands and a natural sense of rhythm and that’s half the battle won already.”

Simon stopped playing and handed the violin and bow back to Jacob. He could feel the blush rising in his cheeks.

“Thank you, sir,” he said quietly.

“That’s a French violin, made in 1810. Not as wonderful as your papa’s Guarneri but still a precious thing.”

Amos took down a box from the rack behind him and held it out to the boy.

“Here, son, have some rosin. Don’t stop practicing, and one day you may be very good indeed. Then we hear you play your papa’s Guarneri. Did you know the master himself described her sound as like the tears of an angel?”

“No, sir!” Simon couldn’t keep the wonder from his voice. The master, Guarneri del Gesú, had described the sound of their violin? He exchanged a smile with his obviously delighted father.

They made their good-byes, leaving the violin in Amos’s care. Halfway up the alley Simon touched his father’s arm anxiously.

“What’s he doing to it, Papa?”

Benjamin laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder as they walked up the sidewalk toward the waiting car.

“Just a minor alteration, a necessary . . . improvement. You’ll see for yourself when I collect it next week.”