by Magnus Flyte
“He’s eating, and flirting. And, um . . . burping.”
Beethoven. The greatest composer who had ever lived. Right in front of her. Eating—well gobbling, actually. What kind of a drug was this?
“What’s happening, Sarah?” asked Max.
“It’s crazy,” said Sarah. “I can see him. I can see the party. It’s like watching a movie—no, it’s like being in a movie. It’s all so real.”
“What the hell is she on?” said Suzi.
Max sighed. “What we see and feel and taste is a precept. It’s not what’s really out there in the world, it’s what our brain thinks we can handle. Her senses have been heightened, like turning up the volume. She can see the energy that people leave behind. The things that happened in this room.”
“So this isn’t a vision?” asked Sarah. “I can see it? I can see the past?” She was light-headed.
“It’s the traces of their energy, like the contrail of a plane or the tail of a meteor. The drug affects your glial cells, which heighten your brain’s awareness past the point where time has any real meaning. Because your glial cells are on super alert, you can see the traces of high-energy moments. Moments of things that happened in the past in this room. It’s not magic, it’s just an expansion of our senses. Your brain is filling in the dark spaces. That’s what Sherbatsky told me.”
“It’s so freaky,” said Sarah. “I’m staring at fucking Beethoven.”
“Well, you’re staring at the energy he left behind in this room,” clarified Max. “Normally you can’t see it because your brain has evolved into thinking it doesn’t need to, but we all have the capacity. The drug just lets you use the tools you already have in your toolbox.”
“Sherbatsky saw this?” Sarah whispered. This was why he wanted her in Prague. He always said he thought Sarah had a special sensory awareness. He knew she’d be able to see.
Beethoven smiled at the woman next to him, who was wearing a pink dress embroidered with roses. She said something in German about a recent visit to Berlin. It was clear to Sarah that Beethoven couldn’t hear her, but he nodded and said, “Ja, ja.” The cellist finished the Bach, and people clapped. Beethoven, who was taking another drink of wine, missed the cue but quickly put his glass down and joined them.
“You must play for us, Luigi,” said the woman. Beethoven turned and met the glance of a slim man at the head of the table. Sarah looked at the man. His face was friendly, but there was a struggle between them, she decided. Beethoven shook his head. But the man, his smile tightening into a frown, nodded. Beethoven sighed and removed something from his pocket.
“Indigestion,” he said to the woman in the pink dress, holding up a pill.
He swallowed it.
For a few moments Beethoven continued to eat and drink. A woman in pale green across the table asked him if he would favor them with his playing. He smiled vaguely.
“He’s so difficult these days,” hissed the woman to the gentleman on her rightn oile. “He used to make love to me constantly, and now he just ignores me. I am tired of him. And his music I find impenetrable.”
After another moment Beethoven stood up.
“Yes, Maestro, yes, play something. Play something,” the people at the table begged. The candles flickered, and smoke wafted toward the frescoed ceiling. The room was warm. Sarah’s nose pricked with the odor of heavy perfumes, barely covering the smell of unwashed, or not frequently washed, bodies.
“Sarah?” asked Max. “What’s happening?”
“I don’t know,” said Sarah. “Something changed. He . . .”
The people seemed to fade slightly, and Sarah realized the drug must be wearing off. Though she had been desperate to escape its hold on her senses earlier, now she wanted to stay in this vision forever.
The man from the head of the table came over to Beethoven, and Sarah saw that he walked with a limp. “Is it working?” the man asked Beethoven. “Can you hear me?”
The composer nodded. “It’s working.” But Beethoven didn’t look completely happy. There was a sadness to him, Sarah could see.
The man with the limp smiled and clapped him on the back. “A toast to Brahe,” he said quietly.
“It takes longer every time,” growled Beethoven. “And the effect is less. I should save it for when I’m working. It’s wasted on these people.”
“These people include two dukes, a count, and a director of the Imperial Royal Court Theater,” said the man. “And you need patrons. Play for us.”
Beethoven frowned, his face turning a deep angry purple. He farted loudly.
“Really, Luigi,” said the man, waving a handkerchief. Beethoven began to walk toward a harpsichord in the corner. Sarah followed him, unable to believe she was going to see Beethoven actually play. The gas she could have lived without, but the music . . . He stopped suddenly. Sarah held her breath. Her vision was fading now, becoming transparent, the actual chairs in the room almost more visible than their older selves. She wished Beethoven would hurry. Just a few moments. If she could hear him play just for a few moments . . .
He stood there in silence, and a dark expression again came over his face.
“What is it, Luigi?” asked the limping man.
Beethoven looked around him, his expression a little wild, and Sarah wondered if he was seeing the kinds of things she had witnessed in the dungeon. It was hard to imagine this pleasant room had ever been used for torture.
The composer now appeared to be listening very intently to something she couldn’t hear. Beethoven turned toward Sarah, and it almost seemed as if he could see her standing there. She looked behind her, but there was only the still, dim outlines of Max and Suzi, watching her. Sarah turned back to Beethoven.
“Who is there?” he demanded loudly, in German. There was a shocked silence, then a murmur of concern through the dinner party.
“Sarah, honey, are you okay?” It was Suzi’s voice.
“Sarah,” said Max, reaching for her. But she push
ed his arm away.
“Luigi,” whispered the man with the limp. “There’s no one there.”
“No, no,” said Beethoven. “I can feel something. Someone is here.”
Ludwig van Beethoven stared at her from one inch away, his eyes locked on hers. Sarah could smell oysters on his breath, and the warm scent of wool over his own musky odor. She was slightly taller, and Beethoven tilted his head up, assessing her with the fathomless eyes of a genius. He stood there for a long second, and then smiled and closed his eyes.
“Immortal Beloved,” he said.
And with that, Sarah fainted.
TWENTY-TWO
Charlotte Yates smiled and applauded on cue, but actually she was feeling a trifle melancholy. For once this had nothing to do with the fact that she was standing behind the president. Yes, he was outlining a “three-prong strategy for increased homeland security,” and of course it was maddening, on one level, to hear His Nincompoopness stumble through a policy she had designed herself, but it didn’t really matter. The strategy itself was meaningless. Just a little red herring to toss to the Dems in the Senate, who would start screaming about “personal liberties” as soon as the president finished his latest malapropism. (“Assuredliness?”) The results of this had already been calculated. Polk (R-La.) would champion the bill, and Davidson (D-Mass.) would organize the filibuster. The good thing about the Senate was that every member was concerned entirely and exclusively with building their own campaign chests, and stayed well out of any actual government. Fox and CNN would feast on what she fed them, and while they were busy stuffing their mouths, actual work could get done.
Charlotte shifted slightly to the president’s left, so that the cameras could get a fuller view of her pantsuit—a nifty plum Elie Tahari. Polling indicated that the American people liked and trusted her more when she was wearing warm shades. Recently she had taken out a pair of reading glasses while giving a speech, and her likability had gone up ten points across three different
demographics. “Humanizing” was what her aide Paula had said.
Charlotte sighed internally, smiled outwardly, and focused on the source of her uncharacteristic funk.
Now that she knew the Russians were hovering around Lobkowicz Palace, the need for the letters became a bit more urgent. The cold war was over, but all the little games persisted. It was a good thing those puppets in the Middle East had been too busy grubbing around in their deserts to play any serious role in international espionage. They were the future, but Charlotte knew she needed to dispense with the old enemies before she could take on the new. She took a calming moment to visualize the entire Arab world as a giant parking lot. Lovely.
No, it was troubling that Miles had continued to come up empty-handed, but the marchesa had recruited another agent to work the palace now. The person had no idea that they had been recruited of course. The marchesa knew how to get dirt and how to manipulate it.
Well, if shes a rec were perfectly honest there was a certain element of . . . thrill to the whole thing. It had been so long since she had inhaled that sharp sweet scent of danger. Plotting, controlling, maneuvering, making deals, these things were enjoyable, yes, and not without risk, but she had become almost too expert at it. Just last week she had sat down with some promisingly destabilizing African pirates, and her heart rate hadn’t gone above 100. Truly, her thirty minutes of morning cardio were more challenging.
Perhaps she was simply nostalgic for the good old days?
Prague in the seventies had been a magical place to be young and a CIA operative. Her official cover was that of an art historian. As a spook, she was deployed to be a liaison between scientists and artists wishing to defect to the West. The Soviets had seen through her cover soon enough, although with typical arrogance the CIA had never known it. Yuri Bespalov had been sent as delicious bait. She had met him several times before he made his first move at a little cocktail party at the National Museum. Yuri had been so courteous, offering her a glass of champagne, inquiring about her “work.” She had been genuinely surprised when he pressed a piece of paper into her palm before turning to another guest. She had stepped onto the balcony, lit a cigarette (ah, those carefree days of smoking), and read what was to be the first of the many letters he would give her—
I know who you are. You know who I am. We are both being watched. But I must find a way to escape these many eyes, so that I may look into yours. This will seem crazy to you? I can hardly believe it myself. Burn this.
It was just the sort of career-making opportunity Paisley had schooled her to watch for. Helping ballet dancers and physicists escape to the land of plenty wasn’t going to get her noticed. But shagging the potential next Minister of Culture and maybe getting a bead on some inner sanctum dealings . . . bingo. Charlotte could hardly wait to pass the note on to her chief.
Except she hadn’t. Because at the end of the evening, Yuri had sidled up and explained that his driver would be happy to escort her home. And she had accepted gratefully because the cobblestone streets of Prague were murder to traverse in heels, and the maintenance of her lowly cover meant she had to either walk or take the bus. She had expected another note, perhaps with a suggestion that they meet somewhere neutral, as if by accident. Maybe he was going to try to recruit her! That would be fun.
Was she surprised when the driver had taken her to Dalibor Tower on the Prague Castle grounds? Was she nervous when the driver had left her alone in the car, ambling off into the darkness, whistling? Was she startled when the door next to her opened and Yuri crawled in, pushing her backward, sliding his hands under her cheap rayon dress?
Her first thought had been that she should grin and bear it. Take one for the team. Let the commie bastard have his way with her and then see what information she could pump.
At what point had her manufactured moans become disturbingly realistic? When he had actually ripped her panties off? When he had wrapped her thighs around his neck and licked her like a starving cat? Definitely before she straddled him like a frantic jockey.
Present-day Charlotte Yates shifted inside her Elie Tahari, mindful that too much movement played terribly on camerrontera.
Later, much later, Yuri had confessed that while, yes, his original mission had been to recruit her to the other side, the sex had been his idea. And the love . . . well, that had just happened. Dig your nails deep enough into the back of a Soviet, and eventually you’ll find a Russian.
So things had played out in Prague a little differently than everyone had anticipated. But she had always been a patriot. Nothing she had ended up doing for the Soviets constituted any threat to the United States. So a few dozen would-be defectors ended up having to stay at home? Nobody was actually hurt. Well, hurt permanently. Well, probably nobody had been killed.
But if it all got out? People could be led to see it differently. People.
There. She had at last located the source of her sadness. It was people. Charlotte Yates loved humanity with all her heart, but she really had to draw the line at individuals. For the most part they were incredibly stupid, clumsy, selfish, and criminally shortsighted. Look, for instance, at who they voted for.
Charlotte forced herself to smile at the back of the president’s head. Thank goodness that for every million incompetent losers there was someone like herself ready to step forward and do what was necessary to safeguard America and the world at large.
When the president finished mangling his remarks (“Islamification?”), she would applaud. Later she would stand on the steps of the Capitol and deliver her own statements. At a designated time, Paula would step forward and hand her a piece of paper. Charlotte would smile ruefully at the members of the press corps
while putting on her reading glasses, then turn and say that unfortunately she would not be able to answer any questions, that she had a very important meeting with a Girl Scout troop at the Senate. “And let’s remember who we’re doing all this for, people,” she would say. “For the children.”
She’d give the marchesa and her new sidekick in Prague a week or so to turn up something—anything. There was nothing like a time deadline to inspire people to get . . . creative. She needed those letters. It was a matter of national security. And also she just really wanted to hold them again. Remind herself that in this crazy old world there were simple things to cherish. Really, if people knew that deep down, deep, deep, deep down, she was such a softie, she wouldn’t have to wear the fucking glasses.
TWENTY-THREE
“He learned to play the violin in his prison cell,” said Max. “If you focus on that sound, you can see him. His name was Dalibor of Kozojedy, and he was imprisoned for being too nicey-nice to some peasants. He’s wearing an orange tunic, but look for the violin. That’s how I know it’s him, and I know it’s 1498 because that’s when he was executed. I always see him when I stand here. Can you find him?”
“I’m trying, but I keep getting stuck on these people humping like bunnies in the backseat of a black Lada,” said Sarah. “It’s like a seventies porn film. Wow, that guy is . . . talented.”
Sarah and Max were standing in the moonlight in front of Dalibor Tower, which rose above Deer Moat. erron;. The drug had mostly worn off, but Sarah was getting little flashbacks as she and Max walked around the castle grounds, not a (present-day) soul in the place. Max was trying to teach her to hone her perceptions and not be overwhelmed, but Sarah was still finding it hard to breathe when layers upon layers of intense human activity suddenly swooped up around her. She tried peering through the windows of the black Lada, but couldn’t make out the faces of the occupants.
And then, as a light breeze stirred the candy wrappers on the cobblestones, Sarah was suddenly staring at an empty patch of pavement.
“It’s gone,” she said. It made no sense that she was not relieved. The past two hours had been the most terrifying of her entire life. She had come to in Max’s arms, muttering “everything, everything” over and over. Suzi was out of her mind with worry,
but Max had convinced her to leave doctors out of it, and just get Sarah a glass of water and an aspirin.
“I don’t know what you gave her,” Suzi said. “But you gave her too much.”
Max frowned, and asked her to please be discreet. Suzi nodded, and Sarah had thought she looked a little awed. Whether at the authority in Max’s voice, or over what she had just witnessed, Sarah couldn’t tell.
Once she could stand up and walk and talk on her own without hyperventilating, Max took Sarah outside into the night air. Suzi had gone to bed muttering that she would not say anything to anyone, but that tomorrow she would be needing some explanations.
Max and Sarah had walked around the castle grounds, with flashes appearing to Sarah here and there. Max was like a little kid, leading her around by the hand excitedly, wanting to show her his great-to-the-tenth grandmother Polyxena standing up to the Protestants when they came looking for the Catholic ministers they had just thrown out the window, Tycho Brahe gazing at the sky from the palace roof, and poor depressed Kafka, hard at work on his account books in Golden Lane.
“You’re my tour guide to the past,” laughed Sarah. “Hey, let’s go over to the Riding School. I want to try to see Emperor Rudy’s lion again.”
Sarah badly wanted to get a glimpse of all these famous people and events, but the problem was, with so many people having experienced moments of intense fear, pain, joy, or longing in one place for over a thousand years, it was hard to sift through it all. It reminded her of when she was a little girl and visited her mom at work at a Beacon Hill brownstone. In the cavernous basement laundry room, rows of sheets were hung on long lines to dry. She loved to close her eyes and run through them, letting the clean linen whap her in the face. Her mom had yelled at her that she would get them dirty, but she hadn’t cared. Now Sarah had a hard time getting through the layers.
