Aria to Death

by Nupur Tustin

  Haydn, looking forward to his own correspondence and glad of this heaven-sent opportunity to be momentarily rid of the singer’s presence, was about to agree. But Frau Dichtler was at the door and out of it before he could utter a word.

  CHAPTER TWO

  In the Esterházy kitchen downstairs, the sound of the mail coach lumbering into the inner courtyard held no excitement for Rosalie Szabó, the palace maid. There would in all likelihood be another letter from Rohrau.

  The thought made the corners of her mouth droop, and for a moment she remained where she was: on tiptoe, fingertips still touching the last of the rose-and-gold china cups she had been putting away.

  She slowly dropped back to her feet. Letter or no letter, she had best get on with it. Herr Haydn would be wanting his mail. He must, if Rosalie knew him, be awaiting it quite eagerly.

  She stepped out of the kitchen and cast a quick look around the hallway. The thought of her own correspondence filled her with such dread, she would gladly have entrusted the task of receiving the Kapellmeister’s mail to Greta or one of the other maids. But no one was around.

  Reluctantly, she took her place behind Her Serene Highness’s maid, Frau Schwann. A footman had already begin sorting the letters into neat piles on a table near the entryway. God forbid, there should be a letter from Mama—

  The sudden loud clatter of a woman’s heels jolted Rosalie’s mind away from the dreadful possibility. She glanced over her shoulder, violet eyes widening at the sight of Elisabeth Dichtler.

  The soprano swept past the waiting maids and came to a halt beside the footman, her satin gown cascading to the floor behind her in soft crimson folds. Good heavens, what did the woman think she was doing?

  “Are there any letters for me?” Frau Dichtler stared at the visibly disconcerted footman. Without waiting for a response, she snatched the stack of correspondence out of his startled hands and began impatiently sifting through it.

  “The impertinence of that woman knows no bounds,” Frau Schwann muttered to Rosalie. “Why Her Serene Highness tolerates her, I shall never know.” The lady’s maid drew herself up, her shoulders set in a disapproving line.

  Rosalie was about to whisper a response when her attention was drawn back to the soprano.

  “Is this all there is?” Frau Dichtler’s voice rose to a pitch so unpleasantly strident, the footman flinched, shying nervously back a pace. Oblivious to the movement, the soprano drew an envelope from the stack in her hands, tossed the rest onto the table in an untidy heap, and surveyed the table and marble floor around it. “Are there no packets for me?”

  She turned to stare at the footman, who seemed able to do little more than gaze haplessly around. His apologetic expression did nothing to appease the soprano, who whirled around with a little snort of disgust. She tore into her letter, an unbecoming shade of purple suffusing her cheeks as she cast her eyes over the thin sheet.

  “…unfortunate venture…no gains…” Rosalie heard her mutter as she walked past. “… hadn’t bargained for…” Frau Dichtler flung her head up at the ceiling. “Is the man a fool?” she demanded of no one in particular. “I shall have to provide for myself at this rate.” She clattered down the hallway, grumbling to herself.

  Frau Schwann watched her go, her lips pursed. “Really! How many men does that woman expect to provide for her? His Serene Highness pays handsomely enough to keep her in spirits, not to mention that no-good husband of hers.”

  “Most strange,” Rosalie agreed, her troubles temporarily forgotten. She twisted around to gaze after the singer. She thought she heard the faintly uttered words: “…promises me the score of…” as the singer went out of sight.

  Had Frau Dichtler been expecting a new singing part? “Do you suppose that’s what she’s in such a pother over? A singing part that never arrived?” Rosalie asked Frau Schwann, even though it seemed unlikely.

  The lady’s maid harrumphed. “I can’t imagine why. It’s as much as Herr Haydn can do to keep her in the Rehearsal Room.”

  * * *

  It was with no little concern that Haydn watched Rosalie leave the Music Room. She had delivered the mail with something close to her usual manner. But her attempt at a smile had been wan and her features still seemed pale and pinched. Her despondent air had struck Luigi as well, for the Konzertmeister remarked upon it almost as soon as she pulled the door shut.

  “Still grieving, I see, poor child!” He contemplated the door through narrowed eyes.

  “And still being made to bear her mother’s recriminations, if I mistake not,” Haydn replied with an imperceptible shake of his head. “There was a letter poking out of her apron pocket. From Rohrau, no doubt.

  “It was in vain that I explained it was as much my fault as anyone else’s. The boy would have come to no harm had I not hired him.” He pursed his lips, the corners of his mouth drawing down. Engaging Rosalie’s brother had caused more trouble than it was worth. He had managed to avert the worst of it, but it was not a decision he could be proud of.

  “You blame yourself needlessly, Joseph. How could you have known he would be so lacking in judgment?” Luigi demanded.

  Haydn shook his head, unable to so easily deny his own culpability in the matter. “I was too blind to see it. If I had, I might have saved him from death.”

  Letting out a heavy breath, the Kapellmeister rose from the little lacquer table at which they sat and walked the few paces toward his desk. He was about to retrieve his correspondence when a knock on the door interrupted him.

  “Johann?” The Kapellmeister’s eyebrows were raised, but he was not overly surprised to see the slight form of his youngest brother at the door. “Herr Porta is eager for news of our progress, I suppose.”

  The Prince’s ardent desire to open the opera house at his newly renovated hunting lodge in Eszterháza had lent an urgency to Herr Porta’s efforts. That Johann had been pressed into service was no surprise. The Opera Director relied upon him. But Herr Porta had gone so far as to recruit every church singer in the Esterházy troupe as well.

  “It is only to appease His Serene Highness.” Johann walked into the room, an amused smile brightening his pale, thin cheeks. “He has no more desire to leave for Eszterháza than any of the rest of us.”

  “Who can blame him? Eisenstadt is positively cosmopolitan in comparison,” Luigi exclaimed as a spasm of distaste flitted across Haydn’s face.

  Eszterháza was even smaller than Eisenstadt. A rude Hungarian village, devoid of any Germans, untouched by civilization. Who would want to hasten there? Worse still, if the Prince had his way, there would be no returning until the end of summer.

  Every fiber of Haydn’s being recoiled at the thought. Not even Satan had the power to make a heaven of that particular hell.

  “At any event,” Johann’s voice intruded upon his thoughts, “Frau Dichtler affords us all a welcome respite. And Herr Porta is well aware of it.” Johann drew up a chair to the rose-patterned black lacquer table at which Luigi remained seated and, with a smile, sat down next to him.

  He glanced over his shoulder. “He is more eager to know whether you have received your copy of the Wienerisches Diarium. He sent me up as soon as he heard the mail coach arrive.”

  He looked expectantly at the Kapellmeister. “Have you?”

  “It would appear not.” A mild note of bewilderment colored Haydn’s disappointment as he rifled through his letters. The back issues of the court newspaper he received from his bookseller in Wiener Neustadt were his sole connection to the musical center of the world.

  He searched through his correspondence again, growing more puzzled. Herr Weisenstein’s brain might be as jumbled as the contents of the drawers beneath the counters in his bookstore, but he had never once forgotten to send an issue. He was well aware just how much Haydn enjoyed reading the Diarium’s accounts of the musical happenings in Vienna.

  He walked slowly back toward his seat by the window, still sifting through his correspondence. One envel
ope caught his eye this time, and he paused to inspect the postmark. “From Vienna,” he said in some surprise, carefully breaking the seal.

  “From Vienna!” Luigi repeated, his eyes lighting up. “Who is it from?”

  Haydn turned the letter over, his eyes briefly scanned the closely written page before coming to rest on the signature. “Wilhelm Kaspar. He wishes me to come to him.” He peered over the top of the sheet at the two men seated before him. “It is a matter of some urgency, he says.”

  * * *

  Rosalie glanced up from her letter, glad of the quiet pervading the Servants’ Hall. How her mother contrived to turn every phrase into an indirect reproach!

  “My dear daughter,” Frau Szabó had concluded her letter, “I pray you may never know what it is like to see a child you have watched over with such care led astray!”

  Rosalie folded the letter with a frustrated sigh and stuffed it into her apron pocket. If she took exception to the words, Mama would reply in pained resignation that she was only expressing her grief. That it was Rosalie’s own guilty mind making her imagine Mama held her to blame.

  She sighed again. “She will learn to forgive me in time, no doubt.”

  She was prevented from dwelling any further on the matter by a commotion outside the window. She twisted around on the oak settee. Through the open window she saw Frau Dichtler walking agitatedly around the bergamot planters in the herb garden, berating her husband.

  Her curiosity piqued, Rosalie leant closer to the open window. A rapid stream of words emerged from the soprano’s lips, but Rosalie could hear only the sound of her high-pitched voice. An expression of sullen resentment descended over Herr Dichtler’s handsome features as his wife spoke.

  “What can that awful woman’s husband have done for her to take on so?” Greta’s loud whisper caused Rosalie to nearly jump out of her skin.

  “It is not her husband,” Rosalie whispered back, pointing to the letter Frau Dichtler was thrusting at her husband’s chest. “It’s that letter that has put her in such a state.” She related what she had overheard while waiting for the Kapellmeister’s correspondence.

  “Gambled her money on some dodgy scheme, has he? And without her knowledge, I’ll wager.” Greta’s plump cheeks puffed out as she voiced the opinion. She knelt on the settee and pushed the long stalks of marigold out of her way for a better view. “Put her in quite a tizzy, it has, hasn’t it? Small wonder, too!”

  Rosalie shook her head. “Whatever it was, she must have known of it. Something to do with—”

  “You must go procure it, Fritz!” Frau Dichtler’s penetrating tones invaded their ears. “Are we to lose the opportunity of a lifetime because of this…this—” She jabbed at the letter, apparently at a loss for words, then turned on her heels.

  “But the money, Elsa?” They heard Fritz Dichtler protest as he followed behind.

  “What can those two be after?” Greta peered out of the window, her eyes following the Dichtlers.

  “Something to do with music—a new singing role,” Rosalie hazarded. “She was expecting a score in the mail. I heard her say so,” she continued at the skeptical expression on Greta’s plump features. “Although, if it is that, how she can have lost money, I don’t know.”

  Greta shrugged. “Neither do I. All I do know is that those two”—she pointed a dimpled hand in the direction the Dichtlers had gone—“are up to no good. No good at all!”

  * * *

  “Herr Anwalt is confident the works will prove to be the operas of the great Claudio Monteverdi. In the maestro’s hand, no less! Only consider their worth, if that is true.”

  Johann raised his head from the letter he had been reading aloud. “Monteverdi’s operas! All of them!” His voice rose in incredulity as he glanced first at the Konzertmeister and then at Haydn. “It scarcely seems plausible, does it, brother?”

  But Haydn, rapt in a study of the undulating landscape visible through the window and the sandstone farmhouses dotting the richly verdant country, made no reply. It was Luigi who spoke.

  “It is not entirely impossible, I suppose. The old merchant traveled often enough to Italy.” The Konzertmeister paused to scratch contemplatively at his beard. “You know, he recounted the most unusual tale to me when I was in Vienna.

  “Something about an old monk who took such exception to Monteverdi’s music, he dispatched some men to steal it. Every score would have been destroyed. But one of the thieves, enchanted by the music, kept the original and gave the monk a copy.”

  Luigi’s remarks had drawn the Kapellmeister’s attention. He twisted around in his armchair, his eyes narrowed. “And the originals passed in some fashion, I take it, to Kaspar’s old uncle?”

  Luigi shrugged, spreading his hands wide. “So, old Wilhelm Dietrich claimed. He said he had met the great-grandson of the brigand in question, a printer in Cremona.”

  “And it is that tale that forms the basis of poor Kaspar’s hopes?” Johann stared at the Konzertmeister. “It is an amusing anecdote to be sure, but…” His eyes drifted toward his brother. “Can it be true?”

  Haydn considered the question, chin cupped in his hand. “The more important question,” he finally replied, voicing the thought in a pensive adagio, “is whether the scores contain the music Monteverdi wrote for his operas.”

  “And that cannot be determined until you have examined them.” Luigi reached for the letter Johann had placed on the table between them. “Why Kaspar did not enclose them with his letter, I cannot understand. His Serene Highness is hardly likely to grant you a leave of absence at this time.”

  “After that first attempt on them, how could he not be wary of entrusting them to the mail coach?” Haydn murmured, his gaze fixed upon the pink roses painted on the table before him.

  “But—” Luigi began, then stopped. His hazel eyes, misting over in confusion, slid toward Johann in an unspoken question. Johann shook his head and turned toward his brother, about to ask a question when Haydn spoke again.

  “Re-read the section about the robbery, if you please, Johann.” He leaned back in his chair, bringing his fingertips together, elbows resting on either armrest.

  “Ah!” he said when Johann had finished reading the passage. “So someone must have been convinced the bequest was valuable. Those ruffians appear to have known exactly what they were after.”

  “That is not to be wondered at, Joseph.” Luigi leaned forward. “All of Vienna knew Kaspar would receive a substantial bequest upon his uncle’s death.” He turned toward Johann. “The old man had no children and Kaspar was his only nephew.”

  Johann nodded, clearly in agreement with the Konzertmeister. “Besides,” he added, “Kaspar says Vienna is grown so unsafe, a man had better carry some additional florins in his purse for just such a mischance as he encountered.”

  “And yet it was not money the thieves wanted,” Haydn replied. “It was the casket. Had he inherited money or precious stones, would he have been foolish enough to carry them so openly? At night no less? No! But a parcel of old, apparently worthless music, why even Herr Anwalt must have seen no harm in—”

  He stopped abruptly, his brow furrowed. “Why…” he murmured, then shook his head.

  “Well, it was fortunate the thieves were not well armed.” Luigi broke the silence that had fallen upon them. “It is odd that they were not. But they could not have been expecting much resistance.”

  “An odd fact, indeed.” A troubled expression descended upon the Kapellmeister’s features. “There can only be one reason for it, I fear.”

  “You mean that it was a deliberate attempt?” Johann ventured, sounding unconvinced. “But that would mean—”

  “That someone knew exactly what the bequest consisted of,” Haydn completed his brother’s thought, his tone somber.

  “But who?” Luigi wanted to know.

  “Who indeed?” Haydn replied quietly.

  CHAPTER THREE

  The day’s events fled briefly from Haydn�
�s mind that evening, dispelled by the bowl of chicken and dumplings his wife placed before him.

  “Paprika,” he muttered, eyeing the telltale flecks of red in his broth. “Surely there was no need to ruin a perfectly good stew with it! It is all we shall be having before long.”

  Even the steam arising from the bowl reeked of its unpleasant odor, he thought, wrinkling his nose in distaste.

  “Then, you had best get accustomed to it, husband,” Maria Anna retorted. “Why we must remove to the swamplands of Eszterháza, I am sure I don’t know,” she grumbled on as she ladled out a second bowl of stew for Johann.

  “It is a most dreadful inconvenience.” She set the bowl before her brother-in-law. “Papa was expecting us in Vienna.”

  “Was he indeed?” Haydn stared at his wife. The Kellers were well aware His Serene Highness never set foot in Vienna between the months of April and November if he could help it. There was certainly no question of the musicians venturing out to the capital on their own.

  “Therese is in Vienna.” Maria Anna sat across the kitchen table from her husband and gazed straight into his eyes.

  “As she has been these several years. What of it?” Haydn replied, determined to remain impassive. He lowered his head to his meal, somehow unable to meet his wife’s eyes. A small, painful flutter arising within his breast made him wince.

  Indigestion. From the wretched paprika, no doubt. What else could it be?

  It was ten years, or more, since he had last set eyes on his sister-in-law.

  “I meant that she is home from the convent,” Maria Anna snapped.

  The words brought Haydn’s head up with a jolt. He was still trying to frame a response when Johann fortunately spoke: “And you naturally wish to see your sister, do you not, sister-in-law?”

  He cast Haydn a quick glance of sympathy. “It will be some months before the Prince moves to Eszterháza. Should you wish to travel to Vienna in the meantime, sister-in-law, I am sure it can be arranged.”