by Shoshi
didn’t plan to wait. He knew he had only one chance now to escape the questions she had asked him and more questions that he imagined would be coming next. He hoped against hope that that phone call would last forever—or at least a couple of minutes.
He tried again to use the talisman. He traced Mozart’s signature over and over, and still nothing happened. “Oh, Carol, if only you were here,” he said aloud. She’d figure out a way to do this or maybe guess out what he was doing wrong.
He could hear the conversation on the phone at the other end of the apartment coming to an end. It was funny how you could tell when grownups were finishing up a phone call. They start to say things that say they have no more to tell this person, but they don’t want to be rude and cut if off. They make nice, make polite. It takes them so frigging long to end it although today he was glad to have that extra time.
And, then, a sudden idea speared into his head like an arrow shot from a castle wall. He had an image of Carol doing her homework, which they often did together. She lifted her pencil to make some notes, and it hit him. It was something he often kidded her about. She was left-handed! He realized now she had traced Mozart’s signature with her left hand. Could that have been the thing he was doing wrong? Did he need to trace the signature with his left hand?
He could hear Carol’s mother snapping her cell phone closed. She was on her way back! With a trembling left forefinger Mathew traced out Mozart’s name and waited and hoped. It happened. On the wings of a near tornado and an explosion of light, he dissolved swiftly into nothingness.
For a couple of seconds before it began, he thought maybe Mrs. Pindler did need to see it all happening. Needed to have a hint that he really was in their apartment and Carol wasn’t because they were off doing unimaginably fantastic things. But it was too late. He was already on his way back through the fog of years to Vienna and to Carol in the year 1791.
• FOURTEEN •
As soon as the door had closed behind the policeman and Dr. Closset, Carol and Mozart began to have an uncontrollable giggling fit. Constanze took it more seriously. “The nerve of him,” she said, “bringing a policeman here. But we are lucky. It could have turned out badly for us. Dr. Closset is a prominent man. If Wolfgang hadn’t been here, the policeman might well have marched Carol and me off to be questioned and, perhaps, spend the night in prison.” Their giggling stopped. “This may not be the end of it,” she said.
“Foolishness,” scoffed Mozart. “They cannot prove anything.” He took a long look at Carol. “Still,” he said, “we all know the truth. Mathew did steal the doctor’s bag. The coachman might tell them that he saw Mathew toss it up to him while he sat on the driver’s seat of the doctor’s coach.” Mozart did a light-hearted dance step through the kitchen while pretending to be a pied piper playing his flute---in this case a long black spatula. “Who cares?” he said. “Who cares? Still there is one thing I would like to know,” he said.
“What is that?” asked Constanze.
“Just what has happened to Carol’s brother? He does not know Vienna, yet he has completely disappeared.”
“Do you think he is lost?” said Constanze anxiously.
Mozart smiled impishly. “No, not lost. Just very curious, I would say. A young man wants to see—you know, the sights—or---whatever. Vienna is known for many things.” He dug a finger into Carol’s ribs and giggled in his maniacal way.
Carol couldn’t help giggling back though she didn’t know quite what he was hinting at. She could also see that Constanze didn’t approve of all this talk.
“Has he got any ducats in his pocket?” Mozart wanted to know.
“Probably not,” said Carol.
“English shillings, I expect,” said Mozart. “They won’t carry him very far.” He danced a minuet around the kitchen. “I believe young Mathew will be back sooner than we think,” he said.
The doorbell rang.
“Speak of the devil,” he said. “I need to pee.” And he danced back to the bedroom, leaving Constanze to answer the door—as he left most things for her to do.
It was someone Carol had never seen before, a well-dressed man in jodhpurs, high boots of fine leather and a riding vest. A nobleman without doubt. He had tied his horse to a hitching post in front of their house.
Constanze seemed very taken aback by him. “We were not expecting you this soon,” she told him.
He bowed briefly. “Frau Mozart, I’m here to tell you that the gentleman I work for has changed the delivery schedule. He must have the Requiem right away. It is urgent.”
Carol now recognized who this was—the mysterious messenger she and Mathew had read about in one of her dad’s Mozart books, the man who had paid Mozart 100 ducats for a requiem that his master could claim he had written himself.
Constanze was for once at a loss for words. “But, sir, it is not ready yet. It was not supposed to be ready for at least four weeks. He is working on it, refining it,” she said, “but the Master has been very ill.”
“That is of no concern to us,” said the man. “We must have it now. If it is not ready, we will have no difficulty finding another composer to finish it.”
“Herr Mozart would never permit that,” she said stoutly.
“He has no say in this. My master has paid well for this work---paid in advance.” The tall stranger rapped his swagger stick on one of his boots and looked haughtily down on Constanze. “It goes without saying that Herr Mozart will receive no addition to the fee if he cannot meet these terms.”
Carol could see how badly Constanze was taking this news. She knew how desperately they needed the money. They had been promised a bonus, and now it might be taken away. Constanze could only give in to his demands. “I will speak to my husband. He will examine his schedule and see what can be done. Come back tomorrow at this time, and we will try to have it ready.”
What Constanze did not know is that Carol and Mathew had already attempted unsuccessfully to make off with the Requiem.
Carol was glad now she had failed to pass it to Mathew as he time-travelled to America. Instead, she had put it back on Mozart’s bed. She hadn’t realized that he was still working on it.
“Good day, sir,” Constanze said stiffly and swept off into her house. She stopped at the door and said: “Are you coming, Carol?”
“In a moment, Constanze.” The door closed behind her. Carol felt an overwhelming loathing for this man and wanted to tell him off. He was doing the dirty work of a nobleman with too much money who could pay to steal what another man created and show it off as his own. She told him as much.
“Who are you to speak to me in this fashion?” he said angrily.
“It’s none of your business who I am,” she flung back at hm.
“I hear your impudent English accent through your German pretention. You are riff raff like the rest of your countrymen. And a child without manners besides.”
“Where I come from we put jerks like you behind bars,” she said. She wasn’t sure if that was true—but it seemed like it ought to be.
“In another minute I will spank your bottom for such impudence,” he said. “In Austria children know their place.”
He started to move towards her, and Carol who was half his size began to panic. In America adults don’t hit kids or very rarely, but Austria in 1791, she suspected, might be different. Maybe she shouldn’t have told him off.
Then, suddenly out of nowhere a coachman’s whip struck him full in the face.
• FIFTEEN •
To Carol’s astonishment the whip was wielded by none other than Herr Schack, who had come up behind him. “Touch my niece, and you are a dead man,” he shouted. He had drawn a rapier and poked it menacingly into the messenger’s tunic. As they often said in old westerns, Carol knew, Herr Schack had gotten the drop on him.
But this was age versus youth. The man turned to se
e who had attacked him, sized up the heavy-bellied Herr Schack and slapped away his rapier. “You fat old pig!” the messenger cried out. “I could destroy you in seconds!”
“Not before you retrieve your horse, sir,” said Herr Schack. The man whirled in time to see Carol untying his horse from the Mozarts’ hitching post. She gave a sharp yell in one of its ears while aiming a resounding whack on its flank and stood back as the animal fled in fright down Raubensteingasse Street. The last thing they saw was an overdressed man shouting and waving his rapier as he splattered down the muddy street after his ride home.
“Well done, Carol! He will be busy for a while.” Herr Schack was breathing heavily after his brief battle but couldn’t stop laughing.
Carol was laughing, too. “Thank you for saving me, sir,” she said. “It’s wonderful to see you again, but I’m not your niece, you know.”
“I don’t think you are Josef’s niece either,” he said with a sly grin.
Carol realized in a rush that she and Mathew had lost their cover. Herr Schack now suspected they were not part of the Mozart family and not visitors from England either. He would probably pass along his suspicions to the Mozarts, and they would want to know who they really were.
That would be the first of many questions they’d want answers to, especially Constanze. Where had they come from and what on earth were they doing there? How would she answer? How could
