Mozart's Sister: A Novel (16 page)

The girl looked at her sharply. “I said I’m not coming, Mama. Is that clear?”

“That’s how you’ll get a reputation for surliness. Holy shit! Where did that obstinacy come from?”

Just then there was a knock at the door, and Frau Mozart grew even more agitated. “Who in the world is that right now? Nannerl, you go; Tresel has better things to do.”

Relieved by the interruption, Nannerl put on a dressing gown and went to the door; but what she saw when she opened it astonished her. Framed in the doorway, with an impertinent smile on her lips and a joyful light in her dark eyes, in a graceful purple dress and a hat to match, this one trimmed with a bunch of violets, was the girl of the white rose.

“Hello, Nannerl,” she said as if she had known her from childhood. “Aren’t you giving lessons today? That must be a relief. Your students are all so bad! How can you stand it?”

She must have been about fifteen, Wolfgang’s age, and she exuded a lively good humor. She let out a silvery laugh, throwing her head back, then she took a score from her bag, which was embroidered in bright colors. “It’s the First Sonata of Johann Gottfried Eckard, the one you performed in a concert when you were little. May I ask you to listen to it? I haven’t played anything else for a month. I can play it from memory and even blindfolded, if you want!”

“Can you pay?”

The smile vanished and the brown eyes grew clouded.

“I can only give lessons to people who pay, because I have to support my brother’s studies. If you can contribute, come back tomorrow. Otherwise, don’t bother.”

She closed the door and returned to the bedroom.

“Well, who was it?” Anna Maria greeted her, but she didn’t answer; the red dress was now laid out on the chair, ready to be put on. Nannerl stared at it with mute rage; she would have happily torn it to shreds, if not for her mother’s fury.

“At least it gives you some color. Tresel, come, do something with her hair. It’s very late and we really must go. Do something quickly, but attractive, please.”

The girl of the white rose, returning in disappointment to the street, surely heard Fräulein Mozart shouting, “I’m not coming! I’m not coming. Damn it, Mama, what language do I have to speak? You go alone!”

XII.

The dress was becoming, at least in style; but the flaming red color only emphasized her extreme pallor. Sitting on the damask sofa with a look of deep annoyance, Nannerl was a dissonant note in that universe of skilled conversationalists and expert entertainers, of subtle observations and secret understandings.

Anna Maria, on the other hand, appeared perfectly at ease, sitting at a card table with Katharina von Esser and two gentlemen; finding themselves on opposite sides in the game of
tressette
did not keep the two women, by now intimate as old friends, from conversing in a whisper.

“Why is your beautiful daughter sitting there all by herself sulking? Looking at her really makes me heartsick. It’s a waste, a true contradiction of nature.”

“Countess, thank you. Nannerl is quite pretty, in fact.” Then on her face appeared a pained expression. “But she has such a terrible temperament. Poor girl.”

“You know what I think about this, Frau Mozart. We must find her a fiancé as soon as possible. It’s the best cure.”

“Indeed! But I’m afraid she doesn’t want to hear anything about it. Men don’t interest her. There’s nothing to be done about it.”

“She’ll change her mind, sooner or later, don’t worry—all women like to be courted.”

Throwing a card on the table, Anna Maria rested her eyes on Nannerl. A waiter passed by with a tray of glasses; she took one and swallowed the contents in a gulp. Frau Mozart sighed.

“I would like to believe you, Countess. But something tells me that my daughter will never find a man willing to put up with her.”

“You mustn’t give up so soon, my dear.” Katharina’s gaze, traveling above the cards she held in her hand, settled on an individual on the other side of the room. “I have an idea about the man for her,” she continued in a complicitous whisper. “Look over there. Do you see him? His name is Johann Baptist von Berchtold zu Sonnenburg.”

“Aristocratic?” Anna Maria said, with interest.

“Of course, my friend. Otherwise I would not have proposed him. He’s a baron, very wealthy, with a number of apartments in Salzburg and Vienna, and also a house in the mountains that they tell me is splendid. How does he seem to you?”

Already Anna Maria saw herself dwelling in a luxurious mansion, surrounded by servants available to brush her clothes, shoes, even her nails, by cooks who at a nod would tempt her with the most refined pastries, by valets who would carry her from one salon to the other in
chaises à porteur
like those of Versailles. “He is…I would say…rather interesting.”

“At the moment he has no one. Imagine, a year ago he was widowed, poor man, with four children to bring up, all boys. Isn’t it sad when a child is reared by a crowd of governesses? I find it terrible, I must say.”

“Yes, indeed, it’s very hard.”

Katharina laid down her cards and addressed the other players: “Gentlemen, would you mind a short pause? My friend and I have a certain matter to take care of. Forgive us, please. We’ll be back as soon as we can.”

The gentlemen nodded politely, and the two women crossed the salon like actresses on a stage. They took their time, partly to create a greater impact, partly because the countess was unsteady on her heels, which were too high; Anna Maria advanced in her shadow, but as soon as she was close enough to the baron to see his features clearly, she moved to one side and shamelessly examined him from head to toe, holding her breath.

Johann Baptist von Berchtold zu Sonnenburg was extremely handsome. Under thirty, slender, with long hair the color of grain that he wore simply pulled back, he had features so harmonious that they could have been lent, with advantage, to an Apollo. He had only one small flaw, as Anna Maria had to admit when he stood up, out of respect to the countess: he was short, as if the Creator had considered that such beauty in large dimensions would have been too dazzling, complicating his life.

“My adored Baron, what a pleasure,” Katharina said, offering her hand.

“Countess, seeing you is always a genuine delight,” he declared, without much conviction and looking around as if in expectation of someone or something.

“Do you know my good friend Frau Anna Maria Mozart?”

“Enchanté,
Madame,” he said, kissing her hand, and for an instant he was silent, observing her with an irresistible smile. His irises, ringed by long, thick, dark eyelashes, were of two different colors: the left was uniformly gray-green; while on the upper part of the right a blue patch appeared. “As you see, Madame,” he declared in a clear, youthful voice, “I am shorter than you, and perhaps also than your daughter. Is the girl in question here, or do you intend to introduce me on some other occasion?”

“Baron, don’t be mischievous!” said the voluble countess, and she turned to Anna Maria: “Baptist is an artist, you know. Just like your beautiful daughter. Who knows, maybe they would understand each other.”

“What art does the young lady favor?” Baptist asked politely, looking up for a moment with those shining eyes of his.

Anna Maria dared to open her mouth: “Well, it’s not a pastime but a profession, as a matter of fact. My daughter, Nannerl, is the best piano teacher in the city.”

“Ah, but then I know whom you’re talking about. I’ve heard her perform, with her brother! Dear Countess, this time you mean to assign me a musician as the mother of my sons? Well done—a true inspiration.”

“I don’t mean to do anything, dear Baptist,” she answered, in some annoyance. “And in any case, I certainly don’t have the power to choose for you what only destiny, and the divine plan, can arrange. I confine myself to smoothing the path to acquaintance of individuals whom my shrewd sensibility picks out as having some affinity, and not exclusively with a romantic purpose, believe me, but in order to widen the circle of my relationships, and of the individuals themselves. As I read the other evening in a French text that my husband obtained for me, nothing is of greater importance in this life than human contact: it is only through those around us, in fact, that we are able to achieve success, perform our duties, and obtain satisfaction. It follows that friendly relations should be cultivated and stimulated more than anything else, and it is undeniable that in that field, I possess a rare intelligence, or perhaps only good intuition. It is well known that those whom I introduce to one another habitually become at least friends, to their contentment and mine. And it is of contentment, dear Baron, that I speak: since it is absolutely certain, you must admit, that a new love would brighten your life, made unhappy by the misfortune that we all know and that I don’t want to refer to explicitly out of respect for your feelings; it is absolutely certain, therefore, that love would genuinely brighten your life. You, dear friend, need to meet carefree young women who come to every occasion with a serene and positive attitude.”

“Mama, I can’t take it anymore!” The three turned toward Nannerl, who had joined them, paler than ever, stormier-looking than ever. “My head is bursting, and I’m tired. I want to go home and I will, with or without you!”

For a moment the baron looked at her with an ambiguous expression, amused by such unfashionable manners. Suddenly, he took a breath and declaimed:

“Oh, beautiful eyes, so weary and blue,

I, humble knight

With humble right,

If those eyes will consent

I, grateful and content,

Will carry them on my steed so white and true.”

And he stood there, one hand raised in the air and the other pressed melodramatically to his chest.

A vaguely embarrassed silence fell. Nannerl looked at the man as if he were deranged, and even Anna Maria seemed somewhat taken aback. But Katharina, satisfied by what seemed to her an excellent beginning, commented, “Nannerl dear, our baron is a man worthy of the greatest interest. He has a unique gift, which he displays to everyone he meets: that of creating extempore verses of rare beauty, in perfect rhymes, sometimes alternating and sometimes in couplets. In short, he has just offered to take you home in his carriage, since you prefer to deprive us of your company. Is that not an unusually gallant gesture?”

Not satisfied, the man pressed on, in a thundering voice and with comically theatrical gestures:

“Not only to the dwelling of Nannerl,

Who of all here is the most beautiful girl,

Will I go, but further, mile after mile

My humble carriage has the power

To take that lovely, heavenly smile

Wherever she likes, for hour upon hour.”

“Do you want only my ‘heavenly smile’ or can I come with my whole self?” Nannerl asked, in a sarcastic tone.

“Go on, go home, daughter,” Frau Mozart cut her short. “I’ll join you later. Please, Baron, take her driving as long as you like. And thank you.”

XIII.

First, it wasn’t even thinkable that a man so handsome could truly be interested in her; second, if he were, it would certainly not be manifested through bad poetry; third, while he was reciting, those eyes, unique in the world, bored into hers with such intensity that she felt naked, as she was in reality only twelve times a year, when she bathed. And so Nannerl avoided that contact, and ostentatiously examined the buildings that ran by outside the window of his luxurious vis-à-vis carriage.

“Sadness now fills the simple heart

Of this man, for too soon will we part,

And th’angelic journey to solitude will yield.

But surely you will not raise up your shield

Against the darts of…of…Cupid….”

The baron stopped and murmured to himself, raising an eyebrow, “Pity! I need a rhyme for ‘Cupid.’”

“So you express yourself only in verse?”

“The truth is, prose is less congenial to me, Fräulein Mozart. The story is that the first words I uttered were in rhyme; and my mother, whom God has taken to glory, made me study poetry composition from earliest childhood, rather pedantically.”

“If you have talent, why do you waste it like that?”

“Oh, so you think I’m wasting it?” he said, ironically. “Don’t tell me that you don’t like my verses, O lovely lady. My heart would break!”

“On the contrary, Baron, I find them enchanting, indeed!” she answered with equal sarcasm. “Spontaneous and not at all artificial—like a spring breeze.”

“Then, if you will kindly consent, I will compose in your honor an entire poem: ‘My Lady Nannerl in Springtime.’ What do you think? Do you like the title?”

“Absolutely on the mark. It will make a great splash in the world.”