Marrying Mozart

by Stephanie Cowell

  “What?” he murmured, astonished. “Are you angry with me now?”

  “Yes, I am. I have been for a time because you said—”

  “But I beg your forgiveness, dear Constanze. We discussed this when we walked home that day in the rain. You told me you’d forgotten it. I did love her; it was true. I did pay for it. My heart was broken.”

  They became suddenly aware that customers had entered the shop and were staring at them. Constanze covered her face and then flung her hands down again. She paced up and down between the shelves, crying, “Where can I stay? What will happen to me? I can’t go back. The things of which she accused me, of which she accused you. Of course everyone has run away but me. I will never never go back there again; I’ll go to Sophie’s convent and ask the good nuns to shelter me.”

  “No, dearest,” Mozart said. “No, Constanze, I’ll take you to my friend, the Baroness von Waldstätten. She’ll give you shelter. I’m afraid this terrible thing has made you ill; look how you shiver. Your father would wish me to take care of you. I will take you to my friend.”

  “Well,” said the Baroness von Waldstätten, gazing with a majestic smile at the shivering girl when Mozart helped Constanze down from the carriage before the mansion some small distance from central Vienna. “What is needed is a dry dressing gown, a place close to the fire, hot wine, and a little rationality. I place great stock in rationality. Young women are not to be bartered and battered with words, are they?”

  Walking so rapidly before them into the great house that they had to hurry to keep up with her, the Baroness waved her hand as if to indicate the agreement of the naked marble muses that stood in separate niches in the round entrance hall. “Especially,” she added archly, “not young Viennese women in these modern times, no indeed. Have not young women hearts and minds of their own? Is this not God’s gift? Come now, come!”

  Settled in a large guest room and dressed in a borrowed velvet dressing gown, the coughing Constanze was brought dinner on a beautiful tray, while Mozart and the Baroness gazed at her with concern. When they wished her good night and left her, she buttoned on a nightdress of soft, rich wool trimmed with pink lace, and slid between the sheets of the great bed.

  By the light of several burning candles, she looked across the room to the dressing table, then rose to examine the crystal bottles of eau de cologne and the many silver boxes. On one lid were engraved the words: NO GREATER GOOD THAN MAN AND WIFE. Near it a silver frame held a small portrait of the Baron, a rather old man, who gazed back at her with a paternal expression. Whether he had gone to another country and died, or separated from his wife for her rumored infidelities, no one was sure.

  Oh, why was she here? Driven, of course, by her mother.

  Dear Saints Elizabeth and Anne! How could her mother descend to such behavior after all the years Constanze had defended her and felt she alone understood her, after she vowed to stay with her? And, oh Sophie, would she ever see her again but from behind a convent grille? We’ll always be together, Stanzi.

  Constanze stumbled back to the large bed, wound her arms about the huge, cold pillow, and buried her nose in it. She began her evening prayers; in the middle of them her thoughts wandered to Mozart and then to the large, echoing halls of the boardinghouse, and the sound of her mother’s humming rising from the kitchen. Then she wept, shoulders shaking under the feather quilt. She recalled herself stricken by diphtheria at five years old, trying to swim to consciousness, gasping for air, how the room bent and rocked, how the pictures on the wall and the windows seemed to be all crooked, how the sheer white curtains of the bed seemed to sway.... There was her mother by her bedside with her prayer book or her knitting. There she was, leaning over Constanze, her hand on her daughter’s hot forehead, murmuring, “Stanzi, Stanzi,” with the greatest love in the world.

  Then again healthy and fed full of meat and dumplings, cradled in that great lap, stories whispered in her ears. Old tales of hidden princesses in a tower deep in the woods, stories of the way the world was, of how to make apple cake, of what it meant to grow up, warnings to beware of men, beware of lying, beware of trusting too much. This warm, bakery-smelling presence, this source of lullabies, cuddling her in their oldest quilt, which they kept on the kitchen chair, its floral cover long faded, a feather or two escaping. Sweet, darling Mother ... What do you do with someone who is everything to you and yet has so angered you? Caecilia Weber was not crazed. She always distorted things when agitated; she told wild untruths and later repented them, especially when she drank too much, which she did these days.

  Constanze recalled her mother’s voice as she had summoned them from their beds on Sunday mornings for so many years: Maria Aloysia, Maria Josefa, Maria Constanze, Maria Sophia ... where are you? Later on Sundays the four sisters might build in the kitchen tents from torn sheets, hiding beneath them near the fire. They were princesses, they were queens, they were virgins in peril and righteous warriors; in whispers those holy late afternoons between dinner and their late small supper, the girls were everything to one another, while from behind their parents’ closed bedchamber door sometimes came sighs. Why had it gone away? Aloysia married; Josefa off in a strange city; Sophie swallowed up by God too soon, before half the conversations were done. Constanze had been unable to hold them together, even with her great love.

  She hid her face in the pillows. She wanted her Thursday evenings again, to make it all right for all of them. Now her mother, with her furious, distorted words, had driven her staggering into this great, commodious house as a refugee. Yes, it was the truth. They had all staggered away; her mother had driven them away one by one. Then why did Constanze love her still? Why did she sometimes feel as if she were her mother, heavy body groaning as she walked from room to room, made too old too soon by life? Constanze alone could run to her and kiss her hands and cry, “It’s all right, truly,” and make her laugh again. Somehow the two of them must make up for all the rest who had been lost. The two of them must fill the empty rooms, hold within them the shadows of those who had gone. Her name was Constanze, faithful to the end. They would be two old fat women together, groaning, barring the door against life’s sorrows.

  Then she slept, dreaming she was a sickly child again with her mother and father sitting on her bed, kissing her cheeks. She felt her father’s stubble, his sharp chin against her cheek as he fell asleep beside her, holding her hand.

  Stanzi?

  She sat up in bed. Was her mother calling?

  But it was only the rain.

  She woke aching all over; even the soft wool nightdress felt hot. She did not know where she was at first, and then looked about the room, now bathed in sunlight. Someone had come and opened the curtains, just as someone must have pinched out the candles last night. On the table next to the bed was a tray containing a pot of fragrant coffee and a plate of newly baked rolls, and from below came the sound of the fortepiano, pouring out the most astonishing variations.

  The Baroness swept across the room. “Mozart has been below for some time, and has eaten several rolls with cheese and coffee. He won’t sit still for wanting to see you. Here’s the dressing gown you wore last night; we can draw it up when we belt it so you won’t trip on it.”

  Constanze gazed from the rich gown to the pale, powdered face. “And my mother?” she croaked. “Has there been word from my mother, madame?”

  “Sadly, she sent the police to fetch you, but I turned them away.”

  “Oh God,” the girl murmured, sliding down in the sheets and biting the edge of her hand. “What shall I do? And what is he playing?”

  “Variations on one of the themes from his opera. He says his mind is too confused to do more.”

  “For heaven’s sake, do send him off. I can’t see him. Look at me. Tell him to come again tomorrow ... yes, and thank him for bringing me here. He’s the great kind spirit of our wretched family. Ask him to forgive me.”

  From below the variations continued briefly, and then stopped su
ddenly mid passage. She tiptoed to the door to listen, then heard his footsteps. She wanted to rush down the steps and through the receiving hall, crying, Don’t go! But how could she show herself to him when she was so ugly, when Aloysia was always so beautiful? Aloysia would take time to adjust a cap, or rub on a little rouge. Then she heard the sound of a carriage and knew Mozart had gone away.

  “I’m going from the city but will come again in three days and hope you’re better by then, dearest,” read the note he sent up to her.

  He returned on a day so beautiful and warm that the doors of the conservatory were thrown open to the terrace that overlooked the garden. She saw him coming through the garden, up the formal path past the rose bushes. He wore his blue linen coat to his knees and a pair of blue breeches; as usual he seemed absorbed by something within him. She stood in the velvet dressing gown, pulled up at the waist, still a little weak from her fever. Her legs felt unsteady.

  His face changed when he saw her. He blinked several times and came closer. Then he kissed both her hands. “I had a concert to give and some lessons,” he said. “And I’ve been working on the opera, but I’ve thought of you all the while, Constanze. I thought of you safe here and wanted to see you. I know you’re likely to go back because your mother’s worried about you and says she’s sorry. I went to see her, you know, and she said she was sorry. She was in tears, and I think she won’t stand against my coming to see you, Constanze, when you return.”

  “But will you come?”

  “I will, of course, every day.”

  They walked out onto the terrace and stood by an enormous stone urn full of flowers; then he took her arm and together they walked up and down through the garden for a time. Looking at the long formal walks between the trees and an arbor, she repeated shyly, “You’ll come every day? But Wolfgang, I don’t even know what’s between us ... we haven’t said. I must ask you, though perhaps I shouldn’t. Are you in love with that English soprano who sings in the opera now? I know you were at an evening gathering with her where you all sang and played for hours. Someone told Mama you were in love with her.”

  “No, not at all,” he exclaimed.

  “Are you quite certain?”

  “I know what I feel and what I don’t,” he said. “And if you ask me also about Mademoiselle Aurnhammer, I’ll laugh. Dearest, I’m glad your mother has apologized. I think I could charm her if I tried, but to tell the truth, I don’t care what or how she is as long as she’s good to you. Come tell me once and for all. Have you forgiven me for that stupid comment I made so long ago?” He laid his hat down on a stone bench, and drew her down to sit next to him. “I want to marry you,” he said. “I want to make you my wife. I’m twenty-five, and I have wanted a wife for a long time. I think I was waiting for you, my Stanzi. I know I was waiting.”

  “You’re asking me to marry you?”

  “With all my heart. Would you, Constanze?”

  “I would, yes, I would. I think I love you, even though I didn’t know if I could love again. But,” she said with a sigh, “how can I trust you utterly?”

  “Have you any reason not to trust me?”

  “You’ve seen so much of the world, and I’ve mostly been at home. But where would we live? How? We haven’t any money. And besides, what will your father say? I know he doesn’t want you to marry for a long time; he’ll find some fault with me.” She looked straight ahead, her chin raised. “Yes, and then you’ll see it, too, and go away. I’m not greatly talented like Aloysia and Josefa, and I haven’t got Sophie’s wit and faith. I’m in the middle. I’ve made a shadow of myself, and now I don’t want to be a shadow anymore, and it frightens me. No one expects anything of a shadow, no one notices anything much ... my dreams are my own.

  “What are your dreams? Would you trust me with one or two?”

  “Oh, ordinary girls’ dreams: being greatly loved, being swept away.” She looked down at her fingers. “Being here I’ve thought of so many things, most of which I don’t understand. I want to be the young woman I was and yet someone new as well. I want to escape my dull place at home, and yet I want to remain there. That’s the problem. I want to go back to be with my sisters just the way we were when you first came up the stairs that Thursday night. Sometimes because I knew you then, I think I can be that way again ... the difficulty is sorting out all the things I want. Oh, if you could simply make this clear to me.”

  They held each other, and kissed again and again. “But how will we get your father’s blessing?” she finally gasped.

  His hair stood up on end, his lace was askew, and every time he tried to make a sentence, he laughed instead, as if everything was pure pleasure to him. “My father ...” Still laughing a little to himself, drumming some rhythm on her upper arm, he said, “Dearest, look there in the garden ... there’s a small bent gardener, and the wheelbarrow he pushes is bigger than he is.”

  Then he took a deep breath, blew out his cheeks in expelling it, and turned back to her, rubbing his hands. “My father, yes,” he said more solemnly. “He’s coming to visit me soon. I’ll put it before him then. I want his blessing, of course. Once he sees you, you sweet girl, there will be no question.”

  He took her hands and kissed each one several times. “As for me, I’ll be all good things to your family. Your mama will be like my own, and I’ll be a good brother-in-law to your sisters. My father will be entirely happy, believe me. I can manage everything. Now I must leave to give some lessons and see if more of the opera libretto is written. Constanze, trust me as I trust you. No one will ever be as happy as we’ll be together.”

  After he left her, running back several times to kiss her, she returned to her room and began to pack her things. It was time to go home. She knew the Baroness was spending the afternoon with a man who used magnets and hypnotism to free the soul to travel to earlier lives, and Constanze didn’t wish to disturb her.

  However, when she had just completed a letter of gratitude and laid the dressing gown she’d been using on the bed, she saw the Baroness standing, distracted and transformed, by the door. “Oh, my dear,” the Baroness whispered. “I have voyaged to the tombs of the pharaohs and found I was a princess then.... Are you going home? Dear child, come again—now Mozart must take very good care of you, and I will come to your wedding.”

  In the boardinghouse her mother stumbled toward her weeping, arms open in reconciliation. Upstairs on her bed she found a letter from Sophie.

  Dearest darling Constanze,

  I have a small confession to make, which is weighing on my conscience. When I ran away so very quickly that early morning, I did something impulsively, which perhaps was not the wisest thing but it was done from a loving heart, and Father Paul says that if things are done lovingly, then much can be forgiven and overlooked. I don’t even have the courage to tell you now what I did, and likely it will blow over and nothing ever come of it. I couldn’t go away without some attempt at your happiness. Since a few months have passed and you have not said you’ve heard word of it, I suppose you never will, which may be a good thing under the present circumstances.

  Now write me quickly and tell me if Mozart has told you yet that he loves you. I’ve prayed so hard over it, I have the strongest sense it’s come to pass. I have a sense you’ll both be married soon. I have faith in my visions, which are almost always right.

  Your sister in all affection,

  Sophie

  PS. Father Paul has promised he’ll find a home for the cat, and until he does, don’t let anything happen to her. They are giving me my novice’s robe next week. Pray for me.

  Sophie, she thought, what on earth have you done? And for heaven’s sake, don’t take vows. Come back to us. Constanze found her rosary under many petticoats and pairs of hose, and she sat on the bed in prayer, the beads slipping through her fingers. Let my meeting with his father go well, she prayed, and let Mother stay calm.

  She saw him every day. They walked, he played her the newer parts of the opera, and s
he copied sections of it to send to his father. It was odd that his father would not know the identity of the copyist when he read the music. In the privacy of his new rooms, for Mozart had found a place just a short walk from Petersplatz, he touched her breasts and her thighs, and kissed every bit of her flesh he could manage that lay outside her corsets, lace drawers, and chemise. He took her hose off and kissed her feet. She kissed his arms to the shoulder, rolling up his shirt, and down his chest as far as his shirt would open. They stopped always at certain boundaries. She gazed at the swelling in his breeches and threw her hands over her face, rocking with delight. He seized her hand to place it there and she touched him, then flung herself away. She ran down the streets with the sensation of that place—warm, full, and yet hidden by light wool fabric—still in her slightly closed palm.

  The clavier as an instrument had been outmoded for over a decade, as had the harpsichord, and yet Mozart did not yet own one of the enviable new fortepianos, though the Baroness lent him hers when he needed it. He had not considered buying one in Vienna for reasons other than simply lack of money; he felt there was none so good as Stein’s in Augsburg, though Stein, he had heard, was considering opening a shop in Vienna. Still that day he thought he would look at Johann Schantz’s stock, which was also reputed to be good.

  He was happy on entering the shop; any instrument maker’s shop was heaven to him. He felt at home, and he would always run into a friend who knew of another friend whom he had not seen in some time. All the news of the world he loved found its way in and out of such shops. This one also sold music, and he was pleased to see his six violin sonatas for sale. He had made a reasonable amount of money publishing them.