Aria to Death

by Nupur Tustin

  Goretti gaped first at Johann, then at Haydn, looking as though he was trying to decipher the score of an unfamiliar piece of music.

  “Well, speak up man!” Kapellmeister Reutter bellowed.

  The physician swallowed. His cheeks appeared more ashen then before. “It was not Herr Dahl. Not the bookseller himself, I mean, although I assumed at the time he was the source of the scores.

  “The man I met at Herr Dahl’s claimed to have purchased some old music retrieved from a convent that wished to rid themselves of the scores. The L’Orfeo and the Proserpina were among them. The only two operas in the lot.”

  Haydn’s eyes narrowed. “If he had just purchased the scores, why was he so eager to sell them?” Tired of standing, he drew a chair close to Goretti and sat down.

  “What other reason could there be to procure such music?” The physician appeared genuinely puzzled. “The operas had been reputed to be lost, and the man was quite certain of being able to interest some wealthy nobleman in the music.

  “Of course being a newcomer to Vienna, he had no contacts. When he heard me mention Her Majesty to Herr Dahl, he approached me to ask if I would present him at the imperial court.”

  “And you offered to buy the scores instead?” Luigi’s mouth twitched, then widened into a grin.

  Haydn could scarcely restrain his own amusement. It would appear the scribe had studied his mark well. The physician, learning of Her Majesty’s interest in the operas, must have been making his own enquiries at the bookseller. He exchanged a smile with Johann and noticed his old teacher Reutter’s shoulders shaking with suppressed mirth as well.

  Goretti glared up at them, chin jutting out in an attitude of defiance. “I hoped to make a profit on the transaction, yes. Why shouldn’t I? He had procured the operas for mere kreutzers. I paid him fifty gulden.”

  “Then turned around and charged Her Majesty ten times as much, I’ll warrant.” Luigi emitted a disgusted snort.

  “She was willing to pay it,” the physician responded simply as though the matter required no further explanation.

  “And so you made a rash promise to procure the remaining operas?” Haydn was so certain he was right, his voice barely rose above the tonic as he phrased the question.

  “Not a rash promise, no.” The physician shook his head emphatically. “I was given to understand they had been discovered as well, but when I returned to Herr Dahl’s establishment later, it was to learn that all he had was a parcel of worthless scores from a Sister Mariana.

  “Stolen apparently from the convent down the road. He neither knew nor cared by whom. The parcel had been delivered by an errand boy who received no payment other than a few kreutzers for his trouble.”

  “St. Nikolai,” Haydn said softly, marveling at the scribe’s forethought in arranging for an errand boy to deliver the music to Herr Dahl’s establishment. Although he very much doubted the bookseller would have troubled to notice the man himself had he chosen to deliver the scores in person.

  “And then, quite fortuitously, you heard of Kaspar’s bequest, I suppose,” Luigi said.

  “It was shortly thereafter. One of the musicians at the Seizerkeller mentioned an unusual bequest his fellow had received. I would have taken no notice, dismissing it as drunken braggadocio, had Fabrizzio—the man—”

  “We know,” Johann interrupted gently. “It was he who sold you the L’Orfeo and the Proserpina, was it not?”

  Goretti nodded, an aggrieved expression on his face. “He was happy enough with the fifty gulden I paid him until he heard—from those gossiping musicians, no doubt—the value the Empress set upon those operas.”

  As he spoke, the physician glared balefully at Kapellmeister Reutter as though the older man were responsible for his troubles. “At which point, the young ruffian demanded his share of the profit, refusing to sell me the remaining operas at anything less than the price Her Majesty had paid for the first two!”

  Luigi’s grin widened. “I suppose that was fair enough. And that prompted the little trick he played on you at the Seizerkeller, I’ll warrant.”

  “The doctor brought it upon himself,” Kapellmeister Reutter gruffly interjected before Goretti could reply. “He said at the Seizerkeller that if Haydn knew anything at all of music, it would take him minutes rather than days to determine the composer of a work of music. Fabrizzio merely put his claim to the test.”

  The physician’s features darkened, and he drew himself up. “It was a rude trick. Most uncalled for. But it exposed him for what he is, a mere forger.” He looked up at Haydn, the picture of indignant wrath.

  “Either that,” Haydn agreed, “or he has found the operas and merely copied them.” Although that would not explain the music scholar’s reaction—a mixture of anger and fear—upon the discovery that Kaspar’s bequest was comprised of madrigals. Nor could it entirely explain his determined pursuit of the bequest.

  After all Fabrizzio had killed Kaspar for it. And attacked—and nearly killed—Haydn himself. The recollection chilled and infuriated him at the same time. Every muscle in his body seemed to tauten as he twisted his neck to gaze down at the physician.

  “Was it Fabrizzio who attacked Kaspar? Do not attempt to lie,” he barked sharply as Goretti began shaking his head. “You watched Kaspar being beaten to death. Then you stole from his dead body. How can you presume to call yourself a physician?”

  “There is no need for insults, Herr Haydn. Yes, I saw it all. What would you have me do? Confront a posse of thugs, all armed with truncheons?”

  “Was Fabrizzio among the attackers?” Haydn wanted to know, although the answer was obvious enough.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  “Armed with truncheons?” Kapellmeister Reutter sounded skeptical. The words had caught Haydn’s attention as well, but he had no trouble believing them. Or that Fabrizzio had not been present at the scene.

  A faint rustling from the balcony beyond came to his ears, but he ignored it. A servant going about her chores, he thought, slowly stroking his chin as he contemplated the disclosures they had coaxed out of the physician.

  “That at least is the truth, Herr Chormeister,” he heard Johann explain. “Herr Moserle, the undertaker, divined as much when he examined Kaspar. The wounds on his body recounted the brutal tale only too well.”

  “And it was a truncheon that caused Joseph’s injuries yesterday, wasn’t it?” Luigi added, looking toward Haydn for confirmation.

  Haydn nodded, glad he had not been too squeamish to attend to Herr Moserle’s vivid musings on Kaspar’s injuries and his own. Fabrizzio had not been present at the scene of either attack. Why should he be, if he had orchestrated both?

  But it was not above an hour after the attempt that the music scholar had made an appearance.

  Was it because the attempt on Haydn’s person had yielded nothing? Albrecht had after all saved the music itself.

  “What were you doing outside the Seizerkeller so late?” Luigi asked Goretti the question a bare second after it had occurred to Haydn.

  “I had just left the tavern,” the physician responded with as much dignity as he could muster. “There were no carriages to be had at that hour, so rather than return to the palace, I decided to walk to my lodgings in the city. The rooms are still paid for, although I have had little enough occasion to use them since arriving here.”

  “And it was then that you saw Kaspar being attacked?” Johann gently steered the conversation away from the physician’s nocturnal routine.

  “But never thought to seek help or call a police guard to the poor man’s aid.” Luigi sounded disgusted.

  “I rushed to his side as soon as the ruffians left. What good could I have done while they were still beating him? They would have turned upon me with as little provocation.”

  The doctor twisted in his seat. “They were still raining blows upon him while one of the thugs rifled through his purse and flung it to the ground. A good stout purse of fine leather. It made no sense to
me that the thieves should discard it.”

  “After his keys, no doubt,” Haydn said softly, recalling the damage around the lock on Kaspar’s bureau. The murderers had broken in that very night, then. The thought sickened him.

  “And what little money he had.” Goretti nodded. “The purse was empty when I examined it. Then I went up to Wilhelm Kaspar.” His fingers encircled the ends of the armrests, the knuckles a grayish-white. “He was beyond help that much was plain to see. No pulse. The body beaten to a pulp.”

  The mere memory of the sight seemed to have caused the bile to rise up in the physician’s throat. He swallowed convulsively.

  Haydn waited patiently. “And the snuff box?” he enquired after a few minutes. He held it out for the physician to see.

  “It had been flung to the side of the road during the skirmish, no doubt. I was about to flee the scene—”

  Luigi snorted at the words, and Goretti turned toward him, stung to the quick.

  “What would you have had me do? Had the police guards found me—a foreigner—hovering over the body of a dead man, do you suppose they would have hesitated to impute the crime to me?”

  “I suppose not.” the Konzertmeister made the admission grudgingly. His features darkened. “I have yet to encounter a more worthless bunch of scoundrels.”

  He turned to Haydn “Do you know what one of them—a bristle-haired dolt with the manners of an ass—said to me? That Kaspar must in a drunken rage have provoked the attack upon himself!”

  Haydn’s lips tightened, but he said nothing.

  “And that dummkopf Pergen tells us his police guards keep the city safe,” he heard Kapellmeister Reutter mutter behind him. “Worse still, the Emperor will hear no complaints against him or his precious men.”

  Haydn’s nostrils flared at the revelation, but he forced himself to keep his mind on the matter at hand. “The snuff box,” he said again through clenched teeth.

  “I picked it up out of mere curiosity. I had scarcely begun to examine it when I felt a loud thwack against my head.” The doctor’s hands reached up to probe the area under his wig. “I still have the bump to prove it, if you—”

  “There is no need,” Johann said hastily. “What happened then?”

  “I imagine the scoundrel who hit me made off with the purse. It was gone when I regained consciousness the next morning. But there the dead man lay right next to me.” Goretti shuddered. “Naturally, I had no desire to be found in such close proximity to a murdered man.

  “I staggered to my feet, making haste to leave before anyone could see me. Dawn was just breaking, and the streets were fortunately deserted. It was only when I reached my lodgings that I realized I was still clutching the snuff box.”

  “Did it never occur to you to return it to his widow or to tell his friends what you saw?” Luigi stood up and paced slowly around the physician’s chair, his hazel eyes fixed on the other’s person.

  “Would you have believed a word I said?” Goretti retorted. “He would still be alive now if you”—he thrust his chin out at Haydn—“had allowed him to sell his bequest to me”

  A scorpion lashing out in fury could not have stung Haydn more deeply than the physician’s words. His chest tightened, the sensation flaring across his ribcage until he could barely breathe. The throbbing in his head deepened.

  Through a haze of pain he heard Kapellmeister Reutter speak. “What will you tell the Empress, Haydn? She must be informed at once.”

  Haydn stared at the massive figure of his teacher. “There is no time for that,” he said at last. “Fabrizzio must be found.”

  * * *

  It was late afternoon when Luigi led Haydn to an oak door set within a low, pale cream wall on Singerstrasse.

  “Fabrizzio lodges with Signora Padrona, I’ll warrant.” He lifted the heavy brass ring on the door up high before letting it fall. It struck the oak panels with a loud, ringing sound. “Any Italian who wishes to be comfortably lodged within the city”—Luigi took hold of the brass ring again—“comes here, for all that it costs twice as much as an entire apartment in the suburbs.”

  “A likely enough assumption,” Haydn agreed. “He would have had to lodge nearby to study Goretti so closely and to frequent the convent while he worked there as a scribe.”

  He could only hope they had come to the right place. Goretti had professed to knowing nothing of his compatriot’s whereabouts. And Kaspar’s aunt dwelt too far for them to avail of any information she might have.

  He studied the area while they waited for the Signora.

  Set back from the wall, Signora Padrona’s house stood considerably lower than its neighbors. Haydn could just make out the red shingles covering the twin gable roofs that peeked over the wall. St. Nikolai, his sister-in-law’s convent, was a few doors to his right.

  Across the street, on a diagonal from where he and Luigi waited, the glass-fronted doors of Herr Dahl’s bookstore glinted in the late afternoon sun.

  The Kapellmeister sighed. The Signora must be hard of hearing, it was taking her so long to respond. His mind turned to another matter. “I trust Her Majesty will not take exception to hearing of the affair from Johann.”

  It had been the only way with his old teacher insisting the Empress be informed of the matter at once.

  Luigi, about to knock for the third time, glanced over his shoulder at Haydn. “I am sure she will understand that pursuing the villain responsible for the affair was more important than staying behind to apprise her of the details. Besides, Johann is likely to handle the situation with far greater delicacy than you, Joseph.”

  True enough, Haydn thought, beginning to smile when the door opened. A tall, slender woman, slightly above middle age, dressed all in black emerged from within. There was something so familiar about her almond-shaped, dark, hooded eyes and long face, Haydn could only stare.

  “If it is lodgings you want—” she began when Luigi interrupted.

  “We wish to meet a lodger of yours. A music scholar recently arrived from Italy. Fabrizzio.”

  “He is within,” Signora Padrona said. She opened the door wider, stepping aside to let them in. “In the cottage behind the garden. Next time, come through the back. The gate is kept open during the day for my lodgers and any visitors they may wish to receive.”

  She led the way down a cobblestone path that ran through the middle of the profusion of vines and flowers that formed her garden to a tiny whitewashed cottage at the back. The blue door stood ajar, and after a brief knock, she pushed it open and set foot within.

  “He will be in the parlor,” she informed them, briskly crossing the narrow hallway to open the parlor door. Haydn was still wondering where he might have seen her when the Signora uttered a muffled scream and reeled back against him, hands clapped to her mouth.

  “What is it?” Haydn asked, startled. But the Signora could only point wildly toward the open parlor door. He edged into the room with the middle-aged woman still clinging to his arm and nearly staggered back himself.

  Fabrizzio lay sprawled on the floor, eyes staring lifelessly up at the ceiling. A small pool of blood stained the white nap of the carpet beneath his head. Haydn took in his matted hair, the bruises on his arms and chest, the forehead severely indented, and felt his stomach roil.

  Sheets of music surrounded the young man’s still form and were scattered all over the desk. Ink dripped in a slow stream from a silver inkwell tipped onto its side.

  Luigi knelt beside the young man and clasped his limp wrist between his palms. “His body is still warm to the touch.” His gaze drifted to the door—inexplicably open—at the rear end of the room. “It cannot have been too long ago that he was—” he swallowed, unable to continue. “Did you hear nothing?” he enquired of the Signora.

  Fabrizzio’s landlady shook her head mutely. “My maid and I were at the market. We had just returned when you and your friend arrived.”

  “I cannot understand it. Why—?” Haydn ran his fingers through his
wig. The only man who could have wanted to kill the music scholar had been at Schönbrunn in their presence. His gaze fell on the desk. Had Fabrizzio somehow discovered the lost operas? But that would mean someone other than Goretti and Fabrizzio himself had been after them as well.

  “Beaten. With a truncheon just like Kaspar,” Luigi said in a low voice. His eyes flickered briefly toward Signora Padrona. But she seemed too much in a daze to attend to her visitors’ speculations.

  Haydn nodded, turning his head to inspect the desk again. A ring of keys sat carelessly atop the sheaf of papers next to a leather pouch.

  “Kaspar’s purse and keys,” Luigi said grimly, having risen to his feet. He set the silver inkwell upright. His eyes remained fixed on the dead man.

  “I would say he has earned his just deserts. Kaspar would still be here were it not for him.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  The late afternoon sun blazed into the servant’s hall at the Esterházy Palace on Wallnerstrasse. Rosalie sat at the table with Clara Schwann and Greta, basking in its golden glow.

  “A gulden?” Greta said, peering down into the shallow depths of a round jewelry case. “Is that all Gerhard paid for Her Serene Highness’s necklace?”

  “And a crate or two of wine.” Rosalie’s lips twitched, then broke into a broad smile. The expression on Sabina’s face when Gerhard had made the arrangements had been priceless. “It is the real thing, isn’t it, Frau Schwann?”

  The lady’s maid nodded. “It is indeed!” She drew the necklace carefully out of its case, gently feeling the pearls and touching the pendant. “I still can’t believe you managed to get it back. I would not have thought it possible!”

  “But how could you know where it would be?” Greta pushed herself forward, her pudgy hands gripping the table on either side of her rounded bosom.

  “It was because Sabina kept turning her head to look at the hatboxes.” Rosalie smiled at her friend. Greta’s mouth hung open ever so slightly, her blue eyes round with avid curiosity. “Sanyi and I would do the same when we hid Mama’s things to tease her.”