Dead, Mr Mozart

by Bernard Bastable

  The audience were arriving for the performance as I reached the Queen’s. There was none of the smartness and style of a first-night audience: second nights are notoriously prone to accidents and lethargy. This was an audience of townsfolk and their wives, and their arrival was watched by no more than a single yokel on the opposite pavement. There was nothing to be gained by mingling with them, so I went at once back stage.

  I had realised, of course, that nothing could be said about the events of the night before. Still, I was a little surprised when I bumped into Mr Popper and he merely said: ‘Keep them on their toes tonight, Mr Mozart. We can’t have slackness setting in.’ It was as if the night before had been a first night like any other. Surely some look – of sympathy, complicity, something – would have been more appropriate, and would have acknowledged my leading role in the events, if not his own dismal showing? But Mr Popper is a man totally without tact, consideration or human feeling – the typical opera manager, in fact. He once, I remember, brought me a piece by Salieri and said it was a little heavy for English taste and I was just the man to adapt it! Of course I refused. Salieri has always been most courteous to me in our communications, so who was I to insult him by watering down his charming little score? It was only later, in one of my dire financial emergencies, that I was forced to do what the appalling Popper asked of me.

  As I did for the performance that night, admonishing the players and singers, spurring them on, securing a performance which (apart from Betty Ackroyd’s being slightly out of voice) was hardly inferior to that of the night before. The audience of beef-witted Britons enjoyed themselves in their way, though of course every joke had to be underlined, shouted loud, repeated two or three times before they could see the point. I dream that one day I will see one of my real operas – the divine Così perhaps – performed by Germans before a German audience, one sophisticated enough to appreciate subtlety, understand the jokes the first time, not to need the cleverness underlined by horseplay and vulgar fooling.

  Backstage the actors were buoyed up by the piece’s success. Many of them had gone to a nearby tavern the night before, and asked me where I had been. I pretended I had been overcome by my old piece’s new-found popular favour – as if it were one of my real works! – and had gone home. Betty Ackroyd was worried about her voice, and was doing all the superstitious rather than medical things that singers do do when they are a little hoarse. She was fast becoming a professional! She looked at me and raised her eyebrows, but beyond that she gave no indication that the day before had been anything other than an ordinary day in the theatre.

  A joke was going round backstage during the interval, a joke that the Queen had made. ‘Yes, it is true I have committed adultery – once,’ she was reported to have said. ‘It was with the husband of Mrs Fitzherbert.’ It went from mouth to mouth, with roars of laughter at each retelling. It would not have been so if Lord Hertford had been around. In his presence Caroline was always called ‘the Princess’, and any joke would have to be at her expense, not at her fat husband’s. I refrained from pointing out that the Queen had never been known to make a good joke before, and if she did so now it obviously had been fed to her by one of her entourage, probably that clever villain Brougham. But at least it was a good joke.

  After the performance I collected together my music and made my way out to the Haymarket with the utmost dispatch. The theatre did not feel good, if I may so express it: it did not seem right to be there knowing what I knew yet unable to talk to anyone about it. The shadow of Jenny, who had been so wraith-like even in life, lingered around the back-stage areas. The last of the audience were straggling out into the street as I quitted the place, and I registered the yokel still watching them. I felt a twinge of disquiet, but was diverted by a call from the theatre.

  ‘Mr Mozart!’ It was one of the doormen, a man hired for his height rather than his brains. He was holding a pair of spectacles in large, clumsy hands. ‘Is these yours, sir? They was found on the pie-nn-o.’

  I took them, nodded my thanks and went on my way. But I had no sooner plunged into the murk of Orange Street than I heard quickened steps coming up behind me, then a shadow appearing at my shoulder. My first thought was that I was being robbed. Luckily, as usual, I had almost nothing on me.

  ‘Mr Mozart!’

  A cultivated robber, a burglarous music-lover! But of course I had been identified by the blockhead of a doorman. There was no point in hurrying on. I turned with reluctance.

  ‘Mr Mozart, could I have a few words with you?’

  It was the country boy I had seen watching the theatre. I was seized with foreboding. Not that there was anything alarming about the boy himself. He was rather below middle height – his eyes, in fact, looked straight into mine – a square, tanned, attractive face and a square body, roughly but neatly dressed. At once I lost my fears of being robbed, but replaced them with other fears.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘It’s about Jenny, sir. Jenny Bowles.’

  My forebodings were realised. I knew at once who the boy was. I temporised.

  ‘Would you mind if we went back into the Haymarket? There’s a little more light there. Talking to people in darkness always makes me nervous.’

  ‘’Twasn’t my intention to do that, sir,’ the young man said. ‘I thought if I followed you all the way home you might think you was goin’ to be robbed.’

  ‘I might, I might.’ We were back into the broad spaces of the Haymarket, and I got a better view of his strong, anxious face. ‘Now, who was it you wanted to ask about?’

  ‘Jenny Bowles, sir. She has a place in the theatre there.’

  ‘Ah now,’ I said, wrinkling my brow. ‘Is that the young person who’s dresser to Miss Ackroyd?’

  But how did he know she was there?

  ‘That’s right, sir. She and me are sweethearts.’ Forebodings all confirmed! The boy looked at me with appeal in his face. ‘She says as ’ow you’re a very kind gentleman.’

  I felt oddly gratified at that. I do seriously believe that, for all the humbug about ‘free-born Englishmen’, the humble in this country are as downtrodden as any in the world. I was not conscious of having done any particular acts of kindness to poor, dead Jenny, and I concluded that it was a general, inborn kindness she had seen in me. But then a thought struck me.

  ‘It was good of her to say so. You have, er, communicated with her since she came to the theatre?’

  ‘Just the once, sir.’ He shuffled and looked down. ‘I know she wasn’t supposed to, and she wouldn’t come out again because she said it was too dangerous. But we’re courting, sir, and … well, it wasn’t natural that we couldn’t talk a little and – you know—’

  ‘I see,’ I said noncommittally. He drew his sleeve across his mouth and hurried on.

  ‘We’re both very poor, you see, sir, and hoping to be married. We’ve dreamed of having a little shop, or an alehouse maybe.’

  Oh, the dreams of the English to have their own little business, to do something-or-other in a small way and thus gain their independence! How it does ensnare and delude them, and how politicians lead them on in their delusion!

  ‘I see. You’re not a Londoner I can hear.’

  ‘Oh no, sir. I’m an Essex man. Little village near Colchester. I’m hoping to take Jenny there when we’re married, out of this nasty dirty ’ole. Young girls come to all sorts of harm in this city, as I’m sure you know, sir. But she’d found this way of getting a bit of money – something I don’t rightly understand – and I’m afeared for her, sir. Folk like us get mixed up with the affairs of great folks at our peril.’

  How sadly right he was.

  ‘I’m sure you’re fearing needlessly,’ I said, sounding unconvincing even to myself.

  ‘I don’t think so, sir,’ he said stubbornly. ‘You see we had this system of signs.’

  ‘Signs?’

  ‘That’s right, sir. Every night I waited here for it. I knew the window of the dressing-room she worked
in, and every night she ’ung a dress in front of the window to show that she was all right. Then I could go home and sleep sound, sir.’

  ‘I see … But you couldn’t sleep sound last night?’

  ‘I didn’t sleep at all, sir. Never went ’ome.’ Further forebodings jumped in my stomach, and probably showed in my face. I should never have left the enveloping darkness of Orange Street. The boy was intent on his explanations, and I hoped he hadn’t noticed. ‘I waited and waited and everything was later than usual because it was some kind of special performance, wasn’t it, sir?’

  ‘That’s right: a first night.’

  ‘Well, very late on you and some other gentlemen came out with some kind of stage stuff it looked like—’

  My voice cracked as I said: ‘Yes, a prop. It was needed at one of Mr Popper’s other theatres.’

  ‘I see, sir. It looked more like a trunk to me. But I don’t know much about theatres and the like. Never been to one, to tell you the truth. Not in my line. Well, then a bit later another gentleman came out and locked up the door – I think it would be Mr Popper, because I’ve seen him do that before – and he walked off a little unsteady-like. And that was all. There was no sign in the window all night.’

  ‘But maybe she just forgot.’

  He shook his head with the certainty of youth.

  ‘Oh no, she wouldn’t forget, sir. Not Jenny. Have you seen her today, sir?’

  I gave the appearance of thinking.

  ‘Er, no I haven’t. But then I wouldn’t in all probability, unless I went to Miss Ackroyd’s dressing-room.’

  ‘Did you see her yesterday, sir?’

  Memories of that body in the poor stuff dress with the gash down the back rose uninvited. I repressed them.

  ‘I can’t recall that I did. Yesterday was very busy for me – it was one of my pieces that was being performed.’

  ‘Did you hear anyone talk about her?’

  ‘Not that I remember. Everyone was very excited by the performance, which went very well.’

  ‘I see, sir,’ he said, looking very crestfallen.

  ‘Have you thought that Mr Popper could have given her a job in one of his other theatres? He has several, you know.’

  That was true enough. Sweaty little flea-pits in parts of London no gentleman would visit or take his womenfolk to. The boy’s face lit up.

  ‘Is that so, sir?’

  ‘Oh yes. If she had got herself involved in something … important, as you seem to think, she may have had to be moved for her own safety.’

  God forgive me for a liar! The poor boy was heartened, and started to beseech me.

  ‘Could you find out, sir? Could you find out where she’s gone?’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘Please, sir. I must know she’s all right.’

  I was in a quandary what to do. The boy had to be staved off, without being given any definite – and certainly not any true – information about Jenny.

  ‘I suppose I could find out if she’s gone,’ I said at last. ‘I imagine they won’t want it known where she’s gone. After all, the reason she’s been moved may be that they found out about you and her and decided that the Queen’s was no longer safe enough.’

  His face fell.

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘I really don’t know. I know nothing about it.’

  ‘But you’ll find out, sir?’

  ‘Well, I’ll try. How do I get a message to you? Are you still working for Alderman Wood?’

  ‘Yes, I am, sir. The wages in’t too bad, him needing to think about his credit as an Alderman. The trouble with noble folk is they don’t have to bother about their credit with anyone, and they pays according.’

  ‘You could be right,’ I said, in heartfelt tones.

  ‘But I’d rather see you and talk,’ the boy said, ‘messages not being in my line. Will you be here tomorrow night?’

  ‘Well, I’m not at the theatre. My piece is not playing. But I suppose I could come especially …’

  I was very reluctant, but the boy drew his sleeve over his eyes.

  ‘Please, sir. Please come.’

  ‘Very well – er, I’m sorry: you haven’t told me your name.’

  ‘Davy, sir. Davy House.’

  ‘Well, Davy, I’ll see you tomorrow night.’

  And I went on my way, leaving him to go back to Alderman Wood’s or his lodging. I had rather liked the young man, liked his simple love, pitied him for the loss he as yet knew nothing about. But I regret for my own credit to say that as I walked home I was thinking mainly of how this new factor in the imbroglio could be turned to account with Lord Hertford and his steward.

  10. Il Dissoluto Punito

  I dressed myself with care for my encounter with Lord Hertford’s steward and (I confidently expected) Lord Hertford himself. For such encounters I have a code of conduct which I have developed over the years: for example, it is obviously unwise to go too richly attired. What is less obvious is that it is unwise to dress too shabbily: if you look like a beggar you will be treated like a beggar and given ha’pence. A dignified middle course has to be steered: one should look and behave like the better class of tradesman – one who has supplied the best produce, given the best service, and now seeks adequate recompense for his pains. I was trained in such things by my dear father, God rest his soul, and I trust I have faithfully followed his precepts.

  Blacks and browns, then, and a clean white stock. I took with me my ivory-handled cane, not because I need it (I have kept remarkably my young-man’s figure and the vigour of my frame), but because it added to the dignified impression. I confess that as I made my way towards Manchester Square one or two of the acquaintances I met smiled, as if they could guess my errand from my clothes. At long last I reached the dignified pile that is Hertford House, and banged on the door. Lord Hertford’s footman was supercilious in his manner, as all flunkies are to artists, but when I was shown into the steward’s office it became clear that this was because the message had not yet filtered down to the lowest ranks. The steward’s demeanour was quite different: cordial, frank, even respectful. It had never been so before, and it was clear he was under orders.

  ‘Mr Mozart! I got your note. A slight chill in the air, is there not? Would you care for a glass of ratafia?’

  I thought it would have been better if Lord Hertford had shown his appreciation of my services by putting in a token appearance himself. However, there was a silver tray on the steward’s desk with decanter, glasses and a plate of delicious-looking biscuits. They looked inviting – I have a very sweet tooth. I bowed my acceptance, and we began the social business of sipping and nibbling as preliminaries to business. The steward, Mr de Fries, continued to be expansive and genial.

  ‘His Lordship is most grateful to you for your help in that unfortunate little business,’ he said. (Poor Jenny! – to be in death nothing but an unfortunate little business.) ‘You were the right man in the right place at the right time.’

  What precisely did that mean? That I was in luck in finding myself in a position to earn a substantial purse? Or that Lord Hertford had been in luck in having the best possible assistance to hand? I assumed the second interpretation.

  ‘I certainly think it would have been unfortunate if His Lordship had been forced to rely on Mr Popper,’ I murmured.

  Mr de Fries nodded.

  ‘Good point. Excellent point. A somewhat unreliable person, I believe?’

  ‘Totally.’

  ‘I will make the point to Lord Hertford. It is unfortunate that he is heavily committed to supporting Mr Popper’s new opera season – a matter of three or four thousand pounds I believe.’ He saw I was about to change my tune, so he held up his hand. ‘But I think you may rely on him for the most forceful advocacy and all other support for your delightful operas.’ He reached down into one of the desk’s drawers. ‘Meanwhile His Lordship hopes you will accept this as a small token of his appreciation.’

  He handed over
an exquisitely soft and substantial chamois bag. In it, my experienced hand told me, there must be around eighty guineas. Adequate if not exactly generous. A man to whom generosity was second nature would surely have made it a hundred. I bowed my gratitude.

  ‘His Lordship is too kind.’

  Mr de Fries signified the end of our business.

  ‘I will summon someone to escort you to your home or your banker’s.’

  Bankers! What use had I for bankers? Only people with money need bankers. His hand had gone towards the bell-rope, but I stayed it.

  ‘Mr de Fries, I regret to say that something has come up – something of the utmost importance. I am afraid that I shall have to acquaint His Lordship with it personally.’

  He looked displeased.

  ‘Oh dear, are you sure that is necessary? Lord Hertford is very much occupied this morning.’

  ‘I am sure he is. But I know that when His Lordship hears what I have to say he will understand why he had to hear of this new development in person.’

  Mr de Fries hummed and ha-ed, then concluded that he would have to talk to His Lordship in person. I was left alone in his office for ten minutes (wasn’t he afraid I’d pocket the silver ink-stand?), but then he came back, accompanied by Lord Hertford, who looked in no very good humour.

  ‘Well, well, Mr Mozart, I hope this is of importance.’

  I nodded confidently. Luckily I felt very sure of my ground (an infrequent state of mind for me when I am dealing with grand personages).