by Shoshi
she prevent the Mozarts from throwing her out of their house? This friendly old musical buddy of Mozart’s was about to become the biggest threat she had ever come up against. Forget about their quest to bring back a finished copy of the Requiem. What mattered more was how would she survive by herself in the middle of a strange city in an even stranger century? The idea filled her with unspeakable fear.
• SIXTEEN •
Herr Schack embraced Constanze and squeezed Mozart’s two hands with his own as the old family friend that he was. “You don’t have to worry about that fop any more. He’ll be chasing his horse for a week yet.” He told them about his encounter with the messenger and Carol’s role in getting rid of him.
“Carol did that?” said Constanze. “A Viennese girl would never dare.”
Mozart as expected loved the contrariness of it. “I wish they would dare,” he said.
“I suppose English girls are just different,” said his wife. “They probably don’t coddle their men or wait on them hand and foot the way we do in Austria.” Something made her smile. “I imagine In England men probably have to go out in the street and empty their own bettpfannes,” she said. “Unless a servant does it.”
Wow, thought Carol, is that how they get rid of that yukky stuff? It sounded horrendously unsanitary. There was no response from the two men. Carol imagined they were probably thinking over what it would be like to actually have to do it themselves.
Herr Schack turned and gave her a mischievous look. “Is what Constanze says true, Carol?” he asked. “Except I think you English call them bedpans.”
Carol could feel she was being challenged. Was he about to open Pandora’s Jar? She suspected he was. Pandora’s Jar, she remembered, was the Greek and Roman myth in which Jupiter put all the Evils of the world in a jar and instructed Pandora not to let any of them out. But she couldn’t resist peeking inside it. The moment she opened it they all flew out to inflict themselves on innocent mankind. In her case, the evils were the true facts about Mathew and herself.
“Of course, it’s true,” said Carol. She knew she was lying, but the idea of women being stuck with such a chore just made her mad. “Why shouldn’t the men do it? It’s only fair. It’s only here in Austria that women are forced to do it.” What she was really up against, she realized, was the 18thcentury and women’s place in it. Thank goodness America was different, she thought.
“That’s curious,” said Mozart. “I have personally seen what goes on in Germany and France. There women are in full charge of bedpans.”
“I myself have lived in London,” said Herr Schack. “Women are in full charge there, too.” There was a long pause in the conversation. Finally, Herr Schack asked the question Carol was dreading. It was the question she knew was coming and could not be avoided.
“Carol,” he said gently. “Why don’t you confess to us that you are not English at all and not related to the Mozarts?”
Mozart who was prone to laugh at just about anything was now not laughing at all.
“What are you talking about, Bene?” he said. “I can hear her English accent in the background of the perfect German this girl speaks.” But she could tell he had become doubtful about her, too.
“Carol, what is your answer to Bene’s nonsense?” asked Constanze. “I know you love to jest, Bene, but there are limits even among friends.”
Carol looked totally distraught. How could she possibly answer these questions? She could never tell a lie big enough to answer them all, and frankly she didn’t feel like telling any more lies. She wanted so badly to tell them the truth. Yet how could she tell them about her promise to bring the finished Requiem back to her dad even if she had to steal it or tell them about a place and time as totally weird as America in the 21st century or describe the mystery of how they had used time travel to get here? They would find it hard to believe a word of it.
There was another long moment of embarrassed silence, and, then, suddenly, came a splintering crash and the sound of pulverizing glass scattering around the Mozart bedroom.
Yes, it was Mathew.
• SEVENTEEN •
Mrs. Pindler came back from her phone call and looked around for Mathew. For half a moment she thought she saw him standing near her doctor husband’s desk. But, then, she looked again and saw nothing.
She shook her head as though she needed to clear it, but the image was gone. “Mathew?” she said uncertainly. “Where are you?” He just wasn’t there.
Had he slipped out of the apartment in spite of her asking him to stay? she wondered. That was unacceptable behavior. She would have to have a serious talk with him later—maybe with both of them. She had never felt comfortable about their relationship. He was just so---peculiar. Perhaps, it was time to terminate it. And, by the way, where was Carol anyway? It seemed clear that Mathew knew but wasn’t about to tell her.
Mathew, of course, was time traveling back to Carol. It felt good. Now that he had the talisman and understood how it worked, he felt confident that he could spring her free from Mozart’s clutches---bring her back to the States in time for their Friday concert. He was looking forward to it. That was the great thing about being in the band. Everybody loved you. It was like a free pass. You were magic.
He wondered where he was going to come down--in the bedroom next to Mozart’s bed or in the kitchen in front of that huge stove? Maybe Constanze had made some more chocolates. Mmm, that would be cool. He loved those chocolates. She would be shocked, though, if he just appeared out of nothing. Or maybe Carol was having a piano lesson by now, playing away as the Master lay in his bed giving her instructions. Had he eaten the chocolates with the pills in them? Was he cured?
And, then, Mathew landed, almost losing his balance but managing to stay upright as he smithereened through Mozart’s bedroom window.
“Howdy, folks,” he said cheerily as he walked into the kitchen. Seeing the looks on Carol’s face and the faces of the others, he sized up immediately what was about to take place.
“I’ll explain everything,” he said. Carol was so glad to see him, but she didn’t know how he could explain anything at all. “I think we’ve got to come clean,” he whispered to her. She nodded vigorously. “We’ll just hope they buy it.”
Carol remembered that that was the last creature left in Pandora’s Jar when all the Evils had escaped. Jupiter himself allowed her to release it. It was Hope, the thing that has sustained men and women ever since, when they were caught in tough binds---like this one. So that’s what they did. They fessed up about absolutely everything, sharing the telling as they went along. At least, Carol thought to herself, when they throw us out, I’ll have Mathew with me to face life in the 18th century if we can’t make it back to the 21st.
“I’m having trouble believing any of this,” said Herr Schack, nervously wiping his plump neck with a handkerchief and breathing faster than usual. Constanze was halfway to a faint and had to sit down.
Mozart was uncharacteristically somber for a whole minute after which he chuckled and said: “It’s wonderful. I love it. I think I want to move there.”
Meanwhile, Constanze was coming back to life. She had heard what he said. “Oh, no, Wolfgang. Never. We must get paid in full for the Requiem first. Besides, where would we live? What would we eat?”
“Will they know me, Carol?” asked history’s most accomplished music-maker. “Or must I start all over again?”
This was the part Carol liked the best, telling him he was a classical music god, that everyone in the world of classical music, even after two centuries, was in endless awe of him.
“That’s nice,” he said. A look of concern crossed his face. He was thinking about his musical rivals in Vienna at the end of the 18th century. “What about those scalawags Clementi or Salieri---or Naumann? Or that filthy prig Cambini? Are they as famous as me---in the twenty-one century?”
; “I never heard of any of them,” Carol said.
“Ah, that’s the best news of all,” he said happily. “Now I don’t have to hate them any more.”
Constanze was already cleaning up the broken glass, good Viennese wife that she was. Mathew grabbed a broom to help her.
“What’s this?” she said, not quite believing what he was doing.
“In my century, men clean up,” he said. “At least sometimes.”
Then, guiltily: “We must pay you for a new window.”
“No, you have more than repaid us. You have made Wolfgang feel himself again.”
“Would we be able to pay the rest of our bills in this Americky place?” asked music’s poorest great composer. “Constanze would like that.”
“I think, Herr Mozart,” said Carol, “you would quickly become a billionaire, maybe a trillionaire. The first one ever.”
“Is that a lot of money?” he asked.
“Quite a bit,” said Carol.
“You couldn’t spend it in one lifetime or two lifetimes or even three lifetimes,” said Mathew.
“Oh, I’d find a way,” said Mozart.
“If you dare leave Vienna on this silly trip, you leave without me,” said Constanze emphatically. “I’m very well satisfied with our life here---in spite of our bills. Vienna is the center of culture of the whole world!”
“I knew she’d say that,” said Mozart, a resigned look on his