‘Where’s Bubi?’ cried the Rhinemaiden, who had come along to help.
‘I have him, Frau Witzler.’
Tessa appeared briefly in the pit carrying the Witz-ler’s three-year-old son on one arm and a plate piled high with sandwiches in the other. She emerged in the rehearsal room where Klasky – cursing the violins in Hungarian, the cellos in Czech and the woodwind in Serbo-Croat – appeared to be preparing Mozart’s score for an audience of ranking cherubim.
‘Thank you. Put them over there,’ said Klasky, glaring at the orchestra who, having rehearsed for five hours without a break, now foolishly assumed that they could eat. He passed a moist hand absently over Bubi’s blond curls and smiled at Tessa. She was a nice little thing, always willing to help. Perfect pitch, too . . . Pity there was never any time. Still, perhaps it was just as well. Like Chopin, who believed that to approach George Sands in love was to deprive the world of an étude, Klasky was convinced that women drained away a man’s creativity and it would never do to dissipate his energy. For in spite of the recent spate of rehearsals, Klasky had made a real breakthrough with his own opera. By changing the wronged husband from a policeman to a railway porter, he had unblocked his imagination in a most amazing way. A chorus for platelayers and signalmen had come to him in a single flash of inspiration; a soliloquy for an engine-greaser, a kind of Holy Fool who would speak for the oppressed proletariat, virtually wrote itself.
And sighing, for the girl was charming, he picked up his baton once again. ‘From the letter D, gentlemen. And remember that sostenuto means sostenuto. Even for Herr Katzenbirger it means sostenuto.’
As the time drew nearer for their departure, the company’s preparations grew more frantic.
‘I am not a canary,’ announced Raisa, arriving for a morning rehearsal. ‘I cannot zink at ten o’clock,’ but she sang. The coloratura Jacob had filched from Dresden to play the Queen of the Night fell off her stepladder, twisted an ankle, and climbed up again to sing ‘O Zittere Nicht’ in a way that had the orchestra banging on their music stands. Boris stayed up until 3 a.m. creating exotic head-dresses for Sarastro’s priest. Even Frau Pollack, presented with new fabrics after years of making do, forgot her almost-eaten great-uncle and trod the treadle of her sewing-machine like a Valkyrie.
As for Tessa, she was everywhere: prompting, copying, sewing, ironing and only once, very quietly and unnoticed, fainting in the laundry room when she had missed a little more food, a little more sleep than her small frame could endure.
On a Saturday evening, just five days before they were due to leave, Jacob received a phone call in his office which sent him hurrying in search of his under wardrobe mistress.
‘I’ve just had a call from Herr Klasky, Tessa. He’s conducting at the Musiksverein at eight-thirty and he’s forgotten The Button!’
‘Oh no!’ Tessa’s eyes were wide with concern. ‘Is it a première?’
Jacob nodded. ‘Berg’s Concerto. We must get it to him. It would be a disaster if he got upset now, so soon before the tour.’
All performing artists are superstitious and Klasky, though technically sane, could only conduct a première while in possession of a small, mottled object suggesting, with its faint air of decay and transparency, the shed milk tooth of an undernourished child, but authenticated without a doubt as the waistcoat button of Ludwig van Beethoven himself.
‘He’s rung his housekeeper,’ Jacob continued. ‘He wants you to run round quickly and fetch it and leave it at Sachers at the reception desk. He’s dining there now on his way to the hall. Can you manage that?’
A faint shadow had crossed Tessa’s face at the mention of Austria’s most famous hotel, once the favourite haunt of the aristocracy, which the terrifying Frau Sacher still ran with a complete disregard for recent changes. But she only said, ‘Yes, Herr Witzler,’ and was presently found by the Littlest Heidi, rummaging hastily in a wicker skip for something to replace her paint-encrusted smock.
Heidi Schlumberger was not only the smallest but the prettiest and sweetest of the Three Heidis, her blue eyes permanently widened in admiration of the world.
‘I’ve got a Sylphides dress that’s spotless,’ she said now, taking Tessa by the hand. ‘Come along, I’ll show you.’
‘Is it suitable, do you think?’ said Tessa, when she had slipped it on and stood looking at herself, white, gauzy and rose-embroidered in the mirror of the chorus dressing-room.
But what was suitable for the delivery of Beethoven’s waistcoat button to Sachers? – and anyway, there was no more time. Thanking Heidi profusely, Tessa ran out into the street.
Guy had spent the day before Nerine’s arrival in a kind of Odyssey, revisiting the places where he had been with her. The old hunting pavilion in the Prater where he had picked her a bunch of early scillas like little sapphire stars . . . the chesnut tree by the gates of the Academy where he had watched for her light at dawn . . . the room in the Kunsthistorisches Museum with its famed and fabulous Breughels in which Nerine – hiding from the other girls – had stood beside him to gaze enraptured at the master’s complete and all-embracing world.
Now, strolling back through the Inner City past scalloped fountains, equestrian statues and the quiet facades of palaces warm in the golden light of evening, he could almost believe that the city, like himself, was waiting for his love.
He crossed the Albertina Platz, exchanged bows with the Minister of Trade who was assisting his portly wife into a fiacre, turned down the Philharmonikerstrasse and entered his hotel.
The foyer was almost deserted, for they had begun to serve the evening meal. But at the far side, between two Venetian mirrors, he glimpsed a small figure in white backed against the red-damask covered wall. A figure imprisoned by the fat, spread-eagled arms of a bald gentleman in evening clothes, his back to Guy, who was bending over her.
Guy approached and as he did so, the anguished face of Witzler’s under wardrobe mistress appeared briefly from behind the bulk of her captor, lit up in recognition of Guy and vanished once again.
A certain melancholy settled on Guy. The man endeavouring to pin her to the wall was old, unsteady on his feet and probably quite genuinely under a misapprehension for the glimpse of Tessa, her throat and bare shoulders rising from a cloud of white, hardly suggested a respectable Viennese hausfrau waiting for her spouse. Which was a pity – for Guy, penned for weeks in the Treasury, was in the mood to do justice to a prolonged, well-matched and bloody fight.
Now he merely seized the man by the shoulder, spun him round and in tones as polite as they were menacing, said, ‘This lady is with me.’
Rubbing his shoulder and muttering angrily, the old gentleman tottered away. Guy, left looking down at Tessa’s fragile, serious little face, transcending the absurd romanticism of the costume, was more than ever inclined to exonerate her tormentor.
‘How old are you?’ he asked abruptly.
‘Twenty. Well, almost.’
Guy, who had been toying with the ‘I am old enough to be your father’ approach, abandoned it. At eleven he had not really been prepared for parenthood.
‘You shouldn’t be here alone,’ he said, his voice still harsh. ‘It’s most unsuitable, you must know that.’
‘Yes . . . I’m sorry.’ Only the ghost of a sniff, a finger pressed against the corner of one eye as if to hold back an impending tear, betrayed her recent strain. ‘I had to deliver something for Herr Witzler.’
Guy’s thick brows drew together in a frown. What did Witzler mean by exposing her to this? Was the child never supposed to eat or sleep?
‘You had better stay and have some supper. My secretary’s probably waiting in the dining-room. She’s a formidable lady, but she’s got a heart of gold. Come and join us.’
Tessa shook her head. ‘No, really, I couldn’t.’
But at that moment a service door opened somewhere at the back and lifting her head, her nostrils flaring in the manner of Baudelaire when he smelled the fleurs du mal, she sa
id raptly, ‘Rindfleisch suppe!’
It was too much, and abandoning further protest she let herself be led to the double doors of the dining-room.
Inside, however, a reverse awaited them. The terrifying Frau Sacher, black-clad and omnipresent, came towards them, stared at Tessa and hissed angrily to Guy, ‘You cannot bring her into the public dining room!’
Fury gripped Guy. Surely the woman could see that Tessa, though dressed like a dancing-girl, was not of their kind? But anxious above all not to subject the child to a scene, he allowed himself to be led upstairs and within moments the door was opened on an image from one of Tessa’s most fervent dreams.
‘Oh!’ she breathed. ‘All my life I have wanted to dine in a chambre séparée.’
Entranced, she looked at the red plush walls, the snowy damask, the alcove with its discreetly looped curtains of gold-tasselled brocade. This was life as she had conceived it: Sarah Bernhardt, the Duse, were now sisters under the skin.
But when she had sat for a while in a chair that Guy had pulled out for her, she fell silent. A cloud passed over her face.
‘Is anything the matter?’
‘No . . . Only . . . would you mind very much if we changed places?’ Guy, following her gaze, found that Tessa was confronting the portrait of an obese and haughty lady whose plump bosom was bisected by the Order of St Boniface. Narrowing his eyes to read the title, he learned that he was in the presence of Her Imperial Highness, the Archduchess Frederica.
‘Certainly.’ Guy rose and the change was effected. ‘Your republicanism again?’ he enquired politely.
Tessa nodded. She was now staring with every appearance of pleasure at a painting of Leda welcoming with unmistakable concupiscence the attentions of the swan.
‘Yes, but this lady at least is enjoying herself,’ she said, answering Guy’s grin.
It was an agreeable meal. Someone, somewhere, had taught this waif the art of conversation. Tessa touched him with her ardent belief in art as the passport to man’s freedom and happiness, but she could be very funny about the International Opera Company’s preparations for their exciting and mysterious assignment. And she could listen. Guy, telling her about his travels in Brazil, saw her almost visibly drinking in his descriptions of that fabled, exotic land.
But as the meal drew towards its close, he noticed her small face slewing round more and more to the object only partially concealed by the half-drawn curtains in the alcove: an object which, without blazoning it to the world, was not really a couch or a sofa – was, by its width, the humped softness of its pillows . . . was, in short . . . a bed.
The waiter brought coffee and a liqueur for Guy, and closed the door with finality. Requesting permission to smoke, Guy watched, concealing his amusement, as the highly expressive face of the little wardrobe mistress registered in rapid succession a series of emotions: apprehension, followed by resolution, followed again by a flicker of despair.
‘Do people often bother you like that?’ he said, deciding to force the issue. ‘Like that old man just now?’
‘Well, a bit. It’s worse since Anita cut my hair.’ Her eyes slid back to the bed. It was awful not knowing how to behave, what was correct. That so handsome and wealthy a man – a man who clearly could have any woman he wished – should have any real interest in her seemed most unlikely. On the other hand, that so handsome a man – any man – should buy her a dinner, a three-course dinner with rindfleisch suppe and kalbsbraten which nowadays cost a week’s wages, and want nothing in return, seemed equally unlikely. Caught thus between Scylla and Charybdis, Tessa reached for her wineglass, gulped and plunged.
‘It is very difficult. You see, I believe that one must be completely generous. One must be like Sonia in Crime and Punishment when she went to Siberia with Raskalnikov, and like Isadora Duncan. I mean, not dancing in bare feet but giving. And like Madame Walewska with Napoleon. Everything must be given freely – money, property . . . oneself. But though I believe this absolutely when anyone . . . the second double-bass player or the electrician . . . or anyone wishes to,’ she went on, looking suddenly extremely miserable and somewhat wringing Guy’s withers, ‘I can’t, I absolutely can’t.’
Overcome by failure, she bent her head. Silky lashes curtained downcast eyes, and in the whispered murmur which now escaped her Guy, hair-raisingly, caught the name of Professor Freud.
With some regret, for it was burning beautifully, Guy now extinguished his cigar. Then he leaned over and laid his strong, chiselled fingers briefly on Tessa’s clenched knuckles, whitened by confession and strain.
‘Tessa, I promise you that one day it will not be like that. One day somebody will come – not the second double-bass player or the electrician, but somebody. And you won’t have to think about being like Isadora Duncan or going to Siberia and you certainly won’t have to trouble poor Professor Freud. When that person comes, whoever he is, all the fear and doubt will go and you’ll know.’
‘Will I?’ Her face, wistful yet trusting, was turned to his. ‘Are you sure?’ Yet even as she spoke she felt, with a strange kind of puzzlement, that the question already belonged to the past.
‘I’m sure,’ said Guy. And meaning only to reassure her, he added, ‘as for me, my dear, I promise I mean you no harm. In fact, I am waiting for someone to join me here in Vienna – someone I love and hope soon to marry.’ He paused and Tessa drew in her breath, seeing what Martha had first seen in the child of six: the lightening of his eyes to a lyrical and tender blue. Then he rose and pulled the red curtains firmly across the alcove. ‘So you see, you are perfectly safe!’
Tessa smiled. ‘I’m glad,’ she said, and took one of the crystallized plums from the box he held out to her.
She was glad. She was very glad. She was happy. Nothing was going to happen, not ever. He loved someone else.
Odd, though, that happiness should feel so much like a weight pressing against her chest; odd that the room looked suddenly a little misty.
Odd, too, that when she so much liked Karlsbad plums, the one she was eating should taste as if it had been dug out of an Egyptian tomb.
6
Nerine and her brother arrived in Vienna with fourteen pieces of luggage and a cowed maid called Pooley. Nerine was pleased with the suite Guy had engaged for them at the Grand Hotel, rather less pleased when only three days later he informed them that they were leaving for the country.
The country – even the dazzlingly beautiful landscape of Lower Austria – did not figure high on Nerine’s list of priorities. Though Vienna was sadly changed from the Imperial capital she had known as a girl, there were always amusements of some sort to be found in the city.
Nevertheless, she made no attempt to delay their departure. Guy had been a courteous host in Vienna but he had not, so to speak, shown his hand. True, there were flowers in her hotel room but no gift of jewels, no offer to take her shopping, no hint of the fabled wealth with which he had been credited. If, as seemed likely, he now expected her to join some drunken businessmen in a damp hunting lodge somewhere in a forest, or don a dirndl and act the village maiden, he would find himself disappointed. Marie Antoinette playing at being a milkmaid was not to Nerine’s taste. And if things went wrong there was always Lord Frith, languishing for love of her in Scotland.
Now she sat beside Guy who was driving the Hispano-Suiza himself, with Arthur dozing in the back. A second car, driven by Morgan and carrying the rest of the luggage, followed behind. It was the seventeenth of June and the countryside through which they drove was straight out of one of Schubert’s more ecstatic songs. Mill-wheels raced in emerald rivers; larks ascended, linden trees spread their murmuring crowns over ancient wells – and in the distance, glimpsed for an instant and then lost again, was the snow-glitter of the Alps.
She threw a glance at Guy, who was unusually silent, and sighed. He really was amazingly attractive with that caged-wild-beast look, those strong hands lying so easily on the steering wheel. No one, looking at him, would e
ver guess that he had been found in the gutter. That was one thing she would have to cure him of, telling everyone about his birth. It did no good, that kind of thing, it only embarrassed people.
They lunched in the courtyard of an inn from whose every window there tumbled petunias, geraniums and tousled orange marigolds, and then continued their journey.
The golden morning was turning into a wild grey afternoon, the peaks shrouded in cloud, and now with the suddenness of mountain weather, the sky opened to release a torrent of rain.
Guy, driving carefully through the downpour, listening to the windscreen-wiper’s slow adagio, had to fight down a sudden sense of desolation. He had hazarded so much on Nerine’s first glimpse.
Then, as dramatically as it had begun, the rain stopped, the clouds parted and in the new-washed, azure sky there appeared a perfect rainbow.
It was thus that Nerine, stepping out of the car where Guy had halted it beside the lake, first saw the castle: its towering, fairy-tale pinnacles spanned by a radiant, multi-coloured arc.
‘Good heavens, Guy, that’s Pfaffenstein, isn’t it?’ Her lovely head was tilted upward, her voice reverent. ‘Frau von Edelnau had a picture of it in her dining-room.’
‘Yes, that’s Pfaffenstein,’ said Guy, making obeisance to the gods, for the skyscape framing the fortress was breathtaking.
Arthur climbed out ponderously and joined them. His finger in his Baedecker, he was able to inform them that parts of the castle dated back to the year 909, that it had been in the possession of the Pfaffenstein family since 1353, that it comprised the demesnes of Hohenstein, Untersweg, Breganzer and Pilgarten, and that the original ramparts measured two kilometres in circumference.
‘It’s staggering,’ said Nerine. ‘There’s nothing remotely like it in England, is there?’ Forgetting for once her determination never to screw up her eyes for fear of wrinkles, she peered at the gatehouse tower looking for the family flag. ‘Do they still own it, the Pfaffensteins?’