I suppose she can see Blessed Saint Anne and Saint Bridget. What other news? Boarders come and go here, but we hardly see Mozart; he’s so withdrawn and distant he hardly notices any of us. Letters from his father come weekly or more, and he reads them carefully. I hear him walking up and down in his room. He hardly laughs anymore. I think he’s going to go away. Oh, if it weren’t for Sophie, I’d run off with Henri, but one of us must stay with Mama. Perhaps when you return we can all live here so that she never has to worry about money and then she’ll be a kinder person.
The Easter bells are ringing outside, but the weather is still cold. I miss you so. Sophie sends all her love. Don’t let your throat get chilled after you sing; wear the warm scarf Mama knit you last year around your mouth and throat. It is very dangerous to chill the voice after singing. Papa always warned you.
With a thousand kisses, your sister in life and death,
Constanze
“You’re called Constanze,” her father had said. “It means constancy. In the worst of times, you hold us together.” But had she? Could she? Two of her sisters were gone now, and the house was angry and scattered, her mother weeping over the breaded meat in the kitchen, declaring that life was against her and nothing was her fault. Sometimes when Constanze encountered her, the older woman would stare at her bleakly, as if to say, You see how unhappy I am? You see that you have entirely failed to make me happy?
Constanze sealed her letter and went downstairs and out into the snow, her heavy flannel underpetticoats and smock hardly keeping her warm. She posted the letter and then slipped into the church, where she sat for a long time, her head leaning forward on the seat before her.
The coffee and pastry café on the Graben was the most beautiful one in Vienna: tiers of marble shelves held cakes on silver dishes; a chandelier reflected many times in the gilded mirrors; and a trio of harpsichord, violin, and violoncello played popular tunes in one corner. The rich scent of coffee and cinnamon greeted patrons at the door. And Thorwart was expansive, generous, pouring out the steaming coffee in a neat arc with his heavy hand, into which his rings pressed deeply. He ordered a three-tiered dish of little cakes with chocolate, sweetened nuts, and a few frosted pink with sugar roses.
Maria Caecilia Weber, from her side of the small round table, brought her handkerchief to her slightly rouged mouth.
Even with the mistake he had made regarding her small investment, Maria Caecilia still insisted to her family and friends that Johann Thorwart was one of the most clever men she knew. Now he had risen to a position of general factotum of Viennese opera under Count Orsini-Rosenberg, and as Orsini-Rosenberg knew the Emperor well, Thorwart now also regarded himself as an intimate of the imperial court. These things made Maria Caecilia regard him even more highly than she had before.
“You need to get away from your cares,” Thorwart had said, descending on her suddenly when she was in the midst of her housekeeping. He made her fetch her hat, then swept her away here.
Now he sat back, coat open to reveal his waistcoat and his silver watch chain, and said, “And how are your girls? How beautiful they all were when I used to come to your Thursdays in Mannheim, though the music did go on and on. I envied them, compared to my one daughter, who speaks to me almost as little as my wife.”
“Johann, you’ve been treated unfairly!” she said. She could see the hurt in his full mouth even after he had spoken. He leaned one arm on the table and looked about the room as if to say, Has any man here been treated so ill?
“After all you’ve given them!” she continued. “And you’re such a good man! I’m sorry that any thought has made you sad.”
Turning back to her, he once more thrust out his wide chest. “Not in the least!” he cried. “A moment’s reverie, that’s all. I didn’t ask you here today to speak of my small misfortunes but of you.” He turned the tiered plate around, offering her the pink cakes with the sugar roses. “You know, I promised Fridolin I’d look after you, and more’s needed than procuring your wretched pension. ”