wants to make sure that no one seduces me and that she’s taken care of in the future. I suppose she doesn’t know anyone else she can marry me to. Everyone in Vienna is so lovely, and I’m plain, but I don’t mind that. I have always liked you. In fact, I love you with all my heart, but not that way. I want to renounce the world for God. I’m sure I’m not suitable for marriage. Still, she says we must marry, and I don’t particularly want to. I wanted to know what you felt about it. We could go to Father Paul together and ask him.”
He said nothing for a time. Some anger passed his face, and she cringed a little, for she knew from some musicians who had lived with them that Mozart could be touchy as gunpowder. Then he passed his hands over his lips, and his shoulders shook; she could see he was laughing. “It’s not so funny,” she cried, leaping up. “I’m not so bad that it’s funny.”
“Bad? Not at all; you’re a darling. Oh, my sweet Lord, do you really—”
“Hush, hush! Mozart, someone’s coming.”
They knew the singing, the slipping, the muttering, the cursing. It was Steiner, the theology student, who was coming home drunk again. His room was opposite Mozart’s, but he did not go into it. He seemed to have stumbled on the stairs and sat there muttering and singing to himself, blocking her possible escape from the room.
Mozart put his finger to his lips. “Be very still, you darling,” he whispered. “Let me see if I can get him to bed, and then you can slip upstairs; we’ll meet somewhere tomorrow in the daylight and speak about this.” At the thought he began laughing so hard he could hardly stand straight, but he took a deep breath, walked across the room and through the doorway. His thick light brown hair stood almost perfectly upward from his sleep, giving him some several more inches in height. He looked ready to take flight. She sat down again on the chair with her hands in her lap.
She heard his stern whisper. “Steiner! Up now, man, to bed.”
“Can’t stand ... stay here ... stairs ... »
“Come, Steiner, you can do it.” Sophie held her breath. It sounded like Mozart was trying to help the drunken student stand, which would have had its difficulties, for Steiner was a hundred pounds heavier and half a foot taller. “Help me, Steiner,” she heard him say.
“Leave me alone, you bastard composer, you organ grinder ... sleep here.”
“Get up, Steiner.”
The noise had awoken another lodger, a traveling financier from Seville, who opened his door and called down in his Spanish accent, “Damn you, you drunken lout, get up and into bed.” Sophie sank deeper into the chair. She held her breath again. The other lodger had pounded down the steps and was also trying to lift the drunken man. Between them, they got Steiner into his room. After several minutes Mozart returned. He closed and locked the door behind him, then began laughing so hard he could scarcely contain himself. He threw the pillows across the bed and buried his face in them. Sophie was laughing, too. He caught her in his arms and laughed with her. Tears ran down his face.
They sat down finally on opposite chairs, listening to Steiner snoring from the room across the way. “Now,” Mozart gasped, wiping his eyes, “tell me again. We’ve got to marry. Can it wait until the morning? They don’t make marriages at this hour, for all the witnesses are asleep. You dear, lovely child, your family’s quite mad, except you and Constanze, of course. But there’s a problem. We don’t love each other. Let’s both stay single, and now you should go back to bed.”
“I ought to wait until the Spaniard upstairs is asleep again. If he finds me he’ll leer at me. I hate him.”
“Yes, you would of course. You saved my life once; you’re the dearest girl. Please forgive me if I was ever cold to you.”
“Forgiven then. But ... Mozart.”
“Sophie.”
“Do you believe we are meant to find happiness with each other in this life? Constanze and I aren’t sure of it. People are either very lonely, or are unhappy together. Do you think it’s easier to find it just with God?”
“Perhaps, but I have no inclination to that. I have a very dear friend, an Italian monk, visiting here from Bologna. He says that contentment’s as hard