Vienna Prelude (37 page)

“Why have you brought me to your secret place?” He could barely speak in the hope of her answer. He had only glimpsed her heart as she played. Now she was opening up so much for him.
Why?

“Because . . . I . . . for so many months now I have prayed for joy, for wisdom, for love—someone who could soar with my soul . . . ”

Murphy felt almost overwhelmed. Suddenly he wanted to know everything there was to know about her. He longed to discover her and the music of her life. What words were hidden in every melody? What had he heard but never known the meaning of? The music was different now. Slower, but still intricate. “What is he playing now?”

“The
Arioso
.” She sensed her eagerness. “I stand at the threshold.” She seemed curious. How could anyone not know this? “You have not heard the verse before?”

Murphy nodded. “Not in music. I stand at the door and knock.” He remembered the words from his childhood, the picture of Christ standing at the door.

“ ‘If anyone hears my voice and answers, I will come in.’ Yes. Jesu, Creator, knocking and hoping we will hear. And I want to hear Him, Murphy. It has been so long—” She did not finish. The music spoke to her and for her.

There was so much more to this woman than he had bargained for, more than a willing kiss or a bright smile. She was at this moment showing him a part of her soul that he sensed she had never shown to anyone before. He carried a dozen little angels in the box. The image of her physical beauty could be duplicated . . . but
this
! He looked into her eyes, and in their depth he saw her very soul. He saw himself as one she trusted enough to share herself with. And he wondered if he could find the depth in his own heart that she had found in hers. What had she learned in her loneliness this year that she offered so freely to him?

“
Was Gott tut, das ist wohligetan
,”
she said as if in answer to his silent question.

“What God has done is rightly done,” he translated. Then he frowned. “I don’t think I can agree with you on that one, Elisa.”

“Nor can I. It is the song. ‘Cantata 99.’ But maybe someday we will be able to believe that God knows what He is doing . . . not now, Murphy. But maybe someday—when we see holy wisdom, and find love and hope that is greater than our darkness. Is God evil? I ask myself sometimes when I think of my father and the others who suffer now, maybe even more than Christ on the cross. But I do not come here to question, Murphy. I come here only to worship and remember,
Gott soll allein mein Herze haben
.”

“God alone should have my heart,” he translated again.

“Yes. A child’s bedtime prayer my mother taught me. And no doubt Bach’s mother taught him. That is his ‘Cantata 169.’” She laughed at the expression on Murphy’s face.

“Is there any thought at all that you cannot find in music?” he teased.

She answered him with a steady, serious gaze. “In answer to your question, Murphy, listen to me play tonight. You in your rented suit and your fistful of tickets. Tonight you must
listen
as I play, and tell me what you hear.”

“If I see or hear or feel any more, Elisa—” His heart was evident in his voice. Desperate. In love as he had never dreamed possible.

She touched his cheek. “Thank you.”

Were those tears in her eyes? “Why are you thanking me?”

“For not thinking I’m . . . silly.”

“Never. You just whet my appetite. I may become a music lover, after all.”

She inclined her head slightly, amused at the thought. “No doubt. Something very important for a musician to have. One plays; the other . . . loves.”

Again he felt the room spinning around him. What was she saying? Was there more in her words? Like the music—level upon level of meaning beyond the notes themselves.
Don’t play with my heart
, he wanted to beg her. But he simply accepted her touch; then he kissed the palm of her hand.
God alone should have her heart, she says. Does that exclude the love of all else? Is there room for her to love me?

“Sitting here like this with you,” Murphy said haltingly, “makes me almost afraid. What happened between last night and this moment? Why have you decided to share so much of yourself with me?”

She smiled a careful, thoughtful smile. “Last night, for the first time in a long time, I was reminded of something my father did.” She did not tell Murphy what it was. “Something reminded me of my father”—she looked away and frowned—“and . . . it has been a very long time since I have even tried to reveal my thoughts to another person. A very long time.” This brief, unsatisfactory explanation ended her moment of sharing.

This one hour together had left Murphy even more hopelessly in love with her—desperate for her safety, eager to be her protector, and hungry to know her. Had it meant anything beyond the breaking of a long spiritual silence? He wanted her to feel what he felt, but he was afraid to push, and more frightened that she would walk away from him forever than he had been while facing Nazi bombs over Madrid.

She glanced at her watch as the music ended and the young Spaniard put his guitar away. “I have to go to the Musikverein before the doors are locked. My mail will be there. Maybe a letter from my mother.”

“Will you come back to the hotel when you are finished?” He tried to sound light and matter-of-fact. “I have a surprise for you.”

“How much time do you need?”

“An hour?”

She nodded and slipped into her coat. “An hour then,” she agreed, kissing him lightly.

The memory of her lips beneath his burned fresh in his memory. He did not want to let go, even for an hour. He grabbed her hand before she turned to leave. “Only an hour. Promise.”

She did not speak but raised her face to his and let him kiss her once again—an electrifying, all-consuming kiss that drove every thought from his mind. Then she pushed him away and skipped lightly up the steps of the cellar while he stood grasping the railing and staring after the bright flash of her red skirt.

“God, what is happening to me?” he said aloud as she disappeared. Then he ran up the steps and searched the teeming crowds of Christmas shoppers for one last glimpse of her. But she had already melted into the throngs.

26

Decision

How long has it been,
Elisa asked herself,
since I felt this way?
Months of memory ticked off into a year and a half.
Thomas and I that evening we picnicked by the Spree River. He took me in his arms and stroked my hair—
She stopped herself midthought, not wanting to mix her image of Thomas with this fresh, new feeling for John Murphy. Had she ever before admitted that she could possibly love any man but Thomas?

Now, as she strolled along the sidewalk, she turned the images of the day like pages in a photo album. Yes, she could love him; given time, sweet days and hours like today could melt into love. She touched her fingers to her lips. His kiss was still with her—just as Thomas’s kisses had haunted her for so long in the night, Murphy’s lips seemed only a thought away. It was cold out. She could see her own breath rising like the breath of the shoppers who trudged past her. But she was not cold.

Everything about Murphy seemed diametrically opposed to the things she had loved about Thomas. Thomas carried himself straight and correctly, like the aristocrat he was. Murphy was tall and slim, easygoing and relaxed. Athletic and confident, Murphy moved with a loose stride, while Thomas had always seemed to march. Murphy carried his heart and convictions quite openly. She had heard his anger as he described the senseless killing of the war in Spain. His affection had been evident in his eyes last night and again this afternoon.

With Thomas she had never been quite certain of his love until the sun slipped away; then he became filled with a passion and fire that had stolen her breath in its fierceness. He had left her silently, bewildered that he could desire her so strongly and yet never say the words “I love you.” Always she had assumed that men did not say such words or show themselves vulnerable to a woman. How she had longed to hear Thomas say all those things!

She sighed and quickly climbed the steps of the Musikverein. Of course none of that mattered now, except by way of comparison. Murphy was so very different—tender. Perhaps she could learn to love him as she had once loved Thomas. Murphy was no soldier, nor was he a saint, but words were his gift, his craft. He would not be afraid to tell her.

***

The mail slot bearing her name contained two letters. The one on top was postmarked from Prague and was from her mother. That had been the only mail Elisa expected. She flipped the other envelope over and stared hard at the postmark. Paris. With a gasp, she recognized the handwriting. Feeling faint, she groped for a chair. Sitting down carefully on a piano bench, she stared at the white envelope. There was no return address. Only her name, in the distinct Germanic script of Thomas von Kleistmann.

“Why now? Why today?” she said aloud as the caretaker walked past.

“Are you ill, Fraülein?” he asked.

She was trembling, but she managed a smile and shook her head in reply.

He was unconvinced. “Do you need me to call someone?”

Leah? No. Not Leah. After our talk last night, she would call me a fool for not tearing this envelope in half before I even read it. Murphy? How can I explain this? Perhaps it is word of my father. Perhaps it is the words I waited for Thomas to say
. She was afraid of what waited for her inside the crisp envelope.

“Yes. Please. I need a taxi.”

***

It was the smallest of all Christmas trees, but Murphy had carried it happily upstairs without waiting for the elevator. In his room he had unwrapped the angels and the rolls of red and gold ribbon and a dozen brass candleholders and long white tapered candles.

Now the candles illuminated the room in a soft light. The branches of the little tree were covered with bows, red and gold, of all different sizes. And the angels—Elisa’s angels—played their violins from the branches. “Bach, no doubt,” Murphy said as he placed the carving of the Holy Family beneath his little tree.

Now, as the minutes crawled by, he paced back and forth in the room, stopping to peer out the window at every passerby. It was growing dark, but the city seemed to glow, and he was sure he could single her out among the shoppers below. He was certain he could spot her anywhere.

He was so full, so hopeful and expectant as he considered the words that had passed between them this afternoon. Always in the back of his mind was the warning that he must not move too fast. She was like a beautiful white-tailed doe in the forests back home. He must approach quietly, slowly, so she would not bolt and run.

As for himself, he knew it was too late for a warning. His heart was shot through. He was smitten, finished. The ladies of the cabarets would hold no temptation for him now. He had an angel on the string. An angel with a violin.

He sat down and stared at the tree. He got up and moved an angel from one branch, carefully securing it to another. He moved the angels around numerous times, admiring the effect of the candlelight on the gold ribbon.

He sat down again, then got up and stood at the window.
“
Not more than an hour,”
she had promised. Where was she, then? Maybe she had been hurt, slipped on the ice and gotten hit by a bus, or . . .

Murphy ran his hand across his face. She would come. She had promised. And this would be the best Christmas he had ever had. He prayed that she was not hurt.
Maybe bad news from home?
The thought made him exhale loudly. If she did not come soon, he determined, he would go look for her! But if he went looking for her, she might come, and he would miss her.
Better stay put.

After an hour and a half, his nervousness melted with the candles into pools of disappointment. He switched on the light and blew out the dozen flames.
She has some reason why she couldn’t come.
I’ll bring her here after the performance.
He comforted himself with the thought, then went in to shower and shave and dress for the evening at the symphony. He would listen to her play; listen to the melody as though he had never heard a note of music before. Tonight Elisa had promised to play for him. And when she was done, he would bring her back and show her his small surprise. Then maybe he would talk to her again about the farm in Pennsylvania, and she would listen to him.

***

The two letters lay opened before her on the table. She had drawn the shades hurriedly, sending the pot of geraniums crashing to the floor. Her hands trembled uncontrollably as she skimmed each letter again, one at a time.

Normally, such a disappointment would have shattered Elisa. But now she could barely comprehend the words. She held the letter from Thomas up to the lamplight. The page shook so in her hand that she laid it down again to read it.

The letter went on, page after wrenching page. The silence was broken. He wanted her to come to Paris. Join him there, and there they would marry and disappear somewhere to live together forever. Did Elisa dare believe him? Hadn’t she loved him to the exclusion of all else in her life? Hadn’t she begged God to bring him back into her arms? And now, the night after she had given him up, tried to shut him out of her heart and turn her hope toward another, he was back, passionate and yearning in his desire to see her. He would marry her to the exclusion of his country and his duty to the Fatherland! It was all there. In Germany, Thomas would have been arrested and sent to Dachau as a traitor! He
loved
her! But he had told her he could not love a non-Aryan and retain his hope of serving Germany! He had cut her heart in pieces; he had deserted her and her father when they were both in the most need!