The Mozart Conspiracy: A Novel

‘I can sing it better than I can translate it. How’s yours?’

‘I can speak it better than I can write it.’ He ran his eye over the handwriting. Was this really Mozart’s original hand? It looked authentic enough, but then, what did he know? He studied it up close. The writing was scratchy in places, and it looked as though the letter had been dashed off in the back of a carriage.

The best place to start was from the top. ‘Mein liebster Freund Gustav,’ he read. ‘My dearest friend Gustav.’

‘Good start.’

‘That’s the easy bit,’ he said.

They worked for an hour, and the coffee cooled untouched on the table. The translation came together very slowly, piece by piece. Ben glanced over his shoulder around the room every few seconds, checking for any unwelcome company.

‘What’s Die Zauberflote?’ he asked.

‘That’s easy. The Magic Flute. What about this word?’ she said, pointing. ‘I can’t make it out.’ She chewed her pen thoughtfully.

‘It’s Adler.’

‘Adler?’

‘Adler is eagle’, Ben said, biting his lip. It didn’t mean anything. He filled the word into his patchy translation. Understanding could come later. First, get it all down.

It took another three coffees and several pages of crossed-out notes before the translation had taken shape. Ben turned the notebook sideways on the table so that they could read it together.

Vienna

16 November 1791

My Dearest Friend Gustav,

It is in great haste that I pen this letter to you, and I hope with all my heart that it may reach you in time. I so wish I could write to you with only good tidings about the magnificent reception of The Magic Flute. But alas I have more pressing things to relate to you. There is nothing more pleasant than the freedom to live peacefully and quietly, and how I wish that could be for our Brethren! However, God seems to have willed it otherwise.

Yesterday I was taking my favourite walk near the Opera when I met our friend and brother ‘Z’. He was most distressed and agitated, and when I asked him what was wrong he told me of new developments. As you know, ‘Z’ is privy to certain information that has been discussed at the meetings of the Order of Ra. Thanks I am sure in no small part to the favours that our Emperor has placed upon The Eagle, our enemies grow stronger and more influential with each passing day. I fear that the success of my opera has angered them exceedingly and that our Craft may be in greater danger than ever before. Our friend advises great caution in all our movements. I urge you to be most careful, my dear Gustav. Do not trust strangers. The Order of Ra has agents everywhere, and not only in our beloved Austria.

I am sorry for the brevity of this letter, but I will sign off now in the deepest hope that my warning may reach you before the forces pledged to destroy us can do greater harm. Keep yourself safe and well. I send my love to your dear Katarina and am always

Your Brother,

W. A. Mozart

‘What do you make of it?’

‘Let’s talk about it while we eat. I’m ravenous.’

The lasagne was hot, tasty and plentiful. They ate as they talked, with the letter carefully tucked away in Ben’s bag. He had the notebook open in front of him, next to his plate.

Leigh looked disappointed. ‘There’s nothing here that we didn’t already know from Professor Arno. Mozart was warning his Lodge friend about these Ra people who were out to get them. That’s it. It’s a waste of time.’

‘Adler’, Ben said through a mouthful of pasta. ‘Eagle.’

‘What about it?’

He pointed at the notebook. ‘It looks from this as though “The Eagle” is important, and connected with the Order of Ra.’

‘How, though?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘Oliver’s notes mentioned eagles a lot.’

‘Might Eagle be a code for something?’

Ben nodded. ‘Could be. Eagle. Maybe a symbol.’

‘Imperial eagle?’

‘It can’t be that. Read it. The Eagle is something or someone the Emperor paid favours to.’

‘If we knew what the favours were—’

‘But we don’t.’ He scanned the letter again. ‘There’s nothing more.’

‘Basically we’re back where we started.’ Leigh sighed. ‘We’re no closer to knowing what happened to Oliver.’ She let her fork clatter down and rested her head on her hand. ‘Maybe this is all a wild-goose chase. Maybe the letter has nothing to do with any of it. And what if it really is just a fake?’

Ben shook his head. ‘I’d be inclined to agree,’ he said. ‘But there’s one thing that’s puzzling me. The room where the murder took place-do you remember the ram?’

She’d been trying to forget what she’d seen in the video-clip. ‘Ram?’

‘On the wall, up above the altar or whatever it was, there was a gold ram’s head with long horns.’

She hesitated. ‘Rams. Goats. Idols. Horns. You’re talking about devil worship now.’

‘No. Something a lot older than that. Remember I said I studied Theology?’

‘That was a surprise, Ben.’

It was a chapter of his life that he didn’t like to talk about, so he moved on quickly. ‘Ra was the sun god of the ancient Egyptians. Arno confirmed it.’

Leigh didn’t see where this was going.

‘He didn’t always go by his name,’ Ben said. ‘He was depicted in symbols too. Usually the sun, but often also as a ram. You see him in Egyptian art as the body of a man with the head of a ram, or sometimes just the head on its own.’

‘Are you sure? Why a ram?’

‘The horns. They symbolized rays of light coming from the sun. It’s an old, old symbol and it became pretty universal through the centuries. The Hebrew word karan, meaning rays, is a close match with keren, meaning horns.’

She took a moment to digest this, then nodded. ‘Go on.’

‘Something about that gold ram on Olly’s film struck me at the time,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t think what it was, but now I have an idea. You’re going to think this sounds crazy.’

‘Nothing sounds crazy to me any more, believe me.’

‘Try this on. I think the Order of Ra still exists.’

‘That does sound crazy.’

‘Yes, but think about it. What did Oliver witness? They cut the guy’s tongue out and then disembowelled him. What did Arno tell us about Lutze? The exact same thing happened to him. Coincidence? I don’t think so.’

She pulled a face. ‘I’m listening.’

‘Now remember what Arno told us before he was shot? He said, “So it is true”’

‘I remember. So what was true?’

‘He never got a chance to finish. But he was pointing at the ram’s head as he said it. I think he knew something. Don’t ask me what. But whatever suspicions he had, hearing the news of Oliver’s death must have confirmed them. He got frightened enough of the letter to want to keep it far away. You saw how well he hid it.’

Leigh thought for a while, poking at her food absently. ‘If the letter is so dangerous, why didn’t they come