The Left-Handed God Read online

  He heard the clock strike the hours and half hours, saw men and women enter, kneel, and pray, and then leave again, watched the light fade and the windows turn dark. A priest came to light candles on the main altar and in the altar niches on either side. He passed Franz with a nod and a smile. What did he know of agony?

  Eventually Franz could not bear it any longer and left to wander about the dark town. Long as the wait was, it was also all too short. The clock struck eleven, the streets grew empty and quiet, and Franz turned his steps toward the summer palace.

  18

  The Duel

  It is easier to be wise for others than for oneself.

  La Rochefoucauld, Maxim 132

  Stiebel’s bitter disappointment translated into activity. He would find Franz and arrange for their passage home on the next coach.

  As he passed the theater, the sounds of music and song from within reminded him of the actors. Thinking that perhaps Franz had followed his inamorata here, he went in. An Italian opera was being rehearsed. The stage set suggested ancient Rome, and the soldiers wore short tunics, dainty gilded boots, and ostrich feathers on their helmets.

  Stiebel took little interest in the performance, but he saw one of the young actors from the inn and approached him.

  It appeared that the opera was Sofonisba, the tragic tale of the Numidian queen captured by the Romans, and, no, neither the director nor Franz was here. The director had stopped by earlier but left again. The actor thought that Franz might be with the charming Desirée who had not shown up for rehearsals, and then he suddenly recalled that a young woman had arrived by coach, claiming to be the lieutenant’s sister.

  “Young Augusta here? In Schwetzingen?” Stiebel was thunderstruck. What could have happened at home? “When did you see her, and where is she now?”

  “It was just striking one o’clock, sir. She must’ve got off the coach and walked into the inn. As to where she may be, I don’t know. Herr von Eberau arrived just then and sent us off to rehearsal.”

  Stiebel stared at him. “Dear God in heaven, I hope it doesn’t mean what I think it means,” he muttered.

  On the stage, Sofonisba drank her cup of poison and collapsed. The orchestra struck up heavy, tragic chords, and the curtain came down.

  Stiebel ran nearly all the way to the inn. There he gasped out questions about Augusta but was told that nobody knew anything about her. There might have been a young woman on the coach but she had not asked for lodging.

  Filled with anxiety, Stiebel asked where Eberau stayed in Schwetzingen.

  The distance seemed farther than Stiebel had thought. He had to rest frequently and developed a painful stitch in his side. The house, when he finally reached it, was shuttered, and there was no answer to his pounding on the door. Stiebel sank down on the steps. He felt ill and confused.

  After a short rest, he started back, his feet leaden and his breathing so painful that he almost he despaired of reaching the inn.

  *

  When Eberau returned to his house, he had hit on the method of having the girl with none being the wiser.

  Desirée, looking tempting in her little apron and cap, met him at the door. She reported that his guest was very ill and resting in one of the bedrooms upstairs.

  “Excellent, ma petite,” he said with a smile and tweaked Desirée’s cheek.

  She narrowed her eyes. “Elle est très malade, M’sieur.”

  “Not too ill for a little sport, I trust,” Eberau said lightly. “Don’t worry, my dear. Your time will come again.” He climbed the stairs briskly.

  “M’sieur,” cried the little actress, “je vous en prie. Ze fever! She must see ze doctor.”

  Von Eberau paused to look down at her. “Nonsense. She’s young and healthy. Clean in body and mind. And that’s more than I can say for you.” He drew a stoppered brown bottle from his coat pocket. “Voilà. I bought some medicine. I have a soft heart for innocence. Tincture of poppies will soothe her pains.” He laughed and continued upstairs.

  The girl lay in the bedroom next to his own. He tiptoed to the bed, a narrow one with curtains à la Polonaise but adequate for what he had in mind. She was asleep, deeply flushed, and breathing raggedly. For a moment, he faltered, but he saw that Desirée had helped her undress. She wore only a thin shift. The heat of the fever had caused her to push away the covers. One charming leg lay bared to the middle of her thigh, and her breasts swelled deliciously under the thin lawn of the shift.

  He went to lock the door and undressed down to his shirt. Taking the brown bottle, he poured some of the liquid into a wine glass. Then he sat down beside her on the bed, and looked at her. He was very tempted to touch her‌—‌here and there‌—‌lightly so as not to wake her. But safer not. Putting his hand on her shoulder, he shook her gently. “Wake up, my dear. Here’s some medicine to make you feel better.”

  Her eyes opened, and she stared up at him. “Mmm…‌who are you?” she muttered, her voice thick.

  “I’m your doctor,” he lied, smiling at his jest. “I’m here to ease your suffering and make a new woman out of you. Here, just take a sip of this medicine. I promise you’ll be better in a moment.”

  She frowned and looked about. “Where’s Mama? I don’t feel well. Please call Mama.”

  “In a moment. Now come, drink this.” He put his arm under her shoulders and lifted her, holding the glass to her lips. She drank a little, than pushed the glass away. “Mama?” she called, her voice louder and filled with panic.

  “Ssh!” he said. “People will hear. Come, just another sip.”

  “No.” She tried to push him away.

  Impatiently, he grasped her firmly and forced the rim of the glass between her lips. She gasped for breath and swallowed the rest of the laudanum. “There,” he said, releasing her, “isn’t that better? Now let me make you comfortable.” He set the empty glass aside and reached down for the hem of her shift. Raising her again to a sitting position, he pulled it up over her head.

  She gave a soft cry and struggled against him, but he gloried in feeling her hot, naked body in his arms. Flinging the shift aside, he caught both of her wrists behind her and lifted her so she straddled his lap. Fully aroused by now, he bent to kiss her breasts‌—‌such charming breasts‌—‌when she suddenly vomited all over him.

  With a curse, he flung her aside and jumped up. A large, sticky, and malodorous stain dripped down his shirt.

  “Diable!” he muttered through clenched teeth. His lust evaporated. He glowered at her. “I’ll be back to teach you better manners, my girl. And when I do, you won’t get a soothing draft of laudanum to save you from what I have in mind.” She cowered away from him, her eyes wide and glazed.

  He stripped off his stained shirt, dropping it on the floor, then scooped up his other clothes and left, locking the door behind him and taking the key.

  Desirée hovered in the dark hallway, staring at his nakedness.

  “What do you want?” he snapped. “Find me a clean shirt.”

  At that moment, the sound of knocking came from the front door. He took a step toward Desirée and clamped his hand over her mouth. “Not a sound,” he hissed.

  *

  Stiebel returned to the inn and climbed the stairs, gasping for breath, hoping against all hope to find Franz in.

  He was not, and Stiebel read the note on the table with a gnawing fear. Why had he not been more careful of his charge? Franz was very young and no match for a murderer.

  He recalled the strange mood Franz had been in the night before‌—‌not at all excitement or male pride, but rather as if he had a very guilty conscience. Stiebel decided to search Franz’s possessions. The sword was gone, and on top of Franz’s clothes in his portemanteau lay a fat letter addressed to him.

  Stiebel tore this open, saw the will, and read Franz’s apology with horror. He glanced out of the window. The sun had set. Was it already too late?

  He put the letter in his coat and started down the stairs. Halfwa
y down, he suddenly felt faint. He swayed as the banister started to float up. Then the steps beneath his feet dropped away.

  He came to in his bed. It was dark outside. By the light of his candle he saw an old man sitting beside his bed. He was a fusty-looking individual and wore an old-fashioned periwig like his own. Stiebel wondered idly if that scoundrel in Mannheim had been right and it was time to get a new wig made.

  The man nodded and smiled. He had crooked yellow teeth. “Ah, we’re awake,” he said in an oily voice. “Good. Drink this.” He held a cup to Stiebel’s lips, and Stiebel drank. It tasted bitter, and he made a face. “And how do we feel?” asked the man solicitously.

  Stiebel glared. “My shoulder hurts and so does my head. I’ve no idea about your condition, sir‌—‌or who you are. What is that vile draft you just gave me?”

  “Ha, ha, ha. I see we’re quite ourselves again.” Such good humor grated. “I’m Thomas Winter, apothecary, at your service, sir. The innkeeper called me when you fell down the stairs. Nothing’s broken, though there will be some nasty bruises on your legs. And I expect you wrenched your shoulder a little when you tumbled. The medicine is to make you sleep.”

  Memory returned, and Stiebel started up. “Hell and Death!”

  Thomas Winter pushed him back. “Oh, no, we mustn’t. Rest is indicated. We’ll feel sleepy in a moment. We must lie still and doze a little.”

  “No…‌you don’t understand…‌Franz…‌the young man with me. I must stop him…” But it was no good. His head and limbs felt very heavy and after a brief struggle, he gave up.

  *

  On his way to meet his death, Franz found life and sound and beauty again. The windows of the summer palace blazed, carriages awaited their owners, and sounds of music came from the theater. Franz wondered if the little princess was inside. He grieved for her, a child still but on the threshold of womanhood. What lay ahead for her? An arranged marriage to a princeling who had no interest in her except as a vehicle for mandatory procreation while he found his pleasure in the arms of women like Desirée. All of them would be cheated of love.

  Love? No, better not to think of Love. It was a cheat.

  When he entered the garden, he saw that the glazed doors of the summer palace stood open and paused. Inside, crystal chandeliers blazed with many candles above a gaily dressed crowd. Not far from him, a man bent his head to the woman beside him and whispered something. The woman laughed with a peculiar and melodious sound, not unlike that made by the plashing fountains and purling violins. Just so his ears had been seduced when he had walked here with Desirée. It now seemed to him that the woman’s laughter was false, as insubstantial as a bubble floating in the fountain, a practiced delusion and an invitation to the male.

  The game of love.

  And yet, and yet…‌oh, to be thus seduced again, to fall into the arms of Venus and become godlike again!

  The distant clock struck the half hour. He had a mere half hour of life left. Turning his back on the glittering palace, he passed silently through the dark garden, passed silently the small hedge-enclosures where lovers moaned softly in each others’ arms as they approached consummation‌—‌the little death some poet had called it.

  Leaving behind the straight open paths and allées of clipped trees and hedges, he lost himself in the darkness of winding trails. The gardens were still under construction, and parts resembled primeval forest. They would be laid out in the English style, the actors had told him, a new Arcadia where the lords and ladies of this country could play at the pastoral life of ancient shepherds and shepherdesses‌—‌or satyrs and nymphs.

  His eyes searched for the snowy marble temple of Apollo where he and Desirée had found their own Elysium, but the trees were too dense. At night the area looked different, and the moon was little help. It merely elongated the shadows and turned trees and shrubs into black shapes, much like Scherenschnitte, those delicate scissor cuts of images from black paper. Only here the background was not white, but rather a slightly paler darkness studded by stars.

  He blundered about, increasingly tense, for the clock must strike soon, and he was afraid to be thought a coward. It mattered that he do this final thing right‌—‌not because he wanted to kill the man who had put him in this position‌—‌he would delope rather than take another life‌—‌but because he must prove to himself that he was a man.

  And because he owed a death to those he had killed.

  By the time the tower clock of St. Pankratius struck midnight with twelve slow, somber peals, he was bent on death with a single-minded frenzy. When he finally burst from a stand of trees, and saw the Apollo temple just ahead, he laughed out loud with relief. He had come to his belvedere, to the white marble monument on a hill. It shone brighter than the moon. Only a few paces to its left was the green dell where he had made love to Desirée and where he would end his life.

  Franz thought he saw the major in the temple above and started forward just as someone called his name.

  He started to turn but felt a sharp blow to his upper back and heard the sound of a shot. He stumbled and fell. He was looking up into the shimmering sky where stars danced measured minuets along the milky way…‌to the music of a laughing boy who was playing a pianoforte…‌for him and the little princess.

  19

  Of Dark Deeds and Darker Desires

  Get place and wealth, if possible with grace;

  If not, by any means get wealth and place.

  Alexander Pope Epistles of Horace

  For so well-laid a plan, it should not have gone wrong. He had arrived well ahead of the appointed hour and had hidden his rifle on a high shelf in the grotto underneath the Apollo temple. From the temple itself, he had a perfect overview of the green dell. There was an adequate moon and the distance was slight.

  Afterward he mingled with the guests at the palace, chatting about the opera they were rehearsing and about the precocious child from Salzburg who was to give another performance tonight.

  Near midnight, he slipped away as if for a breath of fresh air. In the grotto, he retrieved his rifle and primed the gun, then he climbed up to the temple and waited. A green youngster like Langsdorff would be early, he thought, smiling. Early for a duel that would not happen because duels were risky affairs, even for a marksman like himself. Honor was a vastly overrated commodity.

  When he heard the church clock strike midnight, he became uneasy. What if the coward had backed out? He waited a little longer and was just getting to his feet to leave when he saw the cripple coming from the wrong direction.

  It did not matter. The bullet would be fatal either way. He raised his rifle and sighted. Yes. His finger was tightening on the trigger when he heard shouts and then saw two people running toward Langsdorff.

  His heart missed a beat. Now what? What was he to do now? In a moment, it would be too late.

  The sound of the shot deafened him before he realized he had fired. His mind went blank, but the instinct for self-preservation took over. He dove down into the grotto, shoved the rifle into its hiding place, and ran.

  *

  Franz felt the pain on his head first. He muttered a protest and opened his eyes to a fierce, blinding light. Even behind his closed lids, the harsh brightness burned like the sun.

  Phoebus Apollo, the sun god. Or his father’s God? Dante had been deemed worthy to look into that blinding light.

  Something pressed against the pain in his head, and he flinched away. “I’m s-sorry,” he muttered. “I’m s-sorry. I t-tried, but I wasn’t g-good enough. B-brave enough. S-s-stupid.” The stutter was back‌—‌another flaw in his fatally flawed being.

  “Yes,” replied a voice, sounding angry. “You were very foolish, my boy. Hold that lantern still so I can see. There’s a good deal of blood.”

  The painful pressure returned, bringing back the memory of a narrow alley and of an angry woman shaking him. He peered cautiously through his lashes. The light was still too bright, but he could make out
shapes.

  “Hold still, for heaven’s sake,” snapped the voice, familiar now.

  Fingers probed, and Stiebel’s face was bent over him. It was lit up strangely from one side and seemed to float in the darkness. What was Stiebel doing here? He muttered, “What?”

  “It’s just a cut,” said Stiebel. “I thought you’d been shot. You must have hit your head on a stone.”

  Another voice said, “He was luckier than poor Brandt. The bullet got him in the eye. He’s dead.”

  “Oh, the pity of it! Poor man. He saved the boy’s life.”

  Franz returned to the world.

  Shading his eyes against the light, he struggled upright. Stiebel, kneeling beside him, dropped a bloody handkerchief. “Lie still,” he snapped. “I’d just got the better of it.”

  Franz felt warm blood trickling down his face and dug out his own handkerchief. “W-what happened? S-someone shot at me?” Holding the cloth to his aching head, he looked around. Night. In the park. A stranger held the lantern that had blinded him, and a little way off lay a body. A servant in livery. In the distance, the park was coming alive with shouts and torches.

  Stiebel asked, “Did you see him? Was it Eberau?”

  Franz made a face. “No. I was late and hurrying to meet him when it happened.”

  “Hah!” said Stiebel grimly. “The coward was making sure of you. You’d be dead, if the brave Brandt hadn’t pushed you down.”

  “But I told you. I was late. We were to meet in the dell below the Apollo temple. Eberau was bringing pistols. He would not have fired at an unarmed man.”

  Stiebel rose with a grunt. “Franz, I’m much too tired to argue with you. And here comes a whole crowd of people. I’m afraid it will be a long night. You’d best get up and prepare to tell your story.”