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According to a letter to his younger brother Johann, Beethoven was received well and enjoyed himself. Even got a little composing in, minor works mostly, like the concert aria dedicated to the Countess Josephine De Clary, a typical Beethoven romance: brief, inappropriate, probably tortured, almost certainly unconsummated. During the second trip, in 1798, Ludwig premiered his Piano Concerto No. 1 in C Major, playing the piece himself. At the time, Beethoven’s prodigious gifts as a pianist were more remarked upon than his compositions. The last visit was in July of 1812, and believed to be the one where Beethoven met his Immortal Beloved, Antonie Brentano, before going to a spa in Teplitz. (The waters there were good for his gas.)
Be calm—love me—today—yesterday—what tearful longings for you—you—you—my life—my all—farewell.
    Sarah sighed. She knew the contents of the letter nearly verbatim, of course, but only because she was a quick study, and it was endlessly quoted. Ludwig’s enormous, awe-inspiring genius, his productivity, his prescient modernism were all contained in music. Beside that, the letters to the Immortal Beloved looked no more impressive to her than bathroom stall graffiti:
L.V.B. luvs his I.B. Wishes she wuz here
.
    Sarah began playing through in her mind the rondo from the
Waldstein
Sonata. Her left hand raced up and down her thigh in fast scales, her right hand trilling. Second theme. Triplets. Then a daring swing into A minor, then back to C major. There was nothing like Beethoven’s middle period for steeling the nerves. Sarah played h cara A appily. Shortly before the last pianissimo section, she fell asleep, although her hands played on into the coda, triumphantly.
    •   •   •
     
    E leven hours later, Sarah threaded her way through Prague’s Ruzyne Airport. Emerging from passport control into the arrivals lobby, she was surprised to see her own name neatly printed in block letters on a small white sign. Sarah smiled weakly at the man holding it. He must have had the chauffeur’s uniform custom made for him. Sarah slung her bag over her shoulder.
    We meet again,” said the little man gaily, his deep bassoon voice cutting through the mixture of languages all around them. “Welcome to Prague, my dear.”

SIX
    T here had been an awkward moment with the luggage. Sarah hadn’t wanted to hand her enormous duffel over to the little man, fearing it would topple him, and in her haste to fling the bag inside the trunk had almost crushed another—a flat object about the size of a laptop, encased in bubble wrap.
    “Careful,” the little man had said, snatching it up. “This is actually rather valuable and I went all the way to Venice for it. And it is still not easy to get in and out of Venice after the tragedy.”
    Sarah nodded, although if it weren’t for Alessandro, she probably wouldn’t have paid much attention to the gas leak or whatever it was that had killed those people in Italy.
    “So sad,” the little man said. “Although Venice would be a lovely place to die.” He sounded almost wistful.
    Sarah settled into the backseat of the Citroën, feeling a wave of fatigue wash over her. Her eyes stayed open, taking in red ceramic roofs, tidy backyard gardens, tiny cars, but her mind went to sleep. Sarah thought vaguely that the outskirts of Prague looked grim and unpromising. Every balcony of every apartment had a satellite dish on it.
    Suddenly through her foggy head a question surfaced.
    “Why did you give me a box with a toenail in it?” Sarah asked, leaning forward. She was slightly alarmed to notice that as he drove, the little man was also reading a Czech newspaper. He changed lanes so fast it made Sarah’s head hit the window next to her with a gentle thunk.
    “I thought you might like it,” the little man said. “It was in Professor Sherbatsky’s pocket when we found him. If it had stayed there, then now it would be in some cardboard evidence box at