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The Beethoven Quandary

A Mystery Novella

Terence O'Grady

Copyright 2013 Terence O'Grady

Cover by Joleene Naylor

Smashwords Edition

Smashword Edition, License Notes

This eBook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you're reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the author's work.

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter One

David rested his hands on the piano keyboard. There were a number of things he wanted to do that day but practicing wasn't one of them. And yet here it was, 9:00 in the morning—his officially designated practice time. He had a couple of hours clear each morning before he had to start teaching students. He had been very careful not to allow any interruptions to creep into his schedule. This was the perfect time for practicing.

David glanced at his phone. No missed calls. His friends knew better than to try to reach him at this point in the morning. He sighed heavily, then put his hands back on the keyboard. Of course he couldn't practice for very long. He was, after all, injured. The worst kind of injury for a classical pianist—nerve damage, especially in his right hand. Just a little bit in his left.

He had gone to several specialists about his problem. Some of them found nothing to diagnose. They had as much as told him that it was all in his head, that there was no real problem. But—damn it!—they were his hands. He should know if he had a problem or not.

He had finally found a specialist—a doctor Schmonsky—who agreed with David that somewhere along the line he had suffered some real nerve damage. Why and how was never determined and David didn't much care. He was just relieved to have a medical opinion that gave some credence to the reality he was experiencing.

His hands were by no means unusable; under normal conditions he felt fine. But when he stretched them out on a piano keyboard...well, it wasn't long before he could feel twinges of pain and—more importantly—a tightness that just wouldn't work its way out.

It would be bad enough for anybody, but David was a pianist. It was how he defined himself. He didn't really think he could do anything else with his life. And he had a real position now. Or something like a real position anyway. He was employed as a piano instructor by the Leonard Conservatory, one of the foremost schools of music in Philadelphia. True, he was limited to teaching in the so-called "Outreach" program, a program for talented area high school students and a handful of bored seniors with time and money on their hands.

But he was grateful for the position—authentically grateful. It wasn't as if he were one of the upcoming stars of the piano world. Maybe he had been thought of in that way a few years earlier when he had first graduated from the Leonard Conservatory. Some of his teachers at that time were quite sure that he would have a successful career, maybe even a brilliant one.

But the high expectations had yet to be fulfilled. He was only twenty-seven years old. It wasn't as if he didn't still have time. But his career trajectory had been less than stellar up to that point.

His teachers at the Conservatory had arranged a few performances for him after graduation, mostly as a concerto soloist with various regional or community orchestras. The performances had gone well enough. Local reviewers had been unstinting in their praise. But David knew better than to take those kinds of accolades seriously. The local conductors he had worked with had been gracious enough—even appreciative of his efforts. But David himself had been far from satisfied. He had wanted to find his own voice, not simply to replicate the standard, generic versions of the standard concertos that everybody else seemed to be churning out. And that he had not done. He had played the notes. He had been reasonably sensitive to the stylistic nuances of each piece he had played. But he had not really made music, or at least not his own music. So even if the regional orchestras and their audiences had been satisfied with his playing, he had not been.

No invitations from major orchestras had been forthcoming. He had not really expected any. His professors at the Leonard Conservatory could do only so much. So he decided to enter some competitions. There, he had mixed success. He had managed to be chosen as an American alternate for the international Radovsky competition in Vienna. But, since he was merely an alternate and he had not performed during that competition, the whole thing had been a strange and even surreal experience. He had already at that point begun to feel the pain and tightness in his hands that continued to besiege him now. The one bright spot had been his discovery—or really rediscovery—of Elizabeth McDermitt, the talented young pianist he had known earlier and with whom he had become reacquainted at the Radovsky Festival. He had cherished hopes that after that competition, the two of them might even be able to get together permanently. And for a while it appeared as if they might. But they had drifted apart once again, her career taking her back to Europe while he languished in the United States, nursing his injured hands.

But at least now he had gainful employment. He might not be playing concerts, but at least he was making a living, although just barely. The rents in Philadelphia were not cheap and teachers in the Outreach program at the conservatory were not particularly well paid. But the job provided him with a studio equipped with a decent piano and time to practice. And it was really necessary for him to practice. While there were no important professional engagements on the horizon, he was obligated to keep in shape well enough to play in the faculty recitals that were presented twice a year. The damage to his hands did not allow him to practice for long periods, but enough for him to prepare for the relatively low key performances he was obligated to contribute to as a condition of his employment at the conservatory.

And this was his practice time. Today. Right now. He had no excuse not to practice, but somehow he dreaded it.

He pressed his hands on the keyboard once again, strumming a C major chord gently.

His phone rang.

"Thank God," he murmured.

Chapter Two

David scooped up his phone quickly. He instantly recognized the voice on the line.

"Jeremy? Jeremy West? I thought you were in England playing concerts."

"I was, but I'm back now. Just got back, and I've got something I've got to show you."

David smiled. "Slow down...tell me about your trip."

"What is there to tell? I went, I played, I conquered."

"Really? Did it go that well? That's great!"

"Sure. It was fun. You should try it. No major orchestras of course, but we up and coming artists have to take what we can get. Say...when's the last time you had one of these gigs?

"It's been a while. I'm a teacher now. You know...at the conservatory."

"Sure, sure. But come on, now. We're supposed to be performers, you and I. Best pianists to graduate from Leonard for years. That's what everybody always said."

"Good for them. I'm happy doing what I'm doing. Now what's this important thing you've got to tell me?"

"Oh, yeah. Well this is crazy...crazy good. But it's something I've got to show you. I can't just explain it over the phone. So where are you?"

"In my studio...at the conservatory. Room 278 in the practice annex."

"Great! You're only five minutes from Mackinaw's Coffee Shop. You're not doing anything, are you?"

"Well I'm..."

"I'll see you there in fifteen minutes."

David strummed his fingers on the table quietly. There were only a couple of other people in Mackinaw's. It used to be a lot more crowded when he and Jeremy were undergrads. But the city hadn't had a dozen or so Starbucks sprinkled around yet. Mackinaw's had plenty of old-school atmosphere, but it was difficult for any 'homey" coffee house to survive with so much glitzy competition. Of course it was an unusually cool day, even for late October, not the best day to be out for a stroll.

David started to look down to check his phone. When he looked up, Jeremy stood before him, a coy smile on his face.

"My God," David said. "You shouldn't sneak up on people like that!"

Jeremy nodded, his smile broadening. "I wasn't sneaking, David, but you don't always want to draw attention to yourself."

"Are you kidding? You live to draw attention to yourself."

"Now don't be snide, David. We were both superstars in college. It's not my fault that I was the charismatic one."

"Oh, please..."

"But first things first. There's something I've absolutely got to show you."

"A picture of your new girlfriend, I presume? You told me about her last time I saw you."

"You'll meet her later, David. This is more important. Look." Jeremy quickly placed a large brown portfolio on the table. "Open it."

David paused. "Can you at least sit down? You're making me nervous."

Jeremy quickly fell into the seat next to David. "Just open it up and look inside," he said quietly.

David reached inside the portfolio and pulled out a couple of large sheets of yellowed paper. He held them up in front of him and squinted slightly.

"Exactly what am I looking at?" he asked.

"What do you think?"

"Well...it's a music manuscript. Looks pretty old. A century at least. Looks like the first two pages of a symphonic score. The title labels it as 'number nine.' It doesn't seem to be dated anywhere."

"So what does that tell you?"

"Nothing much. It's a symphonic score, probably from the early nineteen century by somebody who wrote nine symphonies. There's no name on it."

Jeremy smiled slyly. "There is...in the lower right hand corner. It's faint, but it clearly says 'Hofhammer.'"

David glanced down to the bottom of the page. "You're right...Hofhammer. So it appears that you are the proud owner of the first two pages of the first movement of a symphonic score by a Herr Hofhammer who absolutely no one has ever heard of."

Jeremy smiled more broadly and shook his head. "The reason that no one has ever heard of him is because he's not the composer, he's the copyist."

"Okay, so he's the copyist. But I'm still not sure what makes this an important discovery. I take it that you ran into it on your recent trip."

"That's right. In London. A little old used book shop....just like a hundred others that are all going out of business. This one was completely closing out its stock. It had a few old scores as well as well as some first editions of nineteenth-century books. Even a couple of music manuscripts. I found this one in a large tattered envelope at the bottom of a pile. The whole manuscript was well over a hundred pages."

David nodded encouragingly. "Well, that's great. Quite a curiosity. Now, if you only knew who composed the thing."

"I do know who composed it."

"Really? Are you going to leave me in suspense?"

"Beethoven composed it."

"Beethoven? Which one? Not the Beethoven."

Don't be a fool. There is only one Beethoven."

"Very true, and all of his scores were accounted for a long time ago, or I spent more time sleeping in music history class than I thought. And besides, I'm looking at the notation. I'm no expert on Beethoven, but it doesn't look like any of the autograph manuscripts I've seen."

"I told you. Hofhammer was the copyist. He wrote the notes you see on the page, but Beethoven wrote the music. Look at those comments in the margin and at the top of the page." Jeremy stabbed the top of the page sharply with his finger.

"Those are Beethoven's directions to the copyist, Hofhammer." he continued. "He's explaining to Hofhammer what he's done wrong...the mistakes he's made in copying Beethoven's original manuscript for the publisher."

David shook his head slowly. "So you're saying that this is Beethoven's composition—the first two pages of a composition by Beethoven—in a version made by Beethoven's copyist?"

Jeremy nodded eagerly. "It was not made by any of the Beethoven copyists we know about. But who's to say we know about all of them? Besides, these corrections, these remarks written in the margin...these are clearly by Beethoven. And if your German is up to it, you can see that Beethoven's comments make it clear that this work is definitely by him."

"You're kidding. So which work is this? It says 'number nine,' but it can't be. Everybody knows what the ninth symphony looks like and this isn't it. This isn't even close to it. In fact this music looks very strange to me...irregular, even quirky. This doesn't look like any Beethoven composition I've ever seen."

"I'm telling you that this is a new work—a composition by Beethoven that nobody knows about. A new symphony."

"But I don't understand...it says number nine."

"It's obviously not the ninth symphony we know. It's an earlier work. Obviously written right after the eighth symphony and that's why it's numbered at nine. But for some reason Beethoven never went ahead with it. He never had it published...never had it performed."

"But how could a major work just disappear into thin air? It's not mentioned in Beethoven's letters or his journals as far as I know. Nobody seems to have known it existed."

"But it does exist. And I've got it. I've got the whole manuscript in my apartment. I only brought the first two pages to show you."

David looked up, his eyes blinking quickly. "But this is incredible! It's unbelievable! I mean...if this is true, history will have to be rewritten....the manuscript could be worth a fortune...it could be worth..."

"At least five million. Probably more."

"If this is true. If this document is real. That's a big if. You're not a Beethoven expert. You could be wrong about this. Those comments might not really be in Beethoven's hand."

Jeremy stared hard into David's eyes. "Look, I've done a lot of work on this and I'm absolutely sure I've got something amazing here. But I'm no fool. I'll have other people check this out. But in the meantime, I don't want everybody in the world to know about it. I trust you but I don't trust everybody."

"How many people already know about this incredible thing?"

"Three or four. I told a few friends before the significance of this thing sunk in on me. And Melissa, of course, my girlfriend, although I don't think she really understands the point of all this."

Just then David's phone buzzed angrily. "Oh damn it!" David said, holding up his phone. "I've got this makeup lesson I forgot all about! I've got to get back to my studio."

Oh crap!" said Jeremy, shaking his head.

"Look...you've got to tell me more about this," David said, slipping the manuscript back into the portfolio and rising quickly to his feet. "And I've really got to meet Melissa. We have to get together—very soon." Halfway out the door, he yelled back at Jeremy, "Really! Call me as soon as you can," and closed the door behind him.

"Damn!" muttered Jeremy, taking the portfolio and sticking it in to his knapsack.

"Will you be ordering anything, sir?" asked a female voice from behind the counter.

"No, I don't think...," Jeremy began. "Well, hold on. Maybe I will." He rose and walked quickly over to the counter.

Within seconds, a short man, dressed in a gray hoodie, walked swiftly by the table and hooked the knapsack with his arm.

Waiting for his change, Jeremy glanced back toward his table. The knapsack was gone.

Chapter Three

David leaned back on the piano bench. That was close, he thought. He had made it back to his studio only a couple of minutes before the student had shown up for his makeup lesson. It had gone well, all things considered. The student in question wasn't David's best by any means, but he was diligent and actually worked on the problems that David pointed out each week. He was a steady achiever and would someday be a perfectly respectable pianist. Not everybody had to become a professional, or even a piano teacher. There was nothing wrong with being a talented amateur. In fact, that might be the most rewarding musical life anyone could have. God knows that being a professional musician was not always what it was cracked up to be.

He looked at his phone. No more lessons until after lunch. That's alright. Maybe I can get a little practicing in after all.

Just then the studio door burst open and Jeremy came flying into the room.

"Jeremy! That was fast. Did you bring..."

"David! It's gone! It's been stolen!"

"Slow down, please. What's been stolen? You don't mean..."

"Yes...the manuscript. Less than two minutes after you left. I turned to go over to the counter. I wasn't gone twenty seconds, so help me. And it was lifted. My whole knapsack...with the manuscript inside."

"Anything else in there?"

"Nothing valuable. Nothing else worth five million dollars."

David frowned. "That's terrible! But who...why? Was this just random? I mean, there were only a few other people in the place when I came in. I can't believe that someone would just step up and grab your knapsack."

"Well, someone did," Jeremy said bitterly, "and I'm screwed if I don't get it back."

"Now wait a minute," David said. "If this was just some random guy...did you see anyone?"

"No. I asked everyone in the room. Apparently this guy was invisible."

"Now look, Jeremy," David said, forcing himself to sound as calm as possible, "the chances are really high that some street person just saw an opportunity and took it. There's no way that the person who took the knapsack had any clue about what they were getting."

"So?"

"So when they discover that the only thing they stole is some old, yellowed pages of music manuscript...well, they probably just dumped the whole thing in the nearest trash barrel."

"Unless they took it back to wherever they live before they looked at it. They're not going to stop right down the block and examine the contents."

David nodded his head slightly. "You're right. They probably wouldn't dump the knapsack right down the street. They'd probably wait until they got a few blocks away and determined that no one was following them. But still, there can't be that much area for you to cover."

"Well I scanned every trash barrel for a couple of blocks and...nothing. I suppose I could go back and widen the search."

"Of course. I'm sure it'll turn up."

Jeremy grimaced. "Well, I'm not sure. Not at all. What if the thief doesn't really know what he's got but figures it might be valuable?"

"Maybe a pawn shop?"

"Right. That's next on my list. How many pawn shops has Philly got?"

"Probably more than you think, but the thief would probably stop at the first one he saw."

"I'll check on everyone in the neighborhood. But there's one thing that's bothering me. What if the thief does know what he's got because he knew it before he stole it?"

"You mean somebody who'd been tailing you and watching for his chance?"

"Right."

"Well that should be simple enough to check on," David said, grabbing a pad of paper from the top of the piano. "Who did you say you told about the manuscript?"

"Like I said...just a few people," Jeremy said, frustration growing on his face. "Wade Nelson is one. He's another American pianist who was hanging around in London. Maybe you know him?"

"Can't say I've had the pleasure," replied David, quickly scratching Nelson's name into his notepad. "So who else?"

"Well, Danny Moore...he's here in Philly. I called him this morning before I called you. He used to work at a music store downtown, before most of them closed down. I thought maybe he could give me some idea of the value of such a thing. He wasn't much help but he did tell me about how a manuscript of Beethoven's ninth symphony that sold in England for several million more than a dozen or so years ago."

"Oh, really? Do you trust this guy?"

"Sure. Why not? No reason not to."

"Alright, that's good, I guess. By the way, where will you be living now that you're back in town?"

"A little apartment on Winston Street. Horrible place."

"Why are you living in a horrible place?"

Jeremy frowned. "Well that's an unusually stupid question. It's cheap, or at least as cheap as I can get."

"Hey, I'm not living in the Taj Mahal either, but at least my apartment is in a decent building. I thought you were the one with money around here. How about those concerts you just played in England?"

"You're kidding...right? You know those small orchestras pay terribly. And I've got expenses you know. I can't walk in there looking like a pauper. Besides I've got old loans to pay back."

"Student loans? I thought the conservatory gave you a full ride."

"Yeah, well not everything is free in Philly. The only reason you don't know that is because you live like a damn monk."

David forced a smile. "Hey, I thought we were talking about your problems. Not mine."

"Well, everybody's got problems, don't they? But right now I'm only worried about one thing—that missing Beethoven manuscript."

David nodded. "Right! Okay, let's keep going over this. You've told two guys about this...and you told Melissa about it. Is that it?"

Jeremy hesitated. "I think so. That's all I can remember. I was pretty excited about the manuscript when I first discovered it."

"And this Wade Nelson is still in London?"

"Yeah. Unless he followed me here on the next plane, which I highly doubt."

"But Danny Moore lives here in Philly, right?"

"Right...I'll call him. But I'm not sure quite what I'm going to say. I can't exactly ask him if he stole the first two pages of a multi-million dollar manuscript."

"No, you can't," David said calmly, "but you can ask him if he let any information about the manuscript slip out when talking to anybody else."

"Yeah, I guess so. I'll call him tonight."

"So now I guess we call the police," David said, folding his notepad closed.

"Uh...I don't think so. No police," Jeremy said, shaking his head slowly.

"No police? But you've been the victim of a crime. Somebody just stole what might be part of a multi-million manuscript from you."

"Yes, I know. But...no, I don't think so," Jeremy said, shifting his weight from one foot to another.

"For God's sake, why not?"

"The police would never understand something like this. They wouldn't see two pages of an old manuscript as valuable, and they wouldn't bother to even look for them. We'd just be wasting our time filling out a bunch of forms for nothing."

"Now hold on," David protested. "The police pick up pickpockets and suspicious looking vagrants all of the time. What if one of them happens to be in possession of your Beethoven manuscript? If they police don't know anybody's looking for it, they'll probably ignore it."

"They'll ignore it anyway," said Jeremy gloomily. "What do they care about Beethoven?"

"Mmm," David replied, his finger going to his chin. "It just so happens that I have an inside connection in the Philly police force...an old friend from our conservatory days that you might remember—Sean McGill, a tenor in his former life."

"A tenor? Good God! Working for the police department? Are you serious?"

"Perfectly. We use to be good friends, but I haven't seen him for a while. But one thing's for sure, he'll know who Beethoven is."

"Yeah, but he's a tenor," Jeremy said dryly.

"Oh, shut up!" David fired back. "He's a good guy. I think he may even be a detective by now from what I've heard. Anyway it's worth a shot. It'll give me an excuse to meet up with him again. You know...talk about old times and former teachers. If that's not a bonding experience, I don't know what is."

"Are you sure about this?"

"Positively. You pursue the local pawn shops and get in touch with Nelson and especially Moore. I'll contact the long arm of the law."

Chapter Four

"I can't tell you what a pleasure it is to see you again," David said, smiling broadly as he ushered Sean McGill into his apartment.

"The pleasure is equally mine," replied Sean, slipping off his coat and depositing it on a nearby chair. "Although I have seen you more recently than you think. I caught a glimpse of you at the last conservatory concert a few weeks ago."

"You did? Well, I wish you had come up to me and said something."

"I looked for you at the reception afterward but you were pretty busy shaking hands."

"Yes, I'm sure I was. I'm not really a faculty member, you know. I only work in the Outreach program. But I'm enough of a faculty member that I have to show up at these things and greet the community."

Sean nodded. "I understand perfectly. But I'm assuming you do enjoy it...teaching in the Outreach program."

"Oh, of course. Not a lot of brilliant students, maybe. But definitely some earnest ones. And that counts for a lot. How about you? Are you still enjoying your life as a policeman...or 'detective' now, I guess it is?"

"Well, I've been a policeman for almost three years but a detective for less than a month. But the answer to the question is, yes, I'm enjoying it."

"Solved any tough cases yet?" David asked, trying to suppress a grin.

"Remember, I'm just a newbie detective. I don't have a lot of autonomy yet...or authority. Mostly I've been making phone calls and following up on alibis for some of the senior detectives in my branch."

"You know, I've got to ask this," David said, urging Sean into the only comfortable seat in his apartment. "Do you miss singing? I mean, we both studied music for years and years and it seems a shame not to..."

"It's not a shame at all," Sean replied quickly. "Not everyone was made for a life in music. Not everyone has the talent to be a professional performer in music."

"But you were always one of the top..." began David.

"No, I wasn't. You don't have to re-write history just to be polite. I was a good singer, but I was not a great singer. Never one of the best in my studio. But I still sing. I'm in a couple of amateur choral groups, although with my haphazard schedule it's obvious that I'm going to miss some rehearsals now and then."

"So you don't miss it?"

"I didn't say that. But the little singing I do keeps me pleasantly amused. And besides, I'm not really a singer anymore. I'm a Philadelphia policeman. And now I'm a detective and I'm looking forward to becoming the best one I can be."

"Terrific! I think it's great. It's not as if my life has worked out in quite the way I hoped it would."

"You seem to be doing okay."

"Oh, I am...I am. I was doing well enough for a while. Entering a few competitions, although not winning many. But then my hands...you know."

"I'd heard that your hands were giving you trouble," Sean said sympathetically.

"Yes, trouble. Well, they just don't do what they're supposed to do all the time. Do you have any problems like that?"

"You mean with my voice? It's not what it was, of course. When you stop practicing, you lose facility. But it's alright for what I do with it. Remember, I'm a detective now."

"Of course and—believe it or not—that's one of the reasons I invited you over."

Sean sighed audibly. "Yes, of course. I expected something like that."

David flinched slightly. "Oh, please don't misunderstand. It's really just the excuse I needed to look you up."

Sean smiled. "I understand perfectly. Now what's on your mind?"

"First, you need a glass of wine," David said, rising slowly to his feet. "I want you to know that I've become quite the connoisseur of incredibly cheap wines. It's something I decided to do on my twenty-seventh birthday and I want you to know that I've already achieved some mastery on the subject."

"But only incredibly cheap wines," Sean said, a bemused grin crossing his face.

"Of course," David said gaily. "In this day and age you've got to specialize to get ahead in this world." David quickly poured two glasses of red wine and brought one to Sean.

David lifted his glass ceremoniously. "To our dear Alma Mater."

"To Leonard Conservatory," said Sean solemnly, lifting his glass in return.

"It just so happens," said David, taking his seat on a somewhat lumpy sofa across from Sean, "that this little problem I have is really the little problem of another alum, Jeremy West. Perhaps you remember him."

"Can't say that I do," replied Sean. "But then again, as a singer, I occupied a different universe. I probably would never have met you if you hadn't accompanied my junior recital at the conservatory."

"That's probably true, I'm afraid," David said, nodding his head gently and smiling. "Well, this friend of mine, Jeremy, has apparently discovered a unique manuscript. Did so when he was in London on a recent trip. He found—in an old, going-out-of-business used book shop—a manuscript by none other than Ludwig van Beethoven."

"You're kidding. I didn't think there were any of those still floating around."

"This is a very special one. The manuscript is in a copyist's hand but Jeremy insists that there's no doubt the piece is by Beethoven himself. He says there are several remarks written on the pages, in the margins and that sort of thing, in Beethoven's handwriting that make it clear that the work is actually by him, even though the musical notation itself was written by the copyist."

"Amazing! And is this one of Beethoven's more famous pieces?"

"No. It's an unknown piece. But if this manuscript is real, it could become one of Beethoven's most famous pieces ever."

"What do you mean?"

"On the top of the manuscript—Jeremy only brought me the first two pages to look at— it says 'Symphony No. 9.'"

"So this is an unknown copy of Beethoven's ninth symphony, with his annotations? That is big."

"No. It's not the famous Beethoven's ninth symphony. It's a different symphony, labeled number nine, by Beethoven."

"Two ninth symphonies? I'm not sure I'm following you here."

"Apparently Jeremy has stumbled across an amazing find. This seems to be a symphony that Beethoven composed after he wrote the eighth symphony but before he wrote the famous ninth symphony that we all know today."

"In between the two? But why hasn't anyone heard about this?"

"Because he presumably decided against publishing it or even having it performed. In fact, he seems to have gone out of his way to suppress it."

Sean frowned, lowering his wine glass to the coffee table in front of him. "Why on earth would he do that?"

David lowered his glass as well. "Who knows? I haven't had a good look at this work but even the first two pages seem kind of strange. It doesn't really look like any other Beethoven composition I've ever seen. Perhaps it was an experiment gone wrong. Perhaps he decided that the world wasn't ready for what he had composed."

"Or perhaps it's not by Beethoven at all."

"But Jeremy absolutely insists it is. He says that the comments in the margins in the first two pages, which he firmly believes are written by Beethoven, prove that it is."

"Wow! That would be something! But what exactly is the problem? Do you think that Jeremy is way off base on this? That he's jumping to conclusions?"

"I don't think so. I don't know. Jeremy swore that he'd get some expert to look at the manuscript and confirm his theory before he takes this any farther."

"So what's stopping him?"

"What's stopping him is that the first two pages of the manuscript which he showed me—just yesterday—have apparently been stolen."

"Stolen? How?"

"While his back was turned picking up a cappuccino at a coffee shop, somebody lifted it—along with the rest of his knapsack— and walked out the door."

"And he's searched for it?"

"Sure. He figured that a casual thief, discovering he had picked up nothing more than an old music manuscript, would toss it away at the first chance. But so far, nothing."

Sean nodded. "So he called the police?"

"No. Not yet. He doesn't think the police will take him seriously."

"I can see why he thinks that. Any suspects? I mean, could it be anybody he knows...somebody who realizes how valuable something like this could be?"

"He did inform a couple of people. One lives in Philly and the other will be arriving back here in a day or two. We're going to talk to them as soon as we can. Oh, also his girlfriend, Melissa. He probably told her as well."

"His girlfriend? Is she a musical type?"

"Not that I know of. But I've not really met her. I'm going to see her tomorrow night at Jeremy's apartment."

"Okay. Well I guess you should let me know what happens when you talk to the other people who know about this."

David looked briefly at the floor. "I don't suppose there's anything you can do."

"First of all, I'd say that Jeremy should report this to the police. It's true that they're not going to organize a major search party for a missing, maybe-famous manuscript, but who knows? Somebody may run into something. And I'll keep my ears open. Please remember, I'm by far the most junior detective in the department and I don't usually even get to pick what cases I'm going to be assigned to. But like I said, I'll keep my ears open. And I'll wait to see if you and Jeremy come up with something else."

"That's all anybody can ask," said David. "I'm grateful."

Sean stood up to leave. "And on a completely unrelated note, you mentioned Jeremy's girlfriend. Whatever happened to your once-in-a-while girlfriend, Elizabeth?"

"I have seen Elizabeth off and on for the last couple of years. But she moves around a lot. Unlike me, she has a real career as a pianist. But I'm expecting her back in Philadelphia soon...any day now."

"Well, that's terrific. Say hello to her for me."

"I will. And I can't thank you enough for helping us out with this problem."

"I haven't done anything yet and I'm not sure that I can. But keep me posted."

Chapter Five

David trudged down the sidewalk, trying to avoid a bevy of fellow pedestrians, all of whom had their heads down against the cold rain that was soaking them.

He felt that this night would probably be a waste of time. He'd heard nothing from Jeremy about the missing manuscript for a week. Now, all of a sudden, he was supposed to show up for a meeting with Jeremy and his other friends. Were they going to have anything useful to say? He doubted it.

At least he'd finally have a chance to meet the famous Melissa. He wondered how that would go. David had a vague sense that Jeremy's girlfriends in his undergrad days tended to be a little off the wall. But usually wealthy. Jeremy always seemed to be attracted to the daughters of wealthy magnates. But then again, Jeremy always liked to put on a good show. And good shows required impressive looking props. Was Melissa also from a wealthy family? Somehow he didn't think so. But he was soon to find out.

David stopped in from of a 1920s brownstone that looked more black than brown. Was this it? He squinted at the house numbers through the rain. Yes, even though one of the numbers seemed to be missing, he was pretty sure this was the place.

A minute later, David stood in front of the first apartment on the third floor. Jeremy had described it well; it seemed like a horrible little place.

After just two light knocks, the door sprung open, revealing Jeremy, smiling from ear to ear.

"You've come!" he said. "And just in time."

"I'm not late, am I?" asked David, slipping out of his jacket quickly.

"No, of course not," said Jeremy. "But Melissa is already here and so is Wade. I expect Danny any minute."

David entered and quickly exchanged greetings with Wade. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Melissa enter the room from the kitchen. He turned to greet her, the warmest smile he could manage on his face.

"And you must be David," she said. "Nice you could make it."

David smiled and nodded but said nothing. He was taken somewhat aback by her look—Goth-like, all in black with shiny black hair past her shoulders and fire-engine red lipstick. Liberally equipped with tats.

"Yes, I...of course..." he stuttered.

Melissa looked bored. "All of Jeremy's friends react that way," she said to no one in particular.

"I'm sorry," said David. "I don't know what 'that way' means, but I'm very glad to meet you. I've heard so much..."

"Actually, Melissa, he hasn't," interrupted Jeremy, gesturing for his guests to take a seat. "I've told him almost nothing about you. I thought it would be better to leave you as a 'woman of mystery.'"

Wade came to the rescue. "Now Melissa, I've been meaning to ask you. Are you into music too?"

"Into music? You're kidding, Wade," Jeremy interjected quickly. "I'm sure she plays more gigs than you do. Or at least she used to."

"Really?" Wade responded brightly. "And who do you perform with?"

"A Punk band," she answered drolly. "The 'Deadhearts.' I was the lead singer with them for three years."

"That's terrific!" said Wade. "Where did you play"?

"Nowhere you've ever been," Melissa replied.

"Well, I think it's nice that we have a diversity of musical tastes represented here," David said sympathetically. "Graduates of Leonard Conservatory can be a bit limited in that regard."

"Speak for yourself," said Jeremy. "There's nothing limited about my tastes. I've been into punk for years. It's very liberating." Melissa had taken a seat beside Jeremy, and he quickly put his arm around her. She edged away slightly.

"Really?" said Wade, a sarcastic smile creeping across his face. "I didn't know there was anything you needed liberating from."

"He's not liberated, he's unrepressed," Melissa said, pulling her short skirt down over her knees. "There's a difference, you know."

"Yes, I'm sure there is," David said.

"Tell me, Melissa," Wade said, "what do you think of Jeremy's famous manuscript?"

"Not exactly my style of music," she said wearily. "I haven't taken the time to look at it. Probably won't."

The pause that followed was mercifully broken by a rapid and powerful knock on the door. The three men jumped up quickly to get the door but Jeremy managed to get there first. "Look, it's Danny!" he said cheerfully, swinging the door open as far as it would go.

Within a couple of minutes, introductions had all been made and the five of them got down to the business at hand.

"I wish there was something we could tell you that would help clear this up," Danny said, "but as I've mentioned before, I only asked a few vague questions of my former boss at the music store. I didn't mention your name. I only mentioned that I knew about a Beethoven manuscript and wondered what it was worth."

"And I didn't say a thing about it to anybody," interjected Wade. "I honestly don't think that the manuscript was stolen on purpose...I mean, some thief just grabbed it without knowing what it was."

"And probably ditched it five minutes later when they came to the conclusion that the contents of the knapsack were worthless," Danny added.

Jeremy looked dejected. "I suppose you're right," he said glumly. "But the 'random thief' idea isn't getting me anywhere. I've checked all the likely places a thief could have ditched the knapsack and... nothing. I've checked a slew of pawnshops...everything on this side of town...and nothing."

"Used bookstores?" offered Wade.

"I've tried a few, but I don't really think a thief would think like that."

"I've got a friend on the Philly police force," David said. "He's actually a detective. He told me he'd keep his eyes open just in case. But so far...no luck."

"It's just bad Karma anyway," Melissa said quietly. "That music...that composition or whatever...was meant to be lost. It was meant to stay hidden in that little shop forever. Nobody is supposed to ever hear it."

"I don't know about bad Karma," Jeremy said sadly, "but it sure as hell is bad luck. I had my hands on a fortune there. And I still have my hands on part of a fortune, but if I can't locate the missing two pages—especially the one with the title on it—my treasure's going to be a lot less valuable."

"Sorry we can't help," Wade said, "but to tell you the truth, I've got to get going. I'll certainly let you know if I hear anything."

"Me too," said Danny. "I hate to sit and run, but there's really nothing I can do here to help. My old boss did mention the owner of an old Antiquarian collector's store on the west side who might be able to put a value on what you've still got. He might even be able to send the manuscript off to have its authenticity established. I've forgotten the guy's name for the moment but I'll send you a text when I think of it. But that's all I can really do."

"Of course," Jeremy said. "I guess it was stupid of me to try to get everybody together for this. But I would appreciate getting the name of the expert."

"No problem, man," said Danny. "I'll text you. But really, I've got to shove off."

The two said their goodbyes quickly and walked swiftly down the stairs and out into the brisk night air.

"Lousy night," said Wade, jamming his hands into his coat pockets.

"Yeah, it is," replied Danny. "You know, I don't have a clue why he asked us to come over tonight. I mean, what did he really expect us to do?"

"I have no idea. But it looks like Jeremy just stumbled upon a multi-million dollar manuscript. I didn't believe it at first, but I guess it must be true."

"Yeah, but he seems to have let an important part of it slip out of his hand."

"True, but he's probably holding on to enough of it that it might be worth something. I'd trade places with him any day."

"Yeah," said Danny, pulling his collar up around his neck. "He's luckier that he deserves to be."

Chapter Six

David looked at his phone for the third time in as many minutes. Half an hour. He would leave in half an hour. That would give him time to grab a cab and get to the airport in plenty of time to meet Elizabeth's plane.

He picked up a cup of coffee from the table in front of him. He wanted to make sure he was alert when he met Elizabeth for the first time in more than a month.

His thoughts kept going back to last night's meeting with Jeremy, Melissa and Jeremy's two friends, Wade and Danny. My God, he thought, that was a strange little get together. What did Jeremy hope to gain from that? Did he think one of his friends was going to break down under the pressure and confess to having stolen the manuscript from him at the coffeehouse? Wade hadn't even been in the country when the knapsack had been grabbed. Danny had been around, but he seemed an unlikely suspect, even though he was the one who had the best idea of what the manuscript might be worth.

And Melissa. There was no way around it, she was an odd one. David had known a number of people like her back in college. Not well, of course, but enough to have a sense that most of them were just play-acting—generating a sense of angst and alienation that they didn't really feel. Or at least had no excuse for feeling, in his opinion.

But Melissa, in her own macabre way, had seemed more authentic than most. The Goth-thing was really her, or at least really her at this point in her life. In ten years she might be a bored housewife, but for now, the black outfit, the long black hair, the nose rings he had noticed shortly after she sat down...all of it seemed the perfect embodiment of her estrangement from society.

But he still had no idea what Jeremy saw in her. Jeremy, of course, was somebody who was quite good at changing roles. That's one reason why he had been cast in some minor parts in student opera productions despite not being a real singer. But what role was Jeremy trying to play just now? And how did Melissa fit into it? Was Jeremy already starting to feel old and having Melissa around proof that he was still hip and relevant?

And what did Melissa see in Jeremy? It had seemed to David that night that she saw absolutely nothing in him. In fact, he detected a coldness in Melissa that went beyond her glib, passive-aggressive moodiness. David realized that a certain distance was typical for any young person who characterized themselves as "post-modern" as she so clearly did. But there was something else. She was not merely aloof, she was almost hostile. Even to Jeremy...especially to Jeremy. Melissa might be sleeping with him, but she showed no eagerness to actually touch Jeremy, even when she sat down right next to him on the sofa.

Well, he thought, gulping down a last swallow of his now lukewarm coffee, it was probably nothing. Probably his imagination. Or worse...probably a projection of his on-again, off-again relationship with Elizabeth. He had been famously unsuccessful at figuring out their relationship as well.

At that moment, his apartment doorbell buzzed noisily.

He closed his eyes. Not Jeremy, he thought. Not again.

He sighed heavily as he rose to his feet and moved slowly to the door. But when he threw it open, he saw Elizabeth standing in the doorway, a friendly smile on her face. David stared blankly for a few seconds.

"Well hello to you," she said brightly. "So this is the greeting I get after five and a half weeks?"

"Elizabeth...I mean...it's you..." David stuttered helplessly. "I just didn't expect...I was about to leave to pick you up at the airport."

"I got a chance to take an earlier flight and I couldn't resist it. Besides I know you hate airport scenes."

David finally reached out to embrace her, his lips clumsily grazing her cheek.

He stepped back. "Well, you look absolutely wonderful. And besides, I don't hate airports. I hate saying goodbye at airports."

"Maybe," she said, stepping inside the apartment and beginning to remove her coat," but you're not that great at hellos either."

David smiled. "Well, there's a lot of pressure at airports. Everyone expects something dramatic. All the people around you are waiting for it. You greet someone and everyone looks at you and immediately analyzes the situation. Are they lovers? Family members? Just friends?"

Elizabeth smiled and shook her head gently. "David, David...all the world is not a stage and absolutely no one but you cares what you do with your life."

"Okay, if you say so," David replied. "Say, can I grab your luggage for you?"

"No, I've already dropped my stuff off at the hotel. As you know, I'm between apartments right now, although I've got to change that situation real fast. If I have to stay at that hotel more than a day or two, I'll end up spending every dollar I made playing in Europe."

"You're always welcome to..." began David, gesturing her further into the apartment.

"Of course. I know that, David," she said, taking a few more steps inside. "But in case you haven't noticed, your apartment isn't really large enough for one human being, let alone two. I think I'll take my chances in my over-priced hotel for a while. Besides, I've already checked out some sublet possibilities. I'll bet I can find a new apartment before you know it."

"If there's anything I can do to help?"

"What you can do is fill me in on all the exciting adventures you've been having while I've been trudging through Europe giving recitals in very dim halls with very bad pianos."

"Well please...sit down. Let me get you something." David quickly disappeared into the kitchen. He was back seconds later with a cup of coffee. "I'm afraid it's not that warm. And I don't even remember if you like this kind. I'm so sorry, but I really thought I was going to be picking you up at the airport."

"I think it's much better this way," she said kindly, seating herself delicately on a half-broken down club chair.

"I suppose you're right," David said mournfully. "But please. You first. You've actually been playing concerts and have a lot more to talk about than I do."

"As I told you David, this was a class C tour all the way. You know where I've been. I sent you postcards from two small German towns and one tiny English village."

"Of course," said David, looking quickly around the room. "They're here somewhere."

"I'm sure they are. Now how about you? I'm so glad to be back in Philadelphia. I want to hear all about it."

"I only cover a small part of it, I suppose," said David. "But we have had a little excitement. Maybe not the best kind of excitement, but it's something."

"Great! As long as nobody's dead, I want to hear about it."

"It's really Jeremy's problem. You remember Jeremy West, don't you? Pianist, about a year older than me? Did a little singing on the side?"

"Yes, I think I do remember him. I don't think I was quite as fond of him as you were, but that's beside the point. Sure I remember him."

"He's found a manuscript, while he was in London recently on his own little tour. This is a very special manuscript. He claims that it's a new work by Beethoven, written in a copyist's hand but with Beethoven's handwriting in the margins that indicates that the work is actually by Beethoven himself."

"A new work by Beethoven? How marvelous? Some newly discovered little song or piano piece?"

"No, the miraculous thing about this is—if Jeremy is right—it's an entire symphony. In fact it's numbered on the first page as the 'ninth symphony.' Now obviously this is not the ninth symphony. It's a work written after the eighth symphony but before the ninth symphony that all of us know. In other words, it's a work that was going to be his ninth symphony, but somewhere along the line he changed his mind about it. He never had it published and never had it performed."

"That is miraculous," said Elizabeth. "But what is it like? Have you seen it?"

"I've only seen the first two pages. Jeremy brought them to show me. They seemed a bit strange, like no other music by Beethoven I've ever seen. But Jeremy figures that the work is authentic and will be worth a fortune."

"I would think it would be...if it were really authentic. But neither of you is a Beethoven expert, so how can you be sure that it's really his work...that the handwriting on the score is really his?"

"Jeremy already is sure. He says he's studied Beethoven's handwriting. I'm not so sure, but I've talked him into going to New York and showing it to the famous Beethoven scholar, Dr. Norman Gray. If anybody can give us a solid answer, it's probably Professor Gray."

"So that's it! Jeremy has his fortune made!"

"Well, not quite. Here's where it gets tricky. The same day that Jeremy brought the first two pages of the score to a coffee shop to show me, his knapsack was stolen with the manuscript pages inside. We've investigated all the normal leads to try to get it back but we've had no luck at all. We've even involved the Philly police—my old friend Sean McGill, a former grad of the conservatory as a matter of fact."

"You're kidding! What an extraordinary story!" said Elizabeth breathlessly. "That's far more exciting than anything I have to tell you."

"I can't believe that, Elizabeth. You've actually been out there playing music for people."

"Yes, it has been wonderful. No matter how small the hall...how bad the piano...how uninterested the people seem, it's wonderful to be playing again." She paused. "I know you miss it, David. There must be some way we can get you back to really playing."

"I do play," said David. "I play sometimes while I'm giving lessons. I play in the Conservatory Outreach recitals—a little Chopin, a little Rachmaninov in the last one."

"No! I mean really playing. Playing a whole recital...or a whole concerto...in a place where people really love music, or at least some of them do."

"That's not going to be particularly easy to arrange, I'm afraid," said David, looking down at his hand. "My hands are still not in great shape."

"But I think you should stop waiting for miracles, David. You should do something about your hands. Now I know of a great doctor—Dr. Victor Benevenolli—that I really think you should see...as soon as possible."

"I have seen a neurosurgeon, Elizabeth. You know that."

"You've seen a neurosurgeon who admits he doesn't really know how to help you. I can't see that as being a particularly useful exercise."

"Maybe there's nothing than can be done."

"Don't say that until you've seen Dr. Benevenolli."

"I have seen other neurosurgeons. Some of them seem to think there's not a lot wrong with me."

"Dr. Benevenolli is not that kind of doctor."

"What kind is he?"

"You've heard of sports psychologists? He's like that except he works with a lot of musicians."

"A psychologist?"

"Yes. One with a proven record of success. You have absolutely nothing to lose by trying him. He knows about musicians. He knows that classical musicians usually don't have much money and he sometimes reduces his fees for them. David, you've absolutely got to try him. I have his card right here." She quickly removed it from her purse and placed in on the coffee table in front of him.

David paused. "I'm definitely not promising anything," he said quietly.

"Fine, don't promise anything. But just go and see him anyway. And right now, tell me what the next step is in this great mystery you're investigating with Jeremy and Sean, the conservatory detective.

David perked up. "I'm not sure there is a next step planned right now, Elizabeth, at least not until after we see Dr. Gray. We're going to show him the rest of the manuscript that Jeremy still has in his possession and hope Gray can still give us the information we need. But you seem so enthusiastic about this little project, I promise I'll try to get you involved as best I can."

Elizabeth smiled sweetly. "That's all I can ask, David. That's all I can ask."

Chapter Seven

Prof. Gray took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. Then he directed his gaze back to the manuscript lying on the desk in front of him.

Jeremy sat forward on his seat, directly across from the professor. David and Elizabeth were in back of him, seated against the far wall.

Jeremy broke the silence. "As soon as we saw what we had on our hands, we immediately thought of you. David and I—and Elizabeth too—know that you're the foremost Beethoven expert on the east coast."

"Mmm," the professor mumbled. "Tell me once again exactly what I'm looking at."

Jeremy cleared his throat. "I believe this is a new, previously undiscovered piece by Beethoven. This manuscript is in his copyist's hand, but Beethoven makes it clear from the remarks he's written in the margins of the page that it's his piece."

The professor Gray looked up for a moment. "This doesn't look like the hand of any of the Beethoven copyists I know."

"No, we assume his name is Hofhammer, since that name appears at the bottom of the first page of the manuscript."

The professor shook his head gently. "Hofhammer...I know of no such person in Beethoven's life," he said. "I don't think you can assume that this person has anything to do with Beethoven. Tell me again, where did you find the manuscript?"

"In London, during a concert tour I was giving a couple of weeks ago. I found it in a little shop that was going out of business."

"This shop sold musical scores?"

"No, it seems to have been primarily a book shop that specialized in first editions and rare books. It was a little family-run store, not that impressive, but it had been around for a long time. The owner said that the store has been in family for four generations."

"A book shop? But they sold rare scores?"

"Not really, or at least that wasn't what they were set up to do. There were only a couple of other scores in the whole store in a pile that looked like it had been dragged up from the basement just for the final going out of business sale. Everything was in a bit of a mess and they weren't too anxious to answer questions."

"Not even about this manuscript?"

"To tell you the truth, once I had a clue about what this manuscript might be, I wasn't in the mood to ask them any questions. They described it only as a nineteenth-century music manuscript. As far as I could see, they had no idea what they really had and I wasn't interested in having them look too closely at it. They were selling the few scores they had for twenty-five dollars apiece. I wasn't about to argue with that price and I just wanted to get out of there before they changed their minds."

"So they made no claim that this was a manuscript by Beethoven, or by one of Beethoven's copyists?"

"No. They made no claims whatsoever. I just bought it quickly and got out of the store as fast as I could."

Professor Gray looked back to the manuscript. "A document like this found in an old book store in London. That would be unusual to say the least. Was it an old building?"

"Very. Mid-nineteenth century at least."

"Still, the fact that you found it in a book shop worries me."

"On the contrary, Professor," Jeremy replied enthusiastically. "It was because it was a book store that they didn't know what they had, and so they didn't display it. I may have been the first person to even look at it for decades."

"Well, I suppose that's possible."

"Once I got back to my hotel room in London, I immediately looked up some samples of Beethoven's handwriting online. There are quite a few available—good quality images. I found that my hunch was right. Even though it only had Hofhammer's name on it, I'd seen enough facsimiles of Beethoven's letters that I was pretty sure that those comments in the margins were in Beethoven's handwriting. Sure enough, the more I compared my score to the facsimiles, the more I was convinced that those comments are actually by Beethoven himself."

Professor Gray peered intently at the manuscript once again. Then he sat back in his chair. It's possible," he said slowly, "that the comments are in Beethoven's hand. Either that, or a very good forgery. And the paper itself seems to date from the right period, although that will have to be proven by scientific tests. If it is a document from the first quarter of the nineteenth century, it is hard for me to imagine that anyone would bother to take the trouble to duplicate Beethoven's hand for such a manuscript. So, yes, it's possible that the comments in the margins and at the top of some of the pages are in fact in Beethoven's hand. "

"I knew it!" said Jeremy eagerly.

"That's great!" said David, turning eagerly to face Elizabeth, who smiled and nodded back.

"But you tell me," continued the professor, "that the most important entries are on the first two pages of the manuscript. And I don't have the first or second page here."

"As I mentioned before, Professor," said Jeremy, "I was unable to bring those with me today."

"Because the comments that I see sprinkled throughout the pages seem a bit odd, at least in terms of the directions a composer might give a copyist. Here, on page twelve of the first movement, Beethoven calls a series of eighth notes 'stumpfsinnig'—'stupid.' Why would a composer say that to a copyist?"

"Yes, yes," said Jeremy eagerly. "Beethoven seems quitted miffed with this poor Hofhammer fellow. But we know that Beethoven was often quite hard on his copyists! On the first page, Beethoven calls Hofhammer a "Dummkopf" for failing to copy Beethoven's notes correctly. On the second page, he accuses Hofhammer of 'sabotaging' his piece."

"Yes, but I don't have the first or second page in front of me. If only you had made a photocopy."

Jeremy looked down at the floor, shaking his head sadly. "It was monumentally stupid of me not to make photocopies. But at first I didn't want to take the chance of harming the manuscript and in the end I just forgot about it."

"Humph," grunted the professor. "It is regrettable. But there are other issues to take into consideration before I can completely vouch for this as a newly discovered work by Beethoven. There are stylistic concerns of course."

Jeremy's expression became serious. "Of course, Professor. This does seem to be an exceptional work by Beethoven."

"If it is a piece by Beethoven," replied the professor drolly.

"But why would it not be?" protested Jeremy.

"Look, if this symphony was in fact composed after the eighth symphony, then it would have to have been composed after 1812 but before...let's say 1821. But I've looked at your score. There are strange passages in it that I'm not even sure how to describe. The dissonances—completely unresolved in some cases—that are sprinkled throughout this score are hard to understand. It's just very erratic. Not just for Beethoven, but for any known composer working in this time period. Some of these melodic phrases...the only way to describe them is angular, sometimes jagged. The rhythms are sometimes extremely repetitive and at other times the syncopation is almost violent."

"But wasn't Beethoven deaf by that point?" protested Jeremy. "Wasn't he completely deaf?"

"He certainly had great difficulty hearing conversations," said Professor Gray, nodding his head gently. "Sometimes he had buzzing sounds in his ears, sometimes he didn't. But I don't think that you could attribute something like this..."

Jeremy's expression had become anguished. "But wouldn't that drive anybody back into the seclusion of their own mind...their own thoughts?" he pleaded. "Wouldn't that cause anyone to stop worrying about whether people liked your music or not? Wouldn't you just want to somehow musically express the demons that were assailing you?"

The professor smiled faintly. "It's true that we don't have any detailed knowledge about how Beethoven felt about his increasing deafness. We know it made him feel isolated. He made that very clear. But he was always somewhat isolated. He isolated himself...by his attitude, his anger at people who he thought might be trying to thwart him."

"Exactly!" said Jeremy eagerly.

"But there's really no indication that these things would drive Beethoven to completely abandon his traditional style and embark on a completely new style."

"But there is!" Jeremy demanded. "Everyone agrees that Beethoven's late style is adventurous. He breaks new ground. He challenges convention. He invents new forms. How about the ninth symphony, especially the scherzo movement and finale? No one before Beethoven ever wrote music like that. And the last string quartets, The 'Hammerklavier' sonata? The 'Grosse Fuga' for God's sake!"

"Yes," said the professor. "Those are exceptional works, remarkable works. Some people have also labeled some of them as erratic. But the score you have given to me is different. It's not like those. And don't forget, some of his most challenging late works, come much later than the period we're talking about."

"Well, I think it's clear that Beethoven is striking out on a whole new path here," said Jeremy calmly. "He's coming to terms with his deafness and he's exploring new worlds. He doesn't care what people think of him."

"Look," said the professor, tapping his fingers rapidly on the desk. "This just doesn't make any sense. There is absolutely no evidence to suggest that Beethoven experimented with the sort of strange and erratic style that we see here between 1812 and 1821. Look at all the other works he composed in the same period. They show no evidence of a desire to experiment with this strange new style."

The professor paused. "I'm sorry to be telling you all these things," he continued. "I know it's not what you wanted to hear."

Jeremy leaned forward eagerly. "But the fact is, professor, that you agree with me that the handwriting of the comments in the margins does appear to be Beethoven's."

"It could well be."

"So this work could be by Beethoven."

"I would be surprised if it were."

"Well, professor, I think you're going to be in for a big surprise."

"So what did you think about all that?" David said as the three walked down the hall away from the professor's office.

"A little disappointing, I suppose," said Elizabeth quietly.

"Actually, I'm not that disappointed," Jeremy said cheerfully. "And I'm not at all surprised. Professor Gray may be a famous Beethoven scholar, but he's clearly not a visionary."

"Not a visionary?" asked David. "I'm not sure what you mean."

"It's simple," Jeremy replied. " I know that this work is different stylistically from most of Beethoven's other known works written after the eighth symphony, but that doesn't at all mean that this is not one of his symphonies. Clearly Beethoven was feeling his way at this point. He had come to accept his deafness, but he was still eager to explore new ways to communicate his inner feelings. Is this symphony different from the other works written about the same time? Of course it is. But who had a more independent spirit than Beethoven? He was proving to himself that he wasn't finished. That he could still explore new worlds. Maybe this was a failed experiment and after this one work he decided to abandon his new direction. But that doesn't mean it's not by Beethoven."

"Well, I certainly admire your attitude, Jeremy, "said Elizabeth. "You're obviously as undaunted as ever."

"Of course I am. Why shouldn't I be? Besides, the really important meeting comes tomorrow with Mr. Morgenstern. He's the antiquarian I told David about. He and I have an appointment with him tomorrow morning at 10:00. Professor Gray may have his opinions about the manuscript, but Morgenstern's opinions are a lot more important. If he gives the manuscript his stamp of approval—if he gives his personal opinion that the work is really by Beethoven, then the sky is the limit. The largest auction houses will fall over one another to offer up this manuscript to the highest bidder. And the winning bid will be for millions."

"And what does Melissa think of all this?" David asked. "Is she as excited as you are?"

"Frankly, she could care less. She's never even looked at the manuscript," Jeremy said.

"I guess it's just not really her kind of music," Elizabeth said.

"Right!" Jeremy said eagerly. "Everybody has their own individual tastes in music. And I think it's great that Melissa is passionate about the kind of music she plays...or at least used to."

"Of course," said David, patting him gently on the back. "Well, I really hope this whole manuscript thing works out for you."

Jeremy smiled and looked from Elizabeth to David. "I want you both to know that I really appreciate your support. And David, tomorrow you and I will take the next big step. Morgenstern's office is only about five blocks from your apartment, so I'll meet you at your place at about 9:30 and we'll walk over there together."

"We'll all keep our fingers crossed," David said.

Chapter Eight

It was a chilly day, the wind gusting in sharp bursts. David shuddered against the cold.

"We could take a cab, you know, Jeremy," he said.

"Not on my budget, my friend," replied Jeremy, starting to walk a little faster. "The fees for my little European concert tour didn't do a lot more than cover my expenses."

The two walked for another half a block in silence.

"So exactly what do you expect to hear from Morgenstern?" David asked.

"Well, I don't expect him to make a full commitment to the manuscript today, if that's what you mean," responded Jeremy.

"Really? I know nothing about these things. I assumed that you'd find out one way or another about the manuscript today."

"No, it's not that simple. He's going to insist on having some scientific tests done on the manuscript. He made that clear when I first called him the other day."

"What sort of tests?"

"He'll let us know, I guess," Jeremy shivered and pulled his collar up closely around his neck. "God! It is freezing out. What's the temperature today anyway?"

"Supposed to be in the thirties. But it feels worse."

"October's not supposed to be winter yet," Jeremy complained.

"Say, Jeremy, I was thinking," David said, rubbing his hands together briskly. "Are you completely sure that this Morgenstern is legit?"

"Absolutely, his credentials are impeccable. I called a couple of auction houses and they both recommended him. Besides, I don't think he's really our big problem right now."

"Really? And what is our big problem?"

"The guy who's been following us for the last two blocks."

"You're kidding! What guy? I haven't noticed anyone."

"He's not exactly wearing a clown costume and honking a horn."

"Should I turn around?"

"No! Not now. Wait a minute. Just keep walking."

The two picked up their pace.

"How much time before we have to be there?" asked David, glancing at his phone.

"Twenty minutes," replied Jeremy. "Only a couple of blocks to go."

"C'mon, let's turn into this shop. Right here... through this door." David grabbed Jeremy's shoulder and directed him into a small bakery.

Inside, Jeremy shook his head. "What's the point of this?" he asked peevishly.

"You said somebody's following us! We can't let anybody do that." David peered out the window intently, trying to see as far down the sidewalk as possible.

"And this is going to solve the problem?"

"Well, no...I don't know. Why is this guy following us? You think it's the manuscript?"

"Maybe. Probably. Why else?"

"Maybe he's just a mugger. What does he look like?"

"Short guy. In a long black coat. A mugger's not going to hit us in broad daylight on a busy street."

"Short guy in a long black coat? Half the male population of Philadelphia under thirty could fit that description."

"I think this guy is older than that."

"Where is he now? I don't see anything."

"He's obviously not going to stroll by the window here. He's out there somewhere."

"Are you sure that this isn't just your over-active imagination?"

"No, David. There's a real person out there. Probably someone who knows that I have the rest of the manuscript in my possession."

"But who would know that?"

"Did you really believe Wade and Danny the other night? Danny admitted he consulted his former boss at the music store about the manuscript. God knows who else he could have talked to."

"But Danny said that he didn't use your name."

"Maybe...but somebody must know about the manuscript."

David frowned. "Well I'm not just going to stand here and wait."

"Nobody told you to. We would almost be there by now if you hadn't pushed me in here. And the people behind the counter are starting to stare at us anyway."

You're right." said David. "We're not just going to stand here and cower. We're going to confront him."

"What?" Jeremy gasped. "Are you crazy?"

"It's like you said...it's broad daylight on a busy street. What's he going to do? Pull a knife?"

"I don't know, but I'm not at all interested in finding out. Now don't be stupid. We'll just leave now and quietly walk down the street toward our destination. I told you it isn't far."

"I'm not going to slink away. I'm going to put an end to this right now."

Jeremy stared incredulously at David. "What are you going to do...arrest him?"

"Of course not. I'm just going to tell him he can't follow us."

"So you're going to intimidate him? David, you're a musician. You're a pianist. You need your hands."

"I'm not going to intimidate him. Just let him know that we know he's following us and we're not afraid of him."

"He knows we know he's following us. He figured that out as soon as we ducked in here."

"So then I've got nothing to lose," David said firmly. He quickly grabbed the shop door handle, flung the door open, and stepped into the street.

"David! Wait!" Jeremy protested.

David quickly turned and started walking back down the sidewalk. His eyes scanned both sides of the street back and forth, but he saw no one in a long black coat. Most of the passersby were women or couples. There were few men walking alone.

A few steps later, David shrugged and began to turn around. In that instance, out of the corner of his eye, he glimpsed the man in the long black coat, loitering back in a doorway about twenty feet away.

The man turned toward him for a split second and then turned away. He quickly disappeared through the door behind him and into the drugstore beyond it.

Jeremy came up behind David. "Please David, let's get out of here. You're just asking for trouble and I don't want to be late for this appointment."

"I saw him," said David quietly. "I really saw him. I half-thought you were kidding."

"Forget it," said Jeremy, taking David by the arm. "Let's just get out of here and go see Morgenstern."

Morgenstern's outer office was extremely well appointed. The receptionist directed the two men into a couple of over-stuffed club chairs, where they sat—somewhat uncomfortably—for several minutes. Eventually they were summoned into Mr. Morgenstern's office, where they sat for another two or three minutes before Morgenstern looked up and acknowledged their presence.

"Which one of you is Jeremy West?" he asked coldly.

Jeremy stood up, smiling nervously, a large portfolio clutched eagerly in his hand.

"And you've got something for me to look at?" said Morgenstern. "Bring it over here. Please hurry. I've got a lot to get through today."

Jeremy hurried up to Morgenstern's desk and gently placed the manuscript in front of him.

"Missing something, is it?" he asked.

"Yes," said Jeremy. "As I mentioned in my email, the first two pages are temporarily unavailable."

"Pretty important...the first two pages, you know," said Morgenstern.

"I realize that. I'll be getting them back in my possession soon."

"So who's had a look at this?" asked Morgenstern, carefully examining the first few pages of the document.

"Professor Norman Gray. He's supposed to be one of the most famous Beethoven experts in the country."

"A musicologist? Huh," Morgenstern grunted. "Those people have their own little games they like to play. But they don't understand the value of a document, not what it's worth on the market."

"That's why we came to you, sir," Jeremy said hopefully.

"So what did your musicologist friend have to say about this?"

"He agreed with me that the comments in the margins are by Beethoven. The actual music notes are by one of his copyists. It's definitely a new composition by Beethoven."

David lifted his eyebrows.

"Really?" Morgenstern said. "I'm surprised he committed himself like that. Musicologists are famous for equivocating."

Jeremy nodded. "Yes, I know. He did say that the style was unusual for Beethoven."

"Unusual?"

"I don't think Professor Gray fully realized that this symphony presents an important stylistic departure for Beethoven. He was clearly experimenting at that point in his career and this work represents one of the possible ways he could go forward. But ultimately he decided against pursuing this path. That's why it's so unlike his other compositions written in this period."

Morgenstern nodded faintly. "Well, I don't comment on style. It's not my area. And I'm not commenting on anything until we have a few tests done."

"What sort of tests?" asked David, edging a little forward in his seat.

Morgenstern glanced over to David. "I've already discussed them with Mr. West. Watermark analysis, chemical composition of the ink. And we've got software that will compare the handwriting on the manuscript with Beethoven's."

"Software? Really?" said David.

""No chance of subjective involvement," said Morgenstern.

"Will there be much damage to the manuscript?" asked Jeremy.

"Hardly any," Morgenstern said, turning back to face Jeremy. "We'll scrape the ink from an inconspicuous part of the manuscript. Now you do understand, I presume, that we're going to need some upfront money here. You know that, don't you?"

"How much?" Jeremy asked.

We'll need two thousand dollars to proceed from this point."

Jeremy swallowed. "Really? That's a little more than I expected. Is that for the tests?"

"And for my fee," Morgenstern replied coolly.

"And when this is proved authentic, you'll be able to find buyers for it?"

"I assume that's why you came to me. I'll make some phone calls. I already have a list of some people—people with money—who are looking for Beethoven documents. If I decide that it would be more lucrative to go to a special auction, we'll do that. You do understand that I receive an additional percentage of the final sale either way."

Jeremy nodded. "Of course. How much do you think the manuscript will go for?"

"I'll know more when I see the first two pages. You say some of the most important comments appear on the first two pages?"

"Right," said Jeremy. "On the second page, Beethoven writes that the copyist is ruining his piece, making it clear that this really is a composition by Beethoven."

"If it's proven to be a new, completely unknown composition by Beethoven, and a major work at that, it should fetch several million."

Jeremy smiled. "That's what I was hoping you'd say."

"Well, in that case I think it's time to get the process under way," said Morgenstern. "When I get the results from the testing—they move quickly so it should be no more than two or three days—I'll get in touch with you. Then we'll have to set up a meeting time and plan our next steps."

"I'm eager to get started," Jeremy said, "so we'll leave you to it." He stood up quickly and shook Morgenstern's hand. David also rose and offered his hand but Morgenstern ignored it.

"Alright then" said Jeremy. "We'll be on our way. The check for two thousand dollars will be dropped off with your receptionist later today. And we'll look forward to meeting with you soon."

Morgenstern grunted and turned away. Jeremy and David exited the office quickly.

Leaving Morgenstern's reception room, Jeremy paused for a few seconds. "Whew! That up-front money is a little more than I was expecting."

"I'll say," David said sympathetically. "Did you save enough from your recent tour to cover it?"

"Are you kidding? I told you I didn't make that much. I barely covered my flight home."

"So where are you going to get that kind of money?"

"I don't know," Jeremy said, "but I'll get it somewhere. And I've obviously got to get it fast."

Chapter Nine

The receptionist smiled warmly at David. "Dr. Benevenolli will see you now."

David nodded as he rose to his feet. He walked briskly into the doctor's office. Dr. Benevenolli, seated on a comfortable-looking lounge chair, looked up from the pad balanced on his lap and smiled.

"Good afternoon, Mr. Currant. I hope you're doing well," said the doctor, gesturing David into the chair beside him.

"Afternoon, Dr. Benevenolli," David said. "I'm fine, thank you."

"And what can I do to help you today?"

"I'm sure you hear this from at least half of your patients, doctor, but it wasn't really my idea to come here today."

Dr. Benevenolli smiled. "And whose idea was it that you should come and see me?"

"Actually," David said, "it was my friend's idea, Elizabeth McDermitt."

"Elizabeth? Why of course. My daughter knows her well. They play tennis now and then."

"Really? I didn't know she played tennis."

"I see. Well, she's a lovely young lady, isn't she?"

"Yes, lovely...yes...now, about why I've come in today."

"Because Elizabeth suggested it?"

"Well, yes. But also because I've been having some trouble with my hands. I'm a pianist, you see. And I'm told that you've worked with musicians before."

Dr. Benevenolli nodded gently. "Yes, I've worked with a number of musicians over the years. Singers, instrumentalists. Quite a few pianists."

"Yes, that's why Elizabeth thought you might be able to help me."

"Of course. I'm sure we can make some progress together. Now, could you give me a little background concerning your injury and the medical assistance you've already sought for it."

David nodded. "It's been a little over two years now that my hands have been bothering me. It started right after I was chosen as the American alternate for the Radovsky competition in Vienna. I was only the alternate—Elizabeth was chosen as the winner of the American competition so she was the one scheduled to compete. But even if I had a chance to perform, I wouldn't have been able to do it. My hands—both of them, but the right hand was worse—would cramp up and experience these sharp pains after about twenty minutes of practicing or playing."

"I see," Dr. Benevenolli said. "And this just came out of nowhere? There was no duress, no injury to the hands?"

"Well, nothing external if that's what you mean. I didn't get them caught in some machine. It was just about a week before leaving for Vienna that I realized something was wrong."

"Your hands felt tight? Could it simply have been over-practicing?"

"Over-practicing? I'm not quite sure what you mean. A concert pianist—to be competitive with his peers—has to practice several hours a day. I've practiced between two and four hours a day since I was about sixteen years old."

"I realize that professional musicians must practice extensively, Mr. Currant. But I also realize that there's a point at which the body rebels."

David sighed. "I understand what you're trying to say, Dr. Benevenolli, and I did slow down a little. I even took a couple of days off from practicing and that's something I rarely do."

"Did it help?"

"No. It didn't. When I did get back to practicing, I ran into the same problems with my hands right away, especially my right hand."

"And I take it you've seen a number of specialists about this?"

"Of course. Half a dozen neurologists and neurosurgeons."

Dr. Benevenolli paused briefly to write a few words on the tablet in front of him. "And what did they have to say? What was their prognosis?"

David sighed. "It varied. Most of them said that they could see no overt signs of nerve damage. They couldn't explain my problem so they couldn't help my problem."

"I see," the doctor said. "You said 'most of them.' Was there anyone who reached a different conclusion?"

"Yes, there was one. Dr. Schneider...Lawrence Schneider...he was convinced that I had a real problem and that it was neurologically based."

Doctor Benevenolli raised his highbrows slightly. "The others perhaps suggested that it was not a 'real' problem?"

"Frankly, the others didn't say much of anything. Nobody actually made the point that somehow all of this is just in my head, but they didn't suggest anything else it could be."

"That must have been very discouraging."

"Of course it was discouraging."

"But Dr. Schneider, did he offer hope of any possible treatment?"

"Not exactly. He basically suggested that we wait and see if it got worse. And if it did, he would consider running more tests."

"No surgery?"

"Well, this isn't like carpal tunnel, Dr. Benevenolli. It's much more complicated than that."

"I understand, Mr. Currant. Why do you think that all of those doctors have had such difficulty in diagnosing and treating your problem?"

"I really don't know. But I know I'm not the first pianist to ever suffer from a condition like this. Have you ever heard of Raymond Fischer?"

"The great American pianist? Of course I have."

"He suffered through similar problems for years. He could only perform pieces written for the left hand for much of his career."

"Yes, I know all about his situation. He was diagnosed with focal dystonia."

"Yes, that's it! Focal dystonia. My understanding is that such a condition is extremely difficult to diagnose correctly."

"It can be, Mr. Currant. It is not diagnosed often and seldom immediately. Are you suggesting that you suffer from that particular condition?"

"I'm suggesting that it's more than possible. Nobody seems to have come up with any other explanation."

"As I understand it, the various treatments that Mr. Fischer submitted to were not particularly successful."

"That's my understanding, too."

"And yet, Mr. Fischer eventually started playing again—successfully—with both hands. How do you think he was able to overcome his difficulties?"

"I don't really know, Dr. Benevenolli. My understanding is that no one knows for sure why his condition improved. And I'm not sure what your point is in asking the question."

"There is no particular point, Mr. Currant," the doctor replied, "but I think we'll move on to other concerns now."

"Yes, well you must understand doctor, this is my primary concern."

"Yes, of course it is. But let's move on to some other subjects for the moment. You mentioned that Elizabeth was the winner of the American competition for the Radovsky prize?"

"Yes, she's been very successful at piano competitions of that sort."

"Did Elizabeth's success please you?"

"Of course it pleased me. She's a very good friend."

Dr. Benevenolli paused and put down his pencil. "Could you explain the relationship you have with her a little more clearly?"

David paused. "It's complicated."

The doctor smiled. "It always is."

"I met Elizabeth a few years ago. We were both up and coming young pianists and we used to run into each other at auditions and competitions. We hit if off very well. Or at least I thought we did."

"And what do you suppose she thought?"

"I suppose she thought the same thing. We spent a lot of time together whenever we could. But our schedules weren't always compatible. Sometimes I was off to one part of the globe when she was off to another. It would sometimes be months before we saw each other again. Then, after the Radovsky competition in Vienna, we spent a lot of time together again. Frankly, I was very hopeful it would become a serious relationship."

"By serious, do you mean permanent?"

"What is permanent? I would have been happy with serious. But of course it wasn't serious and so it wasn't permanent either. It's been almost two years since the Radovsky festival and we've drifted apart again. But we have stayed in touch on and off and have seen each other for a day or two every couple of months."

"Are you satisfied with that?"

"I'm not in a position to see it in those terms."

"I see. You say she's been very successful. Do you feel in competition with her as a pianist?"

"No. But if I did, she'd be tough competition." David paused. "Dr. Benevenolli, I see myself as a very good pianist. A pianist with a bright future, if I can only get over these problems with my hands. But Elizabeth is a great pianist. She's living the bright future I wish I could have."

"But you see," the doctor interjected quickly, "that's exactly my point."

"I'm not following you, I'm afraid," David said.

"Have you entered any competitions lately? Auditioned for any playing opportunities?"

"I've been teaching at the Leonard Conservatory, of course, for over a year in the Outreach program. It's a job I'm very grateful to have. But it hasn't given me enough time to compete for anything."

"The conservatory wouldn't give you a little time off to enter a competition? You'd think your successes would reflect well on them."

"Yes, I guess they would...give me a couple of days off now and then. But my hands..."

"So it's really the problem with your hands, not with your teaching obligations."

"Yes, I suppose so."

"I think it's just possible that you shy away from pursuing performance opportunities because you don't really want to compete with other pianists."

"And by other pianists, I assume you mean Elizabeth."

"Not just Elizabeth. Your other peers as well."

"No offense, Dr. Benevenolli, but I think your hypothesis is a load of crap."

"Look, David," said the doctor, leaning forward in his seat. "I'm not suggesting for a minute that you haven't been having some real problems with your hands. It's probably true that there are actual, physical reasons that your hands are not functioning in the way you want them to. But my point is this: rather than waiting to get over the problems, I think you've got to get through them. I think you should start practicing again...seriously. And then I think you should start competing again. Going out there and competing. Will your hands be bothering you all the while? They probably will, at least for a while. But remember, Norman Fischer came back to performing and he did so successfully. I think you can do it too."

"Are you finished?" David said.

"Yes, I am," said Dr. Benevenolli, putting his pad on a nearby table.

"I appreciate your comments," said David, as he stood and reached for the doctor's hand. "But it's just not that simple."

Chapter Ten

"You know," Elizabeth said, her gaze sweeping across David's living room, "you really ought to do something with this room."

"Do what?" David asked. "Have it condemned?"

"No," she answered. "I'm sure something can be done to improve it, if you just use a little imagination."

"I'm sorry," he said. "I have no visual imagination whatsoever. And I certainly have no clue as to how to improve this room. Any creativity I have is one-hundred percent confined to music."

"No, really. I'm serious. The furniture...really." She swept her arm in the direction of the dingy sofa on which David was sitting. "There isn't much and it's all terrible."

David smiled. "All part of the rental agreement, I'm afraid."

"How about putting something on the walls?"

"Can't do it. We're not allowed to put holes in the wall."

"What?" Elizabeth gasped. "Your walls are nothing but holes! How on earth would a landlord even notice if you put another hole in these walls?"

"I don't know. Maybe he's counted the holes."

Elizabeth shook her head. "You're just not trying, you know. Everybody can improve their life."

"I'm perfectly happy with my life. By the way, can I refill your glass?" David picked up the wine bottle sitting on the coffee table in between them.

"That would be lovely," Elizabeth replied, smiling cheerfully. "By the way, how did the session with Dr. Benevenolli go yesterday?"

"Well, it went," said David. "I mean...he's not a real doctor you know. There's only so much he can do."

"Oh please," said Elizabeth, rolling her eyes dramatically. "He's a psychologist. He's got a Ph.D. He's a doctor."

David grinned. "Just kidding. The meeting was okay. I explained that I'd seen a series of neurological specialists and they didn't help a lot."

"And did Dr. Benevenolli help a lot?"

"He tried. Some of it made me uncomfortable."

"What part?"

"The obvious implication that the whole thing is more mental than physical. It's not as if he didn't admit my problems might be partly physical, but he clearly thought that there were some psychological problems going on. But of course he's a psychologist. I assume you expected something like that when you suggested I go see him."

Elizabeth frowned. "I didn't know what to expect. I know that he's helped some other musicians."

"Work through some psychological blocks, you mean?"

"Work through whatever was getting in their way."

"That's what Dr. Benevenolli said too. He said I should stop sitting around waiting for a cure, and go out there and get back to playing full-time again."

"Sounds like great advice to me."

"He also said that I was sitting on the sidelines because I was afraid to compete with other pianists...like you."

"Well that's just silly," Elizabeth protested. "I never would have said that."

"It's not true, of course. I have no fear of competing. I just don't want to do it until I'm at my best."

"I understand, but I think he may be right when he says you can't sit around waiting for a miracle. I think you have to aggressively work at getting back into shape and then see what happens."

"Maybe," said David. "I'm still working it out."

"It's just that you haven't seemed to be your usual irrepressible self. Anything else on your mind?"

"There are all these problems with Jeremy and his Beethoven manuscript."

"Really? I thought things were going well with that. That Morgenstern guy—who seemed a little bit of a creep to me by the way you described him—sounds likes he's got everything under control. He's going to run those tests on the manuscript and it sounds like he's more than capable of helping Jeremy find a buyer for it."

David nodded. "Yeah, but those tests—two thousand bucks up front—I'm not sure how he managed it. Jeremy seldom has that much money in his possession at any one time."

"But he's just come back from his tour, right? I know it was just a modest one but..."

"The thing is, Jeremy has always been one to try to make a big impression. I know he didn't make much money from his little tour and I also know that he probably spent most of it living an overly luxurious lifestyle."

"Jeremy? An overly luxurious lifestyle? Oh please, I've seen his apartment. There's nothing in the least luxurious about it. I think it might be worse than yours."

"Let's put it this way. When Jeremy gets a little money in his pocket, it quickly finds its way out. I'm sure that when he was in London, he stayed at the best hotels and ate at the best restaurants."

"And then came back to Philadelphia to live in a hovel, right?"

"That's the point. He lives well until he's broke. Then he barely survives."

"Are you sure he ever came up with the two thousand bucks for Morgenstern?"

"I'm sure he did. I'm just not sure where he got it."

"Maybe Melissa helped him out."

"Maybe, but I have a hard time imagining she'd have two thousand dollars just sitting around waiting for some charitable cause."

"I'm sure she doesn't think of Jeremy as a charitable cause. She's living with him. She must care about him."

"I guess, maybe," David said, a slight frown crossing his face. "That's a relationship I don't even pretend to understand."

Elizabeth's face brightened. "And how about our relationship?"

David smiled. "It's great. That doesn't mean it can't get any better, but I think it's great."

Chapter Eleven

Melissa picked up the magazine from the table. Another music magazine. How many classical music magazines were there?

God! She hated Jeremy's apartment. It was soulless. It wasn't that it was cheap. Her apartment had cheaper rent than his did. It wasn't the paint peeling off the walls. It wasn't the absolutely horrible bathroom. Hers was at least as bad.

But there was nothing that showed any personality. Nothing at all. Of course that was Jeremy, wasn't it? Jeremy had ambition. He had an enormous ego. He loved it when his agent booked that European concert tour. It wasn't much of a tour of course. Jeremy admitted that in his emails. Of course Jeremy would have loved a big, glamorous tour, playing all the major European concert halls. But that wasn't going to happen anytime soon. And in the meantime, he was perfectly happy to give small concerts to bored businessmen and little old ladies who thought he was charming. For now, he'd take what he could get. If he could only play the small cities in Europe—the cheap concerts— then that's what he'd play.

And now Jeremy had his precious Beethoven manuscript. So now that was going to make him rich and famous. Maybe...but maybe not. Sometimes it seemed that Jeremy was a fool.

But she had to admit that she had been attracted to Jeremy. Certainly in the beginning, almost eight months ago now. Jeremy was like no one else she had ever met. He sure was out of place in her crowd. She remembered the first time he had come to hear her band. Did he really come to see her, or was it just something to do, something to fill up a night? He said he saw a poster of the band and just had to come and see her in person. But that couldn't be true. No, he just happened to walk in off the street and saw her.

It was a crummy place. She noticed him right away. It was a small crowd and he didn't fit in. Too buttoned down. Khakis and a sweater for Godsake. And cute, in a manufactured sort of way. He couldn't seem to take his eyes off her. Still, she was surprised he hung around until the end of the first set. Then he came right up to her and bought her a drink. It looked like he had some money, although she was soon to find out that he didn't have it very often.

So she stayed and talked with him. He was trying to be hip. He probably thought he was speaking her language, but it was obvious to her that he was just playing a role. Still, she liked him. She wasn't quite sure why. And when he asked her out, she said yes.

They went out several times. He never mentioned her Goth outfits. He seemed to like being with someone who was an outsider, even though he always seemed to try so hard to be an insider.

It wasn't that she didn't have other boyfriends. She had as many as she wanted. And they'd do anything for her. But she didn't care. She was bored. She was bored with them and even with her own music.

But she couldn't ever understand why Jeremy loved classical music so much. Sometimes she didn't even really think he did love it. It was something he was just very good at, so he pretended to be enthusiastic about it.

But God! Those concerts! All those concerts! She went with him to as many as she could stand. But eventually she began to hate even the sight of those musicians...classical musicians. The men dressed up like little penguins...those straight -laced women so rigid that they look like they'd break in half if they bent over. She just hated the symphony concerts.

The piano recitals were better. There weren't as many stuffy old men and rich women in the audience flashing their stupid jewelry. Sometimes she even lost herself in the music for a little while, forgetting where she was and drifting off into these funny little dreams.

But that's not how Jeremy would react to the piano concerts. He would be completely concentrating on the performer. Not the music, but the performer. He was listening hard to every note the performer played. If somebody made a mistake, he would smile. That would make him happy. After every concert, he would go on and on about the performer. He would say that the pianist had played this piece well, but that piece badly. He was always comparing himself to the other pianists. It's like he wanted them to have flaws. He wanted them to be bad so he could be better.

God, she hated Jeremy's apartment. She still kept her old apartment and every once in a while would go there just so she could be alone. She knew that Jeremy expected her to stay with him all the time now. But she just couldn't do that.

She looked at her phone. When was he coming? He was late. She flopped down on the miserable sofa. At that instance there was a knock on the door and she moved swiftly to open it.

She threw the door open and said," It's about time."

Chapter Twelve

"So how often do you come here for breakfast?" Elizabeth asked as she looked over the somewhat untidy-looking diner.

"Not often," Jeremy said, pouring over the raggy-looking menu. "I don't usually get up early enough for breakfast unless I have some special makeup lessons scheduled for the early morning. And fortunately my students seldom seem all that interested in crack-of-dawn piano lessons. As a result, I usually skip breakfast."

"But when you do eat breakfast, you eat it here? That almost boggles the imagination."

"Oh please, Elizabeth. It's not a bad place. It's not cookie-cutter. It's not a chain. It's got character."

"Really? I'm not sure I'd call it character. I'm a little surprised that the Board of Health calls it sanitary."

David folded his arms over his chest with mock indignation. "If I knew you were going to insult the place, I would've invited you over to my apartment and you could have insulted that some more. Why did you come anyway?"

Elizabeth smiled and patted his hand across the table. "I came to help you get a fresh new start on the day. And the week. And the rest of your career. From now on, it's up early every morning and over to the piano."

"And how about my hands?"

"If they bother you, you take a break for half an hour. Read a book. Improve your mind."

David sighed. "I guess this is where I'm supposed to ask what I'd do without you."

Elizabeth nodded in agreement. "It wouldn't be a bad time for it."

"Okay, I'm going to go along this one time. I...hold it for a minute. Text coming in." David pulled out his phone and glanced down at the screen. He paused, blinked a couple of times and refocused his eyes. His face turned white.

"Oh my God!" he blurted. "Melissa's been attacked!"

"Attacked? Where? How?"

"In Jeremy's apartment. Last night."

"Is she badly hurt? Is she okay?"

"I don't know. She's at St. Joseph's Hospital and he wants me to meet him there as soon as I can."

"Is there anything I can do?"

"Come along! I don't know if any of us will be allowed to see her, but at least you can lend Jeremy some moral support. But first I've got to call Sean. I think he should be in on this. Maybe he can meet us there."

Detective Sean McGill walked quickly down the hospital hallway with David hurrying to keep up.

"Remember, David," he said. "I've never met this woman. Can you give me a quick overview of what I'm going to be up against? I've heard her described as 'difficult."

David shook his head. "Well, Melissa is difficult to categorize. I don't know her well of course. But when I've seen her, it's almost like she's acting a part. Like she's always on stage."

"And what is her act all about?"

"Classic Goth I guess, but more aggressive than some. Sings in a punk band, or used to, anyway. That's how Jeremy met her."

"I didn't know Jeremy went in for that sort of stuff."

"Maybe he was bored. Who knows? Anyway, he went up to her at a club when her band was on a break."

"Okay. More on Jeremy later. Back to Melissa Hiller."

"Right. Well, she seems angry a lot. Highly cynical. Always on her guard against insults—real or perceived."

"Charming," said Sean as they both rounded a corner quickly.

"Of course she's had a traumatic experience now. She's lying there in a hospital bed. You may get more of the real Melissa. Assuming there is a real Melissa."

"Okay, there's the nurses' station. Wish me luck."

The nurse strode briskly into Melissa's hospital room. "Miss Hiller, the detective I told you about is here. He'd like to ask you a few questions if you feel up to it."

Melissa sat up straighter in her bed. "Sure, why not?"

"Also, Miss Hiller," the nurse said, "the other gentleman who was here this morning is back with a couple of friends. Would you like to see them as well, when the police officer is finished with you?"

"They can all come in right away if they want to. I've got no secrets."

Sean walked quickly into the room. "Good morning, Ms. Hiller. I'm detective Sean McGill. I think you'll just have me to put up with for the time being. We might have the others join us a little later."

"So it's just you then," Melissa said as she looked Sean over. "All the same to me. You know that I've already given a statement about this, don't you? A couple of hours ago."

"Yes, Ms. Hiller. I know one of our uniformed officers has already spoken to you, but I'm afraid I'll have to ask you a few things again. It's just standard procedure."

"Seems like a waste of time."

"Yes, I'm afraid it does to a lot of the people we have to question. But this is a serious business, Ms. Hiller. You've been subject to a potentially lethal assault and it's important that we get all of the facts straight. Sometimes we have to approach those facts from several different angles."

"I was hit on the head. It wasn't that bad."

"But the doctor tells me that you may have a concussion and that's why they have to keep you here and watch you for a while."

"I told him I was fine."

"I think I'll just let you and the doctors work that one out. But I do want to know a little more about the assault that took place last night. About when did it take place?"

"Around 9:00 p.m. I suppose. I wasn't really paying any attention."

"And you were alone?"

"Yes. Jeremy had gone to a concert. He goes to a lot of those."

"I see. So you had been left alone."

"I wasn't left alone. I was just alone. Women don't always have to have men around to protect them."

"Yes, I see. And while you were alone, did you notice any strange activities going on outside your apartment? Hear any strange noises?"

"I heard nothing. I was watching some TV but it was all garbage so I turned it off. I might have been looking at a magazine."

"So there were no suspicious sounds?"

"Nothing. I heard nothing. I saw nothing. All I heard was a knock on the door. I answered it and got clubbed over the head. I woke up later in the ambulance bringing me to this hospital."

"Are you accustomed to just opening the door for any stranger?"

"I didn't think it was a stranger. I had ordered pizza and I was expecting the pizza guy."

"Did the pizza guy ever come?"

"How would I know? I was unconscious. It was Jeremy who found me."

Sean paused and collected his thoughts. "Did you get even the briefest glance at your assailant"?

"I said I saw nothing. The hallway was dark. It's always dark. The damn landlord refuses to keep it lit because light bulbs use electricity and he's cheap. The whole place is a dump."

"Okay, so you saw nothing. If in fact your assault was linked to a robbery, can you think of anything a thief would want to steal?"

"There's nothing to steal there. Jeremy's apartment is a dump too. There's nothing there. There are a bunch of magazines and a bunch of CDs. There's my mp3 player. There's a crummy television. That's all. There's nothing to steal. Why? Is something missing?"

Sean searched quickly through a small pad of paper. "According to this preliminary report, Jeremy West did a search of the apartment last night after you were taken to the hospital. He reported that a number of drawers had been gone through, but it wasn't apparent that there was anything missing."

"I told you there wasn't anything worth stealing."

Sean paused. "How about the Beethoven manuscript? I was told that a valuable Beethoven manuscript was being held there."

"You were told wrong," Melissa snapped. "Jeremy took the part of the manuscript he still had to some expert on old manuscripts a few days ago. The guy's going to run some tests on it. If the manuscript is any good, he's going to help Jeremy sell it."

"I didn't realize that. I just assumed..."

"Jeremy's still missing the first two pages of the manuscript," she said abruptly. "He told the police about it days ago but they haven't done anything about it. Stolen out of a coffee shop when his back was turned. The police haven't done a damn thing about it."

"I know about that, Ms. Hiller. We checked on a few places where the missing pages might have turned up, but no luck."

"How much time did you spend on it? Twenty minutes? But of course Jeremy isn't rich. I'm not rich. So what do you care if we get something stolen from us?"

Sean sighed. "Look, Ms. Hiller. I did what I could to help. The Philadelphia police department doesn't have all the time in the world to go chasing after a couple of pieces of paper that may or may not be valuable. Now, if you don't mind, I'd like to get back to the matter at hand."

"Yeah? Well I've told you all I can. Somebody slugged me. He probably hoped to find something worth stealing in the apartment. But he didn't. So I guess he won't bother us anymore. Case closed."

"Mind if we pop in?" came Jeremy's voice from just outside the door.

Sean turned around. "Jeremy! Just the person I wanted to talk to. Maybe you can shine a little light into some murky corners."

"Murky corners?" Jeremy said. "That sounds awfully mysterious." He smiled. "What has Melissa been telling you?"

"Basically that she doesn't remember much," Sean said.

"Who can blame her, with a knock on the head like that?" said Jeremy, walking quickly to Melissa's side. He then turned and looked back at David and Elizabeth, gesturing for them to enter the room.

"Nobody blames Ms. Hiller for anything," Sean said. "But since we have no idea who attacked her, I'm trying to focus on why someone would break in the apartment. She said that there is really nothing of value in the apartment."

"Sad but true," said Jeremy.

"And Melissa said the manuscript wasn't there. Is that right?" Sean asked.

"That's correct," Jeremy said. "It's been sent off to be tested."

"Alright," Sean said, "but isn't it possible that whoever broke into the apartment was after the manuscript, figuring it was still there."

"That's always possible, I suppose," Jeremy said.

David stepped forward. "And yet," he said," the other day when Jeremy and I were delivering the manuscript to this Morgenstern guy—he's the one who sent it out for testing—I could have sworn we were being followed."

Jeremy smiled. "Now David, let's not blow that out of proportion. I was probably being over-dramatic."

"Maybe, maybe not," David said. "But if someone was following us and saw us go into Morgenstern's office, then he would probably figure that we don't have the Beethoven manuscript anymore, so it couldn't be in Jeremy's apartment."

Sean nodded his head. "So presumably he— whoever that might be—would not waste his time looking there. And he certainly wouldn't risk an assault on someone staying in the apartment when he wouldn't gain anything by it."

"Unless," Jeremy said slowly, "we're talking about two different people, or two different groups of people."

"So we're back to where we were," said David. "Whoever lifted those two pages of the Beethoven manuscript in the coffee house may or may not have known what they were after. And those people who hit Melissa on the head and searched the apartment last night may or may not have known that a valuable manuscript was hidden in that apartment."

"But it wasn't hidden in the apartment," Jeremy said. "It's in Morgenstern's hands and by now probably in the hands of the guys doing the scientific analyses."

"Okay," said Sean wearily. "Enough for now. We're going around in circles. I'll make a full report of all this, although I'm not sure I can make any sense out of it. And we'll leave Ms. Hiller to rest in peace."

Chapter Thirteen

David, Elizabeth and Jeremy walked quickly out the concert hall doors and into the brisk night air.

"That was a wonderful concert," David said, reaching for Elizabeth's hand as they started down the sidewalk.

""Yes, it was nice," Jeremy said thoughtfully, "but I sometimes think that the Dvorak Cello Concerto is overplayed."

"You wouldn't think so if it were a piano concerto," said David, smiling slyly at Elizabeth.

"I don't agree, Jeremy," Elizabeth said. "There's nothing else quite like it. The composer certainly never wrote anything like that again."

"I suppose so," Jeremy said.

"And it's such a beautiful old concert hall." Elizabeth said. "I'd forgotten how lovely those antique decorations are."

"I'm afraid we're too used to it to appreciate it," David said.

"That's right," Jeremy said. "The students from Leonard Conservatory held most of their important concerts here. So I'm afraid that David and I take it for granted."

"Brrr!" said David, shuddering slightly as the three turned a corner around a large office building. "We've got to pick up the pace, people. It's getting nasty out here."

Just then, two men in dark coats rushed up and grabbed Jeremy. One of them pushed him forcefully against the nearby building wall.

"Hey!" David demanded. "What is this?"

"Turn around and shut up!" ordered the second man, standing between David and Jeremy, who was now gasping for breath. The first man pulled Jeremy from against the wall and delivered a vicious blow to his stomach. Jeremy doubled over and fell to his knees.

The first man leaned down to whisper in Jeremy's ear. "Friday. This Friday or you're in more trouble than you've ever been in your life."

David rushed forward to help Jeremy but the second man pushed him away roughly. Seconds later the men were gone. The whole attack had taken less than a minute.

The next day, David was sitting across from Sean in his office at the police station. "My God, Sean. You've got to do something."

"What did Jeremy do?" asked Sean. "Did he call for help?"

"No. And as soon as he could stand upright again, he insisted we all get away from there immediately. He swore he was okay but he asked us to help him get home. We took him back to his apartment and left him there, outside his door. I don't know if Melissa was there or not, but there was a light on so she probably was. Anyway, he told me he'd call me today. But so far this morning I've heard nothing from him."

"Please remember, David," Sean said, "that I can't do anything about this sort of thing until someone files a formal complaint. I'm sorry if your friend has fallen in with some bad characters, but there's not much I can do about it unless he comes in and tells me about it."

David shook his head. "They roughed him up pretty badly last night with at least two witnesses present. They didn't seem too worried about getting caught."

Sean nodded. "How far from the theatre were you at that point?"

"Two or three blocks. We were headed down a side street."

"Anybody else around?"

"No, not really. The concert crowd dissipated very quickly."

"And it was late at night so the perpetrators knew there wouldn't be too many other people on the street. It looks like they had pretty much a clear field. These thugs were professionals. They knew what they could or couldn't get away with."

"You almost sound like you know these people."

"Of course not. I'm just telling you that this sort of thing happens and the criminals know what they're doing and are very seldom brought to justice."

David sighed heavily. "So what was it all about? That's what I'd like to know. Do you think it had something to do with the Beethoven manuscript?"

"Your guess is as good as mine, David. I suppose the only one who really knows is Jeremy. You said he was going to call you this morning, but he hasn't done it yet?"

"That's right. Listen, Sean. I'm worried. I'm worried about Jeremy whether or not the attack was related to the Beethoven manuscript."

"I understand. Do you think you can get him to come and see me? Make a statement? Then we could at least ask a few questions of other people who might have seen it happen."

"I don't know. He just seemed to want to forget the whole thing happened."

"I'll tell you what. Put some pressure on him to come and see me. You come with him if you have to. Tell him it doesn't have to be official. I just want to talk with him about it."

"I'll do my best."

Later that afternoon, David and Jeremy were seated in Sean's office when the detective entered with a couple of cups of coffee in his hands.

"I'm glad you could make it," said Sean, handing Jeremy and David the cups of coffee. "These are just out of a machine, I'm afraid, but it's all we've got." Sean sank into his seat slowly. "David tells me that you ran into a little trouble last night," he said, nodding toward Jeremy.

"Yeah," Jeremy said. "That was a little crazy."

"Sounds a little worse than crazy," Sean said. "Sounds dangerous."

"I guess," Jeremy said. "Nothing to worry too much about."

"Jeremy!" cried David. "They could have killed you!"

Jeremy shrugged. "They weren't trying to kill me."

"Would you mind giving us some idea of what they were trying to do," Sean asked.

"Trying to send a message, I suppose," said Jeremy.

"And what sort of a message would that be?" Sean asked.

"Look," Jeremy said, "the fact is that I owe a few people a little money."

"A few?" snapped David. "How many are a few?"

"And how much money?" added Sean.

Jeremy squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. "I don't know. A few. Three or four. Maybe a few thousand bucks total. Putting a career together, paying an agent. It's all more expensive than you think."

"Are these loan sharks or what?" asked Sean.

"No," replied Jeremy. "Nothing like that."

"And yet they send a couple of thugs out to hassle you? Sounds like a pretty sinister businessman to me," Sean said. "Did you recognize either of the guys?"

"Never seen them before. Those guys were just there to remind me that the loan was due. They just got carried away."

"Carried away?" said David. "They could have put you in the hospital, like Melissa."

"This has nothing to do with Melissa," Jeremy quickly shot back.

"But can you be sure of that?" asked Sean. "Could the same people have been sent to assault Melissa?"

"No, absolutely not," Jeremy said, shaking his head violently. "These guys just over-stepped their bounds. It's all about a loan. I'm going to pay them back...soon. There'll be no more trouble."

"Can you be sure of that, Jeremy?" asked Sean.

"Positively," he answered confidently. "Look, it'll take more than a couple of Neanderthals to get me off my feet for long. I've got a lot to do today and I want to get to it. Don't worry about this loan stuff. I know it looked bad last night and I know the whole thing upset David and Elizabeth."

"She was petrified," David interjected. "Hell, I was petrified."

"I realize that," Jeremy said. "And that's why I agreed to come to Sean's office today to put all this to rest. But enough of this crap. These people aren't worth talking about." Jeremy rose and began to slip into his jacket. "Look," he said. "It's not that I'm not grateful. I'm grateful to both of you. I'm grateful to Elizabeth for her concern. But this whole thing has been blown out of proportion. I'll take care of this loan soon. And when I do, it'll be case closed for ever."

"If you say so," Sean said.

"I absolutely say so," Jeremy said. "And now I'm going to have to excuse myself. I've got an appointment with my agent. He's got a couple ideas to talk over with me and I'm anxious to see him."

"Of course," Sean said. "We don't want to keep you any longer that we have to."

"See you soon," David said, rising to shake Jeremy's hand.

Seconds after Jeremy left the office, David took his seat again. "Well, what do you think of that?"

"I'm not sure what to think."

"He certainly seemed to want to soft-pedal the situation, didn't he? I wonder if he was telling the truth."

"About owing some people money? I'm sure he is. Nobody would make up something like that for no reason."

"No, I mean about it not having to do with the Beethoven manuscript."

"Why would it have to do with the Beethoven manuscript?"

"Maybe somebody knows that he's come into the possession of what might be a very valuable manuscript?"

"I don't know. Maybe. But Jeremy's obviously been doing business with some very bad guys. He's got serious problems whether it has anything to do with the Beethoven manuscript or not. If I were you, I'd stay pretty close to my friend for a while."

David nodded. "I'll do my best."

Chapter Fourteen

David walked slowly down the street in a light drizzle, his hands jammed in his pockets. A flock of crows were screeching from a telephone wire overhead. Stupid birds, he thought. Why do they even hang around in this miserable weather? How do they expect to find any food in the city with winter coming on? But of course they're scavengers. Somehow they survive.

He thought of Jeremy. Poor Jeremy. The scavengers have gotten a hold on him, too. But I guess no one would want to admit that. That's why he keeps denying that he's really in trouble. And I have no idea how he's going to get out of this one. Somehow he probably had to borrow some more money just to pay for Morgenstern's tests. It seemed pretty obvious that he didn't have any extra cash sitting around for that.

I sure hope that the Beethoven manuscript turns out to be worth some money because he sure seems to need it. And I hope somehow he finds a way to get back the missing two pages that he showed me that first day. Without those pages, the thing's not going to be worth nearly as much.

David's thoughts were cut off sharply by the ringing of his phone. He fumbled for a few seconds before answering it.

"Jeremy?" he said.

"Absolutely," came the voice. "And I've got some good news for a change. Drop everything and come and meet at Mackinaw's—immediately!"

Jeremy was seated at a corner table, beaming broadly as David entered the coffee house.

"I've finally heard from him," Jeremy said excitedly. "Sit down quickly and I'll tell you all about it."

David slid into the seat opposite Jeremy quickly. "I'm all ears."

"Morgenstern called. Most of the tests have been completed. The manuscript is authentic. Everything fits. The watermark is good for the early nineteenth century, the ink is good and even the damn software says that the remarks written in the margins are by Beethoven."

"You're kidding! That's spectacular news!"

"Yes, it couldn't be better."

"And the value of the manuscript? What does he say about that?"

"He didn't want to discuss it over the phone. Besides I can tell he's a bit reluctant to quote a price until we recover the first two pages of the document."

"I was afraid that was going to be something of a problem."

"Of course it is. It's the comments on the first two pages that prove beyond a doubt that it's Beethoven's composition. But Morgenstern's made it clear that the handwriting he looked at is by Beethoven and that's half the battle."

"So I take it there's been no progress in finding the missing two pages."

Jeremy frowned. "No. And I have to tell you, I'm getting a bit worried. The police have obviously come up with nothing. I keep asking around at pawn shops to see if anything shows up there, but no luck so far. I'm beginning to worry that someone really did assume the pages were worthless and tossed them."

"But you said you checked every city trashcan for blocks the day it disappeared."

"Yeah, but that doesn't mean anything. It could have been disposed of anywhere."

"So what are you going to do?"

"Not much I can do. I've put some ads in the papers and posted online. I'm still hoping someone is still just sitting on those two pages and decides they want to pick up a little extra cash by selling them back to me."

"But in the meantime, Morgenstern's message is great news. When are you going to meet with him?"

"You mean when are we going to meet with him? I want you to be in on this."

"Of course."

He's going to call me later on today and then set up an appointment for us to meet with him tomorrow."

"Excellent," David said. "Now things are really going to happen."

As he opened the door to the sleazy little diner on the corner, Danny Moore wondered exactly what news Wade Nelson had that just couldn't wait. He might be unemployed at the moment, he thought, but that didn't mean he had time to waste. There were a number of jobs he intended to interview for and he hated to waste an afternoon doing nothing.

Upon entering the diner, he immediately saw Wade sitting at a booth against the far side of the restaurant. There was one other person at the counter, but other than that the place was empty.

"So what's up?" Danny said as he slid into the booth seat opposite Wade.

"You're not going to believe this," Wade said, barely controlling his excitement, "but David just called and told me that Jeremy's Beethoven manuscript is real, and it's probably worth a lot of money. They just heard back from some antiquarian specialist—guy named Morgenstern— who's got evidence that the manuscript is authentic and probably worth a bundle."

"You've got to be kidding," Danny said, shaking his head. "Why'd David call you?"

"He was wondering if either of us had come up with any ideas about the missing two pages of the manuscript," Wade said.

"That's a longshot," Danny said. "I don't know how anybody can expect us to know anything about it. We're not the ones who lost it."

"He was just asking."

"Well, I'll say one thing. I guess that manuscript must be worth something after all. When we first heard about some Beethoven manuscript worth a ton of money, I figured it was just Jeremy making a typical fuss about nothing. But it looks like he really has gotten lucky."

"Jeremy doesn't deserve that kind of luck," Wade said. "There's no justice in this world, you know."

"You're telling me?" Danny leaned back in his seat, a look of disgust on his face. "He'll just use the money to pay off his old debts. Now if I had that money, I could really do something with it."

"Welcome to the club," Wade said.

"I still say something will go wrong," Danny said. "I'm still thinking that he'll blow it and he'll never see that money."

Wade shrugged. "We'll just have to see what happens."

Chapter Fifteen

The man in the gray hoodie waited patiently across the street from the small but luxurious office building. It was 6:30. He felt that he probably didn't have long to wait. Three minutes later, a middle-aged woman in a fake leopard skin coat came out of the door, shuddered against the cold, and walked down the street swiftly.

The man stubbed out his cigarette and shifted his weight. Another few minutes, he thought.

Less than five minutes later, he walked purposely across the street toward the office building, a black briefcase swaying in his hand. He stopped and waited again. While looking out toward the street to check for passersby, he tried the front door. It was open. He quickly stepped inside.

It was an elegant waiting room, but completely empty. On the far side, he could see the entrance to what he assumed was Morgenstern's office. He walked swiftly but quietly across the room and stopped at the doorway. He paused for a few seconds, and then took two steps into the room.

Morgenstern looked up as he saw the man standing just inside the doorway to his office. "Excuse me, sir," he said angrily. "We're closed for business. If you want to arrange an appointment with me, you're going to have to come back or call after 10:00 a.m. tomorrow and set up an appointment with my secretary. I can't possibly see you now." Morgenstern immediately lowered his head and returned his focus to the papers lying on his desk.

The man walked slowly into Morgenstern's office. "This won't take long," he said.

Morgenstern scowled. "It won't take any time at all, Mr. Whoever you are, because I'm not about to have a discussion with you about anything at this time. So if you don't mind, vacate my office immediately or I won't see you tomorrow or any day under any circumstances."

"You have something I'm very interested in."

"I don't give a damn what you're interested in. Get out of my office before I call the police."

"It's a little late for that," said the man in the hoodie, raising his gun slowly as he walked toward Morgenstern's desk.

"What the hell do you think..."

The bullet hit him in the forehead, slightly to the right of center. Morgenstern fell forward on his desk, his arms shooting out at awkward angles.

The man walked over to Morgenstern's desk and quickly rifled through the folders and portfolios lying there. Within seconds, he grabbed one of them, gave a little grunt of satisfaction, and then placed it in the briefcase he was carrying.

He walked quickly out through the reception area and into the street.

Chapter Sixteen

Sean tapped his pencil rapidly on his desk. David couldn't stop shaking his head and Jeremy sat in silence, his head down.

"Just like that?" David said.

"One shot. To the forehead," Sean said. "His receptionist found him this morning."

"I can't believe it. I just can't believe it," David said softly.

"And you're assuming it had something to do with my Beethoven manuscript?" Jeremy asked.

"I'm not assuming anything," Sean said. "I'm not sure it was a robbery. I don't know if it was a revenge killing. I don't know if it was a random act of violence. At this point I can't be sure of anything. But I called you down here today to talk to you two because I knew you were involved with him. Unfortunately it's taken most of the day just to check out the murder scene and talk to the receptionist."

"So he was killed a few hours after we spoke to him yesterday?" asked Jeremy.

"Right," said Sean. "In fact, you two were probably among the last to communicate with him, other than his receptionist."

"And she saw nothing?" David asked.

"She left a little after 6:30. He stayed late to finish up some work. Apparently he often does. She said goodnight and left. That's about it. Obviously she's shocked, just like the two of you are. As far as she knows, he had no enemies that stand out. Morgenstern was in a competitive, dog-eat-dog business and it's pretty clear that not everyone loved him. But no one apparently had any unique motive to kill him."

"You say the killer must have just strolled into his office? No forced entry?" David asked.

"No forced entry is apparent. The secretary is not sure if she locked the door or not. She often doesn't if she thinks he'll be leaving right after her."

"Is anything missing?" Jeremy asked eagerly.

"That's another piece of bad news, I'm afraid. There's no sign of any Beethoven manuscript. You said he told you that it was back in his possession, right?"

"Right!" Jeremy said. "We were going to meet with him tomorrow to get the manuscript back and to discuss our next steps."

"Maybe you're lucky you didn't get it back," Sean said.

"Why?" Jeremy asked.

Sean paused. "Because there might be a ruthless killer out there who will stop at nothing to get hold of your precious Beethoven manuscript."

"But you said that you can't be sure that's why he was killed," Jeremy said.

"As I told you, I'm not sure of anything," Sean replied. "But the receptionist, who doubles as Morgenstern's secretary, said that the Beethoven manuscript appears to be missing from his desk. She can't be sure either, but as far as she can tell, it's the only thing that was on his desk that is no longer there."

"Nothing else missing in the office?" David asked.

"Not as far as she can tell. But she may be mistaken. The moral of the story is that we have a lot more unknowns than knowns. But we do know Morgenstern is dead and we strongly suspect the manuscript is missing."

"I don't get it," Jeremy said, shaking his head. "There are still only a handful of people who even know that the manuscript exists and an even smaller number that know Morgenstern had it. How could any of those people have taken a chance like this?"

"I don't know," Sean replied, "but you can be sure I'll be questioning everybody I can get my hands on who knows anything about the manuscript. And, unfortunately, I have to start with you two. So, I have to know what the two of you were doing yesterday between the hours of 6:00 and 8:00 p.m."

"I was in my apartment until about 6:00 and then went out to get something to eat," David said.

"Anybody to vouch for that?"

"I don't know. I suppose somebody could have noticed me at the diner."

"And you, Jeremy?" Sean asked.

"With Melissa I guess...I was with Melissa in my apartment," he said absently.

"Okay. Please give me the name and address of the restaurant, David. I'll have to check that out. And I'll have to double check with Melissa to back up your alibi, Jeremy."

"Alibies? We need alibies?" David asked.

"There's been a murder," Sean said calmly. "Everybody involved needs one. I've got a list of other people I'm going to check out as well."

"Is there anything else we can do?" Jeremy asked. "It's absolutely crucial that I get that manuscript back."

"And it's absolutely crucial that we find out who killed Mr. Morgenstern," Sean replied. "When we find the person who did that, we might well find the person who has your manuscript."

"Thanks Sean," said Jeremy jumping quickly to his feet. "If you need us for anything else, just let us know."

"Yes," David added quickly, pulling on his coat. "If there's any way we can help."

"I'll let you know..." began Sean, but both men were already out of his office and moving quickly down the corridor.

Outside the building, Jeremy said "We just can't take a chance, David. We've got to get back to my apartment right now. Melissa is alone there and Sean says that there's a killer on the loose who's very interested in my manuscript."

"I was getting a little worried too, Jeremy, but Melissa doesn't have your manuscript."

"Does the murderer know that?" Jeremy snapped. "Whoever killed Morgenstern is still missing the first two pages and he may think that Melissa has them. Let's move it, David." Jeremy took off in a half-run down the street with David hurrying to catch up.

Chapter Seventeen

Less than ten minutes later, the two men—both out of breath—came hurrying up to the front of Jeremy's apartment building. It was already getting dark.

"Looks peaceful enough," David said.

"I'll believe that when I'm inside and see that Melissa's okay," Jeremy said grimly.

The two walked up the steps quickly.

Jeremy stopped. "Quiet. I think I hear something," he whispered.

There was a shuffling of feet from the landing overhead.

"Yes!" Jeremy cried. "Hurry!" He charged up the last flight of stairs, David lagging a little behind.

At the top of the landing he stopped. There, in front of him, with his hand on the doorknob of his apartment, was a short man in a gray hoodie.

"You!" demanded Jeremy. "What are you doing here?"

The man in the gray hoodie paused and turned part way around. He hesitated for a few seconds and then charged at Jeremy and David, pushing his way past them and hurling himself down the stairs.

Just then Melissa opened the door. "What's wrong? What's going on?"

"Who was that?" Jeremy said, breathing heavily. "Do you know him?"

Melissa paused for a second. "I've never seen him."

"After him!" yelled Jeremy and bounded down the steps after the man. "C'mon!" he yelled over his shoulder to David. David hesitated briefly, glimpsing Melissa's startled face, and then followed.

The man in the hoodie moved very rapidly. He was to the ground floor and out the door of the apartment building several seconds before Jeremy and David. He paused to look left for an instant and then headed to his right, almost knocking over an older lady clutching on to a shopping bag. Within seconds he had covered half a block.

Jeremy flew out the apartment building door with David right on his heels.

"Which way?" Jeremy screamed frantically, turning his head quickly in both directions.

David looked only to the right. "I think I see him!"

"Where?"

"That way!" David pointed violently to his right and started after the man. Jeremy soon caught him and passed him by.

The man in the hoodie jerked his head around to track his pursuers. He then sprinted across the street to the other side, stopping traffic and provoking curses from several drivers.

Jeremy and David followed the man across the street, but had to wait for a few seconds until the traffic presented a gap. The man in the hoodie chuckled and slowed down slightly as he watched Jeremy and David pause for the traffic.

Seconds later, Jeremy and David were across the street and in pursuit once again.

"Jeremy!" yelled David, panting heavily. "We should call the cops! Get some help!"

"No!" Jeremy demanded. "No cops!"

The man in the hoodie, who had slowed down to a trot as he dodged around the pedestrians milling about the sidewalk, looked back and saw Jeremy and David once again making up ground on him. "Screw them!" he muttered to himself. He looked quickly to the right and left and then dodged into an alley shooting out to his left. He made his way down the alley, pausing when he saw what appeared to be an abandoned garbage truck sticking out part way into the alley. He quietly climbed up into the back of the truck and waited.

"Where'd he go?" David said, puffing violently.

Jeremy slowed down to get his bearings. "I don't know. Maybe he slipped into one of these stores," he said, indicating several lighted storefronts with a sweep of his hand.

"I don't know," David said, starting to catch his breath. "Maybe, but those shops are all pretty small. I don't think he'd have any place to hide in there."

"Well, I don't see or hear anybody moving ahead of us," Jeremy said. "I think he's here somewhere."

David looked to the alley to his left. "Jeez, I hope he didn't go in there. I can't see a thing down there."

"Probably a pretty good reason to go in there from his point of view," Jeremy said calmly. "Let's take a look."

"Now wait a minute," David said. "Is this a good idea? If he is in there, he has all the advantages."

"Maybe, but there are two of us," Jeremy said.

"Somehow I don't see that as a great advantage since neither of us knows what he's doing."

"C'mon," Jeremy said and began walking into the dark alley.

"If you say so," David said, keeping a couple of steps behind him.

The two made their way slowly through the alley. Suddenly, a light blinked on toward the back of the alley, showing in silhouette the hooded man with a gun standing in the back of the dump truck.

David saw him first. "Oh crap! He's got a gun!" David ducked down behind a metal trashcan.

"It's alright," Jeremy whispered. "I've got a gun too."

Jeremy signaled for David to keep his head down while he pulled a small handgun from the inside of his jacket.

"You've got a gun?" David barked. "For Chrissakes, you're a musician! You'll kill both of us!"

Just then the man in the hoodie dove out of the back of the garbage truck and took off back toward the end of the ally.

"After him!" Jeremy commanded, slipping his gun back into his jacket pocket, and plunging ahead.

"This is so stupid," muttered David as he began to follow Jeremy deeper into the alley.

When both men were about halfway through the alley, Jeremy pointed and said, "Look. It's a dead end. He can't get out of here."

"Jeremy," David said, trying to sound calm. "He's got a gun. He can just walk over our dead bodies."

"Shh!" Jeremy whispered. "Just follow me."

Just then the single light illuminating the space went dark.

"Did he do that?" David said in an urgent whisper.

"It doesn't matter. Follow me."

The two men were almost at the end of the alley where more than two dozen barrels were stacked up on three levels.

"Careful now," Jeremy whispered. The words were barely out of his mouth when several of the barrels began tumbling off the stack. One swept Jeremy off his feet and another hit him hard on the head. David rushed to his side and he could feel—rather than see—the man in the hoodie brush past him and disappear into the darkness behind him.

Chapter Eighteen

"So were you injured, Jeremy?" asked Sean, sitting across from Jeremy and David in his office.

"The first barrel just knocked me off my feet, "Jeremy replied, "and the other one bumped me on the head. I'm fine."

"You really shouldn't have taken a chance like that, either of you," Sean said earnestly as his eyes went from Jeremy's face to David's. "You have to leave things like that to the police."

"I knew you wouldn't be happy about it, Sean," said Jeremy. "I didn't even want to tell you about last night but David insisted. But I have a permit for my gun and, if I have to, I'm going to use it to defend myself and to defend Melissa. She's in danger. I'm sure of it. Now, if you'd be willing to provide her with police protection?"

"You know I can't do that in the absence of any specific threat," Sean said. "But I do agree that you'd better keep her within your sight for a while. Maybe the intruder, if that's who he was, now figures that Melissa doesn't have the Beethoven manuscript."

"Why should he? This may be a different guy than the one who knocked her out before," said Jeremy. "And by the way, why did you say 'if' he was an intruder? Who the hell do think the guy was anyway? He wasn't going door to door selling magazine subscriptions. Those people don't run down the alley when they see someone approaching the apartment."

"Okay, okay. So it was probably someone with bad intentions. And he may still be interested in Melissa. All the more reason for you to keep your eye on her."

"I certainly will, Sean." Jeremy replied. "But as you know, Melissa's a free spirit. And despite the fact that she was knocked on the head by an intruder last week, she still refuses to believe she's in serious danger. She won't hold still, Sean. She's a wanderer by nature."

"Well, let's hope that part of her nature doesn't get her into serious trouble. But right now, gentlemen, I have to get going. I've got to have a meeting with the chief of detectives in my district now and, since I don't really have a clue of what any of this means, I've got a feeling it's not going to go too well."

Inspector Simmons gestured for Sean to take a seat across from him. "Sit down, Detective McGill. I'm told you're the one who can fill me in on the Morgenstern murder."

"I'll do what I can, sir," Sean said.

"From what I understand, you were on a case related to this even before the murder took place. Is that right?"

"It's a little difficult to know what is related to what at this point, sir. I began by investigating a stolen historical manuscript, or at least a portion of one."

"A manuscript?"

"Yes, actually part of a score by Beethoven. It may be a new, undiscovered work and may be very valuable."

Simmons tilted his head. "It may be very valuable? I'm not sure I follow. Either something is valuable or it isn't."

"Well, that's one of the unknowns at this point, sir. The remainder of the manuscript was valued by Morgenstern as possibly worth millions."

"Really?" Simmons said, smiling faintly. "That's something I wouldn't know about."

"No, sir," Sean replied.

"But it's my understanding that the person who originally reported the theft of this manuscript—or part of it anyway—was a personal friend?"

"Yes, sir. His name is Jeremy West. We were undergrads together, although I didn't know him well. I knew his friend, David Currants, better."

Inspector Simmons nodded thoughtfully. "That's right. You went to that music conservatory didn't you? Leonard Conservatory?"

"Yes, sir. Before I graduated from the Police Academy."

"I see. So these are friends of yours, and you agreed to help them look for their missing manuscript?"

"Yes sir. The first two pages of the manuscript were stolen from Jeremy West at a coffee house not that far from the police station. Anyway, I asked a couple of the uniformed officers who patrol that beat to keep an eye out for it."

"But no luck, I assume?"

"No sir. It's been a little over a week and there's no sign of the manuscript."

"Okay. What transpired next?"

"The lady friend of Mr. West, whose name is Melissa Hiller, was attacked in Jeremy's apartment a couple of nights later. She was apparently expecting a pizza delivery guy and instead opened the door to a man who knocked her unconscious."

"Strong-arm robbery?" asked the inspector.

"That's what we all assumed, but in fact nothing was actually removed from the apartment as best we could determine. The guy seemed to be after something, but apparently never found it."

"Really? What do you assume that it was all about then?"

"I don't know, sir. Jeremy and his friend David have suggested that the intruder was looking for the manuscript—or what was left of it—but that hasn't been proven."

"So how does Morgenstern fit it?"

"He's apparently a specialist who deals with this kind of rare manuscript."

"The Beethoven score?"

"Yes. So Mr. West brought the manuscript to him to be tested and ultimately evaluated. Mr. Morgenstern emailed him a few days later indicating that the tests showed that the manuscript probably was authentic and could be worth a lot of money. They were going to set up a meeting to discuss it but that never happened because, that same evening, Morgenstern was murdered in his office."

"Yes," Simmons nodded his head eagerly. "And that's the part I'm most interested in. I'm sure the manuscript is important to Mr. West and his friend, but what is really of concern to us is Mr. Morgenstern's murder."

"Yes sir, I understand. But it's quite possible that the two are related."

"That Morgenstern having possession of the manuscript is somehow related to his death? That seems far-fetched to me. I'm sure he deals with many important documents. Do you have any evidence at all that his possession of this particular document led to his murder? Do you even have a scenario that makes any sense of this connection?"

"Nothing very specific at this time, sir."

"Here's my problem, Detective McGill," said Simmons. "I don't think this alleged link with some Beethoven manuscript is getting us anywhere. I'm not sure it's moving the investigation forward."

"Yes sir."

"And there's one more thing I'm a little concerned about. You're a young man, McGill. You haven't been a detective very long. I'm a little bit worried that you're letting your friendship with the involved parties cloud your judgment. I have no evidence of that, of course, but it's often better to turn a case over to another detective if you find you're personally involved with any of the participants."

"I understand sir, but..."

"So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to let you pursue your present line of inquiry for exactly two more days. At that point I want a full report of everything that's transpired. And if I'm not completely satisfied, I may have to switch the case to another detective. Is that clear, young man?"

"Perfectly sir."

Chapter Nineteen

"Alright," Jeremy said, looking across the table at Melissa, David and Elizabeth. "I've asked everyone to meet at my apartment so that our collective wisdom might be able make some sense out of this whole mess. So let's review. The first two pages of the Beethoven manuscript are missing and have been ever since that day I showed them to David. There has been no sign of them whatsoever. The police seem clueless. I'm not even sure that they've really spent any time at all trying to trace them."

David nodded. "I must admit that Sean has not been able to be very helpful, although I think he's made some efforts. I also should tell you that his superiors are suggesting to him that he may be wasting his time pursuing the manuscript. He called me about an hour ago to let me know that he wasn't sure how much longer he'd be able to continue on the case."

Jeremy frowned. "So he's wasting his time, is he? Is he also wasting his time investigating Morgenstern's murder?"

"No," David said. "But his superiors are questioning his assumption that the missing manuscript is linked to Morgenstern's murder."

"Are you kidding?" Jeremy cried. "That's the one thing that's clear about this whole mess. Somebody killed him to get the Beethoven manuscript. And it's probably the same someone who attacked Melissa and who we chased through the streets of Philly."

"The problem, as I see it," David said, "is that we don't even know that for sure. Is the person who stole the manuscript from Morgenstern definitely the same person who stole the first two pages of it at the coffee house?"

"Well, if not," Jeremy said, "they're going to have the same problem I was going to have in getting anyone to buy the manuscript. Without those first two pages, anyone is going to have a very tough time proving that this is a lost composition by Beethoven that no one has laid eyes on for almost three hundred years."

"I agree with David," Elizabeth said. "It's not obvious to me that the two thefts are connected. Remember that David said he thought there was someone following you two the day you brought the manuscript to Morgenstern?"

"Yes!" David said eagerly. "That's right. And that 'someone' bore an awfully strong resemblance to the guy that Jeremy and I just chased into that dark alleyway last night."

"But wait a minute," Elizabeth said. "If somebody followed you and Jeremy to Morgenstern's, then they had to be aware that you dropped the manuscript off there and you no longer had it. And if you no longer had it, why in the world would that same guy show up at Jeremy's apartment looking for it and knock Melissa unconscious in the process?"

"I have no idea," Jeremy said, "unless the guy who slugged Melissa may have been a different guy then the one who followed us?"

"And who we subsequently followed into the alleyway," David agreed.

"Yes," Elizabeth said, "but that's just the point. It would mean we were up against two different people."

"It's possible," Jeremy said. "Melissa didn't ever really get a look at the guy who hit her."

"So it's possible," Elizabeth agreed, "but is it likely? I just don't know."

"What is likely at this point?" David asked, throwing up his hands. "Nothing about this makes sense."

The four of them sat in silence for a few seconds.

"You know," David said, smiling faintly, "I sometimes wonder what Beethoven would think if he knew that almost three hundred years later we'd be obsessing over the manuscript of a composition that he never even bothered to have performed."

"I have no idea why anybody even cares about this thing," Melissa said. "Beethoven himself obviously got bored with his own stupid symphony. He didn't make any comments at all on the last part of the manuscript."

"Well, regardless of what Beethoven would say," David said, "I guess it's still extremely important to us. And sometimes I just can't believe we let it slip out of our hands. You were so excited the first day you told me about it, Jeremy."

Jeremy nodded. "At least I managed to make a photocopy of the part of the manuscript I gave to Morgenstern. That copy has been sitting in a safety deposit box since the day I made it. I'm not really sure why I bothered, though. A photocopy of something like this is next to worthless. But anyway, I brought it today. Here it is if anyone wants to take a look," Jeremy said tossing a thick folder of papers on the coffee table in front of him.

"You're talking about what Beethoven would have thought about all this," Elizabeth said. "That brings up another issue. These people who have been trying to get the manuscript at all costs...they must have enough specialized knowledge about music to know how valuable the manuscript could be."

"Maybe, but..." began David

""Right from the beginning," Elizabeth continued, "we thought that the two pages stolen from the coffee shop might just have been tossed away because the thief would have figured that they were worthless. Or he might have tried to sell them to a pawn shop. But neither of those things happened."

"We don't know they didn't happen," David said. "We just know we weren't able to locate the missing pages by following that logic."

"Nevertheless, I think Elizabeth may be on to something," Jeremy said. "It's quite probable that the people who've been after the manuscript from the beginning are musically literate and fully aware that the thing may be worth millions."

"But even if we knew that for certain, I'm not sure it would get us anywhere," David objected. "What are we going to do? Bring the entire staff, student body and all the alumni from Leonard Conservatory down to the police station for questioning?"

"And of course," Elizabeth added, "none of those people—or very few of them—even know that the manuscript actually exists."

"But Wade and Danny do," Jeremy said.

"Look," said David. "You must have trusted them in the first place or you wouldn't ever have told them about the manuscript."

"It's true," Jeremy said. "I did trust them. But I'm beginning to wonder if I was a fool to do so."

"I don't think so," David said. "And I'm sure that the police have checked out their alibies. At least they did for Morgenstern's murder."

"I guess so," said Jeremy, "but then we're back at square one. I'm a little sick of spinning our wheels, having our lives threatened, and still not having the first clue of what this is all about."

"I'm with you there," David said.

Minutes later, Elizabeth and David were walking slowly down the stairs of Jeremy's apartment building.

"I'm not sure any of that was worth the effort," David said. "It seems that we're mostly just going around in circles."

"I know," Elizabeth said. "It's very frustrating. Somehow I can't help but think that some of our basic assumptions are wrong, but I don't really know which assumptions they are."

"Well, in the meantime, we can only hope that Sean can come up with some clue that will give the police a lead on Morgenstern's murder. Because if that gets solved, I still think it's likely that our manuscript quandary will be solved along with it."

"I certainly hope so," Elizabeth said. "But David, there's something else I have to talk to you about. I know this is probably a bad time, with all the concerns you have about Jeremy and Melissa, but I just have to tell you about a phone call I got from my agent right before our get-together. He told me that he could line up some concerts for me—solo recitals at some small and medium-sized civic music series in the Midwest—for next year if I were interested. But there's also a competition in Paris that I really want to try for next year and there's just no time to do both. The problem is that these groups are anxious to get the bookings done now. My agent can't wait for more than a day or two for my response."

David smiled. "I think it's great that you have all of these opportunities."

Elizabeth paused. "Yeah, I'm really excited about it. But as I said, I can't do both; I can't enter the Paris competition and play those smaller recitals as well."

"That's a shame but..."

"But you could," Elizabeth interrupted. "You could play those recitals. At least some of them. These are not high-powered gigs, but you could make a little money and get back to playing. I think the main thing is to have something to aim for, and these recitals would give you some nice targets."

David hesitated. "Elizabeth...that's extremely kind of you, but I couldn't even consider abandoning Jeremy at this point."

"But David," Elizabeth pleaded, "these concerts are months from now. Yes, you'd have to make a commitment now, but you wouldn't have to play them for months. You'd have plenty of time to get ready. And there's plenty of time for this problem with Jeremy to be worked out...for better or worse."

"I don't know, Elizabeth. I promise I'll give it some serious thought. Just give me a little time. Right now I've got to teach a couple of lessons, but I'll meet you at Mackinaw's at 8:00, okay? We can talk about it then."

Chapter Twenty

David walked wearily into Mackinaw's and flopped into the seat next to Elizabeth.

"I've talked to Sean again," said David quietly.

"I suppose it would be too much to ask for good news?" Elizabeth said.

"I'm afraid so. He said that if nothing breaks by the weekend, he's going to turn the investigation over to a colleague."

"Why would he have to do that?"

"Because he hasn't made much progress. And because his superiors are worried that his judgment may be clouded by the fact that he's friends with all of us...or at least some of us."

"Well, that would be very sad. But you say we have until the weekend?"

"That's what he said."

"Well, maybe we can come up with something before the weekend."

"You sound optimistic all of a sudden," David said brightly, sipping the cappuccino that Elizabeth had ordered for him in advance.

"I've been thinking," Elizabeth said, a faint smile on her lips.

"So have I," David said. "And I'm wondering if maybe we're overlooking Wade Nelson and Danny Moore after all? Is it possible that one or both of them saw their chance and took it?"

"No, I don't think so," Elizabeth said. "As you said yourself, they've both got alibis for the time of Morgenstern's death and I'm not at all sure they'd have the courage to do something like that anyway, however much they'd like to cash in on some of Jeremy's good fortune."

"Okay, then. Who have we been missing?"

"First of all," Elizabeth said eagerly, "I want to admit that just a couple of hours ago at our little group gathering at Jeremy's apartment, I was totally confused by the whole situation. It seemed to me then that we had at least two different adversaries—two or even three people who wanted the manuscript so badly that they wouldn't shrink from cold-blooded murder."

"Yes," David agreed. "You seemed to be leaning in that direction."

"But I think that I've now had a breakthrough. And it's all because of something that was said at our little meeting with Jeremy and Melissa. You see, the more I thought about it, the more I realized that it was quite possible that there was really only one mastermind behind this whole thing, although that person was getting some important and rather sinister help from somebody else."

"Well, don't leave me in suspense."

"I think Melissa is behind all this. I think she has the Beethoven manuscript right now."

"You're joking."

"Do you remember days ago when Jeremy told us that Melissa had never even glanced at the manuscript?"

"Right!" David said. "You told him it didn't matter because it just wasn't her type of music, which I thought was very kind."

"But when we were all talking earlier today, Melissa remarked on the fact that Beethoven didn't make any comments at all on the last several pages of the manuscript."

"Yes, she did," David said. "She said something about Beethoven getting bored with his own piece."

"How did she know that? When did she look at the manuscript?"

"Jeremy said that he made a photocopy."

"Which he kept in a safety deposit box until this afternoon. Remember, he announced that when he placed it on the table in front of us."

"Right, but I don't think I see what you're getting at."

"The crucial question is—at what point did she see the manuscript?"

"Now that you mention it, I'm not sure."

"She initially had no interest in the Beethoven manuscript. She had never even looked at it. But the more she heard about it and how valuable it was, the more she became intrigued by it. It didn't take her long to decide that she was more interested in the money it might bring than in Jeremy. So she stole the manuscripts from him—in installments."

"What?"

"First she followed Jeremy to the coffee house where you and he met to talk about the Beethoven manuscript for the first time. You left. Jeremy turned his back for a few seconds and...Voila! She took her opportunity. If Jeremy had turned around at just the wrong time, it wouldn't have mattered. After all, it was just Melissa, coming to join Jeremy at the coffee house."

"I can't believe it."

"I'm not finished. Now she's got the first two pages. Maybe she even thought she'd grabbed the whole thing, but it turned how that Jeremy had only put the first two pages in his knapsack. She quickly realized that the first two pages were important but, by themselves, they weren't going to get her anything. But now, having lost the first two pages, Jeremy grew very cautious and he didn't allow the rest of the manuscript out of his sight. Melissa had earlier expressed her disinterest in the manuscript so it might be suspicious if she now told him she wanted to read it. So she waited. She bided her time. She waited until you and Jeremy took it to Morgenstern's office."

"This can't be true!" David said. "You mean she stole it from Morgenstern?"

Elizabeth nodded. "She or her assistant did."

"And that means..."

"Yes. She or her assistant killed him."

"That's scary," David said with a shudder. "I never would have imagined it. I knew she was a bit strange, but this is incredible. So you're saying that she now has the part of the manuscript that Morgenstern had?"

"She now has the entire manuscript."

"But wait a minute," David said, shaking his head. "She was attacked in the apartment by someone who was looking for the manuscript."

"She says she was attacked. There's a bump on her head. Not a particularly bad one. Really quite a convenient assault. And how could we possibly suspect that she was in any way involved in this whole thing after she was a victim of a brutal attack?"

"So it was all for show?"

"Absolutely, done with the help of her little assistant. You know, the one you were chasing after and who probably killed Morgenstern."

"So she's really got it. How do we prove it?"

Elizabeth paused briefly. "We'll inform Sean and he'll..."

"He'll never get a search warrant," David interrupted. "His superiors think he's just wasting his time on this case anyway. He's as much as admitted it."

"So?"

"So I'll get it. She can't be hiding it in the apartment she shares with Jeremy, so it must be hidden somewhere in her old apartment."

"But apparently she's never there."

"That's what Jeremy thinks, but he doesn't keep tabs on her all the time. I'm sure she's been able to sneak back there from time to time. It wouldn't take long to hide the Beethoven manuscript, especially since no one would think of looking for it there."

"Listen David, I don't really know for absolutely certain that Melissa's got it."

"Neither do I, but I think it's a pretty good guess and I'm going to find out—tonight."

Elizabeth sat forward in her seat. "Wait a minute! That could be really dangerous."

David scoffed. "I'm not particularly worried about running into Melissa."

"Maybe you should be. Either she or someone she was working with probably put a bullet in Morgenstern's head."

"You're right, but with any luck I won't run into her at all."

"You've got let Sean know."

"I'll be careful," he interrupted. "Forewarned is forearmed."

"David! I've absolutely got to call Sean. You could be killed!"

"Don't do it, Elizabeth. I'll be fine. I'm only going to do a little innocent snooping."

Chapter Twenty-One

"Sean, I'm sorry to bother you but I absolutely had to call and tell you this. David's going over to search Melissa's old apartment. He already left."

"What do you mean he went to Melissa's apartment?" Sean said angrily. "Why the hell would he do that?"

"His plan was to break in and find the manuscript," Elizabeth said. "I told him not to do it, but he was determined."

"Why? Why Melissa's apartment?" Sean demanded.

"We're pretty sure she's got the missing Beethoven manuscript."

"I don't care if she does have it. That's a job for the police. Why didn't he contact me?"

"He figured you wouldn't be able to really do anything. We have no proof."

"So that's an excuse to do something incredibly stupid, not to mention illegal? When did he leave?"

"Only a few minutes ago...maybe you can catch him."

"Your God-damn right I'm going to catch him. I'm going to catch him before he does something stupid and I have to arrest him."

David slowly walked up to the second landing in Melissa's apartment building. Did anybody live here? The place seemed totally deserted. The apartments on the first floor seemed completely abandoned. The door to one of them was wide open with no sign of life within. There was no sound coming from anywhere. Maybe it wasn't surprising. From the outside the building looked like it was falling apart. He was surprised that the whole thing wasn't condemned. Maybe it was.

The mailbox downstairs had listed Melissa as the tenant for apartment 2-C. David stopped and looked up and down the entire floor. It seemed as deserted as he had hoped it would be. According to Jeremy, Melissa hasn't come here for a while, David thought. And God knows he's doing his best to keep his eye on her 24/7 now.

Still, now that he was here, he was beginning to think that maybe this wasn't such a great idea after all. With all of the things that had happened, it had never before occurred to him that Melissa had been involved in any way. But he had to admit that Elizabeth had made a great case for Melissa being the one behind all of this. The way Elizabeth had laid it all out, who else could it be?

Besides, he wouldn't take any chances. He'd make sure that there was no one around before trying to get into her place. If she was there, he'd think up some lame excuse for dropping by. He'd say that all of a sudden Elizabeth was worried about her, and had begged him to go and check on her. He would say that he had gone to Jeremy's apartment first, but she wasn't there. But that was stupid, he thought. What if Jeremy is just sitting in his apartment right now and she calls him up to find that out?

Oh well, he thought. If it happens, it happens. He'd think of something. And he'd wasted too much time already. It was time to go in there and find out once and for all.

David knocked on the door of 2-C lightly. No response. He waited a full two minutes and then turned the knob lightly. He could feel that the door was very flimsy. The lock seemed loose. He shook the lock, which rattled loudly. He waited again for two minutes. Nothing. He put his shoulder to the door, gently at first. I don't want to do any permanent damage, he thought. I don't want anyone to know I've been here.

He began to press his shoulder against the door while he jiggled the door knob. Everything seemed loose but nothing would yield. He stepped back from the door and looked around once again. The he shoved his shoulder up hard against the door. It stuck for a second and then swung open!

David held his breath while he checked to see if the lock had been broken. Thank God, no. He had just pushed it free from the door jam. These apartments were in terrible shape. The building should be condemned.

He stepped inside the apartment quickly and gently closed the door behind him. He scanned the room swiftly. Melissa knew that Jeremy would never come here, so if she had the manuscript hidden here, she probably wouldn't have to get too tricky about it.

For one thing, he thought, there just weren't that many places to hide a bulky manuscript. There just wasn't that much furniture, at least in the living room. He stuck his hand under the cushions of the one decrepit sofa. Nothing. I guess nobody would be that obvious, he thought. There was what looked like an old roll-top desk in the corner of the room, but the roll-top had apparently been torn off of it. There were four fairly deep drawers in it and it took him a while to examine the contents. Most of the stuff in the drawers seemed like junk. There were a couple of receipts, an outdated map of Philly, a menu for a Chinese take-out restaurant. In a different drawer there was a stack of computer paper, more receipts.

So far he had seen nothing to suggest that a desperate criminal lived here. But who knew what stuff a desperate criminal might have?

He walked into the kitchen. Filthy, he thought. How long have those dirty dishes been sitting here? Did she ever even eat there anymore? But he looked over to the small kitchen table and saw a couple of placemats. Does Jeremy ever come over here with her, he wondered?

There was an old dishwasher with the front handle broken off. An unlikely place, but he looked inside it anyway. No, and there was nothing else in the kitchen to look at. On to the bedroom.

It wasn't much. Small, very untidy. A double bed with a cheap-looking end table on each side. Two equally chintzy ginger jar lamps on either side. He quickly walked over to one of the two dressers. He had just opened the top drawer in the first when he thought he heard a noise.

He straightened up and became very quiet. Was there someone in the hallway?

David heard the apartment door open. Two people came inside, speaking quietly. One was Melissa. He couldn't recognize the other voice. The killer! he immediately thought. The one who actually killed Morgenstern. David was frozen with fear.

He thought of hiding under the bed but then thought, no, I don't want to die under somebody's bed. He forced himself to creep closer to the door to listen to the two talking. Melissa was doing most of the talking. The man only answered in short choppy sentences.

He listened harder. What was Melissa saying? He couldn't be sure but he thought she was talking about leaving town. She mentioned a plane ticket—two plane tickets. She had already bought them. They would leave that night. By then she would have disposed of the manuscript. She said something about the money they were going to make, but David couldn't quite make out what she was saying.

Eventually they're going to come into this bedroom and find me, he thought. And then they're going to kill me. David couldn't see him, but he was sure it was the short man he had first seen in the long black coat and then later in the gray hoodie. The one they had chased down the alley. The one who had a gun.

I can't just sit around and wait, he thought. I've got to do something. He edged closer to the door, as silently as possible. The old floor creaked a little. Could they hear that? Probably not. They were still talking and wouldn't be paying attention. I could just make a dash for the door, he thought. But he couldn't even tell where they were standing in the room. Maybe they were standing right in front of the door. He just didn't know.

He glanced back at the bed and the two end tables. I've got to distract them, he thought. He snuck over and disconnected one of the lamps and carried it over to the other side of the room. He snuck a peak out the bedroom door. He could see a little bit of Melissa. Her back was turned and she seemed to be heading into the kitchen. He couldn't see the man, the one who had been wearing the hoodie.

After Melissa disappeared into the kitchen, David decided. It's now or never, he thought. He pulled back his right arm and heaved one of the ginger jar lamps as hard as he could—out through the bedroom door, across the living room, and through the kitchen doorway.

"What the..." Melissa bellowed from the kitchen. "Malcolm!" she yelled. "What's going on?"

In that second, David dashed from the bedroom door across the living room toward the apartment door. Malcolm looked confused for a split second. Melissa looked out of the kitchen doorway. "Get him! Shoot him!" she demanded.

But David already had his hand on the doorknob. He pulled the door open as hard as he could but the door seemed to catch. They had fastened the chain lock! David fumbled desperately for a few seconds trying to undo the lock. Malcolm grabbed his gun out of his overcoat. He raised his gun.

Just then, David managed to unfasten the chain lock, swing the door open, and throw himself out the door just as the gun roared.

He hit the floor hard and felt numb for a few seconds. But he heard Melissa and Malcolm yelling behind him and tried to scramble to his feet.

Suddenly, Sean was there, his gun in his hand. His face was grim. He walked purposely past David and into the apartment. "Hold it right there!" he shouted.

Malcolm again looked confused. Melissa, now standing in the middle of the living room, cursed violently. Malcolm dropped his gun.

Chapter Twenty-Two

"No, she didn't do it herself. Her 'pet' did it—an ex-bass player from her former punk band," Sean said, a couple of hours later as he faced Elizabeth and David across his desk. "His name's Malcolm Jordan. He may be musical, but he's also a thug with a record of petty crime and the occasional jail sentence. But there's no question that Melissa set him up to do it, told him he had to do it. She's going to be charged with murder, no doubt about it."

"Now I'm the one who can't believe it," Elizabeth said. "I mean, I had it all worked out and concluded that it could only be Melissa. She was the only one who knew everything and had the opportunity, but still...part of me just can't believe it."

"Well, I thought it was crazy as well, believe me," Sean said. "And the craziest thing of all was hearing that David had gone to 'investigate' on his own. It doesn't get any crazier than that. He could well have been killed. It was a close call."

"Am I getting in trouble for this?" David asked.

"Probably not as much as you should be," Sean said. "I didn't see you actually inside the apartment so I'm not going to go out of my way to charge you with breaking and entering. Something may come up later, but I doubt it."

"But have they confessed? Melissa and this Malcolm guy?" Elizabeth asked.

"No," Sean said, "but they will. At least he will. He seems quite rattled. Melissa kept screaming at him not to say anything, but this guy just seems confused by the whole thing. He seemed very surprised when I put the handcuffs on him. He'll talk and he'll incriminate her."

"Amazing," Elizabeth said. "Did the Beethoven manuscript turn up?"

"Oh, yes. The manuscript was in the bedroom closet under some laundry. You just hadn't gotten to that part of the room yet, David."

David smiled. "So are your superiors finally going to get off your back?"

Sean shrugged. "Probably not. They'll just say I got lucky and the case just cleared itself up without me doing anything. And that's probably true as far as it goes. But Elizabeth certainly had a lot to do with it."

"Hey, how about me?" David said.

"How about you? Please," Sean said, shaking his head, a slight smile on his face. "It was still one of the stupidest stunts I've ever seen in my life."

"I know, I know," David said. "But I still can't help but think that there's a lot about all this that is very sad. Poor Jeremy."

Sean nodded. "Yes. It's going to be very hard on him. He seemed to trust Melissa completely. I'm not going to enjoy breaking the news to him."

"Sean...about Jeremy," Elizabeth said quietly. "We'd like to be there when you tell him."

"Any particular reason?"

"Well," David said, "we are friends and..."

"There are other reasons," Elizabeth said. "I'm particularly anxious to see how he takes the news."

Sean raised his eyebrows. "You're being very mysterious, but I guess we can arrange it. We'll set up an appointment for him in my office tomorrow morning. He's going to want answers, but I think I can hold him off that long."

Chapter Twenty-Three

"You know," David said gloomily," swirling his stir-stick in his coffee, "Mackinaw's used to be just about my favorite place, but lately I've got as many bad memories here as good ones."

Elizabeth smiled gently at him. "This is almost over now. Pretty soon everything will be sweetness and light again."

"I doubt it. Jeremy's going to be heart-broken."

"Jeremy's going to have more serious problems than that."

"What do you mean? What could be more serious than having your girlfriend be the one who's trying to steal your most precious possession? And commit murder while she's at it?"

"It's about the manuscript David. I don't think it is what it's cracked up to be."

David cocked his head. "I'm not sure what you mean. Explain please."

Elizabeth took a deep breath. "I've been suspicious about this almost from the beginning. Yes, the comments in the margins of Jeremy's manuscript are written by Beethoven and the musical notes themselves are written by Hofhammer. But is Hofhammer really acting as Beethoven's copyist? Professor Gray said he thought that some of Beethoven's comments seemed strange if thought of as directions from a composer to a copyist."

"Listen, the whole thing is strange. It's a very unusual manuscript."

"It's more than unusual. You remember how earlier today Jeremy finally got around to showing us a photocopy of the part of the manuscript that he delivered to Morgenstern?"

"Sure," David said. "I didn't look at it though. Too many other things on my mind."

"Well, I did. I was able to glance through the photocopy of the manuscript while you were talking to Jeremy in the kitchen. I didn't have much time, but I came to the same conclusion that Professor Gray did. Some of the comments I read just didn't make any sense if you think of Beethoven as the composer of the music and Hofhammer just the copyist."

"But Jeremy said that the telltale comments come on the first two pages," David said. "That's where Beethoven makes it clear that it's his composition."

"But that doesn't really make any sense," Elizabeth replied. "Many of the comments that Beethoven makes throughout the rest of the manuscript seem to be criticizing the composition, not just the copying job."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that most of the comments really amount to a critique of the composition and Beethoven would hardly be criticizing his own symphony."

"I'm sorry. I suppose I'm being dense but I'm not following you here."

"I think the comments that Beethoven has written are about someone else's composition, and that someone else is almost certainly Hofhammer."

"You mean it's really Hohammer's symphony and Beethoven is just critiquing it?"

"Yes, that's exactly what I mean."

"So you're saying that Hofhammer is not one of Beethoven's copyists, but actually the composer of the piece? But why would Beethoven do that? Why would he go out of his way to spend that amount of time critiquing a composition by a composer that no one's ever heard of? That certainly doesn't sound like something Beethoven would do, certainly not at that point in his life."

"True, but he might do it as a favor to a very special friend."

"What special friend?"

"That's what I wanted to find out. So I contacted a good friend of mine, a musicologist who is doing archival work in Vienna right now. Her name is Victoria Stoneham."

"Who is she? I've never heard of her."

Elizabeth shook her head. "That's because she never graduated from your precious Leonard Conservatory. And I realize she's not a world famous scholar—not yet. But she's a brilliant researcher and knows her way around early nineteenth century Viennese historical documents as well as anyone in the world."

"So what does Victoria have to say about this?"

"I asked her to tell me anything she could about Hofhammer and any possible link there might be between him and Beethoven. She emailed me about an hour ago, and what she has to say is quite amazing. Everyone wondered why they had never heard of Hofhammer if he was indeed one of Beethoven's copyists. The reason is simple; he was not one of Beethoven's copyists. He was an amateur composer. A very eccentric one indeed, who was continually trying to bribe orchestras into playing his compositions. But his style was considered so erratic and quirky that no one would go anywhere near him."

"But I still don't understand the link between Hofhammer and Beethoven? If this guy were a well-known nut case, why would Beethoven waste his time evaluating his symphony and writing comments on it? Why was he such a 'special friend' to Beethoven?

"He was not the special friend. Hofhammer's younger sister was."

"His younger sister?"

"Yes, one of the many young ladies with whom Beethoven became enamored with over his lifetime. One might even say obsessed with in this case. This young lady convinced Beethoven, as a special favor to her, to examine and critique her big brother's symphony. And Beethoven went along with her request, although he doesn't seem to have done it with much enthusiasm. As Melissa pointed out, he eventually just gave up on the task about three-quarters the way through Hofhammer's manuscript."

"So Beethoven critiqued Hofhammer's symphony—at least a large part of it—as a favor to a special lady friend?"

"Exactly."

"But why is there no clear record of this? Why didn't Professor Gray know about this?"

"Professor Gray is an expert on Beethoven's musical style. I don't think he is one of those who spends a lot of time studying Beethoven's love life. And I'm not surprised that he'd never heard of Hofhammer as a composer. He apparently didn't make much of a splash in the music world of early nineteenth-century Vienna. Still, I had a hunch he might be important enough to leave a trace of himself somewhere, so I communicated with Rebecca."

"But still, wouldn't somebody else know the name Hofhammer? Some people spend their lives looking to uncover Beethoven's love affairs."

"True, but it's a bit trickier than usual in this case, because Hofhammer's little sister had a different name. You see, she was married at the time."

"And that explains why Beethoven was so secretive."

"That, and his tendency to keep more to himself, certainly by that time in his life."

"But as you said, Beethoven never finished the job. He gave up on the manuscript. And didn't little sister get disturbed when she found out that Beethoven was critical of her big brother's composition?"

"Maybe, but Beethoven had probably moved on by then. One reason that this lady has not gone down in history as one of Beethoven's famous paramours is that their relationship was so brief."

"But I keep coming back to the first two pages. Jeremy insists that Beethoven's comments on the first two pages make it clear that he's talking about his own composition."

"Skillfully concocted forgeries...they have to be. Jeremy had only to forge Beethoven's handwriting on those couple of comments and that might seal the deal, even if many of the other comments are, as Professor Gray has pointed out, somewhat ambiguous."

"So Jeremy forged those couple of lines, the ones that would prove to the world that this was a new composition by Beethoven. But in reality the manuscript consisted mostly of Beethoven's somewhat ill-tempered criticisms of a symphony by an unknown—and unquestionably quirky—composer. What incredible gall! How did Jeremy think he was going to get away with it?"

"He figured that the manuscript would pass the authenticity tests because most of it is in fact authentic. And it was very convenient for him that the first two pages were not available for Morgenstern to look at, or for the scientific tests to evaluate, because it was those two pages that had been 'doctored' by Jeremy. The irony is that even without Jeremy's trying to pass it off as a new work by Beethoven, the document still would have been worth something as a curiosity with all of those authentic Beethoven comments on it."

"So the manuscript would have some value even though it's not really Beethoven's composition?"

"Some. But not nearly as much as if it were thought of as a new work by Beethoven. The truth of the matter is that the manuscript does not represent what Jeremy claims it represents. Still, a private collector who lusted after a unique souvenir of Beethoven might be so anxious that he or she might not even notice that fact. That's what Jeremy was counting on."

"So this is fraud."

"Moderately clever fraud, I'd say. And it could have worked out for Jeremy if things had broken just right."

"But Elizabeth," David said, shaking his head sadly, "we've got to get to Sean...to tell him before his interview with Jeremy."

Elizabeth smiled. "We're going to be there, remember? I'm pretty sure it will all work out."

Chapter Twenty-Four

Sean rose from his desk and greeted Jeremy as he entered his office door. "Jeremy, I want you to know how terrible I feel for you in all this mess. I know you must be horribly shocked."

"Shocked?" cried Jeremy. "I'm beyond shocked. I come home to my apartment last night and Melissa isn't there. She promised me she wouldn't leave the place, so naturally I'm alarmed. I wait and wait, and then I start thinking that something might have happened to her. So I finally call the police station, hoping to talk to you, and I find out that Melissa's been arrested! Out of nowhere! And that she's been charged with Morgenstern's murder and the theft of the manuscript! This is all just incredible to me!"

"Of course it is, Jeremy, of course it is," Sean said sympathetically. "And that's why I've invited David and Elizabeth to be with you for a little moral support."

Jeremy looked at Elizabeth and David, both sitting over to the side of the room, and frowned. "But I'm told you two had something to do with all this."

"Their role was an unimportant one, Jeremy," Sean said quickly. "The fact is that there's plenty of evidence that Melissa is guilty of what she's being charged with."

Jeremy sank into the seat across from Sean's. "I'm sorry," he said, "I'm just having a real tough time actually believing that. I trusted her. She was my..."

"I know, Jeremy," Sean said. "This must be extremely hard."

After three or four seconds of silence, Elizabeth spoke. "Yes, Jeremy, David and I realize that this must be extraordinarily difficult for you."

"I don't know how she could do this to me," Jeremy said, choking back tears. "Is she completely heartless?"

Elizabeth leaned forward in her chair. "But things like this happen sometimes, Jeremy, when people allow their greed to dominate all of their other emotions, like friendship, loyalty and trust."

Jeremy looked over at Elizabeth. "What do you mean? I'm not sure what you're talking about."

Elizabeth looked directly at Jeremy. "I think you do know what we're talking about, because you betrayed the trust of a lot of people when you hatched this entire scam."

Jeremy glowered. "That's crazy. There's no scam. That Beethoven manuscript is worth millions."

"What's going on here, Elizabeth?" Sean asked.

"I think it'll be clear in a minute, Sean," Elizabeth said, glancing quickly toward Sean.

"So you think it's worth millions, Jeremy?" she said, turning back to face him. "It's worth a lot less than that. The music represented in that manuscript wasn't composed by Beethoven. It was composed by Hofhammer. He wasn't the copyist; he was the composer. Beethoven was just doing a favor for a lady friend by commenting on the manuscript. Of course you already know that."

"That's crazy. How could I know something like that?"

"You may not know the whole story," Elizabeth said, "but you do know that the manuscript isn't legit. Oh, most of the comments on the manuscript are actually by Beethoven, and I suppose the manuscript is a curiosity because of that. But some of the comments on the first two pages—the ones that supposedly establish him as the composer—are not by Beethoven but had to have been faked by you."

"Quite cleverly, I must say," David said calmly. "I really didn't know you had it in you."

"Of course Morgenstern came to the conclusion that the manuscript was the real thing because he never saw the two pages where you faked Beethoven's handwriting. Those pages were never tested in the lab. So things were going your way. He probably could have found a private collector who'd pay big bucks for the manuscript. The only problem is that the composition isn't actually by Beethoven, barely has any connection with Beethoven, and is probably worth no more than a few hundred dollars. But that wasn't even close to what you needed in order to get out of debt, and so you thought you'd embellish the truth a little."

"Quite a bit, I'd say, if all this is true," Sean said, nodding his head vigorously.

"I admire your imagination, Jeremy," Elizabeth said coolly. "I suggest that you use your prison time to write a novel. Probably even an historical novel, since you seem to have quite a flair for inventing nineteenth-century dialogue."

Jeremy stood up. "This is absolutely absurd...complete nonsense," he said angrily.

Sean stood up as well. "Maybe it is, but now that our handwriting experts know what to look for, specifically on the first two pages of the manuscript, I think we'll be able to clear things up pretty quickly."

Jeremy turned quickly to leave.

"And until then, Mr. West, I'm going to have to detain you on suspicion of fraud and forgery."

Jeremy swung around and glared at Elizabeth. "You bitch!"

Elizabeth shrugged. David rose quickly to his feet and started toward Jeremy.

Sean put his hand out to stop David. "Forget it. He's not worth it." Sean gestured to a uniformed officer standing in the corner who immediately clasped Jeremy's hands behind his back and handcuffed him. Within seconds, Jeremy had been escorted out the door.

"Amazing!" Sean said. "It makes perfect sense now, but I still have some trouble believing it. And Elizabeth, you have an incredible talent for this sort of work. Has it ever occurred to you that your first calling may be as a policewoman?"

Elizabeth smiled. "I don't think so, Sean. I just got lucky on this one."

Sean took a deep breath. "Well, I think we made a great team, and I for one am thrilled with our results. My superiors thought I was wasting everybody's time and it turned out that we solved two cases—fraud and murder. And none of it would have been possible without you, Elizabeth. Of course we broke most of the rules in the detective procedural handbook, but that'll be our little secret. At the very least I'm hoping that we'll all stay in close touch."

"I'll be delighted to," David said.

"And how about you, Elizabeth?" Sean said. "Are we going to stay in touch?

Elizabeth smiled coyly. "How could I possibly allow myself to lose contact with someone who is both my favorite Irish tenor and my favorite Irish detective?"

Chapter Twenty-Five

The elegantly dressed waiter gestured for Elizabeth and David to follow as he led them to a table in one of the darker recesses of the bistro.

"I must say, David," Elizabeth said, smiling demurely, "that this is one of the nicest places you've ever taken me to."

"Well, I thought we had a lot to celebrate," David said, helping Elizabeth into her seat.

"Why thank you," she said. "Yes, I guess we do. I mean, we survived a pretty traumatic experience."

"Thanks to your brilliance in uncovering all of the deep, dark secrets," David said, a smile crossing his face.

"I wasn't alone, you know. I had plenty of help, including your rather daring risks of life and limb. I still can't believe that you put yourself in jeopardy like that."

"All in the line of duty," David said. "Actually, I discovered that the secret to performing daredevil acts is to give them absolutely no thought whatsoever before you launch into them."

"Advice for the ages, I guess," Elizabeth replied, "although you'll probably live longer if you consider other strategies once in a while."

"But we got through it, anyway. We made it through together." David paused. "Still, I can't help thinking it's kind of sad. I had always considered Jeremy a good friend. Still, I guess it's pretty clear that I didn't know him as well as I thought I did."

"I guess not." Elizabeth said. "But I don't feel sorry for either one of them."

"I suppose we shouldn't," David said. "And I suppose you're off again to Europe to enter another competition?"

"Oh, I don't know, David. I think I need more of a challenge than that."

"More of a challenge than competing against the best pianists in the world?"

"Sure. That can get tedious you know. I'm thinking about another challenge a little closer to home."

"And that would be?"

Elizabeth reached her hand across the table and clutched David's. "Getting you back in shape and making a respectable pianist out of you."

"Oh really?"

"Of course. So although all of this is very fancy, I don't want us to dawdle over dinner tonight."

"And why is that?" David asked, taking Elizabeth's other hand in his.

"Because, David, we have a lot of duets to play and I can't think of a better time to get started."

###

If you enjoyed The Beethoven Quandary, you might want to check out The Mephisto Mysteries by the same author. Elizabeth McDermitt and David Currant deal with mysterious and even deadly circumstances at an international piano competition. Available from most EBook sellers.
