‘I didn’t know they were so powerful,’ Leigh said.
Arno nodded. ‘They were, but their power was also their undoing. Other forces, even more powerful, were watching with a close eye. In fact, much of our modern knowledge of the Viennese Masons at this time comes from the intelligence material gathered by the Austrian secret police. Freemasonry was officially condemned in the Austrian Empire on the orders of the Pope, and only allowed to exist because of the tolerance of the Emperor, Josef II. But in 1785 Josef’s sympathy grew thin, and he decided that the Masons had become too powerful and influential. He ordered a drastic reduction of the Viennese Lodges, and demanded that the secret police provide him with lists of active Masons. These lists were kept in the files of the court archives.’
‘Why the sudden sea-change?’ Leigh asked.
‘You have to understand the climate of the times,’ Arno explained patiently. ‘Mozart lived in a turbulent age, a revolutionary age. The Americans had only recently overthrown their colonialist British rulers and established a new free nation. Revolution was in the air. By 1789, just two years before Mozart’s death, France stood on the verge of terrible bloodshed.’
‘And the Masons were involved?’
‘Masonry was increasingly associated with the growing revolutionary, anti-royalist current,’ said Arno. ‘With its ideals of liberty, equality and fraternity, it offered a perfect metaphor for the dawning of a new age of free ideas. As the French Revolution gathered steam, some of the revolutionary “clubs”, such as Robespierre’s Jacobins, based their structures on the Masonic Lodges, as well as importing Masonic symbolism into their political ideology. In America, when George Washington laid the foundation stone of the Capitol in Washington he wore with pride the Masonic apron that had been made for him by Adrienne, the wife of the French soldier-revolutionary La Fayette. Thomas Jefferson was another Freemason who drew heavily on those ideals of liberty and equality when he drafted the Declaration of Independence. It was a hugely powerful force with the potential to influence political change across the world.’
‘And so, naturally, it had to be stopped,’ Ben said.
‘Without question,’ replied Arno with a bitter smile. ‘By the late 1780s there were growing concerns in Mozart’s Austria that the Masons were going to plunge the country into the same revolutionary, pro-republic spirit as France and America. It was a dangerous time. Many aristocrats who had initially sympathized with Freemasonry’s ideals began to worry. Then, as the revolutionary mobs tore through France and the aristocracy went to the guillotine, the Austrian clampdown on Freemasonry began in earnest. By 1791 Masonry in Austria was virtually wiped out. It was a period of severe crisis for Mozart and his Lodge brothers.’ He paused. A new Emperor had taken over, Leopold II. The Masons could not tell what his attitude would be to them, but they were not optimistic. Then Mozart and his close colleague, the theatrical producer and fellow Mason Emanuel Schikaneder, had an idea.’
‘What idea?’ Ben asked.
‘They thought that if they could rescue the public image of the Masons, they might help to save the Craft from universal condemnation,’ said Arno. ‘What they did would nowadays be called a huge publicity stunt. They conceived of a grand opera that would reach out to an audience of unprecedented scale. A spectacle that everyone would love, written in popular style. A people’s opera preaching Masonic ideals of the education of men to a higher morality through wisdom, love and goodness, heralding the transition to a new social order. Full of mystical symbols glorifying the Freemasons and their philosophy.’
‘The Magic Flute’, Leigh said.
Arno nodded. ‘The new opera had its premiere performance in Vienna at the end of September 1791. It was received with rapturous enthusiasm by the public and the critics, and played to packed theatres night after night.’
‘It was the most successful thing Mozart had ever done,’ Leigh added.
‘Yes, it should have been the start of a new era for him,’ Arno replied. ‘And it was welcomed by his fellow Masons as a new hope for their Craft. But it was the last opera he would ever compose. Within less than three months, he was dead.’
‘Wait a minute,’ Ben said. ‘Leigh, didn’t you tell me that Mozart had been murdered by the Masons because he’d given away their secrets in The Magic Flute?’
‘That’s what I thought—’
‘Well, that doesn’t make sense, does it?’ Ben continued. ‘If Mozart was becoming this great new hope for the Masons, their public relations man at a time when they needed him most, then why kill him?’
Arno smiled. ‘You are right. This theory is completely illogical. Likewise, the fact that after Mozart’s death his fellow Masons gave his widow Constanze a great deal of moral and financial support makes nonsense of the idea that he was murdered by his own.’ Arno turned to Leigh. ‘Your brother had noticed these inconsistencies early on in the course of his research. Oliver knew that there was no satisfactory explanation for the strange and sudden death of Mozart.’
‘Unless he wasn’t murdered at all,’ Ben said. ‘How do we know there’s any truth in this murder conspiracy theory?’
‘The official cause of death was acute rheumatic fever,’ Arno replied. ‘However, many of those around him at the time found the circumstances of his passing highly suspicious. Towards the end of his life, Mozart often expressed his conviction that he would be poisoned one day-yet the scholars have never bothered to examine this properly. His elder son, Carl Thomas Mozart, also had strong suspicions that his father had died by foul means. The body displayed unusual characteristics consistent with death by poisoning.’ Arno shrugged. ‘Based on the medical records of the time, nobody can disprove that Mozart was poisoned. But the single most important piece of evidence is the letter itself.’
‘What does it say?’ Leigh asked.
Arno looked surprised. ‘You have not seen it?’
‘I had Oliver’s copy but it got burnt,’ Leigh said. ‘All I’ve seen of it are a few fragments.’
‘But surely your father showed it to you?’
‘Professor, I was only nineteen years old. I had other things on my mind.’ She glanced at Ben. ‘I don’t remember much about it.’
‘I see…’ Arno paused and scratched his chin. ‘So you are not familiar with the Order of Ra, to which the letter refers?’
Ben remembered it from Oliver’s notes. He thought for a moment. ‘Ra as in the Egyptian sun god Ra?’ he asked.
Leigh turned to stare at him.
He caught her look. ‘Theology,’ he said. ‘Student days.’
‘You studied Theology?’
‘It was a long time ago.’
Arno smiled. ‘You are correct, and many of the ceremonies and traditions of Freemasonry can be traced back to ancient Egypt. But Ra also means King. It is sometimes written as Re, and is the origin of the word Rex in Latin and your English words regal and royal’.
‘So what was this Order of Ra?’ Ben asked.
‘The Order of Ra was originally a small and obscure Masonic Lodge,’ Arno answered. ‘Their members were largely aristocratic and pro-royalist, and they gave their group a name that would reflect their political leanings: for them it signified the Order of the King. They were far divorced from the growing republican spirit within Freemasonry, and became increasingly allied to the establishment powers as the perceived threat from the Masons grew. While Freemasonry stood for freedom, democracy and the people, the Order of Ra stood for the complete opposite. They were warmongers, fervent capitalists, an agency founded to aid elitist governments in suppressing the people.’
‘A