A mysterious fragment of a lost opera, a murder, and a shadowy occult society more than two centuries old set the stage for young Ted Wheeler's inadvertent plunge into a tug of war between light and darkness. Where is the king's ransom in Ottoman gold paid to murder an Austrian Emperor? Why was the death of a famous composer faked? Ted and his friends must unravel the mystery of a piece of torn musical score, a tantalizing fragment of a melody so beautiful that it could only have come from the hand of a Master.

While they seek answers, darker forces are at work seeking to stop them, forces with roots in the secret Masonic lodges of 18th-Century Vienna. At stake are the unknown location of a fortune, perhaps even their own lives, and the the truth about how one of the world's greatest composers became entangled in a web of evil, deceit, and possibly regicide.

                                       ISBN 1-4196-9935-0