The doorbell rings. I hurry from the kitchen into my bedroom, shutting the door behind just as I hear Emi's voice drift in from the living room.

"Good morning, Lola. How are you doing this week?"

"Good."

I sit at my desk and shove an earbud in each ear, drowning out Lola's private lesson. Emi and I didn't speak much, just kind of shared the house as we went about our morning routines. She normally wakes up earlier than me anyway and eats a granola bar while practicing. After an hour or so, her playing stirs me from sleep. That's one plus to being a musician: you can sleep through anything.

My tired hand settles over the curve of the mouse. I jiggle it, and my computer screen brightens. A small, red one hovers over the email icon. It occurs to me that for the first time in months, I've gone two whole days without checking it. What a first.

When I scroll through several new emails, one from Friday catches my eye. My brow furrows. It's from Staysberry Academy, a local private school located in a town neighboring Dewhurst. Why would they be contacting me? Heart lodged in my throat, I click to open it.

Dear Ms. Lenoir,

Staysberry Academy is seeking to expand their music program. As such, we are currently looking for two new viola private lessons teachers for our students.

In the upcoming 2022-2023 school year, Staysberry Academy is seeking to expand its string music program for violists and bass players. On May 7, from 10am to 1pm, Staysberry will host a showcase of these instruments and is seeking professional musicians who can perform soloist and small ensemble pieces on the viola and bass. We reached out to your professor, Jonathan Myzan, at the University of Indiana, and he recommended you to play at this function.

I stifle a chuckle. More than likely, Staysberry Academy asked him to perform, but he directed them to me due to a packed schedule. Part of me can't believe he still remembers me, but I suppose he doesn't get as many students as the violin professors. He also put up with me for four years; that probably helped solidify me in his memory.

Please submit a recording of yourself by April 15 to be considered for a performance. No accompaniment parts are required. The following repertoire must be played along with the piece you plan on performing for the function:

One movement from any of the Bach Cello Suites arranged for Viola

The first movement and cadenzas from the Stamitz Viola Concerto in D Major

The third movement of the Bartok Concerto for Viola

We will reach out to you next weekend if you have been selected. All performers will be paid $900 dollars for their performance and may be approached afterward for potentially becoming a new private lesson teacher at our institution. Lesson teachers are paid at a rate of $200 a lesson.

We look forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

Abigail Jackson, Director of the Staysberry Music Program

My jaw falls slack. I reread the final paragraph again and again, trying to compute what it's saying.

Nine-hundred dollars? Nine-hundred whole flipping dollars for three hours of playing? And there's the potential for a job, one that pays more than triple my current rate for lessons. It feels too good to be true.

It has to be too good to be true.

And yet there it is, staring me in the face. A job. My lips break into a grin, and I scroll back up to the audition requirements. I'm ready to leap into action. In fact, the moment Emi finishes her lesson with the kid outside, I'm going to tell her the good news and start practicing.

Except...

I read over the audition requirements again. Bach, Stamitz, and Bartok.

Why is it always Bach, Stamitz, and Bartok? My excitement fizzles out, a sparkling light doused with the bitter waters of reality. How many auditions have I played these exact pieces for, only to never get the job? It's far too many than I'd like to admit, far more than Emi knows. She thinks I just don't try, which is part true, part false. I don't try anymore, but I did try at one point. And what did it get me? Slews of rejection emails lining my inbox.

I don't think I can tell Emi about this, not unless I get the job. At best, I'll get in, and we both celebrate. At worst, I fail.

She doesn't need to know that I've failed yet again.

Lola starts a scale outside, and I cross the room to where a pile of music books lays scattered across the floor. I sort through the pile until I find the Bach Cello Suites and the two concertos. Flopping into my seat, I flip through the faded pages, marked up with silver pencil scratches.

This movement isn't too bad. At least it's short. Do they want repeats? I check the email again. It doesn't specify, but I shouldn't take chances by not doing the repeats.

I move on to the Bartok sheet music. Of course, they picked the hardest movement in the piece for me to play. Just looking at it makes me cringe. It's so ridiculously fast and all over the place, not to mention the fact that I haven't played the third movement in years. To relearn it in a week is kind of insane.

Better get started, that nagging voice in my head says. You're running out of time, and you need this job.

Bite the bullet and start practicing. Once you start, it'll be easier to keep going. If only those nuggets of wisdom still worked on me.

What if you go through all this work with no reward for it? That's the voice I listen to these days, the voice that got me into the financial mess that I'm in, the voice that is sadly always right.

My eyes stray from the music pages to another collection of scores — the Silverenn songs. I set the audition pieces aside, opening up Silverenn's compositions. It's not like I can work on the audition anyway since Emi is teaching for the next nineteen minutes.

I start by going to the Dewhurst Library Database on my computer. A large screen will be a huge help. Next, I download the 1917 map of the town along with the 1915 and 1920 versions. I drag the documents into a three-way split screen. Then, I search. My eyes comb the pages for any differentiations, any additions Silverenn might've added that would be the next clue. I find some differences between the 1915 map and the 1920 map, some between the 1917 and 1920 maps, but none between 1915 and 1917.

Frustration grows inside me. The front door shuts, and quiet settles over the apartment, no longer filled with speech and music. My eyes scrutinize every tiny box, every business and street. The music resumes, this time fainter and more professional sounding. Emi's practicing her part of the Mozart trio we played yesterday in the park.

What I wouldn't give for a pair of noise-canceling headphones. The piece only serves to irritate me further. It's not that Emi's playing is bad — quite the contrary. The problem is that I can't stand to hear those same notes over and over and over and over...

I blink at the tiny gray dot on the 1917 map. Wait a second. My gaze flicks to the 1920 map. The dot isn't there, The dot isn't there, yet another difference between 1917 and 1920. My pulse ticking up ever-so-slightly, desperate with hope, I check the 1915 map.

The dot isn't there. I can hardly believe that I spotted such a miniscule difference between maps. I found the next clue!

But where does it lead to?

I open another tab, splitting my screen four ways to include Google Maps. After going between the three maps, I am able to pinpoint where the gray dot exists in real life. It's located on the shabbier side of town, not too far off from The Silver Queen Train Station. I find it curious that the clue leads us back there. Then again, maybe her operations were in that part of the town.

A few searches later and employing street-view, I get a sense for the shabby warehouse Silverenn pinpointed on the map. The music in the other room pauses, and I take that as my cue to rush next door.

My knuckles rap against Emi's bedroom door, grazing a spot that has chipped white paint. Emi cracks the door a moment later so I can see a sliver of her face. Dark circles hang low under her eyes, her tawny skin puffy with fatigue. Still, she smiles and opens the door wider.

"What's up?" Emi plops onto the stained, white comforter on her bed, holding her violin in her right hand. Her left hand raises a mug of tea to her lips, and she takes a long, refueling sip.

"I found the next location we need to go to." I show her the street-view of the warehouse on my tablet. "Our next clue is in here... somewhere."

Emi frowns, setting her mug down. She dunks her tea bag a few times, making the green liquid slosh up the sides. "I wonder if that could be Silverenn's old warehouse. I remember reading something about that when I was researching her."

"Could be." I squint at it. "If it is, maybe it's open to the public."

"Please," Emi snorts. "That place looks like it's about ready to collapse."

"Seems like we found these scores just in time, then."

"Please tell me you're not thinking what I think you're thinking." Worry laces Emi's soft voice.

"I can't confirm or deny, since I don't know what you're thinking," I say.

"Cerise, we are not breaking into the embodiment of a building code violation. We could die!"

"How else will we get what Silverenn left for us?"

"We don't know what she left for us. It's ridiculous to go traipsing through a building with no direction or guidance!"

Emi's words hang in the air. I take a deep breath, trying to expand my lungs with calm and exhale the tension I'm feeling. She could be right, but I'm not ready to face the idea that we might've just wasted the past few days searching for an unfindable treasure. If all the clues have checked out so far, why not keep going? For the first time in years, my efforts haven't been for nothing. I'm not giving up on this treasure, especially when more and more of our path to it is forming.

"What are we even looking for inside the building?" Emi asks, breaking the silence at last.

"I don't know." My mind circles back to the second part of the clue. I pull up the picture of the Silverenn poem on my tablet.

Behold three notes, four kill the cheer.

"We need to figure out what the three notes are that will 'kill the cheer,'" I say. "I think it might be A, E, and F."

"Why? Is that a common progression?" Emi asks.

"Not really," I say. "It's just the gruppetto turn-arounds. They're only on those three notes." My brow furrows. "The part that confuses me is how we're supposed to get four notes out of three."

"Maybe we're looking for a sharped note, or maybe a flat."

It's a good guess, but another scan of the music tells me it's not quite right. Some of the grupettos happen on naturals, some on flats, some on sharps. There's no definable pattern to it.

My gaze shifts to the upper corner of the ceiling, where it connects with the wall. "Fae. Fea. Feat. Fate. Leaf."

Emi sighs, and in the corner of my eye, I see her head drop into her hand. "What are you doing?"

"Testing out letter combinations. I'm trying to figure out if the three notes could make some sort of word. Efa. Afe. Cafe. Taffe."

"Taffe has an extra letter in it."

"Thank you for that observation," I say sarcastically.

"You need to include more letters unless the answer is Fae."

"No duh." I flop back onto Emi's bed. My tablet screen shines bright light into my eyes as I hold it above me. "Behold three notes, four kill the cheer. What is the fourth note?"

"You know," Emi begins slowly, "it doesn't specify that the four is a fourth note. Maybe it's just another letter in the word. We use the first three notes, A, E, and F to figure out a four letter word with an extra letter attached to it."

My eyes stare at the screen, unblinking for so long, tears blur my vision. I blink, and for a second, the black notes crystallize in the image. I bolt upright, visually tracing the grupetto. "Another letter, like an 's?'"

"Where'd that come from?"

"The gruppetto symbol looks like a horizontal 's.'"

Emi's brow furrows. A moment later, her eyes widen. "Safe?"

I shrug. "It works."

Laughter bursts from her lips, her face taut with incredulity. "Safe is the opposite of everything having to do with Silverenn. Safe is the opposite of this search."

"She did say she was a woman of opposites. And there are more meanings to the word safe. Such as a safe for cash or valuables."

Emi goes still. "Oh, my gosh. Oh my gosh, I think you're right. Inside Silverenn's old warehouse, there must be a safe. Do you think the treasure is inside it?"

I skim the rest of the poem. "We still have several clues left. I doubt it's that simple."

"But we're getting closer. The only question is where the safe is located inside the building."

I continue to read over Silverenn's poem, over and over until the clues form a chant in my head.

Have the root turn with the year. Behold three notes, four kill the cheer.

The path lies within the score. Follow the measures to number four.

Realization dawns. The path to the safe must be in the score.

A chuckle breaks my lips. "Don't worry too much, Emi. I think Silverenn may have left us a map to it... in the next score."