Two-Part Inventions Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Overture

  Part 1

  Part 2

  Part 3

  Part 4

  Author’s Note

  Copyright Page

  Overture

  THE HIGH PIERCING WAIL reached him even before he got to the front door, so jarring that he dropped his keys on the flagstones. The wail sounded like a small creature being tortured, a bird, maybe. A demented form of birdsong. But there was no pause for breath or change in tone, no hint of sputtering life. The shriek kept up at that bizarrely high pitch, the far end of the keyboard, while he fumbled at the door and finally rushed inside, dropping his briefcase and laptop on the shelf in the front hall.

  Where was she? It couldn’t be Suzanne. It wasn’t a human sound. He followed it through the living room, past the grand piano with open sheets of music—Bartók, Poulenc, Stravinsky, he registered automatically—and into the kitchen, where billows of steam seethed and rose in clumps from the red teapot, already forming cloudy patches on the tiles behind it. He tripped over her body, stretched out flat on the floor, on her back. She looked like a ballerina who falls back in a firm, elegant line, confident that her cavalier will be there to break her fall and propel her on to her next step. But no one had been there to catch her. Before he knelt to see if Suzanne was still breathing, he stepped over her to turn off the flame under the screeching pot.

  No breath, no pulse. This couldn’t be. It was simply impossible. They had plans.... He had plans. Should he call for help? It was too late. And yet her face and hands were still warm. She couldn’t have been lying there long; there was still water in the pot. The empty mug was on the counter, the one she liked, with the picture of Mozart, given to her, half-jokingly, by the director of the Vienna Conservatory when they visited a few years ago. A potholder lay near her on the floor. He stroked her face, as if he could bring her back to life, as if there were a grace period after death—ten minutes, fifteen minutes, and the loved one might return. But that didn’t happen.

  He had to do something, call someone. But he couldn’t, not just yet. How could he even speak? And they would come and take her, and he couldn’t let her go yet. His throat tightened with tears but he held them back; he hated to cry. Years ago, as a boy, he had once cried every night for weeks, then stopped abruptly and vowed never again to be so defeated. He held her large limp right hand in his, studying the long pianist’s fingers, the carefully trimmed nails, short so as not to click on the keys, then placed it on the floor. If only he had gotten home ten minutes earlier, if only he hadn’t made that last phone call from his studio to a new client—useless anyway, he’d left a message—if not for the interminable construction on the Thruway, he might have saved her, at least gotten help. What a cruel offense, he thought, that the last sound she heard was that dreadful screech. She with her musician’s ears, her hatred of harsh invasive noises. In their apartment in the city in the early days, before they could afford this house, before together they began producing the CDs that made her reputation, she’d complained of the car alarms that punctured the dead of night, their maddening repetitive tuneless tunes and whines, as well as the police sirens and fire engines—they’d lived around the corner from a firehouse. They go right up my spine, she used to say, they’re zapping my brain cells. She was awakened every Wednesday and Saturday at six thirty by the garbage truck under their window—audible even over the hum of the air conditioner in summer—the sound of the heavy bags being tossed into the truck’s maw and crunched by its fierce teeth.

  Sensitive ears. Small ears. He used to joke about her ears, so small and delicate. How could they hear so much, he’d ask, running his fingers along the rim. He ran his finger along her ear, still warm, then sat down on the floor beside her. What would he do now? He had made her ambition his life’s work. What was left to do?

  A New York Times was on a kitchen chair. She must have been about to read it while she had her tea. She never read the paper in the morning; it distracted her from practicing, she said. Late in the day, when she was done, she would sit down with the paper or a book before she started dinner. Now, as always, she liked to cook. Years ago, in the dark years of her despair, she had learned to cook elaborate dishes—she found companionship with Julia Child—simply to do something with her restless hands, and at last when the despair passed (because he found a way to lure her out of it, Philip liked to think), the habit of cooking remained.

  The headline in the paper was about the election fiasco. The Supreme Court had declared George Bush the winner, even though he most likely was not. They’d heard the news together on the radio that morning, Suzanne wrapped in a towel, just out of the shower, still so beautiful. The perfect skin and willowy shape, with a faint middle-aged droop to her body that he found irresistible. They were both angry and indignant, though only Suzanne was surprised. Philip had predicted the outcome. “How can they do it?” Suzanne asked. “How can they allow such an injustice? It’s . . . it’s a fraud. Pure fraud. We’ll be calling him President but Gore had the votes. Everyone knows that.”

  “That’s the way the world goes, sweetheart,” he said, lacing up his shoes. “You of all people should know that.” Those were almost the last words he’d spoken to her. He’d meant to call during the day, but things were so busy in the studio, a group working on a recording of the Archduke Trio, at it for hours, no break, sandwiches brought in at four, that he hadn’t had a chance. Now the words scraped the inside of his skull. That’s the way the world goes. You of all people should know that. He hoped those weren’t the words she took with her to her death. He hoped she’d forgotten them. He hoped she’d forgotten their last argument, too, over a week ago; the memory was still raw. There had been a few days of coolness, but she couldn’t keep it up. Though quiet and wary with new people, at home she was talkative, more and more as she got older. She spent much time alone, and in the evening she liked to tell him every small thing that had happened during the day. She talked most when things were going well; her reserve was saved for times of wretchedness—she had always been that way, even back in high school, where they had met. After the first few cool days, things were gradually returning to normal. Or so he hoped. She must be getting used to the idea, he thought, the matter they had argued over, and seen that it was the reasonable next step. Now he’d never know for sure.

  The following weeks were a vast, gray-skied prairie of grief Philip Markon imagined he might be traversing forever. But in the emptiness of the landscape, broken only by work deadlines—there was no letting things go in the recording business—and by the buzzing of reporters’ calls and emails, buzzards picking at the remains, he found a tiny place of shelter, like a prairie dog burrowing into an underground hole. Maybe this premature death—she was just fifty, a stroke, the doctors said, which might have left her partially paralyzed had she survived it—was lucky for Suzanne. She would not have to face the speculations—more than speculations, if he was candid—that had begun on the music websites. The same sites that had raved about her talents, Half-Note, Andante, Platinum, now were releasing a flurry of nastiness about her recordings that could grow into a blizzard as the zealots gathered their electronic evidence. Every day the computer programs became more sophisticated, able to compare speeds and pressures and dynamics, identifying performances and passages, printing the data as if they were running a corporation rather than dealing with an ineffable art and volatile artists. The technicians were glued to their consoles, and the critics, armed with the retrieved data, would have plenty to fill their columns and blogs. How they would gloat at destroying a reputation. How stunned their readers would be. No matter that he and Suzanne had worked so hard—he, espec
ially, had worked so hard—to win her the recognition she’d spent years struggling for, that she deserved. She wouldn’t have had the strength to withstand the ugly publicity, the notoriety that was sure to grow. Her strength was in her hands, in her wrists and arms, in her ear. There she possessed might and endurance. Otherwise she was naive, easily bruised, an innocent. He, on the other hand, was prepared for any kind of assault, any crude online chatter. Whatever his business might suffer, he could handle it. He was hard. Nothing could touch him. He was impervious, his defenses constructed in early childhood.

  In those weeks after her death the phone rang so often that he was tempted to hurl it against a wall. He let the machine take the calls, and he returned hardly any, except those from close friends or family, certainly not the ones from music bloggers blandly offering condolences and hoping he’d answer just a few questions. He persuaded himself that he was impenetrable, and that was almost true when it came to the rumor-mongers, the pedantic technicians chiming in with their numbers and statistics. None of it mattered now: Suzanne was gone, the CDs were over, there would be no new ones. (Not that he wouldn’t release the last, almost finished one, just a little more editing on the final mix.) He saved the messages, though; there might come a time when he’d want to answer them or need them to defend himself. For the time being he had nothing to say; he’d stonewall, and it would all pass. Fortunately, the obituary in the Times (“World-Class Pianist Known by Few”) was nothing but admiring and respectful.

  Of course, those obituaries were written well in advance. Weird, wasn’t it, he mused, to think that all the famous people walking around were already memorialized in the files of the Times, where the obits sat waiting for them to kick off. Then the people would be dead and the obits would come to life. Some intern must be assigned to keeping them up-to-date, like a hospital’s life-support system. Well, that intern hadn’t caught up with the online chatter about Suzanne, which started a week or so after her death. Most likely it was her death that got the serious listeners worked up again, though there’d been an earlier query or two, a few puzzled comments, on a couple of the websites. Nothing to worry about, he’d thought at the time. Naturally, he never mentioned anything to Suzanne. Now the rumors had slithered through the web—never had that designation, web, seemed so maddeningly apt—though the slower-moving newspaper of record had not yet caught up.

  Despite his relief that Suzanne didn’t have to face these insinuations—accusations, really—now and then came a creeping suspicion that she might have enjoyed the notoriety. He thought he had known her thoroughly, but you never know anyone thoroughly, do you? Even a wife or lover. Especially a wife or lover. Who knew him, for instance? No one. Suzanne had impeccable manners, the graciousness of a born aristocrat (where this came from was anyone’s guess, certainly not her family). But he had seen her angry, and he knew how her will could harden. He had also seen her in moods of abject passivity—the obverse of her despotic ambition. He was the only one who had seen that in its raw state and it was awesome. Perhaps in some people the desire for renown—which luckily did not burden him—didn’t distinguish between praise and opprobrium. Perhaps it was simply the name in the papers, or now on the Internet, that mattered.

  But no, he couldn’t seriously think that. Her passion for music was so genuine and intense; she wouldn’t have wanted to be seen as in any way subverting what she loved. He still wasn’t sure how much she had known or suspected all along—except for that dreadful night last week, they hardly discussed the recordings once they were done—or how surprised she would have been at the lengths he’d gone to on her behalf. She had taken her knowledge or ignorance to the grave, or rather to the flames she told him years ago she would prefer, like her father.

  Before long, he trusted, the right moment would come: He would find the means to clear her name, and his own as well. As soon as he recovered from the shock of her death. He could construct a story, a spin that would shift the interpretation of the whole affair.

  He’d gotten in the habit, in those first few weeks, of checking the music sites, just in case. It was difficult to remain impervious when one afternoon, clicking from link to link, he came upon the interview with Elena in Andante. Elena, of all people. Anything for free publicity, he thought, yet it wasn’t as if she needed it. She was doing a series of concerts at the Ninety-second Street Y this winter, and next fall at the Metropolitan Museum; her photo was splashed all over their brochures, still glamorous, the long blond hair swept back from her face, the stark, dark clothes, the aloof, intimidating look she affected for the camera. She had all the fame she could hope for, not to mention the financier husband and the Park Avenue apartment, but it was still not enough. And there was that semi--scandal linking her and her stepfather, which she sailed through until the rumors passed. But with all that, she had to exploit Suzanne’s death, too.

  He really shouldn’t be surprised, he thought, going to the kitchen for some bourbon before he faced the screen. He must bear in mind that it wasn’t really about Suzanne. Elena had had a grudge against him ever since he dropped her way back in high school. Christ, imagine a woman still clutching a rejection from over thirty years ago. Hell hath no fury, as the saying went.... They were practically children, playing at a teenage romance that lasted no more than a couple of months, if that; he could barely remember. He never slept with her—he would have remembered that—and a good thing, too, though at the time it was galling. She must have had plenty of experience back in the Soviet Union, so why shouldn’t he get some, too, was his attitude. But there was never an opportunity. Her mother was always in the apartment, a skinny woman with wild fuzzy black hair and witchy makeup—chalky face, mauve lips. Elena told him the mother was a translator but she didn’t speak much English to Phil, only grunts and frowns that made it clear he wasn’t welcome. He should never have taken up with Elena, she wasn’t his type at all, overconfident, full of herself, but he’d felt sorry for her at first. The new girl in the special high school, with her peculiar English, just arrived from the Soviet Union, where her life couldn’t have been a picnic. She must be lonely, bewildered, or so he thought. He wanted to help. It wasn’t long before he saw she was ready to use him in any way she could. That was the turnoff.

  It was inevitable, in their work, that they would meet on and off over the years, always cordially, if not quite as friends. She’d been Suzanne’s friend later on, at Juilliard, but not for long afterward. And now here she was online; when he clicked, bourbon in hand, the darkened screen lit up to show a large photo in living color, to accompany her Q & A with the unctuous interviewer from Andante. It would appear in the print version as well, the introduction said. Oh, terrific. Well, he’d ride it out as he had the others. The classical-music world was minuscule, really. It wasn’t as if he couldn’t go out of the house without being accosted like a rock star. He must remember how small and ingrown this world was, how few people cared about classical music or musicians. And even fewer gave a damn about the technical side—a few bars, or a movement borrowed here or there, would hardly make a banner headline, like the election of a phony president.

  No doubt Elena, with her grudge against him, would make Suzanne out to be his victim, the deluded innocent. Well, innocence and delusions aside, any sensible person could see how loyal and devoted he’d been, how he’d done everything feasible to get her what she needed and deserved. They should be applauding him, not making practically libelous insinuations. Even Suzanne, until her dying day, had been delighted with the recordings, at least until quite recently. She’d been willing, more than willing, ready and eager, to do the phone and online interviews he arranged and to say what he suggested she say. When it comes to their background, he used to tell her, all artists tinker with the facts a little bit; it makes for a more intriguing story. So you say you studied in Paris with Nadia Boulanger or at Juilliard with Olga Samaroff, drop a few famous names. They’re dead anyway, what does it matter? It’s the music that matters, and the music
we don’t tinker with. We do everything to make it come out true and pure and perfect.

  “That’s correct, I was a close friend,” the text of Elena’s replies began, “and yes, we did meet when we were very young, at the High School of Music and Art in New York City, back when it was located uptown near City College. I was a newcomer, I’d just arrived from the Soviet Union with my mother, and Suzanne was kind to me.”

  Kind to her! Phil took a long swig from the bourbon and water. Suzanne? After a few weeks Suzanne became furious with Elena and didn’t speak to her for the remainder of high school. She was nothing if not tenacious, and she, too, could hold a grudge. He was the one who was kind. Elena had managed to revise all that ancient history. Maybe she’d even convinced herself that her version was true.

  “She intrigued me, her silences, then sometimes her exuberance. I could tell even then she was an extraordinary talent, even though she was modest about it in public. But she knew her worth.”

  “It’s hard getting accurate information about her past.” This from the interviewer. “There are so many different stories circulating, from the various interviews she gave. She’s something of a mystery, isn’t she? I mean, after those concerts in her twenties she stopped performing in public and was pretty much forgotten, and then years later those amazing CDs appeared. So what was she like back then?”

  “Well, once you got to know her she could be very lively, enthusiastic. Fun to be with. But even so, there was something reserved about her. Kind of wary. It wasn’t so much mysterious, I think, as that she was a trifle shy, hesitant. She didn’t have the temperament of a performer, you know, thick-skinned, outgoing, you could even say aggressive, though she definitely wanted the rewards those traits bring. She was quite striking to look at, I don’t think she knew how striking: great dark eyes, olive skin, that unruly mass of hair flying around when she played. She was tall and thin and affected an arty look that was in style then, you know—or maybe you don’t—the black turtlenecks and dangling earrings, ragged jeans. Anyway, she was certainly one of the most talented, and fantastically ambitious, I realized when I got to know her. Yet kind of an innocent in some ways. I mean naive about the world. But as far as music, she knew exactly how good she was. Later we were students together at Juilliard and there, too, she stood out. We had a fantastic group of pianists, Emanuel Ax, Garrick Ohlsson, other names you’d recognize, but everyone knew she was outstanding. She was a born musician; she only needed to hone the technique.”