A Certain Music Read online

  From the fork in the tree she stared into a filigree of branches, traced webs that spiders spin like Frau Neumann's lace work. She looked towards Rauhenstein blanketed in mist, watched carts trundling into the marketplace, the toing and froing of vendors across the square.

  She jumped down. The earth made a squishing sound beneath her boots while above, the sky hung heavy with cloud.

  She started out, though now the houses with long windows, where boxes of flowers stood and chimneys poked from rooftops, were carved in her memory. Once again the door to his house was open. The sound coming from it seemed to fill the street.

  'I performed this when I was seven and a half,' the man shouted. The child came closer. 'In a place with walls of mirrors. The Elector of Cologne was there, imagine that!'

  The child grinned.

  Along the street people were running. The man jumped up. 'I too must feel the air against my skin; rejoice in the wonders of God's garden! ... Let the devil play what he will ... '

  The child heard the last mumbled words but their meaning was lost to her. She watched as the man whipped up his frockcoat and hat and charged to the door.

  Along the street people were running, but it wasn't to rejoice in God's garden. A man had fallen under the wheels of a carriage and been crushed to death. The crowd had blocked the road. Someone was attempting to calm the horses.

  'He was driving like a madman,' yelled a voice.

  'Poor thing had no hope.'

  A woman was being pushed to the front. The crowd went silent. All was quiet but for the scream.

  The man saw but heard nothing. The child wondered if it would be worse or better to see such a thing and not to hear it. She studied the hand, hanging beneath a grubby frill at her side. How strange it is, she thought, for hands to make sounds like that and look like everybody else's.

  She tugged gently on the thumb and the man moved away.

  In tangles of mist they walked towards the woods and through the woods where the mist was thick and the only sound the squelching of boots in damp earth. And as they went the child slipped her hand into the pocket of the frockcoat by her side.

  In that way and in silence they went ...

  Eleven

  At the window the child stood, watched drops like pellets fall from the roof, drip upon puddles; heard the rhythm of the rain.

  A horse pulling a cart clip-clopped by; spray rose and hissed ...

  She set about sweeping the floor and fixing her bed. She checked the pail her mother had left outside the door. There was water enough to wash the dishes – also a cloth or two and a few things of her own. She hummed to herself as she went about her chores. Then she took her coat from its peg, wound a scarf around her head and set out.

  Over puddles she jumped, splashed into others, flicked rain from her nose. Came to the square, watched rain splatter on covered caravans and carts and people in hoods hurry this way and that with their heads down.

  She skipped on, crossed the tiny parkland where a flock of waterbirds had gathered, and turned into the Reinerstrasse.

  She could hear sound coming from the house before she reached it, and as she got closer it grew louder and louder; it swept into the street and through the street as though it would rise to the very heavens and send stars crashing to earth.

  The child huddled by a neighbour's wall, heard screaming, smashing, the thundering of boots on wood – him.

  ' ... Copy the score exactly, I said. As I have written it down, I said. And the fools and idiots have done the opposite. They've done it on purpose. Yes, the treacherous dogs, they have done it on purpose! That I have to deal with such imbeciles, such cretins and half-wits!' Something smashed. 'Music? They know nothing of music! How can one describe beauty to barbarians! If it's not copied exactly, exactly, as I wrote it, the speed will not be right. And if the speed is not right – Oh God, God, must I suffer this ignominy ... It is because of the singing. Yes. They fear it as they fear anything that is not tried and familiar and predictable. As the swine in the sty knows nothing more than its feed and its filth and the stench of its own excrement ...'

  Now in the street, wind was blowing, People clung to shawls and hats. Leaves rose and fell swirling to their gutter graves. Suddenly the door to the house, which had been ajar, blew open. The child listened, heard nothing. She moved closer.

  The man was standing in a mess of clothes and food and papers and smashed china. Suddenly he swung around and charged at the child, his eyes wild with torment. 'Get out!' he screamed. 'Away from me! What are you, some devil sent to haunt me, to drive me mad! Out of my sight, do you hear. What would you know of beauty ... I tell you, get out! Out! Out of my sight!'

  The child stepped back, tripped, fell, scrambled up, slumped against rough brick, pulled her coat tighter, heard her breath, the beat of her heart.

  Long she stood, and stared into the cobblestone street, saw the man rush from the house without his coat ...

  She tried to think of what to do and where to go. But all she could hear was a voice screaming, 'Out! Out of my sight!' She was bewildered, she couldn't understand it. But strangely, what she felt was not fear. Only confusion.

  A pebble whizzed by her head. Raggedy boys from the Volkschule, like tigers, were prowling ... The child pressed her head to the brickwork, felt a presence ...

  The man stood there. His hair, his shirt, were wet. 'Ah,' he murmured, 'I have made you cry. I'm sorry ... I am mad, you see. Brutal.' He moved closer, drew a finger across the small cheek, wiped away a tear, 'A child is precious, eine kleine Blume – a little flower ... You must blame my head, the ringing in my ears that drives me mad ... And the other. Always the other ... I'm sorry, I'm sorry ... '

  He moved towards his door, then turned and beckoned. 'Come,' he said. 'I will make you forgive me.'

  In the room shards of china and ripped sheets of manuscript rose at the kick of his boot. The child followed.

  He drew the small table that held his 'conversation book' into the centre of the clutter, set a chair at it and began rummaging through the debris for his coat that was lying on the floor. 'Here,' he cheered, and held up a block of chocolate, which he began breaking into bits. 'Like a princess, you shall sit and eat, and I shall play for you.'

  The child sat and ate.

  'I shall play my "Ode to Joy",' announced the man. Then, 'Tell me, what is an ode?'

  The child shook her head.

  'A poem. Or song. If one is to eat chocolate one must learn a new word. That is the rule.'

  He began to play.

  The child paused in her eating. This sound was different again. And joy was the right, the perfect word, to picture it. To the child it was as though all the things that make for happiness had been put into a bottle; the cork pulled, and they had exploded upon the world.

  The man turned in his playing. 'Well?'

  The child nodded. 'Yes,' she mouthed.

  The man started to play again, but suddenly there was a knock at the door. He got up. In the pale sunshine that now coloured the street, the man and his visitor talked.

  The child contemplated the mess. She got up. A bowl had been broken and a plate. She collected the pieces and took them into the kitchen, where food and the remains of meals lay unwashed and congealing. Untouched on a plate were slices of ham, cheese and pickle.

  She returned to the room, picked up bits of food that were lying on the floor, everything except the papers stamped with the strange markings. She shook out the frockcoat and hat and hung them on a peg in the small bedroom. The room smelt. The covers on the bed dripped to the floor and the chamber pot was full.

  Had she been on her own she would have emptied it. She would have drawn water from the pump in the street and cleaned up the kitchen.

  On the sideboard a candle was stuttering. It had burnt to the wick, and grease had spilled onto the floor. As she blew it out the man came in.

  He didn't seem to notice the change in the room but held up six fingers. 'Six weeks,' he sa
id. 'They have six weeks to get it right. I, on the other hand, have got it right already.' He grinned. The child grinned back and pointed to the plate of food she'd brought from the kitchen.

  'When I am working I forget to eat.'The man sifted through papers strewn across the floor. 'They say no singing, but are they right?' He straightened up. 'Are they right?'

  The child shook her head.

  There came a roar of laughter. 'You're a strange little flower, yet you know things – things only old people know, and wise ones too. Where does this wisdom come from? What is your secret? What of your parents? Does your mother play?'

  The child shook her head.

  'Sing?'

  Another shake of the head.

  'Your father?'

  The child went to the conversation book. 'With the army,' she wrote.

  'I think –' the man paused, 'I think that you will bring me luck.' He moved closer, she could taste his breath.

  'This is the first time ever that there will be voices. There will be a choir. And not only a choir – singers on their own. Four of them. Two on one side and two on the other. What do you think? Am I mad?'

  The child shook her head.

  'Should there be singing?'

  The child nodded hard.

  'And so there shall be! There shall be singing, and dancing too!' With that the man leapt to his feet, grabbed the child by the hands and whirled her around and around the room, and together they laughed and whirled and whirled and laughed and the man sang of a song to joy and the child with him ...

  Twelve

  The child danced on. Watched a winter sun slip behind the factory wall, saw the workers in twos and threes and in small groups cross the windswept yard to the main gate. In her heart the dancing paled as she observed how they gestured to each other and kept their voices down.

  'Frau Schultz has died,' whispered her mother, 'and they feel anxious.'

  In silence they walked in the direction of the square. From time to time the woman stopped, leaned against a fence and spat onto cobblestone. Then, 'She will be buried tomorrow,' she said.

  'You don't have to go ... '

  'Everyone will. Tomorrow we close early.'

  'It's too far.'

  'I'll go slowly.'

  The child stamped on dead leaves, crunched them underfoot. 'I'll come too,' she said.

  'It's not a place for children.'

  'I'll wait outside.'

  They walked on, huddled together like seabirds against the wind.

  'Papa tells me he has sent you a story about a squirrel,' the woman remarked.

  'There's a letter?'

  'Yes.'

  'Is he happy?'

  There was a pause.

  'What?'

  'He has a rash.'

  'Where?'

  'It's worse on his legs ... It could be the dyes in his uniform ... '

  'The lime –?'

  'No, not lime.'

  'Has he told?' asks the child.

  'That may not be a good idea,' her mother replies. 'In any case it's getting better.'

  They continued on through the square, then turned into the street by the granary.

  The woman said, 'And what did your music man play for you today?'

  'His "Ode to Joy".'

  'Goodness.'

  They reached the small paling fence that enclosed the giant conifer.

  'This is the very first time there'll be singing with – with ... ' The child stopped.

  'With joy?'

  'With the music.'

  The woman smiled. 'There's always been singing with piano, with violin.'

  'It's different.'

  'How?'

  'I don't know.'

  'Is he happy being different?' enquired the woman as she clicked open the gate.

  'He's frightened,' replied the child. And walked in.

  Thirteen

  The following morning was thick with cloud. By late afternoon rain was sweeping in over the hills on the outskirts of the town.

  The workers gathered in the square, the women in black with thick shawls and hoods. They stood in silence and tight together; watched rain pitter-patter on the hearse with its wooden box. Black plumes rose and dipped as horses tossed their heads this way and that.

  The child took her mother's hand as the carriage moved off. The mourners followed. Along the path and up the hill to the churchyard they toiled.

  From time to time the woman would stop and lean on the child until her breath became easier.

  By the time they reached the churchyard the squalls had been blown far from the hills and a sallow sun was edging its rays through cloud.

  The child watched the women shake their skirts, remove their hoods and follow the box, balanced on the shoulders of four men in mourning dress, into the church.

  'I'll wait here,' the child whispered. And added, 'It's all right.'

  At the door two women were beckoning. She watched her mother join them, and go in.

  She looked around. What she saw reminded her of a painting she'd seen on the wall of a schoolroom, or perhaps imagined that she had. She put her hands to her face, made a hollow square, peered through the frame, saw a church with a bell tower, crosses and angels growing from tangles of grass, trees that spread their branches over dead people in marble.

  She moved the frame to the left, watched two birds flit from branch to branch of a spreading oak.

  This, thought the child, was what the man meant when he wrote his 'Ode to Joy'. This is what he must have seen and felt.

  It was that beautiful.

  She began to move, to lift her head, to spread her arms, to rise up ...

  On the gravestones she danced, and as she turned and swirled she sang the song of joy the man had sung in the house along the Reinerstrasse. She had recalled every note without trying or intending to.

  Suddenly she stopped. Someone had entered the space.

  The child slipped behind a tree and peered out. A woman was standing by a mound of earth. She stood still. There was no sound, no movement, but for a cheeky bird that was hopping backwards and forwards on the chipped wing of an angel.

  The child studied the woman. She had seen her before. But where? And then she remembered the scream. And a leg lying under the wheel of a coach.

  To the left and to the right, blooms of every colour and shape drooped from marble urns, though in one the flowers were fresh.

  Quietly the child dropped to her knees, drew buds of blue and pink, of purple and gold from the urn. Untied a ribbon that held one of her braids and wound it around the stems.

  Just as quietly she approached the grassy mound at which the woman was standing and held out the posy. Eyes stared at the flowers, at the child. A hand reached out. 'Danke,' a voice murmured.

  Now came movement. People were spilling out of the church and a bell had begun to toll.

  The woman at the mound glanced up, around and began to hurry back along the path.

  Dusk was falling as the group from the factory debated whether to stay for the burial or leave. They moved away.

  'Are you all right?' The child took her mother's hand, stared into a face the colour of unbaked bread, felt her hand being squeezed.

  'Why are some of the graves not covered in stone?' she asked.

  'They're probably new and it's still being cut,' replied a woman called Lotti.

  'Or the family can't afford it,' chimed in another.

  'Look,' cried a third. 'Someone's left a bunch of flowers on that one.'

  In the failing light they moved towards the path.

  'It's better going downhill,' whispered the child.

  'You've lost a ribbon,' her mother replied.

  Fourteen

  She had gone back to school. The child had promised to, and had crossed her heart.

  But now it was different. She had a secret. Something that kept her warm and secure, that wrapped her tight in a turtle shell ... Of course the whispering, the taunting, the small cruelties w
ent on, but not to the same degree. They were losing interest, the panic they read in her eyes when she got it wrong, when she misinterpreted the signals, simply wasn't as it once was. And where is the fun in ridiculing someone because they can't play by the rules, if they don't want to join in anyway?

  Added to that the child had a skill for which she was noticed. It was her memory. She could add and subtract faster than anyone. As with her letters, she didn't know how she got there, or what everything meant, she just could do it.

  And those who mocked studied her for a response and found, in her eyes, something they couldn't read.

  Neither did she spend the time she once did listening to the sounds that whispered in the fountain and in the needles of the conifer. Of these she was aware, and would always be, but of a far greater importance now was the man at the house in the Reinerstrasse and the sounds he made.

  At the end of lessons there would be time to hear some, maybe even the 'Ode to Joy', and if she ran she'd still be able to walk her mother home ...

  As for the man himself, she had learnt whether or not it was wise to remain out of sight, at the door, slip away. Or stay to dance.

  The music would tell her ...

  Fifteen

  It was Sunday. Sunlight seeped across the floor, painting clothes and shoes and skins of fruit the colour of buttermilk. The child would see to the mess. She had been doing so for some time though the man said nothing. He didn't seem to notice that the chamber pot had been emptied, the bed made and the dishes washed. Though once, as she was packing up, he remarked, 'Most lasted no more than a week.'

  Who were 'most'? And why did they not last? The child considered this. She thought of the women at the factory who feared the lime (remember Frau Schultz?); yet they stayed. That sickness came from dirt and things that smelled bad, she knew. That wasn't it. It was his difference that most feared ...

  The man was still flapping his arms and crowing. 'Forty-six strings will raise the roof beams!' He split into a laugh. 'They think I'm mad. There was a tugging of beards and a great grumbling, but they can laugh all they like, there can be no compromise. The music will not allow it. It's like this –' Papers fluttered to the floor as he began to sketch.