A Certain Music (2 page)

They talked together by the rustling conifer, away from the child. When they came inside her mother looked older, her father, unhappy. Eggs were eaten in silence and the world grew dark.

In her trundle bed by the window the child feigned sleep, listened with ears pricked to the muffled sounds that came from the big bed. From time to time her mother would cough hard and long and spit into a handkerchief. 'The fibres get up your nose,' she'd laugh. Though how fibres could get up your nose was a mystery to the child, regardless of what work in the paper-making factory her mother was doing.

'You should never have left the forge...' her mother was saying.

'Bad company –' she heard her father mumble.

'You were weak.'

'I'm sorry.'

Her mother went on. 'A clerk's pay is hard to live on, but with mine and the few Kreutzers you get at the tavern we could manage, just. But now ... '

'I'm sorry.'

'They will not get away with this ... '

'It was my fault.'

'It was. But they knew what they were doing –' There came another bout of coughing and spitting. The child pulled the coverlet over her ears. She didn't want to hear any more. This was a place of love. Her mother and father loved each other and they loved her equally. But another face of the world had been brought in ...

Suddenly she heard the mattress creak. Her mother was getting up, had taken her shawl from the doorknob and was creeping out.

'Where are you going?' came from the bed.

The only reply was that of the door being shut.

From her trundle bed, the child, eyes watching and wide, stared from the window into the night. Like a genie who pops from a bottle to cast a spell, so the moon, now full, had cast a spell over the night and stamped the world in silver. Silver flowers in silver pots spilled from silver windows. The rooftops, and trees beyond, Herr Neumann's dog asleep at his door, the filigree of fruit trees – all shone in silver. And above the tree-tops, stars twinkled in a silver sky.

It was magic. She would have sneaked outside, but eyes from the big bed were awake and watching.

She studied fingers resting on the sill that had turned silver and listened for her mother.

The woman whipped the shawl around her head and
took off. She reached the marketplace, now bare of
traders, stalls and caravans, of all but the column with its
shimmering star and cross of gold. She hurried through
the square, and along streets where shadows leered with
menace in the moonlight. As she turned a corner she
could see an orange glow and, as she got closer, hear the
hum of noise. She pushed open the mitred door and
entered into a haze of smoke, and the smell of bodies
and cheap wine.

The tavern was filled with men mostly but woman too joined in the laughter and the banging of fists on tables. Someone on the stage was attempting to sing.

'Hey, over here.'

'No.'

'Uppity, eh?'

She pushed ahead. The man behind the bar wore a rag around a neck thick as that of a bullfrog.

'Next?'

'How dare you –' Her voice was trembling.

'What?'

'You knew his weakness yet you paid him in wine ... ' Her voice was getting stronger, clearer. People at the bar were staring.

She went on, her sound strong now, 'Shame on you ... You get the wine cheap and the more he takes the less you pay and you ply him with more so you can pay him less; no more than you would pay a dog to do tricks ... '

Suddenly the whole place had become silent.

'Shame on you.' The woman swung around. 'Shame on all of you for you know him, but you watched and said nothing. Yet you listened. Oh yes, you did that. For who among you can quote Schiller and Goethe as Otto can? None of you. And you know it. You know it as you know his weakness, and you did nothing. Shame on you – on all of you...' The woman broke into a fit of coughing. She staggered towards the door as bodies parted to let her through.

'He wanted it!' yelled the man at the bar.

On the street, the woman sobbed. She drew her shawl tighter and started back. At the corner she heard the sound of footsteps behind her. She went faster. The footsteps went faster, were catching up.

'Wait!'

Her heart was thumping inside her chest, but she turned and saw, coming closer, the man who had opened the door as she fled.

'The army is recruiting,' he said. 'In the wars against Napoleon we lost many. The pay is good and –' he paused, 'there is discipline.'

The woman stood in the watery glow of a gas lamp and hung her head.

'Otto is a lucky man,' he added.

'Oh?'

'To have a woman like you.'The man gave a quick bow and walked back along the street.

In the cottage by the granary the child heard the gate click open. She pulled the coverlet up and fell asleep.

The day was the colour of butter. Perfect for being with someone whose hand you can hold and hear street musicians play melodies you tap your feet to.

When they got to the cafe in the Kaiserstrasse the players were having a break.

They sat outside and ate cake. The child dropped crumbs.

'The birds will thank you,' remarked her father. He pulled his seat closer. 'I am going away,' he said.

The child turned, questioning with her eyes.

'You shall be very proud of me. You can tell everyone that your papa is in the army, that he wears a jacket with gold buttons. He looks very handsome in his jacket with gold buttons and –' the man breathed deeply, 'he is happy for he is serving his country which he loves and making his wife and his daughter proud which makes him happier, for he loves them best of all.'

The child tossed cake to a head-bobbing bird. 'When?' she asked.

'Soon.'

'When's soon?'

'The army will teach me things,' her father continued. 'Things I have forgotten that are important. Like the things that you are taught in school are important.'

The child continued to toss crumbs.

The man paused, then, 'When your mother leaves for the factory she believes you are leaving for school. But she is not always right, is she?'

The child is silent.

'The authorities have been to the house. It is the law that you attend the Volkschule until you are ten so that you will continue to learn your letters and numbers.'

'I know my letters and numbers.'

'There are things to learn besides letters and numbers ... Just think, you and me, both in places where we are learning things. What a happy thought. Every day we shall think of each other and of the new things we are learning ... Imagine that! Think too,
Liebling
, of your mother who worries.'

The musicians had returned and were tuning up.

'The school is on holiday now,' the man pointed out, 'but when it goes back, you will attend. Yes?'

'Yes.'

'Every day?'

'Yes.'

'You say yes but –'

'I promise.'

The quartet had launched into a waltz.

'You are strong,' whispered the man, 'like your mother. You have a beautiful mind, which is a rare thing. And I love you.'

With hands that dropped crumbs the child reached for her father and buried her face in his neck.

Today there was much for the man to do, so when the players were having their next break, father and daughter walked off, one to the clerk's office, the other to the woods.

In the Vienna Woods the maples, the oaks, the elms and the beeches were heralding the march of winter as the last of their leaves twirled like dancers to the ground.

Today many people were about. They strolled across the grass or sat on rugs under trees with baskets of cheese and wine ... From the fork in the tree the child watched the comings and goings of carts carrying families of picnickers, and here and there a carriage with fine ladies and men in silk hats would wind along a forest drive. Her eye caught something moving in the distance. It was a funeral. She had observed one before. She loved the black horses with the plumes on their heads that nodded and bowed as they plodded up the hill to the churchyard. This funeral was small, only a handful of people walked behind the carriage draped in black. The child wondered why sad things should look so beautiful.

A hare scuttled by as she jumped to the ground. She wandered on, leapt to catch the dead leaves that rose with the kick of her boot. They crackled underfoot like the sound of rifle fire and an image rose of jackets with gold buttons.

The sun had brought the world out on this festive day. This way and that ladies and gentlemen strolled arm in arm, children in dresses ran with hoops, men in uniform clopped along on horseback, carriages rolled, carts rattled, and from somewhere came the sound of marching music. People were moving in that direction.

The child went the other way. There were many ways to get to the cottage by the granary and taking this route she could play games as she went, asking herself who lived in what house, who they lived with and what – at that moment of passing – they were doing.

The first street she took was empty. She walked on, past houses with long windows, where chimneys poked from rooftops and boxes with flowers stood at the door. Suddenly she stopped. The house was like any other, but coming from it was the most beautiful sound she had ever heard. It wasn't like that of the wind in the conifer, or the bubble of water in the fountain. The sound conjured up no image. She only heard the music.

The door was open. She peered inside.

The man seated at the piano was the man in the woods with the wild hair. Suddenly he stopped, picked up his pencil, marked a page and played on. Again he stopped, looked left and right for the pencil, but it had dropped to the floor. As he bent to retrieve it he saw the child standing in the doorway.

'Go!' he roared, flinging his hand wide as though he would strike her. 'Get out. Out! Out! Out!'

She shot away, but didn't leave. Instead she sat on the pavement and listened again for the music.

But it didn't come. Only the man came. He strode from the door, stared briefly at the small figure sitting cross-legged on the ground, and, with his blue frockcoat flapping, stomped off.

As if by magic, street urchins jumped out from nowhere to bark at him.

• • •

A smell was coming from the kitchen in the cottage by the granary. A most delicious smell.

The woman inside had let her hair down. It fell in waves to her waist. She was also wearing her best shawl. 'Tonight we are celebrating,' she announced as the child came in. 'We are having meat with potatoes and red cabbage, and wine. Your father is trying on his uniform. And,' delivered in a hushed voice, 'remember to say how handsome he looks.'

In came the soldier-to-be and indeed he did look handsome. Mother and child clapped. The woman embraced her husband. 'And what did the two of you get up to this morning?' she asked.

'We heard music and ate cake.'

The woman turned to her daughter. 'Was it nice – the music?'

'Beautiful,' the child replied.

In two days her father would be leaving. Not that there was any front for him to leave for and die in. Napoleon had been defeated and banished to the island of St Helena. But an army still must train ...

'It is good for the mind,' her mother said, 'as well as the body. And –' she stopped to cough and spit onto the road, 'you and I will eat well and that will be good too.'

It was late afternoon and they were walking home from the factory. Often the child would wait at the great iron gate that led to where old rags as well as straw and grass and the bark from trees were turned into paper.

Today, as she stood waiting, a group from the Volkschule rounded the corner and were idling their way towards her. She turned her face to the gate.

'Her
Vater
's a drunkee.'

'A fish
Vater
.'

A stone whizzed past her head. The boys threw stones but the words the girls threw hurt harder. A man on his horse clopped by and all four ran.

The child remained at the gate as a group of older women streamed across the yard. She caught snatches of their talk as they pressed together through the gate.

'She's dying – that's what I heard –'

'Can't breathe.'

'It's the lime –'

'How is it we're not all sick then?'

'We might be –'

'All of us might be –'

'Blind like Iris –'

'That was an accident.'

A second wave of workers appeared. Her mother among them.

'What's the lime?' The child wanted to know. The woman bent down. 'I haven't had my kiss yet,' she said.

'What's the lime?'

'Things are used to make paper – like caustic lime ... '

'It's bad.'

'Who said that?'

'Somebody ...'

The woman sighed. 'Frau Schultz has been taken to the infirmary and everybody's panicking ... ' She opened her bag and took out a ham roll. 'Here.'

'That's your lunch.'

'I wasn't hungry.'

They walked on.

'There's accidents,' the child remarked through a mouthful of roll.

'Don't worry. I'm careful.'

Eyes followed a cart creak up the hill to the granary.

'Its wheel is wobbling,' the woman said.

As the moth returns to the flame, so the child returned to the house in the Reinerstrasse
.

And again the door was open. But today the sounds were different. They came in waves and spurts and at times with long breaks in-between. Often the man would crash down on the keys with both hands and the chords were harsh and angry.

The child stood to the left of the door and listened. A long silence followed. She peeked around the door. The man was at the piano, his hands poised above the keys. He sat very still, for what, to the child, seemed an eternity. Then he played.

The sound he made was more beautiful than before, more beautiful than anything she had ever heard. The man, without pausing, suddenly turned his head as though he sensed someone was watching. 'What do you see?' he said.

What did he mean, 'What do you see?' The child didn't know. She thought of the tree in the woods and of the million colours and shapes she saw from the fork in its branches. Nothing was right. There were no images to describe what she heard, not even in the flow of the fountain or the wind in the conifer. And then suddenly a picture did form, of a night when she had looked from the window and seen the world cast in silver.

'Moonlight,' she said.

The man continued to play. 'Write it,' he ordered.

The child peered inside. Near the door was a small table and on it stood a notebook and a pencil. She crept towards it, wrote, crept back, sat on the step and went on listening.

Finally the man lifted his hands from the keys. He got up, grabbed the blue frockcoat that was lying on the floor and, pulling the door behind him, strode out. The child watched him pass. He was taller than she first thought and, with his coat billowing behind him and his long hair sticking out from under an old hat, he made a weird shape. People stopped and stared and nodded their heads.

The man walked in the direction of the woods. The child followed. It was a day of biting air and sweeping mist.

He paced along a path strewn with leaves and flanked by oaks. He came to a seat and sat hunched in the mist turned rain, his head in his hands.

The child peered from behind a maple and waited, but he didn't move. Still she waited. She came closer. Now she stood before him.

Again, as if sensing the presence of someone, he raised his eyes. 'You!'

From somewhere came the distant clanging of a bell. The child turned.

'Tell me what you hear,' he said.

'A goat is lost,' replied the child.

The man shook his head from side to side and looked down. Then he spoke. 'You have heard something. Perhaps the distant sound of a bell, or the calling of a bird, and I have heard nothing. When someone has heard a shepherd singing, or a flute being played, again I have heard nothing ... '

Now rain fell in thick globs, it splashed onto his boots, dropped from his hat, from her braids, like a metronome's beat.

The child studied the man's face, the jutting lower lip, the eyes that glowed. Silently she stood before him.

'Why?' he barked.

Silence.

'Why do you follow me?'

Silence.

'Have you nowhere to go that you sit on my doorstep?'

The child said nothing.

'I cannot work when people watch. It sends me mad.'

Still silence.

'You sit hour after hour. Why? For what?'

At the child's feet was a stick. She picked it up and in the wet earth beneath a giant oak, wrote, 'The music.'