Child Of Music

by Mary Burchell

  'Well, she is playing at the end-of-term concert in about a fortnight's time,' Felicity began.

  'Yes, that's the kind of thing exactly.'

  'It would mean sitting through a certain amount of stuff definitely below Tarkman standard,' Felicity warned him with a slight smile.

  'I'm used to that. So is Professor Blackthorn, who will come too if he is free. Would our presence in the audience seem unusual?'

  'No. It's the kind of concert to which parents come.'

  'Then I shall be there — trying to look like a parent,' he assured her. And he rose, held out his hand and made it perfectly clear that the interview was at an end.

  On the short bus ride back to Carmalton Felicity felt elated beyond expression. She had secured this great chance for Janet, and in a form that robbed it of the terrifying significance which a formal audition might have. It was beyond anything she could have hoped for. And she was bound to admit that this was due to the imaginative understanding of Stephen Tarkman — to whom she had, until now, certainly not attributed either imagination or human understanding.

  Naturally she gave a full account of her interview to both Mrs. Bush and Mary. The former said the most important thing was that there should be no talk beforehand and no question of Janet's knowing the extra importance attaching to the occasion - with which Felicity entirely agreed. The latter said that Stephen Tarkman sounded rather nice, after all.

  ' "Nice" isn't quite the word,' Felicity protested.

  'What is, then?'

  'I don't know.' Felicity looked doubtful. 'He's nothing as innocuous as nice. Attractive, I suppose, in a very forceful way. Impossible to ignore, but not really likeable, if you know what I mean.'

  'No, I don't think I do,' replied Mary amusedly. 'But I'll see for myself on the night of the concert. What is your star chick going to play? Unaccompanied Bach, or something grim like that?' Mary was becoming quite knowledgeable after a year with Felicity.

  Felicity shook her head and laughed.

  'Not for general parental consumption,' she said. 'I'm letting her do two movements of a Haydn sonata. Deceptively simple-sounding and easily accessible to a mixed audience, but extraordinarily difficult to play with real style and musical understanding. Janet will be all right, though. It's just the kind of thing to show off her unusual gifts.'

  In the ensuing two weeks Felicity became more and more sure of this. She was also greatly reassured by the fact that Janet showed no undue nervousness. On the actual day of the concert she looked a little tense. But her 'run-through' in the morning was faultless.

  Then, since there was a half-day's holiday, Felicity told her to go home and rest during the afternoon. And, as she told Mary afterwards, 'Off that child went, with the serious, dedicated air of the real professional ! You'd have thought she was going to play at the Festival Hall, no less.'

  'Not at all nervous?' Mary asked.

  'No more so than any real artist should be,' replied Felicity, unaware that she had paid Janet the final compliment of speaking of her as though she were an adult performer.

  However calm Janet might be about it all, Felicity herself suffered a good deal of nervous excitement during those last hours of waiting. And, to her surprise, she realized that it was not all on Janet's account. There was a sort of enjoyable anxiety about the coming meeting with Stephen Tarkman which had something much more personal about it than she would ever have thought possible. And the exact reason for that she simply could not fathom.

  She dressed with some care for the occasion, telling herself that it was necessary to look her best, while not taking any of the limelight from the young performers — particularly not from Janet, for whom she was, of course, playing the piano part of the Flaydn sonata. But she was inordinately pleased when Mary said,

  'You look lovely. That queer shade of greyish blue is just you, somehow.'

  When they arrived at the school, there was already a great air of activity and self-importance attaching to those who were taking part in the evening's performance. About half of them were pupils of Felicity. The others were, as they importantly styled themselves to admiring parents, drama students.

  'Everything's going to be fine,' Mary told Felicity as they looked from an upper window at the gratifying number of cars drawing up before the main entrance of the school. 'I must say the parents in this school do then- stuff very nobly. I think I'd be in agony if I had to listen to my own offspring murdering Shakespeare or lacerating Beethoven.'

  'My pupils don't lacerate Beethoven,' retorted Felicity mildly. 'Oh, there's Stephen Tarkman, getting out of that ordinary-looking black car.'

  'I'd have thought he would sport a Rolls,' commented Mary. 'Who is his glamorous companion?'

  'Glamorous companion !' Felicity craned her neck to see the other side of the car. 'I thought Professor Blackthorn was coming. Perhaps he couldn't and this is another member—'

  'Oh, no, dear! The lady is no professor,' Mary laughed.

  And Felicity, catching a glimpse at last of Stephen Tarkman's companion, could only agree. There was nothing professorial about the slim, tall, red-haired woman with him.

  'Perhaps it's his wife,' suggested Mary.

  'Perhaps,' agreed Felicity doubtfully. 'Though he didn't seem married, somehow. Too - too—'

  But before she could complete that qualification she glanced at her watch and saw it was time for her to round up her performers and give them a last word of advice and good cheer.

  'Good luck!' Mary sketched a little gesture of encouragement and went to take her seat in the hall, while Felicity made her way to the classroom which had been set aside as a sort of 'green room'.

  High spirits had given way now to quieter, more nervous chattering. But only one person was utterly silent, and that was Janet, who sat alone in a corner, looking unexpectedly attractive without her glasses and in a slightly old-world frock with a lace collar. One glance at her, however, told Felicity that something was desperately wrong. She was pale and tense and so utterly withdrawn from the busy scene round her that Felicity felt her heart plummet.

  She went immediately to the child and, trying to make her voice warm and reassuring, said, 'All right, Janet?'

  'Miss Grainger, I can't play.5 Janet got to her feet and spoke in a rapid, husky half-whisper. 'I'm not well —I can't play.'

  'But of course you can, dear.' Felicity took her hand and was dismayed to find it icy. 'Everyone is a bit nervous beforehand. It's just—'

  'No, it's nothing to do with being nervous. You don't know who's there, in the audience. I've just seen. I looked into the hall.'

  In that moment Felicity could have kicked herself for all her well-intentioned discretion. She should have foreseen this contingency and guarded against this last- minute recognition and reaction. But it was too late now.

  Still warmly and persuasively she smiled, squeezed the cold little hand comfortingly and said, 'Mr. Tarkman isn't an ogre, my dear child. He'll understand, better than anyone else there, just how good you are.

  As a matter of fact, I can't wait to show you off to him. Gome, cheer up—'

  'Mr. Tarkman?' repeated Janet, so blankly that Mary would have said she looked almost idiotic. 'I don't know anything about Mr. Tarkman. It's my aunt who is there - that pretty woman with the red hair. And I can't play if she's there. I hate her - she makes me feel dreadful. She takes all my confidence away. I can't play, I tell you. Not if she's there. I — can't — play!'

  CHAPTER TWO

  Janet's tone carried such conviction that Felicity could almost see her carefully laid plans drifting to disaster on the rock of the child's obsession. For once this evening's chance was gone, any audition, formal or informal, was unlikely to recur.

  It was vital to do something and do it quickly. So, repressing a sense of panic almost equal to Janet's own, she glanced across the room to where the first two or three performers were preparing nervously for their entry on to the platform and, on a rapid reckoning, decided that she st
ill had about a quarter of an hour before she herself would be called on to take any active part in the concert. Then she sat down with Janet's hand still in hers and made a tremendous effort to see the problem from the child's own viewpoint.

  Reasonable argument and false cheerfulness would, she could see, be alike useless. She must accept the situation at Janet's valuation or give up here and now.

  'Listen, dear—' she made the child face her, so that their eyes met— 'I do understand that for all of us there are people who scare us and make us feel inadequate. If your aunt is one of those people for you, I'm not going to pretend it's a small matter. But, Janet, I must tell you now that I've made a very special effort to get Mr. Tarkman here tonight to hear you play. I didn't tell you beforehand for fear of making you nervous—'

  'He doesn't make me nervous. Only my aunt does,' reiterated Janet with a sort of stubborn wretchedness.

  'I understand that,' Felicity said patiently. 'But it's Mr. Tarkman who is important tonight. He has come to hear you in the hope that you'll prove suitable for a place in the Tarkman School.'

  'Can't I play for him when my aunt isn't there?' Janet gazed rather forlornly back at Felicity.

  'I doubt if another opportunity could be arranged. Can't you summon all your courage, ignore your aunt and make the effort?'

  'I don't think so,' said Janet. 'I feel sick.'

  So did Felicity, she discovered to her surprise. But she could not think about her own reactions at that moment. Mary would probably have regarded Janet as a tiresome child who had no right to invent difficulties at this late hour. But Felicity knew that behind the frightened child was a deeply disturbed artist and, with a slight sigh, she tried again.

  'I hardly know what else to say to you, Janet. I can't force you to play, of course. But this is a great chance for you, and I can't bear to see you throwing it away without so much as trying.'

  Janet looked down at her clasped hands, and then up again as though something other than her own misery had impinged on her consciousness.

  'You said it was difficult for you to get Mr. Tarkman here. Does that mean you'd be made to look small if I — if I just backed out now?'

  It had not been in Felicity's mind to plead her own false position. But she felt so desperate at that moment that even a little bit of emotional blackmail seemed justified.

  'My position isn't really what matters,' she said. 'But, since you mention it, yes, I would feel rather awful. You see—' determinedly she put herself on the same footing as the child— 'I once made rather a fool of myself to Mr. Tarkman. I was over-confident about a personal opinion and was afterwards proved wrong. I was so sure that I was right about you that I rather stuck my neck put again. I suppose if my candidate actually refused to perform tonight he would think me more of a fool than ever. But if you feel you simply can't—'

  Janet took out her glasses, polished them nervously and put them back again.

  'I'll play,' she said briefly, and Felicity with difficulty refrained from embracing her. Instead, she just said,

  'That's a good, brave girl. Forget your aunt and play for Mr. Tarkman.'

  'Where is he sitting?' Janet inquired.

  'I don't know,' lied Felicity, realizing that Janet was still unaware that die important Mr. Tarkman and the hated aunt were together. She just put up a confused little prayer to whatever guardian angel looks after temperamental geniuses and hoped for the best.

  In ordinary circumstances, of course, a school concert would not exactly have taxed Felicity's nerves. On the contrary, she was expected to be the calm support of the jittery young performers she had to accompany. But when she finally went on to the platform with Janet she experienced all the familiar symptoms of acute stage-fright. The dry throat, the inescapable chill, the horrid empty feeling in the pit of her stomach, the awareness that her smile was fixed and that she could do nothing about it.

  Janet wasted no smile - not even a fixed one — on her audience. She looked at no one, but proceeded to tune her violin with something less than her usual calm security. Silence had fallen on the hall already, for the school was well aware that Janet could out-play and out-class them all, and in a way they were rather proud of her.

  It was therefore certainly not from any member of the school that the slight, mocking little laugh came. And because of Janet's immediate reaction Felicity knew, as surely as if Mrs. Morton had been named, that it was Janet's aunt who had made that almost imperceptible sound.

  At once Janet gave Felicity a little nod, to indicate that she was ready to begin. And Felicity, knowing that any further delay would unnerve the child completely, simply could not let Janet know that for once her impeccable ear was at fault and that her E string was fractionally sharp.

  At almost any other time it would not have been serious enough to matter. Indeed, Felicity knew that not one per cent of the audience that night would have any inkling of the fact. Almost all of them were there to applaud and praise indiscriminately anyway. And Janet - even Janet at less than her best — could not fail to astonish and impress them.

  But it was not the unknowing ninety-nine per cent who mattered. It was Stephen Tarkman. And Felicity had not the slightest doubt that he would be alert to the smallest fault.

  In spite of the faulty E string, however, Janet launched into her sonata with the near-brilliance of someone beyond her years, and for the first few minutes Felicity dared to think that perhaps she was going to do herself justice, after all.

  But then a change began to come over her performance, something so subtle and intangible that only someone as knowledgeable as Felicity could have pinpointed it. It was as though the life and light drained out of the work. The notes continued to be played with considerable skill and accuracy and, considering the faulty tuning of the instrument, the intonation was good. But the beauty and knowledge, the insight and poetry which Janet had unfailingly brought to her playing simply were not there.

  She could have been any gifted, hard-working little pupil doing her best. The magic which Felicity had found so incredible in a child of her age was gone. It was a highly meritorious performance. But, thought Felicity bitterly, even brilliant failure would probably have been more arresting.

  At the end there was tremendous applause, partly from her fellow-pupils who thought it fantastic that Janet Morton could play so many notes and get them all right, and partly from indulgent parents who either knew Janet's sad history and wished her well or were just touched that anyone so small could give evidence of such hard work.

  Felicity glanced once in the direction of Stephen Tarkman. He was clapping, it was true, and perhaps rather more than perfunctorily. But his head was bent and he was listening with a smile to something which was being said with some emphasis by the laughing woman beside him.

  'I was rotten,' Janet said stonily as they came off the platform together.

  'You were quite astonishingly good, considering that you were upset,' replied Felicity firmly.

  'But not good enough. And my E string was sharp. Was Mr. Tarkman the man sitting beside my aunt?'

  'Yes,' said Felicity because it was not much good saying anything else.

  'I thought so. She whispered something to him quite near the beginning. I knew it was no good then. She didn't mean him to like me.'

  Felicity was hard put to it not to shake Janet and tell her to snap out of this nonsense. Surely not even a sensitive, temperamental child need allow anyone to affect her so strongly. But she realized resignedly that one might as well tell a rabbit to buck up and not mind the snake. Janet, for reasons which seemed sufficient to herself, both hated and feared her aunt to such a degree that she had probably spoiled her chances of a Tarkman scholarship.

  Unless, that was, Felicity could talk Stephen Tarkman into taking a lenient view now and hearing her again in more favourable circumstances. It was not a task she relished, and at that moment Janet added the last piece of information needed to make Felicity feel defeated before she had begun. />
  'My aunt wants Mr. Tarkman to marry her. She always spoke of him in a funny, possessive sort of way. My father used to say he wouldn't have a chance if she really went all out to get him.'

  Felicity was so startled to hear Janet refer to, even quote, her father — and in such terms — that for a moment she was dumb. Then she said hastily, 'People often say things like that without exactly meaning them.'

  'My father meant it,' replied Janet simply. And there really seemed nothing else to add to the argument.

  The concert, however, was not of course standing still for Janet Morton's individual tragedy. There were other pupils to be cheered, inspired and even accompanied. Felicity forced herself to say something conventionally comforting, though she felt certain the words never even reached Janet's comprehension, and then addressed herself to her other duties of the evening.

  By the end of the concert she felt as exhausted as if she had given a solo recital at the Festival Hall. And she was not exactly revived by the information supplied by two of Janet's classmates that she had gone home.

  'Gone home!' exclaimed Felicity in consternation. 'But why didn't she wait until the end of the evening? Everyone was expected to do that.'

  'She said she didn't feel well, Miss Grainger,' one of them explained. And the other added, for good measure, 'She looked ghastly.'

  There was nothing left for her to do but seek out Stephen Tarkman over the modest refreshments now being handed round, and see if she could judge his reactions and undo some of the harm which had been done.

  Even getting anywhere near him was difficult because anxious or gratified parents bore down on her from every side, eager to ask about their own darlings. To each one she somehow managed to sound as though the progress of their child was her abiding interest.

  And, in spite of her inward agitation, she still looked reasonably relaxed and unflustered by the time she reached Stephen Tarkman and his companion.

  He insisted on procuring coffee for her immediately and made the introductions.