Herma

by MacDonald Harris

  Caruso seemed not at all offended by this aggressive attack. He gazed at Fred curiously. He seemed interested not only in his well-cut clothes, his handsome face and long glossy hair, but in his suave and confident, not to say cocksure manner.

  “But you see, my dear young friend,” he explained with elaborate politeness, “we already have got La Moellendorf. So we have no need of another Violetta.”

  Fred: “Perhaps she needs an understudy.”

  Caruso: “Moellendorf never gets sick.”

  Fred: “She doesn’t seem very well suited to the part. She isn’t exactly a young girl anymore.”

  Caruso: “Ah, but neither is Violetta.”

  Fred: “Still, Alfredo is passionately in love with her. With Madame Moellendorf, one can hardly imagine …”

  Caruso: “You seem very confident. Are you a singer yourself?”

  Fred: “The furthest thing from it. Still, as a connoisseur of voices, I’m aware …”

  Caruso: “You’re very young to be a connoisseur.”

  Fred: “Madame Moellendorf is very old to be a demimondaine.”

  Caruso (smiling): “Where has this girl come from, this slip of a child you want me to listen to?”

  Fred (deciding not to say from Santa Ana): “From La Modjeska.”

  Caruso: “Ah, vero?”

  Fred: “Si. La celebrata diva polonese l’ha acclamato in una rappresentazione delle Nozze di Figaro, qui da noi in California.”

  Caruso: “You speak Italian well enough at least.”

  Fred: “E poi dopo a San Francisco, al Larkin Theater …”

  Caruso: “Ah, that one. I’ve heard she tinkles along attractively enough. Kees Mee A-gayn, nevvero?”

  Fred reached into his waistcoat for a card. Caruso took it and examined it politely.

  HERMA

  SOPRANO

  FRED HITE

  MANAGER

  “We’re staying at the Larkin,” said Fred.

  “She sings lyric, or dramatic, or what?”

  “She sings everything.”

  “Ah, I see. Another one of these acrobats of the larynx. You say she knows Violetta?”

  “No, but she’s a quick study.”

  “Oh dio,” said Caruso. “Well, have her come around this afternoon and sing a little something. Perhaps I can find her a place in the chorus.”

  “To the theater?”

  “No, to my room at the Palace.” He scribbled a note on his own card and handed it to Fred.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, for God’s sake,” said the gray-haired man, “let’s get going. Shall we try the second act?”

  13.

  Herma dressed with the score of Traviata spread out on the washbasin before her. “Flora, amici,” she hummed. “Dum de dum dum. D’altre gioie qui fate brillar.” She put on her white dress with the strawberry-colored ribbon in the hem, and tied another ribbon of the same color in her hair. She applied a dab of the magnolia cologne to her elbows and throat. As a last touch, she took the powder puff and tapped it lightly around the bruise on her cheek, inspecting it in the mirror afterward to be sure that nothing showed. Then she collected her white parasol and went out, leaving the score of the opera lying open in the bathroom.

  Having thrown herself on the mercy of Speidermann for another ten dollars, she was able to take a cab to the Palace. There she alighted, with great elegance and grace, assisted by an aloof doorman. At the desk she showed the card, and in only a moment she was being escorted to the elevator by a bellboy in a red uniform and a pillbox hat.

  The bellboy knocked on the door of the suite on the sixth floor. From inside a voice intoned “Entrare” on a single clear tenor note—E above C. The bellboy tried the door. It was locked.

  Presently the door was opened by Caruso himself, in a wine-colored dressing gown with his white shirt and tie underneath. He had changed his polished black shoes for a pair of Turkish slippers. “Ah, scusi. I keep my door locked because of obnoxious persons who might come here wishing to be in my opera.”

  Herma was not sure how to take this. She went in. Caruso closed the door and inspected her.

  “So you are the new diva who is to astonish the Western world?”

  “I don’t know about that. I’m a soprano.”

  “So says your energetic manager Mr. Hite. We will see. Come over here, Mademoiselle—Herma, is it?”

  The suite was immense. It seemed to occupy an entire wing of the sixth floor. In the parlor there was a view out over the Embarcadero, the Bay, and the Oakland Hills beyond. The furniture was mahogany upholstered in emerald plush. By the window overlooking the Bay was a Bechstein grand with a score spread out on it. Caruso sat down on the stool. He gave her an appraising look, without any particular expression. “You don’t have very much chest for a soprano. What can you sing?”

  “Puccini. Verdi. Anything.”

  “Try this.”

  Setting his stubby manicured fingers into the piano, he played a few chords of “Un bel di vedremo.” She sang this effortlessly, and also “Mi chiamano Mimì.”

  He turned on the piano stool and folded his hands in his lap, looking at her with a little more interest.

  “Bene. I see you have studied with Melba.”

  “No. Everyone says that, but I haven’t.”

  “H’mm. Perhaps your old nurse was an Australian. Try this.”

  He turned the score on the piano to the first act. He played a G chord, then a C, and resolved to the tonic. Then, in mezza voce, almost as though he were talking, he sang the couplet of the chorus part for a cue.

  “Giuocammo da Flora,

  e giuocando quell’ore volar.”

  Herma replied, also in a light tone but in a voice that was almost full.

  “Flora, amici, la notte che resta

  d’altre gioie qui fate brillar.”

  He singing the chorus and she the soprano part, they continued on down to “La vita s’addoppia al gioir.” Then he took his hands off the keys again.

  “I thought your manager said you didn’t know Violetta.”

  “I’m a quick study.”

  “Well. You have a nice little coloratura. But the question is whether it can fill a real theater. Now we will do the Drinking Song. And you see whether you can make tremble that flower in his vase.”

  With his head he indicated a single long-stemmed rose in a crystal vial on the piano.

  “Are you sure we won’t disturb anybody?”

  “If we disturb anybody, bah, I am Caruso.”

  He played the cue chords. “Libiamo, libiamo ne’ lieti calici,” he sang, still in his conversational half-voice.

  When he finished the chorus Herma joined in. This time she sang full voice. Caruso, playing the accompaniment, gazed at her narrowly, as if curious to see how all that sound could come out of such a slim and boyish chest. “E un fior che nasce e muore,” she threatened the flower on the piano. When she came to the high G of “fer-vido” at the end of the song, in fact, the water in the slim bud vase trembled a little.

  Caruso substituted piano for the four lines of the chorus. She sang her single line:

  “La vita è nel tripudio.”

  And he answered, with a little smile,

  “Quando non s’ama ancora.”

  He closed the score and turned toward her on the piano stool, folding his hands in his lap again. After a moment he said, “So you are now singing in some trifle at the Larkin?”

  Herma, with a parody of a stagy music-hall smile, sang through her teeth,” Kiss-s-s me a-gayn …”

  “Yes, I know. You mustn’t sing too much of that cheap spaghetti or it will ruin your timbre. Allora. It has been pleasant making your acquaintance, Mademoiselle.”

  On some impulse she said, “What charming slippers you’re wearing.”

  He glanced down at the Turkish slippers. “Ah, you like them? They were made for me expressly in Constantinople. I am very fond of shoes. Come, I will show you my collection.”

  He led
her through a white and gold doorway into the bedroom. There was an enormous bed with a satin cover and three pillows. Masses of American Beauty roses stood about in vases on various tables. The dressing room adjoining was almost as large as Herma’s room at the Larkin. Caruso took an atomizer of Caron perfume from the dressing table and sprayed it into the air; a mechanical gesture. Perhaps he did it every time he came into the dressing room. He set the atomizer down and opened a trunk sitting vertically on its end. In each side were velvet boxes, four to a row and ten rows high, and in each box was a pair of shoes: eighty pairs in all.

  “Why do you have so many?”

  “Two reasons. First, I like them. Second, the public likes for me to have so many shoes.” It was probably only because he had small feet, Herma thought; a harmless vanity. He showed her another trunk with fifty suits in it, and a third reserved for the various gifts and mementos sent him by the public: gold pens and pencils, a pair of binoculars with his initials on them, Havana cigars, canes and umbrellas, solid silver shoehorns, matching hairbrush sets inlaid in silver and gold. On the table was an autographed photo of President Roosevelt in a silver frame. There were several bottles of expensive wine on the table. An unopened case of Krug Sec champagne sat on the floor.

  “I drink very little wine. Before leaving San Francisco, I will give it to the bellboy.”

  The dressing table was cluttered with bottles of mineral water and various medicines. Following her glance, he explained, “To keep the bowels open, every night I take half a bottle of Henri’s powdered magnesia in water. Also, I brush the teeth.”

  He held up a can of tooth powder.

  “Samson was strong because of his hair. My strength is in my teeth. When one tooth goes, I will go too and Caruso will be finished.” He made a mock smile to show her the teeth. They were perfect.

  He put the tooth powder down and almost, but not quite, set his hand in the middle of her back to guide her out of the dressing room.

  “Very well. I will see to it that you have a part in the chorus. Go and see Mr. Beckworth, the manager.” He scribbled a note on a card and gave it to her. “Listen and observe everything, and perhaps one day you can become an understudy. Although Moellendorf,” he was quick to add, “never gets sick.”

  The card smelled of Caron perfume, as did his whole person, but in a faint and attractive way.

  “That’s all there is to it?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “I can go now?”

  He followed her glance to the bed with its gold satin cover. “What did you expect, my dear?” A little smile. “In my villa of Bellosguardo near Florence, I have a woman who is the mother of my two sons, and to whom I am perfectly faithful. We have been discussing art. I have devoted my life to my art, to my music, and you should do the same. You have a pleasant little coloratura voice. You must work hard to develop body and resonance. To sing the great parts, more power is required.”

  “I’ve already sung Violetta for you.”

  “Ah, but only the first act. The first act is coloratura, the second act lyric, and the third act soprano spinto, all without losing the congruity of the vocal line. You have not sung the other two acts. The duet with Germont in the second act—that is something else.”

  “Perhaps I will sing it sometime.”

  “Perhaps. But you must gain body and resonance.” Briskly and impersonally, but still with great courtesy, he showed her to the door and held it open for her.

  She smiled. “Arrivederci.”

  “Arrivederla,” he replied, a slightly politer form.

  14.

  At the Larkin Herma demanded a piece of paper from the desk clerk and scrawled on it recklessly: “Dear Mr. Speidermann. I am resigning from the repertory and will not be singing Fifi anymore, since I now have a role with the Metropolitan. Perhaps you can get Mr. Khatchanigherian to sing the part. He has such a sweet voice. Herma.”

  But up in her room she was less confident. Role was saying too much. She was to be allowed to trill “Giuocammo da Flora” along with the rest of the chorus, that was all, for twenty dollars a week or so.

  She was restless and didn’t know what to do with herself. After pacing around the room aimlessly for a while, and looking out the window, she decided to change. Changing your clothes was always good if you wanted to change into a new mood, or have a new thought. Off came the white dress with the strawberry ribbon. She replaced it with a simple gray satin gown that fell to her ankles, beltless and without ornament except for a touch of lace at the throat. Standing in front of the mirror brushing her hair, she was still aware of a trace of her own magnolia scent, and of Caruso’s Caron, this last no doubt from the card in the handbag in front of her. She hummed into the mirror: “La vita è nel tripudio …” She tried it in English. “There’s naught in life but pleasure, when one does not yet love.” No one ever talked like that. Opera, she reflected, was extremely artificial and had nothing much to do with life. And yet Caruso said …

  She put on a gray hat with lace around it, tilted it slightly forward and to one side, and examined the angle in the mirror. A little more to the front. Then, still on impulse, she went out, sliding her key across the desk toward the clerk with a little smile. He stared after her phlegmatically.

  Walking along the broad expanse of Market toward the Embarcadero, she felt exuberant and alive, and yet pervaded with a kind of bittersweet and unresolved longing. It was an odd sensation—not really unpleasant. Perhaps, she thought, she was in love. But with someone unknown and elusive—not with anyone she had yet encountered in the visible world around her, as various and fascinating as it was. It wasn’t Earl in Santa Ana. Or Caruso. (Here a little smile at the thought of the atomizer of Caron, and the satin bed.) It wasn’t even Mr. Ming. Dear Mr. Ming—she was very fond of him. Perhaps she would meet someone sometime—the real Other—and she would recognize him instantly. As Violetta had recognized Alfredo, from the moment she laid eyes on him. But for her this Other was still concealed—he was still only a shadow in the other elusive shadows of the phenomenal world. And was it really true that for each person there was only one Other? So the songs said. And so it was for Violetta, who gave herself only to mindless debauchery and feasting, until at last she found Alfredo and left her trivial life of pleasure behind her. Of course it ended badly for Violetta—Alfredo was her ecstasy but he was also her sorrow and death. It was too late—she had sinned and was sick, and could only sacrifice herself for the happiness of another. Still, this was only a story—opera was not life. I have given myself to art, said Caruso, and you should do the same. But for her this wasn’t really enough, she reflected. She was resolved to give herself to Life—a life in which art played an immense part, but only a part. And all the rest of it lay around her—keen and glittering, copious in its variety and richness, its infinite possibilities of experience—dark and light, good and evil, pleasure and pain, sensuality, friendship, the joy of possession, the world of the spirit, the life of the mind. And it was all hers, she had only to choose.

  She caught a glimpse of herself in the window of a store. In the gray dress with its lace she looked like a Parisian midinette—a pretty shop girl. “O soave fanciulla …” But Mimì too died of her love, and her lungs. This thought gave her a little chill. She forgot the shop window, strode off along Market another block, and turned left on Dupont Street.

  In the narrow lane on the hillside overlooking the Bay she knocked on the door of the shop. For a long time no one answered. There was a bell, too; she found the string and pulled it, and there was a small bronze tinkle from within. She waited for some time, but without impatience. It was a fine day and there was a scent of pine from a tree overhead in the street, warm in the sunshine. Finally, through the glass, she saw Tea-boy appear at the rear of the shop. He came instantly to open the door for her.

  “Is Mr. Ming in, please?”

  “Massy, no. Go temple.”

  “I’ll wait.”

  “Tea-boy go temp
le. Tell.”

  “If you think it won’t disturb his devotions.”

  “Massy velly love Missy.”

  Herma smiled at this. After Tea-boy had disappeared she spent a few moments looking at the merchandise in the shop, then went on into the gallery with its porcelains and its low silken couch. She wandered about, looking at the porcelains, some in glass cabinets and some on pedestals. It occurred to her that she had never touched any of the porcelains, even though Mr. Ming had permitted himself to touch them and had commented on their texture and feeling to the fingers.

  She knew where the key was, under a red lacquer tray on the shelf behind her. Taking it, she unlocked the cabinet and removed the white Ch’ing-pai vase with the fragile birds and flowers under the glaze. She inserted two fingers into it and held it to the light to test its translucence, then took the fingers out and ran them over the surface of the vase. It was true that it had the slightly slippery feeling of uncooked macaroni. But she preferred Mr. Ming’s poetic opinion that it was like the skin of a young girl. Of course, the one ought to be soft and the other hard. And yet, when she touched her own cheek and then the vase, the softness of the one and the hardness of the other were not apparent as a difference. It was important, she decided, to touch porcelain very lightly.

  Hearing the rustle of a garment behind her, she turned and found Mr. Ming watching her from the doorway of the room.

  “Perhaps I’ve done something I shouldn’t. Do you mind if I touch the vase?”

  He smiled in his reserved and controlled way. “If you like it, I will make you a gift of it. If you will allow me a little time to have it packed safely, it will be delivered to your hotel.”

  “But it’s very valuable.”

  “Very.”

  She put the vase away in the cabinet. “Sometimes I don’t know whether you’re serious.”

  “I am always serious, my dear child, and always amused. If we are helpless in the hands of life, we can at least pretend it is a joke. Please make yourself more comfortable.”