The Prodigy: 2014 Edition - The Ghost Stories of Noel Hynd - Number 4

by Noel Hynd

  “Working hard for me?” Geiger asked.

  “Sweat is rolling off my forehead, my fingers are white from gripping the phone and my blood pressure is three-eighty over two-fifty,” Greenstone said cheerfully. “Sufficient?”

  “Your fingers are only white?” quipped Rolf, backtracking. “They should be bleeding.”

  “When I feel like opening a vein, Rolf, I shall let you and the rest of my client list know. Now. How are things, what’s on your mind, and why aren’t you hunched over an atonal keyboard somewhere bringing tears to the eyes of the so-called cognoscenti?”

  “Frankly, Brian, I have a problem,” Geiger said.

  “A big one?”

  “No, not a big one. But I wonder if we could arrange something impromptu.”

  “Oh, Rolf, my boy. Name it. Ruin my day.”

  “I need an immediate concert date. I know it’s short notice. But I want to take a dry run. See where I am right now. Test the audiences before the world tour. Test myself.”

  “What are we talking about? This evening?” Greenstone asked with obvious irony.

  “Something within the next few weeks, if you can arrange it.”

  “Hmmm. Spring training? A warm-up?”

  “Sort of.

  “You do this all the time, don’t you? You worry about your skills when you needn’t.”

  “This is different.”

  “A concert date should be no trouble. I’m equally confident that your playing has never been better,” Greenstone said. “So tell me what you need. Large House? Small? You wish to play in front of twelve or twelve-hundred? Speak.”

  “I want a critical but friendly audience,” said Geiger. “I need a tune-up. Know what I mean. The house can be big. A concert hall, though, not an arena.”

  “Where do you want to play? New York?”

  “No, definitely not New York. I want it to be a travel date, yet not too far. Too much pressure and part of the local press will rip me just for sport. Plus anything I do becomes too much of an ‘event’ in New York.”

  Greenstone knew that all he had to do was find the date and the venue. An ‘added’ concert by Rolf Geiger would sell out within a day in any large city in the world.

  “What would you play?” Greenstone asked. “In case any of the unwashed out-of-town promoters have the temerity to ask.”

  Geiger thought. “Beethoven. Maybe Opus 109 in E Major. Then the Tchaikovsky piano concerto. If it’s a nice early summer night and we need to tart things up to sell tickets, I could play some Chopin or do the Moonlight Sonata. Or maybe use it as an encore.”

  “Keep talking,” the agent said. “It sounds orgasmic.”

  “The repertoire would depend on the quality of the orchestra available, the conductor, and how much rehearsal time we would have. The pieces should be well-known so that the orchestra would be ready to play.”

  “Of course, of course,” Greenstone said thoughtfully. “Let me see what I can do. I have to be the diplomat as to where this concert is initially offered. This is the first time in two years you’ll have played to an audience larger than two or three hundred. So it’s a very significant event. A lot of people are going to have their knickers in a twist if I don’t ask them first.”

  “I understand,” Geiger said.

  “But that’s my problem,” Greenstone added quickly. “Let me see what I can do. Give me a day.” He paused. “Now I need something from you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Your handwriting. There’s some contractual material here from Aurora Records for you to sign, hopefully after you go through the pretense of reading it. Should I send it over or would you care to make another memorable in-person appearance in my office?”

  “I was in your office as recently as two and a half weeks ago.”

  “And all the girls in the building are still buzzing like queen bees. Does that mean, ‘send it over’?”

  “No,” Geiger said. “I’ll come by. I’ve been getting out doing a lot of walking recently.”

  “Don’t I know it? Don’t I know it” Greenstone muttered. “You were most recently seen in the deplorably vile and disreputable pages of the New York Post, wandering aimlessly through Central Park and carrying a bag of candy like some would-be child molester.”

  “You saw that?”

  “The whole city saw it, Rolf. Come by this afternoon and please duck the photographers if you are able.”

  Seventeen

  Geiger stopped by his agent’s office toward four the next afternoon.

  He sat in the big red leather chair in Greenstone’s inner office for several minutes, signing papers sent over by Aurora Records, efficiently presented by Claire. Rolf’s eye followed her in and out of the room every time she moved. He noted everything about her, her earrings, her skirt, her blouse, her jewelry and her shoes. The curve of her calves, the way her skirt showed off her figure. In return, Claire gave him a friendly hello and a cordial smile.

  “We have some money for you, too,” said Greenstone at length. “Filthy lucre, of which I have siphoned off the filthiest fifteen percent.”

  The income was royalty money from recording contracts in France, Italy and Germany. It had come in at lunchtime, Greenstone said merrily. Fifty-eight thousand dollars and change. Greenstone’s office would deposit it for Rolf, saving him the tacky troubling effort of walking a check to a busy New York bank.

  “Given the concert date any more thought?” Rolf asked.

  “I’ve given it thought and I’ve made preliminary calls,” Greenstone answered. “And I’m not telling you a thing for another few days. Do me a favor, okay? Shut up and be patient. Trust me. I want things to settle. All right?”

  “All right.”

  “What else?” Greenstone asked. Brian was, when all was said and done, a remarkably perceptive human, both in business and in personal relationships. Rolf hunched his shoulders.

  “Nothing else,” he said.

  “You’re bothered by something,” Greenstone continued. “I see it in your eyes and your expression. It hangs on you like a cheap suit. It’s not concentration, that’s different. So what might this be? Is it just this concert business? This tour? Your music?”

  Geiger was momentarily taken aback. He didn’t know how to answer.

  “You don’t wander around the city for no reason, my boy,” Greenstone said. “Now talk.”

  The sentences started to form in Rolf’s mind.

  “Well, yes, Brian. You see, my mentor Isador? The fellow I laid in a grave a few weeks back? The man you used to call ‘the most unbearable pianist of the twentieth century”? Well, he’s not completely dead. Rabinowitz haunts my home, terrifies me with deathly images, bangs on my piano, frightens my beautiful woman, and swears that I will never pull off this tour properly. That’s all that’s troubling me. Doesn’t sound like much when I explain it, does it?”

  “Rolf?” Greenstone pressed, lowering his head and waving a hand slightly as if to catch Geiger’s lost attention. “Are you having a brain fart? What planet are we on today?”

  “What?” Geiger said, shaking himself back to the present.

  “Sorry. I was distracted.”

  “I was asking you what’s wrong,” Greenstone said. “And you were about to tell me, unless of course you weren’t.”

  “Nothing’s wrong,” Geiger said sullenly, getting to his feet. “I just want to perform again. Soon. So, I’m anxious for you to set things up.”

  “When you’re ready to play, we’ll have a venue,” Greenstone said. “Count on it.”

  “I will.”

  The two men embraced, then Rolf left the office.

  Several minutes later, Geiger was out on Fifty-Seventh Street again. The skies had opened finally and rain was falling steadily. He pulled his tan Burberry raincoat tightly to him against the rain, but still resisted the use of the umbrella he had carried. He had moved a hundred feet down the sidewalk away from Greenstone’s office Building when he heard a woman
call his name. “Mr. Geiger? Mr. Geiger?”

  He almost didn’t turn and look. His friends knew to call him by his first name, and he could do without any strangers today. But there was something familiar about the voice. He glanced over his shoulder and stopped short.

  He turned as Claire trotted quickly toward him from Greenstone’s office. Her arms were folded against the wet blustery day. Her navy blue skirt only made it half way to her knees. As she moved, she was a flurry of beautiful young limbs darting amidst the wind and the raindrops.

  “Claire?” he asked, surprised. She came toward him and arrived breathlessly.

  “I’m terribly sorry,” she said. “I completely forgot. Please don’t be angry with me.”

  She panted for breath.

  “Must be important,” he said. “And you’re all wet so I couldn’t possibly be angry.”

  “That writer. The one I mentioned,” Clair said, still panting. She was not only out of breath, but she was also getting soaked.

  “Sorry?” Rolf asked.

  “Remember? Phillip Langlois? That was his name. The man who wanted to write a biography of Isador Rabinowitz?”

  “Oh. Yes. Him. I remember. That pest.”

  “He phoned again,” Claire said. “He’s going to be in New York.” Geiger sighed.

  “I’m really not in the mood for him or anyone else,” he said.

  “He says it’s important,” she said. “Apparently he’s racing two other biographies to press. He wants to interview you as soon as possible.”

  Geiger rolled his eyes. Then he looked back at her. He could see a certain disappointment in her expression. She had, she realized, come out here for nothing.

  “You’re getting wet,” he said. Raindrops made round gray marks on her blouse. They splashed on her face, arms and bare legs.

  “It’s all right,” she said.

  “No, it’s not,” he answered. He pulled up the umbrella and pressed a button to open it. It whooshed into the air. He held it forward, but she stepped closer to him to be under it.

  “Thanks,” she giggled.

  There was something that intrigued him about Claire, but something that set off warning signals, also. He had the notion that she might have wanted more than she was asking for.

  “You have his phone number?” Geiger asked. “This Englishman with a French name?”

  The number was on a piece of paper in her hand. It was already wet. Rain swept across her face as he looked at her. She smiled back as he took the number. Never, when he was growing up in West Virginia, did he ever imagine how many beautiful women there were in the world and how many of them would at one time or another stand before him.

  “Thanks,” she said. “He sounded nice on the phone. He really did. “

  “They all do when they want something.” She looked at him with apprehension.

  “I’m sorry. Did I do the wrong thing?” He smiled.

  “No. You’re fine,” he said.

  She was getting even wetter. But she wouldn’t turn and go back to the office. Instead, she and Rolf spent a moment, looking each other over. Her eyes were wide and merry, which set off her short dark hair to great effect. The beads of rain that ran against her skin made her flesh look satiny and perfect.

  “Tell me something,” Geiger said. “Did mean old Brian send you out in the rain just to hand me a piece of paper?” Geiger asked.

  “Not exactly,” she answered.

  “Well, you’re not on your way home at four-thirty in the afternoon.”

  “Mr. Greenstone said I could phone you,” Claire said. “But since you had just left…”

  Rolf was catching on.

  “You said you’d trot after me?” he guessed. She nodded enthusiastically, trying not to laugh.

  “And trot you did,” he said. “Right?” She waited for a second.

  “Right,” she said.

  He let a few more seconds pass. He was aware of people watching him with Claire as they passed, then talking among themselves. Someone took a picture with his phone. Rolf lived his life, it sometimes seemed, against a background curtain of people watching.

  “So, tell me something else,” Rolf said to her. “Something I don’t know.” She sighed and seemed ready to bare her soul for him, or anything else he wanted.

  “Okay, I’ll tell you. I have all your CD’s,” she said, almost as a confession. “Sometimes I put on your music for hours, and I just listen and listen, and I imagine that I’m in the front row of one of your concerts.” She paused. “Your music, the way you play, oh my god, it really moves me.” She paused. “I even have some bootlegged video. Does that make you mad?” He shook his head.

  “Not at all.”

  “I’m a huge fan, Mr. Geiger. I couldn’t believe it when I came to work for Mr. Greenstone and discovered you were his top client.” She paused and added as a coda, “You take my breath away.”

  “You’re also getting soaked, Claire. You’re going to be wet and breathless.”

  “Yeah. Yes. I know.” She hunched her shoulders. “Well,” she said, “it was worth it. I wanted to tell you. Thanks.”

  She started to turn. He spoke impetuously. He wasn’t even sure where his words came from.

  “The least I can do is buy you coffee,” he said. She was momentarily flustered.

  “Well, oh, sure. Whenever you have the time and…”

  “I meant now,” he said.

  “Oh, but… “ He took her arm.

  “Come on. Brian won’t mind. You’re helping a client.”

  “Helping a client do what?” she asked.

  “Keep dry. Stay in a good productive mood. Remain sane. Come along.”

  He did not let her protest further. Instead, he steered her to a bistro that was a few doors down the block. It was an expensive snooty white-tablecloth two-star joint which actually Geiger didn’t much care for due to its pretensions. He had been taken there a few times and stuffed with an overpriced lunch by recording executives. The maître d’ recognized Geiger immediately and snapped to attention even though he was eating his own late lunch.

  “A table up front or something in the rear, sir?” the maître d asked.

  “Up front is fine,” Geiger said. “We just want coffee.”

  The staff was starting to set up for the cocktail and dinner hours, but a table was quickly arranged. It was a small cozy one. Fresh flowers landed in the center almost immediately.

  The staff also provided Claire with a fresh, dry shawl. The gesture surprised her. She didn’t know whether or not to accept and so she looked to him for help.

  Rolf nodded slightly and thanked the waiter.

  Claire put the shawl around her. Geiger deduced that she had not been in New York too long and was not yet accustomed to being taken to the better places by her dates. He pictured her in a sweatshirt and jeans with a guy her own age wearing a reversed baseball cap. Then he pictured her in a snug T-shirt and cut-off jeans and had to catch himself and issue a course correction. She was a bright young girl. As they spoke, she reminded him of Diana four years younger.

  Geiger ordered coffee. Claire ordered tea. The restaurant provided a plate of small freshly baked cookies. Two diners, a man and a woman, leaving their off-hour lunch, glanced at the celebrity pianist seated in the front of the restaurant as they exited.

  Claire spoke of college and moving from graduate school into the world of entertainment. Her full name was Claire Graham, she said, and she was from San Francisco. This was her first job in New York. She said she was still thrilled with everything in the city and in awe of it at the same time.

  “So, am I the first ‘famous person’ you’ve met?” he asked.

  “Almost, Mr. Geiger,” she said. “My girlfriend and I went to a bar in SoHo the other night and two of the New York Rangers tried to hit on us. And one time my suitcase came open in an airport and George Clooney stopped and helped me. But you’re the first famous guy to buy me tea.”

  He shrugged and kep
t a straight face.

  “Who said I was paying?” he asked. “I can’t afford a clip joint like this and I never carry money.”

  She looked stricken, then realized he was kidding and laughed. He kept up the conversation. He listened to what she had to say.

  As she chatted, the front of Geiger’s mind was processing music, the art of the piano, how much he enjoyed playing, and how much he needed to practice. Meanwhile, the back of his mind played with the notion of how easy it would be to get Claire into bed. He didn’t often have such impulses with women he had just met and was shocked that he was having them here. He was involved with someone he loved and cared about, Diana. He encountered great-looking woman all the time. So why was this different?

  After thirty minutes, he paid and they got up to leave.

  The rain had subsided when they stepped outdoors. But as a special gift, he pulled her into a small store and bought her an umbrella. It was an exceptionally nice fold-up one, yellow, with a good wooden handle and a plush leather case, extravagant, and imported from Spain.

  Then, unable to keep her awe in check, she asked him to follow her into the newsstand of her office building. She bought a copy of a classical music magazine which had his picture in it and insisted that he autograph it for her.

  She produced a Sharpie. He signed.

  “I can’t wait to tell my parents about this, Mr. Geiger,” she said, which almost twice ruined the moment.

  All of this happened to the amusement of the Bengali news dealer, who barged into the conversation, and then asked him to autograph a copy of People magazine. The latest edition had contained the picture of him wandering through Central Park with the bag of butter crunch.

  “Do me a favor. Stop calling me, ‘Mr. Geiger,’” he finally requested of Claire. “Okay?”

  “Okay,” she said. But she was as yet unable to call him by his first name.

  “You know what else?” she asked.

  “What else, Claire?”

  “Would you sign the umbrella, too? It’s my souvenir of today.” He grinned.

  “Sure,” he said. She handed him the Sharpie again. For fun, in big bold strokes, he wrote in black upon a yellow pane of the umbrella.