Unbidden Melody

by Mary Burchell

  And all the time, if report were correct, she too must have been consumed by jealous frustration.

  Was that the life of a famous singer’s wife? Had she already been thrown in at the deep end? With the abso­lute necessity of concealing her feelings, even though they went as deep as human feelings could go? This even­ing should have been the most radiant and cloudless of her whole life. This was the evening when Nicholas had asked her to marry him. And yet, within minutes of her accepting him and realising that she was the happiest girl in the world, she was being torn to pieces with fear and dismay.

  “It must be some lack in me” she told herself. “It’s my own fault. The very fact that he was so frank about it all shows there’s nothing—absolutely nothing—for me to be worried about.”

  That thought did bring a measure of relief and conso­lation. And, in the car, with Nicholas’s arm round her and his lips against her cheek, she was almost convinced that everything was all right. Of course it was all right. Cer­tainly insofar as he loved her and not Suzanne Thomas or anyone else.

  What was frightening was the unknown factor of Suzanne’s power, once she had the scene entirely to her­self. That she wanted Nicholas for herself was something Mary knew instinctively to the very roots of her being.

  “But one must trust the man one loves,” she told her­self desperately. “Am I to start by thinking I can’t let him out of my sight? How paltry! How small-minded and stupid.”

  But—Suzanne. That was the rub! Suzanne, of all people.

  “What’s the matter, darling?” Nicholas asked at that moment. “You’re so very quiet.”

  “Am I?” Even to her own ears her laugh sounded faintly artificial. “I’m still just trying to believe that all this has really happened.”

  But the moment she had said that she felt her heart sore and heavy with the realisation that she was already telling him less than the truth. Her whole being revolted against such an idea, and she knew she could not possibly start life with Nicholas like this.

  “It isn’t only that.” She took a grip on her courage and strove to make her voice sound as quiet and unprovocative as possible. “It’s—do you have to do this concert tour with Suzanne?”

  There was only a fractional pause before his reply, but she knew instantly that, whatever shock she had received this evening, she had administered a chilling one in return.

  “Yes, I do.” His tone was very cool. “I’ve already signed the contract and so has she. Why?”

  He sounded like a stranger all at once. And, as she stared at the impassive back of the hired chauffeur, be­yond the glass panel of the car, it occurred to her that it was as though a glass panel had suddenly arisen between her and Nicholas too. And then she remembered that not only had Monica suffered this kind of jealousy; she had made their married life a hell because of it.

  In that moment Mary jettisoned the exact truth without scruple. And, like someone slipping down a cliff to dis­aster, she clutched frantically at the one thing which could check the descent.

  “Because I just don’t know how I’m going to do with­out you for three whole weeks.” She touched his hand tenderly. “What else?”

  “Oh, darling!” He caught her in his arms and held her close in what she knew was an access of relief as well as love. “Forgive me! For a moment I thought—I forget you’re so different—”

  And she managed to ask gently, “What did you think, Nicholas?”

  “It’s ridiculous to have this obsessive fear! I thought for a moment that you were jealous.”

  He bad thought—but for a moment only—that she was jealous!

  “You see, Monica, poor girl, was jealous of everyone and everything. She checked my every expression, every reaction—sometimes, I felt, my every thought. She even used other people—” he gave a distasteful little shudder—”her so-called friends. She would ask, say, someone in the chorus who was flattered by her attention to spy on me and report on my attitude to my women colleagues. In the end it almost destroyed both of us.”

  There was a moment of appalled silence in which Mary found herself holding his hand tightly, as though only by touch could she draw him back from that remembered abyss of horror. Then he gave a shamefaced little laugh and exclaimed, “I was a fool to think it could happen again. With you, of all people.”

  “I won’t even use the word ‘jealous’,” she promised eagerly. Then, anxious to catch his lighter mood, she added, “Though I was going to say I should be jealous of all those lucky people listening to your recitals while I was in London working for Dermot Deane.”

  “It won’t be for long,” he reminded her smilingly. “Once we’re married you’ll come with me everywhere.”

  It was true, of course. Once they were married. The very words brought a flood of relief and consolation. She was to be his wife—his wife! How then could she pos­sibly indulge in petty jealousy and fear, just because he would be away from her for three weeks?

  With Suzanne Thomas, of course—that was the point. But she simply would not think about that. Suppose it had been Anthea Warrender, for instance—

  Oh, if only it had been dear, safe, loyal Anthea War-render, who adored her own husband and never looked at another man! But it was not, and one must accept the fact.

  Over supper she managed to drive her fears into the farthest corner of her mind, so that even she hardly knew they were there. And as Nicholas and she discussed the future and made tentative plans, the wonderful reality of it all began to take shape, and her fears seemed propor­tionately foolish and unimportant.

  They agreed that there should be no public announce­ment of their engagement for the moment. On Nicholas’s side, he had an almost morbid dislike of the kind of pub­licity which attended the romantic affairs of a popular star. And, for her part, Mary thought she would like some time in which to make the adjustment between her present quiet life and the future which was going to take a lot of getting used to.

  “I shall tell my parents, of course—”

  “But of course!” Nicholas seemed rather shocked at any other idea, which she found endearing. “And I must come and make myself known to them. I hope they’ll like me.” He sounded quite gravely concerned about that.

  “Mother will,” Mary said positively. “It will take my father a bit longer to accept the idea that his well-loved but ordinary daughter could possibly make a success of marrying a famous opera star.”

  “Will he really look at it that way?” Nicholas smiled, intrigued but slightly mystified.

  “Of course. Lots of people—my sort of people—will see it in that way too. I suppose even Dermot Deane—”

  “Ah—Dermot Deane.” Nicholas looked considering. “You say you’ll have to give him notice before you leave?”

  “Why, certainly! A month at least. Is there any objec­tion to that?”

  “I’d rather he didn’t know about us too early. The im­presario side of him simply wouldn’t be able to resist the publicity implications. However much we insisted that we preferred to keep our private affairs private, he would be bound to drop a hint here and there. And that sort of thing goes round our particular world like wildfire.”

  “Do you think—” Mary turned her beautiful ring on her finger—”it would be better to say nothing to anyone until you come back from your concert tour?”

  The moment she had said that she wondered if she had made a grave error. For surely the sooner the position was made clear to Suzanne, the better.

  So she said quickly, trying to make her tone completely casual,

  “You could tell Suzanne, of course.”

  “My dear!” he laughed. “Suzanne least of all. She’s an arrant gossip and would tell everyone, if only to show that she knew my affairs better than anyone else.”

  It was not said in a tone of harsh criticism. But even mild criticism of Suzanne from such a quarter fell sweetly on Mary’s ear at the moment, and suddenly she felt hap­pier and more confident than she had at any time s
ince she first heard of the tour.

  “Well then,” she said expansively, “let’s make no ex­ceptions at all. I won’t even tell my parents, unless I feel I just can’t bear not to. It isn’t as though we have to wait long. You’ll be going on this tour—when?”

  “The twenty-first of this month. We shall be back by the middle of September. You can give your notice in to Dermot at the end of August or beginning of September, telling him to keep his mouth shut until I return. He won’t do so entirely, but—”

  “I’ll just say I’m getting married. I needn’t tell him it’s you.”

  “He’ll guess.”

  “Oh, Nicholas, why should he?”

  “Because he has that sort of nose. He can smell good news a mile away and bad news two miles away. That’s why he’s a successful impresario.”

  Mary laughed.

  “Anyway, if you have to tell him at that point, it won’t matter. I shall be back a couple of weeks later, and we can be married at the end of September.”

  When he actually put a date to it Mary felt it was no dream, after all. This improbable, romantic, wonderful thing really was going to happen to her. To her, Mary Barlow, who not so long ago had thought it the height of bliss just to sit in the gallery at the Opera House and listen to Nicholas Brenner singing on the stage.

  Before they left the restaurant she suggested that per­haps he should keep her ring for her until the engagement was made public. But he would not hear of it.

  “No, my darling. It’s yours—now and for ever. Take it home and hide it if you like. Or show it to your mother. I still think she should be told. But don’t try to return it to me for so much as a day! It would be unlucky.”

  “Oh, Nicholas, are you as superstitious as that?”

  “Of course. All stage people have their little super­stitions. In addition, I’m partly Slav, remember, which makes me even worse.” He laughed and touched her hand lightly. “You’re marrying quite a difficult fellow in many ways. Did you know that?”

  She did. But she found no problem in smiling back at him and saying she would have chosen no one else.

  To this idea she clung during the next rather difficult days. Like all engaged girls, she longed to tell everyone of her happiness and good fortune. And up to now she had lived in a world where this would have been the most natural thing to do. It was hard to accept a situation in which one’s simplest private action might have unwelcome public results, and to Mary, who was by nature open-hearted and impulsive, the necessary restrictions were very irksome.

  Most trying of all was to have to pretend, in the office, that Nicholas was no more to her than any other artist they handled. Her employer was inclined to talk frankly to her, for he had already found that he could do this with safety. And he was even beginning occasionally to ask her opinion of this or that performer.

  “You’ve got innate taste,” he told her approvingly, “which is something you can’t teach or learn. Clever of you to spot that Middleton is a performer rather than a real music-maker. And I think you’re right when you say that little French coloratura will go far if she will accept soubrette roles and not fancy herself as Violetta or Gilda. One of these days I’ll send you out to make a spot judg­ment on your own. You could be a lot of help to me if I could come to rely on that side of your work.”

  Mary was pleased, as well she might be, when he said this. But she was not so pleased when he went on to ask outright, “What do you think of Brenner and Suzanne teaming up for this concert tour? They could make quite a big thing of it if they wanted to. They complement each other quite extraordinarily, both artistically and vocally. And incidentally, they look remarkably good on a plat­form together.”

  “They’ve done it before, haven’t they?” Mary asked, in order to avoid expressing an opinion.

  “Yes. In Canada on one occasion. Suzanne was on her home ground there, and that made her a very useful part­ner for him. That was in Monica’s time, of course. I think she made difficulties. She usually did, to tell the truth. Now there wouldn’t be that problem at any rate.”

  “No,” agreed Mary, but she felt her mouth go dry.

  Dermot Deane was in a gossipy mood. He leaned back in his chair, smiled reflectively and said, “I wonder if he’ll marry her? She’s going to mount a pretty powerful cam­paign, if I’m not much mistaken.”

  (And Nicholas had said he could smell bad news two miles off!)

  “I don’t think they’d suit each other,” she said coldly, because she had to say something.

  “No? Well, she’s not everyone’s cup of tea, of course. Not mine, for one. But she’s genuinely fond of him in her way, and he’s used to having a managing woman around. Monica conditioned him to that. Suzanne is a tremendous go-getter, both for herself and those she likes. She could be quite an asset in his career.”

  “But hardly much comfort to him personally! I should think he’s tired of having a managing woman around, as you put it.”

  “Could be.” Deane’s reflective glance rested on her for a moment, which made her uncomfortable. “That’s prob­ably why he has enjoyed your company from time to time.”

  Mary produced what she hoped was a non-committal smile and went on determinedly with her work.

  But she checked in the easy flow of her typing when her employer capped the conversation with the philosophical remark:

  “Well, this tour will be the test, I expect. She’ll have him to herself, and she’ll make the most of her oppor­tunities, if I know my Suzanne.”

  “Don’t you think it was a mistake to encourage them to arrange this tour, then?” demanded Mary, and her sup­pressed agitation made that sound almost aggressive. “You know she couldn’t possibly make him happy. If he’s going to marry again, wouldn’t it be much better that he—”

  “My dear girl!” Dermot Deane had let her get thus far out of sheer astonishment, but he interrupted her now with a genuinely amused laugh. “I don’t undertake to look after my clients’ private affairs. I’m glowing grey and bald in the service of their professional ones. That’s enough for me. If Brenner likes to fool around with Su­zanne Thomas, who am I to take a dangerous hand? He must look after himself.”

  “But suppose he made another disastrous marriage and was miserable? Wouldn’t that affect his work and career—and incidentally you?”

  “Not necessarily. Some of them do their best work when they’re in an emotional crises,” replied Dermot Deane callously. “There’s no hard and fast rule about these things. That’s why it’s almost always best to let them take their natural course.”

  He seemed to think that really did conclude the discus­sion. But for the next three minutes at least Mary quite hated her good-natured, cynical employer.

  Afterwards she assured herself that it was just the way he talked. He enjoyed throwing off these verbal fireworks in the privacy of his own office. They made up for his having to be super discreet outside. He didn’t really be­lieve half he himself said. Or did he? and he was probably quite wrong in this particular case. He must be.

  Even so, the few weeks before Nicholas went off on his tour were anything but unalloyed happiness to the girl he was going to marry. When she was with him, everything was clear and beautiful and even reassuring. It seemed then both ridiculous and unworthy to suppose that anyone could threaten her position.

  But there were so many times when she was not with him, when he was deeply involved with his work.

  There must, she knew, be long discussions and inten­sive rehearsals with Suzanne. They were not, either of them, the kind of people to throw on a performance and expect all to go well on the night. They were both inten­sely professional, artistically dedicated, and absolute per­fectionists. It was no wonder that they had such profound appreciation of each other as colleagues.

  So long as it was as colleagues, well and good. But Mary could not always help it if her lively imagination—stimulated by her fears—sometimes took over from that point. She usually ended
by accusing herself of being no better than the beautiful, jealous creature who had, in her time, so nearly destroyed Nicholas as well as herself.

  When she was in that remorseful mood, she leaned over backwards to give Nicholas the reassuring impression that he was as free as air and that she was perfectly happy when he simply had to be away from her. But then a tougher line of approach would suggest itself to her, and she would wonder if she were a fool not to guard her happiness more carefully.

  But how? That was the problem. How?

  In the end, of course, she told her mother about her engagement. The relationship between her and her parents was too close and frank for her to keep the greatest news of her life to herself.

  Her mother was not surprised, she saw. But she did look dubious.

  “Well, my dear, I was rather expecting this, of course. If you’re sure you can tackle the difficulties there will be—”

  “I’m not sure,” Mary interrupted with unusually grim candour. “But I love him too much not to try. I had to tell you. He wanted me to, anyway. But perhaps we’d better not tell Dad until the engagement is actually announced.”

  “Why not?” She saw immediately that her mother re­sented that. So then she had to explain in detail why the engagement was not being made public for the moment, and it was obvious that her mother regarded the explana­tion as inadequate.

  “Well, I agree it would be better not to tell your father until we can talk about the whole thing openly,” she said finally. “He wouldn’t like any hole-and-corner arrange­ment for you, I’m sure.”

  Mary felt fiercely anxious to defend her glorious, romantic engagement from any such description. But she realised that this was one of the almost unbridgeable gaps between the new life and the old, and that no verbal effort was going to help. To Nicholas it might be perfectly nat­ural to put a veil of secrecy between his private life and his public one. To her mother—and even more to her father—it would merely seem like a lack of candour about something which should be openly and happily discussed.

  So she swallowed her resentment and said almost meekly,