Crescendo

by Phyllis Bentley

  “No,” said Freeman, pausing. “I have no such pretensions. I have come up out of the gutter and carry no sentimental luggage.”

  “And I too, you fool!” cried Fiammetta, springing to her feet. “I too am of the gutter. I am as relentless as you are yourself. I take what I want.”

  “Ah! Now we understand each other.”

  “Stay, then,” said Fiammetta, stretching out to him her small hot hand, on which the diamonds glittered.

  “No. It is the dress you want, not the man,” said Freeman, turning away. He spoke soberly, but felt violence rising in him like fever.

  She threw herself between him and the door.

  “Are you so certain, Freeman?” she cried, panting.

  “Don’t try to lie to me!” shouted Freeman, plunging into rage.

  For a moment they stood glaring at each other, furiously angry; then they both began to laugh.

  “I shall not make you a yellow dress,” said Freeman stubbornly.

  “Basta! What do I care?”

  “But I will design a beautiful new scarlet dress—the old one is too dull, too spiritless, for such a guttersnipe as you,” concluded Freeman, laughing.

  He took her in his arms; they strained each to each as if their embraces could never be close enough to express how near they were to each other, how separate from all the rest of the world.

  A few days later Freeman said to Fiammetta, as she lay in his arms:

  “Let us marry.”

  “Why?”

  “We are more than lovers.”

  “That is true,” said Fiammetta. “Luckily my first husband died.”

  “Who was he?”

  “My first manager. A most kind, amiable, elderly man. But to me, nothing.”

  The wedding was turned by the company into a wild and riotous affair, typical of the stormy, gay, frenziedly restless life which Freeman now lived in all the world’s capital cities. He had never had a real home and Fiammetta had long since left hers behind; they did not make a real home together now, but met when they could, dashing about Europe—to the furious alarm of the theatre managements with which they were respectively concerned—on preposterous schedules, in order to spend a few passionate hours in each other’s company. Sometimes these hours were filled with ardent love-making, sometimes with quarrels which shook the theatrical world, but they were always immensely satisfying to Freeman and Fiammetta. Opera houses in Berlin, Milan, Naples, Vienna, New York; flower-decked suites in luxury hotels; flower-decked cabins in immense Atlantic liners; surging music, with Fiammetta’s magnificent voice throbbing through it all; applauding crowds; bold designs in black and scarlet; hours of frenzied work; wine; books, plays, films, ballets, pictures; elaborate arrivals, hurried departures; the speech and currencies of many different countries; the emotions of many different peoples—all these were jumbled in his memory into a glittering pageant; a seething flux of colour and sound, in which the most brilliant colour, the most vibrant note, was always his feeling for Fiammetta. They both earned money in rich abundance and threw it away in lavish profusion, generous and open-handed to their friends, carelessly princely in their personal expenditure. Fiammetta’s first husband, of a more cautious disposition than her second, had invested quite a pile of her earnings, but in some way Freeman did not trouble to understand all these savings were lost in the New York stock market debacle of 1929—they laughed together over this confirmation of the foolishness and meanness of trying to save.

  Then, most unexpectedly and belatedly, long after they had abandoned any hope or even speculation on such a matter, Fiammetta found herself with child. They were astonished and disconcerted, and on account of Fiammetta’s age, which by now was nearing the climacteric, somewhat alarmed. The alarm was justified, for Fiammetta’s accouchement, which took place in Paris, was most painful and protracted, and the child, a daughter, appeared ailing and much underweight. But to Freeman’s amusement and admiration, Fiammetta’s peasant ancestry here asserted itself; shouting a vigorous stream of invective, she drove out doctors and nurses and tended the child herself with passionate care.

  The little girl grew and thrived; the sweetest, gayest, darlingest child, as Freeman thought, in all the world, whenever he saw her. Gay was not a beauty like her mother, for she lacked Fiammetta’s fine aquiline profile, and her dark hair was short and curly in a homely way, but the same wonderfully starry eyes shone in her round, merry little face, the expression of which was always most singularly loving, intelligent and tender. She lived chiefly in Freeman’s flat in London, with excursions at first all over Europe to accompany her mother—her parents were always intending to take a cottage in the country somewhere and give her a settled life, but somehow they were never settled anywhere themselves long enough to bring this plan to fruition. Heaven knew, thought Freeman ruefully, looking back at it all now, how the child had contrived to be fed and clothed and educated, but somehow she had managed it—herself; smiling and happy, observing everything with those beautiful eyes and storing it all behind her broad white forehead, she made arrangements of the most admirable kind for herself, quietly and without any tears or fuss. This was all the more necessary because Hitler’s war suddenly cut the Freeman family in half.

  Fiammetta was in Germany when it began. Freeman did not believe in Hitler’s promises for a moment and considered Chamberlain a deluded ass for doing so; he rang Berlin repeatedly and implored Fiammetta to return to England while there was time. But Fiammetta had a contract to keep and a role to sing; besides, Germany and Italy were allies; if war should break out, what of it? Her next engagement was in America and Freeman and Gay could meet her there.

  War broke out and Fiammetta simply disappeared; in spite of Freeman’s frantic string-pulling he could get no news of her. Had she perhaps returned to Italy? He hoped so. Was she regarded as Italian by the Germans because of her birth, or as English because of her marriage? He could not discover. He found himself busily employed in the matter of camouflage, and tried to still his anxiety by overwork, but at times the misery of uncertainty flooded his mind and drove out every other thought. He tried to send his little Gay away to America, but she would not go; when the matter was broached to her she said nothing, but clasping his arm with all her strength, she gazed up at him with such terrible though silent reproach that he simply could not say another word about it. Accordingly they went through all the vicissitudes of the war together and came to disregard them as most Londoners did at the time. In the absence of her mother Freeman loved Gay with all his heart but without knowing her very well; one could not force a daughter’s confidence.

  The war was over. The Red Cross found Fiammetta in a concentration camp, whither some stormy resentment of police regulation, or some indiscreet championship of her husband’s country—Freeman could never discover quite which—had sent her. She returned to England—to die, as she bitterly said. Freeman and his daughter, now in her teens, stood on the station platform as the hospital train rolled smoothly in. Racked by an anguished expectancy, Freeman ran heavily up and down, seeking for his wife. It was Gay who found her; exclaiming “Mother!” she threw herself down beside a stretcher on which lay a small figure with a yellow, wizened face.

  “No, no!” stammered Freeman, embarrassed, pulling at Gay’s shoulder. “Some mistake—we are looking for my wife.”

  “You don’t recognise me, Freeman?” said the woman, smiling. “But I know you, my dear. You are not changed.”

  The sardonic droop of her lip was Fiammetta’s. But her once beautiful body was merely skin and bone, her face deeply wrinkled, her eyes lustreless and sunk into her head. Worst of all, her voice, that once superb instrument, now sounded shrill, uncertain.

  Or rather, reflected Freeman, that was not the worst. The worst was that she was simply too exhausted to take any further interest in life. The once superabundant vitality was now flickering to extinction. Occasionally for a few moments her eyes would brighten and she would show her husband and her da
ughter the love which a wife and mother should, laying her hand on Freeman’s, or putting the curls back from Gay’s face, as the pair bent over her bed. But soon the flicker of interest died, the hand dropped, the look of almost peevish weariness returned. Fiammetta withdrew into herself, far away from Gay or Freeman, and lay silent, brooding. Eventually she slipped away from them. They wept together for her loss, not as she was now but as they wished to remember her. Then life began again for them.

  In the great burst of theatrical activity which followed the close of the war Freeman participated at first joyously. He noticed that his commissions were slightly less frequent than of old, but attributed this to the dislocation caused by the war—as peace settled in, he thought, the world of the theatre would steady. He noticed too that his name seemed unfamiliar to most of the promising young men who were now beginning to make their appearance, and that there was a general tendency on the part of any who did know him, to regard him as the “grand old man” of scenic design. This amused him; he was in his late sixties, of course, but tremendously strong physically and as powerful as ever in his art. Indeed he thought himself more powerful; his war experience with Fiammetta had, he knew, deepened his sense of the ironies of human existence, and that should surely increase his feeling for beauty and truth.

  Television came. Ever ready to attack a new problem, Freeman made an attempt or two to adapt his style to the requirements of this fresh medium. But he abandoned them impatiently. He felt like a bull in a small china shop. There was no colour yet, and his bold lines looked simply an untidy mess on the tiny screen. Designing for television was clearly a job for smaller people than himself, people who devoted their whole professional lives to television, who worked within one or other of the great television corporations. Freeman observed with a shrewd eye the decay of the theatre in the provinces as the new medium flooded them; he was troubled, for he did not see how, in such conditions, young men of talent, such as he had been, could work their way up to the top as he had done. He mentioned this to Gay, who listened with her usual look of loving sympathy but could suggest no solution.

  Indeed she seemed even more troubled than the situation demanded, thought Freeman; almost, indeed, as if she were personally involved. She was rising eighteen, now; not handsome, not (it seemed) particularly talented in any special direction and rather silent in general, but sweet and comely and loving, altogether a most darling person. No doubt she would marry soon, thought Freeman benevolently; in the course of her work as his secretary and general manager of his affairs, she met many young men. He could not help being glad that her choice of a partner was delayed, but of course he would not for a moment stand in the light of his darling daughter’s happiness when she found her man.

  In the early 1950’s Freeman was asked to design settings for a new play, the first by its young author to receive London production. Uncomfortably penetrating, full of angst, its popular appeal was doubtful and Freeman had been called in to give it the support of his name. Its disillusioned tone appealed strongly to Freeman, and he thoroughly enjoyed the preparation of the sinister and macabre sets, in the course of which he once or twice overruled the inexperienced young writer, he was sure for the lad’s own good. At the first night, he saw well enough that the reception of the play was lukewarm; the audience’s response seemed muted and the critics, though they stood about in groups as usual, were decidedly not engaged in animated discussion; they looked sour and said little. Opening the newspapers next morning, Freeman, all unsuspecting, was struck as by a sledge-hammer between the eyes. It appeared that the play had been ill served by its settings, which were variously described as Victorian Gothic, heavily baroque, stale whimsy, and quite out of tune with the contemporary theme and writing of the play. Freeman was stunned. His thick powerful fingers trembled as he turned over the pages, vainly searching for some more favourable comment on his cherished settings.

  “Gay! Gay!” he shouted.

  Gay came in—he was in bed, reading the papers and drinking his morning coffee. She chanced to be wearing a house-gown of a thin blue silk which Freeman had bought before the war in Paris, at the time of one of his greatest triumphs. The remembrance of this was bitter to him now. He looked into his daughter’s troubled eyes and saw that she was perfectly aware of the failure of his latest settings, that she had indeed expected it, been expecting such a failure for some time. Instantly his decision was taken.

  “I shall retire from my profession, Gay,” he said. “I shall leave London.”

  Gay said nothing, but seating herself on the bed by his side put her arms round him and rested her head on his shoulder.

  “I’ve harmed that young man,” said Freeman gruffly. “I’ve put an unnecessary obstacle in the way of his career. I mustn’t do that again, Gay. I’m not wanted here. I’m a nuisance. I shall take myself off somewhere—get out of the way of the younger men.”

  “Nothing can rob you of your previous achievements,” said Gay softly in his ear.

  It was true and it was the right line to take; the acceptance, frank and uncomplaining, of the common human lot: rise, triumph, decline. He had been lucky in that his period of maturity had brought him more than ordinary success; he must not grumble now that his greater height brought him a correspondingly greater fall.

  He held to his decision to leave London, for he did not wish to be tempted to take further commissions. For a time he wandered restlessly about, looking at seaside resorts and picturesque country villages, Gay in faithful attendance. Then, chancing to hear in a London street—it was the day of some great football match at Wembley—a voice speaking with a Yorkshire accent, he laughed and said half-jokingly to Gay:

  “I think I’ll return to the home of my ancestors.”

  “Why not?” said Gay.

  So they came to Hudley, and searching the hills for some small house which would suit at once Freeman’s sense of beauty and his wish not to impose too much housewifery on Gay, they discovered High Royd.

  The tiny farmstead was in a shocking condition when they first came upon it, a mere ruin, with that dark desolate look which long untenanted houses acquire. They saw it from the hillside road below, up which the car Freeman had hired in Hudley was conducted rather reluctantly by its driver at the direction merely of one of Freeman’s whims. (He never drove himself nowadays; he had long since discovered that the combination of dreamy preoccupation with thoughts of designs, and sudden bullish charges to make up the time thus dreamed away, which formed his driving, was dangerous to the public and must be given up.)

  “Stop!” cried Freeman suddenly.

  The driver, grinning, stopped.

  Freeman threw himself out of the car, thrust his burly body through the stone stile and clambered vigorously up the overgrown path to the old farmhouse. Gay followed, and after a moment so did the driver.

  The door stood askew, its top hinge perished, and grass had invaded the stone flags of the front room. But the gabled roof, as Freeman discovered by climbing up to it, was sound except for a few strayed stone tiles, the stone staircase was firm, the bedroom floors not unrepairable; while even the driver was impressed by the magnificence of the view. Freeman enquired the name of the house and locality; a bus driver passing in the road below told him that the village over the brow was Blackstalls.

  The name seemed to strike a note in Freeman’s memory. Could this possibly be the hillside township where his mother had been bred and courted? Was there a reservoir in the neighbourhood, he enquired? There was indeed; but moorland reservoirs, in the hills round Hudley, were not so unusual as to constitute a means of certain identification. Freeman was the last person in the world, he told himself, to entertain superstitions or romantic fancies, and he put away the belief in an ancestral connection on his part with Blackstalls, with a laugh. Nevertheless, there was no harm in it as a mere fancy, and certainly he felt very much at home in High Royd. He decided on the spot to buy it and settle there. Gay, as usual, was pleased with what pleased he
r father.

  That afternoon, having “looked over”, as he said, two or three Hudley lawyers—that is, charged in and out of their offices with Gay at his side—he picked one to do the business for him. Freeman was a good judge of men—he had seen so many—and this one served him well. Somehow in the course of the preliminary negotiations for the house all his financial affairs came into the solicitor’s knowledge—Freeman was only too glad to transfer all that tangle to somebody else’s hands—and the man told him emphatically that he had not the money with which to buy High Royd, he must be content to rent it. Freeman was amazed.

  “Not the money?” he exclaimed, incredulous.

  The solicitor had prepared a lengthy statement which he proceeded to explain in a blunt and forthright style, tapping each item with a square Yorkshire forefinger.

  “I don’t want to know all these details,” said Freeman impatiently—details always cluttered a design—“Tell me the essence of the matter in half a dozen words.”

  “In half a dozen words, then,” said the solicitor: “You’ve very little capital and no income.”

  “Really?” said Freeman. “Well, that is a surprise!” He laughed heartily, so that the solicitor stared at him; then fell to ruminating. “No—after all it’s not surprising,” he said at length ruefully. “I’ve earned plenty but I’ve spent it as it came.”

  “You never had anything at the back of you,” suggested the lawyer in an absolving tone.

  Freeman, recognising a local phrase but not quite sure of its meaning, looked interrogative.

  “No savings—nothing left to you by your parents,” expanded the lawyer.

  “No savings and nothing left to me by my parents,” agreed Freeman with a rather grim smile.

  His solicitor, after a prolonged haggle with the owner of High Royd, a Mrs. Eastwood, arranged that Freeman should rent the place on a monthly basis for what seemed to Freeman an amusingly small rent. The solicitor also disposed of the lease of Freeman’s London flat, paid all outstanding bills, tidied everything up generally and wished to invest the sum which remained so as to bring his client a steady if small income. But the income thus secured would be so ludicrously small that Freeman roared with laughter at the sound of it.