Ecstasy

by Mary Sharratt

  “New York streets are laid out in a grid, so if you can count, you can find your way around,” Kahn said. “Frau Direktor, you’ll be able to travel all over the city in our new subway system while your husband’s at work. No need to hire a cab. How’s that for modern living?”

  The farther they traveled uptown, the more elegant the department stores, concert halls, theatres, and town houses appeared. When they arrived in the Upper West Side, the chauffeur opened the door. Alma stepped out in front of the Hotel Majestic, rising twelve stories into that crisp winter sky. This wasn’t a dream—she and Gustav would truly be living here. Residential hotels were the ideal accommodation for visiting artists and musicians. Their suite, so the Kahns promised, was as commodious as an apartment and lacked only a kitchen. Food could be ordered up from the restaurant below. The hotel staff would see to their cleaning and laundry, which spared Alma from having to hire servants.

  After they bade farewell to the Kahns, the concierge escorted them through the marble lobby with its crystal chandeliers and into the elevator of brass and frosted glass. The eleventh floor! Never had Alma risen to such heights in any building anywhere in the world. Her heart raced, and she could still feel the ocean’s swell in her unsteady legs.

  Just when she thought the vertigo might overpower her, they stepped out into a corridor blazing with electric light. The concierge showed them into their suite, where their luggage already awaited them by some miracle. Taking Gustav’s hand, Alma rushed through the parlor and dining room with their walnut furniture, marble fireplace, and built-in bookcases and cabinets of solid oak.

  “Look, Gustav! Two pianos!”

  She darted to the large leaded windows that looked out on the snowy expanse of Central Park. Far below, figures skated on a frozen lake while a brass band played Christmas carols. Beyond the park rose the splendor of the Upper East Side, where the Rockefellers and Carnegies lived.

  “Oh, Gustav, this is like living in a mansion in the sky!” She threw her arms around her husband, who hadn’t yet removed his coat or hat. “Everything they say about America is true,” she murmured, loosening the winter scarf tied around his neck. “Here we can start all over again.”

  “I’m glad you like it, Almschi.” He kissed her before extricating himself from her embrace and retying his scarf.

  “Gustav, you’re not leaving already,” she said, her spirits sinking as he headed for the door. “We’ve only just arrived.”

  But he was as jumpy as though he had downed ten cups of strong Viennese coffee, frantic in his urgency. “Almschi, I’m expected to direct my debut performance on New Year’s Day after only nine days of rehearsal, and I don’t even know what opera they’ve chosen! I’ll be back for dinner!”

  At that, he dashed off to the subway.

  Much to their relief, they discovered that Gustav’s debut performance would be Tristan und Isolde, an opera he knew inside out, having directed it so many times before. When he wasn’t rehearsing at the Met, he spent most of the day in bed to spare his heart, following his doctor’s orders. He even took his meals in bed—his own separate bed in his own separate room. Her once-active husband who used to sprint like an athlete, never sitting still if he could help it.

  Christmas Eve in New York, their first without their daughters, was more hellish than anything Alma could have imagined. Gustav didn’t want to be reminded of the holiday and refused to suffer as much as a wreath over the mantelpiece. Instead, there being no rehearsals that day, he worked in bed, buried in his scores. Alma huddled on the window seat and looked out over Central Park. Families were everywhere. Skating, tobogganing, gliding along in horse-drawn sleighs. She shoved open the casement, allowing frigid air to flood the room, just to hear the distant voices of happy children. That drove a blade through her heart. Slamming the casement back down, she sobbed. Gustav, if he even heard her through his closed door, didn’t come to her. How she wished she had Mama or Gretl to pour out her heart to. Anyone.

  Little Gucki’s absence, far from freeing her and Gustav to enjoy a second honeymoon, made them both miserable. Without their only surviving child, what was left to bind them together as husband and wife? What revenant of love or desire remained? Their lovemaking in Paris already seemed a lifetime ago. Alma shrank inside to think that Gustav still blamed her for Putzi’s death, which had left them indelibly estranged, each of them locked inside their separate grief. If they could only talk about Putzi, remember her together. But Gustav couldn’t even tolerate hearing their dead daughter’s name.

  Now Gucki, left behind in Vienna, seemed lost to them as well. What Alma would have given to have her near. To shower her in kisses and presents. She would buy Gucki her first pair of ice skates, and they would go skating together in Central Park, Gucki’s little mittened hand in hers. Even Gustav would burst out of his cave when he heard their daughter’s laughter. Beautiful Anna Justine with her eyes like the sky.

  Dusk fell and Alma was still frozen on the window seat. The coldness between her and Gustav left her paralyzed. But she jerked to hear the knock on the door.

  Having no servant to make excuses and send the intruder away, Alma dragged herself up and dried her eyes before cracking the door three inches and peering out. She had a terrible cold, that’s what she’d say. That was why her nose and eyes were swollen and red. No, she hadn’t been crying. But the sight of the smiling middle-aged man with his waxed moustache left her mute. He held out an ornate tin box of gingerbread.

  “Do I have the honor of addressing Frau Direktor Mahler?”

  To her astonishment, he spoke not only German but Viennese German. For one blinding second, she could believe she was back home and that somewhere across the room Gucki was clapping her hands, anticipating unwrapping the gifts beneath the tree.

  “Maurice Baumfeld is my name,” the visitor told her, shaking her hand. “Director of the Irving Place Theatre and a great admirer of your husband, I might add. I’ve come to wish you both a merry Christmas and a warm welcome to New York.”

  When Alma attempted to smile graciously, she thought her face would break in two. There was no hiding her unhappiness from Herr Baumfeld.

  “Forgive me, but I see it’s not very merry for you, is it?” His face knit in concern. “In a foreign place, so far from home. Well, no need to be lonely, madam. You and the Herr Direktor must come and share dinner with me and my family. I’ll wait while the two of you get ready. Don’t look so bashful, Frau Direktor. I insist! It would be a crime to leave you two alone on Christmas Eve.”

  Trembling in gratitude, Alma ran to fetch Gustav.

  “We can’t possibly say no,” she said, dragging him out of bed as though he were her child. “It would be beastly to refuse such kindness.”

  So Alma and Gustav found themselves in a handsomely furnished brownstone several blocks away. Though the Baumfelds were Jewish, they, like the assimilated Jews back home, celebrated Christmas in true Austrian style, with all the trappings except Midnight Mass. Their seven children sang “Stille Nacht” while their mother lit the white candles on the tree. Alma played carols on the piano, taking requests from the children who thronged around. She struggled not to weep all over the three-year-old girl who kept tugging on her skirt and telling her she was pretty. An older child brought her a cup of mulled wine. Soon enough, she and the other adults, apart from Gustav, became agreeably tipsy.

  Then Frau Baumfeld summoned them to the holly-bedecked table, where they ate roast goose stuffed with apples and served with red cabbage and roast potatoes. Back in Vienna, Mama was probably serving an identical meal. Alma pictured her mother’s table with Gucki, Maria, Carl, Gretl, Wilhelm, and their little boy gathered around. Mama had probably tied a red velvet ribbon in Gucki’s silky golden hair. But the Baumfelds were so convivial and their children so endearing, they managed to draw Alma out of her homesick introspection. Likewise, Gustav seemed more relaxed than she had seen him since they had first set foot in New York. What a gift it was to see him smi
le while he listened indulgently to the Baumfelds’ little boy chattering about his pet turtle, who was also named Gustav.

  Alma thought back to their lovemaking in Paris. She began to wonder if there was a chance she was carrying a new life inside her to redeem Putzi’s death. Maybe this time she would bear a son—would that make Gustav love her again? She bit her lip and made herself laugh and smile along with everyone else.

  Later, after the children had opened their presents and finally trudged reluctantly to bed, the Baumfelds served coffee and liqueurs. Herr Baumfeld told them of his dreams of a German-language theatre company. He made it sound possible to live a full artistic life in New York without necessarily mastering English—an idea that gave Alma considerable hope, considering her own struggles with the new language.

  Before long, Baumfeld’s theatre troupe burst in. A perfect hostess, Frau Baumfeld opened several bottles of champagne. An effort the lady could have spared herself, Alma thought. The actors and actresses were already in their cups, their language louche enough to make even Alma blush. She hoped the children upstairs wouldn’t hear.

  Jolly as ever, Herr Baumfeld introduced her and Gustav to his company. The most inebriated among them, a blonde with a plunging neckline and too much kohl around her eyes, lurched toward them and offered her hand for Gustav to kiss. Her fingernails were painted as red as sin.

  “Enchanté, Herr Direktor,” she slurred. “My name is Pauline, but everyone calls me Putzi.”

  Alma watched Gustav go white around the mouth before he reared away as though fleeing a leper. Murmuring excuses, she stumbled in his wake as he shot out of the house. On the icy sidewalk, he gasped and doubled over. Alma’s stomach pitched in panic. Was he having a heart attack? When she reached for his arm, he drew himself up and rubbed his eyes. The Baumfelds’ maid, meanwhile, stepped out to hand them their coats and hats. Alma stammered her thanks.

  Fortunately, the Hotel Majestic was close enough so Alma and Gustav could walk home, dodging the revelers and the families headed for church. But wherever Alma looked, from one lamplit window to another, she saw her dead daughter staring back at her. The last look Putzi had given her before Alma had left her on the makeshift operating table at Maiernigg.

  Feathery snowflakes drifted down, touching their faces, reminding Alma all too cruelly of her first walk with Gustav six years ago. When he had been so fervently in love with her, abandoning all reason and restraint. You know, it won’t be easy to marry a man like me. Alma reached for his hand and squeezed, but Gustav only blinked and looked straight ahead. She saw that his eyes shone with the tears he could not allow himself to shed on these cold, windy streets. She shivered and shook. All the excitement and promise New York offered could do nothing to heal their grief.

  On December 26, Gustav was back at the Met, leaving Alma alone for most of the day. And yet he needed her. Who else was there to listen to his apprehensions about his looming debut? Gustav was appalled at the Met Opera’s shoddy staging. Though his soloists were among the best in the world and the auditorium was luxurious, the dressing rooms were cramped and there was very limited space for rehearsals. The scenery and props had to be stored beneath the stage.

  “Almschi, they hired me to raise the Met to European standards, but that will take years!” He paced the floor until Alma wondered if the downstairs neighbors would complain. “What I wouldn’t give to bring Roller over here! Now I understand why Kahn offered me Conried’s job. Conried’s a megalomaniac and he has syphilis! All I need. A syphilitic boss.”

  On New Year’s Day, his opening night, Gustav was so nervous that as they entered the elevator he stepped on Alma’s evening gown, ripping off her train and most of the back of her skirt. Half-undressed, she was obliged to flee back to their suite and frantically stitch her gown back together. Meanwhile, Gustav was a bundle of convulsing nerves on two skinny legs.

  “Go!” she told him. “Otherwise you’ll be late. This will take me ages.”

  But he gripped her bare shoulder and kissed the top of her head more tenderly than he had touched her since Paris. “They’ll have to wait. I can’t go without you, Almschi. Facing the Astors and Vanderbilts alone? What if the reviewers eviscerate me?”

  He sounded like a man fighting not only to save his career but also his entire existence. Perhaps, for Gustav, they were one and the same.

  The telephone rang shrilly. It was Conried, predictably racked with apprehension as to why his star conductor was late.

  “Don’t shout at me!” Gustav shouted into the receiver. “Anyway, it’s your fault—why did you put us in a hotel so far from the opera? If you want to be helpful, send an automobile to drive us down!” He had never sounded more Bohemian, as though he had never left his native village of Kalischt. In spite of herself, Alma laughed. She caught his eye until he cracked a smile and laughed, too.

  “It’s finished,” she said, holding up her mended gown. “Lace me back in, would you? And watch where you put your clumsy feet, Gustl!”

  The interior of the Metropolitan Opera was a jewel case of white, red, and gold with a magnificently painted ceiling. It seated 3,635, or so Gustav had told her, and every one of those seats was full. The auditorium echoed with impatient murmurs.

  Mr. Kahn was gracious enough to show Alma up to the director’s box, where she joined Mrs. Kahn and Conried, who looked as though he might die of apoplexy if the performance was delayed another second. Conried did indeed look ill, Alma observed, as she shook his plump, pasty hand. She strove to mask her discomfort over touching a person who was slowly dying of syphilis. The disease had left him half-crippled.

  To distract herself, she looked out over the audience where New York’s elite were assembled. Debutantes and socialites glittered like galaxies in their diamond tiaras and colliers. Alma sat down abruptly, the better to hide her torn skirt that she had so hastily stitched back together.

  A hush fell over the auditorium as the lights dimmed.

  “Finally!” Conried muttered.

  Alma leaned forward to see her husband mount the podium, his tuxedo tails flapping. Her jaw relaxed to see him move with such agility, as though he had never been diagnosed with a heart condition. But when he turned to face his cheering audience, his face was guarded, almost severe. She knit her hands together to think how nervous he must be, directing his American debut after only nine days of rehearsal. Back in Vienna, he would have spent months preparing for such a production.

  The curtains opened to reveal the slapdash backdrop of ocean waves and the clumsily rigged stage ship. Gustav was right—in terms of staging, the Met was no better than some provincial opera in the Tyrolean hinterland. But when he lifted his baton and the orchestra began the overture, the lush swelling notes swept her away. The acoustics were superb, as was his cast. The Swedish-born soprano Olive Fremstad was singing the role of Isolde for the first time. The beauty of her voice eclipsed even Mildenburg’s back in Vienna. Heinrich Knote had come over from Munich to play a smoldering Tristan. He was the perfect heldentenor—slim, youthful, and expressive, his rich voice seducing every lady in the audience.

  But Alma’s eyes kept returning to the true star of the evening—her husband. The others, too, she noticed, kept their opera glasses trained on him. Gustav was mesmerizing, his movements economical and precise. He rode the orchestra with the assurance of a master equestrian. At one moment, he curbed its luxuriance so as to better showcase his vocalists, allowing them to be heard with ease. At another, he gave the orchestra its head so it could race forward with brio into dramatic crescendos. This lean yet muscular interpretation heightened both the suspense and the sensuality. Never had the libretto sounded this lucid, and Fremstad shone in this spotlight, her diction flawless.

  “I’ve never heard Tristan like this,” Kahn said, in the interval. “It sounds like something entirely new.”

  Conried appeared ecstatic. “This is how Wagner should sound! Frau Direktor, your husband is a genius.”

  The “Lie
bestod” scene was more sublime than Alma had ever heard it, moving her to tears, her silk gown nearly melting off her flesh. It was as though Gustav were making love to her through his exquisite music.

  When the opera reached its dramatic close, she was lifted out of herself in rapture. Blind to that audience of millionaires and jewel-encrusted grande dames, she leapt to her feet and applauded madly. Then she saw that everyone else had also risen to give her husband a standing ovation. The thundering clapping and cheers threatened to bring down that painted ceiling.

  Turning on the podium, still gripping his baton, Gustav looked dazed, as though flabbergasted that his debut had been such a success. Truly, this is one of his greatest triumphs, Alma thought. In one stroke, her husband’s brilliance had entirely changed their fortunes.

  33

  Such a fantastical city New York was, a living fairy tale. Electric lighting all up and down Broadway, turning night into day. We should be so happy here. There were good days, such as their luncheon party at Conried’s apartment, furnished as though it were an Old World castle with heavy Gothic chandeliers set with gaudy colored lightbulbs. There was even a full suit of medieval armor lit from within by a red light. Alma had never seen such hilarious kitsch, but Conried took his décor very seriously so she was obliged to keep a straight face. Only when she and Gustav left the building and emerged on the sidewalk could they dissolve into helpless laughter.

  The newspapers sang Gustav’s praises, hailing him as one of the greatest conductors New York had ever known. Yet, despite the acclaim heaped upon him, he didn’t seem happy. Instead, he remained fixated on his heart condition. Nervous, quick-tempered, and irritable.

  Alma lived for Mama’s letters assuring her that Gucki was healthy and well. For the photographs of Gucki playing with Maria. Of Gucki perched at the piano Alma had once thought of as her ultimate refuge. In all the photographs, Gucki looked so serious, her huge eyes dominating her round little face. What would it be like to reunite with her daughter when she and Gustav finally returned to Vienna in May, Alma wondered. Would Gucki still know her mother? Or would she regard Alma as a stranger?