Authors: Frank Conroy
Claude had brought the matter up with his mother.
"I can't do it," she said. "I know it's important, Claude, but don't make me do it."
"Okay," Claude said. "That's okay."
"I take swells to Carnegie Hall all the time. I wouldn't know what to say. Let me just stay here with Al and you can tell me all about it, you can tell us both."
Even with some mild encouragement from Al she had remained adamant. "On top of everything else I'm too big. I'd stick out like a sore thumb."
"What you talking about," Al said. "You ever see some of those opera-singer ladies?"
"Did you ever see Kate Smith? It doesn't matter. I'm going to stay right here. Claude understands."
And so, a few days later, in the basement of the music store, Claude put aside the scores on his worktable and composed a letter to Catherine Marsh. He went through two drafts on notebook paper before copying it down on heavy stationery he had bought at Woolworth's.
Dear Catherine,
On June tenth, at three o'clock in the afternoon, I will be performing Mozart's Double Piano Concerto in E-flat Major, with Charles Fredericks at the Longmeadow Music Festival in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. I should add that this will be with a full orchestra. I guess you know that lots of people think Mr. Fredericks is the best player of Mozart. Even better than Victor Wolff. Also he hasn't played a recital in a long time, so this will be a big event. It will certainly be big for me!
I would like to invite you. If you can come, Mr. Fredericks's driver will pick you up in the Rolls-Royce Friday morning at your house (I will already be at the Festival). But then I can ride back with you Friday night. I really hope you can come. Please call me at Weisfeld's Music Store, ATwater 9â0418. If I'm not there, please leave a message. I hope you will let me know soon so I can arrange everything about the Rolls-Royce.
Sincerely,
Claude Rawlings
He sealed the letter, went upstairs and got a three-cent stamp out of the cash register, affixed it carefully, and mailed it at the corner box. It would be delivered, he knew, the next morning at the earliest, or the next afternoon at the latest.
Five days later, as Claude left to meet Ivan at Bentley and say goodbye, Weisfeld held the letter out to him from behind the counter. The address had been crossed out with a slash of blue ink, and someone had written
Return to Sender.
He turned the envelope over several times. It did not appear to have been opened.
"What does this mean?"
"I don't know," Weisfeld said.
"Did she do this?"
"I don't know."
"I can't believe she wouldn't even read it." Claude kept looking at the envelope, the blue slash, the unfamiliar handwriting. "This
is strange," he said, finally putting it in his back pocket. Weisfeld shrugged.
Claude walked over to the Bentley School. Halfway there, he stopped at a corner and pulled out the letter for yet another look, put it back again, and crossed the street. For days he had been waiting for her response, looking up every time the phone rang, and now he realized he had been waiting for nothing. Passing a newsstand, he resisted the urge to kick out the table and send the papers flying.
Ivan awaited him in the faculty lounge and poured him a small glass of sherry. "The headmaster gave it to me. Said if I was going to Cambridge I might as well get used to it. Cheers."
"Cheers," said Claude, and took a sip.
"Well, God knows when I'll see you again. Possibly never." He sat down on the leather couch, legs sprawling. "But it's been fun."
"I never thanked you properly for all the help." Claude went over to the window.
"Working hard on the Mozart?"
"I ... I..." He took a breath. "I invited Catherine Marsh to the concert, but the letter was returned unopened and I can't figure it out." Staring out at the street, he eventually became aware of the silence behind him and turned to face his friend. "What?" Claude asked.
"You haven't heard?" Ivan gave a small cough behind his hand.
"Heard what?"
"Everybody's been talking about it for days. I thought you would've heard. All very dramatic. It seems she's eloped with somebody from the Harvard Business School and gone to Australia. Just like that. Didn't even warn her family. Gone."
(Many years later, in the wings of a theater in Cleveland, Claude was to be knocked half unconscious by a falling board. Sunk to his knees, he was to feel not pain but a sensation of discontinuity in time, as if lifted out of its flow entirely and then,
click,
back in, feeling uneasy and unsure about what it was he was back into. He would later connect that moment to what he felt now in the faculty lounge.)
"Are you sure?"
"Nobody seems to know much about this fellow except his father owns an aluminum company. That's why Australia. The bauxite. John Dogge, I believe his name isâwith two
g
's and an
e
."
"When ...," Claude began. "How long?"
"I don't know. The story is, they took a train to San Francisco,
caught a Matson liner, and were married by the captain the first day out." He drank some sherry, watching Claude. "Like something out of a bad novel, isn't it?"
"My God." Claude fell into a chair.
"I know you fancied her," Ivan said. "I'm sorry."
"She's only seventeen."
"Well, that's old enough, old chum. They grow up faster than we do." He got up and approached with the bottle, topping up Claude's glass. "Drink."
Claude did so, and Ivan topped the glass again. "That's enough," Claude said.
"Now don't be downhearted our last time together," Ivan said. "Life is long and rich. We are young and there will be many girls. I know it sounds insensitive, but it's true."
"Yes. Of course."
They talked of other things.
The station wagon, an old but well-kept-up Ford with the words
WHITE FOX INN
burned into the wood under the side windows, was parked beside the station. As Claude approached, the driver, a short, wizened old man in overalls, scanned the crowd behind the boy, moving a toothpick from one side of his mouth to the other. Claude walked right up to him.
"You Rawlings?" the old man asked.
"Yes."
"I thought you'd be older." He removed the toothpick and reached for Claude's small suitcase. "Hop in."
As they drove out of Springfield, into the hills and the soft late afternoon sunshine, Claude saw fields, farmhouses, cows, and low stone walls. He watched with attention, since he'd never been out of New York City and its environs before.
"The reason I thought you'd be older," the old man said, "is you're staying at the inn with the big shots. The kids stay in those old houses on Perkin's Road. School bus picks them up. You must be important, I guess."
"I guess," Claude said.
They rode in silence the rest of the way. The White Fox Inn was a large, three-story building with a broad wooden porch stretching almost its entire length. People lounged in the shade, talking, reading
newspapers, even playing cards at bridge tables. No one seemed to notice as Claude and the driver climbed the steps and crossed the threshold into the lobby.
At the reception desk another old manâwho could have been the driver's brother, so close was the resemblanceâtouched his bow tie and turned the registration book around. The lobby smelled of apples and vinegar.
"Rawlings," the driver said. "One bag." He placed it on the floor, turned, and left.
"Please sign here," the clerk said. "You have 203. That's right across the hall from Mr. Fredericks. Just go up the stairs and turn left. The bellboy's off helping his brother find a cow."
Claude signed.
"Dinner's in there at six-thirty." He gave a nod toward the dining room in back. "I guess you know everything's been paid for already."
"Thank you."
"You know how to get to the farm?" Catching Claude's blank expression, he added, "Where the festival's at?"
"No."
"Okay. Walk out the door, take a left, turn right at the first street, that's Perkin's Road, and it's about a quarter mile."
His room was high-ceilinged, with two windows facing a lawn, a stand of tall trees, and a lake behind. There was a four-poster bed with a tufted white bedspread, a bureau, and a writing desk. He found a small closet, and a bathroom with an enormous tub on cast-iron legs. He went back and lay on the bed.
Taking several deep breaths, he closed his eyes. His body still felt the motion of the train and the station wagon. He was tired and wound up at the same time, his mind casting around. He thought he might go over to the festival after dinner and see if he could find a piano somewhere, lock himself in, and play. He had done almost nothing but play since his meeting with Ivan.
On a sudden impulse he went into the bathroom and, with a great clanking, rattling, and knocking, filled the deep tub with the hottest water he thought he could stand. He undressed and lowered himself inch by inch, gasping at the sweet pain. It was possible to lie fully stretched out, the back of his head against the porcelain, immersed to his chin. The warmth crept into his body, ever deeper, and his mind fell still, hypnotized by the slow, steady drip from the faucet.
After some time he heard the drip as a tempo, and he heard the high, clear voice of Alfred Deller in his head.
Music, music, for a while, shall all your cares beguile.
Claude fingered the notes of the accompaniment on the bottom of the tub.
He ate alone in the nearly empty dining room, served by a gray-haired woman who wore a hair net and kept her white socks rolled at the ankles. The meal was goodâthin slices of pot roast with gravy, mashed potatoes, glazed carrots, peas, and iced tea. He ate steadily, surprised to discover how hungry he was. After she'd cleared the table, the woman in the rolled socks came back with a piece of cherry pie a la mode. "Try this," she said. "I made it."
It was excellent, tart and fruity with a light crust.
He went back to his room, lay down for what he thought was going to be a few minutes, and fell asleep. He woke in the middle of the night, undressed, and climbed between the sheets to sleep the clock around.
Early the next morning he stood in front of the administration buildingâa large farmhouse converted to office space, studios, a library, living quarters, and classrooms. The assistant director, a wire-thin woman named Mrs. Chatfield, had greeted him with obvious relief even as she shouted instructions to the front office, answered the telephone, and pulled out drawers at her desk.
"Marvelous," she'd said, "you're here. One less thing to worry about." She flashed a brief apologetic smile and handed him a three-ring binder full of mimeographed material. "Everything's in there. Maps. Schedules. All the events. Felix will show you around. Felix!" she shouted.
Now, standing in the sunshine, Felix, a fast-talking, effeminate young man in his twenties, pointed with a languid arm. "Three hundred and fifty-six acres. Twelve buildings. The big performance space is behind us, near the lake. A sort of natural amphitheater. Major rehearsals over there, in the old cow barn. I'd show up early if I were you."
"Okay."
"You want me to take you around? I've got a composition seminar in forty-five minutes, but there's time."
"Thanks. I'll just wander."
"Fine." He went back into the building.
Claude walked along the main path toward an enormous, solitary
elm tree. There was a rough-hewn bench underneath it, where he sat down and opened the three-ring binder. He could not shake a feeling of unrealityâthe birds singing above him, the wide, impossibly blue sky, the smell of new-cut grass, the rustling leaves, the background of deep silence, the sense of space. The binder seemed to contain an antidote: facts, lists, times. Descriptions of activities. He read slowly.
At first it was bewildering. What was the difference between a class and a seminar, a rehearsal and performance preparation, a lecture and a demonstration? Most of the music referred to he recognized, if not by the piece itself, then by the name of the composer, but who was Christian Sinding? What was Jacques Ibert's Capriccio? What was the Thuille Sextet? What were the ongoing auditions? Auditions for what?
The days were jammed with classes, meetings, and rehearsals. Gradually it became clear that a great deal of what was going on was aimed at the afternoon and evening performances. Performances of one kind or another seemed to be almost continuous in different buildings and settings. It took Claude five minutes of riffling the pages to discover that the student orchestra had been working on the Mozart Double Piano Concerto under someone named Vladimir Popkin for an hour a day. It seemed a short time, but as he correlated information he saw they were working on a number of other pieces as well.
He raised his head and was surprised to see people moving around the previously empty landscape. A young man ran clumsily with a thick pile of manuscripts in his arms. Two women strode briskly with violin cases. Groups of people ambled every which way, talking, laughing, arguing as they moved over the grass. Nearby, a young woman lay down on her back and turned her face to the sun. Everyone seemed to be wearing whiteâskirts, pants, shirts, even a few hats in various shades of white. Two men in identical cream trousers sat on a split-rail fence, white sleeves rolled up, swinging their legs as they talked. One of them sang a phrase, tracing the shape of the melody in the air with his forefinger.
Claude became uncomfortably aware of his blue suit, green tie, and heavy black Florsheim shoes. He took off his jacket and tie. At least his shirt was white, and brand new. He rolled the sleeves to just below the elbow, like the men on the fence.
After an hour of walking the grounds he came upon the amphitheater, which was empty. An enclosed stage, rows of benches under a large canvas of army-surplus khaki, and a gently rising hillside of
cropped meadow. As he stood looking down on it a flock of large black birds flew silently overhead toward the lake behind the stage. It would be like playing outdoors, he thought, wondering how much he would be able to hear.