Authors: Mary Burchell
'My position isn't really what matters,' she said. 'But, since you mention it, yes, I would feel rather awful. You see—' determinedly she put herself on the same footing as the child— 'I once made rather a fool of myself to Mr. Tarkman. I was over-confident about a personal opinion and was afterwards proved wrong. I was so sure that I was right about
you
that I rather stuck my neck put again. I suppose if my candidate actually refused to perform tonight he would think me more of a fool than ever. But if you feel you simply can't—'
Janet took out her glasses, polished them nervously and put them back again.
'I'll play,' she said briefly, and Felicity with difficulty refrained from embracing her. Instead, she just said,
'That's a good, brave girl. Forget your aunt and play for Mr. Tarkman.'
'Where is he sitting?' Janet inquired.
'I don't know,' lied Felicity, realizing that Janet was still unaware that die important Mr. Tarkman and the hated aunt were together. She just put up a confused little prayer to whatever guardian angel looks after temperamental geniuses and hoped for the best.
In ordinary circumstances, of course, a school concert would not exactly have taxed Felicity's nerves. On the contrary, she was expected to be the calm support of the jittery young performers she had to accompany. But when she finally went on to the platform with Janet she experienced all the familiar symptoms of acute stage-fright. The dry throat, the inescapable chill, the horrid empty feeling in the pit of her stomach, the awareness that her smile was fixed and that she could do nothing about it.
Janet wasted no smile - not even a fixed one — on her audience. She looked at no one, but proceeded to tune her violin with something less than her usual calm security. Silence had fallen on the hall already, for the school was well aware that Janet could out-play and out-class them all, and in a way they were rather proud of her.
It was therefore certainly not from any member of the school that the slight, mocking little laugh came. And because of Janet's immediate reaction Felicity knew, as surely as if Mrs. Morton had been named, that it was Janet's aunt who had made that almost imperceptible sound.
At once Janet gave Felicity a little nod, to indicate that she was ready to begin. And Felicity, knowing that any further delay would unnerve the child completely, simply could not let Janet know that for once her impeccable ear was at fault and that her
E
string was fractionally sharp.
At almost any other time it would not have been serious enough to matter. Indeed, Felicity knew that not one per cent of the audience that night would have any inkling of the fact. Almost all of them were there to applaud and praise indiscriminately anyway. And Janet - even Janet at less than her best — could not fail to astonish and impress them.
But it was not the unknowing ninety-nine per cent who mattered. It was Stephen Tarkman. And Felicity had not the slightest doubt that he would be alert to the smallest fault.
In spite of the faulty
E
string, however, Janet launched into her sonata with the near-brilliance of someone beyond her years, and for the first few minutes Felicity dared to think that perhaps she was going to do herself justice, after all.
But then a change began to come over her performance, something so subtle and intangible that only someone as knowledgeable as Felicity could have pinpointed it. It was as though the life and light drained out of the work. The notes continued to be played with considerable skill and accuracy and, considering the faulty tuning of the instrument, the intonation was good. But the beauty and knowledge, the insight and poetry which Janet had unfailingly brought to her playing simply were not there.
She could have been any gifted, hard-working little pupil doing her best. The magic which Felicity had found so incredible in a child of her age was gone. It was a highly meritorious performance. But, thought Felicity bitterly, even brilliant failure would probably have been more arresting.
At the end there was tremendous applause, partly from her fellow-pupils who thought it fantastic that Janet Morton could play so many notes and get them all right, and partly from indulgent parents who either knew Janet's sad history and wished her well or were just touched that anyone so small could give evidence of such hard work.
Felicity glanced once in the direction of Stephen Tarkman. He was clapping, it was true, and perhaps rather more than perfunctorily. But his head was bent and he was listening with a smile to something which was being said with some emphasis by the laughing woman beside him.
'I was rotten,' Janet said stonily as they came off the platform together.
'You were quite astonishingly good, considering that you were upset,' replied Felicity firmly.
'But not good enough. And my
E
string was sharp. Was Mr. Tarkman the man sitting beside my aunt?'
'Yes,' said Felicity because it was not much good saying anything else.
'I thought so. She whispered something to him quite near the beginning. I knew it was no good then. She didn't
mean
him to like me.'
Felicity was hard put to it not to shake Janet and tell her to snap out of this nonsense. Surely not even a sensitive, temperamental child need allow anyone to affect her so strongly. But she realized resignedly that one might as well tell a rabbit to buck up and not mind the snake. Janet, for reasons which seemed sufficient to herself, both hated and feared her aunt to such a degree that she had probably spoiled her chances of a Tarkman scholarship.
Unless, that was, Felicity could talk Stephen Tarkman into taking a lenient view now and hearing her again in more
favourable
circumstances. It was not a task she relished, and at that moment Janet added the last piece of information needed to make Felicity feel defeated before she had begun.
'My aunt wants Mr. Tarkman to marry her. She always spoke of him in a funny, possessive sort of way. My father used to say he wouldn't have a chance if she really went all out to get him.'
Felicity was so startled to hear Janet refer to, even quote, her father — and in such terms — that for a moment she was dumb. Then she said hastily, 'People often say things like that without exactly meaning them.'
'My father meant it,' replied Janet simply. And there really seemed nothing else to add to the argument.
The concert, however, was not of course standing still for Janet Morton's individual tragedy. There were other pupils to be cheered, inspired and even accompanied. Felicity forced herself to say something conventionally comforting, though she felt certain the words never even reached Janet's comprehension, and then addressed herself to her other duties of the evening.
By the end of the concert she felt as exhausted as if she had given a solo recital at the Festival Hall. And she was not exactly revived by the information supplied by two of Janet's classmates that she had gone home.
'Gone home!' exclaimed Felicity in consternation. 'But why didn't she wait until the end of the evening? Everyone was expected to do that.'
'She said she didn't feel well, Miss Grainger,' one of them explained. And the other added, for good measure, 'She looked ghastly.'
There was nothing left for her to do but seek out Stephen Tarkman over the modest refreshments now being handed round, and see if she could judge his reactions and undo some of the harm which had been done.
Even getting anywhere near him was difficult because anxious or gratified parents bore down on her from every side, eager to ask about their own darlings. To each one she somehow managed to sound as though the progress of their child was her abiding interest.
And, in spite of her inward agitation, she still looked reasonably relaxed and unflustered by the time she reached Stephen Tarkman and his companion.
He insisted on procuring coffee for her immediately and made the introductions.
'Mrs. Morton is Janet's aunt, you know,' he explained. 'She wants to have a word with you about her.'
'Yes, indeed! and a very congratulatory word.' Mrs. Morton smiled so engagingly that for a bewildered moment Felicity thought Janet's antipathy must surely be groundless and unjust. But then the other woman went on,
'You must have worked terribly hard to bring the child to this standard, because she's really rather — what shall I say? —
limited.
Clever as a monkey with her finger work, but not a very accurate ear. Much more the little mechanical show-off than the true artist.'
'I totally disagree.' Felicity did not even try to conceal the contemptuous hostility in her voice. 'Janet is an artist to her finger-tips, and more truly musical than any other child I've ever handled.'
'Oh,
really
—' the other woman began, on a note of smiling protest.
'Miss Grainger is very emphatic when it comes to praising or blaming,' put in Stephen Tarkman amusedly. 'I warn you, she'll defend any candidate of hers to the death.'
'It's too sweet of you to feel like this about Janet.' Mrs. Morton still smiled, but she spoke as though Felicity were sentimentally allowing any judgment she might have to be clouded by her emotions. 'Of course one would
like
the poor chick to be something out of the ordinary, to compensate for her personal tragedy, and I do understand your feeling like that—'
'I don't feel in the least like that,' interrupted Felicity almost rudely and, turning deliberately to Stephen Tarkman, she asked bluntly, 'What did
you
think of Janet?'
'I'm not quite sure,' he said frankly. 'I heard nothing tonight which convinced me that she was outstanding, except perhaps the opening phrases. And it was disquieting, to say the least of it, that she could not even tune her instrument accurately. If she has a faulty ear—'
'But she hasn't!' Felicity assured him. 'She was nervous—'
'Why? Surely you didn't tell her beforehand that I was coming?'
'No, of course not.' Felicity felt that the last-minute admission, which had left Janet completely untouched, need not be mentioned.
'Do you mean that such a minor ordeal as a school concert can upset her sufficiently to spoil her work?' Stephen Tarkman looked
sceptical
.
'No, it wasn't that. It was just — I hardly know how to say this without being offensive,' said Felicity, who would have welcomed the opportunity to be offensive to Mrs. Morton, but not in front of Stephen Tarkman. 'The fact was that Janet was put out to the point of panic at finding she was to play in front of you, Mrs. Morton. I don't know if she felt you might be over- critical, or whether it was just that, like many people, she couldn't bear to have a member of her own family there. It makes some people self-conscious, you know — inhibited—'
'Oh, don't apologize, Miss Grainger.' Mrs. Morton gave an understanding little laugh. 'Janet just doesn't like me, I'm afraid. It's as simple as that. She was a very spoiled, over-praised little girl in her parents' lifetime and had a remarkable capacity for putting herself in the centre of the scene. I said so frankly, and was very unpopular in consequence. She
is
a gifted child superficially. But when you've had her a little longer under your care you'll find that there's not much staying power behind the initial good impression. Her father was the same,' she added reflectively.
'You do dislike her, don't you?' Felicity said drily.
'Miss Grainger, not
at all!'
The dark-fringed grey eyes looked shocked rather than angry. 'It's just that I know my own family rather well, and I don't want natural sympathy to cloud anyone's artistic judgment. There are so few of those precious vacancies at
Tarkmans
. We don't any of us want them wasted on the wrong people, do we?'
'No,' agreed Felicity, with an irony she had not thought herself capable of. 'We really don't, do we?'
Then she turned away to answer the tentative approaches of another eager parent. And when she had dealt adequately with that situation, Stephen Tarkman and his companion had left.
'I muffed the whole thing,' Felicity told Mary much later that night. 'I panicked. Inside only, of course. But panic is infectious, and by the time I tackled Stephen Tarkman and that woman I felt nearly as badly about her as Janet does. And I lost my temper too. That was inexcusable.'
'Anyone would have in the circumstances,' Mary insisted loyally.
'No.' Felicity shook her head. 'Losing one's temper is an indulgence — an indulgence one can't afford when the cards are stacked against one. He hasn't absolutely pronounced against Janet yet, of course. But Mrs. Morton means to spoil the child's chances if she can. I can't really think
why I
Why does she dislike her so much? She isn't an objectionable child. Dreamy and irritating at times perhaps, so that quite reasonable people — you, for instance — might not particularly like her, but—'
'I?' Mary looked startled and rather indignant. 'I've nothing against the kid and I wish her well. It's just that so far as my particular subject is concerned she's plain ivory from the neck upwards.'
'Well, that's
it!
That's what I mean. As you say, you have nothing against the kid. But she
has.
Mrs. Morton, I mean.'