The Demon's Riddle (4 page)

A surge of something like electricity shot through Kerry's body at the way she had pleased him, and she knew she wanted more of that. Much more.

Just as quickly as he praised her, though, Cavanaugh went back to the piece. He split off the rest of the first row and told them they were taking the second part, then walked them through the vocal line, which was quite similar to what Kerry had just sung. Without the words, though there was a slight hesitation within this group as they acclimated to this new format.

Once they got it, though, the sound was excellent -- not as thrilling as what Kerry had just done, of course, but close enough to set off a ripple of beaming smiles in the front row.

From there, Cavanaugh moved to the back, slowly piecing together the third and fourth parts. These two parts were a bit more of a struggle initially, with several false starts as part of the process. Once it came together, though, the results were sterling, and Kerry watched him work carefully, comparing his process to that of some of her better teachers at Oberlin.

Except there was no comparison. Cavanaugh was in a league of his own when it came to doing this -- he knew exactly what he wanted and exactly how to get it, with a minimal amount of fuss and extra repetitions.

He neither cajoled nor encouraged anyone, he simply went forward, knowing intuitively what to do next if a particular step failed or didn't quite work the way he initially expected. His intuition was remarkably accurate, and Kerry found herself increasingly fascinated as he continued with his work, eager to hear what the final results would wound like.

She didn't have to wait long. The director got right to it once he was through rehearsing the individual parts, jumping them right into the full piece.

The results were amazing. It sounded like a cross between a hymn and a Gregorian chant, Kerry couldn't decide which. There was something unique and ethereal about it, a quality Kerry had never heard before that she couldn't relate to any particular composer or individual period. Everyone in the choir was stunned when they were finished, no one said anything, and Cavanaugh smiled at her, as if to say "this is what I do."

Once again, though, the choirmaster took little time between pieces, collecting the Bartok and passing out yet another piece of sheet music. The format was the same, no words, just staves full of notes, although there were just as few notes in this piece as there had been in the Bartok.

The process of putting it together was identical as well. Kerry was the focal point for a second time, and this time she took to his direction with confidence, with no hesitation. Her sight singing chops had kicked in, and she recognized the simple melody almost
immediately, for it was neither as foreign or as arcane as the Bartok had seemed the first time she sang it.

The rest of the choir knew it as well, because it was familiar, so familiar that Kerry was tempted to add the words, that's how obvious it was. Even classical neophytes in the choir knew the tune as being from Dvorak's "Going Home," and Kerry let it ring out across the balcony, out into the rafters of the church itself. The sound reverberated and echoed back as she sang, so much so that they were able to hear it twice and then a third time, each repetition hot on the heels of the last.

This time it was Kerry who smiled when she was done. Cavanaugh immediately added the rest of her part of the front row to the equation, and everything came together almost instantly. The second part came together almost quickly, and even the back row was up to the challenge of singing without words, capitalizing on the familiarity of the melody line under Cavanaugh's crisp, elogant direction. 

When the Dvorak was done Cavanaugh repeated the process once again, collecting the sheet music and passing out another piece. This one arrived in the same condition -- no words, just notes, no title, credits or anything similar. Kerry tried to read the melody, but this one was foreign to her -- she could barely sing it to herself, and she knew immediately without voicing any of the notes that it had a decidedly odd sound.
 

Nonetheless, she was willing to take the power of the piece on faith alone. Cavanaugh was two-for-two so far, and Kerry was utterly sold on his talent and the uniqueness of his approach. She was sold on him as well, and dying of curiosity to find out more about him.

More than that, though, she wanted to be alone with him, regardless of the context, to experience his power one and one and bask in the glow of his talent. And she had a feeling she was about to get her chance. 

Kerry's adoring reverie was broken, though, when the conductor finally spoke.

"This one is different from the other two," he began. "Less familiar, for sure. And also..."

Suddenly he stopped in mid-sentence and glanced down at the score in front of him. He smiled and shook his head, as if amused at himself, then scanned the choir to address them all once again.

"I almost forgot," he said, his voice tinged with chagrin. "And the most obvious part, no less."

He paused for effect, knowing he had his audience in the palm of his hands.
 

"The words."

A murmur rippled through the choir, and Kerry heard a couple of women giggle. Cavanaugh had them so mesmerized that no one had thought about this at all, not even Kerry, who should have been the first one to mention it. She knew the way her father would react at hymns without words, and no matter how powerful or good the music was, such an approach would bring both his disapproval and considerable wrath within the church community.

"Allow me to explain," Cavanaugh continued. "Rest assured, there will be words, and they will be in the normal style of the hymns to which you have become accustomed. I
have developed my own set of liturgical texts, and the will be matched appropriately to the music you have just sung."

He paused once again for effect, and Kerry looked across the front row to see a couple of heads nodding in approval and agreement. For some reason she couldn't put her finger on, though, she was more skeptical about this. Not because Cavanaugh's approach was so unusual -- it was more the way he explained this. Something about it seemed off and didn't quite ring true to her.

Nonetheless, she continued to give him the benefit of the doubt. Kerry watched him more carefully now, to see what rabbit the conductor would pull out of his motorcycle helmet for selection number three. 

"As I was saying," he went on, appearing just slightly flustered, "this one is different. In fact, I can guarantee with full confidence that none of you have ever heard the melody, much less the substance of the accompaniment parts."

He let this pronouncement hang in the air, as if they were supposed to know what he was talking about, when in fact Kerry knew it was his intent to remain mischievous. Little did she know, though, that she was about to become the specific focus of Cavanaugh's attention.

"Ms.
Harrigan," he said, his head swiveling as he looked right at her, no longer mocking her with his derisive music school nickname. "Will you sing the melody line for me? I believe your part is different than the other first parts."

Kerry shook her head, slightly stunned and a bit taken aback. Cavanaugh had set her back on her heels, and he knew it, she could tell from the way he was grinning at her. Flustered, she started to think of a question to ask to give herself time to think, but before she could do that his baton was rising in front of him, pointed right at her.

Instinctively, Kerry responded according to her training and programming. She began to sing the line, hesitant at first, and she thought back with embarrassment at how awkwardly the first hymn had sounded. Determined to show how confident she was, she focused on her breathing, then on the notes, just the way she had learned at Oberlin, not trying to read any connotations into the notes or anticipate a specific melodic sound that might not be there.

It took a couple of measures, but slowly the line came into focus. Not everyone understood it as quickly as she did, she knew that, but she kept going, one note and a single phrase at a time. Once the first phrase clicked in for her she knew where it was going, and suddenly her struggle to read the line seemed almost foolish and silly to her. She knew this music, somehow, even though she had never heard it before, and she continued on, following his lead as he shaped the phrase into a line.
 

When it was done, the melody line was as beautiful as the other two had been, but in a much less obvious way. The only word Kerry could come up with to describe it was haunting, but even that didn't do it justice, and she wanted to hear and see more, much more. Cavanaugh nodded with satisfaction at her when it was done, but this time no words of praise or assessment followed, the physical gesture of approval was all she got.
And in a strange way Kerry knew now that this was all that was necessary, that somehow her status with him had been elevated in a way she couldn't quite put into words. Cavanaugh turned to the rest of the choir and paused before speaking, then stunned all of them with his words.

"That was the solo part," he stated simply. "The other four parts will simply support that line, and we'll go through them now, in the same way we did with the others."

Kerry's jaw dropped suddenly, and several heads wheeled toward her just as suddenly. She looked at the other choir members who were staring at her, and Kerry could tell they were wondering what had transpired or passed between them during those brief few moments when their paths had crossed on the church steps. She shrugged, more than a bit nonplussed herself, then turned her attention back to Cavanaugh, awaiting his next instructions.

As soon as she did, his eyes met hers. "You will sing the first part with the others for now, Ms.
Harrigan," he stated simply. "The solo part will be taken care of at a later date."

There was an authority and a finality in his tone that completely eliminated any possibility of questions, comments or anything of the like. He paused again, allowing the silence to hang in the air, then tapped the baton on the stand and addressed them as a unit once again.

"Now then," he continued. "Shall we continue with the first part? Same format as before, same configuration, same approach."

With that Cavanaugh raised the baton and gave them the downbeat, as if nothing unusual had just taken place. Kerry, though, couldn't begin to describe the changes taking place inside her. For one thing, her stomach was roiling and churning, but not necessarily in a bad way, this was more like a supercharged case of butterflies.
 

She hadn't soloed on anything complex since her graduation at Oberlin, when she had been the featured soloist in the final performance of the concert choir. Her mind moved back to that performance, and suddenly she had the strangest sensation of
deja vu, that something just as significant was about to happen with Cavanaugh.

Kerry had nothing to authenticate that feeling, just the power of her intuition, which was something she thought had gone dormant since she had returned home to Mississippi. Evidently, though, it was still with her, and more powerful than ever at that. She tried to wrap her head around the idea of soloing off the line she had just sung, but nothing would come to her, and she realized she was basically at Cavanaugh's mercy when it came to needing the power of his guidance.

Once again, though, her reverie was cut off by Cavanaugh's return to the music. Kerry was so caught up in her thoughts that she almost entered a half beat late, and she caught Cavanaugh's sharp glance at her, which somehow also contained a sly half smile. Feeling chastened, she put her focus back on the point of the baton and simply followed his lead, realizing that this was simply the way it was supposed to be between them. 

But mastering the line was another matter entirely. Grasping it may have been something of a challenge for Kerry as he led her through it, but for the rest of the choir is was like a musical Rubik's cube, at least initially. It took several slow repetitions before it began to come together, and Kerry had to force herself to be patient while this
happened, for there was no way to transfer her understanding of the line to the rest of her half of the front row.

Ultimately, though, this didn't matter. Cavanaugh suddenly turned patient, gentle even, to a degree that surprised Kerry quite a bit. It was more than a bit of a revelation seeing him this way, his guidance slow and measured. He always approached them as a group, even when it was obvious which individual singer was gumming up the works.

When this happened he would merely pause and start again, sometimes breaking up the line into smaller and smaller bits so that his charges could understand it, and the way he did this reminded Kerry of a mother bird feeding her young, tempering their eagerness with patience so they could take in and understand what he was doing.

It took a similar approach to rehearse and master the other three parts, with the lack of expertise in these groups slowing down the process even more. By the time he reached the fourth part the rehearsal as a whole was crawling, and Kerry found herself beginning to fidget, her mind drifting to the thought of her solo even as she tried to stop herself from going there.

And whenever this happened, Cavanaugh would slowly glance over at her, no matter what he was in the middle of with the rest of the group, and to Kerry it felt as if he were reading her thoughts, one by one as they floated through her mind.