'Not really,' she replied lightly. 'After all, I'm not exactly your concern, am I?'
There was quite a long pause.
'You mean it's too quick a change-round if I say that I wish you were my concern?' he said at last. 'I've hardly convinced you of my indifference to Sara and here I am trying to make you regard me as something special in your life. Is that it?'
'Not entirely, Elliot.' She glanced down at their clasped hands, and tried to find the right words. There was something in what he had just said, of course. There was even more in the difficulty of believing in the discovery she had just made about her own feelings. But most of all was the thought that for some months at any rate she was going to have to live a sort of secret life. The most important thing in her whole career was opening up before her. If she gave him some sort of right to share in her thoughts and experiences how was she to maintain the secrecy which had been so sternly enjoined upon her?
Luckily or unluckily, they were interrupted at that moment by the waiter bringing their meal. And by the time they had disengaged hands, and the dishes had been set on the table, a slightly more prosaic mood inevitably prevailed.
'All right—' he smiled across at her when they were once more alone. 'Let's not rush our fences. Forget the exact words if you prefer to, and just remember that all the questions I asked were dictated by the fact that you and your future matter quite a lot to me. Does that fit the mood of the moment?'
'Perfectly!' Her smile was as gay and warm as his. 'And I'm glad that you said all you did.'
'Darling!' Again the endearment held more than a casual meaning. 'Now tell me about your visit to Volnikov. Didn't she terrify you?'
So Joanna gave him a lively account of her first encounter with the legendary dancer, taking care to keep it all in general terms, and not for one moment suggesting that the training was intended for a specific project.
It was all rather easy, once she had embarked on a perfectly true description of the actual visit, and they both laughed a good deal together, and at the same time he showed a genuine respect for her artistic comments.
'There always seems something new to discover about you, Joanna,' he said when he took her home.
And as he said good night to her he suddenly drew her into his arms and kissed her.
There was nothing casual about the kiss, any more than there had been about the twice he had called her 'darling'. And as Joanna kissed him in return she was aware that this probably betrayed her true feelings far more than any words could have done.
He would have detained her a moment longer, his arms very close around her. But she broke away from him with a breathless little laugh which she tried to make lighthearted instead of excited. Then she ran up the short path to her front door and let herself in without once looking back at him.
It was late and her mother was already in bed, so that the house was very quiet as she leant against the door and drew one or two quick breaths, while her heart beat loudly in the stillness.
'It's true!' she told herself. 'It really happened. Oh, I'm so happy ! All this - and Sir Oscar's plans as well. It's almost too much. And Mr. Wilmore's generosity too. I don't know what I've ever done to deserve it all.'
During the next week or two the eager dreams were translated into sober fact. Neither Volnikov nor Oscar Warrender could be described as indulgent. Both could inspire one to an extraordinary degree, but Joanna soon found that their demands on her understanding, her capacity for work and her sheer stamina were formidable.
'Tears have a place in every artist's development,' the old Russian dancer observed, when she had actually reduced Joanna to tears one day. 'But beyond a certain point they are an emotional indulgence. It is the unshed tears which move an audience to the depths.' And in some strange and magical way she began to channel Joanna's frequent despair and protest into gesture and facial expression.
Warrender came more brutally to the point, when he gave her a gruelling lesson on the final aria in her otherwise silent role. He simply said, 'Stop sniffing and gulping. The one interferes with the purity of tone and the other spoils your phrasing. Now try that again.'
Quite simply, both took perfection as the norm, and any deviation from that standard irritated them. There were moments in those first two or three weeks when Joanna wondered why on earth she had taken on this impossible challenge. But there were also moments when she glimpsed what was required of her, and the few almost grudging words of praise vouchsafed her on those occasions elated her as nothing else had ever done in her whole life before.
Nothing, that was to say, except the discovery that she loved Elliot and that he was not indifferent to her.
She saw very little of him during that first week or two. Unexpectedly he had to fly to the States to discuss the New York production of a play in which he was interested. And for this Joanna was almost glad. For nothing and no one must distract her from her present work, and if she had been seeing Elliot frequently it was hard to see how she could have maintained a discreet silence about the project on which her every hope and effort was fixed.
About this time she met the composer of the work which occupied so much of her time and thought. He was a kind, mild-mannered man, and in startling contrast to the star quality which blazed from both Volnikov and Warrender, his almost gentle and deprecating way of speaking to Joanna made her doubly determined to make a success of his work if it were humanly possible.
'One can never quite assess one's own work until one hears it performed,' he told her. 'But now that I've heard you sing that air - and sing it so beautifully, my dear - I feel that, unpractical though the work may be in some ways, it could indeed have a future.'
'Sir Oscar is sure of it,' Joanna declared. 'And, in my opinion for what it's worth, it is an utterly lovely work. At first, like everyone else, I thought that a whole evening of virtual silence would be impossible to sustain. But with Madame Volnikov's help I'm sure I can do it.'
'You really gather inspiration from that unlikeable woman?' Bernard Fulroyd smiled at her doubtfully and, taking off his spectacles, polished them vigorously - a trick he had when he was either moved or nervous. 'I confess she terrifies me.'
'Well, she terrifies me sometimes,' Joanna conceded with a laugh. 'But she is a unique teacher, and if I make any success of this role it will be due to her. And Sir Oscar, of course.'
'Ah, Sir Oscar! There's a man!' said Mr. Fulroyd. 'I owe him more than I could possibly say. I doubt if any of my music would have reached public performance without his help. He seems confident he'll put this work on the stage. Indeed, he was telling me this morning that, if his plans for the backing turn out as he is expecting, we might look forward to a first night in less than six months' time.'
'He said that?' Joanna's eyes shone and the colour rushed into her cheeks. 'Then he must think I'm shaping all right.'
'I think he's very pleased indeed with you,' replied Mr. Fulroyd. Which was more than Joanna had dared to hope, for the conductor had been sparing indeed with his praise.
She went home after that talk with her spirits high. But, at the same time, the mention of a first night within the foreseeable future seemed to bring the whole enterprise into clear - and terrifying - perspective. So far, her ambition had been merely to satisfy Warrender and the old Russian dancer. From day to day that had been the limit of her effort.
Now, however, when the composer himself appeared to be looking forward with some confidence to hearing his work performed, she realized with a great bump of her heart the tremendous weight of responsibility which was going to rest upon her. If, as Warrender himself had said, she was uniquely suitable for this role - a role that few singers either could or would take on - she was more or less essential to the whole project.
' I have to make that dear man's work a success!' Joanna thought. 'I could also make it fail. But I mustn't even think of failure, I must just work hard, and believe that my star is riding high. And it is, it is! Oh, I won
der when Elliot is coming home from the States.'
She had been walking the last part of the journey home, which she did most days as an antidote to the hours she spent in concentrated study, and as she turned into her road she saw, with an uprush of joy, that a familiar car stood outside her home.
'Elliot!' She broke into a run. And then when she came up to the car she saw he was sitting in the driving seat still and had apparently not made any attempt to go into the house. 'Elliot, how wonderful!' She bent down to speak to him through the window, 'Why didn't you knock and go in?'
'I did knock.' He got out of the car and gave her a slight smile, though he did not attempt to kiss her, perhaps because it was broad daylight which hardly contributed to a romantic mood. 'But I think your mother must be out.'
'She is — I remember. She was going to a matinee with a friend. But come on in,' She led the way up the path and opened the door, 'I'll give you tea. Oh, I'm so glad to see you, Elliot. Did everything go well in the States?'
'Yes, And—' she suddenly thought he was speaking with some sort of effort - 'is everything going well with you too?'
'Yes, of course, I'll get tea.' She bent to switch on the fire, and as she came upright again he caught her lightly by the arm,
'No - wait a moment.'
She stood still and said in surprise, 'Is something wrong?'
'I don't know. No -I hope not. But I have to ask you something, Joanna. I have to ask you, will you believe me? And if I'm doing you an injustice, try to forgive me.'
She said nothing. Only stood there close beside him, with his hand still on her arm.
'Well?' she said at last, aware that her lips had gone dry.
'Joanna, is it my uncle who's paying for your lessons with Volnikov?'
She felt a little as though the floor had opened up in front of her. In a way, she would have been glad if it had, so long as she could have disappeared in some magical way from this terrible moment. But there was no escape. He was holding her arm fast, and he was looking at her with an almost pleading expression which, even as she stared back at him, began to change to one of cold anger.
'Yes,' she said at last. 'But you must let me explain—'
'There's nothing to explain!' he interrupted violently. 'It's perfectly simple. You wanted those lessons and so you went crying to him—'
'I did not go crying to him! And I'm sure he never told you any such thing. The fact was—'
'Sara told me,' he said flatly. 'She saw you clinging to him and crying in the garden. And she overheard you asking him for money.'
'It wasn't like that at all!' she cried angrily, 'He had always said - offered—'
'I don't care how it was.' Suddenly his voice was cold and extremely well controlled. 'There are no circumstances which could make it anything but contemptible. Do you know what he did, so that he could satisfy your inexcusable demands? He started to sell some of his collection - the things he loved—'
'Oh, no, no, no. It's not true,' she cried wildly, 'He couldn't do any such thing. Why should he? What possible need could there be for that? He's quite a wealthy—'
'He lost heavily in that crash of the Home and Overseas Company. He'd have had to economize sharply in any case. And at just that moment, along you came snivelling for money to pay for these ridiculous lessons with that old Russian vulture. You make me sick, you little - gold-digger!'
He flung the word at her, and at the same moment he released his grip on her, so that she actually staggered back against the wall.
'Elliot, listen to me! I didn't know - I hadn't the slightest idea! How could I? Please believe me when I say—'
But he brushed past her as though he hardly saw her and went out of the room. Two seconds later she heard the front door close, and she was alone in the house. Alone with her shattered dreams and a horrified sense of remorse.
CHAPTER EIGHT
For several moments Joanna stood there, just where Elliot had left her, crushed by a complete sense of disaster and grief which seemed to encompass all the reasons for her wretchedness. Remorse for what she had done to Mr. Wilmore, anguish because of Elliot's fury, and despair at the way her hopes were crashing in ruins.
But slowly there sifted to the top of her consciousness the thing which gave her most agony. Mr. Wilmore, who had never been anything but kind and generous and understanding, had started to sell his precious treasures because she - she - had gone and asked him for money.
Shame and remorse engulfed her at the thought, and she actually gave a little groan of distress as she told herself she had been guilty of that most contemptible of all reactions - ingratitude.
'I must stop it!' She spoke aloud in her misery. 'He mustn't go on with this. Whatever he's sold he must somehow get back. If I never have another lesson in my life, I am not going to have things paid for that way.'
Still trembling with the shock of revelation, she almost tottered to the telephone and unsteadily dialled the number of Wilmore Manor. There was quite a long silence, and then the precise tones of Mrs. Trimble replied.,
'Mrs. Trimble— somehow she steadied her voice -'please could I speak to Mr. Wilmore?'
'I'm sorry, Miss Joanna, That is Miss Joanna, isn't it? He left home yesterday, and I'm not expecting him back for some time.'
'Can you tell me where he's gone?' Joanna tried t: make her voice sound clear and not hoarse with urgency.
'I'm afraid I can't. He'll be travelling round, visiting friends, and I haven't got a forwarding address for the moment. I think he had some idea of joining a friend who goes yachting in the Mediterranean . Someone who shares his interest in collecting. It will do him good to get away a bit. He has been just a trifle depressed lately.'
Joanna wanted desperately to ask if the friend with his yacht in the Mediterranean might be the sort of person who would buy treasures from Mr. Wilmore's collection. But her courage failed her. She said something about writing, and hoping her letter could be forwarded, and then she rang off and stood staring at the telephone, wondering what else she could do.
Perhaps, if she could not reach Mr. Wilmore, she might do something from the other end. She started resolutely to dial Oscar Warrender's number. But then she stopped, realizing that it would be quite impossible to explain things to the famous conductor on the telephone. She would have to see him. He was going to take a good deal of personal convincing that his cherished plans must be abandoned.
She left a note for her mother on the hall table, explaining that she had had to go out once more. Then she went out into the street again and, because she felt a terrible sense of urgency now, she took a taxi. Only when she was in it, driving westward, did she reflect bitterly that, in a sense, it was Mr. Wilmore's money she was wasting. The money he had produced from the sale of his treasures.
She felt a few tears trying to force their way between her lashes, but she controlled them somehow. Tears were not going to do her much good if she needed to impress Oscar Warrender.
Never before had she presumed to go to the War-render apartment without a specific summons, and she felt little less than a trespasser as she pressed the bell and stood outside, waiting in barely-controlled trepidation. Then, quite unexpectedly, it was Warrender himself who opened the door, which almost robbed her of the few words she had prepared.
'Can I come in, please?' she said timidly. 'S-some-thing has happened, and I have to see you about it.'
'Well then - come in.' He stood aside for her and told her to go into the studio, which at least was reasonably familiar ground to her. Then he followed her in, told her to sit down and, to her surprise, asked her if she felt in need of a brandy.
'Oh, no, thank you!' Joanna wondered for the first time how sick she looked. 'But perhaps a strong coffee if - if-'
He rang the bell and ordered a strong coffee. Then he simply waited for her to speak.
'It's about - the money,' she got out at last.
'What money?'
'The money
Mr. Wilmore has been giving for my lessons. It must stop. They must stop. I didn't know -but he's been selling things from his collection to raise it.
'Rubbish,' said Warrender imperturbably. 'And nothing - I repeat nothing - must put a stop to your lessons. - Ah, here's your coffee. Drink it up and stop talking nonsense. And then you can explain to me what all this is about.'
She drank the coffee obediently. It was hot enough to burn her mouth slightly, but she was almost glad of that because it partially offset the greater anguish in her mind. Then she put down her cup, rattling it slightly in the saucer because her hand was still unsteady, and she said more calmly,
'What I said is quite true, Sir Oscar. I had no idea, but apparently Mr. Wilmore dropped a great deal of money in the recent Home and Overseas crash. He would have had to economize anyway. But just at that moment I - I went to him and asked him to help me with money for my lessons. He agreed generously and almost instantly, as you well know. It never entered my head that there was any real difficulty. But now I've heard—'
'From Wilmore himself?'
'Oh, no. From—' she swallowed - 'his nephew. There's no question about the facts. His uncle's started to sell—'
'All collectors sell unwanted items from time to time,' said Warrender impatiently. 'They find they have duplicates, or their preferences change and what was once precious seems no longer to be so. Or sometimes items will rise so steeply in value on the market that it seems a good time to sell rather than retain something for sheer sentiment.'
'What Mr. Wilmore chose to do with his collection for personal reasons is no concern of mine.' Joanna was surprised at the firmness of her own voice. 'But he sold because of my request, not for any preference of his own. That's the difference.'
A Remembered Serenade Page 13