Solo

by Rana Dasgupta

  He comes in under the marvellous light, and stops to watch. Dazzling screens wrap polyp towers, which spire against the orange sky. His white hair reflects the logos, and turns harlequin.

  His attention is captured by the familiar features of Albert Einstein playing on a vast video display. Einstein’s face is the size of a large house and it lights up the damp ground. The screen dims, and text appears: The highest form of musicality in the sphere of thought – and Ulrich smiles possessively, for these are words he had once written on his wall: Einstein’s opinion of Niels Bohr’s theory of atomic structure. The text dissolves and converts to plasma. The advertisement ends with the logo of a mobile phone company.

  It is late and he grows tired. He looks around to orient himself, and sets off into the dark streets. The wind is cool and he puts his hands in his pockets, which are heavy with marbles.

  Boris’s signature on the contract is a work of art. Still, the lawyer asks him to do it again.

  ‘In English please. Our people can’t read Cyrillic.’

  The document is forty-five pages long, and there are three copies. Boris has to initial every page. Hereinafter called ‘the Artist’. He is bemused by their heavy-handed ways.

  The CEO of Universal Music has stepped into the room to give the moment some razzle-dazzle.

  ‘We’re really excited to have you on board,’ he says, shaking Boris by the hand. ‘You’re a great musician, and you’ve come to the right place. You’ll see what we do here when we pull out all the stops.’

  Boris nods appreciatively.

  It is eleven in the morning, and the ceremony does not last long. People turn away to discuss work, even over champagne.

  The CEO is left one-on-one with Boris.

  ‘I want you to think of this place as your home. Universal is like your family, and the only thing we care about is helping you make great music.’

  Boris does not reply. The CEO says,

  ‘It’s nice to get a bit of good news from Bulgaria. All I usually get from that part of the world is piracy. I guess you must have seen it on the streets.’

  He shudders. He looks at his watch and says,

  ‘It’s an uphill battle. Consumers don’t pay for music any more because they think it’s free. They don’t respect the work we do, you and me.’

  Plastic comes and puts an arm round Boris’s shoulders.

  ‘I need to steal this man away,’ he says to the CEO.

  ‘I’ve been telling him about piracy,’ says the CEO. ‘But you have nothing to worry about, Boris. You’re with the biggest music company in the world. You have a lot of muscle on your side.’

  ‘I’m taking him to buy a new violin,’ says Plastic. ‘Look at that old thing he uses.’

  Boris is holding the violin that Slavo gave him, years ago. It’s somewhat knocked on the corners, and the varnish is dulled, but he doesn’t understand why these men look at it with such derision. It has new strings, and the sound is good.

  Plastic makes a quick exit with Universal’s new star, and they get into his limousine, which is waiting outside the building.

  By now, Boris has been in New York for a while. He has settled down with a small group of musicians: a piano player, a bandoneon player and a DJ. He is writing a lot of music.

  Boris is staying in a company apartment, but he also has the keys to Plastic’s home. Plastic wants every kind of resource to be available to Boris while he composes. There is a full-time butler in his apartment who takes care of meals, and it has a soundproofed music room with a miraculous stereo system. Boris spends many days there, working through Plastic’s enormous record collection. He has taken to writing music at his Blüthner piano.

  When he wants to think about other things, he sits in Plastic’s living room. He reads his books and watches his TV.

  Today, Plastic is in a rush to buy the violin. The driver takes them to the violin dealer’s studio, which is open to a little courtyard, and invisible from the street. Mr Stern, the owner, has half-moon glasses hanging on a string of coloured beads around his neck, and is standing outside plucking a pomegranate from one of the trees in the courtyard. He is expecting Plastic, and leads them inside.

  Boris gasps at the riches held there, and Mr Stern shows him violins from every place and time. He can recite the list of owners over centuries, though the names mean little to Boris. He has a lute and a viola da gamba, and curiosity instruments with ten strings.

  He has made a shortlist for Boris, who begins to try them out. With each trial, Mr Stern identifies the precise cause of his dissatisfaction and offers him another instrument, nearer to perfection.

  The ageing Mr Stern eyes Plastic as Boris frowns over each violin. His look says, Who is this boy?

  Boris is absorbed by the sounds he is making with these instruments. He is already at work, testing ideas. It is impressive to see how he thinks, but Plastic is due to give a speech at a charity lunch, and he cannot stay long. Two violins are lying on the counter, and he pushes Boris towards a decision. Boris plays the same phrase on each, and Mr Stern smiles.

  ‘Now it’s obvious,’ he says, and he laughs delightedly when Boris indicates his choice. He picks up the violin himself, and caresses it.

  ‘Italian,’ he says. ‘Not such an old instrument, but extremely fine.’

  ‘And by far the most expensive,’ says Plastic. He looks at Boris. ‘You’ll have to pay me back when your album comes out.’

  Mr Stern says,

  ‘Take it home, live with it a few days. If you don’t like it you can come back and try again.’

  He lays the violin in its case.

  Boris is looking at the battered fiddle he came in with. He turns it over and strokes it mournfully. Plastic picks up the new violin, trying to hurry things up.

  They go outside. Prophets in tall hats are relating visions on street corners and drawing obstructive crowds. Plastic is trying to get away fast, and he’s zigzagging angrily. It takes him a while to realise Boris has not kept up. Exasperated, he turns around. To his consternation he sees that Boris is crouching over his old violin, which is already in flames on the sidewalk.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ demands Plastic, running back. ‘You can’t light fires on the street!’

  Boris does not look up. He is completely absorbed in the burning violin. He has a small bottle of petrol in his hand. The wood is already turning black.

  Plastic says,

  ‘You’ll get yourself arrested!’

  Plastic is preparing to stamp out the flames in anger when he sees that a young woman is standing by, taking video of the burning violin on her phone.

  The young woman is Khatuna. She is fascinated by the sacrificial fire, and she feels a wave of relaxation pass through her as she watches. Through the flames, she notices a streak of green where a metal string is burning, and she thinks this is the most moving thing she has seen for a long time. Boris turns and looks at her. She says,

  ‘Why are you burning your violin?’

  She says it in Russian, she doesn’t know why.

  The flames die down.

  Boris stands up and looks at Plastic. He holds out his hand for the new violin. Plastic hands over the case, warily. He is uncomfortable at what he has just seen. But he is distracted by Khatuna.

  ‘You like fire?’ he asks her.

  Plastic knows something about names, and when she tells him hers he says Georgian? and thinks he sees her interest awaken. He takes an invitation from his pocket and gives it to her.

  ‘This man is a great musician. Come to his show. I’m his producer. Plastic Munari.’

  Boris’s first performance in New York is only a week away.

  ‘Will you come?’ Plastic insists.

  ‘Maybe,’ she says. She looks him over. She likes his suit.

  Plastic is running very late, and can stay no more. He says, See you next Saturday and walks away. Khatuna watches him get into his limousine and disappear.

  Boris prods the
charred violin with his foot, and it scrapes on the concrete. He smiles at Khatuna and she begins to walk with him. He leads her through anonymous streets of warehouses and old factories. He opens a faceless entrance and takes her into a hallway of garish tiles. They go up aged wooden stairs, the stairwell cavernous around them. She follows him, thinking to herself, This is not me who is doing this, this is not Khatuna.

  The apartment is huge, and built in an old factory. It has Persian rugs on the floor and antique maps on the walls. In one corner is a huddle of chairs, and Khatuna sits down on the sofa. Boris brings two glasses and a bottle of vodka. He pours for each of them.

  I have a meeting in an hour, thinks Khatuna. What am I doing here?

  There are pipes from floor to ceiling and the bricks show through the paint. There are windows instead of walls, and the great expanse of concrete floor ripples in the light, for it is not exactly flat. There are paintings stacked against the walls, and objects on the shelves that are worn and mournful with age.

  Boris does not speak at all. When the silence becomes too big, Khatuna says,

  ‘What star sign are you?’

  Boris does not know about such things.

  ‘When is your birthday?’

  He tells her. She says,

  ‘The same day as my brother!’ She is strangely exhilarated. She asks which year he was born, and says,

  ‘You’re one year older than him. To the day.’

  She tells him all about Irakli.

  ‘He’s an artist too. He writes poetry. He sits all day in our apartment, writing.’

  She doesn’t know why she feels so happy with him, for he remains silent throughout. She feels something significant will happen because of him.

  He gets up and leaves the room, and she waits for him to come back. She hears him playing the violin somewhere else in the house. She sits and listens to the music.

  She takes out her phone. She puts on the video camera and turns it in slow circles, sweeping the clocks and paintings of this large and doleful room and coming back to herself, expressionless on the sofa. She wants to capture herself at this moment, sitting in this place, with this music in the background.

  The music finishes, and still Boris does not return. Khatuna waits for several minutes. Then she gets up and looks for him in every room of the apartment. She cannot find him and finally, incredulous, she lets herself out.

  13

  KHATUNA AND IRAKLI EMERGED from the elevator and crossed the lobby. The doorman wished them a good night as they pushed through the glass carousel.

  Outside, it was dark and cold.

  ‘You’re not wearing enough clothes,’ observed Khatuna unhappily. ‘Where’s that jacket I bought you last week?’

  She stood on the edge of the sidewalk, the lights of the ziggurat terraced above her. She held out her glove; a taxi swooped.

  She let Irakli in ahead of her. He had an old umbrella, which he’d bought at a flea market and took with him everywhere.

  Khatuna had dyed her hair blonde for this evening, and she checked the effect in the driver’s mirror. She turned her head to both sides.

  ‘I look so sexy,’ she said. ‘I am jealous of myself.’

  She put in sixteen-hour days at Struction Enterprises, and she had lost the habit of going out at night. She had taken pleasure in dressing up tonight. Normally, she thought only about work.

  She was now head of security systems at Struction. It was a role for which she was superbly qualified. New York boardrooms had never heard anyone speak so nonchalantly about snipers, chemical weapons and truck bombs, and on her lips this breezy militarism seemed not retrograde but futuristic – and even profound. Everyone wanted a piece of her advice.

  Her early estrangement from Charles Hahn had done nothing to hamper her advancement in his company, and within a year she had gained a seat on the board.

  The taxi drew up in front of the club.

  Inside, there was neon darkness. They stopped in front of a little wooden hatch to buy tickets. It seemed they were early. There was no queue in the lobby, and the old woman inside was playing solitaire on a computer. She stopped her game to write out their tickets.

  ‘That’s forty-four dollars, please.’

  Khatuna paid, and stopped to leave her fur in the coat-check. Irakli handed her his umbrella. He murmured amusedly,

  ‘Did you see that woman?’

  ‘What woman?’

  Khatuna looked at herself in the mirror.

  ‘The old woman who sold us the tickets. She added twenty-two and twenty-two on a calculator.’

  Through the doors, the music was louder. A man played piano onstage, and sang a duet with a woman in a top hat. There were only a few people as yet, and the atmosphere was like someone’s house. People shouted jokes at the performers.

  Most of the tables were still empty, and Khatuna chose a place near the front. She looked around at the battered furniture and said,

  ‘I thought it would be a fancier place.’

  Irakli put his head close to hers. He was still thinking about the woman in the lobby.

  ‘She added the total on a calculator. Then she wrote out the tickets by hand.’

  The singer hit a high note and lifted her bare leg on to the piano, and both performers dissolved into laughter. People clapped, and another act came on to the stage.

  ‘So what’s her computer for?’ said Irakli. He was full of glee. ‘It’s just for her to play solitaire. It’s just a two-thousand-dollar pack of cards.’

  Plastic was backstage with his entourage. The editor of a big magazine was there, and some movie people, and a princess from the deposed Bulgarian royal family.

  ‘It’s absolutely true,’ he said sotto voce. ‘He grew up in a totally empty town. There was no one else except his grandmother. He grew crops and raised pigs – he made candles from pig lard to light his house, for God’s sake. When he came here he didn’t know – you know – anything. But he’s a genius. He’s just a pure natural fucking genius. When you hear him you’ll understand. I haven’t been this excited about an artist in years.’

  The room was small, and the photographer kept flashing. Boris had turned his back and was warming up in the corner. He had on a green military uniform. Plastic introduced his guests to the owner of the club.

  ‘Isn’t this place great, though?’

  They gushed compliments. Someone mentioned the antique chemical bottles so artfully laid out in the men’s bathroom. A conversation began about a fabulous little store in the Village where you could pick up the most eccentric things. They drank champagne and chatted happily.

  ‘I’m allergic to sulphites, you see.’

  ‘Once in his life, a man should buy a pair of leather pants.’

  ‘I saw him play in Carnegie Hall, just two months before he died.’

  ‘Africa? I said. There’s nothing to do in Africa!’

  Noise was building in the club. The owner said it was getting full out there. The bandoneon player took off his jacket and warmed up with some tango. The magazine editor said,

  ‘Plastic has probably done more than anyone else.’

  A mobile phone rang. The movie director took the call and got into an argument with someone on the other end.

  ‘He didn’t mean it in a negative way? Can someone please explain to me?’

  ‘Boris needs some water. Get some water over here. And keep the volume down!’

  ‘More than anyone else I can think of to dictate cultural taste in the world today. Can anyone think of anyone else who comes close?’

  The Bulgarian princess lit a cigar. Her hair was shorn. Boris had a melody he was trying out, again and again. The movie director was indignant on the phone:

  ‘I’d like to know how someone can say genocide in a positive way.’

  ‘His influence goes beyond music, because it’s not just about music. It’s an aesthetic attitude to globalisation.’

  The CEO of Universal stopped by with another bottl
e of champagne and they drank a toast. Boris signed a couple of invitations, and the CEO did a mock benediction. OK, said Plastic, OK, everybody out!

  ‘If he’d stayed in America he would have been as big as Duke Ellington,’ said the movie director to the princess. ‘But no one’s heard of him because he spent the whole of the thirties in Europe. I went to see him play in Carnegie Hall before he died: there were maybe forty people in the audience.’

  ‘Let’s have some quiet back here!’

  ‘He was playing in Berlin and Paris. He was playing in Latin America.’

  Everyone filed out, still talking, and Plastic was left alone with the band. He shook hands with each of them.

  ‘You don’t need any advice from me,’ he said. ‘Go make some music.’

  From the moment Boris came on the stage, Irakli was transfixed: he had never heard anything as magnificent as this. The DJ’s samples were sharp, like the brilliant ripples in a murky well. The bandoneon was like leather carving on the tune. Boris played four pieces, back to back, and the music came to Irakli like poetry.

  She plane? She solstice?

  She sixty forecast of seven breezes, the anticyclone miniature,

  a mossy-flooring wading girl!

  Was cirrus not she, nor tremor nor breakfast? She fair was timely –

  but storm wind loafs impatient.

  The whale is averse on a New England beach.

  She bitter squints the squat-eye fool

  and mirthly mock entire the mull:

  My dearly friend, so faithful-word,