Mrs. Everton, who had been half-listening while attending her mother, was now frowning in response to Gridley’s remarks. “You have changed the name of the opera,” she said to Scheimann. “I believe I was once told it was named for the flowers...something French, was it not?”
“There is a song in it–or was–by that name,” Scheimann answered. “The heroine’s performance is for the flowers when her composer first sees her. A rather fantastical piece which animates them, if you will–brings them to life.”
“That would be rather lovely upon the stage,“ said a young woman seated near him, a poetess of independent means. “Imagine how it would play out as a garden come to life. With a girl narrating them into being by song.”
“It was intended later to be a song of expression–between herself and her rescuer. But that was before I changed the means of their encounter.” He delivered this explanation in halting speech, the words spoken with distaste.
“And it has been removed? How unfortunate! You must speak to the theater, for they cannot make you remove it, surely,” said Mrs. Everton, who was under the impression that the performances’ engagement was a thing of fact and not a process of endeavor. "They were wrong to do so in Paris."
“Melancholy is more suited to the show,” said Scheimann. “There is another piece which is better for the songmaid’s performance. A blind girl singing of the beauty of flowers that she cannot see? That did not seem suited to the opera.”
“Isn’t it true that the Seuerling family’s theater troupe performed with dolls on the stage whenever the actors were indisposed–or on strike?” mused Everton. “Shall we see such a theatrical touch in your opera, Scheimann? Or shall you merely pay tribute to the songmaiden‘s own song of unhappiness, whatever was it called?”
Scheimann had grown silent again; further speculation on his show did not rouse him to response and he did not speak again until the subject was changed to a debate on the merits of Swedish composers in contrast to the rest of Europe. Here, he spoke with more enthusiasm and seemed more himself, which was more than could be said of his hostess–who still mourned the theater's offenses to his opera and the lovely heiress who had come among them lately only to leave London before this pleasurable party.
*****
For the first few lessons, Herr Scheimann seated himself in the music room and listened to Miss Harwick play. Her fingers were at work for a half-hour each time, bringing forth sonatas and modified librettos, concertos and glees.
He listened with a face seemingly devoid of interest as it was of handsomeness in the eyes of a true aristocrat. His stony features would arrange themselves in an expression more pleasant than a scowl when she finished each piece, as if reminding himself that it was not by unpleasantness that he earned his bread.
“That will do,” he would say. Then he would select another piece and they would begin all over again. She did not question him; she did not resist his methods, either. She complied with perfect indifference, her golden head erect as she faced the music, her shoulders drawn straight beneath the sleeves of a pink organdy.
They continued in this manner for two hours; longer than the lesson period engaged, but that was Scheimann’s plan. She said nothing until she reached the end of Beethoven’s sonata.
“What is the point of this, Mr. Scheimann?” She turned her head towards him. “Am I to go on playing forever? If so, then I do not see the point of you sitting by and doing nothing.”
“I do not know you as a performer, Miss Harwick,” he answered. “If I knew you as a friend, it would be different, perhaps; but as I do not know you in any respect, this must be how I make my acquaintance with your music.” As he spoke, he snapped closed a pocket watch which had been in his hand–which, in truth was broken–and stowed it away as if their lesson was concluded.
“What would be the point in knowing me?” asked Hetta at length. Her curiosity has taken hold in spite of herself, since there was no other means of obtaining information from her instructor.
He rose. “Music is not merely an exercise, Miss Harwick,” he said. “You play it as if it were such; as if only the means of playing matters. But a true artist would know differently. I have heard better musicians, for instance, whose manner of playing is much poorer than yours.”
“That does not make sense,” Hetta retorted. “Mistakes are unpleasant for the listener. No one wishes to hear someone who slurs their notes or fumbles about for the next chord.”
“But they wish to hear something in the music besides the training,” said Scheimann. “When you go to the theater, you do not wish the actors onstage to sing as if they were dead–merely automatic in their performance, as if wound up and compelled to perform. You wish them to seem real.”
“I am not a paid performer, Mr. Scheimann.” Miss Harwick’s cheeks had paled with indignation. Scheimann merely smiled.
“Of that, I am all too painfully reminded, Mademoiselle,” he said. He was silent a moment, to see if this would bring a storm of emotion from the girl. Her silence, while that of offense, remained silent.
“When you play, it must be more than a well-trained hand that your listener hears,” he continued. “What you feel when you play, that is what you wish them to hear. They shall forget all else in the music but its feeling–that is how they remember it best.”
“I am sure that performers feel the same as everyone else,” answered Hetta, with contempt. “The actress upon the stage is thinking about her dinner as much as anyone else, or the appearance of her costume, or else the ugliness of another on the stage. I cannot be persuaded to believe that they may sing such words hundreds of times and not be bored with them.”
He refrained from sighing. “You are right in supposing that there are actors who think of all those things when they perform,” he said. “But a true artist, a great artist, believes his role when he is upon the stage, with such force of mind that there is room for nothing else.”
Standing behind her, he positioned himself so that her face was within his view and she would be forced to turn her head to one side to avoid his glance. “Now, Miss Harwick,” he said, “I must ask you what you are feeling when you play.”
“The same as everyone else,” she answered. A blush had suffused her cheeks, however, rising higher with each word.
“And by that you mean–what? That you are thinking of the impression your song shall make. Or perhaps how pretty you shall appear when singing it?”
“I shall not be spoken to in that manner!” Hetta rose from the seat, scarlet with anger. One foot stomped beneath the pink skirts, the look upon the face turned towards Scheimann one which undoubtedly shriveled the servants in the Harwick household and drove unsuitable young men from the family’s parlor.
“Then you deny it?” Scheimann asked, calmly.
She turned away again. “I do not think my father would wish you to speak to me in such a manner,” she answered, angrily. “There are other music masters to be had in the city, I will remind you.”
“And I think none would be more pleased with the change than I,” said Scheimann.
If he was to be dismissed, the moment would come now, he assumed. Although he regretted the loss of his income already, he felt the relief of one who has expressed their thoughts perfectly on such an occasion.
“If you wish to know what you should feel,” he said, at length in their silence, “then you must ask yourself what you wish you could be, Miss Harwick. If it is nothing more than a sense of satisfaction which comes from mastering a skill, then that is enough. If it is a sense of the Divine or a higher calling, then it will suit your purpose. But it must be something more than preening in a drawing room.”
“Else what shall happen?” Miss Harwick spoke. “Shall I dismay the true musicians in the room? Shall you send for another instructor, that I might know you despair of my talents?” He could not help but notice that she did not speak of dismissing him herself in these questions.
“Then I shall be obli
ged to train your fingers only in the means of playing music,” he answered, gently. “Which should be a great waste of your skills, I think.” With these words, he rose and bowed to his mistress before leaving the room.
Outside, he reflected it might be the last time he entered the Harwicks’ music room; for Miss Harwick was a young lady capable of banishing offenders from the earth’s face, like a goddess of old mythology. If he would regret it–that was another matter. For he had seen something, not in the queenly pose of this half-grown girl, but in the flash of anger in her eyes that proved there was more than merely preening manners beneath her surface. He suspected her indignation was partly shame; and that beneath its surface lay passions much deeper than even Miss Harwick knew but which were readily discernible to the eye of one with artistic temperament.
He did not return to the Harwicks’ house for three days; and on that afternoon, he found her waiting for him as usual upon the pianoforte’s bench. Her gown was blue and embroidered with gold–vastly expensive in comparison to the muslin of the young woman he had been teaching only an hour ago–but her shoulders did not have the same haughty determination as before.
He did not speak, merely bowing to her before seating himself in the usual damask chair nearby.
“When you spoke of my talents,” she said, “did you mean to imply that I might be quite good–with training?” She asked this cautiously.
“I did,” he answered. “I believe you are capable of–if you will forgive me–of great feeling. Of great passion, perhaps. I believe that those who truly know you would admit you to be a young lady who wishes a means of expressing herself. Of achieving greatness, which, until now, has perhaps been denied.”
He, too, was cautious with his words; for while there was little to be known about the Harwicks of England, he knew only too well the general state of affairs for the emigrated daughter of a financially-precarious gentleman. Living upon credit, fleeing cities beneath a burden of expenses, gearing one’s existence to the triumph of a successful, wealthy match, perhaps. They were all the same. It was merely a guess upon his part that a young lady who had given great effort to maintaining a cold and haughty exterior might do so to mask a discontentment with that life which was beyond words.
“I see,” she answered, softly. There was silence; then she turned slowly towards her keys and positioned herself before them.
“What should I play?” she asked.
Instead of directing her from where he was seated, he rose from his chair and produced a folded sheet of music from beneath his coat. It had been purchased recently, with what few coins were left in Scheimann’s possession after his expenses.
“I wish you to play this,” he said, propping it in front of another open sheet of music. Piano Sonata: Helene Liebmann.
“A woman,” said Hetta. She glanced at him, surprised by this choice, perhaps even a little dismayed.
“A woman,” he repeated. “A girl when she published this–but fifteen years of age.” He drew back again, lacing his fingers together until he appeared an awkward statue posed behind her, an ungainly bird perched upon a tree in vulture-like fashion. For once, his posture and frowning features did not draw the mocking eye of his student.
She sat before the keys in silence, looking at the music, then looking at nothing at all, it seemed, unless it be something within her thoughts. Her fingers lifted, then touched the keys. Hetta had begun to play.
The difference was there; faint, but audible to the musician’s ear. Scheimann closed his eyes for the length of the performance, hearing with very little interest the mistake in fingering Miss Harwick made in the middle, and the faltering note near the close. In between, he listened and heard the depths which he had believed must lie in his student’s nature.
He waited until she folded her hands on her lap again before he spoke. “Do you hear the difference also, Miss Harwick?” he asked.
She did not reply. Then, after a pause. “I did not know that women wrote music,” she said.
“Women accomplish a great many things, when they are let to do so,” he answered. “There are limitations, of course. But are there not limitations for man in general?”
“I have seen this woman once,” he continued, after a pause. “A long time ago now, when we were both in our native Germany. But she was even then little known for her work. I had the pleasure of being given one of her compositions by a friend–and the pleasure of having her read one of mine in return.”
“Where is she?” asked Hetta.
“She lived in Vienna; but now she lives in your city of London with her husband,” he answered. He could see this remark struck her with surprise–perhaps favorably so.
“I will give you others by her,” he said, “and also by a great many composers of whom you have not heard, but whose works you will know by heart soon. We will practice an hour every time; and you will practice a great deal longer than that. If you wish to bring your skills into fruition.”
She practiced a great deal when he was not present. He knew this in the weeks to come, when he would hear her play at the beginning of each lesson. She improved in technique gradually, but improved more quickly in her depth of feeling. It was as if a hole had opened within a dam of emotion, allowing it to flow into her music as freely as water from a stream.
Mr. Charles Harwick continued to pay him, although with the chuckle of a man made less content by his daughter’s request that her lessons–and therefore, subsequent fees–be doubled. If the payments ceased to come because of the gentleman’s financial straits, Scheimann did not ask himself what he would then do. Before, the answer had been quite obvious; but he was finding interest in this student now, and would be loathe to part with her before he could see the results.
The summer passed; the autumn was upon them. The Harwicks continued to reside in their rented house and Scheimann spent three afternoons a week listening to Miss Harwick’s pianoforte progress from Mozart to Lanner.
In October, he made his second advancement in Miss Harwick’s musical training. She was in the midst of playing a piece from Mozart’s Cosi fan Tutte when Scheimann raised his hand.
She ceased playing. “What is it?’ she asked. Her instructor tapped his fingers on the music.
“Does not this piece have words, Miss Harwick?’ he said.
“It does,” she answered. “But that signifies nothing to me, does it?”
Scheimann lowered his brow in a manner which deepened his frown. “I would hear you sing it, I think,” he said.
There was a slight pause on the part of Hetta. “I thought my singing was a matter forgotten, Mr. Scheimann,” she answered. “You declared it to be only fair at best; and that was many months ago.”
“I said you had a good voice,” he reminded her, “which could be made better by training. But that was my impression then. Let us see if it has altered with time. If you please.”
He motioned for her to begin; Miss Harwick did not hesitate any further, but lifted the sheet of music–Despina’s song from the opera–and began singing.
“Would a maid be worth the winning, she must early learn discretion,” she sang, “Calculation, self-possession, and another thing or two...” The lively tune was delivered with some seriousness in the beginning, then with a little more comic approach as Miss Harwick evidently grew more comfortable before her instructor.
“She must seem at the beginning, lively, innocent, and clever; ever charming, changing ever, in attraction ever new...”
Her German pronunciation was good, Scheimann noticed, so much so that he suspected she had studied the language before, or else been fond of German songs in the past. There was something playful in her demeanor, in the expression of her eyes, as if this particular song had a hidden meaning for her.
A beguiler by nature. This was too easy of a choice for her to perform, for she found a facet of herself in this piece readily. No doubt she believed he was not aware of it, as the gesture of her fan at a fete might fail to sig
nal its underlying attention to a suitor.
She did not reach the end; he stopped her first. “That will do,” he said, noting the disappointment and the element of sulkiness which crept into her features with this interruption.
“Sing this, also,” he said. He had withdrawn the Mozart piece; in its place, another of the composer’s works, Pamina’s entreaty from Die Zauberflote.
This abrupt switch he anticipated without sign of his interest in the result. Hetta took up the piece of music, glanced over it briefly, no doubt having sung it before, then began.
He closed his eyes. There was hesitation in her voice, then a falseness which proved she was seeking to convince him that she had grasped the piece’s meaning. He did not motion for her to stop, instead interrupting her with a comment.
“I was not aware that Pamina was a wooden puppet, Mademoiselle,” he said, bitingly, “nor that her performer was also pulled about by strings like a painted coquette.”
He saw the color vanish from her cheeks; her voice faltered, but when he waved for her to continue, she did so, an element of pain winding itself through the pride in her voice. His eyes sank closed again, listening to the effect until her voice died away with a tremor.
Scheimann opened his eyes; before him, Hetta was standing, her indignation visible in her features.
“There,” he said, softly. “That was much better, Miss Harwick. You did not understand it until now, I think; and not until now did you understand that you must do so in order to sing it well.”
A series of emotions seemed to pass through her frame all at once in response to this. “Then you meant your comments to sting–for the purpose of changing how I might sing the song?”
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