Mountain Solo

by Jeanette Ingold

  "I'd love that," Maureen said. "Wide enough for a rocking chair and maybe a swing."

  "Papa!" Katharina called from where she was leaning over a fence to pet Patch. "See? He won't hurt me. Please can I ride?"

  "When you're older!" Frederik called back. "Next year maybe!"

  "You know," Maureen said, "I've been riding since before I can remember."

  "Me, too," Frederik said. "But I don't want Katharina growing up as fast as we had to."

  "She's almost six ... And she's not asking to do something dangerous. She'll never learn to take care of herself if we don't start letting her try."

  It was an ongoing argument. Frederik thought he understood Maureen's determination to see that their daughter learned to do everything she could as soon as possible. She didn't want Katharina ever to be left with as few choices as Maureen herself had had those first years Frederik had known her.

  But Katharina was still such a little thing Put her on a horse and next she'd be wanting to ride off somewhere, and who knew what dangers she'd get into. Frederik saw no need for taking risks with her as long as he could keep her safe.

  "Come on, now!" he called. "Come look where we're going to put our new room."

  THEY FINISHED the addition to the cabin a month later and celebrated with a Sunday afternoon picnic by the stream.

  A day couldn't be any better, Frederik thought as he ate a second piece of chocolate cake Or the woods sound any nicer.

  Or, he thought, looking around, a place be any prettier. A red brown calf nursed at its mama. Their biggest crop of lambs yet were chasing each other about. The potato field was a skim of new green. The sour cherry trees Maureen had planted were trying to blossom.

  His gaze traveled up the hillside to the irrigation system he'd finally finished—two miles of ditch dug and wood flume built. Diverting water from the stream's upper end to run along the high edge of their fields had been a huge job, but now he could open gates and flood anywhere he wanted.

  His gaze sharpened as sparkling movement caught his eye. Frowning, he said to Maureen, "Does that look like water gushing out up there?"

  UP ON THE HILLSIDE, he wondered what animal had used his flume for a step stool. Something big, he guessed, a bear or a mountain lion. Otherwise, the nails he'd used to anchor the wood trough to a tree trunk wouldn't have pulled clear out.

  "Frederik!" Maureen called. "Is Katharina with you?"

  "No!" That child! he thought. What trick is she playing on her mother now? Probably hiding under the bed the way she did yesterday. "Look in the cabin!"

  He went back to repairing the flume but was interrupted by a sound like a shot. It surprised him—people didn't come into this gulch very often, and hunting season was over anyway.

  "Frederik, what was that?" Maureen called. "Katharina!"

  Maureen hadn't found her?

  Suddenly afraid, Frederik started up the hillside, hurrying toward where the sound had come from. His pace picked up even faster when he hit the overgrown old pack trail, and fear gripped him tighter and tighter Katharina can't be at the old mine. She can't be, he told himself. But a sound like a rifle shot doesn't just happen.

  Then he got a whiff of a sharp, acrid smell like gunpowder gone off; and an instant later he saw her She lay across the trail, her body and mangled hands so still that he thought she was dead.

  Dear God in heaven, let her be alive.

  "Frederik!" Maureen shouted.

  "Up here!"

  God in heaven... Gott im himmel... Mein Gott im himmel. Somehow he couldn't get past the plea from so long ago—his own father's plea—held inside him.

  Then Maureen was with them, listening with her ear against Katharina's chest. "She's breathing" She brushed hair back from the child's dirty face. "Come to, sweetheart. Please. Please. Frederik, help!"

  Frederik looked at her blankly a moment, and then he felt his mind cleat: A blasting cap, he thought. Dynamite would have killed. He picked up Katharina. "We'll get her to the hospital."

  Tessie

  My hard work with Mr. Stubner was paying off in orchestra. At the beginning of my junior year, I leapfrogged over other violinists so that now I was first stand, just one chair away from being concertmaster.

  That position was held by a senior named Tran, who everybody liked. When he stood to play an A for the orchestra to tune to, he'd say, "Please." He led the violin section with a constant firmness that made us sound good. And sometimes when I turned a page of our music—the second person on a stand always got that job—he'd nod a thank you.

  Kendall, on my left, was a different story altogether She'd hoped to be concertmaster expected to at least have my chair and now she never looked at me without resentment showing.

  I wasn't sure what to do about it, except act like I didn't notice, and when I knew she'd done something like get top ratings in a music competition, I congratulated her.

  She rarely bothered to answer Except once she said, "How come you never enter anything? If you're not going to build a career you shouldn't be taking up space here."

  "I don't think that's so," I told her "Besides, my violin teacher says that preparing for competitions would divert me from working on the things I need to learn."

  Kendall said, "Mr. Stubner has been teaching so long, he doesn't know what the real world's like anymore. I wouldn't have him for my teacher."

  I said, "And maybe he wouldn't have you for his student!"

  After that, I gave up even saying "hi" to her.

  She didn't talk to me, either except to occasionally whisper just loud enough for one or two others to hear "Tess, you're playing sharp," or "Tess, would you count? You're throwing me off!"

  Ben told me, "Ignore her She's jealous."

  "She shouldn't be. She's a wonderful violinist."

  "And a witch," he said. "You're crazy if you let her get to you."

  I never did find out if it was Kendall who told on Ben and me. But someone did.

  On the last Thursday of October Ben and I cut classes to wait in line for tickets to a live television show. The tickets ran out before our turn came up, though, and Ben and I ended the afternoon early. I went home in plenty of time to beat Mom there.

  Only I found her waiting for me, still dressed up for work. "Why are you here?" I asked.

  "I got a call from your school. Would you like to tell me about this special ensemble practice you and Ben had? None of your teachers seems to know anything about it."

  I just stood there, caught too off guard to come up with an answer feeling my face burn.

  "I will not have you wrecking your future, throwing away all your effort and everything that's been done for you, for the sake of some teenage romance."

  "But I'm not ... We're not..."

  "I don't want to hear it," she said, her voice brittle. "Just don't skip school again."

  I stared at her perplexed. That was all she was going to say?

  And even more perplexing was how, for just an instant, her expression went soft and pleading, as if there was something that she really needed me to understand. "Tessie..." she began.

  She hadn't called me that in months—not since I'd made a scene about it—and I wondered what caused her to now.

  She didn't finish her sentence. Fast as the odd moment had come, it was over and Mom's voice and expression went brittle again. "I have to return to work," she said. "There's a letter for you on the table."

  I read it after she left. It was actually one of two letters on the table: One was to her and one was to me, both from Dad.

  Mine began, "Dear Tess, I have news to share."

  I read quickly to the end, and then, my feelings in a turmoil of protest, I telephoned Montana. The clinic receptionist said, "Your father's in the middle of appointments, but I'll see if I can catch him. Can you hold?"

  "Yes."

  I held long enough to read Dad's letter several more times. He was going to get married again, to a woman with a nine-year-old daughter.

&nb
sp; I was having a difficult time taking it in.

  No wonder Mom acted so odd, I thought. She must have just gotten the same news, and even though she and Dad were divorced, nobody likes to be replaced.

  "Tess?" I heard Dad's voice on the phone.

  "I got your letter Congratulations."

  "Thank you."

  "But, Dad, you're marrying somebody I don't even know."

  "Not 'somebody,'" he said. "Her name is Meg I wanted to tell you about her this summer when you two could have gotten to know each other in person, and when you could have gotten to know her daughter Amy, too. Only you went to music camp instead of coming here, and then last week I got your note saying you're not going to make it out for Thanksgiving, either."

  "I can't. I have a program. When are you getting married?" I asked.

  "The week between Christmas and New Year's. We thought we'd get married in Hawaii and ask you and Amy to stand up with us. Will you be my best man?"

  "I guess so," I said. "I don't know. I have to ask Mom. Hawaii?" Not that I cared where. It was just a question to ask when I suddenly couldn't trust myself to talk anymore.

  Dad filled in details until he seemed to realize I wasn't really listening "Look, Tess," he said. "I want..."

  "It's okay," I told him. "Really. But I've got to go now. Really. Congratulations."

  I said good-bye and put the phone down feeling kind of lost. And, I guess, scared, too, although at first I couldn't figure out why. Then I realized that up till now, I was the one who'd been doing all the changing Even if I hadn't been going home very often, I'd always known home—and Dad—were there, just the way I'd left them. And now neither would ever be the same.

  Mom gave me my Christmas present early: tickets for the two of us to holiday performances at Lincoln Center.

  I looked at them—an opera, a ballet, a symphony concert. She'd even thrown in an evening at Carnegie Hall, which wasn't even a part of Lincoln Center They'd be wonderful performances, and from the close-in seats she'd bought I'd be able to see faces and hear even the quietest, most individual sounds.

  I told her, "Mom, I can't use these. Christmas week is when I go to Hawaii."

  "I've been thinking about that trip," Mom said. "I don't see how you can make it. You've got SATs to study for and exams coming up in January. It's going to be hard enough for you to keep up on your violin, without your taking a week off from practicing."

  "Dad's not going to understand."

  "That depends on how you present it," Mom said. She handed me a piece of stationery and a pen. "I'll tell you what to say."

  APPARENTLY MOM was right: Dad didn't argue, so he must have understood.

  But I went to bed crying more nights than not, between then and Christmas. First I cried because I'd be missing the wedding Then I cried because I was just as glad I wouldn't be at it. I cried because I might not like Meg and Amy. I cried because they might not like me.

  I cried because I missed seeing Ben outside of school. Mom had begun telephoning me at four o'clock every day—just to say hi, she said, but I knew the real reason was to check up on me, and I cried about that.

  I cried because I kept making mistakes in orchestra, and because I could guess from the pleased expression on Kendall's face that she thought we'd soon be switching seats.

  I cried because Mr. Stubner asked why I'd begun playing like an automaton, without putting any of myself into my music.

  I cried because half the people at school were snappish and pinch faced over one thing or another The dancers were all either worn out from performances of The Nutcracker, or else they were upset at not having parts. Hie voice students and musicians who took private engagements were exhausted from doing holiday parties.

  Teachers got provoked, and there was even a rumor that Gabriel Nageo, a senior flute player bad gotten fired by his flute teacher for not taking directions.

  "I don't think teachers can fire you," I said, when some of us were talking about it after orchestra.

  "No?" Kendall said. "Then you tell me why Gabriel's dropped out of school."

  I didn't have an answer to that any more than I did to anything else.

  I just knew I was miserable, and that it was at least partly because I'd been so rotten to Dad. I wondered if he'd ever forgive me.

  I got my answer on Christmas Eve, when the apartment buzzer rang while Mom and I were eating dinner A delivery man brought up a large insured box that Mom had to sign for.

  When we opened it and took out layers of packing, we found a gift-wrapped present with a card that said, "Merry Christmas to my dearest daughter Tess, with love from your old man."

  "I'm not going to wait for tomorrow," I told Mom. I could guess from the box and careful packing what my present just might be. With shaking hands I pulled off the ribbon and gift paper and opened the inner box and then the case inside. Dad had sent me a violin.

  I peered through one of the instrument's f-shaped sound holes, read the label, and caught my breath. Dad must have been saving and saving for this. I'd expected to wait years for a violin so good.

  I was so afraid to break even a string that I took forever tuning it. And then just as long examining the fine bow, tightening it, running rosin down it.

  Cautiously I played a few short notes and then longer and fuller ones, not wanting to be disappointed. I was thrilled at the violin's rich tone. And when I finally dared play my best, I heard my best sound better than it ever had.

  "Mom, did you know?" I asked.

  "No. I wish he'd consulted me," Mom answered, setting her mouth in an unsmiling line. Then she added, "It's a lovely present." She gave it a speculative look. "You could start a career with that."

  Mr. Stubner was as thrilled as I with my new violin. Not that it came as a surprise to him. I learned Dad had called him for advice.

  He was less pleased, though, with how I played it that first lesson after holiday break. I'd gone hoping to surprise him with the start of a sonata I'd heard a fantastic violinist play at one of the holiday concerts Mom and I attended. At intermission I'd even bought one of the violinist's CDs so I could study just how she put so much emotion into each phrase.

  I'd practiced and practiced, and when I played it for Mr. Stubner I watched for his nod of approval. I wanted to see his pleasure and pride in me.

  Instead I saw mirth.

  "What's funny?" I asked.

  He named the soloist I'd admired so much. "Right?"

  "Yes."

  "Tess, what you played was very nice, but it was her not you."

  "What do you mean?"

  "The grief and anguish! Surely you can come up with something more honest than that."

  "I thought it sounded honest," I said.

  "It was when she played it, because she took a piece of music begun by a composer and finished it with skill and with what was inside her But when you play, I want to hear what's inside you!"

  "I don't think there's anything in there all that special," I told him.

  "Well, well," Mr. Stubner said, smiling although his eyes looked sympathetic. "That is a problem, isn't it?"

  I got in the last word, though, when I thought of it a few minutes later I broke off in the middle of an exercise to say, "And the listener The listener has something to do with how a piece of music is completed, too."

  Mr. Stubner looked surprised. Then he said, "Right you are, Tess. And sometimes, the listener is the most important part, and the easiest part to forget."

  THE REST OF January slid by in a blur of work and exams and tense, anxious faces. I didn't see my friends to talk to except at lunch, and then our conversations mostly ended up in our endless game of What If?

  Even Ben got caught up in it: What if I'd started playing/dancing/acting younger than I did? "What if I'd taken up a different instrument? Had a better teacher early on? Been born with perfect pitch instead of just almost? Came from a family already in the music business?

  When we weren't playing What If?, then we were o
n to What's Next? We learned it from seniors stressing over choosing between college and a music conservatory, sweating out acceptances, applying for scholarships or jobs, making frantic last efforts to stand out above super-talented peers.

  We had a third game, too, but it was one that we mostly kept private. It was the game of What's After That?

  For some of us—the violinists and cellists and pianists—who played solo instruments, a career as a concert soloist who traveled the world hung out there as the biggest, brightest prize.

  Others wanted a regular job with a good orchestra. Sometimes I thought about that cellist I'd heard practicing the time Mom and I toured Lincoln Center and I wondered if he was doing what he wanted. I wondered if maybe he'd rather be a concert soloist but didn't have the personality to connect with audiences. You heard about that, how some performers had a way about them and others didn't.

  And we all knew that some of us would be making a career of teaching, either aiming for or drifting into it. Growing into it, maybe Teachers like Mr. Stubner had done it all—had solo careers, played in orchestras and ensembles—and now were respected masters passing on their skill and knowledge.

  But when I thought back to my first year in New York and the defeated orchestra teacher at that one school I briefly attended, I wondered which ones of us would end up like him.

  I told Ben about him, and Ben surprised me by saying, "I've been thinking about teaching junior or senior high myself. I'd still have time to do some composing."

  Then, looking a bit embarrassed, he said, "I like the idea of opening students' eyes to what music can be. The people who buy season tickets to symphony orchestras already know, and they're likely to see that their children do. But most kids—if they don't run into a good music teacher someplace, they might never find out."