The Piano Tuner

by Daniel Mason

  They walk home, now they speak of inconsequentials like how many pairs of stockings he has packed, how often he will write, gifts he should bring home, how not to become ill. The conversation rests uneasily; one doesn’t expect good-byes to be burdened by such trivialities. This is not how it is in the books, he thinks, or in the theater, and he feels the need to speak of mission, of duty, of love. They reach home and close the door and he doesn’t drop her hand. Where speech fails, touch compensates.

  There are three days and then two and he cannot sleep. He leaves home early to walk, while it is still dark, shifting out from the warm pocket of scented sheets. She turns, sleeping, dreaming perhaps, Edgar? And he, Sleep, love, and she does, burrowing back into the blankets, murmuring sounds of comfort. He lowers his feet to the floor, to the cold kiss of wood on soles, and crosses the room. Dressing quickly. He carries his boots so as not to wake her, and slips quietly out the door, down the staircase layered with a wave of carpet.

  It is cold outside, and the street is dark save a gathering of leaves that twirl trapped in a wind, which has taken a wrong turn down Franklin Mews, which tumbles over itself, backing out of the narrow row. There are no stars. He tucks his coat around his neck and pulls his hat down tightly over his head. He follows the wind’s retreat, and he walks. Along streets empty and cobbled, past terraced houses, curtains drawn like eyes shut and sleeping. He walks past movement, alley cats perhaps, perhaps men. It is dark, and they have not yet electrified these streets, so he notices the lamps and candles, hidden in the depths of the houses. He tucks himself deeper into his coat and walks, and the night turns imperceptibly to dawn.

  There are two days and then one. She joins him, anticipates his early morning waking, and together they walk through the vastness of Regent’s Park. They are mostly alone. They hold hands as the wind races along the broad promenades, skimming the surface of puddles and tugging at the wet leaves that mat the grass. They stop and sit in the shelter of a gazebo and watch the few who have ventured out into the rain, hidden beneath umbrellas that tremble with the gale: old men who walk alone, couples, mothers leading children through the gardens, perhaps to the zoo, skipping, Mummy, what will we see? “Shhhh! Behave yourself, there are Bengal tigers and Burmese pythons and they eat naughty children.”

  They walk. Through the darkened gardens, flowers dripping with rain. The sky is low, the leaves yellow. She takes his hand and leads him away from the long avenues and across the emerald lawns, two tiny figures moving through the green. He doesn’t ask where they are going, but listens to the mud suck at his boots, foul sounds. The sky hangs low and gray, and there is no sun.

  She takes him to a small arbor and it is dry there, and he brushes her wet hair from her face. Her nose is cold. He will remember this.

  Day turns to night.

  And it is November 26, 1886.

  A carriage pulls up to the Royal Albert Dock. Two men in pressed army uniforms emerge and open the doors for a middle-aged man and woman. They step tentatively to the ground, as if it is the first time they have ridden in a military vehicle, its steps are higher, and its threshold thicker to support the carriage over rough terrain. One of the soldiers points to the ship, and the man looks at it and then turns back to the woman. They stand by each other and he kisses her lightly. Then he turns and follows the two soldiers toward the boat. Each carries a trunk, he a smaller bag.

  There is little fanfare, no bottles broken over the bow—this custom being reserved for the christeners of maiden voyages and the drunks who sleep at the dock and occasionally wash up at the fairgrounds downstream. From the deck, the passengers stand and wave to the crowd. They wave back.

  The engines start to rumble.

  As they begin to move, the fog closes in over the river. Like a curtain, it covers the buildings and the piers and those who have come to bid good-bye to the steamship. Midstream, the fog grows thicker and creeps over the deck, erasing even the passengers from one another.

  Slowly, one by one, the passengers return inside, and Edgar remains alone. Mist beads on his glasses and he removes them to wipe them on his waistcoat. He tries to peer through the fog, but it reveals nothing of the passing shoreline. Behind him, it obliterates the ship’s smokestack, and he feels as if he is floating in emptiness. He holds his hand out before him and watches as the swirls of white wrap around it in currents of tiny droplets.

  White. Like a clean piece of paper, like uncarved ivory, all is white when the story begins.

  3

  November 30, 1886

  Dear Katherine,

  It has now been five days since I left London. I am sorry I have not written to you sooner, but Alexandria is our first mail stop since Marseilles, so I have decided to wait to write rather than send you letters which bear only old thoughts.

  My dear, beloved Katherine, how can I describe the last few days to you? And how I wish that you were here on this journey to see everything that I am seeing! Just yesterday morning, a new coastline appeared on the starboard side of the ship and I asked one of the sailors what it was. He answered “Africa” and seemed quite surprised by my question. Of course I felt foolish, but I could hardly control my excitement. This world seems both so small and so vast.

  I have much to write, but before all else, let me tell you about the voyage thus far, beginning from when we said good-bye. The journey from London to Calais was uneventful. The fog was thick and rarely parted long enough to give us a glimpse of anything more than the waves. The trip takes but a few hours. When we arrived in Calais, it was night, and we were taken by carriage to the train station, where we boarded a train for Paris. As you know, I have always dreamed of visiting the adopted home of Sebastien Erard. But no sooner had we arrived than I was on another train heading south. France really is a beautiful country, and our route took us past golden pastures, and vineyards, and even fields of lavender (famous for their perfumes—which I promise to bring you when I return). As for the French people, I have less positive words, as none of the Frenchmen I happened to meet had ever heard of Erard or the mécanisme à étrier, Erard’s great innovation. They only stared at my inquiries as if I were mad.

  In Marseilles we boarded another ship, owned by the same line, and soon we were steaming across the Mediterranean. How I wish you could see the beauty of these waters! They are a blue like none that I have ever seen before. The closest color I can think of is the early nighttime sky, or perhaps sapphires. The camera is a wonderful invention indeed, but how I wish we could take photographs in true color so you could see for yourself what I mean. You must go to the National Gallery and look for Turner’s Fighting Temeraire, it is the closest to this that I can imagine. It is very warm, and I have already forgotten the cold English winters. I spent much of the first day on deck and ended up with quite a sunburn. I must remember to wear my hat.

  After the first day, we passed through the Strait of Bonifacio, which runs between the islands of Sardinia and Corsica. From the ship we could see the Italian coastline. It looks very still and peaceful, and it was. It is hard to imagine the tumultuous history that was born deep in those hills, that this is the country that gave birth to Verdi, Vivaldi, Rossini, and, most of all, Cristofori.

  How to describe my days to you? Apart from simply sitting on the deck and staring at the sea, I have spent many hours reading reports sent by Anthony Carroll. It is strange to think that this man, who has occupied my thoughts for weeks now, does not yet even know my name. Regardless, he does have extraordinary tastes. I opened one of the packages of sheet music that I was given to deliver to him, and found it to contain Liszt’s Piano Concerto no. 1, Schumann’s Toccata in C Major, and others. There are some sheets whose music I don’t recognize, and when I try humming them out I can’t decipher any melody. I will have to ask him about these when I reach his camp.

  Tomorrow we stop in Alexandria. The coast is very close now, and in the distance I can see minarets. This morning we passed a small fishing boat, and a local fisherman stood
and watched us steam by, a net hanging loosely from his hands, so close that I could see the dried salt which dusted his skin. And less than a week ago I was still in London! Alas, we will stay only a short time in port and I will have no time to visit the Pyramids.

  There is so much more I want to tell you … the moon is almost full now, and at night I often go on deck to stare at it. I have heard that the Orientals believe that there is a rabbit in the moon, but I still cannot see this, only a man, winking, mouth wide open in surprise and wonder. And now I think I understand why he looks so, for if all is wondrous from the deck of a ship, imagine what it must be like from the moon. Two nights ago I couldn’t sleep for all the heat and excitement, and I went on deck. I was looking out at the ocean when slowly, not a hundred yards from the ship, the water began to shimmer. At first I thought it was the reflection of the stars, but it appeared to take form, glowing like thousands of tiny fires, like the streets of London at night. By its brightening, I expected to see a bizarre sea animal, but it stayed amorphous, floating on the water. It stretched for nearly a mile, and then, after we had passed it and I turned back to look for it in the sea, it was gone. Then last night, the beast of light came again, and I learned from a traveling naturalist who had come to the deck to look at the sky that the light was not the light of one monster, but millions, microscopic creatures that the man called “diatoms,” and that similar creatures dye the Red Sea its famous color. Katherine, what a strange world this is where the invisible can illuminate the waters and color the very sea red.

  My dear, I must go now. It is late, and I miss you terribly, and I hope you are not lonely. Please do not worry about me. In truth, I was a little frightened when I left, and sometimes when I lie in bed, I question why I am going. I still don’t have an answer. I remember what you told me in London, that it is such noble work, that it is my duty to my country, but this cannot be: I never enlisted in the army when I was young, and have little interest in our foreign affairs. I know it made you angry when I suggested that it was my duty to the piano and not the Crown, but I still feel very strongly that Dr. Carroll is doing the proper thing, and that if I can help in the cause of Music, perhaps that is my duty. Part of my decision certainly rests in my confidence in Dr. Carroll, and a sense of shared mission with him and his desire to bring the music I find beautiful to places where others have only thought of bringing guns. I know that such sentiments often pale when faced with reality. I do miss you dearly, and I hope that I am not on some hopeless mission. But you know that I am not one to take unnecessary risks. I might be more frightened than you by stories I hear about the war and the jungle.

  Why am I wasting words on my fears and insecurities when I have so much that is beautiful to tell you? I suppose it is because I have no one else to share these thoughts with. In truth, I am already happy in ways that I have never known. I only wish you could be here with me to share this journey.

  I will write again soon, my love.

  Your devoted husband,

  Edgar

  He mailed the letter in Alexandria, a short stop, where the ship took on new passengers, men in flowing robes who spoke a language that seemed to come from deep within their throats. They stayed in port for several hours, time only to wander briefly amid the smells of drying octopus and the scented bags of the spice traders. Soon they were moving again, through the canal at Suez and into another sea.

  4

  That night, as the boat steamed slowly through the waters of the Red Sea, Edgar couldn’t sleep. At first he tried to read a document provided to him by the War Office, a turgid piece about military campaigns during the Third Anglo-Burmese War, but gave up in boredom. The cabin was stifling, and the small porthole did little to welcome in the sea air. At last he dressed and walked down the long corridor to the companionway leading onto the deck.

  Outside it was cool, the sky was clear and the moon full. Weeks from now, after he has heard the myths, he will understand why this was important. Although the English call the thin, anemic slivers of light “new moons,” this is only one way to understand them. Ask any child of the Shan, or the Wa, or the Pa-O, and they will tell you that it is the full moon which is new, for it is fresh and sparkling like the sun, and it is the thin moon which is old and frail, and soon to die. And thus full moons mark beginnings, eras when change begins and one must pay close attention to portent.

  Yet there remain many days before Edgar Drake arrives in Burma, and he does not yet know the divinations of the Shan. That there are four classes of auguries, those being the omens from the sky, the omens of flying birds, the omens of feeding fowl, and the omens of the movement of four-footed beasts. He doesn’t know the meanings of comets or halos or showers of meteorites, that divination can be found in the direction of a crane’s flight, that one must look for augury in the eggs of hens, in the swarming of bees, and not only if but also where a lizard, rat, or spider drops on one’s body. That if water in a pond or river turns red, the country will be laid waste by a devastating war; such a portent foretold the destruction of Ayutthaya, the old capital of Siam. That if a man takes anything in his hand and it breaks without apparent cause, or if his turban falls off of its own accord, he will die.

  Such auguries need not be invoked for Edgar Drake, not yet. He does not wear a turban and rarely breaks strings when he tunes and repairs, and as he stood on the deck, the sea reflected the light of the moon with a glittering of silver on blue.

  The outline of the coast could still be seen, and even the distant wink of a lighthouse. The sky was clear, and sprayed with thousands of stars. He looked out at the sea where waves flashed with their reflections.

  The following evening Edgar sat in the dining hall, at the end of a long table laid with clean white cloth. Above him a chandelier betrayed the motion of the ship. An elegant affair, he had written to Katherine, They have spared no luxury. He sat alone and listened to an animated conversation between two officers about a battle in India. His thoughts wandered away, to Burma, to Carroll, to tuning, to pianos, to home.

  A voice from behind brought him back to the steamship. “The piano tuner?”

  Edgar turned to see a tall man in uniform. “Yes,” he said, swallowing his food and rising to extend his hand. “Drake. And you, sir?”

  “Tideworth,” said the man, with a handsome smile. “I am the ship’s captain from Marseilles to Bombay.”

  “Of course, Captain, I recognize your name. It is an honor to meet you.”

  “No, Mr. Drake. The honor is mine. I am sorry that I could not have met you sooner. I have looked forward to making your acquaintance for several weeks now.”

  “My acquaintance, really!” said Edgar. “Whatever for?”

  “I should have told you when I introduced myself. I am a friend of Anthony Carroll. He wrote and told me to expect your passage. He is eagerly looking forward to meeting you.”

  “And I, him. He is, indeed, my commission.” He laughed.

  The Captain motioned to the chairs. “Please, let’s sit,” he said. “I didn’t mean to interrupt your meal.”

  “Of course not, Captain, I have eaten enough already. You serve us too well.” They sat down at the table. “So, Doctor Carroll wrote about me? I am curious as to what he said.”

  “Not much. I think they haven’t even informed him of your name. He did tell me you were a fine tuner of pianos, and that your safe passage is extremely important to him. He also said that you may be out of sorts on this journey, and that I should watch over you.”

  “That is too kind. But I seem to be managing. Although, without an Indian war under my belt”—he tilted his head toward the men beside him—“I am not much for conversation here.”

  “Oh, they are usually bores,” answered the Captain, lowering his voice, an unnecessary precaution, for the officers were fairly drunk and hadn’t even noticed his presence.

  “Regardless, I hope I am not taking you away from your duties.”

  “Not at all, Mr. Drake. The sailing
is smooth, as they say. We should be in Aden in six days, if we don’t have any problems. They will call if they need me. Tell me, have you enjoyed the journey?”

  “Enchanting. This is my first trip away from England, actually. Everything is beautiful beyond my imagination. I know the Continent mostly through its music, or its pianos.” When the Captain didn’t respond, Edgar added awkwardly, “I am a specialist in Erard pianos. It is a French model.”

  The Captain looked at him with curiosity. “And the journey to Alexandria? No pianos there, I imagine.”

  “No, no pianos,” he laughed. “But quite a view nonetheless. I have spent hours on deck. It is as though I am a young man again. You must understand.”

  “Of course. I still remember the first time I sailed this route. I even wrote poems about it, silly odes about sailing at the cusp of two continents, each vast and barren, stretching through hundreds of miles of sands and fabled cities, each rising to the sky, to the Levant, to the Congo. You can imagine, I am sure. Being at sea has lost none of its thrill, although thankfully I have long abandoned poetry. Tell me, have you made the acquaintance of any of the other passengers?”

  “Not really. I am not the outgoing sort. The passage is thrilling enough. It is all quite new for me.”

  “Well, it’s a pity you haven’t met more of the others. They are always an extraordinary lot. Without them, I might even tire of this view.”

  “Extraordinary. How so?”

  “Oh, if only I had the hours to tell you all the tales of my passengers. Where they embark is exotic enough. Not only from Europe or Asia, but any of the thousands of ports of call along the Mediterranean, the North African coast, Arabia. They call this route ‘the axis of the world.’ The stories, though! I need only to look around the room …” He leaned closer. “For example, over there at the back table, do you see the old gentleman dining with that white-haired woman?”