‘Right,’ he said. ‘Let’s see what we can do.’
‘I shall have to go,’ Owen said.
‘You just hold your horses. You’ve time to hear a bar or three.’ He took out his violin and tuning fork, which he banged. ‘You’re spot on, Wilk.’
‘I know where bloody A is.’ Wilkinson rosined away at his bow.
‘Make sure that your seat’s rock solid,’ Payne told David, standing over him. ‘You can’t play on a seesaw.’ He circled the platform, blowing like a grampus, the violin he was carrying dwarfed. ‘Can you see, Cy? Wilk’s not hogged the light again?’ He took his chair, shifted it about as if to show David what was necessary. ‘Right we’ll tune. In order.’ The three sat silenced until he had satisfied himself, then Wilkinson, Barton and finally David took their turn. ‘Check your scores.’ He turned his own pages, then eyed his troops, lifted fiddle to chin, bow arm up, and they had started.
‘What’s that like?’ he shouted to Owen. They’d done half a dozen lines, stopped without reason.
‘Beautiful, beautiful.’
‘I hope you’re right. Again.’
They worked through the Haydn, without breaks. David Blackwall, breath crushed inside his lungs, played uncomfortably, but not badly, and without show. He had practised carefully, and the superb instrument served him well. Payne asked for a repetition on one or two bars, expressed gratification, scratched his face, practised furiously a run he managed with easy limpidity and said, interrupting the others who were fluently fingering awkward passages, that they’d have the Beethoven.
‘That’s second,’ he told David. ‘Mozart after the interval.’
Owen noisily left his seat, came down, congratulating them.
‘You’ve got the dressing-room key?’ he asked.
‘Cyril has.’
‘Fear not.’ Barton, socially. Wilkinson in some world of his own dashed away at Beethoven as if he grudged time off from the music. Owen banged the door; somewhere in the recesses of the building a telephone trilled. The four became one.
After the Beethoven, during which Payne stopped them several times with a show of ill-temper, as if Owen’s departure had opened his lips, and they repeated the unsatisfactory sections, never more than a half-dozen bars, the order was given.
‘Walk round and a pee.’
David three or four times played the solo opening of the last movement, Allegro molto quasi presto.
‘Perfect,’ Barton said. ‘Couldn’t do it better myself.’
‘You have a walk round,’ Payne commanded. David laid his cello down, replacing the bow in its case.
‘How’s it going?’ he asked.
‘Good enough. As long as you’ve a decent chair and your instrument’s not on the wobble. Harry knows that. You’ve plenty of light?’
‘Yes.’
That Payne should bother himself about details of comfort rather than interpretation seemed improper, but he himself was in no mood to judge. He had lost fear, but with it his exhilaration, was locked inside himself in a mild insensitivity, as if he were beginning a cold.
‘Walk to the back,’ Payne ordered. They stood by the main doors, watching, hearing Wilkinson play, hunched over his fiddle, with powerful clarity, repeating passages already polished. David whispered a compliment and the leader nodded succinct agreement. ‘He can’t trust himself. But if somebody pinched the scores he’d be the one who could play it through. Whole programme. No bother. And there he sits, worrying himself to death.’ They had walked into the foyer. ‘He’ll be here till the concert starts, you know. Lying on the floor doing his exercises. I want you to go out with Cy for a bit of tea. When we come here I go to visit an aunt. Cy’ll look after you. He’s the nearest to a human being we’ve got. I think he’ll get married.’ He showed yellow teeth.
Now they stood shoulder to shoulder in front of a crowded, neat notice board.
‘Harry Owen’s a marvel, really. Gets some first-rate concerts and audiences for them. Isn’t easy, but he does it. And why? Why? I can’t answer. He wants us to do a whole Shostakovich evening, three quartets, in June.
‘Is he keen on Shostakovich?’
‘I shouldn’t think so. No more than the next man. But he thinks that’s what they ought to have.’
‘Ought?’ David felt a stir of delight.
‘Somebody’s convinced him. Somehow. And not only shall we play them, but he’ll have people here to listen.’ Payne tapped at the mosaic floor with his toe. ‘We shall be packed out tonight.’
‘Does that suit you?’
‘Oh, yes. I long enough ago gave up playing to myself.’ They returned after a tour of the building to Mozart. Payne was more critical than ever, but not sarcastic now, placid. ‘Let’s do that again,’ he invited them, sternly calm. Once or twice he played a phrase over, elegantly with emphasis, muttering, ‘Something like that.’ At the end of the rehearsal David now understood with certainty who led the group.
‘Twenty past five,’ Payne said. ‘You’re not going out, Walter?’
‘No. I’ve brought a flask.’
‘Give him the dressing-room key, Cy. And don’t go wandering off, for God’s sake. We’ll meet at just after seven. Five past at the latest. On time. I don’t want heart failure.’ They cased instruments, stacked them on a table. Payne dragged on an overcoat and a flat cap David had not seen before, and sloped off, a pale man, frozen, looking older than his years. Barton explained to Wilkinson where he and David were going, and how long they would be out.
‘Do you want to come?’ he asked.
‘No. I’ve got to get myself ready.’
As the two left they heard Wilkinson fasten lock and bolt behind them. Barton grinned.
‘He’ll do his exercises now, lying on the floor. It’s funny; he’s very good at it, twists himself into knots. He goes through a routine every day, morning and night, but on concert days it’s an orgy.’
They walked into the main road, peered into antique shops most of which displayed notices of their concert, and watched people pass on a cold evening. In a café Barton ordered two pots of tea, honey and toast. ‘Make it thick slices,’ he said at the counter. ‘Hunks.’
The cook disappeared round the back to comply.
‘You’re lucky,’ he told them, reappearing, ‘I thought we’d only got this thin-sliced muck.’
‘You’re a friend,’ Barton said.
‘To everybody except myself,’ the man replied, dabbing sloppy margarine on to the sides of their plates.
The place was not crowded, but overpoweringly hot so that the windows were steamy, ran with moisture. The two men ate silently, before deciding against cream buns.
‘I don’t like to play on an empty stomach,’ Barton said, pouring himself a fourth large cup from David’s pot. ‘On the other hand . . .’ He seemed to be guying himself, and his lips shone unnaturally red, greasy from the toast. David thought his companion was encouraging confession, but had no idea how to satisfy him. He mentioned Mary’s Semele, but neither man raised much enthusiasm. He dredged up a reminiscence about the difficulties of a series of lunchtime recitals he had arranged as a student in Cambridge. Barton countered with an orchestral concert he had played under Britten, but now both were immersed in themselves, vaguely waving from parallel lines.
‘Quarter past six,’ Barton said. A youth plonked down his plate on the next table, and without loosening his scarf wolfed into his sausage, beans and chips. ‘It’ll give us time to cool off and warm up again. Wilko will have done. I don’t like to hurry.’ They watched the youth’s demolition act.
Outside the cold attacked them, suddenly ferocious. Barton found a confectionery shop still open, went in for cough sweets, left David in the bitterness of the east wind.
For some reason Barton circled the hall so that they entered by the main door which was open. One or two people, presumably officials, darted about in the foyer. ‘Just under an hour,’ Barton grunted, consulting his watch. ‘By God, it was cold out th
ere.’ They heard a clashing of cups and saucers; Barton held out his hands in front of a radiator before pushing into the hall, which was thinly lighted. A young woman carrying a pile of programmes up the central aisle looked them over without much interest. Barton prowled over their rostra, tested his chair, picking it up, then sitting on it and inviting his companion with a left-handed flourish to do likewise. There they sat, uncomfortably, men with nothing to do.
‘Will you know anybody here?’ Cy asked.
‘My parents are coming.’ David explained about the jaunt to America and Barton smiled, pleased to hear this, human again.
‘Tell you what,’ he confided, ‘I wouldn’t mind being able to nip off to the States for a week. If I could afford it.’
Payne and Owen came down the aisle together, Harry talking still, not yet out of his anorak. They took up a position halfway down to halt, to stop talking before making sedately for the front.
‘Ready, then?’ Payne asked.
‘Don’t make so many mistakes this way.’ Barton mimed performance.
‘Walter all set?’
‘Haven’t been round yet. Don’t want to interrupt.’
The young woman reappeared calling for Owen, who stormed off.
‘Is your stand firm?’ Payne asked David. ‘And tight? You get it just right in the afternoon and some caretaker comes in swopping ’em or unscrewing the things. These are good, aren’t they?’ He approached Barton, grasped and shook the upright.
‘Compared with some we’ve seen.’
‘I’m surprised you don’t bring your own,’ David said.
‘We do. Cy’s back seat. But these are good. Let’s go and put Walt out of his misery.’
Wilkinson was sitting easily, plastic cup of milkless tea in hand, feet up on one of the deal tables. He raised his drink.
‘All present and correct.’ He shouted confidently, out of character.
They hung up their overcoats.
‘We’ll spruce up, then get changed and have a tune,’ Payne ordered. ‘Washrooms, mirrors and loos through there.’ He disappeared in that direction.
‘He puts water on his hair,’ Wilkinson informed David, who sat miserably by a table, one hand on his cello case, searching for confidence.
They washed, changed, combed hair a second, a third time, hindering one another, apologizing, grinning weakly. At quarter past, Payne said they’d tune, slapped his fork on the table. This over, they immediately began to play, famished for their instruments. Wilkinson raced with schoolboy zest into the Allegro of Fiocco; Barton improvised broad chords; Payne with earpiercing tone mastered the preludio of the E major Partita while David turned to the comfortable difficulty of his Bach in C major. For a few minutes they lost each other in brilliant discord, forgetful of everything except the relearning of trust in instrument and fingers, running counter to each other as they prepared by the violence of individualism for the supreme combined rationality they were to demonstrate within a few minutes. David felt better; he knew his capability.
The torrent had eased when Harry Owen pushed in, penguin-stout.
‘We shall be a bit late starting,’ he said, squinting down to silken lapels. ‘They’re coming in by the thousand.’
‘What time is it?’ Wilkinson, not lowering his fiddle.
‘Seven twenty-seven.’ One glance at his wristwatch; absolute certainty of statement. ‘He’s here,’ in a low voice to Payne, who paid no attention ostentatiously. That would be the agent.
‘How long, then?’ Payne asked.
‘Five minutes, perhaps. We’re still selling tickets. Fiddled another row of chairs in, and God bless the fire precautions. Can’t keep ’em out. Don’t know why. They must have heard of your new cellist.’ He pulled a face at David. ‘And they say there’s no audience for chamber music. I’ll be back to fetch you.’
‘Keep your eyes on me when we’re making our bow. No need to do it like drill, though. And don’t forget, somebody, to look at the clients in the side blocks and the gallery. They’ve paid. Carry your cello in with you if they call us back. It looks better.’
At 7.36 Owen summoned them. They stood, shook their trousers straight, breathed deeply.
‘Forward, the Light Brigade.’ Barton.
They walked in line down the corridor behind Owen, who opened the door, closed it after them. The crowded hall smelled of the audience, crackled with their talk; applause jumped, inordinately amplified. Barton signalled his partner back and the quartet bowed, two either side of the platform, before they took to their chairs. David, glad to be seated, bending with bow and cello in one hand, copy in the other had been awkward, arranged his instrument, opened his music, tried his first turnover. Now he felt neither fear nor pleasure, a mere indifference to himself, a wish to make a start, complete the job. He tuned, as if it had been at home. Payne seemed in no hurry. Cyril Barton leaned towards David, face serious, man on the threshold of communion with the great.
‘There’s always some woman wearing a fancy hat,’ he said. David nodded, but could not crack his face into a smile.
The audience grew still, in seconds, as if to order. Payne looked round his men, eyebrows raised in question, then lifted his violin. Easily, broadly they embraced Haydn.
David, in relief, unaware of his audience, found he could concentrate, that his instrument spoke back to him, allowed him to take his rightful place amongst the others, without showing off. He knew his role, and keeping to it excelled himself. Payne set precisely the pace they had practised; the marks on Blackwall’s copy could be seen, were obeyed. Sometimes he lacked breath, but once they were beyond the first movement, the constriction vanished and he was the player he had prepared himself to be. He paid no attention to the actions of his colleagues, their becks, posturings, head jerks, Cyril’s sniffs, only to the sounds they made, his cues, their magnificent reassurance.
When they had finished Haydn, he felt sorry, slightly abashed by the strength of the applause, modestly waiting to repay the noisy, expressed gratitude by a repeat which would set right the few flaws. As the four bowed, clapping gained in ferocity.
‘That’ll do. On your way, brother.’ Barton again, guide and counsellor.
David led them smartly out.
‘Whoa,’ Payne said in the corridor. ‘They want to see us again. We won’t cross the platform this time. Just from this side.’ Back they trotted to renewed delight.
In the dressing room, Payne gave them two minutes to themselves, he said, and publicly congratulated his cellist.
‘That’s the way to do it,’ he called, Punch-happy. He mopped his brow. ‘Never does to drink at this game. Sweat too much. If your mouth’s dry, swill it out and spit it out.’ When it was time to return, he straightened himself, said unemphatically, ‘They’ve had time to wriggle,’ played the first four bars of the Beethoven, picked up his copy with ‘Let’s get it over and done with,’ led them forward.
This time David could make out individuals in the audience, though he recognized nobody he knew, not his parents, not Barton’s lady with hat. The settling process on the platform was over more quickly, but Payne, violin held balanced and straight up on his knee, sat back, thumb to lips as if waiting for some signal. Finally, he leaned wickedly to Wilkinson, muttered what looked like a sardonic aside, winning a gawp, and then upped his fiddle and Beethoven had begun.
Again David did not find his ease until the opening Allegro neared its end. To his great joy he began the last movement at Payne’s friendly nod with incisive verve, with a precision in confident piano that lifted his colleagues. No doubt, there; only certainty certainly expressed. The audience leaped into enthusiasm, recalling the quartet four times.
Payne and Owen congratulated them.
‘Put your instrument away,’ the leader warned David. ‘It’ll be Piccadilly Circus in here in a minute.’
‘They seemed to like that,’ David suggested to Barton as they locked their cases.
‘Early Beethoven’s perfect for these.
A great composer before he’s too complicated. But, I’ll say this, we made a good job of it.’
Raps at the door announced friends and admirers, crowding into the corner where Frederick Payne held court in his shirt-sleeves. He wore, David noticed, elastic armbands and, like Wilkinson, highly polished dancing shoes. A young couple, man and wife in anoraks, hand in hand, engaged Blackwall in talk about gut strings and pitch in Beethoven’s time; he felt trapped, unwilling to argue, was glad when his parents rescued him.
‘Marvellous,’ Joan told him. ‘It really is.’
Horace stood back, smiling, pink-cheeked, the picture of healthy maturity. He still wore his raincoat.
‘That Haydn’s superb,’ she said.
‘Did you know it?’
‘We have a record.’
Barton edged across, was introduced.
‘It’s exciting in here,’ Joan said. Certainly chatter hurtled, broken by laughs, once by a spasm of coughing. ‘Wouldn’t you prefer quiet?’
‘I’m not sociable,’ Cy answered, ‘but I like to see all this.’ He looked at the tall figure of Wilkinson draped back over a table, besieged by three matrons. ‘We shall come to the Mozart all the fresher.’ He asked about their trip to America, coaxed a sentence or two out of Horace to which he solemnly listened and slid away.
‘He seems nice.’ Joan.
‘Very. He looks after me.’
‘Not the leader?’ His father, voice hoarse, forced up.
‘Fred’s a remarkable man, and he’s wasted up here and he knows it. He talks with his fiddle. You can’t help being impressed.’
‘Hero worship,’ Horace said, out of the blue, as if surprising himself.
‘I wonder how Mary’s feeling?’ Joan asked.
‘It’ll be the middle of the afternoon, now. I hope she’s fit.’
‘She’s very strong, physically.’ Joan scraped her bottom lip with her front teeth. Anna Talbot came across, dressed in a short fur coat and wide, electric-green trousers. She wore a hat, a green half-walnutshell shape with red jewels and a dyed feather. Cyril’s lady? David began to introduce them.
‘I know your parents,’ Anna smiled powerfully. ‘James and your mother are practising together. St Anthony Variations for good causes.’ She congratulated David, asked after Mary, ribbed Horace about gentlemen of leisure. ‘I got your son into this outfit.’
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