‘You think so?’
‘I know she is. Look at her. Her beliefs are unwavering. She knows there’s a whole world out there waiting for us when we die. Although I’m not certain of it, it’s very comforting at my age that she’s so sure. That gives her a huge advantage over everyone else. She’s never needed anyone because she’s so content in her own skin. That’s a blessing. She’s not vulnerable. She’s unconquerable. She’ll never do anything that goes against her better judgement just to fit in, or do something silly because of some foolish infatuation. No, I believe that Grace is somehow closer to God than the rest of us, that’s why she’s childlike. It’s as if she’s aware that life is a stage. She doesn’t take it too seriously. I never thought I’d say that about Grace, she used to baffle me to the point of despair. But I’ve grown to understand her over the years. She’ll do all right. I really believe she will.’
Audrey looked at him with eyes that revealed in their gentle expression the admiration she felt for him. It never ceased to astound her that he truly loved Grace as his own child. ‘You’ve put my mind at rest. I shall sleep well tonight.’
‘And so shall I. Because, my dear, if you’re happy, I’m happy.’ She kissed him on his weathered old cheek and knew that he meant it.
But that night she dreamed about Louis for the first time in many years and awoke with the ‘Forget-Me-Not Sonata’ ringing in her ears.
Grace settled into her college with the ease of someone who considers life a wonderful adventure. With childlike curiosity she searched for the good in everyone, disarming her fellow students and tutors with her directness and the unique quality that made her stand apart from the others, what her mother called her ‘otherworldliness’. She floated about the university with the same air of detachment that had isolated her from fellow classmates at school and although she was well liked she didn’t make close friends. She seemed not to need anyone. Grace thrived at Trinity College. She had an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, soaking up new information with the enthusiasm of someone who’s been deprived of education all their life. She found university so stimulating that at night she could barely sleep, not because of her spirit friends, who often kept her up with their games, but because her mind was whirring with all the questions she wanted to ask and she could barely restrain her impatience. She joined the Don Juan Society who met every Thursday evening in a pub to discuss poetry over beer and cottage pies and the Olivier Society where she discovered a natural talent for acting. Her parents weren’t surprised, she had acted all her life. But her gift earned her more notoriety than her stage performances. After astonishing a few students with the accuracy of her readings she was besieged wherever she went by people thrusting their watches and bracelets at her so that she was forced to limit herself to two readings a day. She refused to look into the future, having learned a sharp lesson from her cousin Nelly.
After a few weeks in Dublin Grace decided to go and pay a visit on her reclusive Uncle Louis. It wasn’t hard to find him. Everyone seemed to know of him. ‘You’re his niece?’ they laughed in astonishment when she asked after him. ‘He’s as nutty as a fruit cake. Except when he plays the piano, then he’s a god.’ Their comments made her all the more curious.
Following their directions she found his flat situated in an old courtyard of great beauty that probably hadn’t changed for over one hundred years. The door was small, built into a weathered brick wall and surrounded by an abundance of late roses that seemed to grow better there than anywhere else. She held her breath and knocked. No reply. She waited, put her nose to one of the roses and sniffed it. It had an extraordinarily sweet fragrance. Finally she heard a shuffling noise, then the sound of feet and the unbolting of the door. She envisaged an ogre but what she found was an old man with long grey hair that fell about his shouders in unruly rats’ tails and the softest blue eyes. He didn’t look mad at all.
‘What can I do for you?’ he asked in a deep voice that crunched like gravel. He looked at her quizzically as if he had met her somewhere before and was trying to place her.
‘I’m your niece, Grace Forrester,’ she said confidently. ‘Audrey and Cecil’s daughter.’ He stared at her as if he were seeing one of her spirits for the first time and his pale cheeks glowed as if suddenly bruised.
‘Cicely told me they had had another daughter,’ he mumbled, shaking his head in astonishment and rubbing his chin with his fingers. ‘You had better come in then.’ All the while he led her up the narrow wooden staircase he kept turning around to look at her again. ‘You’re the image of your mother,’ he said wistfully when they reached the sitting room on the first floor. It was small and dark with a thin layer of dust that covered everything. He seemed nervous for he flicked his long fingers on his knees and his mouth twitched at one corner.
‘Am I?’ she replied, noticing how his eyes suddenly looked sad. ‘I’ll take that as a compliment.’
‘Oh, I mean it as a compliment. The greatest compliment a man can give. I admire your mother. More than you’ll ever know.’ Grace removed some loose bits of manuscript from the sofa and sat down. ‘Excuse the mess, I don’t often receive visitors these days.’
‘Why not? I hear you play the piano beautifully. You should share your gift.’
‘Do you play?’
‘Yes,’ she replied brightly. Anyone else would have been unsettled by the intense way that he looked at her, but Grace wasn’t afraid of anyone. She found him compelling for she sensed a deep unrest in his soul and knew instinctively that she could somehow make it better.
‘So how is your mother?’ he asked, sitting down on a chair that only had three legs; the other was made out of books piled one on top of the other.
‘She’s well. Not very happy that I’ve come all the way to Dublin to study.’ She gave a gentle laugh that was so innocent and charming Louis found himself smiling too. He couldn’t remember the last time he had smiled. His face had set into a grimace that had become a comfortable habit he was frightened of breaking. But Grace disarmed him. When he smiled his whole face changed, as if he had turned on a light and transformed the dank little room into a conservatory. And it felt good. His smile caught Grace off guard and very little caught such a gifted clairvoyant off guard.
‘Does she still play the piano?’
‘Never.’
‘She once played, you know.’
‘Yes, she did. Leonora plays though and remembers you teaching her in Buenos Aires. She’s married a gypsy called Florien and has three children.’
He shook his grey head and rubbed his bristly chin with his hand. She noticed how the tips of his eyelashes had been caught by an early frost.
‘How time flies. It’s only with children that one becomes aware of the rapid passing of the years. If it weren’t for them I’d feel the months withering away slowly. But no, I am old and the years have left me behind.’
‘Goodness, Uncle Louis, you’re not old. You only look old because you’re unhappy.’
Louis smiled again. ‘You didn’t inherit your boldness from your father, that’s for sure.’
‘I say what I think. There’s no point in hiding the truth, as long as the truth is always motivated by love.’ He frowned. Her uniqueness was compelling.
She looked around the room and saw the piano hidden beneath disorderly piles of manuscripts.
‘Did you enjoy being Director of Music?’ she asked.
‘I enjoyed teaching music,’ he replied with a sigh. ‘Nothing gives me more joy than music. It’s the rules and regulations that go with an institution of this sort that grate on my sense of freedom. But it paid the bills and has given me a roof over my head ever since.’
‘You never married?’
‘You ask a lot of questions.’
‘I’m curious, Uncle Louis. You were a handsome man when you were young. I’ve seen your photograph on Aunt Cicely’s piano.’
‘She can’t play a note.’
‘Well, I’ve never heard her play, to be
honest.’
‘That’s because she can’t, the old stoat.’
‘The names she calls you are much worse,’ she said with a giggle.
‘I bet they are. Has Marcel left her yet?’
‘Goodness me, you are out of date!’ she gasped. ‘Marcel left her, which was no bad thing, and she married the farmer next door. Anthony Fitzherbert. You’d like him.’
‘Why would I like him? You don’t even know me.’ His face turned irritable again as if to challenge her.
But Grace smiled indulgently. ‘I know. But I feel I do.’ Louis stared at her with his chin loose and floundering. Grace held his eyes with an expression of compassion and understanding that was a direct reflection of her mother’s.
‘So, what can you play?’ he asked, getting up stiffly and shuffling over to the piano.
‘Anything you want. But I find sight-reading boring. I tend to improvise for fun.’
‘You do, do you?’ he said slowly. ‘Show me how.’ So Grace sat down and lifted the lid. Louis handed her a manuscript. She placed it on the stand and began to play. She put little feeling into the notes at first, following them mechanically. Then all of a sudden she closed her eyes and allowed her fingers to follow a different course, in the same style as the original. Louis was astounded. He knew no one else who could play like that but him.
When she finished, his eyes were moist with tears. ‘I’m an old man and you’ve just given me a lot of pleasure,’ he said huskily. But then he looked at her with that strange intense stare and asked in a very quiet voice, ‘How old are you, Grace?’
‘Eighteen,’ she replied.
‘What month were you born?’
‘October.’
‘October,’ he repeated slowly, nodding his head. ‘October.’ The truth hit him between the eyes and he had to sit down.
‘Are you all right, Uncle Louis?’ she asked.
‘Play some more. Anything. You play so beautifully, it breaks my old heart,’ he choked gruffly, waving his long fingers at her. ‘Just play.’
So she played. Sensing his unhappiness she let her empathy direct her fingers so that the music mirrored the heaviness in his soul and enabled him to let go of it, little by little. It was only the beginning of a healing process that would take many months, but Grace was very gifted and when she left the house he felt strangely lighter. ‘Your roses are beautiful,’ she said as she departed. Then she opened her inner eye and saw the flurry of spirit entities who danced among the branches. She laughed. ‘They like your music,’ she added. ‘No wonder the flowers grow better here than anywhere else.’
‘Who do?’ he asked.
‘The spirits,’ she replied, as if everyone could see them. He shook his head and watched her skip off with a bounce in her step. It was painfully obvious. She wasn’t Cecil’s daughter at all.
Louis retreated into his house. His little sitting room still smelt of her, the sweet scent of youth and optimism that mingled with the tang of lemon. He sat at his piano and placed his fingers over the keys, breathing heavily, his mouth set once again into its habitual grimace. Then slowly, as if to reflect his enduring patience, he began to play the tune he had composed for Audrey. He closed his eyes and the frost that had caught on the ends of his lashes glistened with sorrow. Over and over he played it. So that he would never forget or give up hope. No wonder Audrey had been able to survive the years without him; for Grace was the part of him he had left behind.
That night he dreamed. He couldn’t remember the last time he had dreamed. He had lost the will many years ago. But that night he dreamed of Grace. He was sitting in a field full of buttercups. The gentle evening sun bathed him in a warm golden light and he felt at peace. And Grace was with him, her laughter like the bubbling of a nearby stream that filled him up inside until he was so light that he was hovering over the grass. Half of him wanted to stay on the ground, the other longed to fly. And Grace kept on laughing and laughing, filling him up and up and up . . .
In the morning he awoke, not with the usual heaviness of spirit that made getting out of bed the hardest part of the day, but with an enthusiasm that had been lost somewhere over the years along with his dreams and his smile. He hoped that Grace would visit him again. He hoped so very much. He bathed and shaved and splashed himself with an old bottle of cologne that was sticky with dust and neglect. It was hard to find a clean shirt, but at the very bottom of his drawer he found one that was slightly too small but washed and ironed by the housekeeper who came weekly. Then he emerged into the early morning sunshine to go to the corner shop to buy the papers and some milk.
When he returned Grace was sitting on his doorstep in a pair of faded denim jeans and a bright yellow shirt. Next to her was a basket full of food. ‘Good morning, Uncle Louis,’ she said brightly. ‘I’m taking you on a picnic. It’s a beautiful day and I’ve bought bread and pâté, a bottle of wine and some tomatoes.’ Louis was so taken aback that he didn’t know what to say. Grace didn’t wait for him to respond. She stood up and followed him through the front door. ‘I don’t have lectures today, but I have lots of things I want to ask. I thought, perhaps you wouldn’t mind helping me.’
‘What are you reading?’ he asked.
‘Philosophy,’ she replied.
‘Ah, there are never satisfactory answers in philosophy, only questions.’
‘But isn’t it exciting to discover just how many questions there are? We could go on asking questions for ever. Can we go and sit in a field somewhere? It’s going to be a warm day. An Indian summer. We had better make the most of it before autumn sets in. By the way, I like your cologne.’
Louis found Grace refreshingly unpredictable. With a small smile tickling the corners of his face he drove his old Morris Minor into the countryside where the roads were narrow and winding and the small green fields lush and inviting, lined by the grey stone walls that had withstood centuries of wind and rain. Grace entertained him with her stories of the Argentine, reminding him of the hideousness of Aunt Hilda and the neediness of her daughter Nelly, until he laughed out loud. ‘Do you miss it?’ he asked, wiping his eyes.
‘I thought I would when I left. But I belong here now. I’d like to go back one day. Of course it will all be very different. Granny died some years ago then Great Aunt Edna. Great Aunt Hilda is still alive somewhere, she’s so old she’s probably petrified, quite literally. People’s personalities end up in their features, there’s no avoiding it, so she must be set in stone by now. But I’d like to go back just to remember it.’
They found a little wood that bordered a stream and sat down on the rug that Louis had found in an old trunk in his hall. The sun shone through the leaves creating moving patterns on the grass like a kaleidoscope. Grace kicked off her shoes and stretched out her legs. ‘Can you see all the wood spirits?’ she asked, then laughed with childish delight. ‘This is a beautiful place. How clever of us to find it.’
‘Anyone else would think you were mad,’ he said and chuckled. ‘People have considered me mad all my life.’
‘Have they?’
‘Yes. Nowadays people are far more tolerant of those who are different. In my day everyone had to be like everyone else. It was all very rigid.’
‘I’ve been different from birth. None of the other children had spirit friends like I had. Of course they all had them, we all have guides, but they couldn’t see them. People are afraid to believe in what they cannot see.’
‘Which is silly considering we’re surrounded by things we cannot see which are proven by science, like radio waves.’
‘Have you ever wondered where the world comes from? Why are you you? If you weren’t you, who would you be? What would you be? Would you be at all?’ When her uncle frowned at her again, this time in amusement, she continued with haste, her eyes wide with excitement. ‘Most people are too caught up in the world to wonder at it. They take the rain and the sunshine for granted without wondering why. Why, when science has invented all these clever machines to
give us more time, like dishwashers and washing machines, do we have less time? Do you ever take a moment to lie on the lawn and stare up into space and question eternity? Do you?’
Louis chuckled. ‘You really are full of questions.’
‘But I don’t have the time to answer them,’ she replied in frustration.
‘Well,’ he sighed indulgently. ‘Let’s start with the first question, what was it?’
‘Have you ever wondered where the world comes from?’
‘Ah, that’s a hard one. Open the bottle of wine, there’s a good girl. It’ll oil the cogs in my mind and get them turning, they haven’t turned for many years.’
Louis and Grace lay on their backs gazing up at the mobile of leaves that shimmered above them as the breeze tickled their spines and sent them dancing. They questioned their existence with the fervour of ancient philosophers and the humour of students embarking on an existential journey for the first time. The wine loosened their tongues and their throats and they laughed with their bellies until they ached with happiness. When the evening shadows began to lengthen Louis looked at his watch and realized that it was already time for supper. ‘I should have bought two baskets, one for lunch, one for dinner, then we could have set up a tent and continued all night,’ she said, packing the picnic away. Louis loaded the boot of the car and was about to get in when she handed him a small cluster of yellow buttercups. ‘These are “happy-making” flowers,’ she said with a grin. ‘Put them on your piano to remind you to play happy tunes.’
He took them from her and recalled his dream and her laughter that had filled him up. He hadn’t felt this full in a long time.
Chapter 33
As the cold autumn winds whispered through the shortening days and the Indian summer of their picnic dissolved into morning mists and frost Grace’s relationship with her uncle grew in depth and strength. She was elusive by nature and didn’t bond easily with other young people but in Louis she discovered a soul mate, someone whom she could relate to, someone who saw the world as she did. They lay under the stars and questioned eternity, they went to concerts and cried in the same places, they sat together on the piano stool and played the same music instinctively, composing the tunes as they went along, laughing when they clashed, which they didn’t do very often, and smiling when they blended with such perfection that their music might just as well have been composed by the angels themselves. Grace cooked for him, badly, but he didn’t mind for he loved her company. His grimace was worn away by so much gaiety and the spontaneity that had once captivated the heart of a reticent young woman returned to enchant her daughter.
The Forget-Me-Not Sonata Page 42