by Maris Morton
Mary put a plate of hash browns with scrambled eggs and bacon in front of him. It was dry from being kept warm. Martin poked at it, but once he’d tasted the first bite he ate with his usual appetite. She poured a cup of tea for each of them and sat down opposite him.
‘I’m quite worried about her,’ she said. ‘She isn’t picking up like I expected. Do you have any idea what her illness is?’ Martin shook his head, his mouth full of food. ‘It doesn’t look as if she’ll make it up to Perth for the wedding.’
Martin swallowed and stared at her. ‘Not make it! But she’s got to. She’s my mother!’
‘I think you’d better start getting used to the idea, Martin.’
He shook his head again. ‘She’s got to be there! I know her and Dad don’t get on, but she’s still my mother.’ He scraped the last of the egg with a crust of toast. ‘I want her to be there. I was thinking about the wedding last night. Alyssa’s folks have got a nice garden. I’ve always seen Mum running the show, in a long dress and a big hat, being proud of me and wanting me to be happy …’
‘I’m sure she does want you to be happy, Martin,’ Mary said quietly, ‘even if she can’t be at the actual wedding.’
Martin pushed his empty plate aside and reached for the marmalade. ‘It’s all going wrong,’ he muttered, querulous as a child, then looked up at Mary, his eyes filling with horror at the thought. ‘She’s not going to die, is she? She’s not old! She can’t!’
CLIO HAD SLEPT BADLY, too: slow to get to sleep, and slow to wake up. The return to consciousness had been like entering a nightmare of pain. She must have slept in a bad position because her left shoulder was in agony, and the muscles in her back complained every time she tried to move into a more comfortable one. Confronting the pain seemed too hard, so she made an effort to drift back into sleep.
And she remembered the last time she’d experienced pain, just like this.
Years ago, when she still had her music, Richard had come to visit: Richard, the sceptic of the Tartini Quartet. Richard had his own quartet by then and was touring the Great Southern for the Arts Council. He’d written to say that they were scheduled to have three days off and could they come and stay with her on her grand stud farm and make some proper music, not the pap they were being paid to serve up to the peasants? She still played, didn’t she? They were travelling in campervans, so accommodation wouldn’t be a hassle. Tony, their violist, had his own fish to fry in Albany, so there would just be the three of them — and she remembered Justine, didn’t she? They were married now.
Once over the shock, Clio had been delighted, her pleasure only slightly tarnished by worry about Paul’s reaction. She’d never understood why, but he invariably flew into a temper if she was ever careless enough to let him overhear her playing. But as the visit would be happening on a weekend, when Paul would be in Perth and Martin away at school, this wasn’t likely to be an issue. She told Paul she was expecting a visit from old friends, but carefully didn’t say anything about music.
In the days leading up to the visit, Clio cooked like a demon, so that when they arrived her time would be free. She’d had no idea how much she missed having people to talk to who knew and loved music as she did.
When the vans finally bumped in over the sandy track, and Richard got out, bearded now, and wrapped her instantly in a bear hug, it was hard not to cry from wonder and happiness. He looked around at this strange place and shook his shaggy head. Still with an arm around her, he said, ‘God, Mario, you’re a long way from home.’
That really brought the tears: nobody had called her Mario since the Con. ‘I’m a long way from anywhere,’ she said, with a little teary laugh, ‘except Downe.’
‘How’re ya gonna keep her Downe on the farm …’ Richard carolled.
The other two were introduced: Richard’s wife Justine, whom she could vaguely remember, and Ivor, a stranger, dark and taciturn. After the introductions, they stood silent, looking around at the buildings, the peppercorn trees, the vistas of green distance.
It had been late spring. The fields were a patchwork of greens, the forming heads of grain moving in the wind like combed silk, the sheep fat and the lambs getting bigger every day. On still days, Clio would swear she could hear the grass growing, a faint, subliminal rustle as blade crept up against blade a billion, billion times over the spreading acres.
Clio offered them a tour of the place, but Richard had made up his mind that he wouldn’t waste time on anything that wasn’t music. He was still bossy, even more so now that he didn’t have to defer to Tallis, and they hauled music stands and instruments out of the campers and set them up on the east verandah where the wisteria, not so big then, was in full flower.
‘You ought to have seen some of the places we’ve had to play in. This is paradise.’ He set four of the chairs from the kitchen in a semi-circle, and Ivor busied himself adjusting the music stands. ‘Thank Christ we didn’t have to try to play any of those pianos! Not one of them was in tune.’ He gave a theatrical shudder, and Clio smiled at him. Apart from being bigger and hairier, he hadn’t changed at all. ‘Town halls, freemasons’ halls, and Anglican and Baptist church halls, and in Berricup, wasn’t it?’ — he glanced at Justine for confirmation — ‘in the dining room of a girls’ boarding school, for god’s sake, reeking of boiled cabbage and god knows what.’
Richard looked at each of them in turn as they took their places. ‘We’ll have Mozart. I thought two of the Prussian quartets. It’ll be good for you, Mario, a civilising influence after all this nature. You can still play, can’t you?’
Clio was nervous: these three were used to playing together and the challenge of joining in seamlessly was overwhelming. If she made mistakes, she couldn’t expect Richard to be kind.
But it wasn’t too hard after all. Clio had been playing the Bach suites often enough to have kept her technique up to scratch, and once they started going through the music, she recognised that she’d played these two quartets with the Tartinis, long ago. Remembering the rapport that the four of them had then, she struggled for the first hour to replicate it with two strangers, but it helped that they were being led by Richard, whose playing she remembered amazingly well. It was a joy to see the interaction between Justine and Richard, too, as they played first and second violins almost as if they were two parts of one person, each knowing exactly what the other was about to do. That made it easy, almost like playing with two Richards.
It was the next morning, after a full afternoon and evening of playing, that she’d felt this pain, waking to it just as she was now; the stiffness caused by long hours of bowing, when she normally played for no more than an hour or so at a time.
But after a hot shower and breakfast they’d started again, and the aching had been forgotten in the joy of making music.
Clio was fully awake now, and flexed her body to ease the pain. This time it wouldn’t melt away in the pleasure of playing. She’d have to manage it in other ways: painkillers, a hot shower, and then she’d sit out on the verandah and let the sun’s warmth soak into her flesh while she meditated on that visit, and all the happiness and pain it had brought.
THE SUN MOVED OFF the verandah, and Clio shivered. She was still bothered by the soreness in her shoulder and wondered if she’d ever be rid of it. She had tried to do the exercises they’d given her in Perth, but it had hurt too much and she’d stopped. Looking back, she realised it was actually weeks since she’d made herself go through the motions. She struggled to her feet and went inside, climbing into bed and pulling the duvet up over her shoulders. While she waited for stillness to bring physical ease, she searched her memory for more details of that visit.
She’d wanted to impress these city people with the joys of country living, so she’d taken them to see Garth’s vegetable garden and chickens, Gloria milking the cow, some of the sheep that were already becoming famous. But at the sight of Bessie’s milk foaming into the bucket, and Gloria’s strong hands and flushed face, Richard had
recoiled, murmuring, ‘This is unreal!’
But Clio could recall being proud that she’d responded quickly, ‘No, Richard. This is real!’
When they were looking at the chickens, Justine nudged Richard and muttered, so that the others could hear, ‘The eggs come out of their bottoms, Richard.’ Richard looked horrified and demanded that they stop torturing him and get back into the house and the sanitised sanity of music. Clio had realised then that Richard, at least, would never understand why she was making a life here, unless it was out of some misguided belief in the virtue of True Love.
Over lunch, Richard reminded them of Goethe’s remark that a string quartet is like a conversation between four sensible people, each taking his turn to develop the same idea.
‘Easy for you to say,’ Ivor remarked quietly, ‘when you play first violin.’
‘Rubbish!’ Richard protested. ‘Can you remember ever being part of any meaningful conversation that wasn’t dominated by one person? Eh? Either because one person knows more than the others or has more personality —’
‘Or is simply more aggressive?’ Justine suggested with a smile.
‘Or a control freak?’ Ivor added.
The joy of that visit flooded her thoughts. It was so easy to forget those moments of happiness. Her memory of their music-making was like a view of a city in a dream, a wonderful place of soaring towers and gilded domes that caught the light; the buildings clean, bright and beautiful; the people cultured, kind, and at peace with one another, with leisure to love and play. But it was a long way away. I feel as if I’m standing in a dry and stony desert, Clio mused, looking at it in the distance shining like a mirage, but I can’t get to it; it’s too far away and I don’t have the strength.
But I was there, once, she told herself. I walked those streets and talked to those people.
BY TEATIME ON SATURDAY, Richard was satisfied with their performance. Justine fetched a cask of red from their campervan, and they’d unwound with it, chatting about times past and mutual acquaintances.
At last Clio felt she could ask, ‘Do you know what happened to Tallis, Richard?’
Richard was dismissive. ‘Our beloved leader? Oh, Tallis went back to Pommieland.’
Next morning, after demolishing a huge breakfast, they sat around the kitchen table, and Richard told them what he had planned for the day.
‘It’s your turn to entertain us, Mario. What have you been playing down here on your lonesome?’
She hesitated. ‘Just the viola version of the Bach cello suites and some songs. Nothing very clever.’
Richard raised an eyebrow at that. ‘Don’t let anyone hear you say the Bach suites aren’t clever.’
‘Before we get started, I think we could take some time off and go for a walk, Richard,’ Justine suggested in her calm voice. ‘It would do us good.’ She stretched her arms over her head, flexing her wrists. ‘It’s a lovely day and we’ll be cooped up all week.’
Reluctantly, Richard agreed. ‘So long as you don’t make me look at cows, or chooks’ bottoms.’
‘We could go and look at the wildflowers,’ Clio said. ‘It’s the peak of the season, and there are hundreds of them just down the road.’
‘Really?’ Justine sounded interested. ‘Yes, let’s do that, Clio.’
So they piled into the old Holden station wagon that she’d been using since Martin and David were babies, and Clio drove them down the road to the reserve. For a change, it was Clio who was the expert. It was a wonderful year for wildflowers, the air heavy with the scent of honey and alive with birds and insects. Overhead a pair of wedge-tailed eagles rode the thermals, their shadows sweeping over the sea of flowers.
Back at the house, and after the meal, when Clio was half hoping that Richard had forgotten, she found herself, for the first time, playing the Bach suites to an audience.
The verandah had been warm from the morning’s sunshine with the wisteria’s perfume hanging like incense, but Clio shut everything else out to concentrate on the sound of the viola, starting off with the Prelude to the first suite.
The rich sound of the viola flooded her head, filling her veins and nerves as she followed the rhythms that, over the years of playing, she’d found had brought out the patterns of notes in a way that satisfied her own musical sense. Without a teacher to impose his interpretation, she’d been able play as if she herself had written the suites, with their dance rhythms, drama and playfulness, to please nobody but herself.
When she finished, there was a silence. Clio could feel that she was smiling. Richard shuffled to his feet and came and held out his hand. Clio changed her bow over to her left hand and took Richard’s, not understanding what this was about, feeling drained by the hours of playing but at the same time lighter than air.
‘That was excellent, Mario,’ he said, solemnly shaking her hand. ‘I knew you were good, but that was excellent. Different, and Bach wouldn’t recognise some of it, but bloody good music-making. And that’s high praise, from me.’
Justine was smiling her approval, too.
Over the evening meal, they didn’t talk about music but about Justine and Richard’s two children, at home with their grandparents. Clio told them about Martin and, under the influence of more red wine, about David.
That brought a minute of silence, until Justine said quietly, ‘They really are hostages to fortune, aren’t they.’ She was thoughtful for a minute. ‘Were you thinking of David when you played the Sarabandes? There was a real sadness in those, especially in the fifth.’
How perceptive she was. It had always been Clio’s habit to dedicate the Sarabandes to the memory of David.
But Richard wasn’t going to allow any sadness. ‘I’ll play you a little something,’ he said, ‘to cheer us all up. Then we’ll go to bed and sleep like angels.’
After dinner, Richard played Bach’s Partita in E. It was a dazzling performance — full of fire and virtuosity — and Clio wondered why Richard hadn’t chosen to become a solo performer. He had the technical and musical skills, but maybe he preferred to have a small group of his own that he could boss about.
When he finished playing, Richard signalled that the entertainment was over. ‘Early to bed,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow we’ll have time for just one more thing, then we’ll have to get back to Albany. If we leave straight after lunch we should have plenty of time.’
‘What are we playing tomorrow, Richard?’ Clio asked.
Richard looked uncharacteristically vague. ‘See how we feel in the morning.’
After the others had gone off to bed, Richard stayed sitting at the table. Clio wondered what he wanted. It wasn’t like him to hang about and make small talk late at night.
She soon found out.
‘See here, Mario.’ He hesitated. Could Richard be nervous? ‘The thing is, we had a bit of a meeting earlier out in the van, and we want you to come and play with us.’
Clio felt her eyes widen in astonishment. ‘Play with you? When?’
‘You’re good, Mario. We all agree about this. Tony’s leaving, for some fool reason or other. Getting married to a goat farmer or something. We need you.’
‘What, now?’ Clio’s thoughts were racing.
‘Beginning of next year. You’d like to get back to Sydney, wouldn’t you? After all this … wilderness? Sydney, where there’s work for a good middle fiddle?’
Clio had felt overwhelmed. He really meant it. He — all of them — thought she was a good musician. It was a tremendous compliment, one she’d never expected. Suddenly a whole new world of possibilities had started to open up.
Paul would hardly notice she was gone. Martin neither, now he was away at school. A life filled with music! Who could have hoped for a second chance like that!
‘I … I’ll have to think about it, Richard. It’s a great compliment.’
‘We all want you, Mario.’ Amazingly, Richard’s voice held a note of pleading. ‘You fit in perfectly. Yes, okay, the Mozart was a test. I thought we’d
take the whole time to get it somewhere near right, but you’re a champion. We all want you. The others like you. It’s better to have two women, anyway, balances better. Will you?’
‘I’ll think very seriously about it, Richard. When do you need to know?’
Richard smiled, confident that he’d won her over. ‘Yesterday.’
That night Clio hardly slept, kept awake by the euphoria of making music again, combined with this enormous compliment, which she was still not certain she deserved. As if that weren’t enough, suddenly there was the possibility that she could have it all again. It was unbelievable, but true. There was no reason to doubt Richard, or that Justine and Ivor were just as keen to have her. She’d discussed with Richard the practicalities, and it looked as if it would be possible to make a living as they did, with odd jobs to fill in between the quartet’s engagements. It was really possible.
But the real question was: could she walk away from Downe, from her marriage and her son?
Her marriage to Paul hadn’t turned out to be the loving and mutually supportive relationship she’d expected. To be honest, leaving it wouldn’t cause her any grief. Paul would only miss her as a cook and housekeeper; any remnant of affection between them had withered after David’s death, and finally died when Clio discovered that Paul had a mistress up in Perth. No, she would feel no guilt about leaving Paul. But leaving Downe would be a public admission that she’d made a mistake in marrying Paul. Could she handle that?
Of course she could! She’d be going away to make a new life, leaving everything here behind.
Martin, though, was a different matter. She’d always poured scorn on women who abandoned their children. Could she live with the knowledge that she’d done just that? It wasn’t as if Martin needed her in any practical way. He was off at boarding school for all but ten weeks every year, and when he was at home he was outside with Paul, hopefully learning about the stud business. Of course, she loved him, but she’d never felt the kind of bond with him that made her miss David so sorely. And he was getting older, already the first hint of adolescence evident in his deepening voice, his lengthening legs, the shadow of a beard.