Читать книгу Playing with Keys - Julia Osborne - Страница 7

The headmistress had recommended Eric L’estrange to teach Sandra seventh grade piano until she auditioned for the Conservatorium High School later that year.

‘In case you’re wondering,’ she had explained to Angela in the principal’s office, ‘L’estrange is a very old English name. He’s certainly not your usual type of teacher but he’s highly skilled and has top qualifications from England.’

Angela was delighted. Qualifications from England! And Sandra could simply walk to his flat for her weekly lesson.

Sandra gazed at the gold letters set above the keyboard: Feurich, a smaller Leipzig. Her own Beale looked very plain compared with this tall, gleaming piano with the strange name, and straight away she wanted to run her fingers over the ivories. She waited for her new teacher to speak.

‘According to your mother,’ Mister L’estrange remarked, ‘you aspire to being a classical concert pianist. Hmm, we shall see. Your mother also said that you started tuition when you were nine ...’ Sandra heard him click his tongue. ‘Nine years old is quite late to begin lessons.’

Hoping to impress him, she said, ‘When I was nine, we went the Town Hall. My mother got tickets for a famous pianist – that’s what made me want to learn piano—’

‘Who played, do you remember?’

Sandra desperately racked her brain but no name surfaced. ‘Oh gosh, I can’t think ... I remember he played Chopin—’

‘But you don’t remember his famous name, hmm?’ Mister L’estrange looked quizzically at her as he sorted sheet music from his files.

Embarrassed and angry, Sandra wished she could slide under the piano and disappear. Should she look at the keyboard or the teacher? She looked down at her hands, fingernails perfectly cut and buffed to a gleam. He flicked a strand of black hair from his eyebrow, spun on his heel to regard her – as if, she thought, I’m an insect under a microscope.

Closing the files, he placed the score for Elgar’s Dream Children on the piano, ‘Sight-reading,’ he announced. ‘You may read this briefly, then play the piece.’

It didn’t look too difficult, but maybe there was a trick? Still smarting at his rebuke, she followed Miss Brook’s advice: take a deep breath, count to three. The keys were silky under her fingers, the tone beautiful, and she thought she played the piece quite well as the notes went dancing sweetly across the page ...

Abruptly, Mister L’estrange motioned her to stop. ‘Not bad,’ he commented, without smiling. ‘If you could not play it properly, I didn’t wish to teach you.’ Again he flicked his dark hair.

How dare he say ‘Not bad’ as if she was barely good enough to sit at his precious piano. Sandra felt herself rebel, and bit her lip so as to remain silent. Now she was stuck with this horrid teacher. Mister L’estrange – what sort of a stupid name was that!

She looked up into the darkest brown eyes she’d ever seen, the glint of earring in his black hair. He smiled – a brilliant smile that showed neat white teeth.

How could her mother like this awful man? She would complain tonight, as soon as she got home. He was a foreigner!

23 Tyrell St,

Randwick, N.S.W.,

Tuesday, 21st February, ’61.

Dear Emmy,

At my first piano lesson Mr. L’estrange was so nasty. He made me do a test and he was really rude but Mum didn’t want to talk about it. She thinks he’s the ants pants. He calls me Sarn-dra and he has long hair!

Today’s lesson was better. He told me Percy Grainger died yesterday and he played “Country Gardens” as a memorial song. He plays really well so maybe he’s all right for a teacher. He said he used to play piano at home in his pyjamas that his mother sewed for him. I mean Percy Grainger not Mr. L’estrange.

Have you seen Mrs Morgan again or Nick or anyone apart from Lofty? Tell me some exciting NEWS!

Aunt Meredith said one day we’ll go into town to the shops and have lunch at Mark Foys or David Jones, just the two of us. I’d rather go to DJs and see their piano player. He wears a tuxedo and plays a shiny, black grand piano and I like how he looks all around while he plays.

We’re reading “The Merchant of Venice” and “The History of Mr. Polly” by H.G. Wells, which I like because it’s funny and old-fashioned. We did a poem by Elizabeth Riddell about a lifesaver that drowned. I like it better than lots of English poems. The lady teachers for English and Geography are very nice thank goodness. I’m glad I don’t do French as the other kids don’t like the teacher.

Carol asked me to go to the beach with her but I didn’t want to because my swimming costume is all wrong and I always get dumped by a wave.

It’s been raining and today was boiling hot.

Love from Sandra xxx

P.S. Mr. L’estrange has an earring!! I bet he didn’t wear it when he met Mum.

15 Bentley St.,

Curradeen, N.S.W.,

Friday, 3rd March, 1961.

Dear Sandy,

I got your letter and I think maybe its nice to go to a big school and not sit in stinky hot classrooms like ours. Tony left school after his Intermediate and works at the flour mill. Boo hoo. Anyway I don’t mind, he never would have liked me.

Guess what, Lofty asked me to go with him !! We have “Henry V” for Shakespeere and our book is “The Passage” which is about fishing in the ocean. That story “The Monkey’s Paw” gave me a nightmare. I didn’t get to read the rude book.

There was a grass fire between here and Denalbo but they put it out real quick and no sheep got burnt. Pa says there are big bushfires in Western Australia from lightening, and nearly a million acres got burned and some buildings. I’d be so scared.

I have to work at the shop after school every day. I haven’t seen Mrs Morgan again. Your piano teacher sounds scary. Whose Percy Granger?

Love from Emmy xxxOOO

10 / 3 / 61.

23 Tyrell St, Randwick.

Dear Emmy,

Are you really going with Lofty? We called him googly eyes because he was an annoying little squirt, so why? He’s all right, I suppose. It’s better with no boys at school. Remember how Wilkins raved on to the boys in Geography about his old university days and what a good time he had? I hated him. I don’t like the Merchant of Venice, it’s horrible, about asking for a pound of flesh to pay a debt. I don’t know how it ends yet.

Mum and Dad like living here. It’s a long walk to the shops but I’m getting used to it. Prue sometimes comes with me. She’s made lots of friends already, lucky thing. She came a cropper off her bike and got into trouble for riding on a main road.

Mr. L’estrange doesn’t look old for a music teacher. I think he might be a gypsy, his hair is very inky black. In my last lesson, the phone rang while I was playing and I tried to play with long pauses but I couldn’t hear what he said except it wasn’t English. He’s got the blackest eyes I’ve ever seen.

I can’t believe Tony would leave school, what a drip.

Sorry, but he is, I never knew why you had such a crush.

On Saturday I’m going by myself to the Art Gallery specially to see a painting I like.

I’ve got to practice before dinner, I’ll write more next time. Percy Grainger was a world famous pianist.

Love from Sandra XXOO

Today was the day. If she couldn’t go with Nick, she would go by herself. From the front steps of the Art Gallery, Sandra gazed across the velvety grass of the Domain. She and Nick had sat on this exact same step after they walked through the park that long ago sunny day when Nick had described his secret visit about studying architecture at university, and how he’d paid little attention to the real reason his father sent him. And Sandra had tearfully told Nick of her father’s transfer to Randwick.

Ever since that day, she’d promised herself to return to the gallery and find the painting; stand in front of it one more time, re-live the moment when Nick had suddenly said, ‘Hold my hand and close your eyes ...’

Her sandalled feet made barely a whisper on the parquet floor as she walked quickly through the halls. But not too fast, she decided, as people may be curious – although she badly wanted to run. There was hardly anyone around yet, so she would have the painting all to herself.

With great control, she strolled past the old paintings in their gilded frames, pausing to stand a moment at Gruner’s cows in the early morning spring frost. ‘Dad’s favourite,’ Nick had told her. It used to be hers too, but now she had a new favourite ... one more room and she would find it ...

She imagined Nick taking her hand again, her eyes obediently closed as they walked the few steps to where he’d already glimpsed the picture: seated beside a pool, a young girl threaded red poppies in her long fair hair, daisies in her lap, a golden girdle around her hips. Then he’d said, ‘Open your eyes and look at this painting. Who does she remind you of?’

Unable to think of an answer, shaking her head, Sandra stared at the girl who looked so thoughtful, so beautiful, painted so perfectly as if the paint had been licked smooth.

‘She reminds me of you,’ Nick said. ‘Same pretty profile, same hair ... and if you wore a long dress like that ...’ She remembered how she had blushed, brushed off his compliment. It was nothing to do with the sad story of Ophelia, he explained, it was simply how John Waterhouse painted the girl. She could still see the painting clearly in her mind. If she could stand in front of it, feel her hand enclosed in his ... this was the room ... on the left side, halfway along the wall ...

Where the painting had previously hung, there was a picture of a father with a sleeping child. Rapidly she went from room to room, anxious and tearful, but the painting of Ophelia had definitely disappeared. She recalled the little card had said ‘on loan from a private collection’ – so it must have been returned to hang in the home of its owner – vanished from the gallery.

Outside, Sandra slumped on the steps. It was a stupid idea anyway. Why should the picture have been hanging there, months later? She was a stupid fool to think she could recapture that wonderful day with Nick. Stupid stupid stupid.

It was hard not to cry, and her throat ached with unshed tears. She didn’t want to live in the past, as her mother chided her on bleak days when Sandra complained – but the past held her dreams, her memories of all that was lovely. She felt a tear run down her cheek and angrily wiped it away so strangers wouldn’t see her distress. Counting one-two-three, she breathed in deeply, tried to calm herself.

More people were arriving at the Gallery, stepping around her where she sat. It must be nearly lunchtime. She stood, dusting the seat of her skirt. Across the road was a kiosk and she bought an icecream in a cone. She would sit there and figure out a melody to play when she got home. It will be a song for Nick, she decided, a song without words in a key full of happiness and hope.

It might begin with morning at Wilga Park, a ripple of notes andante con brio like the wind brushing through dry winter grass and paper daisies, and high above, oh, maybe two swallows scooping up pieces of sky. She hummed some experimental notes. Perhaps the key might change ... a discord, a change in beat with the staccato stamp of horses’ hooves on frosty ground. She smiled to herself ... that might be the easiest part. And finally, a cadence for the peace of evening, the way she remembered shadows lengthening across the fields until daylight faded into darkness.

Forgetting to lick it, her icecream had melted softly into the cone. So easy to say the words, to call her imaginary song Winter’s Day, but the melody remained elusive, the harmonies would not come.

That night Sandra lay uneasily in her bed, cradling the pillow. So many times she had misted her bedroom mirror with kisses, whispered: I love you Nicholas Morgan. With her eyes closed she could imagine Nick. But it wasn’t enough – it was never enough. Was it wrong to want more of a person, she wondered ... when did it become possessive? Ideally we should be like two stars circling about each other, drawn together. A double star? But while Nick stays at Wilga Park he can only be a sun, with me spinning around him, alone on my own orbit.

Five months since she’d watched over him as he lay bruised and sleeping in the hospital. Five months of far-away dreaming on her pillow each night, reliving the touch of his hand on hers at the gallery when she told him her family must leave Curradeen. I will write Nick’s song, she promised, and one day soon, I’ll take the score out of my handbag and I’ll say, ‘This is something I wrote especially for you,’ and push the pages across the table – yes, we’ll be in a café, and instead of picking up the pages immediately, Nick will look at me with so much affection, he’ll be so impressed that I wrote a piece for him... he’ll finally wake up that I love him, and he’ll feel it too, and he’ll take my hand and tell me, ‘Now I understand, it’s been in front of me all the time. I’ve been in love with you without knowing it, ever since we met that day at the polocrosse.’

The dream was magnificent and Sandra allowed it to flow, Nick close beside her on the pillow, his lips in her hair whispering secrets, loving her, circling like a star, and at last she slept deeply, her arm curled around the pillow.

15 Bentley St.,

Curradeen.

16 March 1961.

Dear Sandy,

I think you are real brave going to the art gallery by yourself, I would be scared stiff. I suppose you have been to Sydney lots and know where to go. I never went and would get lost on a bus for sure. Did you find your picture, what is it of?

Maybe Mr. L’estrange is Italian like me. If you hear him again on the telephone tell me what he says. Italians say “pronto?” when they answer but I suppose he won’t if he dont know whose calling him. He has not got an Italian name but.

I’ve nearly read all of “The Passage” but Shakespeere is hard and I don’t understand any.

Love from Emmy XOX

Seated at the piano at home, Sandra sorted through sheet music to find the Mozart Sonata. At her first lesson Mister L’estrange had announced: ‘Nine years old is quite late to begin lessons’. The scalding words still echoed. Music teachers were supposed to be encouraging, so what sort of encouragement was that? ‘Hmm, we shall see,’ he’d said. Like she was some sort of experiment.

Mozart’s dizzying notes flew from her fingers. Sonata in C Major, first movement allegro, try to keep every note pure, bright ... a blur of semi-quavers, this bar fortissimo – all these darned grace notes diddle-diddle-diddle. Principal Theme andante ... Oops. Why did she have to learn this stupid piece, impossible to put her heart into it.

She’d rather practise her own songs, threading them among the set study pieces, surprised that her mother never seemed to notice. Prue sometimes teased, mimicking her songs until Sandra drowned her voice with a loud set of scales or crashing bass chords. And in her dreams, Nick stood close beside her at the keyboard, turning the pages as she played.

Nick Nick Nicholas Nick ... she hadn’t hummed his name like that since they moved to Sydney. It had disappeared on the endless seven hour train journey, changed by the rhythm of the wheels to a click click clickety click. Nick was at home at Wilga Park. Perhaps as he got used to a wheelchair and regained his strength, he would forget her ... but that was too too sad to think about.

Concentrate on Mozart: Secondary Theme ... pianissimo ... those trills were not crisp enough. Would he recall that she’d visited him in hospital? In the midnight dimness of the ward, she had leaned over his bed, pressed her lips to Nick’s forehead in the precise spot where his own lips had kissed her. His eyelids had opened briefly, closed again. Did he recognize her?

Only the nurse knew she was there – the nurse who’d found her searching for him on the third night, and told her Nick had been sent to Sydney for surgery. She hadn’t seen him again.

She heaved a deep breath. Last page ... together she and Nick were riding their horses, the wind tossing manes and tails, Nick smiling beside her, cheeks flushed, brown hair blown back from his face as he leaned forward into a gallop. When they came to the steepest drops, the other riders fell back, leaving Nick the only one, the bravest one, shirt flapping as he disappeared into the distance with the final fortissimo chords.

Angela came to the door, wiping her hands on an apron. ‘That sounded very nice from the kitchen,’ she said. ‘Finish up now, dinner’s on the table.’

Her father and Prue were already seated. Angela continued, ‘Tomorrow you’ll have to start your practice earlier so you don’t run into meal time.’

Don smiled a hello as he sliced his pork chop. ‘Pass the apple sauce, please,’ was all he said.

Sandra wondered why her father was so quiet lately. He used to talk to them about his day in the office, stories about some of the customers, the odd reasons some people gave for wanting a loan – not that he ever told any names. One man even wanted to start a fish farm! When she asked her mother, Angela said he was weary from his new job and Sandra thought it was probably true. But an earlier companionship between them all was missing.

Last winter, bundled into the car to travel the fifteen miles to Denalbo polocrosse field had been very special – even mugs of tea on the sidelines were joyous, cheering the game and talking to whoever was there. Especially Nick and the Morgans. And Lofty, whose family owned the farm next door, who’d been such a pest at school. Was it possible she missed Lofty, too?

Now that they lived in Randwick, the household seemed to have become quieter. They still watched television together after dinner, seated on the brand new lounge suite, Ginger curled on Don’s lap. Rawhide remained a favourite and Don whistled through his teeth as usual until Angela said, ‘Shush.’

The pile of magazines and books in the newspaper rack beside Angela’s chair grew and grew. She wanted a job in a florist shop to help her decide about a business of her own, and every night a book lay open on her lap, or the classified pages from the Herald, with circles drawn around relevant advertisements.

Prue had abandoned learning to knit. It was too hot and sticky, she complained. Happy at school, some weekends she stayed overnight at a girl friend’s house. ‘We have midnight feasts,’ she skited to Sandra. ‘My friends have got hundreds of records.’

‘They have not,’ Sandra said sourly, but envious of the possibility.

Prue ignored the rebuke. ‘My favourite’s Boom Boom Baby. Crash Craddock’s sooo good looking.’

‘I don’t care.’

‘He sings that his baby did the chicken in the middle of the room. What’s the chicken?’

Sandra knew her companionship with Prue was slipping away. There were times when she missed how they used to ride their bikes to the creek, or drew pictures together, making up stories. But most of all she missed Emilia, missed all those afternoons after school, sitting on Emilia’s bed talking about everything and nothing, and at the weekends whizzing around the roller-skating rink or lazing in the warm grass at the old cemetery.

At her new school, next to the confident city girls, she felt like a country bumpkin who would never fit in, with nothing to say of any interest to anyone. No matter how she dressed or how she did her hair, it never looked right. Maybe she should get a perm like some of the girls in her class? She tried to picture what she might look like with really curly hair, but when she brushed it thoroughly and wound it in a plait, she was glad for the thick weight of it. Nick had called her ‘my pretty piano player’, so why change what he liked?

Meredith developed a suspicion that all was not as well as it should be, and often suggested that on Saturday mornings she and Sandra make an excursion into the city shops, or to Rowe Street to discover what was new in the art studios and decorators’ windows.

On these days, thanks to auntie, Sandra returned home feeling better.

23 Tyrell St.,

Randwick, N.S.W.,

19th March, 1961.

Dear Emmy,

I said I’d write with more news and here it is! No, I didn’t find the painting and I searched in all the rooms. It was loaned to the gallery so it must’ve been given back. I saw it with Nick, and he said I looked like the girl in the picture. I was sad not to see it again but I’m all right now.

I had a lovely time with Aunt Meredith yesterday, we went to the tea room where I went with Nick, then we went to David Jones and pretended to buy hats. Auntie took all the pins out of her French roll so she could try one with net that came down over her eyes and looked so beautiful. She has red hair, I think maybe she dyes it.

Auntie is really glamorous and not at all like Dad. She told me she used to dance the tango at the Trocadero which is a dance hall in the middle of Sydney. Her boyfriend was in the army! I worked out she’s 32, I wonder why she never got married. Sometimes I think it’d be good to be like her when I grow up. All I would do is study piano and play in concerts and travel the world. Mum says I’m selfish when I tell her that.

It’s Easter next week, hooray! We’re having an Easter egg hunt in our garden. On Sunday we’re going to the Royal Easter Show and I wish you could come too.

Do you think your parents would let me stay with you in the May holidays? I would come on the train.

Love from Sandra xxxxx

15 Bentley St.,

Curradeen.

Saturday, 25th March, 1961.

Dear Sandy,

You can come and stay, thats real good and Pa can’t ask me to work in the shop if your here.

Guess what, Nick came in the shop today with Mrs Morgan and I got to serve them. She bought Easter eggs. He is a bit bent and has two walking sticks. I thought you would like to know. We go to Mass lots over Easter. The best bit is Nonna makes special bocconotti bikkies, made of pastry filled with armands and cherry jam and with icing on.

I wish I had an auntie like yours. When my relatives visit us they all talk so fast and shout at me Emeeeeelia! Ora parla italiano! I think my auntie and uncle dont like me because I don’t understand them. I was born in Australia and at home I talk how my family talks.

Nonna knits all day with a black scarf on her head and a skirt down to her ankles. She doesn’t know English but it doesn’t matter. I like it when she sits in the shop with me. This week my brothers, Nonna and me helped Mamma make tomato sauce with hundreds of real ripe tomatoes, we take the skins off with hot water and after its all boiled up with Pa’s onions and garlic and herbs we squash it into jars. I like that part best. Mamma is going to put some in the shop to sell.

I’m so excited your coming to visit, we all miss you, Mamma, Pa, and my 2 silly brothers.

Love from Emmy xxx

23 Tyrell St.,

Randwick.

3rd. April, 1961.

Dear Emmy,

I booked my train ticket and I’m counting down till I leave. We’ll have 5 whole days to do what we like. Can we borrow another bike and ride to the cemetery like we used to and I can visit Miss Brooks too? I’m glad I won’t be here because the kitchen is going to be painted and Mum has to put everything away. Prue wants to help, she’s such a goody- goody when she wants to be.

I am so happy that you saw Nick. I want to know more. What does he really look like, you said he needs sticks to walk.

Did he say anything? What did Mrs Morgan say or did she just buy Easter eggs? Tell me everything, pleeeeeeeeeeeeease.

The Show was good fun and we got some sample bags. I got very sun burnt and we sucked lots of ice blocks to keep cool. The grand parade was enormous, I liked the horses best. In the cat pavillion some of the cats are so beautiful it’s lucky Ginger doesn’t know he’s only a plain “ domestic short-haired tabby.” Prue spent all her pocket money on rides and she ate so much fairy floss she vomited last night.

Only one month to go!

Lots of Love from Sandra xxxxxxO

15 Bentley St.,

Curradeen.

15th April, 61.

Dear Sandy,

I posted your birthday present this week plus Nonna knitted you a surprise!

My grandpa died on Wednesday. We are all very sad. I went to school but Pa came to get me. The funeral was yesterday and we put roses and white lilies on his grave.

We will be at the station to meet your train. Nonna said you will help us to smile again. I will write more next time.

Love from Emmy xxx

23 Tyrell St, Randwick.

20th April, 61.

Dearest Emmy,

I know you must be very sad your grandpa died. I hope you liked the card Mum sent. I wanted to write my own letter and tell you that I think of you every day, and wish I still lived at Curradeen but I’ll soon be there.

Thank you for the box of lace hankies with your pretty card. I got it today on my birthday! Please tell your Nonna thank you for the scarf, it’s so long it must have taken ages to knit. We ate some of your biscotti last night and I cried in bed again. Carol is O.K. I suppose, she still sits with me but I don’t know if it’s because she likes me or because she was told to.

Big disaster! Mum saw Mr. L’estrange in the butcher shop yesterday and saw his earring and she says it’s wrong for a man to wear earrings and she wants me to change to another tutor. She can’t do that when I am starting to do well and I even play Mozart better. I really want him to be my teacher now.

Aunt Meredith has invited us for dinner again so I better get ready. Try not to be too sad.

Love and kisses from your friend Sandra XXXX

With Sympathy

Dear Mrs. Ferrari,

We are very sorry to hear about the loss of your father. Our thoughts are with you and your family and we extend our deepest sympathy to you all.

Yours sincerely,

Angela Abbott and family.

23 Tyrell St.,

Randwick, N.S.W.

20th April, 1961.

Dear Miss Brooks,

I’m writing to let you know that I will be staying with my friend Emilia Ferrari in the May holidays and I would like to come and visit you.

You will be pleased to know that I am studying Handel Suite No.14 in G, and Nocturne in B flat by John Field for the exam. I also have to learn Mozart Sonata in C major K279 for the exam later this year.

I wish you were still my teacher, my new tutor is a man but I liked you much better. I hope I can see you when I visit Curradeen.

Yours sincerely,

Sandra Abbott.

15 Bentley St.,

Curradeen, N.S.W.

28th April, 1961.

Dear Sandy,

Your mum’s card is very nice. Its sad my grandpa isn’t around any more. Nonna teached me to knit and I am making a scarf. It’s a bit crooked but I like that I made it. It’s better than reading comics.

Pa has dug the hugest vegetable garden and drives the truck around to houses where people can’t go out to shop, mostly old people. He made a sign for our front fence “Ferrari’s Farm”. I know its not a proper big farm but the sign is nice.

Lofty says he wants to be called by his real name. His real name is “Warwick”. He is taller than me now so he’s not “lofty” anymore. Its hard to change as everyone called him Lofty, teachers too.

There is a new boy called Roger, he’s nice. Third Year is better than Second maybe because some kids want to leave after the Intermediate to get a job (like Tony) and they are feeling grown up. Pa wants me to leave at the end of the year and help him in the shop but Mamma and Nonna say no.

We had our social this week and I can dance the Pride of Erin proper now. I asked Lofty for lady’s choice. I’m not going with Lofty but I like him because he’s fun and he doesn’t call me fat dago like some of the kids.

You will be here next week and we will have a real good time.

Love from Emmy XXX