<<  -- 6 --  Jenna Orkin    TO EVERYTHING THERE IS A SEASON

At college Michael studied piano with a well-known teacher, Ernest Kroll. Mr Kroll was a Renaissance man. In addition to music, he was knowledgeable about literature, art and wine. His walls were hung with pictures of himself laughing with Messiaen, at a rehearsal with Stockhausen; receiving an honorary degree from a college in Georgia. But he did not love music in the primal, maternal way of Miss Laudon. When Michael played the Chopin Fantaisie Mr Kroll sighed, 'You know, Michael, the world runs according to Darwin's theory of the survival of the fittest.' Then, referring to his star pupil, 'Have you heard Donna Kim play this piece? Ask her to play it for you.' Mr Kroll was not able and, had he been able, would have felt it beneath him to explain to Michael in song, dance or drama the meaning of a musical phrase or particular harmony.

Meanwhile, other subjects beckoned to Michael. The temptation to study them was one which he resisted. He felt guilty about his desire to drift from the straight and narrow path of music. For a while Psychology and Literature nourished his brain, music still lived in his heart which he considered the superior organ. So although he got better grades in English, he felt that music was his path to enlightenment.

But fate did not agree. Perhaps Mr Kroll was right and Michael, as one of the less fit was, as a pianist, less equipped to survive. Or perhaps what changed Michael's attitude was Malamud -- when he gave a series of lectures at the college -- and a handful of other writers and professors who, like Stokowski, Boulanger and Rubinstein had accomplished, exciting lives. (All were old and many had long white hair although Malamud was bald.)

More likely it was a question of hormones; a satisfaction and resulting ebb of desire. For as Michael grew older, music drained from him. The facility he gained in college put the music he'd always wanted to play literally at his fingertips. But it was too late. The greatest works -- Beethoven, Chopin, Bach -- maintained their power over him but he was no longer in love. No longer did the harmonies of Schumann play all day in his head. He left music behind as though waking from a dream. He spent his twenties in a series of unfulfilling jobs and put his energy into writing a novel. All that was left of music in his life was an ideal to strive for in his writing.

One day Michael saw Miss Laudon on the street, looking in the shop windows as she walked home with a bag from the supermarket. She was wearing the same black coat she had had when he was a student. When Michael reached her she was studying the components of a model bathroom with faux-brass faucets and claws on the bathtub.

'Miss Laudon?' Michael said.
'What?' She turned around and focussed on his face. 'Michael!' She opened her arms and they embraced. Beneath her coat, Miss Laudon was thinner. 'How are you?!'
Her enthusiasm had the same inflection that it had had years before but now it seemed forced. As the two talked they scanned each other's faces for change. Miss Laudon's eyes were duller, the blue turned the color of dish water.
'Fine. How are you?'
'Oh, well, you know Mr Eschenbach died. Yes, yes, of course, what am I talking about? You were there. You were such a lovely boy. I know you must be a fine young man. Yes, yes,' she insisted over Michael's demurral. 'I can tell. I have an instinct about people, you know. Did you know that? I'll bet you have it too. You can tell if someone is a ... a good person, a fine person, what they call in Yiddish a 'mensch!' Do you know what that is? You do. I can tell that about you, see?

'How's your mother?' she asked, the attempted enthusiasm returning.
'Fine.'
'Have you been to any concerts?'
'Not recently,' Michael said.
'Did you hear De Larrocha when she was here?'
'No.'
'Oh, it was something! And Bolet, did you go to hear him?'
'No.'
'Beautiful concert! I was there all day for the rehearsal. He came in the afternoon around one. First he played the E Major Scherzo of Chopin, you remember -- Dah dah dee dah dum ...' She became hushed as she sang the opening and Michael saw that as a teacher and musician, she hadn't changed.

The conversation which consisted of accounts of concerts Michael had missed, and questions about matters he'd left behind years before, lasted an hour and twenty minutes. The next time he saw Miss Laudon on the street, he pretended interest in a newsstand until she passed.

Over the years that followed Michael called Miss Laudon twice -- once when he married and again when his first child was born. She talked of artists -- especially De Larrocha and Bolet -- the mention of their names reawakening her enthusiasm for their playing. Michael listened with the patience of a sober guest pacifying an intoxicated one. He saw that music was her element and that her spirit was like a deer: Though unwanted in the garden of his present life, it had been beautiful in the woods of his youth.