The smile only widened; it even warmed slightly. «Herr Takesti, this is perfectly true, and I would never deny it. Anyone may come to you, and welcome — but you do not yourself go out to them. Do you understand the difference?» After another momentary pause, while I was still taking this in, he added, «We are more alike than you may think, Herr Takesti.»
The appalling notion that there might be some small truth in what he said kept me quiet for a time. Finally I mumbled, «I will speak to him. But it will be no help. Believe me, I know.»
«I believe you.» Sigerson's voice was almost gentle — totally unnatural for that querulous rasp of his. «I have known men like Andrichev, in other places, and I fear that the music will not always be outlet enough for what is happening to him. That is all I have to say.»
And so it was. He began humming tunelessly to himself, which was another annoying habit of his, and he was snoring away like the rest by the time our horses clumped to a stop in front of their stable. Everyone dispersed, grumbling sleepily, except Andrichev, who insisted on sleeping in the wagon, and grew quite excited about it. He would have frozen to death, of course, which may well have been what he wanted, and perhaps a mercy, but I could not allow it. Progorny eventually persuaded him to come home with him, where he drank mutely for the rest of the night, and slept on the floor all through the next day. But he was waiting for me at rehearsal that evening.
What are you expecting? I must ask you that at this point. Are you waiting for poor Herr Andrichev to kill his wife — to stab or shoot or strangle the equally pitiable Lyudmilla Plaschka — or for her to have him knocked on the head by one of her lovers and to run off with that poor fool to Prague or Sofia? My apologies, but none of that happened. This is what happened.
It begins with the cello: Andrichev's Fabregas, made in Lisbon in 1802, not by Joao, the old man, but by his second son Antonio, who was better. One thinks of a Fabregas as a violin or a guitar, but they made a handful of cellos too, and there are none better anywhere, and few as good; the rich, proud, tender sound is surely unmistakable in this world. And what in God's own name Volodya Andrichev was doing with a genuine Fabregas I have no more idea than you, to this day. Nor can I say why I never asked him how he came by such a thing — perhaps I feared that he might tell me. In any event, it was his, and he loved it second only to Lyudmilla Plaschka, as I have said. And that cello, at least, truly returned his love. You would have to have heard him, merely practicing scales in his little house on a winter morning, to understand.
So, then — the cello. Now, next — early that fall, Lyudmilla fell ill. Suddenly, importantly, desperately ill, according to Progorny; Andrichev himself said next to nothing about it to the rest of us, except that it was some sort of respiratory matter. Either that, or a crippling, excruciating intestinal ailment; at this remove, such details are hard to recall, though I am sure I would be able to provide them had I liked Lyudmilla better. As it was, I felt concern only — forgive an old man's unpleasant frankness — for Andrichev's concern for her, which seemed in a likely way to destroy his career. He could not concentrate at rehearsal; the instinctive sense of cadence, of pulse, that was his great strength, fell to ruin; his bowing went straight to hell, and his phrasing — always as impulsive as a fifteen–year–old in June — became utterly erratic, which, believe me, is the very kindest word I can think of. On top of all that, he would instantly abandon a runthrough — or, once, a performance! — because word had been brought to him that Lyudmilla's illness had taken some awful turn. I could have slaughtered him without a qualm, and slept soundly afterward; so you may well imagine what I thought of Lyudmilla Plaschka Murderous fancies or not, of course I favored him. Not because he suffered more than she — who ever knows? — but because he was one of us. Like that — like us. It comes down to that, at the last.
He sold the cello. To his friend Progorny. No fuss, no sentimental self–indulgence — his wife needed extensive (and expensive) medical care. and that was the end of that. Any one of us would have done the same; what was all the to–do about? At least, the Fabregas would stay in the family, just to his left, every night, while he himself made cheerful do on a second–hand DeLuca found pawned in Gradja. There are worse cellos than DeLucas. I am not saying there aren't.
But the bloody thing threw off the balance of the strings completely. How am I to explain this to you, who declare yourself no musician? We have always been weak in the lower registers, as I have admitted: Andrichev and that instrument of his had become, in a real sense, our saviors, giving us depth, solidity, a taproot, a place to come home to. Conductor and concertmaster, I can tell you that none of the Greater Bornitz Municipal Orchestra — and in this I include Herr Sigerson himself — actually took their time from me. Oh, they looked toward me dutifully enough, but the corners of their eyes were focused on the cello section at all times. As well they should have been. Rhythm was never my strong suit, and I am not a fool — I have told you that as well.
But there are cellos and cellos, and the absence of the Fabregas made all the difference in the world to us. That poor pawnshop DeLuca meant well, and it held its pitch and played the notes asked of it as well as anyone could have asked. Anyone who wasn't used — no, attuned — to the soft roar of the Fabregas, as our entire orchestra was attuned to it. It wasn't a fair judgment, but how could it have been? The sound wasn't the same; and, finally, the sound is everything. Everything. All else — balance, tempo, interpretation — you can do something about, if you choose; but the sound is there or it isn't, and that bloody ancient Fabregas was our sound and our soul. Yes, I know it must strike you as absurd. I should hope so.
Progorny gave it his best — no one ever doubted that. It was touching, poignant, in a way: he seemed so earnestly to believe that the mere possession of that peerless instrument would make him — had already made him — a musician equal to such a responsibility. Indeed, to my ear, his timbre was notably improved, his rhythm somewhat firmer, his melodic line at once more shapely and more sensible. But what of it? However kindly one listened, it wasn't the sound. The cello did not feel for him what it felt for Andrichev, and everyone knew it, and that is the long and the short of it. Musical instruments have neither pity nor any notion of justice, as I have reason to know. Especially the strings.
Whatever Progorny had paid him for the cello, it could not have been anything near its real value. And Lyudmilla grew worse. Not that I ever visited her in her sickbed, you understand, but you may believe that I received daily — hourly — dispatches and bulletins from Andrichev. It very nearly broke my peevish, cynical old heart to see him so distraught, so frantically disorganized, constantly racing back and forth between the rehearsal hall, the doctor's office, and his own house, doing the best he could to attend simultaneously to the wellbeing of his wife and that of his music. For an artist, this is, of course, impossible. Work or loved ones, passions or responsibilities … when it comes down to that, as it always does, someone goes over the side. Right, wrong, it is how things are. It is how we are.
Yes, of course, when I look back now, it was remiss of me not to go to Lyudmilla at the first word of her illness. But I didn't like her, you see — what a sour old person I must seem to you, so easily to detest both her and your hero Mr. Sigerson — and I was not hypocrite enough, in those days, to look into those ingenuous blue eyes and say that I prayed for the light of health swiftly to return to them once more. Yes, I wanted her to recover, almost as much as I wanted her to leave her husband alone to do what he was meant to do — very well, what I needed him to do. Let her have her lovers, by all means; let her sing duets with them all until she burst her pouter–pigeon breast; but let me have my best cellist back in the heart of my string section — and let him have his beautiful Fabregas under his thick, grubby, peasant hands again. Where it belonged.