Dissonance (31 page)

Erwin lifted his head, thinking. ‘Sort of. Some of them have artificial legs, and bad hips.'

Schaedel laughed. He reclined, blowing smoke up to the ceiling in short puffs, gagging, coughing, undoing his sarong to reveal a food-stained singlet and shorts. ‘The problem is, you could be called up,' he observed.

Erwin shook his head. ‘That lot? What could they do?'

‘They could hold a gun.'

‘That's not our job. We're police, we keep order.'

Schaedel stared at him, as if he was asking, are you sure? ‘Everything gets back to Hitler,' he said.

‘So?'

‘At the rate it's going he'll run out of soldiers. Especially when America gets involved.'

‘America won't get involved. What do they care?'

Schaedel stared at him. ‘You didn't have to join.'

‘I did. They sent me a letter, inviting me to apply.
Inviting
 me.'

‘You could've said no.'

Erwin bowed his head.

‘What did your mother say?' Schaedel asked.

He shrugged.

‘And Luise?'

‘She's all for it.'

Schaedel took a deep breath, paused, leaned forward and touched his knee again. ‘Enough time wasted. Bach.
The Clavier
 … what are we up to?'

Erwin opened his Bach. ‘The Gavotte, I think.' He smoothed it flat against the piano and the spine cracked. Then he started playing.

‘Light touch … don't hammer the notes … slurred here, slurred, look,' as he pointed.

After a few minutes of notes circling each other, rising and falling, receding and shouting, there was a knock on the door. ‘Christ!' Schaedel exclaimed. ‘Is that you, Mrs Janzen?' he called.

No reply. ‘Hello?'

Schaedel stood up. Without doing up his sarong he stormed to the door and opened it. He looked down at a short, dark-haired man with oval-shaped glasses, a high-collared shirt and a six-way coat sprinkled with snow.

‘Yes?' Schaedel barked.

The man showed him identification and told him he was from the Reich Security Office.

‘So?' Schaedel asked.

‘Herr Professor, do you know of the law prohibiting the playing of music by certain composers?' he asked quietly, politely.

‘No,' Schaedel replied, looking back at Erwin. Erwin turned, shrugged, and looked at his teacher's hairy legs and bare feet, splayed out across the cold tiles.

The small man studied Erwin and then Schaedel and then looked around the apartment. ‘I find it hard to believe,' he continued, ‘that a professor of music wouldn't be aware – '

‘How can I help you?' Schaedel interrupted.

‘The point is, Herr Professor, you have been playing banned music.'

‘No!' he exclaimed, looking back at Erwin.

The small man raised his voice a few tones and decibels. ‘Professor Schaedel, this is a serious matter.'

Schaedel stopped to think. ‘How do you know what I've been playing?' he asked.

‘That's not important.'

And then Schaedel turned to the far wall. ‘Are you listening now?' he half-sang, as Erwin turned to the piano and played a few chords accompaniment. ‘Do you use a spirit or wine glass,' he continued, operatically. ‘And should …' he let the note hang, as Erwin improvised under it, ‘I play a little louder?'

‘Professor!'

Schaedel looked at him. ‘I assume you mean Jewish music?' he asked.

‘Yes … mostly.'

‘Well, you see,' Schaedel explained, ‘being a teacher of the pianoforte, I have to use a variety of pieces, of composers as … exemplars. Otherwise it would be like teaching medicine without reference to, say, the kidneys.'

‘It's not the same thing, Professor. There are many German composers.'

‘For example,' the professor continued, returning to his piano, shooing Erwin like a lame dog, ‘Mendelssohn has some of the best lyrical writing.' He started playing the opening to Mendelssohn's
Nocturne
.

‘Stop,' the small man said, stepping inside the apartment. ‘You are breaking the law.'

‘Sorry,' Schaedel shrugged. ‘What about high drama? Bits of Meyerbeer?' He was off again, hammering chords in both hands and fumbling melody as he looked up at them.

Meanwhile, the policeman had moved closer to the piano. ‘Professor,' he said, holding his hands above Schaedel's.

Schaedel stopped. He stood up, sorting through scores on top of the piano. ‘Webern, Berg, transcriptions of Art Tatum, Fats Waller.'

‘Jazz especially, Professor. Negro music. When our boys are off fighting. What does that mean to you?'

Schaedel shrugged.

‘I'd put Ellington up against Bach,' Erwin said.

‘And who are you?' the policeman asked.

‘Erwin Hergert, the professor's pupil.'

The policeman looked him over. ‘His pupil?' he asked.

‘Yes.'

‘Here, in his living room?'

‘Yes,' Schaedel added.

‘Why not the conservatorium?'

‘We live nearby,' the teacher explained, gathering his sarong and tying it loosely. ‘Plus, this is more comfortable.'

‘Comfortable?'

‘Yes.'

Then he looked at Erwin and said, ‘That's no way to wear a uniform.'

Erwin shrugged. ‘I've come from training.'

The policeman's eyes settled on Schaedel's day lounge and he imagined the games the dirty old cunt must have played with his boy. He was furious. He took a clipboard from his satchel, adjusted his glasses, squinted and said, ‘For playing any of these you could be arrested.' And he read. ‘July 28, 1939, Block, unknown piano piece. August 2nd 1939,
I've Got Rhythm
, by the American Jewish composer Gershwin.'

Schaedel looked at Erwin and smiled. Erwin laughed.

‘This is not funny,' the policeman said.

‘She's been listening in for that long?' Schaedel asked. He picked up a fire poker from beside the piano and tapped on the wall a few times. ‘If you like, I'll keep a record,' he called.

‘Professor,' the small man said, pushing the clipboard into his chest. ‘There are six pages here … what would you have me do?'

Schaedel took the clipboard. He took a step towards his mostly dead fire but the policeman stopped him, reclaiming the evidence.

‘Arrest me then,' Schaedel said.

Silence. Schaedel returned to his piano. He searched for all of the banned scores, motioning to Erwin and piling them in his arms. Then he led his student towards the fire and said, ‘Go on, throw them in.'

Erwin looked at Schaedel, and then at the policeman.

‘Go on,' Schaedel said. ‘Do it for
Germany
.'

Erwin took a deep breath, looked at the policeman and asked, ‘Can we store them?'

‘Yes,' he agreed. ‘As long as they're not played, or taught, Herr Professor.'

There was a long pause, interrupted only by the sound of resin popping in the fire. Schaedel took a score from Erwin and placed it on hot coals. It took a few moments before catching around the edges, and then burning.

The policeman was satisfied. ‘A few small compromises,' he said.

Schaedel sat at his piano studying the gavotte. ‘Bach,' he said, turning to Erwin.

The eight-year-old boy wore shorts, and a white shirt with a black bow tie, and looked at Madge expectantly.

‘Sit up!' she said, turning a long, narrow length of bamboo in her hands.

The boy sat up. He looked at the keys and placed his right thumb over middle C.

‘One two three,' she counted, and he started to play a simple transcription of the American song
Down in the Valley
, his left hand darting between the chord notes and his right attempting the melody.

As Madge counted she tapped the cane in her hand. When he reached for the pedal she said, ‘Sit up.' He pulled himself back onto the stool.

Then he stopped. ‘I can't play when you count,' he said.

‘You'll just have to get used to it.'

‘It puts me off.'

She glared at him. ‘Very well.'

This time she counted him in, but then fell silent.

Luise appeared from the bathroom with a mop and bucket. She wiped her forehead with a towel draped across her shoulder. Then she went and sat on the lounge, reclining, looking up at the ceiling as she tried to slow her breathing.

Madge looked at her and smiled. ‘All done?' she asked, but Luise didn't reply.

The boy finished a passage, stopped, shook his head and said, ‘I can never get that bit.'

‘Concentrate,' Madge replied, as she played it for him. ‘See?'

He tried again, stopping a few notes in.

‘What now?' she asked, showing him again.

‘Can we try something else?'

‘What's the point of that?'

Luise could see Erwin, in short, short pants, long socks and scuffed shoes. He'd been practising for two, maybe three hours already and he was tired. ‘Mum, I'm thirsty.'

‘You're not going to die of dehydration. Now, like this, see?'

Luise could see the old bag standing up, putting her cane under Erwin's fingers and lifting them off the keyboard. ‘Now, listen,' she was saying, unless you're going to do this properly.'

‘I will.' Reclaiming his fingers.

Madge wasn't finished with her newest student. ‘It's quite simple: G chord, C chord, F major seven, finish.'

‘Alright.' The boy twisted his legs and tried again.

Luise was turning the mop in the bucket. ‘Go easy, Madge,' she said.

Madge glared at her. ‘You've finished the bathroom?'

‘Yes.'

‘You did behind the toilet?'

‘I did behind the toilet.'

Madge looked back at the boy. ‘Next page,' she said.

They tried a new piece but the boy ran out of concentration, or ability, again. ‘Is there any point continuing?' Madge asked him.

The boy bowed his head.

‘You played that last week, perfectly,' she said.

And he dropped his head even further.

‘Madge,' Luise whispered.

‘What?'

‘Maybe he's tired.'

The boy chewed his bottom lip, and looked at Luise.

‘You've done the kitchen?' Madge asked her daughter-in-law.

Luise stood up. ‘Can I see you outside for a minute?' she asked.

‘I'm in the middle of a lesson.'

‘For a minute.'

Luise let the mop fall. It rolled out of the bucket, spreading grey water full of hair and soap-chips over the floor and onto Madge's rug. Madge looked at the mess. She stood up and walked out of the sitting room, into the hallway. Luise followed her. When they were gone the boy looked up at the half-closed door. His legs started swinging and he hummed the song's melody.

Out in the hallway, Luise stood with her arms crossed. ‘Why do you talk to me that way?' she asked.

Madge turned to go in. ‘This is your hormones speaking.'

‘What is it?' Erwin asked, arriving at the head of the stairs.

Luise turned to him and started listing her chores on her fingers. ‘Make the beds, do the dishes, clean the toilets, mop the bathroom – not forgetting,
behind the toilet
.'

Erwin approached them. He looked at his mum. ‘She's pregnant,' he said.

‘I told her, if you're feeling tired, sit down.'

Luise turned and paced, trying to avoid an explosion. ‘Sit down?
You've done the kitchen?
'

‘There was no rush.'

Luise folded her arms and looked at her husband expectantly.

Erwin turned to his mother. ‘Mum, we've had this ­discussion. I said, leave it until I get home.'

Madge unbuttoned his tunic collar. ‘But you're so tired, after all that marching.'

‘I'm not.'

And from inside the apartment came
Down in the Valley
, two hands, no pedal, perfect. All three of them listened, waiting. Then Madge pulled the door closed. ‘I have lessons from one until four,' she said.

‘You mustn't make her work like this.'

‘And what's more,' Luise continued, fixing Madge with cold, red eyes, ‘those photos of my mum, on the bookcase, have gone.'

‘What, I took them I suppose?'

Erwin studied his mother's face. ‘Did you?'

‘Why would I? No.'

Erwin looked back at Luise. ‘Maybe you moved them, when you were dusting.'

Luise had had enough. She turned and walked down the stairs, two, three at a time and then jumping as Erwin ­followed her, calling, ‘Careful,' looking back at his mum. ‘Did you move them?'

She didn't answer. He heard Luise at the street door, so he jumped down the stairs, a flight at a time. Madge went to the banister and looked after him.

Out on the street, Erwin caught up to her. ‘I might have moved them, when I was looking for a book,' he said.

She shook her head and met his eyes for a fraction of a second. ‘You did not.'

‘What's it matter?'

‘It's my mum.' She was walking with her arms crossed. ‘Madge didn't move them … she's hidden them.'

‘No.'

‘You can't see, can you?' She stopped and sat on a low, flat windowsill, holding her stomach and breathing deeply. ‘She likes to own people, Erwin. And if she can't …' She tensed her jaw and closed her eyes.

‘She didn't hide those pictures.'

‘And this morning, she sat me beside the piano and played Bach. For Frans, she said. He's listening.' She paused; after a moment she looked up at him. ‘Not for me. No, for Frans. Then she said, You have to start early.'

Luise could see Madge back beside the boy, counting as he played with a saucer resting on his flat hands. She could hear the cane tapping in her open palm, the boy's fingernails on the keys. ‘You've gotta stand up to her,' she said.