The Ghost Sonata (10 page)

12

The Holywell Music Room

 

Holding their umbrellas to shield themselves from a steady, monotonous drizzle, Gilda and Wendy walked quickly through Gloucester Green, past rows of buses, an assortment of pizza and kebab shops, and a handful of touristy pubs. They made their way to Broad Street, where Gilda felt compelled to pause and peer up at a row of giant sculpted heads that perched on the semicircular gate surrounding the Sheldonian Theater. With square beards and wide eyes shaped like giant olives, they seemed to gaze above the street as if they were gods who could see some distant future event.

“I think they're supposed to be Roman emperors,” Wendy said, remembering something she had read in a guidebook.

“They kind of look like those guys we used to see when my dad took us to the Harley-Davidson convention in Detroit.”

“Gilda, come on! I'm late enough as it is!”

The girls hurried on to Holywell Street, where the narrow road was lined with terraced houses painted a variety of pastel colors—white, blue, lime green, pale pink. Just ahead were the high, stone walls of New College. Weary-looking students emerged from an arched doorway that reminded Gilda of the entrance to a castle. They pulled on backpacks, jumped on bicycles, and sped down the street, presumably in search of coffee at one of the cafés.

Gilda and Wendy stood on the sidewalk in front of the Holywell Music Room—a simple white building with two arched windows that seemed to peer at the girls with a surprised expression.

Wendy suddenly wished she could make herself much smaller—the size of a mouse that could scurry away in the gutter or hide in a corner of the building until the competition was over.

“We made it!” Gilda glanced at her watch, relieved that Wendy still had fifteen minutes before her performance time. Then she realized that Wendy seemed paralyzed by the sight of the Holywell Music Room.

“I can't do it,” Wendy whispered.

“Wendy, what is your deal? This isn't like you at all.”

“Did you know this place is like one of the oldest concert halls in the whole world?”

“It is?” To Gilda's eye, the building looked less antiquated than the medieval architecture of many of the college buildings.

“I mean, it's one of the first places ever built just for performing music—with no other purpose.”

“Well,
your
purpose is to play music. So let's go, okay?”

“What business do I have playing in the Holywell Music Room, where so many great musicians have performed? I'm just a kid from Detroit who can't even wake up on time.”

“Should I get out my violin, or do you want to have your self-pity party without music?”

“Without music.”

“Wendy, first of all, you've practiced just as hard as those people of olden times did—probably harder, since they had to spend so much time powdering their wigs. For another thing, you're unshowered and heavily perfumed, just like they were. Besides, they were all drunk or insane in those days anyway.”

“They were
not
all drunk or insane.”

“Come on, Wendy. Just picture everyone in there naked and wearing eighteenth-century wigs, and you'll be fine.”

Gilda grabbed Wendy's hand and practically dragged her up the steps leading to the building entrance. As they walked through the door, Wendy heard the sound of familiar music—the Chopin Ballade No. 3—a happy, horsey-sounding piece that, in the current performance, sounded frantic. “That's Gary playing,” Wendy whispered.

Mrs. Mendelovich rushed toward them from a backstage hallway. “Windy! Thank God!”

A young woman who was handing out brochures at the entrance to the concert hall shot Mrs. Mendelovich a warning glance, pressing her finger to her lips.

“I was worried you got lost,” Mrs. Mendelovich said in a slightly lower voice. “Thank God you are here.”

Professor Heslop appeared. “Is this number nine?”

“This is Windy Choy—one of my stars.”

“And she is performer number nine, is she?”

“I'm number nine,” said Wendy.

“Numbered score for the judges?”

Wendy handed Professor Heslop photocopies of the music she would play. Each bar of music was marked with a number in case the judges wanted to point to a specific phrase in their comments.

“Yes, well, I'm afraid Wendy won't have time to practice on the warm-up piano. You'll have to go straight to the backstage waiting room, Wendy.”

“But she must warm up!”

“Mrs. Mendelovich, I'm afraid there just isn't time. Wendy is late. Follow me, please, Wendy.”

Mrs. Mendelovich grabbed Wendy's hands and pressed them in a prayer position between her own. “Windy, I know you weell make me ploud. You are champion.”

“I'll try,” said Wendy meekly.

Gilda wondered if Wendy was going to need someone to give her a shove onto the stage after the events of the morning. “Professor Heslop,” she said, “is it okay if I wait backstage with Wendy?”

“The backstage waiting area is only for performers,” Professor Heslop replied curtly.

“Professor Heslop,” Mrs. Mendelovich interjected, “Geelda is our page-turner, and I would like her to wait with Windy.”

“I suppose I can make an exception for
you
, Mrs. Mendelovich.” Professor Heslop eyed Gilda's hat with disapproval and then turned to lead Gilda and Wendy to the backstage waiting room.

“Just don't distract me, okay?” Wendy whispered. “My concentration is completely off as it is.”

“How could I distract you? I'm here to
help
you concentrate, Wendy.”

They entered a small backstage rehearsal room filled with music stands, a harpsichord, and an upright piano. Two other competitors waited there—Ming Fong and a boy who observed Gilda and Wendy with frank interest as he tilted back precariously on two legs of his chair, bracing himself against the harpsichord with one hand to keep from toppling over. He wore a white T-shirt and a worn leather jacket and jeans, as if affecting the style of a very young Marlon Brando. His black hair was disheveled, and he had none of the usual accessories of a young classical pianist waiting backstage for a performance—no marked-up music score in his lap, no mittens on his hands. Gilda felt certain that she recognized him from
somewhere.
Then she realized it was the boy who had observed her from across the room during the drawing of numbers. For some reason, she felt herself blushing under his gaze.

Ming Fong turned to give Wendy a prim little smile, then glanced up at a large clock on the wall with eyebrows raised as if saying:
You're late!

She almost seems happy that Wendy's late
, Gilda thought suspiciously.

Both Wendy and Gilda took note of Ming Fong's girlish dress trimmed with lace, and with a broad sash that tied behind her back in a giant bow. It looked like the kind of dress an antique doll might wear. As a final touch, she positioned a large red silk flower in her hair that matched the enormous crimson mittens she wore on her hands to keep her fingers warm.

“She looks like Alice in Wonderland,” Gilda whispered cattily, wanting to distract Wendy, who seemed to be oddly fixated on the flower in Ming Fong's hair.

Wendy nodded, but she was actually wondering why the red flower in Ming Fong's hair bothered her so intensely. Somehow the flower seemed to be mocking her—declaring victory in advance.

Secretly, Gilda had to give Ming Fong some credit for dressing with what she could only hope was a competitive strategy: the childish dress was ridiculous but memorable: it made her look much younger than her fourteen years.
Either she's completely clueless
, Gilda thought,
or she's trying to give the judges the impression that they're watching a child prodigy.

Gilda glanced at Wendy and found herself wishing that she had at least brought a feather boa to drape around Wendy's neck to add some color to the drab, black skirt and gray woolen sweater she had hastily selected. Then Gilda remembered the pair of arm-length pink gloves she had stuffed in her bag.

“Here, Wendy.” Gilda pulled the gloves from her bag. “Put these on to keep your hands warm.”

Wendy eyed the hot-pink gloves. “Thanks, but I'm not going to the prom right now.”

“But these look nicer than those boxing mitts you're wearing. You need some color.”

“Shush!” Professor Heslop gave the girls a warning glance, and the boy who was watching the two of them grinned.

Wendy opened the music for her Bach French Suite, turned her back to Gilda, and began tapping the fingering of the notes inside her mittens.

Gilda decided to observe Ming Fong, who sat with a collection of Chopin compositions opened on her lap and a pair of headphones on her ears. Burning to ask Ming Fong about the tarot card Wendy had received, Gilda impulsively tapped her on the shoulder. Ming Fong turned to peer at Gilda with distant eyes, as if she had just been called out of a daydream. She reluctantly removed her headphones.

“Hey, Ming Fong,” Gilda whispered. “Does this look familiar to you?”

She handed Ming Fong the tarot card she had discovered on Wendy's floor and watched her expressionless face closely.

“One of your tarot cards?”

“It isn't mine,” said Gilda. “This one is different.”

“Scary picture,” said Ming Fong. “Spooky.”

“Have you seen this before?”

Ming Fong shook her head.

“Are you sure?
Someone
left it under Wendy's door.”

Ming Fong eyed Wendy, who sat with mittened hands covering her ears in an attempt to concentrate on her music. “Wendy looks scared.”

“She isn't scared,” said Gilda defensively. “We just wondered who gave this to her.”

“Scared,” said Ming Fong, turning back to her music. “That card looks like bad luck.”

“What are the two of you talking about?” Wendy peered over her shoulder at Gilda.

“Nothing.” Gilda hastily stuck the tarot card back in her bag. She had to admit that Ming Fong wasn't acting particularly guilty.
Maybe she's just a good actress
, Gilda thought. She was about to ask Ming Fong a few more questions when the boy sitting across the room grabbed his chair and shuffled closer to the three girls, drawing both Ming Fong and Wendy's attention.

“Reading fortunes, are we?” he asked. “Any luck for me?”

Wendy reached over and pinched Gilda. It was her sign that she thought a boy was cute. Gilda took another look at the boy and saw that his ears stuck out a little, his nose was a bit crooked, and his skin was very pale—almost translucent. His blue-gray eyes were a striking contrast to the floppy, eye-grazing layers of his black hair. He had dimples when he smiled. She pinched Wendy back much harder.

“Ow!”

Professor Heslop approached the group. “Excuse me. This is a serious international competition,” she whispered. “I don't know how you do things in America and China, but here in England, we show respect for the performers onstage by keeping quiet during a competition.”

“I'm English, actually,” said the boy. “And I know for a fact that we show as little respect for performers as possible in this countr y.”

Professor Heslop wasn't amused. “Quiet please, the lot of you; or I will have to ask you to wait outside in the rain. I have to go check on the front entrance now, and I expect you all to behave yourselves.”

The group fell silent until Professor Heslop was out of earshot.

“In America, we just throw greasy McDonald's hamburgers at the stage throughout the whole performance,” Gilda whispered. “It's our way of showing appreciation. How do you do things in China, Wendy?”

“We throw chopsticks and raw fish.”

“Shh!” whispered Ming Fong loudly. “Be quiet! I don't want to wait outside in the rain.” Ming Fong put her headphones back on.

“Bit of a Bossy Britches, isn't she?” said the boy.

“Tell me about it. Ming Fong drives us crazy.”

“No.” The boy pointed a thumb at the door through which Professor Heslop had just exited. “I meant Heslop.”

“Oh, yeah. A real gorey granny.”

“You mean ‘granny gore.' All crotchety and grumpy.”

“I prefer ‘gorey granny.'”

He looked bemused. “You don't often hear an American trying to talk like a Scouser.”

“I'm not trying to ‘talk like a Scouser.' This is how I
always
talk.” Grateful that she had studied her
Handbook of English Slang
so carefully, Gilda remembered that Scouser referred to the slang used in the city of Liverpool where all the great “oldies” songs by the Beatles originated.