The Rainaldi Quartet (19 page)

‘I won't take any money,' I said. ‘Let your grandson try it, have a few lessons. He may not want to continue, in which case buying him an instrument would have been a waste. Even if he does keep it up, he'll have grown out of the quarter-size and be on to a half-size before you know it. When he's finished with it, just give it back to me.'

‘Well, if you're sure. Thank you. But if I can't give you any money, let me pay you in some other way. Why don't I take you to dinner? Are you staying in Milan this evening?'

‘I am,' I said. ‘But I'm going to a recital at the Conservatorio. The granddaughter of an old friend is playing.'

‘The violin?'

I nodded. ‘I've heard her. She's absolutely stunning.' I looked at Margherita over the desk. ‘I wondered if you might like to come. Do you like classical music?'

‘I love it.' She paused, considering my invitation. ‘You know, I'd be delighted to come – it's ages since I last went to a concert. But there is one condition. You must come home with me now and I'll make us something to eat.'

‘With pleasure,' I said.

‘You haven't tasted my cooking yet,' Margherita replied.

*   *   *

Her apartment was on the second floor of a modern block close by the university. It was small: kitchen, living room, bathroom and two bedrooms, one of which – I could see through the open door – Margherita used as a study. Her home was even more untidy than her office. There were books everywhere – on shelves on the wall, on tables and almost every available flat surface, even piled up on the floor. We picked our way through into the living room.

‘Excuse the mess,' Margherita said. ‘I don't know how it gets like this. I'm sure it's nothing to do with me. I'm really a very organised sort of person.' She picked up a bundle of what looked like dirty laundry from an armchair and took it away into the kitchen.

‘Make yourself at home,' she called. ‘Would you like some wine?'

‘Let me get it,' I said, following her into the kitchen.

‘In the cupboard in the corner,' she said. ‘Corkscrew in that drawer there.'

‘Red or white?' I said, opening the cupboard to discover a rack of some twenty bottles.

‘Whichever you like, I don't mind.'

I poured two glasses of red wine and handed her one. The kitchen was what I call ‘comfortably dirty', but I didn't mind. I have always found there is something deeply disturbing about people with tidy homes. The washing up from breakfast, indeed from the previous evening, was still untouched in the sink, the draining board was stacked with crockery which had yet to be put away and the cooker top was in need of a serious clean. But it didn't feel unhygienic, just healthy evidence of a woman with better things to occupy her time than domestic chores.

‘I know it's a tip,' Margherita said. ‘But at least it's my tip.'

‘I could do the washing up,' I said.

‘You'll do no such thing. Go and sit down with your wine. I hate being watched while I'm cooking.'

I went back into the living room. The furniture was good quality, but well used – a stained wooden sideboard, a settee and armchair whose upholstery was faded and wearing thin. Against one of the walls was an old Bechstein upright piano with a battered casing and chipped legs. A book of Chopin Nocturnes was open on the music rest.

‘You're a pianist?' I said.

Margherita appeared in the kitchen doorway. ‘Well, I'm not sure pianist is the right word. Not if you heard me play.'

‘You can't be that bad if you're playing Chopin.'

‘Chopin might not agree with you,' she said dryly.

She disappeared back into the kitchen and I continued my exploration of her living room. There were family photos on the sideboard: a couple of wedding pictures showing two young women who, from their likeness to Margherita, I was sure were her daughters; others of the same two women with their own children, a couple of little girls and a little boy with his grandmother's eyes. I picked up the photograph containing the boy and walked over to the kitchen door. Margherita was chopping tomatoes on a worktop.

‘Is this Stefano?' I asked.

Margherita glanced over her shoulder. ‘Yes, that's him.'

‘He's cute. He looks like you.'

‘You think so?'

‘So do your daughters.'

‘Yes, everyone says that.'

‘Do you see much of them?'

‘My daughters? Yes, we're close. They have their own busy lives, but I manage to see them perhaps a couple of times a month. We speak on the telephone, of course. Sometimes I babysit for them.'

‘You enjoy that?'

‘I do actually. I like being a grandmother. It took me a while to come to terms with it – it makes you feel so old – but I enjoy it now. I get the pleasure of my grandchildren without the responsibility – and noise – of having to look after them.'

‘Do they come here, your grandchildren?'

‘Not if I can help it. Three overexcited children in a flat this size? How about yours?'

‘I've got more space for them. And fields outside they can play in.'

‘I'm envious. I used to have more room, but we sold the house when we divorced and I bought this place with my share of the proceeds. As you can see, it's barely big enough for all my belongings.'

Margherita put the chopped tomatoes into a bowl with some lettuce and avocado, then spread pieces of Parma ham out on two plates.

‘You couldn't cut some bread, could you, Gianni? The knife's somewhere – try the sink.'

‘How long were you married?' I asked as I sliced the loaf of bread.

‘Twenty-nine years. It sounds a long time, doesn't it? You'd think if you'd lasted twenty-nine years you could survive a few more. I suppose we were the typical cliché – a couple who'd grown apart without noticing it. Lorenzo, true to the script, had found himself another woman. Younger, of course. He said I'd stopped “looking after him”. He said he needed a woman who was “more attentive to his needs”.' Margherita smiled wryly. She didn't sound remotely bitter. ‘A simpering doormat was what he meant. I'm afraid I don't do simpering doormat.'

She took some knives and forks out of a drawer and placed them next to the plates.

‘Come and sit down. The funniest thing was, when I told my mother we were separating – she'd never liked Lorenzo – you know what she said? “I told you it wouldn't last.”'

*   *   *

The Conservatorio concert hall was very nearly full – pretty good for a student recital. I saw Clara and Giulia and several other members of Tomaso's family as well as a few people from the Milanese music mafia I recognised – a couple of agents, record executives, a concert promoter. Down near the front of the hall I was surprised to see Serafin's sultry mistress, Maddalena.

Sofia's programme was an intriguing mixture of pieces: a first half comprising Beethoven's Spring Sonata and the Bach unaccompanied partita, the second a selection of lighter works by Saint-Saëns, Sarasate, Wieniawski and Paganini. It had an old-fashioned feel to it. It was the kind of eclectic programme that the giants of the early twentieth century would have tackled – men like Ysaÿe, Kreisler and Elman – but which you don't tend to see so often nowadays. Soloists today tend to favour weightier programmes, a more earnest selection of music which they feel reflects the seriousness of their purpose, their perception of themselves as profound artists. Well, they are artists, but they are entertainers too and I was glad to see that Sofia was willing to take a few risks to show off the full range of her talents.

The Beethoven was warm and lyrical, a duet in which the violin and piano parts wove in and out of each other like courting eels, slipping coyly over one another in a seductive dance, breaking apart for a time then coiling back into another lubricious embrace before their final magnificent union. I exaggerate perhaps, I lose control of my metaphors, I know, but I am an emotional man and the performance was a delight to me.

Then came the Bach, and from the first notes I knew that Sofia had what it took to be a great musician. She played with an authority, an intensity, almost a wild abandon that was mesmerising. I could feel the bodies around me stiffen, senses awaken, our eyes and ears and thoughts focused on nothing except that spine-tingling sound. The hall ceased to exist, the world beyond it was a memory from a different life. There was just a girl on a platform with a violin.

No one seemed to move, no one coughed or rustled their programmes. And when she started the final Chaconne – perhaps the greatest piece of writing for the violin in the entire repertoire – I felt a prickle like a rash creep over my skin and knew unequivocally that there was not a single person in the audience who was not feeling the same. Tears came into my eyes. This piece had been such a part of my life. Hearing it now took me back fifty years to my youth when as a thirteen-year-old boy I used to struggle clumsily through the chords, searching for the notes, searching for a voice which this young woman was now finding with such a sublime, intoxicating ease.

At the end there was a full half-minute's silence, the last chords melting away into the ether, before anyone clapped. Then the applause was like an explosion. One person stood up, then another. Soon the entire audience was on its feet. Sofia stood petrified to the spot for a few seconds, then she smiled and her eyes flickered around the hall, taking in the golden approbation.

Five times she left the platform and five times she returned for yet another bow before – our hands sore from clapping – we allowed her to escape our enthusiastic embrace. The doors were opened and the euphoric atmosphere permitted to slip away.

We rose from our seats to stretch our legs.

‘That was just incredible,' Margherita said enthusiastically as we walked out into the open courtyard next to the concert hall. ‘I don't know much about violinists, but she was electrifying.'

‘Wasn't she just,' I agreed. ‘One to watch for the future.'

‘And you know her?'

‘She's the granddaughter of my old friend, Tomaso. The one I told you about who was killed.'

‘Ah, yes, I remember,' Margherita said softly.

‘If he'd been here tonight, he would have been so proud of her.'

‘Rightly so. She was terrific. But she has other family here?'

‘Oh, yes. Her mother, her father, grandmother, lots of support.'

‘Don't let me keep you from them, Gianni. I'm just going to the ladies'. I'll see you back inside.'

I glanced around the courtyard. Sofia's family must still have been in the recital hall. I wasn't sure I wanted to see them just at the moment. There was something too painful about being here without Tomaso – for both them and me. But a couple of metres away I noticed Serafin's mistress talking to a woman with a mass of unruly jet-black hair. The woman looked familiar, though I couldn't place her. They broke apart and the dark-haired woman moved away to talk to another group.

‘Good evening, Maddalena,' I said.

Maddalena turned and looked at me, surprised and haughty like a wealthy courtesan whose under butler has had the temerity to address her.

‘
Ciao
…' She waved a manicured hand helplessly as if she couldn't recall my name.

‘I didn't know you liked music.'

‘But of course. I adore it.'

She looked around for someone more interesting to talk to, but there were no obvious candidates nearby. She was stuck with me. She fanned herself with her programme.

‘Who was the woman you were talking to just a moment ago?' I asked.

‘Magda? You mean Magda Scamozzi?'

Of course, now I remembered. Ludovico Scamozzi's wife. She'd been a concert violinist herself once, if my memory served me right. But she'd given it up after meeting Scamozzi. As so often when two musicians – two anything – marry, the husband's career had taken precedence.

‘She used to play, didn't she?' I said. ‘What was her name then, her maiden name? Magda…'

‘Erzsébet. But it wasn't her maiden name. She had another husband, before Ludovico.'

‘She was a talented player, I seem to recall.'

Maddalena shrugged. ‘I didn't know her then. I met her only through Vincenzo.'

‘Where is Vincenzo tonight?'

‘He's gone to the country,' Maddalena said waspishly.

So he was visiting his wife and family. Poor Serafin, I thought. No, poor wife and family.

‘He's back from Venice then?' I said.

‘He's been back for days.'

‘Do you know Venice at all?' I asked casually.

Her hard blue eyes came to rest on my face. ‘Not well,' she said. ‘It's a long time since I was there.' She glanced away, spying an escape route. ‘Excuse me, I see someone I know.'

I walked back to my seat in the hall and waited for Margherita to join me. When Sofia returned to the platform with her pianist there was a brief burst of applause, then a hush of anticipation descended over the audience. She played Saint-Saëns and Sarasate and Wieniawski, bravura pieces which are regularly dismissed as shallow and lightweight. But there was nothing shallow about Sofia's performance. Her interpretation transcended the glittering fireworks, drawing out the soul of the music and scattering it profligately across the auditorium. Fritz Kreisler once said that if he could live his life over again he would ignore the great warhorses of the repertoire and devote himself solely to light music. Sitting there among the rapt audience, I knew what he meant. There was a joy in these pieces, a joy in the way Sofia played them, that made my spirits soar.

Then she moved on to Paganini, the Moses Variations and
Le Streghe,
The Witches' Dance, the piece that more than any other of his compositions gave rise to the speculation that Paganini was in league with the Devil. Indeed, at one performance several witnesses – of apparently sound mind – swore they saw Satan himself directing the virtuoso's bow arm and fingers. I've attempted the piece and, believe me, it would take more than the Devil at my elbow to enable me to play it. But Sofia was in need of no assistance, supernatural or otherwise. She was in her element, the runs and harmonics and all the other fiendish contortions executed as if they were no more difficult than a simple one-octave scale. This was stratospheric violin playing where technique wasn't in the fingers but in the mind, the difference between someone who played the notes and someone who played the music. Sofia went for it. She was herself and it was an exhilarating privilege to behold.