The Unconsoled (50 page)

"No, there's no piano," I said cheerfully. "There's nothing. No manuscript paper, nothing. I've decided not to compose again for two years." That's what I said to her. I was very quick, I said it with no outward sign of distress or hesitation. I even gave a specific date on which I planned to return to my composing. But for the time being, no, I wasn't composing. What could I say, sir? Did you expect me to look at this woman, this woman I loved desperately, who had only a few days earlier agreed to marry me, did you expect me to take it lying down? To say to her: "Oh dear, it's all been a misunderstanding. Naturally I release you from any obligation. Please, let's part herewith…" Of course I could not, sir. You might think I was dishonest. That's too harsh. In any case, you see, at that point in my life what I said wasn't entirely a lie. As it happened, I had every intention of taking up an instrument one day, and yes, I wished to try my hand at composition. So it wasn't a complete lie. I was disingenuous, yes, I admit it. But what else could I do? I couldn't let her go. So I told her I had made a decision to stop composing for two calendar years. In order to clear my head and my emotions, some such thing, I remember talking about it for some time.

And she listened to me, taking it all in, nodding her beautiful, intelligent head in sympathy to this nonsense I was telling her. But what could I do, sir? And you know, after that morning, she never mentioned my composing again, never in all these years. Incidentally, Mr Ryder, I can see you're about to ask, I will tell you, I will assure you. I had never before that morning, never at any time during our courtship, during all our walks along the canal, the times we met for coffee in the cafés on Herrengasse, I never,
never
, intentionally led her to believe I composed music. That I was perpetually in love with music, that it fuelled my spirit every day, that I heard it in my heart each morning I awoke, yes, these things I implied and they were true. But I never deliberately misled her, sir. Oh no, never. It was simply a terrible misunderstanding. She, coming from the family that she comes from, inevitably she
assumed
… Who knows, sir? But until that morning in my room, I had never uttered a single word to imply such a thing. Well, as I say, Mr Ryder, she never mentioned the matter again, not once. We married in due course, bought a small apartment over Friedrich Square, I found a good position at the Ambassadors. We began our life together and for a time we were reasonably happy. Of course, I never forgot about… about the misunderstanding. But it didn't worry me as much as you might suppose. You see, as I said before, in those days, well, I had every intention, when the time came, when there was an opportunity, to take up my instrument. Perhaps the violin. I had certain plans then, such as you do when you are young, when you don't realise how limited time is, when you don't realise there's a shell built around you, a hard shell so you
can't - get
-
out
!' Suddenly he took both hands off the steering wheel and pushed upwards against an invisible dome around him. The gesture contained more weariness than anger, and the next second he let his hands fall back onto the wheel again. He went on with a sigh: 'No, I didn't know about such things then. I still hoped I would become in time the sort of person she believed me to be. Indeed, sir, I believed I would succeed in becoming such a person precisely because of her presence, because of her influence. And the first year of our marriage, Mr Ryder, as I say, we were reasonably happy. We bought that apartment, it was perfectly adequate. There were days when I thought she'd realised about the misunderstanding and that she didn't mind. I don't know, every sort of thought ran through my mind in those days. Then in time, naturally, the date I'd mentioned, the two-year point when I was to return to composing, it came and went. I watched her carefully, but she said nothing about it. She was quiet, that was true, but she was always quiet. She said nothing, did nothing unusual. But I suppose it was from around that time, around the time of the two-year mark, the tension came into our lives. It was a sort of low-lying tension, it seemed always to be there, however happily we might spend an evening, it would still be there. I would arrange little surprise outings to her favourite restaurant. Or bring home flowers or her favourite perfumes. Yes, I worked diligently to delight her. But there was always this tension. For a lot of the time I managed not to notice it. I told myself I was imagining it. I suppose I didn't wish to admit it was there and growing by the day. I only knew for sure it had been there the day it went away. Yes, it went away and then I realised what it had been. It was one afternoon, we'd been married three years by then, I came in from work, I'd brought her a little present, a book of poetry I happened to know she was wanting. She hadn't explicitly said so, but I had guessed it. I came into the apartment and found her looking down at the square. You could see all the people returning from work at that time of the afternoon. It was a noisy apartment, but not so bad when one is relatively young. I handed her the volume. "Just a small gift," I said to her. She continued to look out of the window. She was kneeling up on the sofa, her arms resting on the back of it so she could cradle her head as she gazed out. Then she took the book from me, very wearily, and without saying a word went on looking down at the square. I remained standing in the middle of the room waiting for her to say something, to acknowledge my gift. Perhaps she wasn't well. I stood waiting with some concern. Then finally she turned round and looked at me. Not unkindly, oh no, but she looked at me, it was a particular look. The look of someone
confirming
with her eyes what she had been thinking. Yes, that's what it was, and I knew then she had finally seen through me. And that was when I realised, realised what the tension had been. I had been waiting, all that time, I had been waiting for this moment. And you know, it may seem odd, but it was a huge relief. At last, at last, she had seen through me. Oh, what a relief! I felt so liberated. I actually exclaimed: "Ha!" and smiled. She must have thought it odd and the next second I pulled myself together. I realised immediately - oh yes, my feeling of liberation was all too brief - I realised immediately what new dragons I had to wrestle and in a moment I was all caution. I saw I would have to work doubly, triply hard if I were to keep her. But you see, I still thought then that if I worked at it, even though she had
realised
, if I worked very hard at it, I could yet win her. What a fool I was! Do you know, for several years after that day, I continued to believe it, I actually believed I was succeeding? Oh, I attended very carefully. I did all in my power to please her. And I never grew complacent. I realised that her tastes, her preferences, were bound to change with time and so I watched every nuance, ready to anticipate any change. Oh yes, even though I say so myself, Mr Ryder, for those few years, I performed my role as her husband quite magnificently. If a composer she had liked for years was beginning to please her less, I would pick it up instantly, almost before she had articulated the change to herself. The next time the composer was mentioned, I would say quickly, even as she was hesitantly thinking of expressing her doubt, I would say quickly: "Of course, he's not what he was. Please, we won't bother to go to the concert tonight. You'll find it tiresome." And I would be rewarded by the unmistakable look of relief on her face. Oh yes, I was extremely attentive, and as I say, sir, I believed it. I fooled myself, I loved her so, I fooled myself into believing I was slowly winning her. For just a few years, I actually felt confident. And then it all changed, all changed in one evening. I saw how inevitable it all was, how all my great efforts could only add up to nothing. I saw it all in one evening, sir. We'd been invited to Mr Fischer's house, he'd organised a little reception for Jan Piotrowski following his concert here. We were just starting to get invited to such things then, I was beginning to earn a certain respect here for my keen appreciation of the arts. Well, in any case, there we were at Mr Fischer's house, in his fine drawing room. Not a large gathering, forty at the most, it was a very relaxed sort of evening. I don't know if you ever met Piotrowski, sir. He turned out to be a very pleasant man indeed, most skilled at putting everyone at their ease. The conversation flowed very easily, we were all enjoying ourselves. Then at one point I went over to the table where there was a buffet, and I was helping myself to a few things when I realised Mr Piotrowski was standing there right next to me. I was still quite young then, I hadn't so much experience of celebrities, and I admit, yes, I was a little nervous. But then Mr Piotrowski smiled pleasantly, asked me if I was enjoying the evening, very quickly put me at my ease. And then he said: "I was just speaking to your most charming wife. She was telling me about her great love of Baudelaire. I had to confess to her I didn't know Baudelaire's work in any depth. She very correctly reprimanded me for this deplorable state of affairs. Oh, she made me thoroughly ashamed. I mean to put it right without delay. Your wife's love for the poet is absolutely infectious!" To which I nodded and said: "Yes, of course. She's always loved Baudelaire."

"And with such passion," Piotrowski said. "She made me thoroughly ashamed." And that was all that took place, all that was said between us. But you see, Mr Ryder, my point is this.
I had never known of her love of Baudelaire
! Never even suspected it! You see what I am saying.
She had never revealed this passion to me
! And when Piotrowski said this to me, something fell into place. All of a sudden I saw clearly something I'd been trying not to see over the years. I mean, that she had always hidden certain parts of herself from me. Preserving them, as though contact with my coarseness would damage them. As I say, sir, I had perhaps always suspected it. That there was a whole side to herself she was preserving from me. And who could blame her? A woman of great sensitivity, brought up in a household such as hers. She had not hesitated to tell Piotrowski, but at no point during our years together had she once hinted of this love of Baudelaire. For the next several minutes I wandered about the reception hardly knowing what I was saying to people, just mouthing pleasantries, in a turmoil inside. Then I looked across the room, it must have been half an hour after the conversation with Piotrowski, I looked across the room and I saw her, my wife, laughing happily on the sofa beside Piotrowski. There was nothing flirtatious, you understand. Oh no, my wife has always been meticulous where propriety is concerned. But she was laughing with an ease I realised I had not seen since our walks together along the canal in the days before we were married.

That's to say, before she
realised
. It was a long sofa and there were two others sitting on it, and some people were also sitting on the floor in order to be near Piotrowski. But Piotrowski had just spoken to my wife and she was laughing happily. But it was not just this laugh, Mr Ryder, that spoke volumes to me. As I watched, I was standing on the other side of the room, as I watched, what happened next was this. Piotrowski until that point had been sitting on the edge of the sofa, his hands clasped around his knee, like so! As he laughed and made some remark to my wife, he began to recline, yes, as though he wished simply to sit back in the sofa. And as he began to recline, very swiftly, very deftly, my wife took a cushion from behind her and placed it for Piotrowski, so that by the time his head touched the back of the sofa, the cushion was there. It was done so swiftly, almost without thinking, a very graceful movement, Mr Ryder. And when I saw it, I felt my heart breaking. It was a movement so full of natural respect, a desire to be solicitous, to please in a small way. That little action, it revealed a whole realm of her heart she kept tightly closed to me. And I realised at that moment how deluded I had been. I realised then what I have known and never doubted since. I mean, sir, I realised she would leave me. Sooner or later. It was just a matter of time. Ever since that evening, I've known it.'

He fell silent and seemed once more to become lost in his thoughts. There was now farmland to either side of the road and I could see tractors moving slowly in the distance across the fields. I said to him:

'Excuse me, but this particular evening you talk of. How long ago was it?'

'How long ago?' Hoffman seemed slightly affronted by the question. 'Oh… I suppose it was, well, Piotrowski's concert here, that must have been twenty-two years ago.'

'Twenty-two years,' I said.
I
take it your wife has remained with you all that time?'

Hoffman turned to me angrily. 'What are you implying, sir? That I don't know the state of affairs in my own home? That I don't understand my own wife? Here I am confiding in you, sharing with you these intimate thoughts, and you care to lecture me about these matters as though you know far better than I…'

'I apologise, Mr Hoffman, if I appeared to be intruding. I simply wished to point out…'

'Point out nothing, sir! You know nothing of all this! The fact is, my situation is desperate and has been now for some time. I saw it that evening at Mr Fischer's, as clear as daylight, as clear as I see this road before me now. Very well, it hasn't happened yet, but that's only because… only because I've made
efforts
. Yes, sir, and what efforts I've made! Perhaps you would laugh at me. If I know it's a lost cause, why do I torture myself? Why do I cling to her like this? It's very easy for you to ask such a thing. But I love her deeply, sir, more today than ever. It's unthinkable for me, I could never watch her leave, everything would become meaningless. Very well, I know it's pointless, that sooner or later she'll leave me for someone like Piotrowski, someone like that, someone like the man she thought I was before she realised. But you can't scoff at a man for clinging on. I've done my very best, sir, I've done my best in the only way open to someone like me. I've worked hard, I've organised events, sat on committees, and I've succeeded over the years in becoming a figure of some stature among the artistic and musical circles of this city. And then of course, there was always the one hope. There was the one hope, which perhaps explains how I've managed to keep her so long. That hope is now dead, has been dead for a good few years already, but you see, for a while, there was this one, single hope. I refer, of course, to our son, Stephan. If he'd been different, if he'd been blessed with at least some of the gifts her side of the family possess in such abundance! For a few years, we both hoped. In our separate ways, we both watched Stephan and hoped. We sent him to piano lessons, we watched him carefully, we hoped against hope. We strained to hear some spark that was never there, oh, we listened so hard, each for our different reasons, we wanted so much to hear something, but it was never there…'