The Strange Case of the Composer and His Judge Page 18
‘Don’t you have any more rehearsals to attend?’
‘Yes. This evening. I’ve been flung out by my lighting engineer for brazen interference. We’ve been working together for decades, so he can say what he likes. You must meet him. He thinks that light is an abstract language, like music.’
She reflected on this for a moment.
‘But it is, isn’t it? Light doesn’t use words, but has the power to rouse the emotions.’
‘And that, Dominique, is the root of your mistrust of music.’
For the first time, he used her Christian name. She decided to take no notice of this collapsing barrier. Instead she merely nodded her agreement, sacrificed the pawn, and made her much meditated move across the board.
‘If I ask you something about the Faith, will you tell me the truth?’
Oddly enough the question now seemed neither risky nor impertinent. She was at last sure of her ground, and they were sitting side by side, close together, facing the sea far below them. She could see his hands, his knees, his worn jeans and leather moccasins; she watched his jacket trailing on the tiles, but she could not see his face. He answered without hesitation or disquiet.
‘Yes, of course. You can ask me anything. And you know quite well that I will always tell you the truth as I understand it – and as far as I know where truth lies.’
‘Where does the poem come from –
Ja! Ich weiß woher Ich stamme!
Ungesättigt gleich der Flamme –?’
He corrected her German pronunciation.
‘Stamme. That means ‘‘originate from’’, it’s a ‘‘sch’’ sound, not like ‘‘stammer’’ in English. Don’t you know it? Ecce Homo. It’s from Nietzsche.’
He recited the poem, just as it was written in the Guide.
Ja! Ich weiß woher Ich stamme!
Ungesättigt gleich der Flamme
Glühe und verzehr’ Ich mich.
Licht wird alles, was Ich fasse,
Kohle alles, was Ich lasse.
Flamme bin Ich sicherlich!
Yes, I know where I began!
Insatiable as flame
I glow and consume myself.
What I grasp turns to light,
What I leave becomes cinders.
I am surely flame!
‘I see you have been studying the Guide! I’d write it all down for you, but I don’t think I could translate it properly into French.’
‘Yes, I have been reading the mysterious book. But we haven’t yet cracked your code.’
She stared at her own toes; he laughed softly.
‘The language is only for initiates to know. But nothing would give me more joy than to teach you how to read that book.’
The day’s heat flowed over them both, like an incoming wave, yet as he spoke, her skin rose up against an inner gust of cold, peculiar, unforeseen, and a quick thread of fear passed through her. The instinct of self-preservation swirled in her stomach, bounded through her heart. I must never, never know these secrets. I must never understand his code. She sat up straight and looked at him. One of the cushions fell to her feet. But the Composer seemed unaware of her alarm. He leaned back, tranquil, languid, giving no sign that he had said anything disturbing or out of the ordinary.
‘Tell me,’ for now she risked everything, and the question was unpremeditated and therefore unprofessional, but her fear screamed within her: save yourself, save yourself, and the only safety that remained lay in knowing the scale of the monster before her, ‘what is the Faith?’
He took hold of both her hands and swung round to face her, the chair scrabbling the tiles; he looked straight into her eyes. She saw tiny flecks of hazel amidst the dangerous blue. She had never been so close to him. He did not raise his voice; there was neither urgency nor hesitation in his words, simply the desire to be as clear as possible.
‘The Faith is a way to live in this world and a doorway into the life to come. It is a very ancient pathway towards wisdom and has always existed in the margin of other faiths. This is not to say that the Faith, as you call it – for bien sûr it has another name, a secret name – is in any way derivative. Our teachings and the hidden knowledge we transmit are borne through the millennia by members of our people, who may well apparently be highly placed representatives of other monotheist religions: Judaism, Christianity or Islam. Sometimes we have been burned as heretics or traitors. We are engaged in a long search, like the Grail Knights, but we are also watchers, the people who remain awake while all else sleeps.
‘We are also known as the people of the dark, because in our mythology, which has been studied for hundreds of years, we follow the Dark Host, the charioteer, Auriga. You may have noticed the maps and charts of the night sky buried in the Guide. Auriga is easy to see in the northern sky because of Capella, the most northerly star of the first magnitude and the sixth brightest star in the night sky. You know that astronomers have always mapped the night skies; mariners have always used them to steer across the world. Those are our traditions, our inheritance. But Auriga possesses one intriguing characteristic. Within this cluster of stars are two eclipsing binaries. Do you understand this?’
The Judge held her breath and said nothing.
‘Well, one is Zeta Aurigae, the scientists now call this an orange giant – I rather like the term – which holds a smaller blue star in its orbit. The giant eclipses the blue star every 2.7 years. This causes the star to fade for a period of six weeks. But in the same constellation we see Epsilon Aurigae; the ancient Arabic name for this star, which we continue to use, is Almaaz. And this is what modern astronomers describe as an eclipsing binary star, for Almaaz has a mysterious dark partner, which we cannot see, but which eclipses the star every twenty-seven years. And the eclipse lasts for two years. This means that this giant star – it’s about two thousand light years away from the sun – is being eclipsed by something far greater than itself. But exactly what this dark companion is, we cannot know. My people call it the Dark Host. Astronomers think it may be another star veiled in dust. Perhaps one day we will know. The next eclipse will begin at the end of 2009.’
He paused; and all around him the bright day began, imperceptibly, to ebb, despite the throbbing cicadas and the windy heat. The Judge sensed the change at once, as if the Dark Presence he invoked seeped out of his words and infected the blaze of southern summer, muting the heat, softening the sounds, darkening the world. The wind stilled, dropped.
‘We only know of the existence of the Dark Host because of what it conceals. But we can hear this Dark Presence at the heart of the charioteer, whose horses’ heads are pointed towards eternity. We can record its voice.’
‘The thing speaks?’ The Judge had heard enough; her scorn gave her away. She pulled back from him, incredulous, and thrust her feet into her shoes. He shrugged, and smiled slightly, as if he had anticipated her reaction.
‘I am a musician, not an astronomer. You can ask Professor Linford at the Jodrell Bank Observatory in England. He is the world expert on Epsilon Aurigae. He seldom calls it Almaaz. He has been listening to the radio signals for decades and will tell you whether what I have said is true or not.’
‘So we’re being addressed by something in the stars?’ Her self-possession, now utterly restored, wrapped her away from him, and her voice rang out, taut, ironic, cold. The Composer never flinched, but faced her down.
‘Show me a little more respect, Dominique, and hear me out. We are part of everything that is. This is the voice of our own souls speaking to us, across infinite distances. Do you expect me to tell you about little green men and flying saucers? They don’t exist and never will do. We are all that there is, and the Great Mind speaks in us, through us.
‘We find the love of God in one another. Earth and heaven are locked together in the perpetual explosion of creation and eternity. All time is collapsed into the drama of a splintered second. We seem to follow our small lives like a thread, across the few years we possess, when we inhabit the kingdom of this w
orld, but inside every second here, within every moment that I stand before you – loving you more than you will ever be able to grasp – I touch the colossal space of endless night, die ewige Nacht of all eternity, where there is no loss, no grief, no churning time, only the endless night of union and joy, the moment that endures for ever, this moment that we can grasp now, with our bare hands. We are such lonely creatures: the poor, bare, fork’d animal, longing to be accompanied, to be comforted. That loneliness is an illusion; for we are surrounded, secured. You know – for it is written – that the very hairs of your head are all numbered. ‘‘Now therefore with angels and archangels and the whole company of heaven we laud and magnify your glorious name, evermore praising thee and saying Holy, Holy, Holy.’’ How many times have you spoken those words and neither understood nor believed them?
‘The people of the Faith belong among that company of heaven. We stand on both sides of the doorway; we are the guardians of the gateways and the crossroads.’
He spread out his great hands and bore down upon her like an accusing deity.
‘Look at me. Speak to me,’ he demanded.
‘I’m here. I’m listening,’ she snapped back.
‘I love you, Dominique Carpentier, and not just now, in this moment, and this life. But for all time and throughout all eternity.’
* * *
Gaëlle was pacified with two cream cakes when the Judge finally pattered back into the office at almost five o’clock. She kissed her Greffière on both cheeks and handed over the freshly baked bribes. Gaëlle grinned and kissed her back, and so peace reigned between them.
‘Any calls?’
‘Schweigen. Felt like every half-hour. He’s got info on the accounts.’
‘I’d better clear all this up.’
The accounts were still there, buried beneath the black straw hat. They sat down together.
The afternoon began to darken around them, that first shadow that the Judge had sensed beneath the white cupola lengthened and extended its grip upon the city and the surrounding land. They printed off all the material on the floppy discs and opened a new filing system for the financial records of the Faith. By seven they were almost finished, when a sudden power cut stopped them short. The Judge watched the green screen tremble and fade, then gave thanks for her mass of hard copies.
‘There’s something I don’t understand,’ said Gaëlle as they stood side by side at the window, looking out at the clammy black streets, pregnant with thunder and the coming storm. ‘Why are we so bothered with this mad sect? They don’t hurt anybody but themselves with their crazy suicide ceremonies. So far as we know they don’t embezzle funds or seduce children. And they only seem to murder their close friends. You say that they support all sorts of charities we’ve never heard of – to whom they’ll presumably leave all the cash. So why don’t we just let them kill themselves off?’
The Judge stood still, thinking hard. Then she said, ‘Écoute-moi bien, Gaëlle, I didn’t want to alarm you. You’re a young woman with your whole life ahead of you. The reason why I am so concerned with the people of the Faith is because I do not believe that we are dealing with just a suicide sect; they believe in the approaching Apocalypse. They are leaving the earth and taking their children with them. They think that the Apocalypse is imminent. No, I know what I’ve always said – plenty of people think that the Apocalypse is coming up tomorrow. Human beings are much given to signs and wonders. But the members of the Faith, or at least the ones I know about, are all highly placed in society. They aren’t misfits, dropouts, or women whose husbands don’t love them. The chief government adviser on the environment and global warming was in the Swiss departure. So were two scientists from the nuclear research station at Grenoble and the Director of Research in Astrophysics. How many of them are there? Who is still here? And what are they doing?’
Gaëlle clapped her hands over her mouth and gasped at her own stupidity.
‘You think they’re actually working towards that Apocalypse? You think they’ll try to make it happen?’
The Judge watched the first distant bolt of forked lightning dividing the sky and entering the earth. She wiped the sweat from her forehead and began to count.
‘I have no hard evidence, Gaëlle. I cannot be certain. But there is a pattern in the dates of their mass departures, and a trail of significance too exact and rational to be coincidence moving in the stars.’
She had calculated that the storm was still at least fifty kilometres distant, but her count proved too short. The cataclysm exploded over the mountains of Haut-Languedoc in a theatrical spectacle of white fire and black rain, far closer than she had allowed in her original calculations.
12
AGAPE: HEALING THROUGH LOVE
Within two days the third letter came. Postmark Avignon; presumably he was still occupied with the Festival. She stalked straight out of her kitchen and into the tiny office, the unread letter in her hand. The music programme slowly fluttered into focus on her screen: Beethoven’s Ninth, all tickets sold, returns only – scheduled for Saturday night. He was conducting a concert of his own music, also sold out, on Friday in the theatre. Was there any danger that he would liberate himself from rehearsals and appear upon her doorstep? Not unless he abandoned the orchestra. No, she was safe from arrivals and apparitions. She took a deep breath and opened the letter. Once more he had written in English.
My Dearest Dominique,
I must risk your anger at my impudence in addressing you thus, but I cannot wait. I am an impatient man. Yet in one thing I am like a woman – when my heart is full I must speak. And my heart is full of you. Please don’t think that I do not listen to you or understand you. I do. Your fame as ‘la chasseuse de sectes’ made it inevitable that you should be burdened with this terrible investigation. Yet I cannot wish the fault undone, because it has brought you to me. And I know, without your words, why you despise all religions and mistrust anyone in thrall to a great idea, or even a wild hope. You are someone who is utterly alone and your solitude is that of the truly independent spirit. You are the child sitting reading in the corner of the playground. You hold in absolute contempt the need of weaker people to belong to something greater than themselves. And you dislike anyone who longs to be told what to do and how to live. I have grasped this aspect of your ferocious character. But I am not only a composer; I am the conductor of an orchestra. An orchestra is one single, breathing, living thing, like a body that awaits its commands from the brain. Sometimes you must join together with others to create something greater than yourself. You must see that, Dominique. My music cannot exist without my musicians and my singers.
Please do not wilfully misunderstand me. For if you do you will misjudge me.
I must see you again. And very soon. I beg you to allow me to visit you. I will come wherever you suggest and agree to whatever conditions you wish to make. My commitments here end on Sunday and my assistant will take care of the orchestra. They have five days’ repose before we begin our rehearsals for Salzburg. Kilometres of Mozart, naturally. Please answer me. I beg you to answer me. So far as you are concerned I have no pride and no shame. I love you with all my heart and it is my greatest joy to tell you that this will always be so.
F.G.
The Judge misread ‘impudence’ for ‘imprudence’, looked up both words in her dictionary, and found herself unable to decide which defence would be the most suitable. Repose resembled ‘repos’, but seemed oddly archaic. She had never seen the word used in a letter, only in advertisements for sun loungers. She imagined the orchestra, lifeless and frozen like a vast modern sculpture, magnificent in repose, only to be summoned back into vitality by Mozart’s crescendos, limpid and demanding, a great bell, ringing across two hundred years. The Judge experienced no unease listening to Mozart. Mozart’s structures exuded logic and security. They represented no emotional threat; the mathematics of beauty did not disturb her. She had neither knowingly heard nor ever seen any of the operas.
‘Myriam? C’est Dominique à l’appareil.’
‘Salut, ma belle. You’ve caused quite a stir here. Marie-T never stops talking about you. Congratulations! She’s utterly bewitched. I thought she’d never smile again when her Maman went off so disgracefully. I know we shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, but let me tell you, now that the first wave of shock is past, there are some very angry people here, who don’t think too well of Madame Laval. I mean, how could she do it? Her son’s a monster and he might well inherit the estate. Did you see how he’s ruined the façade of the mas with his orange awnings? I’ve a mind to ring the Beaux-Arts. It’s a listed medieval building. What was it that you wanted, ma bibiche? When are you coming to see us again? Marie-T says you’ll be here next week.’
‘Next week?’
‘Mais oui, aren’t you here for the fête en l’honneur de l’orchestre on Sunday? Or were you coming on your own later in the week?’
The Judge invented a banal reason to rush, sent her best to Marie-T and rang off. She poured herself a powerful slug of bitter coffee and then sat quite still, looking at the phone. She was everywhere anticipated, expected, cornered, coerced. What course of action should she choose? As she drove into work, anxious and puzzled, she decided to do nothing. The best course of action, when surrounded by uncertainty, is always to do nothing. Watch, listen, wait. Let them declare their hand first, give themselves away, let them come to me. Gaëlle also sat looking at the phone, but she had her huge black watch, the strap covered in spikes, laid flat upon the desk, and a mysterious tally of figures and letters on a large white sheet before her.