One Station Away Page 12

  I played the record again only when they were out. That didn’t happen often, and I made sure I took it off before they came home. It was like in a cold war: they knew about my weapon, and that was good enough for me.

  That chapter would doubtless have been closed had my friends and I not walked down to the center of Allington at the beginning of August to buy some refreshments after football. The shop was in a square that had a jumble sale on Saturdays where you could pick up all sorts of things, including cheap, secondhand editions of the football magazine Shoot. We lingered there before going back to the pitch, drinking our Cokes and browsing through the magazines. As we were about to leave, I spotted some records next to fountain pens and picture frames. One of them caught my eye. It was Beethoven’s piano concertos played by Vladimir Ashkenazy with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.

  Before I knew it, I had parted with a pound and the record was in a plastic bag. I put it under my jumper while we were playing, and sneaked it up to my room when I got home. After dinner, I put it on the turntable, and played it all evening without interruption.

  Margaret wasn’t there the next morning at breakfast and Vincent was silent. I wolfed down my egg on toast and went out to play with my friends until the afternoon. When I got home the record had vanished and I never saw it again. Margaret was nowhere to be seen, and it was only when my father and I sat down to dinner that he told me she had gone away for a while. He waited for me to ask where, but I didn’t. I found out later that she had moved into a guesthouse in Cambridge, not far from the park. She stayed there until I left for St. Joseph’s two weeks later.

  Although I never discussed it with her, I kept thinking about those days when Malena and I got back from Iceland and she announced she was going to Buenos Aires to recuperate. She told me about a physical rehabilitation center for dancers and athletes where she had been twice before, once when as a child she suffered a torn ligament, and later when she sprained her ankle. “They work miracles there,” she told me, and her choice of words didn’t strike me as odd; people say these kinds of things. I asked if I should go with her, but she simply caressed my cheek, giving me a kiss as she thanked me and reminded me that I needed to attend to my own career. She didn’t want to be a burden to me, she said. That stayed with me, too.

  I took her to the airport, carried her bags from the taxi, and helped her check in. After saying good-bye, I watched her pass through the security gate, and waited for her to turn around, but she didn’t.

  Chapter 21

  A tiny tremor in the upper right eyelid, a slight but definite quiver.

  “Definite?”

  I was sitting at my desk, while Simone stood leaning against the book cabinet.

  “Yes, definite,” I replied. “I saw it with my own eyes. Not once but twice.”

  “When?”

  “Last night.”

  “Just you, not Anthony?”

  “Yes, just me.”

  We had started running tests on our patient that morning, first the CAT scan, then the MRI down in the basement. We needed the most precise information about the nature of the brain damage she had suffered, and Anthony was concerned there might be an occlusion or a potential rupture, but I was convinced the woman’s injuries were restricted to the brain stem, and that she was otherwise fully conscious and able to think clearly.

  “Convinced?” Simone demurred.

  “I see no reason not to be,” I said.

  “So you mean she doesn’t even have a bruise or any other short-term problems.”

  She resented the fact that I hadn’t told Anthony to consult with her, and I sensed she was dying to remind me that my judgment hadn’t been exactly reliable recently. Simone can be merciless when she feels affronted, and I was fully expecting her to bring up the two patients from Boston at any moment. I thought I could read it on her face as she stood leaning against the cabinet, arms folded, staring at me.

  “I never went,” I blurted out.

  “What?”

  “To Boston. I never went.”

  She raised her eyebrows, but then she gradually understood.

  “I didn’t examine either patient, and the second time I didn’t even make it out of bed.”

  I neither lowered my gaze nor bowed my head as I made my confession, but rather looked her straight in the eye and spoke as clearly as I could.

  “Why . . . ?”

  “I couldn’t handle it,” I said before she finished her sentence. “I couldn’t handle anything.”

  She looked down.

  “Why didn’t you ask me to go?”

  I couldn’t answer that question, not properly, not in a way that would make her feel better. So I said nothing, and silence descended between us until she quietly walked out.

  Among other things, the tests revealed that the new patient was severely concussed. The cortex showed signs of bruising, but there were no occlusions or ruptures in the middle artery. However, there was clear tissue damage in the brain stem, although we couldn’t tell how serious from our initial examination.

  Anthony went over the results with Simone, the nursing staff, and me. I affirmed how pleased I was that everything seemed to support the theory that the young woman was locked in her own body, fully conscious, although unable to move or speak. I praised Anthony for a job well done, and said this boded well for our research, adding that we could soon start trying to make contact with her. Anthony lapped up the praise and agreed with my conclusions, and the two of us rose to our feet as if there were nothing more to say.

  Simone had listened in silence while we were talking, an impassive expression on her face, but now she cleared her throat. We were almost at the door.

  “I’d like to look at the images,” she said.

  She offered no explanation, but it was clear that she had some reservations. Anthony and I stopped in our tracks, and I could see him bridle at her overbearing tone. She was trying my patience, too, and I was tempted to tell her that, but thought better of it. Instead, I was about to say something about two pairs of eyes being better than one, but she spoke first.

  “Has the patient shown any response?”

  Anthony looked at me and then shook his head.

  “But she opened her eyes before she came to us,” he said, “and Magnus saw a tremor in her eyelid, which you already know.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  Silence. Anthony thought she was criticizing him and frowned but said nothing. He didn’t realize her anger was directed at me, not him.

  I decided to put an end to the conversation, and said with as much calm as I could muster:

  “Have a look at the images, then we’ll compare notes.”

  When I stepped into my office, a small package was waiting for me. It was wrapped in brown paper and I recognized Vincent’s ornate, flamboyant handwriting. It had been more legible when he was younger, but it was shaky now and not easy to decipher. He had asked for my business card at my mother’s birthday party and had copied what was on it, making sure he underlined my title, Assistant Professor, Cognitive Neuroscience and Imaging, with a different color pen. To anyone else he would undoubtedly have seemed like a proud father, and yet I remembered only too well all the business cards he had made when I was a boy. They had bristled with titles, too.

  I was taking the packaging off when Anthony walked in.

  “What on earth is the matter with her?” he said, closing the door behind him.

  “She’s annoyed with me,” I said. “Don’t worry about it.”

  I didn’t want to talk to him about Simone, who, in spite of everything, is extremely dear to me, and so I quickly changed the subject. The contents of the package provided me with the perfect excuse: two CDs, one of them double. Liszt and Schubert, just as my father had promised. Both had my mother’s photograph on the front, hand cupping her cheek.

  “This is for you,” I said, passing him one of the CDs.

  He gave a start.

  “Liszt,” he said, and s
tarted to read aloud from the back. “‘Gnomenreigen, Liebstraum, Funerailles . . .’”

  I was about to hand him the Schubert as well, but I pulled back. Perhaps he noticed the gesture, because he stopped reading and looked up.

  “Schubert,” I said. “You can have him, too. After the weekend.”

  He thanked me, and yet I could sense he was going to find waiting for the Schubert difficult. He glanced at the CD in my hand, then caught hold of himself, slipped the Liszt into his pocket, and told me he would listen to it as soon as he got home. Right now the tests were waiting; he would tell me how things were going at the end of the day.

  “And don’t forget to make sure Simone has access to the images,” I said.

  At midday, I interviewed some medical students applying for an internship, and afterward Hofsinger and I met with the other heads of department to discuss budgets and related matters. The meeting was long and I found it hard to concentrate, although I think I succeeded in not letting that show.

  At five o’clock, when I finally had a free moment, I hung my lab coat over the back of the chair and walked down to the village. There were people sitting at tables outside the café, warmly dressed to be sure, and the doors to the restaurant were open while inside waiters were setting the tables for dinner. In the window of the drugstore a revolution had taken place: instead of the faded Old Spice poster, there was now sunscreen lotion and a picture of children flying a kite. The old perfume bottles remained along with the dried flowers, and yet to me it felt as if everything had been turned upside down.

  I walked quickly to the appliance store next to the supermarket. Of the two stereo systems the sales assistant showed me, he recommended the one that was more compact, weighed less, and had a radio as well as a CD player.

  I walked back along the shore, and although I couldn’t help thinking about the day Malena took the train up and we walked down to the beach and then into the village where we stopped outside the café, I felt fine.

  I had been gone longer than I intended. It was after six when I returned to my office and the corridors were quiet, most of the staff having gone home. Anthony had been looking for me, and when he couldn’t find me had sent an e-mail instead. He said that the tests hadn’t revealed anything new, but would resume tomorrow. He was on his way home to listen to my mother.

  It was still bright outside and the lights hadn’t yet been switched on. The room was silent apart from the hum of the ventilator. Although the patient lay like an effigy on the bed, I felt that she was aware when I opened the door and walked in. I coughed gently.

  “You’ve had a busy day,” I said.

  I walked over to the bed and studied her face in the twilight. Her features seemed sharper, but I told myself I must be imagining it. I spoke to her about the tests and told her to be patient, this was a lengthy process, but she could be sure that we were on the right track. I was about to ask her to try to move her eyelid, but changed my mind. It wasn’t fair to burden her with that after all the tests she had undergone that day.

  I took her hand and stroked it without saying anything before plugging in the stereo system and opening my mother’s CD.

  “I hope you like this music,” I said to her as I pressed the play button.

  I listened for a while. The music floated around the room, enveloping us, merging with the darkness, transmitting beauty and calm. I walked back over to the bed and looked at her. All of a sudden, it was as though her expression had changed, as though some inner light had surfaced.

  “I know you can hear,” I said, clasping her hand. “I can see it in your face.”

  I would probably have stood beside her bed until the last strains had died down had one of the night nurses not entered the room.

  We exchanged a few words, then he turned his attentions to the patient, checked the monitors, adjusted the pillows under her head. I asked him not to switch the music off, said good night to them both, and closed the door quietly behind me.

  Chapter 22

  Before leaving home, I grabbed the rental agreement I had received over a month ago. The old lease had expired and the owner was planning to raise the rent to market prices. I thought this was perfectly fair and intended to sign the document and send it back to him, but hadn’t gotten around to it. I had been wondering whether it might not be healthier for me to move, to break away from all the memories that lived with me in that apartment. I had pretty much decided to make the leap, but that was before I started feeling better. Now I was of two minds, and as the train wove its way through the Bronx, I began to read through the contract. It was a boilerplate agreement, but I couldn’t really concentrate. I was thinking about the tremor in her eyelid.

  Monsieur Chaumont brought up the subject of the new contract when I met him on the stairs over the weekend. I didn’t tell them about Malena’s death until a month after it happened, purposely avoiding them. Madame Roullard had left four or five messages on my answering machine (in French, naturally), but I was in no state to return her calls. She had knocked on my door twice as well, but I didn’t trust myself to let her in, and was content to look through the peephole instead. It was only when I ran into them outside the house that I told them the news. I was on my way out and they were arriving home. I was brief and then hurried away.

  Monsieur Chaumont was outraged by the new contract. He was very excitable, and spoke about injustice and robbery, told me also how thieves had broken into the apartment of a fellow countryman and stolen two hundred euros which he kept in an envelope in the fridge. I couldn’t see how that was relevant, and not wishing to draw out the conversation, I didn’t ask.

  “Aren’t you going to contest it?” he asked. “Shouldn’t we join forces?”

  “I’m afraid I’ve already signed it,” I lied.

  He was disappointed, but before we parted he said to me:

  “Madame Roullard has just written a poem about Malena. She misses her. It’s very moving.”

  The contract didn’t take long to read when I finally put my mind to it, and after reflecting for a moment when I reached my office I signed it, stuck a stamp on the envelope, and put it in the mail. At ten o’clock I met Hofsinger and gave him the gist of the tests Anthony had done on Adela, made sure I sounded moderately optimistic but didn’t promise too much. He posed all the predictable questions, and was pleased when I replied that so far we hadn’t discovered any cause for concern.

  Then he asked: “Why do you call the patient Adela?”

  I explained that she had acquired the name at the hospital in New Mexico.

  “I don’t approve of allotting arbitrary names like that,” he replied.

  I said I knew what he meant, and that I didn’t think the name suited her, either.

  He appeared baffled by my choice of words, but said nothing and instead looked at the report.

  “I shall refer to her as patient number two hundred and twelve.”

  I nodded. Before taking my leave I mentioned Osborne and Moreau. We hadn’t told them about her and perhaps it was time we did, I said.

  “No, let’s wait,” he said. “As we should have done on the last two occasions.”

  Patient number two hundred and twelve had been taken for tests when I looked in on her. However, the stereo was in its place, though switched off. I opened it to make sure the CD was still in there before closing it again and pressing play.

  I was surprised that the music should touch me as deeply as it did. I had arranged to meet Simone at eleven o’clock but realized the time only when I was already a quarter of an hour late. Then I hurried out, but the music stayed with me, as did the memories and doubts it had awakened. Why had I never allowed myself to feel the mournful tenderness of my mother’s playing, the boldness with which she tackled fear and despair? I was more familiar with the music than I had realized, for she had often practiced Schubert’s piano concertos, but perhaps I hadn’t listened to them properly before now. Or been too young. Could that be the explanation?

>   Simone wasn’t in her office but had left a note on my desk asking me to e-mail her when I was free. I sat at the computer and was about to tell her to come by when it occurred to me to open the website Anthony had introduced me to. I wanted to see whether there were any new posts about Margaret, assuming it wouldn’t take me long to read them.

  It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say that over the past few days the posts about the Mephisto Waltzes had increased tenfold, and in addition a passionate debate about my mother’s interpretation of Liszt was taking place. I could see that Anthony’s name figured prominently as he led the discussion for the most part. In his first post, from ten o’clock the previous evening, he said he had listened to the CD three times and was still euphoric. He spoke of Margaret’s intuition, clarity, and perfect balance, her search for beauty and transcendence, the profound stillness concealed between the notes, imbuing them with meaning and intensity. He started his review with the words: “I am honored to be among the first to write about Margaret C. Bergs’s interpretation of Liszt . . .” and though I couldn’t help smiling at his need to draw attention to himself, my amusement was soon replaced by an odd mixture of gratitude and remorse, which had been eating away at me lately.

  When one forum member ventured to suggest that Jorge Bolet had at least done an equally good job of interpreting Liszt’s work, especially in his 1972 recording, which had just been rediscovered in the RCA archives, Anthony was quick to respond. His comment was posted at two in the morning, and this time he declared that he had just listened to the CD five times in a row and was convinced it was a masterpiece. “I feel I could be hearing Liszt himself play, so lucid is the interpretation, so pure and unpretentious, free of the need some musicians have to impose themselves to the detriment of the composer.”

  On the next page were some reviews of the Mephisto Waltzes from respected magazines and websites such as Gramophone, International Piano, MusicWeb, and Classics Today, along with articles from several newspapers. The reviews were all positive but only a taste of what was to come. I read them from beginning to end—they were all to the point—then clicked on the link to my father and his partner’s company and bought five copies of each CD.