Russka - Edward Rutherfurd [486]
And then his mother came.
If there was any consequence of his accident that Dimitri would never have foreseen, it was that it would change his view of Rosa. What had she been to him until then? The loving mother who had helped him take his first steps in music; the woman who adored his father; the selfless, strangely sad figure who worried incessantly about her husband and her son. She did not look well when she arrived. Her large eyes were haggard. Her black hair was streaked with grey, and because it was both thick and long the effect was to make her seem unkempt. He loved her but felt sorry for her, because she could not be happy.
It was Vladimir who revealed another side of her. ‘You must rest, now you are here, Rosa,’ he urged. ‘And,’ he added firmly, ‘you must play. We cannot allow this young man to be without music.’ And to Dimitri’s great surprise, the very next day, she began to do so.
How strange it was. He had never heard her play before. He had known that once she had played. Often, when he was younger, she would help him over a few bars here and there, where he ran into difficulties, and from this he knew that she had considerable technique. But for some reason she would never sit down and play. Now, however, hesitantly at first, she began to do so: simple pieces the first day or two. Then a Beethoven sonata or two. Then pieces by Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov and other Russians. She would play for an hour, then two, her face sometimes frowning with amusement as she asked her fingers to perform tasks they had not done in years, sometimes smiling gently. And as he listened, Dimitri was more and more astonished. She is formidable, he thought. A major talent. He could hear it coming through in every phrase. By the fifth day, the transformation in Rosa was astonishing. It was as if she had shed her sad persona like an unwanted skin. She had drawn her hair back more tightly, so that it no longer seemed untidy. Fresh air and several nights sleep had relaxed her face and smoothed out the lines. Now she threw her head back in calm triumph as the Beethoven ‘Appassionata’ flowed like a wave from her fingers. And often Vladimir stood beside her.
‘I never knew you played like that,’ Dimitri remarked one day; and almost added: ‘Or that you were so beautiful.’
‘There are many things you do not know,’ she replied gaily, and strolled out, with a laugh, on to the verandah with Vladimir and Nadezhda.
And then, just as suddenly, it ended. It was a sunny afternoon. Rosa had been there ten days. The day before, Vladimir had brought her the scores of some studies by his favourite of all the Russians composing just then, the brilliant Scriabin. They were wonderful pieces, as delicate and measured as a Chopin prelude, as haunting as one of the Russian Symbolist poems of Alexander Blok. Rosa was playing them while Vladimir basked in an easy chair, a seraphic smile on his face. And unusually Dimitri had fallen asleep.
Rosa had stopped playing when he began to awaken, and Vladimir was standing beside her at the piano. They obviously imagined he was still asleep, and though they were speaking in low tones, he heard most of their words distinctly.
‘You cannot go on. I’ve been telling you for three years.’ His uncle’s baritone voice, gently persuasive. ‘I can’t bear to see it.’
‘There’s nothing to be done. But, Volodya …’ Dimitri had never heard anyone use this diminutive form of his uncle’s name before. ‘Volodya, I’m so afraid.’
‘You need sleep, my little dove. Stop tormenting yourself. At least stay with me here a while.’ Vladimir paused, apparently to think. ‘I have to go to Berlin and Paris next spring. Come with me. We can go to one of the spas for a health cure. I think you know you will be safe with me.’
Dimitri stared, his eyes wide open. He saw his