The Metropolis Case_ A Novel - Matthew Gallaway [155]
INSPIRED BY THE thought of meeting her son like this, she wanted to sing, and with no cause for restraint, took a last, deep breath and delivered her final aria. She opened on a full, sumptuous C-natural before nimbly sliding up the scale to land on an unwavering F-sharp that would have been at home at the nearby Metropolitan Opera. She nailed it, and even better, she knew it. Her thoughts turned to Maria, who was making her debut in Bayreuth, and as Anna sustained her F-sharp, she knew that, just as she could hear Maria, at this second finishing her Liebestod, Maria could hear her, and for the last time they embraced.
Professional that she was, Anna projected the novelty of the experience, the way time slowed as Death teased her forward with the most sensuous caress, so that each of these final seconds seemed an eternity, while her life to that point—all eighty-two years—seemed no more than a second. She took a moment to acknowledge the appreciative nods of the many classically trained musicians who in the midst of their unemployed wanderings on the Upper West Side recognized a final performance of one of their own, a fellow obsessive who had spent a lifetime on scales and arpeggios, and who to her eternal credit had not choked or clutched in this farewell.
The sound of her voice made her pause; she knew its allure stemmed not only from her superb technique but also from its ephemeral nature, which made its brilliance that much brighter. She felt all of her wants—for this man, for Maria, for the manuscript, for the city, for the grand opera itself—give way to calm resignation. Her faith both lost and restored, she stepped back from the canvas of her life and like a master painter made some minor adjustments, dabbing here and there in a state of mindless serenity, not unaware of her fast-approaching death, but not particularly bothered as she entered a last, blissful trance, confident that her voice was an endless ripple in the sea of time.
43
In Distortion-Free Mirrors
NEW YORK CITY, 2002. The day was perfectly clear, but as Maria looked back over the harbor at the Twin Towerless skyline, she almost wished that Linda had scheduled Anna’s memorial at night—or better, in the fog—when it might have been easier to ignore such a stark reminder of loss. Still, she was relieved to be on the water, which at least gave her the opportunity to think for a few minutes, something that, between getting back to New York and helping Linda plan this event, hadn’t happened since long before Bayreuth. Even—or especially—now, with her thoughts on Anna, the memory of her Bayreuth Isolde made her smile; it had been a preposterous night, on which so many disasters had somehow, miraculously, added up to the best performance of her career. She considered the guests milling about on the decks below and realized that she was looking forward to singing for Anna, to saying good-bye properly. She saw Leo Metropolis, whom she had made sure to invite, knowing that he was in New York. He had mentioned this after the show—before she got the call about Anna—and suggested that they meet, a proposition to which she had been more than amenable; even after the performance, she wished there could have been more time to talk—she wanted to ask how much of their conversation at Juilliard he remembered—but there had been a swarm of patrons and management—all of whom seemed to need reassurance that the performance was in fact as great as Maria knew it had been