Parallax View (9 page)

She noticed a woman, sitting across from her at another window booth. She was in her mid-thirties, her features plain and undistinctive, her clothing casual. Every so often this woman had glanced over the glossy pages of her
Cosmopolitan
at Mae: not the familiar look of one who has recognized the famous – this was more discreet, more purposeful.

As the truth dawned, Mae felt her brief sense of release being dragged away. She should have expected it: even here, they were watching her.

That afternoon, following the routine they had established, Mae went to the drawing room. As ever, she had no idea which Jonathan would await her, where he would be on the spectrum from nervous and confused to brash and passionate.

He was bent over his large pad, scribbling notes as fast as he could.

“Hello.” He barely glanced up at the sound of her voice. She went across to the windows and looked out, waiting.

Finally, out of the corner of her eye, she saw him look up. There was an expression of triumph on his face, but it was rapidly replaced by uncertainty, caution.

“Is it ready?” she asked quietly.

“I... No. Not quite.”

But it must be close, she could tell. She took the manuscript from his hands and placed it on the piano. As she studied the notes, she saw that he must have worked through the night: the entire opening movement had been transformed so that now it suddenly pulled together everything that was to follow, drawing the listener in, tantalising, entrancing.

She took a deep breath, then started to play.

It was even better than she had anticipated: she would never have believed it possible to craft a piece such as this from that which had preceded it.

She remembered Ventori’s words: that to show influence was no bad thing, that merely to be
good
was original enough. This sonata was still decidedly Beethoven, but now it was more than
just
Beethoven, it was as if Jonathan had added something of himself to the piece, something personal.

When she had finished she sat slumped at the piano, the last note still suspended in the air. Finally, she turned to Jonathan. “It is magnificent,” she said. She realised that she was crying.

Jonathan opened his eyes and looked at her. He reached out and took her hands in his. “I thought I had lost it,” he said. “Or... or I never knew I had it. I don’t know.”

Impetuously, Mae leaned forward and kissed him on the cheek. His mood was still subdued. She did not know what to do.

Tentatively, she extracted her hands and held them poised over the black and white keys of the Steinway. She played the first subdued notes of “Appassionata”, the most intensely personal of Beethoven’s piano sonatas.

Jonathan rose abruptly and walked across to the French windows. Suddenly, he hauled them open and started to run.

Mae stopped in dismay. Soon, Jonathan’s figure was tiny, reduced in perspective like a character on TV. Gradually, it dawned on her how crass she had been. By playing this piece she could have been implying that Jonathan was still a copyist, or that no matter how good he was he could never approach the master. How cruel and unthinking to confront him – at the climax of his own creativity – with proven genius!

She went and stood on the lawn, staring down at Jonathan’s retreating form. For a moment, the old barriers were up: she should shut herself off, retreat, hide her weaknesses.

With an almighty shudder she started to run, following Jonathan.

She reached the lake and paused to regain her breath. For a moment she had lost sight of him, then she saw that he was lingering in a small stand of trees, watching her. She composed herself, then walked across to join him.

For a long time they stood in silence, staring out across the coruscating expanse of water.

“That tune,” he said, then stopped.

Beethoven did not write
tunes
, she wanted to say, but she stopped herself. “Beethoven,” she said, instead. “I meant...” She did not know what she had meant – some kind of compliment, she hoped.

Jonathan looked puzzled. “Beethoven,” he repeated. It was as if the name was new to him.

Mae reached out and took his hand. “Come along,” she said, backing away from him like a child pulling at a kite. “Come and listen.”

He sat next to her on the piano stool with his eyes closed, just as he had before. All the time she played, he did not move.

When she had finished, he opened his eyes. The blankness in his gaze frightened her for a moment, then he turned and kissed her.

This time she did not pull away, did not resist. She liked the feel of him against her, his almost animal smell. She liked his hands on her body, the sensations he stirred deep inside her.

Some time later, they lay together in his bedroom, clinging to each other like the sole survivors of some terrible shipwreck.

In the morning, she left him to his work. “The piece is finished,” she told him, but he would not accept that it was. She asked Ventori for the car to take her into town again.

As the car swept down the drive and joined the main road, Mae caught a glimpse of an open-topped MG pulled up in a gateway. The Mercedes accelerated and Mae turned in her seat: the MG was following closely enough for her to see that the driver was the plain woman she had noticed in town the previous day.

Mae climbed out in the town centre. They could follow her if they liked. She made her way straight to the McDonalds. Junk food, TV and pop music were her vices. She ordered Coke and fries and went to sit by the window.

A short time later, the woman entered and to Mae’s surprise approached her booth.

She seemed nervous. “We must talk.”

Mae maintained a neutral expression. “About?”

“About what’s going on at the chateau.”

Mae was taken aback. She gestured at the seat opposite and the woman lowered herself into it. “Aren’t you...” She stopped. She had clearly been mistaken. “I thought you were working for PK Syntronics.”

“Me?” The woman was clearly surprised at the suggestion. “I thought
you
were working for them.”

Mae hesitated. “I have been hired by them,” she said. “But I am not in the company’s employment, as such. I am a pianist.
I–”

“I know,” said the woman. “You’re Mae Chang. I have your ‘Liebesträume’. I recognized you.” She paused, then added, “I’m sorry: I know who you are, but I still haven’t explained who I am.” She smiled, nervously. “My name is Isabelle Graves. I’m looking for someone – I hoped you might be able to help.”

Isabelle Graves
. Mae struggled to keep her face blank. Hiding her weakness. “Who are you looking for?” she asked in a small voice.

“My husband,” said Isabelle. “His name is Jonathan. I believe he is at the Chateau d’Arouet. Have you, by any chance, met him?”

Mae swallowed, remembered the Press labels: be inscrutable! “Yes,” she said. “Jonathan is at the chateau. I am working with him on his new sonata.”

“His
sonata
?” Isabelle looked startled. “Jonathan?”

Mae nodded, keeping her eyes averted.

“But Jonathan has never written a note of music in his life. I mean, he loves music, of course, but he can’t even play a kazoo.” She was silent for a moment, studying Mae closely. “Can you tell me what’s going on out there? Why all this secrecy?”

“What do you mean?”

“Jonathan is a cultural historian. His research has been funded by PK Syntronics for three years – first on a rolling six month contract, then, in May, they extended it to five years. I last saw him over a month ago. He told me he was going away for a short period, that it was top secret. He was on a big bonus, he said, but I knew there was more to it than that: there was something that had hooked his interest. I knew it was no good opposing him. But I thought he’d at least keep in touch with me.”

“You heard nothing?”

Isabelle shook her head. “I only found out where they’ve put him by breaking into his work files at home. I want to know what’s going on, why all the mystery?”

Mae shook her head. “I really don”t know,” she said. “Your husband has written a magnificent piece of music, in the early Romantic style. I rehearse it with him and hope, one day, to be allowed to record it.” She decided not to worry the woman with the fact that her husband had no memory of her, or of his life outside the chateau.

Isabelle sighed. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have bothered you. You must get hassled all the time.” Then she smiled. “I don’t know why I’ve left it so late, in any case: he’ll be back in three days.”

The announcement shocked Mae. She reminded herself that her contract was only for one week. But how could Jonathan return to England in his current aberrant mental state?

She glanced at her watch. “I’m sorry,” she said, hurriedly. “I must be getting back. Excuse me, please.”

“Of course. One thing: is Jonathan keeping well?”

Looking down at the table again, Mae nodded. “Yes. Yes, he’s fine.”

She turned away, went out into the street, her expression blank.

That night, she stayed with Jonathan again, feeling a new kind of guilt, of betrayal.

She pushed her fingers through the tangles of his hair and whispered, “Can you remember
anything
from before the chateau?”

In the pale moonlight, she saw Jonathan’s brow crease. The man she loved. All afternoon and evening she had fought to hide from him the pain she felt inside. “Anything?” she repeated, hoping that, in a flash, he would recall his previous life, that he had never been married and Isabelle had been lying.

“Like a dream, half-forgotten as you wake,” he said. “Even as you try to grasp the shards of memory they flee, become indistinct. Some faces, I recall. Buildings... a cobbled square and the tall spire of a magnificent church or cathedral.” He shook his head. “I know I have recalled other snippets at other times, but it never slots together. Before I was here, before I had you, Mae, I was not a complete person.”

He turned to her, stroked her cheek. “The past is gone,” he said. “The present is what is important. And the future.”

Mae pressed her face into his chest, trying to hide her agony.

For the next two days they were inseparable. Even when Jonathan composed, Mae sat quietly in the room, watching him, loving him. She wanted to store every moment they shared so that she might fill the long days ahead with these memories.

He finished the sonata, although he would not admit it, had to keep tinkering, making changes he would later undo.

Whenever she could, Mae tried to get hold of Ventori, only to be told by whoever she found that he was unavailable but would speak to her at the earliest opportunity. Finally, she tackled a woman who had been watching them from the observation room.

“Tell Dr Ventori I must see him,” Mae demanded. “He brought me here under false pretences and I have reason to believe he has done the same – if not worse – to Mr Graves. If these circumstances are made public I can make sure PK Syntronics’ reputation is dragged through the shit! Do you hear me?”

The woman was clearly stunned by Mae’s onslaught. “Dr Ventori will be back tomorrow,” she said. “He cannot see you before then.”

Mae smiled. “Is it true that Mr Graves is leaving tomorrow?”

The woman nodded. “That’s right,” she confirmed. “Tomorrow afternoon.”

That night Jonathan seemed amused by her passion, concerned at her tears. “Mae,” he said. “Mae. What’s troubling you?”

She lay her head on his chest, so close to telling him – of his wife, of the inevitable awfulness of the world – but she knew that would be cruel. There was nothing she could do about it.

The following morning Mae played the finished sonata all the way through and it was the performance of a lifetime. Afterwards, she smiled at Jonathan through her tears.

Ventori arrived at noon, accompanied by two medics. “Time for some more therapy,” he told Jonathan.

Jonathan was studying Mae’s carefully composed features. “Mae?” he said, clearly sensing something amiss.

She made herself smile, said, “See you at dinner, Jonathan, my love.” In silence, she watched him pass from the room.

When he had gone, she turned to Ventori. “Tell me the truth,” she said. “I have met his wife.”

He was visibly surprised by that: a chink in his otherwise meticulous planning.

“I apologise for the subterfuge,” said Ventori. “But I believe it was necessary: you would never even have listened to me if I had asked you to come and work with Beethoven. I had to offer you what you wanted: peace, escape, refuge.”

“But...” How could Jonathan
be
Beethoven?

“Mr Graves is a historical research technician with PK Syntronics. He was working as part of a team studying the memetic patterns of Beethoven’s work when he was selected for his current role. Musicologists identified the recurrent themes and patterns of Beethoven’s work, the individual techniques and variations which are uniquely his own: his memes, to use the jargon. Historical psychologists studied the man himself: the key points in his life, his influences, what made him function as an individual different from all others. When all of these elements have been broken down to their essential units – quantised, if you like – it is possible to reconstruct from them a functional model of an individual’s creative processes.”

Mae interrupted him. “But that has been done already,” she said. “What about Lennon, Gershwin, Marley?” These programmed simulacra had been churning out material commercially for at least five years – Bowie’s latest opera was created in collaboration with his own memetic model. A new Lennon song was identifiably John Lennon, but it was never really
Lennon
.

Ventori nodded, as if pleased with the progress of a troublesome pupil. “But never before has such a finely detailed simulacra been produced,” he said. “Never before has such a model been programmed into a volunteer’s brain by a carefully executed programme of eidetic instruction. Where the earlier models you mention have been no more than simulations, for the past month Jonathan has
been
Beethoven in every sense but the physical – he has been driven by the same drives, his thoughts and behaviour shaped by the same psychological influences, he has been equipped with the same musical vocabulary...”