Mary Westmacott - Giant's Bread

He heard her voice behind him – a singer’s voice, slightly husky.

‘Good night, Sebastian. Thank you.’

She moved towards the door, looked over her shoulder at Vernon.

‘Come and see me some time,’ she said carelessly. ‘Your cousin has got my address.’

Jane Harding had a flat at the top of a block of mansions overlooking the river in Chelsea.

Here, on the evening following the party, came Sebastian Levinne.

‘I’ve fixed it up, Jane,’ he said. ‘Radmaager is coming here to see you some time tomorrow. He prefers to do that, it seems.’

‘ Come, tell me how you live, he cried ,’ quoted Jane. ‘Well, I’m living very nicely and respectably, entirely alone! Do you want something to eat, Sebastian?’

‘If there is anything?’

‘There are scrambled eggs and mushrooms, anchovy toast and black coffee if you’ll sit here peaceably while I get them.’

She put the cigarette box and the matches beside him and left the room. In a quarter of an hour, the meal was ready.

‘I like coming to see you, Jane,’ said Sebastian. ‘You never treat me as a bloated young Jew to whom only the flesh pots of the Savoy would make appeal.’

Jane smiled without speaking.

Presently she said: ‘I like your girl, Sebastian.’

‘Joe?’

‘Yes, Joe.’

Sebastian said gruffly: ‘What – what do you really think of her?’

Again Jane paused before answering.

‘So young,’ she said at last. ‘So terribly young.’

Sebastian chuckled.

‘She’d be very angry if she heard you.’

‘Probably.’ After a minute she said: ‘You care for her very much, don’t you, Sebastian?’

‘Yes. It’s odd, isn’t it, Jane, how little all the things you’ve got matter? I’ve got practically all the things I want, except Joe, and Joe is all that matters. I can see what a fool I am, but it doesn’t make a bit of difference! What’s the difference between Joe and a hundred other girls? Very little. And yet she’s the only thing in the world that matters to me just now.’

‘Partly because you can’t get her.’

‘Perhaps. But I don’t think that’s so entirely.’

‘Neither do I.’

‘What do you think of Vernon?’ asked Sebastian, after a pause.

Jane changed her position, shading her face from the fire.

‘He’s interesting,’ she said slowly, ‘partly, I think, because he is so completely unambitious.’

‘Unambitious, do you think?’

‘Yes. He wants things made easy.’

‘If so, he’ll never do anything in music. You want driving power for that.’

‘Yes, you want driving power. But music will be the power that drives him !’

Sebastian looked up, his face alight and appreciative.

‘Do you know, Jane?’ he said. ‘I believe you’re right!’

She smiled but made no answer.

‘I wish I knew what to make of the girl he’s engaged to,’ said Sebastian.

‘What is she like?’

‘Pretty. Some people might call it lovely – but I’d call it pretty. She does the things that other people do, and does them very sweetly. She’s not a cat. I’m afraid – yes, I am afraid now, that she definitely cares for Vernon.’

‘You needn’t be afraid. Your pet genius won’t be turned aside or held down. That doesn’t happen. I’m more than ever sure, every day I live, that that doesn’t happen.’

‘Nothing would turn you aside, Jane, but then you have got driving power.’

‘And yet, do you know, Sebastian, I believe I should be more easily “turned aside” as you call it, than your Vernon? I know what I want and go for it – he doesn’t know what he wants, or rather doesn’t want it, but it goes for him … And that It whatever It is, will be served – no matter at what cost.’

‘Cost to whom?’

‘Ah! I wonder …’

Sebastian rose.

‘I must go. Thanks for feeding me, Jane.’

‘Thank you for what you’ve done for me with Radmaager. You’re a very good friend, Sebastian. And I don’t think success will ever spoil you.’

‘Oh! success –’ He held out his hand.

She laid both hands on his shoulders and kissed him.

‘My dear, I hope you will get your Joe. But if not I am quite sure you will get everything else!’

Herr Radmaager did not come to see Jane Harding for nearly a fortnight. He arrived without warning of any kind at half-past ten in the morning. He stumped into the flat without a word of apology and looked round the walls of the sitting-room.

‘It is you who have furnished and papered this? Yes?’

‘Yes.’

‘You live here alone?’

‘Yes.’

‘But you have not always lived alone?’

‘No.’

Radmaager said unexpectedly:

‘That is good.’

Then he said commandingly:

‘Come here.’

He took her by both arms, and drew her towards the window. There he looked her over from head to foot. He pinched the flesh of her arm between finger and thumb, opened her mouth and looked down her throat, and finally put a large hand on each side of her waist.

‘Breathe in – good! Now out – sharply.’

He took a tape measure out of his pocket, made her repeat the two movements, passing the tape measure round her each time. Finally he pocketed it and put it away. Neither he nor Jane seemed to see anything curious in the proceedings.

‘It is well,’ said Radmaager. ‘Your chest is excellent, your throat is strong. You are intelligent – since you have not interrupted me. I can find many singers with a better voice than yours – your voice is very true, very beautiful – very clear, a silver thread. But if you force it, it will go – and where will you be then, I ask you? The music you sing now is absurd – if you were not pig-headed as the devil you would not sing those roles. Yet I respect you because you are an artist.’

He paused, then went on:

‘Now listen to me. My music is beautiful and it will not hurt your voice. When Ibsen created Solveig, he created the most wonderful woman character that has ever been created. My opera will stand and fall by its Solveig – and it is not sufficient to have a singer. There are Cavarossi – Mary Wontner – Jeanne Dorta – all hope to sing Solveig. But I will not have it. What are they? Unintelligent animals with marvellous vocal cords. For my Solveig I must have a perfect instrument, an instrument with intelligence. You are a young singer – as yet unknown. You shall sing at Covent Garden next year in my Peer Gynt if you satisfy me. Now listen …’

He sat down at Jane’s piano and began to play – queer rhythmic monotonous notes …

‘It is the snow, you comprehend – the northern snow. That is what your voice must be like – the snow. It is white like damask – and the pattern runs through it. But the pattern is in the music, not in your voice.’

He went on playing. Endless monotony – endless repetition – and yet suddenly the something that was woven through it caught your ear – what he had called the pattern.

He stopped.

‘Well?’

‘It will be very difficult to sing.’

‘Quite right. But you have an excellent ear. You wish to sing Solveig – yes?’

‘Naturally. It’s the chance of a lifetime. If I can satisfy you –’

‘I think you can.’ He got up again, laid his hands on her shoulders. ‘How old are you?’

‘Thirty-three.’

‘And you have been very unhappy – that is so?’