The Music Shop

  ‘I need to make some alterations to the shop.’

  Frank checked the wall clock above Henry’s head. One more hour, and he would be meeting Ilse Brauchmann. Just thinking that made him want to get up and pace about.

  ‘So how much do you need?’

  ‘How much do I what?’

  ‘Are you all right, Frank? You seem very nervous.’

  ‘I’m fine.’ Frank reached for his fringe and remembered he hadn’t got one. ‘I need five thousand pounds.’

  Henry widened his eyes before expelling a long breath, as if he had just bitten into an especially lively chilli. ‘That much? Why?’

  Pulling out a piece of paper, Frank ran through the alterations he needed to make. The list had been drawn up for him by Kit, so it also included spelling mistakes and a host of exclamation marks. Aside from the external repairs to the falling masonry, the entire shop would be refurbished with proper wooden display units. No more plastic boxes and crates. There would be an illuminated sign above the door, a lit-up window display (and also a new window), as well as a shrink-wrap machine. A shrink-wrap machine? Henry laughed. What in hell’s name was that? There was still something of the public-school boy in Henry. When he laughed, it came out more like a guffaw, as if he had done something he shouldn’t in the science lab. ‘What’s happened to you, Frank?’

  ‘I accept that people want CDs. That’s what’s happened. People don’t want their old records. They bring them to me every week. Some people don’t even want money. They’re just desperate for the space.’

  ‘So you’re finally going to stock them?’

  ‘CDs? No way.’ Frank grinned. ‘I’m going to save vinyl. I’m going to make it even more beautiful.’

  He explained. Once he had the new shrink-wrap machine, he would be able to sell his records individually heat-wrapped in cellophane, with the vinyl sealed inside the sleeve. Each one would come with its own label, handwritten and decorated by Kit, describing what exactly you needed to listen for. People would flock to the newly refurbished shop; it would be like one of those specialist stores you read about in the NME. That in turn would generate new business for the remaining shops on the parade. Unity Street would be back on the map.

  ‘What’s your balance at the moment?’

  Frank said he wasn’t sure. He wasn’t in the red exactly, but he was probably heading (kind of) in that (sort of) general (pinkish) direction. He found himself wafting his hands a lot. ‘Can I smoke in here?’

  Henry called through to a clerk and while they waited for the balance on Frank’s account, Henry answered Frank’s enquiries about the family as if he were batting off shuttlecocks. ‘Good! Fine! Yes!’ On his desk, there were framed photographs of his wife and the boys, and one of Mandy before the kids; it was the only one, Frank noticed, where she looked happy in an abandoned way. For some time now, whenever he listened to Henry, he heard a strange lonely sound – like a minor chord tuned too fine. He had a hunch the couple were struggling.

  The clerk laid a slip of paper on the desk and Henry sighed. ‘It’s not looking good, Frank. You have sixty-eight pence.’

  ‘I thought perhaps I could get an overdraft,’ said Frank vaguely. ‘Lots of people have those, don’t they?’

  ‘The problem is that we’ve had instructions from head office to be very strict about overdrafts.’

  ‘I thought this was supposed to be a boom time? I thought Maggie Thatcher wanted us all running our own businesses and looking after number one—’

  ‘She does. But inflation’s going up again. Head office is uneasy.’

  ‘I can pay the money back. I just need a few months.’

  ‘What are your books like? What kind of guarantee can you offer?’

  Frank admitted he didn’t actually keep any books at the moment. But he would. In future he definitely would. In terms of a guarantee, he was happy to offer his flat. Henry looked pained. ‘You can’t offer your flat, Frank. It’s too risky.’

  ‘This is an investment. Once I’ve made the improvements on the shop, I’ll be competing with the big hitters on Castlegate. You watch, I’ll be raking in the cash.’ Frank took a glance at the clock. Five to five. His heart plunged. ‘Look, I should go. I’m meeting someone—’

  ‘A date?’ Henry looked touchingly hopeful.

  ‘No. A kind of – you know – lesson. I’m going to take her on a journey through music.’ He said it quickly, hoping Henry wouldn’t stop too long and examine the contents of that sentence. ‘By the way, this is for you and Mandy.’ He searched through the bag of records at his feet and pulled out an album.

  ‘What’s Shalamar?’

  ‘Play it tonight when you get home. Side one, track one. “A Night To Remember”. And make sure the boys are out of the way.’

  The two friends looked as if they might hug but then the idea seemed to lose its way and instead they got infinitely more sensible and shook hands.

  ‘So what do you think? Will I get my overdraft?’

  ‘It’s unlikely, but I’ll do what I can.’

  This time Frank did embrace his friend. He couldn’t help it. It was a great big bear hug that almost floored Henry. Afterwards Henry straightened his cuffs and his tie and cleared his throat several times as if he were reassembling himself into a bank manager. Frank asked in passing what Henry knew about Fort Development and Henry said he’d never heard of them.

  ‘They want to buy up Unity Street.’

  ‘Why would they want to do that?’

  ‘You’re right.’ He smiled and thanked Henry again. ‘Trust me. You’re going to love Shalamar,’ he said.

  The light was beginning to change, darkening. The air was as sharp as glass and a bitter wind had swept in, smelling of cheese and onion; at least it did something to counterbalance the Jovan Musk. Traders were already packing away stalls on Castlegate, shouting that it was your last chance to get bargains. Frank passed the clock tower – a gang of junkies crowded round a plastic bag – before taking a left turning down one of the cobbled alleyways that led to the cathedral. People had set out goods for sale here too – but these were single personal items placed carefully on a blanket; a paperback book, a plug, an ashtray, one walking boot. God help me, he thought.

  Gulls swung to and fro, pale crosses against the sky. The cathedral was ahead, square and sure of itself. Frank tried to rehearse what exactly he would say to Ilse Brauchmann but he couldn’t even remember how to speak. He stopped. Turned round.

  He would run straight back to the shop.

  But someone was shouting across the green. Were they in trouble? This person was waving his arms, and springing up and down—

  ‘Kit?’

  A few feet to his left, Maud stood scowling in her stripy tights and fun-fur jacket. Father Anthony – wearing a hat with earflaps – was peering over his broken spectacles at a bus timetable. His breath seeped from his mouth like white smoke.

  Frank marched over. ‘What are you all doing?’

  ‘We’re just out on a Tuesday night,’ said Kit. He couldn’t look Frank in the eye. ‘It’s a free country.’

  Father Anthony said that, as it happened, he was very interested in the route of the number 11 – he had no idea it went through so many parts of the city. Maud offered no explanation whatsoever.

  Kit bit his lip. ‘Also, we wanted to check you are OK.’

  ‘I am terrified.’

  ‘Will you get the overdraft?’

  ‘I doubt it.’

  ‘You have the records for Ilse Brauchmann?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Remember what you have to do.’

  ‘What do I have to do?’

  ‘You have to get a good look at her hands.’

  ‘Right now I am struggling just to stand up.’

  ‘OK. Well, bonne chance.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘That’s French.’

  ‘I know.’

  Kit looked as if he might like to recite more French, or perhaps f
urther words of encouragement in other European languages, but at that point he trod in something compromising and had to scrape his shoe on the kerb.

  ‘Remember. Just be yourself,’ murmured Father Anthony, still studying the wonderful complexities of the number 11 route. ‘Tell her what you feel when you listen. What are you going to talk about?’

  ‘The “Moonlight” Sonata.’

  20

  Moonlight Sonata

  ‘WHAT DO YOU know about sonatas and Beethoven, Frank?’

  Frank repeated everything he knew. A sonata was traditionally made up of three sections. Fast. Slow. Fast.

  ‘Bullseye,’ said Peg.

  It was Haydn and Mozart who really cracked the sonata, but it was Beethoven who reinvented it, just as he reinvented the symphony. Bach was king of the Baroque; Mozart and Haydn were kings of the Classical; Brahms, Chopin, Liszt and Berlioz were the great Romantics. Bruckner, Mahler and Wagner brought music into the twentieth century; Stravinsky and Schoenberg redefined harmony. But Beethoven was in a class of his own. He didn’t write music to praise God. He didn’t write it to earn a living. Beethoven wrote music because he had to.

  ‘Yes yes yes!’ Peg puffed out a whoosh of smoke that almost choked her, it was so happy. ‘So the first thing to know about the “Moonlight” Sonata is that it has fuck all to do with the moon.’

  ‘Nothing whatsoever?’ Now that he was twelve, Frank found himself editing out Peg’s swear words and replacing them with more maternal ones.

  ‘It was a critic who gave it that name. When he heard the sonata, he said it was like looking at the moon on a lake. Fuck knows why. I guess he was sitting by a lake. So after that everyone thought it was just a nice bit of music about the full moon and some water.’ She held up the new album cover. It showed – surprise, surprise – a full moon and some water. ‘I mean for fuck’s sake,’ said Peg.

  ‘So it isn’t about the moon?’

  ‘No! It’s a revolutionary piece. It’s crazy. It’s Beethoven taking the rules and snapping them in half. It’s not fast, slow, fast. It’s slow, fast, fuck off. It’s anarchy!’

  Peg told the story of the ‘Moonlight’ Sonata. Beethoven had fallen in love with one of his students. He was a complicated man. Moody. Abused as a kid. No idea about things like personal hygiene. He was always falling in love with his students but this one was a countess and she was seventeen.

  ‘Then bam. A bombshell. Beethoven finds out two things. One: the countess is going to marry a count. Two: he – Beethoven, not the count – is going deaf. He is poleaxed. The man IS music. What will he be without it? So he pours all those feelings into his piano sonata and he dedicates it to Julia. It’s like rocket fuel. I mean, a full moon. For fuck’s sake.’

  Peg lowered the stylus on to the vinyl. She settled herself on the floor. Tick, tick went the record—

  ‘Aren’t you going to join me?’

  ‘I think I’ll stay in my chair.’

  Afterwards, Peg remained lying on the carpet, staring at the ceiling. She didn’t say anything for a long time. She just blew smoke rings and sighed. When he listened to her, she seemed very sad.

  ‘Peg? Do you think we should get something to eat?’

  They fixed one of their regular suppers. A tin of mock turtle soup from Fortnum’s, along with a box of Bath Olivers, followed by canned peaches and condensed milk. Peg’s cookery revolved entirely round packets and tins.

  It was only as Frank carried plates to the sink that she began to speak. ‘I was fifteen when I fell in love. He was a friend of my father’s. Had me once a week in the back of his car. God, I loved that man. We carried on for years. But did he leave his wife? His kids? Did he hell. Broke my fucking heart. If you learn one thing from me, make it this. Love is not nice. Stay away from it, Frank. Stay away.’

  21

  A Beautiful Pea-Green Coat

  SHE WAS OUTSIDE the cathedral. You couldn’t miss her. She stood waiting in her green coat beneath an old-fashioned street lamp; still and erect, and somehow illuminated to the point of brilliance, though maybe that was another of those details his head supplied. He had assumed a woman like Ilse Brauchmann would keep you waiting. The air went clean out of him. Would she notice if he walked straight past?

  Clearly she would, because she waved.

  Frank’s face began to smile, all of its own accord, so he had to pretend he was glancing round and appreciating the loveliness of the night in general. The smile solidified. He couldn’t actually get rid of it. He tried to make out he was remembering a particularly hilarious joke.

  Her face fell. ‘Is it me?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Do I look funny?’

  ‘Of course you don’t.’

  ‘I tried a straightening comb. It’s a disaster.’

  There was something very flat about her hair. She was right. It was looming round her face like a veil. But then again, Frank could hardly talk. You could probably smell him before you could see him, and his fringe was a wedge.

  She didn’t mention that. She just lifted her face to his, her eyes so solemn he failed to breathe again.

  ‘I thought you had forgotten,’ she said.

  Forgotten?

  How could he?

  Would he ever?

  She suggested they should go to a café nearby, called the Singing Teapot. It had ruched pink curtains, and a display of teapots in the window; none of them exactly singing but quite happy-looking nonetheless, ranging from a plain old Brown Betty to a more extrovert thing, painted with flowers. There was no one else in the café. They chose a round table by the window and took off their coats. She kept her gloves on, though.

  ‘I close at five thirty,’ said a waitress, charging through a pair of saloon doors at the back, and pointing to a clock on the wall. She was a large young woman in her early twenties, kitted out in a black dress that was too small and a tiny lace cap.

  Ilse Brauchmann lifted her eyes. Her expression wasn’t a smile, and neither was it a challenge; it was more a direct connection. ‘Couldn’t you just serve us? We don’t need very much.’

  The waitress pursed her mouth. She tugged at the hem of her dress. ‘Go on, then,’ she said.

  However, there were some restrictions. She could not, for instance, serve alcoholic beverages without food. Ilse replied that food would be lovely, and the waitress said it wouldn’t, on account of the fact the cook had gone home. There was tea or squash. That was it, in terms of drinks. And food, in fact.

  ‘Thank you, I’ll take lemon squash,’ said Ilse Brauchmann.

  ‘We’ve got orange.’

  ‘I’ll take orange. With a cube of ice.’

  ‘We don’t do ice.’

  Ilse Brauchmann smiled. No ice would be lovely. ‘I suppose we should get on with our lesson,’ she said, once the waitress had stormed back through her saloon doors and they were alone again. He asked if she had a notebook or a pen or anything like that, and she said she didn’t. She was happy just to listen. She cupped her exquisite face in her gloved hands and blinked with those large eyes, as if clearing things out of the way in order to see him all the better.

  ‘The thing, uh, about music—’ Frank was shaking. Never mind Ilse Brauchmann’s hands, his own were jelly; he thought it would be a good idea to sit on them. ‘The thing about music is that sometimes we know it so well we, uh, we don’t know it at all. My first lesson is about listening—’

  ‘Bon appétit,’ interrupted the waitress, slamming down a tray with their drinks and leaving.

  But Frank was such a barrel of words and feelings, he felt unable to swallow. Also, his hands were still beneath his arse and unavailable for duty; there was no way he was going to tackle a tiny teacup. ‘The “Moonlight” Sonata is by Beethoven. Do you, uh, know Beethoven?’

  ‘Aren’t they a rock band?’

  Oh well, this was a disaster. He might as well give up. ‘Beethoven was German. He was kind of the biggest thing ever in classical music. What’s wrong? Wh
y are you laughing?’

  ‘I know who Beethoven was, Frank. That was a joke. I’m not stupid.’

  She appeared to find her joke hilarious. She actually couldn’t stop laughing. Then her laugh did something untoward, coming out as a hiccup. She shot her palm to her mouth. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said mutely. ‘I will be sensible now. Go on, Frank. I’m listening.’

  Time passed: but how, he had no idea. Whenever he looked at the clock, it had jumped forward. Slowly and with much clearing of his throat, Frank told Ilse Brauchmann what he felt about music. How it had been a part of his life since he was a boy, and so had vinyl. How it had been like stepping into a secret world through a cupboard. He had not intended to say any of this – he had spent years listening to other people – but now that he had started, one word seemed to pitch up after another. Every time he dared a glance in her direction, her eyes were locked on his. He could feel it without even looking – the depth of her gaze. It seemed to draw the words out of him.

  He told her about Peg, the white house that she had inherited, all her married men, his exiled and irregular childhood. Not even Father Anthony knew these stories but the stillness with which Ilse listened was as great as the sea. It seemed without end. Besides, what did he have to be afraid of? She had no interest in him, she was engaged to someone else. At the end of the hour, she would hurry away from this café, she would get on with that very busy life of hers, she would be with her fiancé and forget all about the things Frank had told her.

  She sat with her face tipped in one hand, listening. She didn’t smile or frown or do anything except watch with her solemn black eyes.

  Frank explained that as he grew older he had searched for music of his own on the radio – his mother rarely visited shops, they had most things delivered – and this was how he discovered the connecting threads between music and learnt to love not one genre, but all of them. Music was a part of him – he had been brought up that way. Really it was the only thing he knew. He had been a no-hoper at school.