A very scary few minutes ensued, with me haring through the station with the remaining pack in pursuit. Fortunately, most of them were not only carrying an excess of beer in their bellies but also some substantial extra pounds around their waists and they were no match for my adrenaline-fueled flight. However, two of them were remarkably nimble in spite of these handicaps, and more than once I felt their fingers on my coat. On one occasion, I swung my overnight bag at one of them and was rewarded with an audible grunt.
I tore out of the station and leaped over the pedestrian barrier into the traffic on the Euston Road, dodging buses, cars and taxis as I sprinted for my life. Fortunately for me, a combination of good sense and the timely intervention of a passing police car meant that the chasing pair did not follow me as I weaved across the four lanes and jogged rapidly westwards along the pavement, breathing heavily.
I slowed down and laughed out loud in relief. I received a few strange looks from people I passed, but, thankfully, this time there was nothing more sinister than amusement in their eyes. I felt on top of the world, and I literally skipped along the pavement as I searched the oncoming vehicles for a vacant cab to take me to Fulham.
CAROLINE LIVED in what she described as a lower-ground-floor apartment. Tamworth Street, like many residential streets in west London, was bordered on each side by rows of stucco-fronted terraced town houses built in the 1920s and ’30s to house an increasing urban population. Whereas they had originally all been single-family homes, many had since been subdivided into flats as the pressure for accommodation increased further in the latter part of the twentieth century. All along the road the lower-ground-floor flats had been created out of the original “below stairs” areas, where the servants had once tended to the family living above. Access to Caroline’s abode was not through the house’s front door but by way of the old staff entrance, via a gate in the iron railing and down eight or so steps to a small concrete yard below street level.
She opened her door with what appeared to be a squeal of delight and threw her arms round my neck, planting a long, welcoming kiss on my lips. If she was having any second thoughts about our relationship, she had a funny way of showing it.
Her flat ran through the house from front to back and had access to a small exterior space at the rear, just big enough for a table and a few chairs.
“I get the morning sun during the summer,” she said. “It’s a lovely little garden. It was the reason I had to have the flat.”
How was it, I thought, that human beings were happy to live so close together in this urban jungle that a table and chair on a six-foot-square concrete slab constituted a garden to delight in? I was happier with the wide-open spaces of Newmarket Heath, but I knew that I would soon have to move and join the throng in this conurbation if I was to fulfill Mark’s ambition.
The flat itself was modern and minimalist in style, with plenty of bare wooden floors, and chrome barstools in the white-fronted kitchen. She had two bedrooms, but the smaller of them had been converted into a practice room, with a chair and music stand in the center and piles of sheet music around the walls.
“Don’t the neighbors object?” I asked.
“No,” she replied rather firmly. “I don’t play late at night or before nine in the morning, and no one has complained. In fact, the lady upstairs has said how much she loves to listen.”
“Will you play for me?” I asked.
“What, now?”
“Yes.”
“No,” she said. “I’m not playing for you until you’ve cooked for me.”
“That’s not fair. I would have cooked for you during the week if my car hadn’t crashed.”
“Excuses, excuses,” she said, laughing.
“What’s in your fridge?” I asked her. “I’ll cook for you now.”
“No you won’t,” she said. “We’re going down the pub. I’ve had to bribe the barman to hold us a table.”
Going down the pub with Caroline on a Saturday night was everything I had hoped it would be. The pub in question was The Atlas, around the corner in Seagrave Road, and it was packed. Even though she had somehow managed to make a reservation, this was unquestionably a pub and not a restaurant like the Hay Net, our bleached wooden table being underneath the window of the bar. Caroline sat on an upright wooden chair that reminded me of those at my school, while I fought my way through the crowd at the bar to choose a bottle of Chianti Classico from the blackboard and chalk wine lists that were proudly displayed above the mirror-backed serving area.
The food was good and also imaginative. Caroline chose grilled whole sea bass with couscous salad, while I plumped for the Cumberland sausages and garlic mashed potatoes. I wondered about the garlic, and so, obviously, did Caroline. She used her fork to pinch some of my potato. I caught her eye as she was putting it in her mouth. For a moment, we glanced deeper, into the inner soul, and then laughed as we both understood, unspoken, the reason why.
Caroline was excited about the Chicago trip, and we talked about her job and especially about her music.
“I feel so alive when I’m playing,” she said. “I exist only in my head, and, I know this sounds stupid, but my hands on the bow and the strings seem somehow disconnected from my body. They have a mind of their own and they just do it.”
I just sat there, looking at her, not wanting to interrupt.
“Even if I have a new piece that I haven’t played before, I don’t really have to consciously tell my fingers where to go. I just look at the notes on the paper and my fingers seem to do it by themselves. I can feel the result. It’s wonderful.”
“Can you hear what you yourself are playing with all the others instruments around you?” I asked.
“Oh yes,” she said. “But I actually feel the sound I make. I feel it through my bones. If I press hard on my viola with my chin, my whole head becomes full of my music. In fact, I have to be careful not to press too hard, as then I can’t hear any of the rest of the orchestra. Playing in a great orchestra is so exhilarating. Apart, that is, from all the damn people.”
“What people?” I asked.
“The other members,” she said. “They can be so catty, so prima donna-ish. We are all meant to be one team, but there are so many petty rivalries. Everyone is trying to be one better than everyone else, especially in their own section. All the violinists want to end up being leader, and most of the other instruments hate the fact that the leader is always a violinist. It’s like a bloody school playground. There are the bullies and the bullied. Some of the older members hate the younger ones coming along and getting the solo parts that they think they should have. Hell hath no fury like a passed-over would-be soloist, I can tell you. Once, I even saw a senior member of an orchestra try to sabotage the instrument of a younger soloist. I just hope I never get to be like that.”
“Chefs can be pretty devious too, you know,” I said, and I wondered again if jealousy of my success had been the real reason for someone adding poisonous kidney beans to the dinner.
“But I bet you’ve never had to work with eighty or so of them at once, all trying to show that they’re better than their neighbors while at the same time having to come together to bring a score to life.”
“Maybe not,” I said. “But it feels like it sometimes.”
She smiled. “Now, don’t get me wrong,” she said. “I adore being in a really good professional orchestra. It can be so moving and so wonderfully fulfilling. The climax to a work can be fantastic. You know, like Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, with all the cannon blasts and everything, in the Royal Albert Hall with seven thousand people there, it’s unbelievably exciting.” She laughed. “Better than an orgasm.”
I wasn’t sure how to take that comment. Practice, I thought. I just needed more practice. “Wait and see,” I said.