Rachel was observing the boy narrowly. ‘Young Adolf is in love with you, Masha.’
At once, the blood rushed into Thomas’s face, reaching the roots of his hair. Rachel laughed mockingly. Masha shot her a reproving glance, and then patted Thomas on the knee again. ‘Pay no attention to her. She’s a dreadful tease.’
But Rachel’s malice – or perhaps that gentle hand on his knee – was too much for Thomas. He jumped to his feet, made them a bow, and hurried out of the cabin.
‘You’re cruel, Rachel,’ Masha said. ‘Why do you torment him?’
‘I hate the sight of him. Besides, it gives me a little pleasure.’
‘He’s a sensitive boy.’
‘Oh, very. He has the hots for you.’
‘Really, Rachel. It’s nothing so adult as “having the hots”. And it’s a reason to show him some consideration.’
‘There was a dwarf in our apartment building in Leipzig. She was tiny, like a child, even though she was thirty years old, with little stunted arms and legs. But do you know, Masha, she could play the violin with surpassing sweetness. I don’t think I ever heard a sweeter tone. She asked me to give her lessons from time to time. Her arms were too short to hold the violin under her chin, so she played it like a cello. They came for her, the SS men, and took her away.’
‘I don’t want to hear any more horrible stories,’ Masha said, with tears in her eyes.
‘They didn’t show her much consideration. I saw two of them swinging her like a sack between them, laughing on the way to the van. I said nothing, because I knew I would be next. By now she has been exterminated. Don’t waste your pity on that boy. He’ll be back in Germany baiting Jews while you and I are begging for our bread on the streets of New York.’
‘If we do this work of Stravinsky’s, we’ll have at least forty dollars more,’ Masha said, wanting to get Rachel off such bitter subjects. ‘Shall we make a start?’
‘And by the way,’ Katharine pointed out sharply, ‘you can ill afford forty dollars for a task you don’t need doing.’
‘It will be useful to have fair copies of those two movements.’
‘I happen to know that fair copies of those two movements have already been sent to your publisher.’
‘Exactly. That is why I require further fair copies for myself.’
She snorted at this prevarication. ‘Those forty dollars would have bought you a Cabin Class ticket.’
‘I am happy with my cabin.’ He was playing patience in the Tourist Class smoking room, his legs wrapped in a rug, a cigarette in a holder clamped between his teeth. From time to time, when he was frustrated by the way the cards turned out, he muttered filthy expletives in Russian, imagining that she couldn’t understand. ‘There is nothing wrong with the cabin at all.’
‘And what about the food?’
‘I have never been very interested in food.’
‘Nonsense, Igor,’ she said roundly. ‘You know you are a gourmet.’
‘Shit on your mother,’ he muttered to the cards in Russian.
‘I understand what you are saying. I have enough Russian for that. And I see you cheating.’
Irritably, he gathered up the cards and shuffled the deck. ‘How can I play, with you sitting there like a crow, pecking at me?’
‘If you wanted to give those women charity, you could have just handed them the cash. You didn’t have to risk your precious autograph manuscripts.’
‘It is not a question of charity,’ he replied, starting to lay out a new game. ‘It’s a business transaction.’
She lit a cigarette and began to buff her nails. ‘You are absurdly trusting.’
Thomas König arrived at their table, his pale face set. ‘I gave them the portmanteau.’
‘Good boy.’
‘Why do you always repeat that I am a Nazi to them?’ he asked tensely.
Stravinsky looked up, adjusting his spectacles. ‘But you are. Aren’t you?’
‘You make them hate me. Especially the older one.’
‘Is that not in the natural order of things?’
‘It’s hard for me.’
‘And yet you must bear it,’ Stravinsky replied with a warning note in his voice. ‘You have no choice.’
‘You could at least not make a point of it every chance you get.’
‘I don’t think they need reminding of what you are. And my advice to you is not to annoy the elder Fräulein Morgenstern. She has a very sharp tongue.’
Thomas grimaced and walked off without replying.
‘What was that all about?’ Katharine asked.
Stravinsky returned to his cards. ‘I suspect he has formed a sentimental attachment to one of the Jewesses.’
‘How ironic. The softer one, I should guess.’
‘Indeed, the other is something of a virago.’
‘I hope he doesn’t have any expectation of it being reciprocated.’
‘I shouldn’t imagine he is so foolish. He worships from afar. He is considerably younger, in any case.’
‘I don’t like him.’
‘Is he not a man and a brother?’
‘He is merely your cabin-mate.’
‘Indeed. On life’s journey, like us all. He will learn from us and we will learn from him. Aha.’ Chewing on his cigarette holder with satisfaction, he began to move the cards around successfully. ‘You note I am not cheating. Please do not tell me when I win that I have used underhand means.’
Masha had worked for much of the night on the Stravinsky score. Rachel had been wise enough to leave her to it. Despite being rudely awoken by the anti-aircraft batteries, after having got to sleep only a couple of hours earlier, Masha was ready for breakfast, and full of the music she had been transcribing.
‘You can have no idea how wonderful it is,’ she exclaimed to her cousin as they made their way to the dining room.
‘Is it the roaring of lions or the trumpeting of elephants?’
‘Neither. It’s the most elegant, refined music you ever heard – well, since Beethoven, anyway.’
‘Since Beethoven!’
‘It’s full of enchanting rhythmic variations. And Rachel, it’s so clever.’
‘Oh, I am sure it is clever.’
‘And witty.’
‘I will tighten my stays before reading it, so as not to break a rib laughing.’
As they made their way to the dining room, they encountered Arturo Toscanini, walking at great speed, as always. He almost collided with them, and began to utter curses in Italian, before his dark eyes, flashing beneath his tangled eyebrows, registered who they were.
‘Ah!’ he exclaimed, pulling himself up. ‘The beautiful signorine.’ He lifted his hat and showed his brownish teeth in a smile. ‘Buongiorno, buongiorno! ’
‘Good morning, maestro,’ Masha replied.
Toscanini took Masha’s hand in both of his and raised it to his lips. ‘I was told of your unhappy news. I offer my condolences.’
‘How kind of you, maestro,’ Masha said, moved by this attention from the great man. Rachel, however, remained tight-lipped.
Toscanini pressed another kiss on Masha’s knuckles, his eyes fixed hypnotically on hers. ‘That mean little man in his ridiculous chauffeur’s uniform! How I loathe him.’
‘Do you mean Hitler?’ Masha asked timidly.
‘They asked me to return to Bayreuth in 1933, to conduct The Ring. With Hitler sitting in the front row? The bloated Goering beside him? And that hideous gnome Goebbels on the other side? Never!’ He kissed Masha’s hand again. ‘They sent me ten thousand Deutschmarks. I sent them back. Hitler himself wrote to me, pleading. Do you know what I told him?’
‘What?’ Masha asked breathlessly.