Quinn looks up. “Not on basic pay though.”
Baxter laughs and raises his mug. “A toast to the revolution and home rule.”
The door opens before they can discuss it further and Pierre Klauer briskly enters, cheerfully depositing his canvas bag on the table. Quinn moves his page clear of the intrusion.
“I sold nearly all of mine today,” Pierre announces, opening the bag to show how few copies of Advance lie bent beside a bundle of greasy brown paper containing the remains of his dinner.
“Well done young Frenchman,” Baxter declares, having grown paternally fond of Pierre in the short time they have been acquainted.
“There’ll be more for you to sell tomorrow,” Quinn says with what both other men register as a scowl.
“He’s vexed over a misprint,” Joe Baxter explains.
“Only that? If I worried about every mistake I made in life then my hair would have turned white by now.”
“It’s in a headline,” says Quinn. “It looks foolish.”
Pierre removes his bag to see the page pushed beneath his gaze, his lips quivering as he reads. Eventually he says, “I find nothing wrong.”
Quinn points. “Committee.”
“I would never have known.”
“You see, John?” says Baxter. “Let it pass. Angus has enough on his hands out there without getting the dictionary thrown at him.”
Pierre agrees. “I can tell he’s in one of his black moods.” Angus was invalided back from Passchendaele and all who knew him agree he has never been the same since. Pierre remarks on the printed notice. “The meeting is so soon.”
“It’s the only date I could get for the hall.”
“No use advertising it here, there should be posters and leaflets.”
“That’s too much to ask of Maclean.”
“Then your meeting will be a failure, John. I should worry about that instead of a spelling mistake.”
If this is meant as a provocation it fails. “I know how to run the campaign, Pierre.”
“And I am trying to help.”
“Then sell as many of these as you can tomorrow.”
Pierre is immovable. “I cannot sell to men who gave me money today.”
“It’s a petty sum.”
“Not when doubled in a single week. I shall give copies gratis and ask my comrades to distribute them. Otherwise the meeting will be a waste of time.”
John stares at the table, bridling at this challenge to his authority while doubting his ability to exert it. He says quietly, “Do you wish to help or do you prefer to be in charge?”
“What?”
“This is a great deal of work, Pierre, I’d happily give it to someone else.”
Baxter gets up, puts his half-empty mug beside the sink, and goes back to the printing room.
Pierre asks, “Who will speak at the meeting?”
“I’ve contacted a few people.”
“You’ve left it all too late. This needs thought and planning, it takes time. If you want to persuade the workers of this town to become involved in national action then you have only one opportunity to do it, one moment when you can win their hearts. One test that you either pass or fail.”
The words sting Quinn’s heart; he looks sadly at Pierre. “I always fail.”
“That’s not true at all.”
“How my father will laugh.” He bites at his lip. “What are we to do?”
“It’s quite simple,” says Pierre. “Let me be the main speaker. I promise you that what I say will be worth hearing.”
Chapter Three
Samuel Johnson said that if you want to be an artist then be a mediocre one, since the public for the most part have mediocre taste. Arriving home from his concert tour Conroy considers this observation as true nowadays as it was in the eighteenth century. The last of his three appearances was part of “Tune Inn”, a crassly named festival of music and fine food put together by some kind of local development agency in association with various media and sponsorship partners. Conroy never figured out the details and honestly didn’t care, he was there to give the same programme he’d offered at his other two engagements: Beethoven’s Opus 26, Firelli’s Dance Suite, some Chopin mazurkas, Schumann’s Kreisleriana. He got there and found he was up against Paul Morrow, they’d put the two pianists head to head, the timings overlapped so it was impossible for anyone with a genuine taste in art rather than salad dressings to attend both recitals. Morrow, half Conroy’s age, is the latest photogenic long-haired wunderkind, the press love how he plays in jeans and says he doesn’t mind if people talk during the performance, they do it at rock concerts after all, so why not classical ones? When Beethoven was debuting his own works, people would drink and talk.
Yes, thinks Conroy, and Beethoven fucking hated it. He unlocks his front door, deactivates the burglar alarm and sees the mail piled on the floor, he thought Laura would be back already but she must still be away on her assignment. He’s had no more texts, hasn’t been able to speak to her since that last argument. Among the junk mail there’s a large envelope with a handwritten address, he takes it to the kitchen and opens it after he’s put on the kettle. The collector he met at the second performance, Verrier, has sent a photocopy of the sonata he mentioned.
Conroy’s parched, makes some tea and sits at the kitchen table. Showed up at Tune Inn and the green room was a marquee with rugs and sofas, ethnic finger food, crew of enthusiastic helpers fresh out of university. One of them said come and meet Paul Morrow who was sitting holding court with a glass of white wine in his hand, Conroy couldn’t tell if the ongoing repartee was a press interview or regular conversation. Of course he didn’t want to come and meet bloody Paul Morrow.
He quickly looks at the Klauer score and reads the accompanying letter from Verrier who’s been doing some research and says the composer died from a gunshot wound in a Paris park in 1913, reported in the press as a tragic accident, probably a polite way of saying suicide. Klauer’s handwritten notation on the photocopied sheets is neat and readable, first movement looks interesting, perhaps a touch of Busoni about it. Again the tantalising vision of a come-back concert, media interest. Forget the music; the troubled young genius blew his brains out and the world unjustly forgot him, that’s a story.
Morrow, unshaven in baggy blue pullover, was telling his little entourage about his plan to do the complete Well-Tempered Clavier at Heathrow airport. “Like, you can buy your duty free, listen to some Bach, whatever.” The juvenile assistant with a Tune Inn tee-shirt did the introductions, Morrow didn’t bother getting up but stretched an arm in languorous handshake. He’d obviously never heard of Conroy, had no idea he might face any kind of competition for audience-share that afternoon, knew in any case it would be no contest. Wine-glass in hand, Morrow generously asked about Conroy’s programme, nodding with approval. “Great line-up, I’ve never heard of the Firelli, that sounds really cool. I’d love to hear your gig, man, it’s fucking nuts the way they scheduled it. Wonder if they could change the timings? And Kreisleriana, that’s wicked.”
The Tune Inn organisers hadn’t stopped to ask themselves how two guest artists might feel about being made to clash, they had thought only about abundance of consumer choice: a jazz quartet in a kitchenware promotion, Mongolian folksong next to a lecture on Italian wine, some Debussy for dessert; or if not that, then an entirely different permutation from the menu. Morrow was inter-changeable with a TV chef, Conroy with a jar of mustard. He asked Morrow, “Have you ever read Kreisleriana?”