By the time it came to rehearsing the dancers, Sir Aidan found that his baton was shaking so violently that he was obliged to lay it down for a moment to flex his fingers.
When he picked it up again to tap the top of his rostrum it was as much to call himself to order as the musicians.
As it happened, the orchestra was sufficiently familiar with the music to be able to play it without direction from him. They were instead taking their cues from the leader, who was directing things with exaggerated head movements and eyebrow animations. Normally, he would have taken this as a slight, which would have piqued him into a show of dominance. But now he just wanted to get through the rehearsal without any further mishaps. He was aware that he might have made a few small faux pas himself. But the choir was proving particularly intractable today. And the almost mutinous attitude of the musicians had not helped.
It had been agreed that they would perform three excerpts from The Nutcracker Suite: ‘March’, ‘Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy’ and ‘Russian Dance’. The first would be danced as a Pas de Deux; the second was of course a solo by la Volkova; and the third was choreographed to bring Kuznetsov’s talents to the fore.
The trombonist with whom he had been obliged to have words pointedly played the opening notes of the march with meticulous precision and conspicuous disregard of his conductor. His demeanour was gloatingly self-important. But Sir Aidan was wise enough, and magnanimous enough, to let it go. He had achieved the desired result. The fellow was at least concentrating now.
The dancers, of course, needed no help from him, which was just as well as he had his back to them. This meant that he could not see their steps, and so missed out on their interpretations. But he could see the expressions of delight in the faces of the choir members.
Once or twice he was tempted to cast a quick glance back over his shoulder. The evening might not be an entire disaster after all. The couple were not yet in full costume but had changed into rehearsal leotards and tights. Even that was enough to invest them with a kind of dramatic glamour. They had transcended being human to become characters in a magical story.
It was captivating to watch them, so much so that he naturally became distracted from what he should have been doing. He lost his place in the music and found that he was simply waving his hands ineffectually in time with the music, which he was making no effort to conduct.
Even so, when the choir burst into enthusiastic applause at the end of the first dance he had no compunction about accepting his share in the credit. He even bowed to acknowledge it.
There was an air of excited anticipation among the choir as Ekaterina Volkova took her opening position for the ‘Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy’. Sir Aidan waited for a nod from her and then turned to find Metcalfe, who ought to have been seated at the celeste by now, ready to play the distinctive part. But the bloody fool was standing helplessly next to the percussionist, with an expectant look directed towards his conductor.
‘What is it, Metcalfe?’
‘We don’t have a celeste.’
‘What?’
‘We don’t have a celeste.’
‘I heard what you said. My interjection was provoked by incredulity rather than inaudibility. What do you mean, we don’t have one? We absolutely must have one.’
‘Well, we don’t.’
‘Cavendish?’ Sir Aidan looked for his treasurer among the basses.
Cavendish shook his head in the most provoking manner.
‘Don’t just shake your head at me! Where is the celeste?’
‘No one said anything about a celeste.’
‘I should not think it was necessary! We are performing the “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy”. Any fool knows that we need a celeste!’ Sir Aidan held up his hands in a gesture of despair and turned on his pianist. ‘Don’t stand there like a malodorous imbecile, Metcalfe, even if that’s what you are. Play the part on the piano for now. Come on, come on. We’ve wasted enough time as it is.’
Metcalfe remained rooted to the spot for a moment longer. His gaze, inscrutable as ever, was fixed on Sir Aidan even when he started moving back to the piano. It was unnerving, but Sir Aidan was used to it. Metcalfe always played up a little when he chaffed him.
This time, Sir Aidan did not even look at the orchestra. One hand marked time with loose, sketchy gestures, while he watched the ballerina’s dance closely. Viewed from behind, her body was lithe and slender, taut with a sinuous muscularity. He noted with approval, however, that it curved in places with a gentle femininity. She was not at all scrawny, as some of these dancers could be. He thought in passing that the leotard was the most marvellous of garments, and that a woman’s body was the most marvellous of objects. The combination of the two was as sublime as any piece of music. As a connoisseur of female beauty, which he considered himself to be, he recognized this moment as one of rare privilege.
The racing of his heart played havoc with his timekeeping. A giddy excitement expanded inside him.
At last the dance came to an end. This time there were whistles and cheers at the end of the piece. Surprisingly for Sir Aidan, he noted that they seemed to grow in warmth when Metcalfe turned his head towards the choir. The conceited ass even bowed his head in acknowledgement! How extraordinary! Could he really believe that this enthusiastic appreciation was for him? Had he not just seen the glorious display of feminine grace and beauty that had taken Sir Aidan’s breath away? Knowing Metcalfe, probably not.
Now it was time for Kuznetsov to step forward. It was natural that Sir Aidan’s interest in the male dancer should be less than in his partner, but his glance was so cursory and dismissive that it could have been taken as insulting. He caught the fierce glare in the other man’s eye. These Russians were a touchy lot, by the looks of it.
He held his baton up and waited for the orchestra to settle. ‘Thank you. Next we have the Trepak, the Russian Dance. Now it’s not just our wonderful dancers who have to be on their toes for this! We all have to be. Myself included. The tempo as you know is given as Prestissimo. Molto Vivace, Prestissimo. Which for me is this.’ He marked the brisk two four beat with several swooping arcs of his baton. ‘I have no doubt at all that you will be able to keep up with that. But I just wanted to give you fair warning that this is going to be … very very fast! And thrilling. And wonderful. So …’ He turned briefly to receive a sullen nod from Kuznetsov.
He held both hands up as if he were holding the orchestra back. His heart was racing with excitement and terror. The dance was played at a fearsome pace. And whenever he had practised it, his forearm had tired before he was halfway through. He even had dreams where he was conducting the piece and his arm became as heavy as lead, or the muscles locked in a painful cramp – either way it was suddenly incapable of any movement at all. Even worse, uncontrollable spasms wracked his arm. In one particularly horrible variation of the dream, the arm detached itself from his shoulder and fell lifeless from his sleeve. How could he have forgotten that he had a false arm? And how could he have been so stupid as to take on the ‘Russian Dance’ with such a disability! At least he should have had the sense to fasten the prosthetic securely.
He shuddered away the memories of his nightmares.
No.
This was a moment to make his own. A moment, even, to enjoy. It was a moment of power, his power. He would not be cowed by the music. Or by the Russian dancer’s glare. Or by the mutinous murmurings of the players. It was a moment of silence that held within it all the pent-up tumult of the glorious, blistering noise that he was about to unleash. For that was what it felt like, an unleashing.
He held himself up tall and breathed deeply through his nostrils, his arms poised and quivering.
Then, with a sudden lurch of energy, he threw himself into the path of the oncoming troika as it galloped full pelt over the ice and snow.
He was caught up and swept along.
His body was thrown this way and that. He kept his right arm swaying frantically, beating time as if he were beating off attackers, thrusting and parrying against the onslaught of music like his life depended on it. As he had feared, his arm grew weary, and sooner than he might have hoped.
But somehow he kept it together and kept it going. He surrendered himself entirely to his instincts. There wasn’t time for conscious thought or intervention. He had to pull himself up into the driving seat of the troika and take hold of the reins.
He noticed that more and more of the musicians were looking to him. Perhaps this had started sceptically, as they allowed themselves a quick glance to enjoy his incompetence, no doubt expecting to see his arms flailing uselessly. But his instincts seemed to be coming through for him. He felt buoyed up, exhilarated. He had stopped being afraid of the tempo and was relishing it.
By the time they reached the rousing fff prestissimo at the end, his sense was that the orchestra regarded him with a new respect.
Of course, in reality, it was over almost as soon as it had begun. And all these impressions of the performance came and went as quickly as the notes themselves.
He let his arms hang limply by his side and bowed his head. ‘We’ll break for lunch now,’ he finally managed to get out, his voice trembling with emotion.