“You are so close, but still not quite there, Miss Van Tassel,” Mr. Crane said three days later. The lesson room suddenly felt incredibly warm and close. “The distance between those two notes is not as far as you think. Listen here.” He played a series of notes on his guitar. “Do you hear it?”
I sighed for what felt like the hundredth time. Despite how well I had done practicing after my first lesson, as soon as I was standing before Mr. Crane, I felt uncertain once again. The moment I opened my mouth, my voice seemed to shrink and shrivel away to somewhere deep inside me, somewhere so deep I could not seem to reach it. The sound came out small and fragile, like a tiny bird unsure of its place in the world, unsure even if it will survive the season.
Never had I been nervous or frightened or indeed cared what any of my listeners might think, yet with Mr. Crane suddenly, somehow, it was different.
“You are far too hesitant, Miss Van Tassel,” Mr. Crane said after my first attempt. “Louder, and stronger, if you please. I had rather hear a loud mistake than a nearly silent success.”
I had gotten slightly louder over the course of the lesson, but not much. I could barely meet my teacher’s eye as he demanded that I repeat the scale, over and over again.
“Do you hear it?” he asked again now, when I did not answer immediately. “You are going much farther than you need to in order to get to that next note.”
“I think so,” I said.
“Do you know, I feel as though you are not really trying, Miss Van Tassel,” he said, almost conversationally. “You made such progress last lesson, and today, not much. Did you practice since then? I neglected to mention you should, but I thought it was understood—”
My head snapped up and I glared at him, his words erasing all trace of my earlier meekness. “I certainly did practice,” I shot back. “It is quite different practicing on my own and trying to do it with you here shouting at me.”
“Was I shouting?” he inquired mildly. “I hadn’t thought so. But I shan’t believe you’ve practiced until you can show me—”
Fixing him with a cold, haughty look, I opened my mouth and loudly, defiantly, began to sing the blasted scale again. I was barely paying attention, and yet as I reached the top I realized I had done it right. I wobbled a bit on the top note as this realization set in, but then I came down again strong.
If Mr. Crane’s criticism was prickly and difficult to bear, his praise was warm and effusive and somehow worth all the difficulty. “Brava, Miss Van Tassel!” he cried, rising from his chair and applauding me. “That was wonderful! You see, your voice knew what to do all along, you had only to let it!”
I beamed at his words, though a part of me felt foolish that I should experience such a sense of accomplishment after singing just a few notes. “I suppose you are right,” I said.
He clasped his hands over his heart. “Ahh,” he said, “fine words to hear from so disdainful a lady.”
I laughed. Slowly, realization dawned. “You did that on purpose,” I said, an admiring half smile sliding onto my lips in spite of myself.
He regarded me quizzically, yet he was betrayed by his own small smile. “Did what, pray?” he asked.
“You were … you goaded me and made me angry, so that I would want prove you wrong and do it right,” I said.
“Ah,” he said, and spread his arms wide. “Guilty as charged, I am afraid.”
I laughed again, at his gall, at his honesty, at his seemingly unwitting charm. “You are quite the trickster.”
“No trick,” he said, smiling openly now. “It worked, yes? It is one of the reasons I fancy myself a rather successful teacher. I am usually able to discern how best to coax—or provoke, if necessary—a given student into doing what I know they are capable of.”
“Indeed,” I said. “And what exactly did you discern from me, Mr. Crane?”
He met my gaze evenly. “You are a proud young woman, Miss Van Tassel—and rightfully so. So when our previous attempts today were unsuccessful, I thought I ought to … anger your pride, as it were.”
“Indeed,” I said again. Spontaneously I bowed from the waist, my arms held wide to the sides. “I yield, good sir. It seems I have been bested and outsmarted. Not to sound too prideful, of course, but it does not happen often.”
He took my hand and kissed it, and my silly grin stilled at the touch of his lips on my hand. “I well believe it,” he said.
I drew away, flushed and uneasy and not sure why. “And what task shall you set me next, Mr. Crane?” I asked after a moment. “Now that I have mastered the scale.”
“One successful performance does not a mastery make,” he said, chuckling when I sent a glare his way. “But we are out of time for today, I am afraid. Therefore here is what I propose: you must repeat your successful performance at the beginning of our next lesson, and if you can, I have a song we may endeavor to learn together.”
“At last!” I said, heaving a mock sigh.
Mr. Crane reached out and took my hand again, but his face was quite serious. “And, Katrina,” he said, his voice low. “You must never let your voice hide again. Now that I have heard its true power, I do not think I can go without it.”
I froze for a moment, wondering if he was joking, but there was naught but earnestness in his eyes, green as the forest. “You … you quite flatter me, sir,” I said, struggling to find the very voice he had so praised.
“I do not,” he said. “Flattery is not an art in which I am particularly gifted.” He released my hand, then turned to collect his guitar and its case. Instrument in hand, he turned back to me and bowed. “Miss Van Tassel.” Then he went past me out the door.
I remained rooted to the spot, replaying his words in my head, thinking of how he had slipped, for the first time, and used my Christian name.