AS HE’D PLANNED, Philip had turned a spare room of the house into a soundproof studio where he could work at night, editing his recordings, a small room Suzanne rarely entered, crowded with a console and screens and tape machines and wires, all a mystery to her. It was too small for recording, and so Suzanne kept going to his studio in New York. Over the next few years her work there was often as dazzling as ever, Philip said; remarkable, the reviewers called it. Philip allowed a few journalists from small magazines to come to the house for interviews—to show she was real, Suzanne always said jokingly when they arrived. To them she spoke less about her background and more about the music, her interpretations.
But she grew tired and frustrated ever more quickly. Philip was required to do more and more alterations on her recordings; it was occasionally necessary to substitute an entire movement from his vast library of recordings by other pianists. What worked best were recordings made in his own studio, with the same room sound, so he found himself bringing out CDs nominally by Suzanne that competed with his earlier issues. Or he had to seek out older recordings made in similar studios. All this required a good deal of legwork, but it was worth it, he never doubted, for Suzanne. She was doing the best she could. It was not her fault that her powers were so uneven. If not for the bad luck of her illness, she could have been one of the great pianists of her generation.
For they had finally found a neurologist right in Nyack who had diagnosed Suzanne’s mysterious on-and-off symptoms as a form of fibromyalgia. She was frightened when she first heard the words, then somewhat relieved when the doctor described the illness at length—elusive and difficult to diagnose—and said that hers was a relatively mild case. She was lucky that it hadn’t progressed very far by this time—Suzanne was in her forties. If her luck held and she didn’t succumb to depression again, it might not get much worse.
“We need to make clear,” said Phil, who of course had accompanied her to the appointment, “that my wife is an important pianist. A major artist in the middle of a successful recording career.” Suzanne shot him glances to make him stop, but to no avail. “She’s been managing to play up to now, but we need to know the prospects for the future.”
“It’s hard to predict with fibromyalgia,” the doctor said. A Chinese woman probably twenty years their senior, with a severe white coat and an array of diplomas on the wall, she seemed unfazed by Phil’s boasting. “But I’d advise you, Mrs. Markon”—and here she turned back to Suzanne, who didn’t interrupt to explain that she used her original name—“to go on as you’ve been doing, get exercise and plenty of rest, and, as I said, if you’re lucky you’ll be able to continue your work. I certainly hope so, and you should come in every couple of months so I can have a look.”
The doctor wrote out several prescriptions and though both reached for them, she handed them to Suzanne. “You’re fortunate that it hasn’t affected your arms and hands any more than it has. I know it must sound odd to use that word, fortunate, in these circumstances, but you may come to see it that way once you get used to the idea.”
“Frankly, I’m relieved, in a way,” Suzanne said as they got into the car. “Not knowing is worse. At least I know it’s real, it’s not depression alone, or I’m not indulging myself. Did you think I was just, you know, avoiding . . .”
“Of course not,” said Phil. Although he had at times thought precisely that. His sympathy and encouragement had grown slightly worn and thin, like an old coat its owner is thoroughly tired of but can’t afford to replace. Now he could be freshly sympathetic and useful; it was bad luck, nothing psychologically torturous or self-destructive. He must see that she kept playing as long as possible. In any event, the recordings could continue; by now they had an independent existence.
Months passed and Suzanne was no worse. Indeed, she seemed better, more energetic and lighter in spirit, since the doctor had given her condition a label. She still enjoyed cooking. One winter evening she’d made an elaborate cassoulet, and as she was setting it on the table she said nonchalantly, “You’ll never guess who came over today. Elena.”
Philip put down his glass of wine and stared. “You mean turned up, just like that?”
“No, of course not. She called last week and said she wanted to see me. I wasn’t eager, but she really pressed. So finally I said she could come today.”
“You didn’t tell me. Well, how does she look?”
“The same as on the posters. Even better. Still glamorous. Very well cared for. The same faint remnant of an accent. I think she keeps it on purpose.”
“What did she want? I assume she wanted something.” Philip played with his fork, running his fingertips along the tines.
“She said . . . I hardly know how to tell you this.... She said a couple of passages in the Chopin ballades . . .” She had sliced the bread and brought the salad to the table; there was nothing more to delay her. Suzanne sat down, pushed her hair away from her face, and looked at him. “That very first recording we did, remember? She said passages were copied from hers. I’m sorry, I don’t know how else to put it. You know, pasted in, or over, however it’s done.”
She watched him carefully, but he revealed nothing. He looked blandly at her, began eating the cassoulet, and made appreciative murmurs. When he looked up, Suzanne was still gazing steadily at him. He remembered how shy she was when they first met, or maybe it wasn’t shy, maybe simply an innate reserve, an instinct of vulnerability that kept her from meeting people’s eyes. He had taught her, when she first began to play in public, that she must look at people straight on, that otherwise they would distrust her. She had learned her lesson well. She stared straight at him; it was he who had to look away first.
“And did she say how she came up with something so preposterous?”
“Well, she heard something on it that rang a bell, and then she listened to my CD and hers, one after the other. Hers was a few years older, also done in a small studio, maybe that same place on West Twenty-fourth Street you used to rent. She sounded very specific about what she heard, but I didn’t want to know the details. Still, I thought I’d better check with you. She didn’t seem angry, only puzzled. Why did I do it? she wanted to know. Of course, I said I did nothing of the sort.”
“Of course not,” said Philip.
“I got flustered. I think I was kind of rude, at the end.”
“That’s understandable. Who wouldn’t be? It’s a serious accusation.”
“It wasn’t an accusation. I mean, she didn’t threaten or anything like that. We’re friends, she said. She just wanted to clear things up. But in the end I asked her to leave. I was in the midst of doing the cassoulet—that was the truth. It takes time.”
He grunted and continued eating.
“Well, Phil?” That steady gaze from her large dark eyes was making him flustered as well, so rare a sensation that he hardly understood what it was.
“Well what?”
“Well, did you do that? It doesn’t sound like something she’d invent.”
“Okay, look,” he said after a long pause. So long that there was nothing else to do but admit it. She’d get it out of him eventually—why let it drag them into an unpleasant scene? “It was only a few seconds, not even worth mentioning. When I did the editing I could hear that you were tired. I didn’t want to make you go through it again. You’d already done several takes. It was our first time, remember?” He knew each CD, each date, each recording session with Suzanne in the studio; they required so much patience. “You weren’t used to recording. You didn’t have the . . . the confidence you have now. A couple of seconds—nothing really. It’s a fluke that she caught it. I didn’t want to bother you about it when you were off to such a great start. Where’s the harm? I mean, it’s your performance, the whole thing. It’s just a sort of . . . a Band-Aid.”
“A Band-Aid?” She laughed, a harsh brittle laugh. “You’re calling part of a Chopin performance a Band-Aid?”
“Okay, I’m sorry. That was a stupid phrase. Just a little adjustment.”
“Did you do this ‘little adjustment’ in any of my other recordings?”
“No! I certainly did not.”
“Do you do it with any of your others?”
“No! Well, maybe once or twice. No one realizes how hard it is to produce a perfect CD. It takes a hell of a lot of work. Musicians are all the same, all of you. No one wants to keep repeating a few bars that didn’t come out quite right. Or they want to play the whole piece straight through again. Sometimes you get five, six, ten takes and you’ve still got a couple of doubtful patches. So . . . I’m not the only one, believe me.”
“I’m not sure I do believe you. Did you do it with any others of mine?”
“You just asked me that and I said no. Don’t you trust me?”
She didn’t answer that directly. “Don’t do it again with my work, Phil. I mean it. It’s not right. You know it’s not right.”
“It’s not any worse than plenty of other stuff that goes on.”
“I don’t care what else goes on. If it’s not me playing, then it’s not me . . . it’s not my . . . I mean, how can I feel any sense of accomplishment? How can I read the reviews without feeling sick?” She remembered when she entertained her parents’ guests, the Woodsteins, with that section of the Rachmaninoff prelude she passed off as her own composition. And her mother’s stern disapproval, and Richard’s. It must be tempting for someone like Phil. It was easy to understand how, with so much technology and skill at his command, he might be tempted.
“Oh, I bet you can.” He looked wily, and this time it was she who couldn’t meet his glance. “I know what you want. I’ve always known what you want.”
“I don’t want it that way.”
“And if that’s the only way?”
“Just don’t do it, okay? Besides the fact that it’s wrong and it’s . . . it offends me, it could get us into a lot of trouble.”
He didn’t reply, and she pressed him no further. The meal was over. They’d barely eaten, and they cleaned up in silence. Suzanne was about to throw out the rest of the cassoulet, but Philip put it carefully in a plastic container, a habit he had learned from his aunt Marsha. “It was very good. It’ll be fine for another night,” he said. “I’ve got some work to finish.” He washed his hands at the sink, went into his studio, and shut the door.
Suzanne stretched out on the sofa in front of the TV. It was another of those crime shows. A suspect was being grilled in the small cell-like room by two detectives. It involved an international counterfeiting scheme—politics and terrorism were part of it—but as the scenes continued she couldn’t follow the intricacies of the plot. The commercial was even more obtuse: A car slammed to a sudden stop, perched precariously on the edge of a cliff above a roiling sea. She should be working instead of sitting and staring at nothing. She was too tired to practice at this hour—nearly nine—but there were scores to go over. Phil wanted her to work on the Schubert Impromptus. She’d studied them in school, they were a staple of the repertoire, but that was a long time ago. Still she didn’t move. It felt good to hear voices in the house, even the harsh voices of the detectives and the district attorney. Voices that smothered the voices in her head, her own and Elena’s.
She hadn’t told Philip the whole truth about Elena’s visit, only the bare minimum. Least of all how much it had shaken her. The phone rang when she was at the piano a week ago, practicing the Impromptus. The machine was turned down low so as not to disturb her, and she nearly forgot about the call. Later, when she saw the blinking light and heard Elena’s unmistakable voice, she felt a shiver of apprehension. The voice conjured Elena’s image. Suzanne hadn’t seen her in ages. She and Phil had received an invitation to her wedding but they had invented an excuse. And Richard had mentioned something about a baby, but Suzanne never got around to calling.
She had followed Elena’s musical endeavors more attentively than her domestic ones. Elena generally played in New York several times a year, with the Philharmonic just a month ago, then with a chamber group at the Ninety-second Street Y, and she toured and made recordings with one of the large corporate studios. She was leading the life Suzanne had expected for herself, and she couldn’t help feeling Elena had stolen it from her. Just as she had stolen Richard and, years ago, Philip. She couldn’t get over the notion that her own life would have been entirely different had Elena never come from Russia and turned up in high school. It was as if they were characters in a fairy tale and Elena was the fortunate sister who wins the prince and the kingdom, while the other sister, not as lucky, is hustled offstage to a hovel in the forest. Although Snow White and Rose Red, as Mme. Kabalevsky used to call them at school, had both wound up happy in the end. Snow White married the prince and Rose Red got his brother. Suzanne had actually looked up the Grimm story to remind herself.
“Suzanne?” The voice on the message was low, softened by trepidation, not at all like the usual Elena, bold and sure of herself. “I know it’s been ages. I hope you’re feeling better. The last time I ran into Phil he said you weren’t feeling well. Listen, I’d really like to see you. There’s something I need to talk to you about. Can you give me a call?” Aside from the faint accent, her English was perfect, colloquial, no more of those quaint textbook constructions. Those had disappeared long ago, by the time she got to Juilliard. She was nothing if not adaptable.
Suzanne didn’t return the call. She had a good enough life now, thanks to Phil. But if she couldn’t have Elena’s world, she didn’t want to be reminded of it. When the phone rang two days later, she picked up because Phil had said a reporter from a French magazine might be calling.
“Suzanne, I’m glad I got you. Maybe you didn’t get my message. How are you?”
They exchanged banalities as if the gap in their friendship had been accidental, as if they’d simply lost touch and were cheerfully catching up.
“Look, I really need to see you. Can we arrange something? If you’re in the city, maybe we could have—”
“I’m seldom in the city these days.”
“Well, okay, then I’ll drive up. Where is it, Westchester somewhere?”
“Nyack. It’s in Rockland County.”
“Nyack. Fine. I can get there.”
“I’m not sure it’s a good idea. I’m so busy right now, and you must be, too. . . .”
But Elena persisted, and Suzanne was no match for her determination. Elena always got what she wanted, she thought as she hung up. And now she wants me. For what, she could not imagine. She brooded about it for days.
The appointment was for late afternoon. Suzanne purposely occupied herself with the cassoulet, but nonetheless she was watching from the kitchen window as the car pulled up. A small black foreign car—she couldn’t tell the make, but an expensive car. She would have expected something more gaudy. Nor, when she came in, was Elena gaudy. She was dressed soberly. She didn’t need flashy clothes—success was a glow surrounding her. She was slim and her hair was slightly darker, with coppery tones in the blond, cropped short now and with that billowy, recently washed look usually seen only on TV commercials. She wore narrow black slacks and a gray silk blazer, and Suzanne immediately wished she had thought to dress for the occasion. She was wearing jeans and a black turtleneck, as she used to as a student. She felt older, dowdy, although Elena exclaimed about how wonderful she looked.
“You’re as stunning as ever,” Elena said.
“Me, stunning? I never was.”
“Oh, come on, Suzanne. You know you always had that mysterious, secretive look, like, who knows what’s going on behind that face? You still do. Anyway, so here I am. I never thought you’d move to the suburbs. You always used to say how you loathed visiting your brothers when they moved out of Brooklyn.”
“That was Long Island, all that tract housing. This is different, it’s a real town. We can walk to shopping, the bookstore, the cafés.” Why was she accounting for her house, her town, her life? Already she was on the defensive.
“Well, it’s a lovely house, and right on a corner, too. And that beautiful garden out front. Who takes care of that? Is Phil the gardener?”
“I am. I learned. I love it, and it’s not hard, really.”
“Aren’t you afraid of hurting your hands?” Elena spread her own hands out on her lap, the thin fingers splayed. The hands were pale and perfect, articulated and alive even in their stillness.
“I wear gloves. I’m careful.” Suzanne wanted to spread her hands out as well. They were every bit as good as Elena’s, if not quite so white. But she restrained herself. Enough competition. “And you? You’re still in the city, aren’t you? And you have a baby?”
“Not such a baby anymore. Petey’s almost three,” and she smiled with the irrepressible joy parents always have when speaking of their young children. Suzanne had seen it on their other friends from school—Tanya, Rose Chen, even Simon Valenti—all of them now teaching and raising families. “We bought a town house in the East Seventies, room for the baby and the nanny. And not far from Paul. He’s getting on, you know. I don’t like to be too far away. Also because of Petey. Our boy.”
“Your boy?” Suzanne repeated, puzzled.
“Yes, Petey is Paul’s child. Oh, don’t look so shocked. You must have known. We never tried to hide it.”
“I . . . I suppose I did. I was never quite sure, though. And I certainly didn’t know about the boy.”
“Well, it’s nothing we needed to advertise. And it’s fine with Oliver. My husband. He can live with it, and in fact soon we’ll be having one of our own.”
“That’s great,” Suzanne said. So, the rumors about Elena and Paul had been true. Of course they were true. Rumors about love affairs generally were. And now Elena had everything, plus a baby from each man. “You’re not showing yet.”
“No, it’s early. I just found out a couple of weeks ago. Are you really shocked?” Elena followed Suzanne into the kitchen while she got the coffee ready.
“Not anymore. No. You always did things your own way.” Suzanne grinned and Elena grinned back, and for a moment it was as if they were girls again, girls who understood each other well and wordlessly. As soon as she felt that kinship, she realized how much she missed it.
“Are you still in touch with Richard?” Suzanne asked. She poured carefully, no longer looking at Elena.
“Of course. He’s got a new opera opening next season. This is some Chinese folktale theme, I forget what. Didn’t he tell you?”
“No, I read about it in the papers. It’s been a few months since I spoke to him. You know how New Yorkers never like to leave the city. I’m surprised you found your way up here.” The moment of intimacy had passed. She hoped it wouldn’t be long before Elena got to the point. Surely she’d come for a reason.
“But you and Richard were such close friends! Why are you burying yourself up here, Suzanne? Everyone you know is in the city. Even Phil’s studio is there.”
“I like it well enough. I don’t feel buried.”
Elena sat down on the couch and set her mug in front of her on the coffee table. “Well, I guess it’s not my business. I’m sure Richard’ll send you tickets to the opening. Listen, I’ve heard some of your CDs. They’re fantastic. And I saw some of the reviews in the music magazines. I’m glad for you.”
“Yes, they’re doing well. You know Phil, once he gets an idea in his head. He talked me into it.”
“Really?” Elena turned to look at the piano. “I see it’s the same Steinway. I remember it from your apartment in the Village.”
“It’s still in good shape. I practice on it, but for the recordings I go to the studio in town.”
“I wanted to talk to you about the Chopin CD,” Elena said.
“The one with the ballades. It’s a wonderful performance, of course. You were always fantastic.”
Suzanne smiled. Maybe this was nothing but a friendly visit. Maybe now that she had established a reputation, Elena wanted her friendship again, or thought she or Phil could be of use, though she hardly seemed in need of anything.
“There was just something . . . something that bothered me.”
“Don’t tell me I made some awful gaffe. Philip would have caught it.”
“No.” Elena stayed silent, her mouth open, as if the words were stuck in her throat. “I don’t know how to say this, but . . .”
“What?”
“I thought you would know. But maybe you don’t. In the third ballade, the second and third movements actually . . .”
“Well, what?”
“Suzanne,” she said. “Parts of them are mine. They’re taken off my CD, the Chopin one I did way back when.”
Suzanne set her cup down very slowly, as if it contained a toxic substance, mercurial, that would spill at her peril. “What on earth are you talking about? I played them in the studio and Phil did the editing there, too.”
“You know these things can be done, with all the fancy equipment they have now. I was shocked, but I know it’s mine.”
“This is madness. I don’t even want to hear it.”
“No, please. Please just listen a minute. Let me tell you what I heard. If you don’t know, you need to know. I was listening to the second movement and something tugged in my ear, sort of like an itch deep in the ear. At first I let it go. But then a few minutes later, in that chromatic passage, you know, it happened again. Just like . . . I can’t explain it, almost like a sense of déjà vu. So I listened all over again and it was that fermata, you know, after the runs . . . there’s that fermata, and it was held just a little longer than it should be. I tried to remember where I’d heard that done before, and I realized it was me—I also did it the time I played it at Carnegie Hall. And the second time, a little later on, there was an ornament I added, a tiny trill—no big deal. But it’s impossible that you’d do exactly the same thing. And if you did, it’s odd that it got onto the CD. It probably shouldn’t have gotten onto mine, either. What I couldn’t figure out is why he’d copy a passage that had that. Maybe he just liked it.”
Suzanne stood up. “I can’t even keep track of what you’re talking about. This is absurd. Stop it. Just stop it. You’re saying he took your recording and put my name on it? That’s crazy.” Could he have done that? Even as she denied it she felt a shiver of dread. He was capable of it. Of course he was. There had been hints all along, but she hadn’t allowed herself to pay attention to them. What had she been thinking? The fear shot through her and left her sick.
“No, no. Mostly it’s you playing. He just inserted those Two-Parts. I’m not sure where it starts and ends, but I know there’s a section of me in there. What I did was, I played my recording alongside yours. They weren’t the same all the way through, not at all. Yours is even better in places, or at least different. Remember, we were always different? You were more restrained and I tended to go overboard. Not so much anymore, though. Anyway, it’s just those two passages. I swear to you, Suzanne. Do you think I’d make this up? Listen for yourself. Here”—she rummaged in her big leather purse—“I brought my CD. Put it on and see.”
Suzanne wouldn’t look at the CD Elena held out. “Put that away. I don’t want to listen. For all I know, you could make it up. You’ve always wanted to take everything away from me, from the very beginning.” Suzanne stood up and turned her back to Elena. She didn’t want to see or hear her. She wished she could make her disappear or pretend this was not happening. Out the window, three birds were pecking at the feeder; she felt as if they were pecking at her own skin. Elena was pecking, jabbing with her sharp beak. “First you took Phil. Then Richard. What is it now? Isn’t your reputation enough for you? You can’t stand that I’m having some success, too?”
“Suzanne! Phil was a silly high school romance, for God’s sake. I thought we’d been through that over twenty years ago. You’re married to him—what more could you want! I’ve hardly exchanged two words with him since. And Richard! I didn’t ‘take’ him. He wasn’t yours.”
He was mine, Suzanne thought. Ever since I was a child. Mine.
“It was a brief fling, a few months, one of those things. It happens all the time. We became friends—it was you who wanted us to meet and be friends, remember? And then it just happened. It wasn’t ever serious. Richard does that, you know, with men, with women. He’s omni . . . omni something, or ambi . . . I don’t know the word. Ever since that old boyfriend of his died—Greg, was it? And no, it wasn’t AIDS, thank God, if that’s what you’re thinking. They were very careful. Anyhow, Richard flits around, I don’t know, for distraction, maybe. It didn’t mean he wasn’t still your friend. I wasn’t even very hurt when he ended it. I just . . . Look, I don’t want anything that’s yours. I never have. But you never trusted me. Just because I’m not the kind of person you grew up with. It’s so provincial, my God. But look, Suzanne, what matters now is that if Philip is messing around this way, you’ve got to get him to stop. Someone’s going to find out and there’ll be trouble.”
“I suppose you’ll see to that.”
“As it happens, I won’t. I haven’t said anything and I’m not going to. If that was what I had in mind, I would have let my agent handle it. You and I were friends. I came to ask you how it happened. You say you don’t know, and okay, I trust you. But Phil is doing something and you can’t let it go on.”
Suzanne wheeled around to face her. “This is outrageous. You are outrageous. Why don’t you just go?”
“Suzanne, I came here as a friend. You need to know about this.”
“We have nothing more to talk about. It’s a terrible accusation.” It was, and more so because it might be true.
“I’m not accusing. But I did hear what I said I heard. I could let that go, I will let it go, but if there’s more of the same, others are going to hear it, too, sooner or later. Maybe I should talk to Phil. Is he around?”
“No, and I’m sure he wouldn’t have anything to say to you.”
Elena gathered the jacket she’d thrown on a chair. “I’m sorry it turned out this way. Will you at least talk to him about it? For your own sake?”
“He wouldn’t do anything to hurt me.”
“He may think he’s helping. Not that you need help—the playing is fine. That’s why I don’t see why—”
“I’ve asked you to go. Will you go now?”
Elena took a step forward as if to embrace her or simply take her hand, but Suzanne backed away. A moment later the door closed. The car started with a low rumble, and Elena was gone. For ten minutes Suzanne sat looking at the half-empty coffee cups, waiting for her heart to stop pounding. Elena’s cup had a bright red lipstick smear on the rim; that tangible evidence of her presence was infuriating. Suzanne took it immediately to the sink and attacked the smear with a soapy sponge. She would have liked to pretend the visit had never happened. Could what Elena said be true? And if it was, could she live with that knowledge?
Back in the living room she noticed the CD Elena had left on the couch, her recording of the Chopin ballades. Suzanne didn’t want to touch it. She picked it up with two fingers as if it were something filthy or sticky. She couldn’t think what to do with it, and finally put it on the rack with the others; she would never listen to it. She returned to the kitchen, tied a dish towel around her waist, and resumed slicing the sausage.
That was hours ago. Now, she forced herself to look at the TV screen. The culprit, once again seated in the tiny room with the false windows, persisted in denying everything, but it was clear that this time he was defeated; the police were breaking him down. Philip must not do that ever again, she thought. But could she control what he did? Was there any way to control Philip, so good to her, always looking out for her welfare, so elusive, so insistent?
Over the voices on the screen—the cops exultant, the criminal deflated—came a whisper from the voice inside that she couldn’t suppress: If he had to do it, then she was glad he’d used Elena. Elena, who had taken so much from her. It was only right that she, Suzanne, should take something back. Of course he must never do it again—she’d find a way to see to that. But meanwhile, she couldn’t prevent a smile at the thought of this small but useful betrayal. Now the jury was giving its verdict, but she no longer cared whether the defendant was found guilty or not. She knew he was guilty, but it really wasn’t such a terrible crime. He didn’t deserve a lengthy sentence. She fell asleep on the couch.
It was close to midnight when Philip came out of the studio and sat down on the edge of the couch. “Come to bed. It’s much more comfortable there.”
“Oh. Did I sleep long?”
“I don’t know. Did you?”
“I guess so. Have you been working all this time?”
“Yes. I’m not tired, though.” He put his hand under her sweater and touched her breasts. “You’re not too tired, are you?”
She smiled. “I was, but I’m persuadable. Persuade me.”
He lay down next to her and began caressing her. In a moment he had his fingers inside her. “You’re not still upset, are you?”
“No,” she whispered. “But you will do what I asked, won’t you? No more of that?”
“Shh, sweetheart, it’s all a fuss over nothing. Think about this instead.” She was already moaning. It took no time at all these days. He dug his fingers in harder, and she was gasping and clutching at him. He smiled. He loved to watch her come—he felt he was seeing the secret Suzanne, the one no one knew but him, the one behind the music.
Finally she stopped and sighed.
“That was just for openers. Now we’ll go to the bedroom for the real thing,” he said. He felt, as always, that he was directing a performance, produced, stage-managed, all conceived by him. She was his material, his setting, his cast. “My star,” he said, and led her to bed. Chances were, she would never mention that other business again; she’d forget, or pretend to forget. He knew her better than she knew herself.
He was right. She didn’t bring the subject up for a long time after that evening, simply played and left him to go about his business. That was the best he could hope for. It was no surprise to Phil that she was ignorant of how the real world operated. No one had ever explained to her that the goal was to get what you wanted, by whatever means. What he did was harming no one. And look at the benefits: It made Suzanne happy. He’d certainly rather see her happy than moping around the house, as she had for so long. If she thought it over carefully, she would feel the same, he was sure.
Richard’s new apartment on Central Park West was larger and mellower in every way than the small house in Brooklyn where Suzanne had first met him, and it was more spacious than the place in the West Fifties where he’d lived until his operas became so successful. The Persian rugs resembled the ones from the Brooklyn house but couldn’t be the same. Instead of the paper Japanese lanterns there were fixtures in odd curved shapes that shed a soft amber light. The old couch was the same, though, and the piano. There were still piles of magazines and prints on the walls. The heavy yellow crockery in which she’d had so many cups of coffee was the same—even when she was a child Richard had indulged her fondness for coffee, which her parents would not.
“Are you back to living alone?” Suzanne asked as she looked around. No need for awkwardness on that subject any longer; the small window of time in which there might have been something between them had slammed shut for good long ago. Or maybe had never been open.
“Yes, for now,” and he smiled, almost flirtatiously. Only lately she’d noticed that he was a flirt, provocative with all; she had to admire all the more his restraint when she was a teenager. The perfect gentleman, as her mother would say, for all those years. If only he hadn’t been. “But I’ve been seeing someone from the opera we’re working on for next fall. The Chinese folktale one?”
“Yes, I read about that. Who is it?”
“The tenor,” he said, almost shyly. “He’s a little young, but after all, I am the composer. That’s an attraction.”
“Oh, you have other charms, too. Now, what was so urgent that I had to run into town immediately?”
“It’s nothing funny. Let me give you a glass of wine first. Sit down.”
He sat down beside her. “Elena called me yesterday.” He waited, but Suzanne did not help. “She said she’d been to see you. She told me what you talked about.”
“She talked. I didn’t say much. It’s never necessary, with Elena. She can converse for two.”
“I think you may not realize how serious this is. What she told you, I mean.”
“I do realize it’s serious.” She emptied half her wineglass. “Why do I have a feeling we’ve had this conversation before?”
“I know. I haven’t forgotten. Rachmaninoff, right? That was actually pretty clever, that you could pull that off. I couldn’t praise you for it, though.”
“No. Not even a smile. You made me see how serious fraud is. But I haven’t done a thing wrong this time. I go to the studio and play as best I can, which isn’t bad, frankly. I don’t have anything to do with the technical part except to repeat what we decide needs repeating. The rest is Phil’s affair. I don’t even listen to the CDs. I just want to play music, I’m not an engineer or a businesswoman.”
“Suzanne, you are being so disingenuous. And you know what that word means now.”
“I certainly do. You explained it very well, what, thirty-five years ago?”
“They’re your recordings. They have your name on them. Your husband is your manager and your collaborator in making them. If he is . . . stealing—I hate to use that word, but it’s the only one that fits—other people’s work, you’re involved in it, too.”
“After Elena came that day, I made him promise not to do it again.” Even as she spoke, she remembered this was not the precise truth. She had implored him, but had not extracted any promise. How could she make Phil promise anything? He was so slippery, she would never know whether he’d keep a promise or not. Her marriage, she felt, was the opposite of most: The single aspect of their lives in which she could place complete trust was his love and sexual fidelity; in every other way she could never be quite sure of him.
“And you believe that’ll do it?”
She couldn’t keep it up any longer in front of Richard. He was right—it was disingenuous. Or worse. “I don’t know. It was the best I could do. How can I force him to stop?” It sounded like a plea.
“You can’t force him to stop. I’m not laying it all on you. You’re not responsible for his behavior. But you’re responsible for your own. You’re the one who’s got to stop.”
“Stop making the recordings, you mean?”
“Yes. That’s the only way to be sure this doesn’t continue. Or else record with some other firm.”
“You know I can’t do that.”
“Well, maybe not now. But sometime—”
“I can’t stop,” she broke in. “It’s totally unfair to ask that of me. It’s all I have. You know I can’t go back onstage. . . . You know how much I wanted that. Oh, it’s all right for you to talk—you’ve got what you want now. You worked hard, you did everything you were supposed to, and it happened for you. And I’m glad, really glad. But it doesn’t give you the right to go around telling other people to give up all their hopes—”
“You say it’s all you have. But you don’t really have it, do you?”
“What do you mean?”
“If he’s used Elena’s recordings, he must’ve used others’, too. You’ve told me yourself, you can’t play for long. You have an illness that makes you tire easily. He doesn’t push you—that’s his form of kindness. Why don’t you listen to the CDs? Study those recordings and see which parts of them are genuine and which . . . you know. How much satisfaction or fulfillment can you get if they’re not really yours?”
“They were very satisfying. Fulfilling, yes. I was so happy with them, until you and Elena came up with these . . . these accusations.”
“Come on, Suzanne, you know she was telling the truth. She couldn’t make something like that up. Would it have been better if she hadn’t told you? Then you’d be satisfied with an illusion.”
“And so?”
“Is that what you want? It’s not something real. Yours. Aside from being dishonest to others.”
“They are mine. They have my name on them.” She was trying to stay calm. He was opening a door on a cabinet of doubt she kept secret even from herself. She refilled her glass from the bottle on the table.
“What does that signify? It’s only your name. It’s your playing you want to be heard. At least I thought so. But you don’t really know—”
“I don’t want to know!” she cried. “I don’t want to hear any more.”
“All right, all right, I didn’t mean to upset you. I only—”
“What did you mean, then? Did you think I’d just laugh it off? Or did you think I’d give up an entire career to satisfy your high moral standards? You’re a prig, you know? You’ve always been a prig.”
“Well that’s a new one. I’ve been called a lot of things, but never that. And I thought you were the genuine article.”
“I am! When I played for you long ago, you said so yourself. I can play as well as Elena and any of them onstage right now.”
“I’m not disputing that. I mean genuine in another sense. That you wanted the music first, above anything else. But no, you want the reputation more than you want the music. Your name even without the music. A hollow shell.”
“That’s not true!” She was standing now, and almost shouting. “I want both. Why can’t I have both?”
“But don’t you see? You don’t have either. It’s a house of cards. As soon as someone who’s not a friend of yours finds out—and they will, believe me—you’ll have nothing. Less than nothing.”
She tipped the wineglass up and drained it to the last drop, then started toward the door. “I’m going to trust Phil to do the right thing. I’ve made it very clear that’s what I want, and I have to trust him. He’s always kept his promises.” He’s done so much for me, she thought. He delivered what he promised, and I let him. Is that so wrong?
“Will you come to my opening if I send you tickets?” Richard asked.
“Sure. If you still think I’m worthy of listening to your work.”
“Cut it out, Suz—”
But she was out the door.
