The lights dimmed abruptly.
There was darkness, and definitely no more hot water.
We’re not talking the pitch black that greeted me after I was dead and buried, or cremated and scattered—or whatever the case may be—when I first landed, slap-bang, in that miserable place I call the Hereafter (have you dreamed up a better moniker yet?).
My fingers had stopped aching, for which I was beholden, and I was completely dressed, in a relatively comfortable seat, and heard the subdued murmur of people around me.
There was a gathering rumble of sound, a slowly advancing noise that came from what I recognized as an orchestra pit below, in front of closed stage curtains.
We were in some kind of large theatre, and although most of the lights were out, they slowly grew back, along with the sound.
‘Richard Wagner’s “Vorspiel”, the prelude of Das Rheingold—we’re listening to the low E Flat beginnings,’ said a childish voice beside me.
As my sight adjusted, I found myself face-to-face with a six-year-old. The girl peered back from beneath a cute, pageboy haircut.
‘We’re at the bottom of the Rhine,’ she said lightly. ‘The music builds slowly, to a stirring drone in E Flat major. Can you hear it?’
How a child could dissect something that was, for me at least, wonky pedestrian noise, came across disconcerting. For all I knew, she was making it up and hoodwinking the old man in the next seat.
‘Wolram, it’s me.’
‘Kohana?’
‘You were expecting Little Red Riding Hood?’
‘I haven’t the faintest idea. So, what’s afoot this time? And why the kiddie get-up?’
‘It’s early 1936.’
‘Of course it is.’
‘So, you get to meet itsy-bitsy me.’
The girl stood up, all of one hundred and ten centimetres, in a taffeta party dress and big bow, and curtsied to me. Then she grinned and sat down again.
‘Very polite of you,’ I remarked. ‘Tell me, is this where the Arthurian nonsense started?’
‘Actually, Das Rheingold isn’t about King Arthur at all. It’s the story of water-sprites in the Rhine River, some coveted gold, and assorted characters from Norse mythology.’
‘Don’t they go hand-in-hand?’
‘No! …Well, I suppose they could, if you choose to be completely ignorant.’
‘And we’re backtracking this far because you wanted to give me a better musical education?’
‘Why not?’
As Kohana kicked back, I noticed her feet didn’t come close to touching the floor.
‘To fill you in, when I was six years old, the world famous Freigedank-Dummheit Opera Company came from Dresden, to tour Japan for several performances. They were a hit. Germans were popular here in the 1930s.’
‘Likely, this had something to do with the kindred authoritarian bias.’
I looked around the theatre. The walls were gold and the ceiling had a huge chandelier, as well as a big picture of a nymph. There would have been over a thousand people there, many in Western clothes, but most in traditional Japanese garb.
‘We’re in the Teikoku Gekijo, also known as Teigeki—the Imperial Theatre in Tokyo,’ Kohana held forth in her new, disquieting child’s tone.
‘You didn’t have your Orochi tattoo at this age, did you?’
‘Wolram, I’m a little young to go getting tattoos.’
‘Well, you brought me here, true, but aren’t you also, then, too young to be allowed admittance to a prestigious event like this?’
The girl pouted. ‘I guess.’
‘Who brought you?’
‘My father. He loved opera. I used to come here every summer as a child. You know, before the war.’
‘Which war?’
She slit her eyes.
Curiosity definitely got the better of me. ‘Where is your old man?’
‘You’re sitting in his seat.’
I almost jumped out of the thing, worried I’d been reclining on some poor fellow, but there was nobody beneath me.
‘Good gosh, Kohana—don’t scare me that way. He’s not here?’
‘He’s not important.’
‘You’re desperate to hide the man from me. Why is that?’
‘Not desperate—I choose to spend no more time with him.’
‘Your drama, I suppose.’
About three minutes had past since the orchestral thrum began, and I will admit it had something rousing and zippy about it. Of course, I’d heard the music before—I just felt like playing it dopey.
The waif-like Kohana had turned away and was gazing at the nymph on the ceiling. It took another half minute for me to notice the tears on her cheeks.
‘This was the most sublime, moving music I had ever heard,’ she said, so softly I barely took in the words. ‘Beautiful, isn’t it?’
‘What is?’
‘The music.’
‘What music?’
‘The music they’re playing.’
‘Oh, yeah.’
‘To be honest, the opening four to five minutes were the best. The rest of the opera, well, I could have done without it. Straight after the performance, my father flagged down a rickshaw, we stopped by Oume-san’s okiya—and he left me there. For good. I never saw him again, but I am grateful for this parting gift.’
One thing occurred to me—where was Kohana’s sister Tomeko, in this memory? If she were taken to the geisha house at the same time, after the grand finale, wouldn’t the girl logically be here? A frumpy, middle-aged woman with far too much makeup occupied the seat next to Kohana.
That was the moment I remembered something.
Another concert, another six-year-old. Not Wagner. What were they playing? Mozart? No, Tchaikovsky, something from The Nutcracker.
Corinne beside me, watching and listening in awe. She adored the ballet, even if she would never be able to dance.
Me, checking text-messages, bored senseless. Ignoring the girl as much as I did the music. Her sad expression, when I finally found the time to take a look.
I brushed it off and started texting again.