The Sacrifice

THE SACRIFICE
(for Jill Sands)

“Suicide?” my sister asked in the car on the way from the airport.

“That’s what the coroner said.” I was glad to be talking with Marty while driving on the freeway; so I didn’t have to look at her; so she couldn’t see the look in my eyes.

“I know Lois was sad sometimes,” I heard the catch in her voice, “but why would she kill herself?”

* * *

Lois had never married, and Marty and I were the only children her brother had. When we were little we would visit her at least once a week when she was in town. She was a second mother to us. But it wasn’t until I had moved away to attend college, then moved back, that we became friends. Lois rented me the old servant’s quarters above her garage for a percentage of the royalties off my first book, which I had started during my last year of college. I had two rooms with a full bath in between, and in return for doing the grocery shopping, access to her kitchen. It was during those eleven years that I learned more about Lois.

“Write a book about me after I die. Tell everything.” She would make me promise after her seizures, that’s what her doctor called them, seizures.

I was reading on the back patio when she had the first one I had ever seen. She was playing the piano. Everyday she played. One hour of scales, one hour of Bach, then three hours of whatever piece she was trying to learn. Since I can remember, the room was off limits to us in the mornings, although that never stopped us from hiding outside the French doors to listen. In the afternoons, when she gave herself up to the fun of making music, we were allowed in. There was a fireplace, used almost every evening, and full, stuffed chairs for company. On the white walls were framed copies of reviews and programs from her days as a soloist. And the room smelled, of smoke and perfume, the same perfume she had worn everyday for thirty years. I had tried to get her to tell me why she had given up performing, but she always evaded the question—always, until the first seizure.

She had just started playing the Chopin "Ballade in g-minor," which had been her signature piece. She had recorded it twice, once on her record of encore pieces, and once on what was to have been her definitive Chopin.

“No!” she yelled. “I can’t. You know what you’ve cost me.”

I ran to the door, thinking that someone else was in there.

She started to cry. “Everything,” she whispered. “You’ve cost me everything.”

My hand touched the brass, fish-shaped door handle. I hesitated, looking through the glass panels. No one was in the room with her.

“I’m sorry,” she said, staring into the open piano. “I do love you.”

I stepped to the side of the door, to listen unseen.

“Again?” Then quietly, as if cajoling an unruly child, she begged,
“Please, you know I try. Give me another chance.”

Even through the door I could feel the tension ease as she gave herself up to the music. But it was different: more lyrical, more uneven, and lighter with a playful touch. It sounded as if she were playing on a different piano from her 1873 Broadwood. Gone were the massive, full chords. She lingered, trapped in middle voices. Lightning flourishes that had been her trademark, were slower; she teased them, occasionally hesitating as if she were going to change her mind mid-passage. Her tempos changed as much as her dynamics.

“Better?” she asked, waiting for an answer as if from the piano itself. “Yes,” she smiled. “I thought so too.”

She collapsed, hitting her head against the protruding, though unused, music holder. I ran in. “Lois?” I lifted her away from the piano. A red welt marked her forehead. “Lois?”

“It was better.” she mumbled. Then she opened her eyes. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was you.”

“Are you all right?”

“Of course. I—”

“You passed out. You’re not all right.”

She smiled faintly. “Believe me, I am.”

“I’m going to call your doctor.”

“Please?” She grabbed my hand. “Please don’t. I’ll tell you. And, maybe, when I’ve died, you’ll have something marvelous to write about.”

She looked older, tired and fragile, in a way that our different ages didn’t account for.

“Would you like a drink of water, or something?” I asked.

“No. Yes, iced water with a touch of sherry in it.” She looked at me carefully, assessing whether I could keep her secret. “Let’s sit on the porch, and I’ll tell you.”

I helped her to the wicker chaise lounge on the covered patio. “I’ll get your drink.” I said walking over to the small bar.

“It’s Frédéric,” she whispered.

”Frederick?” I asked, pouring the sherry into the glass.

Her eyes had filled with tears. She reminded me of Marty, coming home from a dance in school, and telling me of her greatest love. I handed her the watered sherry. “Frederick?”

“You will promise to write about us?”

“I . . . I’ll try. It’s hard to promise.”

“It’s a beautiful and tragic story. I’m sure you’ll do it well.”

“I will,” I conceded. “But who’s Frederick? You’ve never talked about him before. Have I met him?”

She looked at me as if somehow I should have known. I felt embarrassed.
“Chopin,” she whispered.

My look of astonishment must have been something, because despite the mood, Lois laughed. Thinking back on that moment, I still can feel the pride I felt then that our friendship was strong enough that in stead of taking offense, I laughed too. But I did think she was joking with me, until she stopped and held my hand. It shook.

“Yes, Chopin. He visits me often. And I play for him.”

“Were you talking to him earlier?”

“How did you know?”

“I was outside the doors. I thought you were arguing with someone.”

“I was.”

“Chopin?”

“He hates the way I play his music. He hates the way everyone plays it. He wasn’t crazy you know.”

“I never thought he was.”

“But that’s how most people play it, as if he had written for Hollywood. Sometimes, I forget, and play it the way I used to. It gets him very angry.”

I got up to get a drink. I knew this was a story I’d never write. “Was he angry today?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve always avoided telling me why you gave up performing. Did it have anything to do with him?”

“He wanted me to rerecord everything, to show people how his music should be played. I tried, but—”

“Was that the record project that was never released?”

“They laughed at me.” Tears welled up in her eyes. “Laughed.”

“Who? The record people?”

“Well not to my face. But my agent said they’d call him. Telling him that I’d lost my mind.”

“Why give up performing?”

Frédéric made me. He found me—it’s been almost a hundred and fifty years since he died—about twenty years ago. At first I thought it was my imagination, stress. I gave up my European tour to rest. Then he visited me almost every day, unless he was mad. He got mad often. It was frustrating for him. He had looked for someone who was able to respond to his— spirit. He had looked so long. Then, he found me, and even though I knew his music, I played it wrong.”

“You’re Chopin was always your signature. How could you play it wrong?”

“Did you hear me today?”

“Yes?”

“Then you know. It’s in the differing tempos between the right and left hand, in the dynamics, in the sense of it.”

“But the music, it’s written out. Doesn’t that tell you—”

“No, it says almost nothing. What he wrote—like mere scales—a skeleton of the music. How do you show the soul of something?”

“And they laughed?”

“Yes. It made him so mad. It was through me that he sought to have his music played and heard like it should have been. And no one cared.”

“It was beautiful.”

“I know. But that’s just for us. He got so frustrated that he won’t let me play in public.”

That had been seven years before. And for the next eight years she, they, continued to refuse to play publicly.

My book was published. It didn’t do well, but it allowed me to start paying Lois back. And it kept the door to the publishing world open for everything I’ve written since. I moved away three years ago, into the country. Lois’s
seizures had become almost daily occurrences, and gotten to be difficult things for me to work around. That first time, I felt goose bumps when she told me the story, but later I doubted it, although it wasn’t long before I truly believed her, and through her I think I’ve even talked to him. Lois was heartbroken when I moved, but I think he understood.

I visited every weekend. She seemed to wither during the last year, exhausted by his demands and frustrations.

When Doctor Georgeson called to tell me that Lois was dead, I think I understood. Chopin’s spirit was too bound to Lois’s. He couldn’t rest, and she couldn’t help him, not until she understood the depth of their bond. I might argue that it was a mercy killing not suicide, but who would believe me?

* * *

It was a simple, private funeral. Marty's husband stayed with their son back in Seattle. My wife had handled the arrangements with the funeral home. I had tried to tell her about Lois once, but she couldn’t believe it, and I never brought it up again.

The service was beautiful. They played Chopin during the reception.