faint, high note floated through the room.
âI was playing in the dark,â Claus said, speaking very slowlyââin the dark, Anna, because I find that I can dream along with the music. That is silly, yes?âand I am too old to be silly. But I sit at the piano, and I have fancies. What kind of fancies? I am inâwhat do you call itâa great hall, where there is one single piano, a long concert grand. I play, and then there is the ovationâand then there is my Anna. When I am in my dressing room, triumphant, people come in, but they have no eyes for me, only for my Anna. She is so beautiful, you see, that nobody will look at someone who is only a great pianist. Is it right?â
âClausâClausââ
âNow what, my Anna? Tell me, do I frighten you when I speak about my dreams? No, no, my Anna. Donât think about me eating out my heart any more, because now I have all that I will ever want. I have you.â
âYesâyou have me.â
âLike my own child. You knowâyou never will be but my own. Like God led me to you, where you were, so that when I have you, I have everything. Come over here to me, my Anna. Come here.â
But she continued to stand at the door, and unable to see her face, he fancied she was smiling, for no other reason than that he was so quietly glad inside of himself.
âWhen you are quiet with me, coy, my Anna, does it mean that I should go to you and take you in my arms?â
âClausââ
âWhat is it? Come over here, Anna.â
Then she walked over to him, and he reached up, drawing her down into his arms. She tried not to resist; she tried to make herself loose and willing in his arms; but it was woefully hard, and when at last she was there, close against him, she felt her lips trembling.
âClaus,â she whispered, âClausââ
âYes.â
âWithout me, what would happen to you? Tell me. Wouldnât it be just the same as if you hadnât ever known me?â
âWhat a little fool you are!â
âBut tell me, Claus, pleaseââ
âI should scold you, perhaps, for having ideas like that.â
âNo, donât scold me, Claus. But sometimes you must thinkâyou must think of how it was before I was with you, how it would be if I were to goââ
âWhere, where?â
âNo, no,â she explained hastily. âIâm going nowhere, Claus. But if something were to happen to meââ
ââYesâif something happenedââ
âThen what would you do?â
âI donât know. I think about it sometimes, but not too much. I have no one, my Annaâbut you.â
âYesââ
âThen maybe you understand meâa little? You donât understand much, because you are only like a little child. But if you were to go away and leave meâlistenââ He pushed her from him, swung abruptly to the piano, and brought down his hands in two crashing chords. Again and again, until she fancied that the room had turned itself inside out, that it had filled itself with all the senseless, mad, rushing turmoil of the city. It was discord, direct and terrible counterpoint, rushing into her ears until her senses seemed to be leaving her. Then he stopped. He turned back, and took her hand.
âAnnaâdid I frighten you?â
âA littleââ
âThere is a boy I teach. This is what Iâve come to. His motherâs a common woman of the streets, but I teach him because I need the few poor dollars he can give me. Just a tattered little brat, but with something inside of his head. Maybe heâs mad. So today, when he came in, he struck those two chords, and I thought that I would lose my senses, only listening. But you see what would happenââ
âI seeââ
He smiled, throwing his arms around her. âBut why do we talk of such things, my Anna? I
Rebecca Hamilton, Conner Kressley