The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben: Installment #8

In the final installment of the "Intermezzo" that opens The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, many things in Kerr's dream have been going even more wrong than seemed possible - the constant warnings from the Old Woman aside, it seems the Aficionati have discovered him and Sebastian and are now pursuing them but who they are and why they're after them, he's not sure. The last thing he remembers was running into Beethoven who tried to comfort him, asking "What are you frightened about? There's..."

This installment marks the official beginning of the actual novel, The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, as Kerr wakes up and isn't quite sure where he is. And we've all had dreams like that...

(If you've only just arrived and have no clue what's going on, you might find it easier to start with the introductory post and begin from the beginning, here.)

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PART ONE

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CHAPTER ONE

"There's no reason to be afraid, really," the gentle voice was saying, prodding me softly with confirmation if not concern as the fog, I saw, began to lift and the light shone through. It had been very dark a moment ago, the darkness inside a tunnel, but I still couldn't see who was speaking.

What was it, I wondered, that frightened me, trying unsuccessfully to concentrate harder;
who was it who'd been talking to me?

"I was just about to wake you up: we're almost there," Cameron said.

Aware my head was leaning against the glass, I looked out the window as swirling patterns of snow began taking shape, the fog starting to break up a little, a pale sunbeam barely visible. Slowly coming to the surface, I looked around and wondered, "where am I?" What had scared me that jolted me awake?

'Jolted' wasn't the word, though; more like 'nudged,' as if it really mattered. I was probably just dreaming before waking up. Isn't this what psychiatrists called a 'fugue state,' that confusion before consciousness returns? Like different musical strands playing against each other, it felt like a fugue, though perhaps a quodlibet might be more accurate.

"True, a fugue implies a precise, procedural logic," I began explaining to myself, "but a quodlibet was more of a free-for-all." This reminded me why students often asked me, "Could you be less specific?"

Putting my inner professor aside for the moment, I started to look around wondering where I was now that I'm awake, or perhaps had been when I was dreaming, before becoming slightly more conscious. Clearly, I was sitting on a moving train on a blustery winter's day but what day that was, I'd no idea.

Cameron Pierce, who was both friend and assistant, sat quietly across from me with his thoughts buried deep in his iPod, his head nodding rhythmically to some pleasant beat (probably not listening to Schoenberg).

My hands were holding an old cloth-bound book of an unappealing faded brown resting comfortably against my stomach, splayed face down. I could no longer recall anything about it, not even the book's title (I usually took some book along with me even when I went shopping in case I'd have a moment to read).

The blanket of snow covering everything visible outside gave it an ominous air as if it could continue snowing for days. Vaguely, now, I remembered something about a blizzard that left our plans unsettled. There was something else besides the weather forecast that was ominous and unsettling but all I wanted to do was sleep.

An indecipherable announcement bleated from the overhead loudspeakers and people started shuffling about. Apparently, wherever we are, they could understand that. Cameron looked up and put his iPod away. Perhaps he understood it, too.

It's a good thing I'm not traveling alone because I'd still be asleep and then miss our stop, whatever it was. Who knows where I might end up, then: probably somewhere north of Glasgow.

"Well, that didn't take very long," Cameron said, handing me both my suitcases as we pulled into a picturesque old station.

The whole process of struggling to stand up forced the fog to recede but not so much to be really helpful. It had seemed a long time to me, like I'd slept for hours. I checked the larger suitcase and was relieved to see my familiar stamp – "T. Richard Kerr" – in heavy old-fashioned Gothic letters.

Then I remembered there was a large man who'd sat next to me carefully holding a viola case to his chest. Cameron said he'd left at the station before, some name I couldn't place.

Hadn't I just told myself something about Glasgow? But that didn't sound right. Why would I want to go to Scotland? I recalled being in Germany the other day, part of some whirlwind vacation...

Just then, a woman leaned forward and handed me a tattered brown book, the one I'd been reading only moments ago.

"Here, sir," she said deferentially, "you've forgotten this: don't leave your book behind!"

Still befuddled, I said "Thanks. You speak English?"

"Yes, of course," she smiled, "we're in England. We tend to do that."

Beside her, the man with the walrusy mustache who reminded me of Elgar muttered some no doubt derogatory comment I missed.

"Okay," I mumbled, turning away, "that explains it." Another nod, another thank you.

Not that it really explained all that much, the fog still swirling around. Perhaps some coffee would provide the necessary jolt.

Yes, but hadn't I been jolted awake before – last night on the plane? There was some turbulence as we approached London. "No reason to be afraid," someone had said, probably coming from the cockpit. Still, I recalled having made copious use of some mal d'air bags then. Hadn't we just left Munich earlier last night?

If we'd only spent one day in London, why did we change plans? Maybe it had to do with this blizzard. That's right, now I remember, not just weather: something else that was scary.

"Please watch your step, sir," the porter said. "Look out for the snow. There'll be plenty more where that came from." Holding on to my elbow, he carefully helped me down off the step.

Perhaps he thought I looked a bit woozy, stumbling headlong up the aisle trying not to hit everyone with my suitcases.

"The agent inside will call you a cab," the porter said to Cameron, winking at him as he nodded toward me. "Around this time of day, he'll usually be at the Dog & Pony."

The Snaffingham Station wasn't much by any account, a suburban out-of-the-way watering hole compensating in charm what it lacked in practicality, though I'd've felt better if it weren't locked, out here in the middle-of-nowhere.

"You blokes Curr and Pierce?" a voice asked, hiding back in the shadows.

"Apparently..."

"Then I been sent to fetch you."

In a cheap London hotel, earlier that morning

Things were so much easier before I retired, living on a regular schedule.

In the good old days, I felt useful; now, not nearly as much. What did it matter what day it was, after retiring the appointment book? Every day was the same: really – what schedule?

Yes, in the good old days, after all, things were different, weren't they? They're 'old' days because they were long ago. They're 'good' because I had a purpose then, a reason to wake up.

Now, I feel I'm just 'good and old,' sidelined at a certain age when I should be entering my 'Golden Years.' (What marketing firm came up with that slogan, snagging someone a hefty bonus?) If I entered Middle Age at 40, I'd only make it to 80; if 63's my Golden Section, I'll die 102!

In the good old days, I'd fall asleep staying up late correcting papers, a hard-working young college professor filled with idealism. "Work hard, learn your craft – earn your keep: success'll automatically come your way." Yes, this might be okay, this 'life philosophy,' as far as it went (not that the term 'philosophy' is accurate, here). It's only later that we discover – too late – there are other factors involved, things like politics or the economy, your health. These are the things now that keep me awake at night, these variables.

The best times (or sometimes, the worst times) were having trouble falling asleep after I'd come home late from a concert, better yet when I was playing the concert, a cellist in the orchestra. But even when I was just a listener, excitement often kept me awake, whether from reliving technical issues or emotional ones.

These days, I would fall asleep at night while listening to a recording, dozing off before the ending, missing the climaxes, though still better for my brain than falling asleep to some television show.

There were lively, happy nights spent with friends – students, colleagues, my fellow musicians – those nights we called 'out on the town,' those nights when coming home late would make waking up early a challenge.

Then Sondra, my wife of ten years, died of cancer, which changed everything (a heart attack had hurried up the process).

There was a difference to waking up before, excited about starting the day. I'd wake up already awake, feeling wonderfully alive. I could hardly wait to get to school, to meet my first class. Now, it's like I'm swimming to the surface – slow motion, an unfolding process – considering I always hated swimming, afraid of drowning.

Usually, these days, I'd struggle to open my eyes, look out the window, and try to guess the time of day. But the window was on the wrong side of the room this morning.

"Okay, where the hell am I?" I wondered, in a state of confusion, hoping pieces of an answer started to form but I couldn't even find the fragments of a dream to help me. Is this what they called a fugue state? Maybe that's not the term. In music, fugue comes from the Latin, 'flight.'

I lay there in the semi-darkness before dawn wondering "was I fleeing something" other than the usual recent fears and worries that had long replaced the adventures of youth which were never that adventurous?

"No," I thought, trying to recall (without success) my last thoughts before bedtime, or what I'd been doing before feeling sleepy.

Though dawn felt like it was hours away, it finally dawned on me: not 'flight' as in 'running away from something.' It was 'flight' as in 'on a plane.' But where had I landed?

The door burst open revealing a naked man and I very nearly screamed as I slammed myself into an unexpected wall. I was under sudden attack from evil agents, the police perhaps or terrorists. Through dim light from an even dimmer hallway, I could see someone, dark-haired, in the doorway waving his arms and yelling.

He wasn't yelling anything I could tell about Jihad or 'Death to Musicians,' but the voice, though excited, sounded vaguely familiar.

"Did you sleep through your wake-up call again? Aren't you even up yet?"

Cameron, wearing briefs and toweling his hair dry, tried desperately not to laugh when the phone began ringing, right on cue. I groped about to find the phone if only to stop the racket.

"Sorry, mate, meant to call you 'alf an 'aar ago," the voice mumbled. "'Ere's your wake-up call," and then hung up.

Cameron snapped his towel at me as I hastily clambered out of bed, laughing that we would be late for breakfast.

"No big deal, I'll just grab something later," I said, bleary-minded and mumble-tongued.

"Yeah, but you're the one who agreed to meet LauraLynn for breakfast, remember?"

I couldn't imagine ever doing such a thing.

"Well, you'd better get dressed and hurry up: we haven't got much time. We're supposed to meet them in thirty minutes. You should've come out with us, last night. London's such an incredible place!"

"Right," I continued mumbling as Cameron closed the door behind him and left. "London – yeah, that helps. Okay, I'm in London." I looked through a grimy window into the hotel's even grimier ventilator shaft. Both bed and offending wall were on the opposite side of my bedroom where the window looked into my back yard. I couldn't imagine hanging around with Cameron, out and about in London Town, meeting up with some young chat-friends of his. I'd long ago gotten too old for that but I'm glad he went.

We'd been planning this trip for five months, ever since LauraLynn's invitation arrived, after not seeing her since the previous summer. Plus her fiance Burnson – I kept thinking 'Bronson' – sounded like a great guy. The wedding would take place at his family's house out in the country, the weekend before Christmas, everything sounding so idyllic.

It may not have been record time, but I managed to get dressed and, after Cameron's inspection, not forget anything critical before taking the steps to the lobby (the lift was out of service). I asked the guy at the desk – who couldn't pronounce 'concierge' if his life depended on it – to call a cab.

Waiting in front of the Cheap Bastard Arms, ten minutes later, we saw a dumpy cab driven by a grumpy Arab.

"You blokes Curr and Pierce?"

"More or less."

He nodded at the door.

After I'd given him our destination (more like our goal), he said nothing and continued saying nothing for several more blocks. Once hopelessly stuck in traffic, Cameron said something in Farsi that sounded cheery. The man – his name was Akhmed; he was from Tabriz – never stopped talking. To me, however, he spoke in monosyllabic English.

How small the world was – considering Cameron was, as he called himself, Persian-American – that we'd find an Iranian-born cabdriver in London. Unpleasant at first, our cabby became a different person in his native language. His father had been a professor of poetry, Cameron explained to me later, but then the revolution came – he shrugged philosophically.

Cameron, now a student in Philadelphia, had been named after his uncle Kamran, his father's older brother killed in the revolution. Akhmed, Cameron translated, had an uncle named Kamran who still lived in Tehran.

Hearing the musical strains of their lively conversation, completely incomprehensible as it was, I sighed and gazed out the cab's window at the buildings crawling past, unsuccessfully ignoring the greater speed of my watch. Would they wait for us in the restaurant, assuming there'd been a delay? No doubt they'd still stay and eat breakfast. We'd get there eventually, perhaps not too late, and there was always plenty to see in the area around the restaurant, like Wigmore Hall around the corner, where the Drang Quartet played last night.

It was 25 years since I'd last been in London – a week's vacation – when Rob and I stayed at LauraLynn's flat, a place in the midst of fashionable Chelsea not far from the Thames. Rob Sullivan was in town for the European premiere of his "Gemini Fantasy" which Schnellenlauter was conducting at the London Proms.

Now a year ago, Rob had been murdered, his new opera nearly destroyed, and his cousin and I, along with Cameron, caught up in the international intrigues of SHMRG, very nearly getting ourselves killed. And here I was in London at least for a few days to hear a concert suite taken from Rob's opera.

LauraLynn was full of plans for the London premiere of Rob's Faustus, Inc., scheduled for the summer season of next year, despite Schweinwald's original production – including scores and parts – being destroyed in a fire.

Whatever SHMRG was up to, since their man Arthur Lemm was running Schweinwald after its two previous directors had been murdered – both Rob's and Franz-Dieter Zeitgeist's deaths had been laid squarely at SHMRG's door – it didn't really matter in the long run, since LauraLynn had a back-up disc with files for the scores and parts. It didn't matter either that SHMRG's CEO, N. Ron Steele, viewed the opera as a highly politicized, personal attack on him, allegorically exposing his criminal past, the "real" reason Rob rewrote the final act.

What it had been was an up-dating of the old Faust legend where a man sells his soul to the devil but reset into a modern corporate environment in which Mephistopheles was the CEO. Trust me, N. Ron Steele should not have been the only corporate boss to see himself standing in Arachne Webb's stilettos.

Breakfast at the restaurant, Mandeville Place: minutes later

The cab came to a halt beside an imposing white and brick building. Akhmed's raised palm indicated this was our destination and I paid the fare. While my thanks and good-bye were answered with a grunt and a nod, Cameron and the cabby exchanged several more pleasantries.

Realizing we were now over twenty minutes late, I looked for the restaurant and asked Cameron what that was all about.

"Oh, he could see why you were staying there as opposed to here."

The Mandeville Hotel, not on a snowy day

The Mandeville Hotel's comparatively modest entry, considering its posh name, address and reputation, was flanked by two pairs of Ionic columns with only three steps leading into the lobby: not very grand – more understated.

"Well, we're here now, so let's figure out where the restaurant is," I said, "some place called 'Reformed Grille & Social.'"

After following the doorman's directions, we found ourselves in a trendy-looking restaurant rather than, as I expected, a Victorian gentleman's club, crowded for a Monday morning, the weather notwithstanding, already buzzing with friendly chatter. In a booth under a photograph of what looked like aging rock stars, someone was waving at us, motioning us over.

"Ah, good, they're here" I said, pulling Cameron along, "they haven't left yet." Actually, it didn't look like they'd ordered yet. LauraLynn and her fiancé stood to greet us and traded hugs and handshakes.

I almost didn't recognize LauraLynn with shorter hair than when we'd last met. Before I could apologize, she began to apologize, how they had only just arrived moments ago and ordered some much-needed coffee.

"When I called your hotel to tell the concierge we were running late, he assured me that you had already left."

Even casually dressed in dark gray slacks and a luxurious, turquoise turtle-necked sweater, she looked stunning and elegant without any effort. Her outfit today alone probably equaled my entire clothes budget for three years.

"But, Terry, really" she said, lowering her voice, "why were you staying there? That place must have such an uncouth reputation."

Granted, the Cheap Bastard Arms wasn't exactly 'Upstairs/Downstairs,' but it fit the plan.

"You could've stayed at my place," she continued, "I've got plenty of room. Look, after the rehearsal, go check out and..."

She was interrupted by the waiter who introduced himself as Trevor and politely plopped the menus down in front of us. Burnson, speaking for the first time, suggested we order first and chat latter. LauraLynn agreed but under her breath urged me to bring my things up to her place in Maida Vale after lunch.

I'd chosen the Cheap Bastard because it was close to Victoria Station where we could catch the train to Phlaumix Court.

"Yes," Burnson agreed, "the Southern line to Snaffingham – a couple stations beyond Dorking."

Phlaumix Court, located deep in Surrey's Mole Valley on the outskirts of London, was the stately ancestral home of Burnson's family: the wedding was being held there this weekend with just family and friends. The only serious problem was the weather forecast, complete with an imminent blizzard, which was becoming more dire by the hour.

LauraLynn, as usual, seemed unperturbed by the weather – it was snowing buckets, already – but admitted it could be worse by evening. Besides, Burnson mentioned he had an important board meeting with his company tomorrow. The plan had been to drive to Snaffingham sometime after tomorrow morning's meeting but he could postpone it and leave tonight.

"I'm sure that reception after Schnelly's concert will go quite late," she said, already resigned to the inevitable and necessary glad-handing. "There'll be major backers there for the opera, and I must impress them..."

She was once again interrupted by Trevor, now ready to take our order. Fortunately, he politely started with the decisive LauraLynn.

"I'll have the Eggs Benedict," pointing it out. "They're really quite good, here."

Burnson opted for the same, but I balked at the idea of spending $16 for poached eggs after doing the math.

He recommended we try the standard English Breakfast – including sausage, bacon, tomato, a flat mushroom, beans, black pudding and two eggs – though it would cost, I figured, $25 each which seemed even more absurd.

LauraLynn must have seen Cameron's quick glance in my direction, looking for approval – he was, after all, still a growing boy – when she said, "go ahead: it's my treat, you know – you're my guests."

I chose their Royal Eggs instead (still, at $17) which included smoked salmon but, despite the Hollandaise sauce, sounded slightly healthier.

Burnson, amused by LauraLynn's comment, may not have been familiar with my background, coming as he did from the 'landed aristocracy,' but at least he wasn't condescending about it like some of LauraLynn's family. Given those summer vacations when she'd met me, a childhood friend of Rob's, she knew my background was purely middle class.

Both she and Burnson had inherited considerable fortunes but were also successful in the stock market like Rob's father had been. Plus, even if Rob eventually became a composer, he'd become a famous one.

Burnson Allan, grandson of the 11th Marquess of Quackerly, was no ordinary stockbroker with his love of art, especially classical music. He regularly attended the opera and contemporary music programs, occasionally commissioning new works. Not as tall as LauraLynn, he was no less striking in his appearance, his dark hair now salt-and-peppered, his chin square-cut.

They made a handsome couple and I was happy she had found someone that suited her so well, physically and emotionally, especially after last year's horrors with her cousin's murder and everything at Schweinwald.

While we waited, she told us (once again) how she had met Burnson a week after returning from the opera's premiere, when they were standing in line for tickets at Wigmore Hall's box office.

She'd been reading a review, picking up today's paper to strike a pose, when Cameron shouted, "OMG, look at that! Zenn!"

= = = = = = =
To be continued...

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The usual disclaimer: The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, which you've no doubt figured out by now, is a work of fiction and as such all the characters (especially their names) and incidents of its story are more or less the product of the author's imagination, sometimes inspired by elements of parody, occasionally by personal experience. Many of the places are real (or real-ish) but not always "realistically used," like the Mandeville Hotel and the Royal Academy of Music's Duke's Hall (my apologies to both the hotel and the concert venue for having murders committed there). Other places like Phlaumix Court and Umberton are purely fictional. Any similarity between characters and real people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, but then, as Klavdia Klangfarben keeps quoting a former professor of hers, "Perception is everything." Yadda yadda yadda.

©2016 by Richard Alan Strawser for Thoughts on a Train

The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben: Installment #7

In the previous installment of the "Intermezzo" which begins The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, the composer's nightmare continues: after almost getting to hear the pianist rehearse his new piece, he ends up joining him for a beer at the student lounge (and what do you think they serve at St. Sisyphus Community College?) which isn't made any easier when he realizes he can hear the man's thoughts. He recalls a student who didn't like Bartok but loved Mahler (though not at first); and after a few more appearances of the Old Woman, Kerr walks into the parlor at Escher House and finds a coffin laid out, surrounded by lilies and lilacs, wondering whose funeral he had walked in on.

If you've only just arrived and have no clue what's going on, you might find it easier to start with the introductory post, here. 

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-13-

The audience was finally brought to attention by the presence of Adam Whitehead, an eminent English musicologist from the late-18th Century who chaired the panel, "Bach, Harmonia and Perfection: Music from the Organic Garden."

We were meeting in the grand ballroom of this great house, resplendent in white and gold trim with rich burgundy walls. The panel's dais, placed before a large fireplace, sat under a fabulous painting of three elegant ladies robed in turquoise gowns with towering powdered wigs, standing in a small grove before a Greek temple.

Dr. Whitehead, nodding and bowing, began by introducing various members of the panel before explaining how Bach's music had grown organically from ideas that, "for all their novelty and invention, imitate and perfect Nature."

He also stressed that Bach was the middle ground between those rigorously "improved" French gardens and the Englishman's more natural landscape.

The first speaker, another 18th Century musicologist named John Farmer, began quite elegantly how Bach's music was dismissed for its complexity by people who were unable to comprehend the simplest applications of his art.

"And yet, because they failed to appreciate its beauties, they could not fathom how it possessed beauties to delight we connoisseurs.

"For those with no understanding of science to comprehend the writings of Newton," he continued, "once sufficiently advanced in their studies found they could not only appreciate them but easily discuss them quite knowledgeably."

The next speaker, whose name I hadn't heard but who somehow looked familiar, rose and carried the topic a bit further, how "True Art" had to be guarded by those who truly understood it.

To me, a lot of this rehashed that old "Trickle Down Enlightenment" theory, which meant only rich people could appreciate art.

If it existed for the cognoscenti, they argued, enough of it would survive to be experienced in passing by those who could, say, no longer afford to attend performances but sought to better themselves.

"I don't like all this talk about 'advanced education' and the connoisseurs finding delight in advanced Science." Sebastian shook his head. "Basically, he's saying only smart people with advanced degrees best appreciate something intellectual."

"I've always been a big believer in the More-You-Know Theory, myself," I said.

"Yes, but he's going far beyond music appreciation."

Most people had a casual acquaintance with art and usually didn't understand anything about it, the largest percentage of potential listeners, while other people knew what they liked (or rather, liked what they knew).

Some expanded that awareness, like increasing their appreciation of a sport by studying its rules and the subtleties of playing it.

"But nobody has to go to school and earn a degree in football so they can watch a game," Sebastian argued.

"This man's advocating Bach's music should only be accessible to the Learnèd Few?"

"When I say he's a 'bad man,' I mean he's the opposite extreme of those disciples of the Great Dumbing Down."

I knew, of course, Sebastian meant SHMRG, always pursuing the lowest, commonest denominator.

"I'd been studying these secret societies of the past," he explained, "seeking to exclude anyone not 'smart enough' to appreciate Art."

"So they're, like, members of the Classical 1%?"

Somebody behind us coughed slightly to let us know we were being overheard.

"Shhhh!" Sebastian looked around like he was caught in a conspiracy theorists' convention.

Fortunately, our seats were along the side aisle so we weren't that obtrusive when he rose to leave, grabbing my hand.

"Trust me," Sebastian said, his finger to his lips as we scuttled out, "it's not like you need to know this."

"But what're you scared of?"

"The Aficionati," he shuddered. (*1) "I'm afraid they're back!"

*-*

What did Ericson-Torres mean, "the game was identifying the game?" Was that it? Was premiering a new piece just a game? What about all the interpretive questions he might have for Beethoven or Schubert? And yet when he had a new piece that's never been heard before, he ignores a composer he could talk to.

We continued walking down the brilliantly lit underground hallway on our way, presumably, to the student lounge and a cold beer. There's no sense dwelling on any issues if he could read my mind.

In addition to our echoing footsteps and being able to hear Ericson-Torres' thoughts, I heard a quiet rush like distant water, perhaps an underground stream or maybe water or steam pipes somewhere above us.

Then I realized, like a sensory deprivation chamber, it was so quiet I could hear the blood coursing through my ears.

"How do I tell him I hate his piece," I heard Ericson-Torres think.

"Wow, this is awkward." I just kept walking.

"Why, you need a road map just to find your way through it!"

"It's no more complicated than the form of a Mahler symphony," I thought.

"He could have called it 'The Higgelty-Piggelty Variations'..."

Then he complained about patterns he found difficult to get under his hands, without calling it badly written for the piano.

"If all you play is Haydn and Mozart, Chopin's patterns don't come easily..."

It occurred to me – and this was weird – that I could hear his thoughts (since I wasn't actually reading his mind), but, given what thoughts followed, he wasn't responding to what I was thinking. Did that mean he couldn't hear my thoughts? If not, did that mean he wasn't smart enough to read my mind?

"At least his music suggests some nice images: like those chubby mooing crickets and mournfully chirping cows," he thought.

I'm astounded...

"Isn't it amazing, this power that music has?" The epiphany quite fascinated him.

As we reached the end of the hallway and approached the steps up to the ground level, I felt quite hungry. I know he wanted a beer, but what was there to talk about?

Then, too, there was a matter of settling myself in at Escher House.

The clock in the lounge said 2:30.

Weird...

*-*

This wasn't helping me find the dining room or get changed in time. Speaking of time, what exactly was the time? It's as if every room in Escher House had its own time zone. And while every place I went seemed to be recently vacated by someone, I only ever saw this same old woman. Who was she and why was she there, every time I turned around, and what was she trying to tell me? It got to the point I was afraid to look over my shoulder.

She wasn't dressed like one of the servants, even from an earlier century, more like a widow who'd been a librarian. When I asked one girl who worked here, she immediately said, "Ms. Escher?" I'd barely described the woman I'd seen when she mentioned Ms. Escher's name. But she said she'd died sixty years ago.

Not keen on warnings from beyond the grave, I thought Ms. Escher's daughter – how old would she be now, I wondered – didn't actually work here any more but maybe had escaped from the attic. Could she have been the pianist's maiden aunt locked away with her dementia? Was she aware her nephew was performing tonight?

But surely, these days, there were other ways of dealing with elderly relatives suffering what used to be dismissed as senility? But that didn't help explain how she would suddenly appear then immediately disappear.

This door opened into a long room, narrow with large windows looking down over the town, the campus on the right. A quick scan of the room proved it was empty: no old ladies. Entering stealthily, I hoped I could reach my room from the opposite end. Then I noticed a painting by the window.

In it, a man looked out a window over a town, college buildings on the right – just like the real view! There was an old woman peering back at him through another distant window.

Beneath that window where the old woman stood, I could barely see another man looking at a painting of a town. Was this image replicating itself within the image? Someone stood behind the man.

That's when I could feel someone breathing against my neck. I turned slowly.

It was the old woman!

"What the hell...?"

*-*

And when I stopped running, I thought I'd lost Sebastian along the way – how far away from the symposium were we?

"Ah," he'd mumbled under his breath, "our leaving has been observed – hurry up."

He never really explained who these Aficionati were or what caused this fear. But there's very clearly something that's frightening him.

I didn't hear him say anything about separating, where we should meet, later: there must be millions of places to hide.

Once again, I was hurrying across this great hall with its magnificent staircase.

I could gaze into that crystal globe forever and see myself staring into its perfect sphere at everything it ever witnessed. Was this the Aleph that contained all things, from which all understanding flowed?

But that's not the point, I told myself, not now nor anytime soon. I must stay focused, steering clear of danger.

Will it tell me who the Aficionati are, why Sebastian's afraid of them? Is this another plot to destroy classical music? Has the pendulum swung back, the circle come 'round again, the wave collapsed?

But I can't get caught in another adventure, out to save classical music like that time we'd somehow landed on Harmonia-IV.

There's a crime scene I must attend to, my piece has been murdered: at least, I have to clear my name!

Besides, I can't be late for the wedding – I can't miss LauraLynn's wedding!


-14-

When I was a student – when Tom Purdue and I were both graduate students in our early-20s – our teachers were old, never really thinking much how old but old enough to be considered successful. It would take so many years to earn your degrees and become established but we never bothered to do the math.

Artur Merlynski had turned 50 some years before we arrived at Grimmoire Conservatory, not that it was much of a celebration. For the moment, yes, perhaps, but the glory soon faded like stale cake.

At the beginning of the New Millennium, nobody'd thrown me a 50th Birthday party with even a hint of cross-campus fame. By the time I turned 60, I'd been laid off a few weeks. So much for calculating an artist's age by one's success in the world. So much for retirement nest eggs and laurel-resting.

The dePaula Escher Foundation had granted me $8,000 to write a twenty-minute piano piece for Carter Ericson-Torres which I called "Labyrinth," half what they'd offered Zenn but I had less than half his fame. Perhaps they figured I could compose the piece in a few weeks' time, giving me (at my level) a munificent sum.

Even so, it took me almost six months to complete it, averaging about five hours a day, six days a week. I figured it out to $15.47 an hour, not exactly a princely wage.

The thought occurred to me to bring this up in my pre-concert talk – "The Economics of Composing" – but it sounded petty considering most people in the audience would think the Foundation had been robbed.

I could've said "Only $8,000 – I won't spend much time on this, then," dashing off something at least easier to compose.

But arguments about the longevity of art and the price of one's integrity interest the audience even less than the bureaucrats. Ultimately, I had only myself to reckon with and Howard Zenn to honor.

Still, there were daily fears, as I composed: I was losing my grip, that I'd never lived up to my potential, that the adventure (such as I imagined creativity to be) had somehow passed.

And yet there was Howard Zenn, pushing 100, still going strong, still composing. It was both an inspiration and a frustration.

*-*

You never knew who you'd run into at Patelson's, the Best Little Score-House in New York City to most classical musicians, and one afternoon, while browsing through Bartók, I mean quite literally "ran into." Visitors from touring orchestras and soloists performing across the street at Carnegie Hall mingled with professionals, students and music-lovers at Patelson's.

I had only ever seen photos of Sherman Cooke, not one of the big names in American music but highly respected. As a child, I had hoped to study with him some day, perhaps.

A romanticist at heart who was once considered brilliant as a young man, Cooke may have long ago passed his prime but he still had fans – like me – who adored what he'd already composed. It was a shame he'd written nothing new over the past dozen years. At 72, he had unfortunately outlived his reputation.

Academic serialists, then in ascendance if not in popularity, called him "Short-Order Cooke" who wrote mostly half-baked symphonies and cream-puff ballets. Friends said he'd never quite recovered from his last opera's failure, Anna Karenina. One critic dismissed it as "beyond his meager culinary skills and about as palatable as a soft-boiled egg that's arrived overdone."

Hearing a commotion behind me in the narrow aisle, I turned around and saw, too late, Sherman Cooke standing beside me. Without intending to, I'd stepped on his foot and he looked quite wounded.

*-*

"Art was how we perceived it," I'd say. "No two people could ever look at it, read it or hear it and react to it quite the same way. That's what makes it Art."

Everybody might agree, to some extent, that Beethoven's Ninth was a masterpiece but not everyone agreed it was a great symphony.

A student disliked Bartók because he didn't meet the criteria of the familiar.

"It didn't matter whether it was an accurate assessment as long as the person believed it was true: Perception Is Everything!"

But the process of turning the unfamiliar into something familiar – acceptable – took effort. One student in the back row wondered how we'd ever arrive at the truth if our perception was all that mattered.

She argued every answer was right whether I thought it wrong or not: "That's how I perceive it – that's what counts."

She wasn't there every time I recalled this scene, sitting in that back row, glowering at me like some all-suffering know-it-all. When I recollected this event, which of these memories was the real one?

Which, in fact, with any memory was the real one, edited over time? Was I imagining her – was this my perception?

I couldn't quite remember her name – usually quiet but often wildly argumentative, like the time she got into "Quantum Music Theory."

Then there was that mass of unkempt silvery hair, platinum blonde – Claudia Something-or-Other...?" (*2)

*-*

It never occurred to me I might've been such an idiot in college, a brash young student engaging in outlandish arguments. Perhaps I did it to impress my teachers, or more likely impress myself. If I could convince others I knew everything, they wouldn't see my insecurities. Then I could bluff my way through life.

I was as invincible as I was vulnerable no matter what I tried, even when only showing one side of that. There was no success in exposing our vulnerabilities, so we perfect our disguises.

All the bullshit I composed as a student, a bit of this today, another bit I tacked on the next day, all these bits making a longer piece by accretion, not by cellular division.

"What the hell're you doing," my teacher exploded. "That's not composing – that's quilting!"

I looked at him, shocked. "God, he knows...!"


-15-

"Terry!"

Sebastian had somehow gotten ahead of me and motioned for me to hurry which didn't strike me as a bad idea. But what was the plan? (Was there one?) Where do we go, now?

He also motioned for me to be quiet, and to stay down low. The hallway began to fill up with people.

We ducked into one of the side rooms which was, for now, empty, and I barely had time to notice the array of geometrical shapes embedded in the décor and especially across the floor.

"Quick, someone's coming! Over here." Sebastian nodded toward a settee in the corner. We'd hardly gotten behind it when Beethoven entered.

"Ah, but even I," he was telling someone, "was constantly riddled by insecurities."

It was especially difficult after losing the love of his life and all the world wanted was the music of Rossini.

We could hear Brahms braying in the hallway. "Ach, Herr Tüsch'l-Püsch'l, will you continue torturing me by playing my music again?"

This outburst was followed by some nervous laughter and the smell of cigars.

It was a young woman with Beethoven – I thought it was Lili Boulanger.

"Is Brahms always such a jerk," she asked.

"Just last week, he was saying some awful things to Ravel," Beethoven explained, "such mean-spirited stuff that even poor Clara blushed.

"But come, I believe it's time for lunch." Beethoven gave Lili his arm.

"We'd better get out of here," Sebastian whispered. "We must warn the others."

The role of "we" continued to mystify me.

After Beethoven escorted Ms. Boulanger out the door, the room was again empty.

"I believe they're using this conference to revive their ancient ideas and rituals."

"You mean they're some Satanic cult – musical extremists...?"

"If they realize we're on to them and what they're planning," Sebastian whispered, "we could be in big trouble, I'm afraid."

I mentioned I had no idea who they were or what they've planned.

"Sebastian, who are these people you call Aficionati?" It sounded like some kind of medieval secret society, and no doubt sinister.

What he began to explain was just that: medieval, secret and ultimately evil.

"More importantly, why would they be after us?"

Then I noticed someone was standing there, blocking our way. It was Beethoven.

*-*

The woman I'd thought was Tom Purdue walked over and extended her hand. She didn't look in the least like Purdue.

"Hello, I'm Dr. Madeline Wilsher, Dean of Fine Arts here at St. Sisyphus."

I apologized for being late but was hoping I'd be able to locate an old friend of mine, Dr. Thomas Purdue.

"Ah, very sad about him, though, isn't it?"

"Sad? Why – has something happened?"

"About his having been diagnosed with Usher Syndrome...?"

That meant he was gradually going deaf and blind.

"How horrible – is he...?"

"Did you get to hear that new piece?" Before I could explain, she continued, "awful piece of trash – waste of money. And poor Carter hates it, can't make head nor tail out of it.

"I have been a life-long classical music aficionado," she added, putting special emphasis on the word aficionado, "just like my parents..."

I took a deep breath and interrupted her.

"Hi, I'm Dr. T. Richard Kerr, a.k.a. the composer of that new piece."

It was an awkward moment of recognition hanging in the air between us.

For that moment, I noticed a piercing glance which flickered, then quickly disappeared.

Suddenly weak in the knees, I became nauseous.

"Oh, I'm sure it will be lovely, tonight," the Dean said, smiling blandly. "The weather's supposed to be wonderful, I hear."

If a good forecast would help my nerves, maybe I would feel better.

*-*

Beethoven asked, "Gentlemen, what's the matter?" nodding at Sebastian before patting my shoulder. "What are you frightened about? There's..."


= = = = = = = = = = = = =

to be continued...


= = = = = = = = = = = = =

(*1) The Aficionati: where certain elements of the "Intermezzo" look back on previous novels in the trilogy or look ahead to the up-coming novel, this reference to the Aficionati looks forward to a plot-thread that will be encountered in the next novel in the series which I am currently working on, In Search of Tom Purdue.

(*2) Claudia Something-or-Other: this would be Klavdia Klangfarben, the villain of The Doomsday Symphony who also figured in The Lost Chord and who is about to resurface in the third novel of the trilogy. Because of the nature of time-travel in the first novel, the traveler could not always remember exactly what occurred while in the past and, since something critical happened to Klavdia during one of those time-jumps, she did not always reappear in Kerr's past experiences because, well... that's what happens when you mess with the past and therefore inadvertently affect the future, isn't it?

* * ** *** ***** ******** ***** *** ** * *
The usual disclaimer: The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, which you've no doubt figured out by now, is a work of fiction and as such all the characters (especially their names) and incidents of its story are more or less the product of the author's imagination, sometimes inspired by elements of parody, occasionally by personal experience. Many of the places are real (or real-ish) but not always "realistically used." The town of Marple in Pennsylvania (or rather, Marple Township) does exist though I've never been there and my use of it - aside from being a logical locale for a mystery inspired solely by the association of its name with a character created by Agatha Christie - is entirely fictional. Any similarity between people and places, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, but then, as Klavdia Klangfarben keeps quoting a former professor of hers, "Perception is everything." Yadda yadda yadda.

©2016 by Richard Alan Strawser for Thoughts on a Train

The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben: Installment #6

In the previous installment of the "Intermezzo" which opens The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, the dream becomes more fragmented, even fractured: through different scenes, some seemingly out of order, the dream turns into more of a nightmare. The Old Woman keeps recurring, warning him; thinking about his new composition, "Labyrinth," he begins to see it as a murder victim but rather than the pianist, he realizes he is the prime suspect. The house which is like walking into an M.C. Escher print eventually becomes more like the house in Edgar Allan Poe's story, "The Fall of the House of Usher" (and we've already met Dean Madeline Wilsher and President Roderick Ascher, haven't we?).

If you've only just arrived and have no clue what's going on, you might find it easier to start with the introductory post, here.

* * ** *** ***** ******** ***** *** ** * *

-10-

When I went to push the door open, I found it wouldn't budge so I pushed harder, wondering why it's locked. The janitor, our friendly "custodial engineer," simply reached forward and pulled it open. Too embarrassed to see if there was a sign anywhere that said "PULL," I nodded at him with a mumbled thanks. As the door closed behind me, I imagined him, going on about how difficult it is to be a good janitor, clucking in dismay, muttering, "and I bet that one even has his PhD."

It took a while for my eyes to adjust to the recital hall, not as large a space as I imagined, with a modest rake down to the stage, shallower than it was wide. It might seat a couple hundred at best but probably rarely needed to seat more for a small school like this.

Given the size of the college not to mention this rather diminutive auditorium, I wondered why they're holding the concert here except it's apparently the "try-out" for his appearance next month at Carnegie Hall. But then I remembered it's the home base for the dePaula Escher Foundation, whatever else her ties were to the school.

The commission existed specifically to supply Ms. Escher's grandson with a new piece: perhaps he's a distinguished alumnus of the school? I might have overlooked something about his being on the St. Sisyphus faculty.

The door clicked shut behind me, echoing through the not quite empty hall (I could only see one other person, clearly) and suddenly I felt self-conscious for having intruded on a class or rehearsal. Despite arriving late from that infernal bus ride, I was still early for the pianist's rehearsal before his performance, wasn't I?

I could hardly believe, after all this work and all this endless waiting, I was about to hear my own composition! I tried not to dwell on how important this was for my career.

My concerns were interrupted by a loud rush of notes on a piano, an upward sweep resolving onto a crashing dissonance which itself resolved to a loud expletive – "Shit!" – before the passage was repeated.

This time, the passage resolved to a different chord and a louder expletive when I realized this was from my piece.

I scooted along to a seat in the back row of the auditorium, somewhere that would be out of the way, not wishing to distract him as he continued struggling with this difficult passage. Not wishing to draw attention to myself, I would listen to him first and then, once asked, make comments – not before.

He continued working on this one brief passage yet never once managed to land on the right chord for its resolution. I hadn't thought there were so many options yet none made logical sense.

A tall man, he sat hunched over the keyboard, concentrating on his hands swirling up three octaves in a vertiginous pattern as if willing them to find a place to land on their own.

Each attempt landed on a cluster of wrong notes with more imaginative cursing which, after a dozen tries, became unbearably annoying.

I looked over at the other person I could see sitting in the shadows a few rows in front of me but it wasn't Tom Purdue – a woman, instead, in a rather mannish-looking suit.

She stood up and said, "you wanted to know when it was 3:00."

"Good, yes," he said, stopping suddenly. "That's enough."

"They told me you were starting your rehearsal at 3:00," I piped up.

"And who are you," he asked rather testily.

"I'm Richard Kerr – the composer?"

"Excellent! I've just finished – let's grab a beer."

*-*

Fortunately, I'd grabbed a handful of programs before going back to the room where the pre-concert talk was to be held, so I gave one to each person as they wandered into the room, mumbling a quick greeting with either a "thanks for coming" or, on occasion, a "so glad you could find the room." No one was responding beyond a tenuous nod or a slightly sour-looking smile, offering no information nor any form of welcome. Nobody appeared to have any interest being here – "a cheery lot, this bunch."

I felt like the teacher of an unpopular requirement at the start of the semester who'd best get it over with. Two of them were slightly older than me, another was in his mid-30s. One man, middle-aged, with long straggly hair and horn-rimmed glasses, could've worn a button that read "Good Composer = Dead Composer."

The woman in the red skirt began looking at me with some suspicion but said nothing, glancing back at her program. Other than getting the title wrong, I wondered what else was a problem. My program notes, about 1/4th the space allotted to Beethoven or Schubert, had been edited down to the basic biographical background.

The photograph of me included in the notes was of someone else entirely. I smiled: googling my name using their misspelling, someone may have found a Terrence Carr who was a podiatrist in Poughkeepsie.

Small talk seemed superfluous, everybody sitting there stone-faced waiting for me to begin but I waited a few minutes for stragglers. I was about to begin when I heard a commotion in the hall. A small group of students hurried in, three of them quite trendily dressed-up, two more wearing the usual t-shirt and jeans. Each took the program I handed them and sat down with embarrassed giggles, the one telling me how they were all taking Dr. Purdue's music class, but it was still early in the semester.

It renewed my sense of young people these days, that they would postpone going to their dance to attend a recital. Figuring they'd party till midnight, I mentioned the recital would conclude around 9:30.

I no sooner started talking than all the students got up to leave: "Sorry," one whispered, "it's time for the par-tay!"

*-*

Before the recital began, I looked around, having been standing at my seat – I'd chosen an aisle seat on the right, easy for me to get up and acknowledge the applause after my piece – and noticed with some sadness that the hall was barely one quarter full, counting at best maybe sixty people so far. With over half the auditorium behind me, it was impossible to tell who else might have entered after I sat down, but nobody, after this point, came in and sat in front of me.

There was no one there I imagined young enough to be a student – even the student ushers had already taken off – and though I'd met only a few people, not one had yet arrived. I kept looking around for a glimpse of Tom until the houselights dimmed, but he also was nowhere to be seen.

At least, I assumed Dean Wilsher would make an announcement from the stage, introducing the soloist in the semester's first recital. But the program began without an official college welcome or any other remarks. The audience in front of me was certainly enjoying the performance so far but I wished the evening were already over.

The Beethoven was one thing, Ericson-Torres' remarks made after we'd met disconcertingly another, but I couldn't help wonder whether or not he'd pepper the premiere of "Labyrinth" with an array of deftly interpolated profanities.

The music began – barely recognizable – and already I could sense the audience's withdrawal. I might close my eyes so as not to watch those around me, but I couldn't close my ears from listening. Every mistake was a jab to the ribs, a punch to the head, and there was no way to defend myself.

Not sure I had the strength to get up, too weak-kneed to stand, I felt sick to my stomach from nerves, amused what people would think if I walked out on my own composition.

Supposing I didn't bother to stand up when the pianist acknowledged me afterward: who'd recognize me sitting there (since I didn't look like the podiatrist from Poughkeepsie), pretending to look around for the composer?

Would they greet it with approval or indifference or, I wondered, will they be coming after me with torches and pitchforks?

*-*

I dashed into the bathroom, feeling the urgency, seeking both relief and refuge. I was a nervous wreck after everything happened, the dinner that conflicted with the pre-concert talk and that awful bus trip. It was bad enough opening my suitcase to see the wrong clothes inside, but that pianist was icing on the cake.

If only Howard Zenn could appreciate what he missed by refusing this commission, not that he'd be able to attend it. Fortunately, I had succeeded in sparing him that – but why me, O Lord?

It was one of those frequent instances where the worse my nerves were, the more adamant my aging bladder had become, sorry I had to leave the dinner early to dress for the concert.

And this bathroom on the main floor of Escher House was elegant, spacious, more than three times larger than my bedroom.

After a sense of calm managed to return following this seemingly endless pee, I checked the medicine cabinet over the sink, hoping to find something to calm my nerves a little stronger than aspirin.

Doubtful I will be able to make it through the rest of whatever the evening offered, I zipped up my fly.

Closing the cabinet, I saw in the mirror not mine but the face of the old woman staring back at me.

"You'll be wrongly accused!" (Or was that the squeak of a rusty hinge?)


-11-

The student lounge at St. Sisyphus Community College was located in the Stone Administration Center that connected directly to several buildings including the one housing the recital hall, Fine Arts, History and Language departments. Once Dean Wilsher apologized for leaving us to prepare for another faculty meeting, Ericson-Torres ordered a beer – "preferably ice-cold" – for himself.

"That's one thing I do rather hate about living in England," he said, "their habit of drinking beer at room temperature. You should really try the house special, here, an old-fashioned brand, 'Rolling Rock.'"

Normally, I didn't drink, only rarely since the time I was a student, but given the way things were going today, this would be a really good excuse to knock back a few brews.

Missing lunch because of that interminable bus trip, I ordered some hot food but decided to skip the "Tantalizing Shepherd's Pie."

Eventually, I opted for a salad and iced tea, much to Ericson-Torres' dismay as he sat there, waiting impatiently for me. He'd chosen a small booth beneath a sign celebrating the school's football team. They were called "The Stones" but they'd had several losing seasons of late. Alas, their rivals were calling them the "Sissies."

It must have been a thankless job, dressing up as the school mascot which was nothing more than a large rock. Lacking both arms and legs, it couldn't induce much excitement just sitting there.

Considering Ericson-Torres had never contacted me beyond letting me know he'd received the finished score – nothing more than "it looks hard" – I figured it was too late to ask if he had any questions. This made the unfortunately necessary ritual of Small Talk something of a challenge and I sorely missed having Cameron's extroverted presence.

I noticed his eyes wandering around the lounge and saw he was following one particularly tall, buxom student wearing tight jeans.

"I wonder if she'll be coming to my recital tonight? One only hopes..."

"Somehow, I suspect she'll go to the dance."

"What dance? There's a dance?"

I told him about the semester's first dance. "Sarah Fuller and Dean Wilsher both said not to expect too many students."

"Maybe we should scoot over to this dance after the recital? I'm sure it'll be far preferable to that stuffy reception."

Since I said nothing, returning to my salad, he apologized for not being very talkative with the recital coming up later.

"I'll probably go find an empty room somewhere and do a little meditating."

He explained this was his normal routine a few hours before a performance, then go have some dinner after it's over.

After getting up for another bottle of beer – I politely refused his offer to join him – he heaved a deep sigh.

"It's a tougher program than I thought, doing three challenging sonatas like that."

I looked up at him, fork in mid-air. "Mine's not really a sonata, you know, just because it's a large-form piece." Would this prove a safer topic for discussion rather than arguing about interpretation?

"Yes, it is," he argued, looking slightly startled. "It's got multiple movements – I just don't know where they begin and end..."

"Well, there are five contrasting sections, sort of like movements, but they weave in and out of each other," I said, "more like a single movement with five themes developed by their individual juxtapositions."

He sat and stared at me while I finished my tea, looking dumbfounded.

"I didn't think of them as self-contained movements."

"Look, if you want to make some revisions to the piece, I understand. I can always postpone the premiere till later."

"Fine, then call them movements." (It wasn't called "Labyrinth" for nothing, you know...)

*-*

Someday, hopefully later than sooner, when I'm old, I'll be lying on my deathbed poring over any regrets in my past and not wasting precious time worrying about whether I should've called them movements. This premiere may well be something to regret, but it brought about what I think is a pretty darn good piece. With any luck, as all composers hope, it will survive its first performance and maybe even manage to outlive its composer. Who really cares what the premiere was like, listening to Beethoven's Violin Concerto?

Will I regret standing up to this performer, telling him he isn't ready to play it and have the performance canceled? Would I regret instead having let it go just to get it heard?

Or would I more likely regret having to return the foundation's commission fee, accused I had written something he couldn't play?

And what would I regret? Certainly something, more likely, as I "become old," not that I've thought about it except during the middle of the night at the bottom of some dark, lonely spiral.

"If you could go back in time to fix just one thing, when would you choose and what would you fix?"

It's like those questions people bother you with, thinking they sound terribly philosophical, but you can't answer them, except in theory. It can't be done, it's scientifically impossible, so why bother dwelling on it?

But I have so many things I wish might have turned out differently: having had more time with Sondra, for one. If we'd stayed at Cutler, dealing with everything, would it have been enjoyable? Leaving there was a matter of faculty politics but a few years later, teaching itself had changed, was no longer fun.

I could say, "I wish it hadn't changed," but life isn't like that. Just as you find yourself saying, "Ah, stay a moment, for thou art fair," it's over: nothing ever stays the same.

Of course, looking back at a point when there was no more future, wouldn't I mourn dreams that were never realized? I could wish my luck had been better, but that's too late, now.

Would I feel the loss of all the music I never heard performed, all the pieces I never got to write?

*-*

It was one of the best "a-ha!" moments I had, teaching at Cutler, when the old-fashioned light bulb had gone off, the look of comprehension on a student's face in the middle of class and I remembered telling Tom Purdue about it years ago, how we laughed, how envious he was it happened so easily. It was one of those anecdotes frequently told that I'm sure never had quite the same impact on anyone hearing it as it had that promising spring afternoon in my 20th Century Styles class.

After covering Debussy, Stravinsky and Schoenberg, it was time to introduce Bela Bartók, one of the early century's more innovative composers, but unfortunately less well-known to the average undergrad than any of these others. I had no sooner said the name than one of the students, a clarinetist named Tony Stadler, grunted derisively, "Pffft, Bartók...!"

"What's the matter, Tony," I said, interrupting myself. It wasn't unusual for a student to dislike some of this "contemporary" music. "I take it you don't like Bartók's music?" Actually, it hadn't surprised me.

He quickly rattled off a litany of sins – motor-rhythms, machine music, biting dissonances, simple-sounding tunes and a host of other transgressions.

"But you like Mahler, don't you," I asked, knowing he's more familiar with Mahler's symphonies than I was at that age.

"Oh, yes," he said, lighting up, "Mahler's like a god – compared to Bartók!"

So I asked him what it was about Mahler that he liked so much, considering how many people didn't "get" Mahler. Others in the class, knowing this passion, either chuckled or rolled their eyes.

"Well, I love that incredible length, how climaxes take so long to build, how he keeps spinning out melodies and harmonies..."

The next question seemed obvious, so I asked, "Did you always like Mahler?"

"Oh no, the first time, I hated it."

He described how he couldn't stand the length, the slow-building climaxes, never-ending melodies...

"So," I asked him, "what was it that made you change your mind?"

Defensively, he challenged anyone who didn't like Mahler: "I had to listen to him a lot to get used to it."

The silence lasted only a few seconds before he said, rather sheepishly, "Oh..."

"Bingo," I said. "Perception, you see, is everything."

*-*

Perception – or the loss of perception – may be the most difficult thing any artist has to deal with, reaching middle age. I remember when Sebastian told me that before he decided to quit teaching. And Merlynski was always warning his male students about the inevitable Mid-Life Crisis. It sounded like some conspiracy against the young.

I wonder how Tom Purdue handled all this: disappointment over a career that never took off, the fading of early recognition. He and I found ourselves in the same boat – those with "unrealized potential."

Rob Sullivan had been lucky, at least as far as that was concerned. He'd "made it," achieving fame, teaching at Juilliard. He'd written an opera that had been premiered in Europe to great reviews.

Of course, the opera also got him killed so maybe, yes, given my luck with politics, failure's been healthier for me.

For composers, going through a "style change" was another form of Mid-Life Crisis – I'd recently described it as a "Mid-Career Crisis" – when an already established composer feels the need to find that "new voice."

But it's more work now than before and I've become too old to put that kind of work into it anymore.

This was why, perhaps, I'd put so much hope into this new piece of mine, a chance to rejuvenate my career.

To be noticed once again? Was this, perhaps, why I'd re-entered the labyrinth?


-12-

The Dean had suggested Ericson-Torres and I head down to the student lounge if we wanted to have a quick beer, reminding us that the President's dinner at Escher House would begin at 6:30. She sounded a bit like a mother warning her children not to spoil their dinner even though it was only 3:00.

Madeline Wilsher then offered to point the way, neither of us able to see what it was she was pointing at. Apparently, it was somewhere in a nearby building, connected by a tree-lined walkway.

Since the afternoon had turned cold and stormy and sudden brisk winds were now whipping the leaves around in the courtyard, she recommended taking one of the underground passages that connected several campus buildings.

They all led to the Stone Administrative Center, she explained, named for Dr. Roland Stone, founder of St. Sisyphus Community College.

The door to this particular stairwell over which was inscribed something I could not quite read – "Lasciate ogne" something or other – led to a series of steps that went deep into an underground hallway. Except for the occasional arrow that pointed vaguely in both directions at once, the walls were pure white without discernible lighting.

And yet everything the full length of the hallway was bathed in a flood of intense rays reflecting a ghastly splendor. Frankly, it freaked me out and I was glad Ericson-Torres remained mostly silent.

The hallway was completely empty – perhaps it was different during breaks between classes – even if it didn't sound like we're alone, the walls echoing with the sound of our footsteps which were loud enough. I couldn't imagine what it must sound like when the corridor was full of students, talking, hurrying from building to building.

Footsteps aside, it was quiet enough in a different sense of the word, I swore I could almost hear myself think and wondered if I were thinking hard enough, could Ericson-Torres read my mind?

"Why'd you never get in touch," I thought, "ask me about the piece? You were treating me like a dead composer."

"Most composers that I play are dead, anyway," I heard him thinking back.

Wasn't that the challenge, trying to figure out what a composer was saying?

"The game," he thought, "was identifying the game."

*-*

There were dead composers everywhere I looked! Amazing!

"Too bad Cameron hadn't come along on this one, Sebastian – he'd love it."

"Yes," Crevecoeur said, pointing at Stravinsky behind the drinks table, "and Zoe, too."

When he'd first guided us all around Harmonia-IV, we gawked at the composers we saw like most tourists gawked at buildings.

Cameron had been a student of Zoe's but it had been a while since I last saw her, Facebook posts aside. The last time Sebastian saw his granddaughter was when we attended Mahler's premiere.

That had been quite an event: everybody on Harmonia-IV was there, it seemed. They let us back in because of our role in rescuing the score after it had been stolen by that conductor.

Mahler conducted his "Doomsday" Symphony December 21st, 2012, and fortunately nothing had happened, considering an Earth premiere might've had disastrous consequences.

"So, Sebastian, where is this symposium being held?" I knew this wasn't on Harmonia-IV – usually people scheduled conferences in exotic locations.

"I'm not sure," he said, pointing out Schubert who smiled and waved back.

The house was huge, ornate, like an old English palace, full of art, but everything curiously asymmetrical and not very Palladian-looking.

"I understand the owners rent out the house's public side for special events, but now they've allowed us the entire house."

It was time for the next panel. There was that crystal globe again.

*-*

I have always hated arriving at some place when I was by myself. It was one of the many reasons I felt comfortable having Cameron along, not just as an assistant or merely company. There wasn't that much for him to do but still, just his being there took a weight off my introverted shoulders. Of course, people looked askance a lot at an older man traveling with a younger man – a student – as a companion. But nowadays, I didn't give a rat's ass and he thought it amusing.

This is the school which seemed to be the right school and the building which seemed to be the right building – I was pretty sure though not entirely certain it was the right day. Not that I necessarily warranted a welcoming committee, but I looked around for someone who could at least confirm I'm expected.

I pushed open the door into a dark, empty lobby where a sign stated simply, without further assistance, "You are Here." Cameron would've pointed out that may have been all the confirmation I'd get. Maybe there's time to locate Tom Purdue's office and see if he's in but I saw no other map or directory.

It made me wonder why Tom never answered my e-mails, especially about today. Had I said something that maybe offended him? Then I noticed somebody standing there, behind that ficus tree: was it Tom?

*-*

Wandering around Escher House, I hoped to find where dinner would be served since it was to begin promptly at 6:30. This made for a tight schedule given my pre-concert talk was at 7:15. The problem was, losing track of the time, I was running so late I still needed to change for the concert.

"These doors looked imposing enough," I thought. "Perhaps this was the dining room?"

But when I managed to push them open, all I could see was an overly decorated room fit for a funeral.

Above the fireplace was an ornate, old-fashioned inscription:

Who entereth, a conqueror hath been:
Slayeth ye dragon, thy shield to win! (*)
Beneath this lay a casket, nearly surrounded by copious lilies and lilac blossoms.

I opened the lid and looked inside.

There was the old woman – dead!

Her eyes burst open with sudden, unspeakable fear...

= = = = = = =

To be continued...

= = = = = = =

(*) Who entereth...: This is a near-quote from Edgar Allan Poe's Fall of the House of Usher, where the narrator is reading from Sir Launcelot Canning's story, "The Mad Trist," which he recalls as one of his friend Roderick Usher's favorite books. Shortly after this passage, he hears a noise that then leads to the revelation of the tale's final catastrophe.

* * ** *** ***** ******** ***** *** ** * *
The usual disclaimer: The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, which you've no doubt figured out by now, is a work of fiction and as such all the characters (especially their names) and incidents of its story are more or less the product of the author's imagination, sometimes inspired by elements of parody, occasionally by personal experience. Many of the places are real (or real-ish) but not always "realistically used." The town of Marple in Pennsylvania (or rather, Marple Township) does exist though I've never been there and my use of it - aside from being a logical locale for a mystery inspired solely by the association of its name with a character created by Agatha Christie - is entirely fictional. Any similarity between people and places, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, but then, as Klavdia Klangfarben keeps quoting a former professor of hers, "Perception is everything." Yadda yadda yadda.

©2016 by Richard Alan Strawser for Thoughts on a Train

The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben: Installment #5

In the previous installment of "In the House of dePaula Escher" which opens The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, the dream becomes a little more confused - or confusing. It starts with the narrator talking to a squirrel who sounds exactly like his old friend Tom Purdue, so anything after that probably seems a bit more normal: memories of his late wife, or of his friend Rob Sullivan and his cousins LauraLynn and Maurice Harty, then his odd introduction to Escher House and the page turner for the pianist at the concert that night. But then, dreams are often like that - threads of space and time that weave themselves together. sometimes without any relationship to space and time, the quantum equivalent of our perceived reality...

If you've only just arrived here and have no clue what's going on, you might find it easier to start with the introductory post, here. 

* * ** *** ***** ******** ***** *** ** * *

-8-

"Dr. Purdue isn't in today, I'm sorry," the secretary for the Fine Arts department at St. Sisyphus Community College told me. "He only teaches classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays during this year's fall semester."

When I wondered if maybe he'd be coming in for the recital tonight, she repeated he's only in Tuesdays and Thursdays.

"Do you know if he'll be at the dinner at Escher House tonight?"

"I'm sorry, you'd have to ask him that."

"Someone at the Foundation might have that information?"

"You could ask them, certainly."

"Maybe I could call Dr. Purdue at home? We're old friends from college."

"We're not allowed to give out phone numbers."

"Could you call and give him a message?"

"He'll be in next Tuesday."

When I looked around to see if Dean Wilsher was in her office, the secretary said she'd left for the day.

At the pre-concert talk, recalling the exasperation I'd felt mounting throughout the day, I wondered who this know-it-all was, sitting there. To say he "looked something like" Tom Purdue didn't make lots of sense. Besides, why would Tom attend my talk and not let me know it unless this was his idea of a joke?

"That was probably it," I thought, smiling back at the man, exasperation aside. "This is some kind of disguise, isn't it?"

(But Tom would be my age, of course, and this guy's, what... 30-something?)

Come to think of it, when's the last time I'd heard from Tom? Had he responded to those e-mails I'd sent? I remembered writing once the commission was settled and again about the concert. Just to make sure, I'm sure I'd also sent that one to the address they had listed on the college's website.

But I don't think he had ever responded, as often as I'd checked, not that Tom was ever big on correspondence. I assumed he was just filing them away: maybe he hadn't received them?

It was like a three-voice fugue, giving this pre-concert talk about my "Labyrinth", focusing on my well-crafted, written-out, carefully timed material, dealing with this annoying man and his comments, and then wondering about Tom.

At one point it actually occurred to me, before I'd concluded my remarks: was Tom avoiding me because he was jealous?

*-*

Though I'd arrived too late to hear Ericson-Torres rehearse "Labyrinth" in the hall, I expected we'd talk briefly about the piece after Dean Wilsher apologized for needing to leave us in the student lounge. But other than the fine weather, the rigors of traveling and his impending concert at Carnegie Hall, he wasn't very talkative.

"Don't you have any questions for me," I asked him, reminding him I was the composer of the piece he's premiering.

"No, not really – I think I've got it," responding with a mischievous smile.

He apologized for not being in touch before – "so very busy, you know" – and disliked "talking shop" right before a concert: "tends to spoil the surprise of the performance," he added, "especially a premiere."

Taking another sip of the beer which he was thoroughly enjoying, he casually mentioned, "There are a few changes I've made."

For one thing, he continued, he felt that the climax wasn't big enough, "so I decided to repeat a couple measures – it helps in the build-up: you know, that spot where the fish dies?"

"Excuse me, 'the fish dies...'?"

"Oh, I added a story of my own," he mentioned, "since I couldn't figure out yours."

That meant he had to change some things around that didn't fit, anymore, "but it all makes sense in the end."

Surprise indeed – like me, rolling over in my grave, not even dead yet...

*-*

Late in more ways than one, I finally arrived for the dinner where I imagined I would be an honored guest: while they had already started without me, I went to find my place.

"Oh, Mr. Curr," Dean Wilsher said, pointing to a place near the far end of the table, "I believe you're there."

Like most rooms at Escher House, the dining room seemed much larger than one expected from the size of the house, but it was still a tight fit squeezing myself around all the guests.

Dean Wilsher quickly introduced me, somewhat miffed that I was not on time, to the President of the college, Roderick Ascher, to Sarah Fuller from the Foundation plus members of the administration and faculty.

I asked if Dr. Thomas Purdue would be here, but Dean Wilsher shrugged, saying "No, why - should we have invited him?"

There was a long wait before the soup was ready to be served, not leaving me much time to get ready. I rose to apologize that I needed to get changed for my talk.

Then the old woman stood beside me with a soup ladle in hand, whispering "I must warn you..." and then disappeared.

"Don't forget the President's Reception," Wilsher said, "it begins right here at 8:00."

"But so does the recital...!"

"Everybody's so busy..."

They resumed talking as the butler named Bernard White continued serving the soup.

*-*

Thinking about the salmon paillard molé I was missing at the dinner (Madeline Wilsher assured me it was 'to die for'), here I stood on this beautiful fall evening wishing it'd soon be over. There were few people attending the pre-concert talk – a worthless expenditure – who seemed interested in hearing me talk about my piece.

After listening to Ericson-Torres who had no understanding of the piece I wrote, I realized it didn't matter what I said: the music they're about to hear isn't the piece of music I'd composed.

All the careful work that had gone into its planning, in composing it, all the hopes I had for its success, and all I could do was sit there while this man butchered it!

Now I understood what the old woman's been trying to warn me about: my composition – it was about to be murdered!

-9-

No sooner had Zenn asked if I'd be interested in his rejected commission, 'absorbing' it so as not to waste it, I didn't even wait to see how the dePaula Escher Fund would respond. Even if they weren't interested in 'recycling' their commission to an unknown composer, I suddenly had an idea for a piece. By the time they contacted me for an interview about 'redirecting' their commission, I could show them sketches for a Work-in-Progress. From there, they'd have a better idea what they'd get for their money.

My own aesthetic was not very different from Howard Zenn's 'intellectual' abstract style: considering they were commissioning him to begin with and what they'd be expecting, it seemed I might be a good fit. Though they were initially reluctant, at least I was a friend of Zenn's and after all had been hand-picked by him.

Since they were interested in a sonata, something more substantial than the shorter "moments" Zenn was composing in his old age, I would give them a multi-movement work (which 'sonata' implied) but handled differently. Rather than just following along with the traditional three or four consecutive movements, I'd phase in and out of them concurrently.

There would be five sections, basically, each one of recognizably independent, contrasting material, all weaving in and out through each other, some of the sections overlapping at points but each distinguishable by their contrasts.

The idea of a labyrinth came to me almost immediately if somewhat skeptically: the quest for tonal resolution was so much a part of traditional form, how could I translate this into something 'labyrinthine'?

I didn't want it to tell the story of Theseus and the Minotaur, the idea of being trapped inside a maze. But wasn't it comparable to the idea of stating a tonic key, digressing through various modulations to some dramatically contrasting key, then finding its way through the development back to the expected tonic resolution?

Technically, I'm told, a labyrinth does not contain the usual wrong-turns and dead-ends typical of mazes where one becomes easily lost. Still, if one needs a long thread to find one's way out again, even the labyrinth Daedalus designed for King Minos was more than a long, circuitous path to something hidden at its center.

But I had no idea who I was writing for, assuming since the Foundation commissioned Zenn to create something for him, the pianist Carter Ericson-Torres must be acquainted with music of similar technical demands. You would think he'd hardly have approved spending his grandmother's perfectly good money on something he had so little sympathy with. Granted, the repertoire list on his website was vague about any modern music, listing only "several world premieres" without further details. I had assumed he didn't wish to scare off the more traditional presenters.

Maybe he wasn't a champion of New Music, but I hadn't expected his acquaintance with the style to be so tenuous. Wasn't it like a reader unfamiliar with Russian looking at those illegible letters and making it up as he went along, figuring others also unfamiliar with Russian would think his gibberish made perfect sense?

For many composers, the process of completing a piece is almost never done. Even during the first performance, we'll sit there wondering if we'd done this, here, how would it have affected that, there? And along with Artur Merlynski, we might agree, "It's as if all my faults came to the surface to taunt me."

I was only glad that my friends weren't here to share this debacle, especially Cameron or Tom Purdue, for that matter. It would take everything I could manage to scrub this from my memory.

The old woman, whoever she was, had been right – or what I assumed she was trying to tell me was right: my piece was in danger; in fact, it was going to be murdered. Though how, I wondered, did she know that? Who was she and what was it she had tried warning me against? Was she the spirit of the pianist's grandmother, the name behind the Foundation, the ghost of dePaula Escher herself, resting uneasy, come back to tell me her grandson had no business playing my music?

As I sat there listening to a piece which I'd supposedly composed but could barely recognize except by process of elimination – it could never have been mistaken for either Beethoven or Schubert, could it? – it occurred to me I was present at the scene of a crime, indeed a witness to my own piece's undoing.

There was the poor victim, slowly having its life throttled out of it, a long, slow, certainly agonizing sort of death, the perpetrator beating it senseless with his bare hands, the blood splattering everywhere. The pianist, with the complicity of the instrument he was beating it with, was clearly cast in the role of murderer.

And I – was I not also a victim at this same crime scene, suffering through the loss of my own child? Was I not helplessly watching it being destroyed right in front of me?

And these others, sitting here in the dark, also watching (if not listening): aren't they all witnesses, every one of them? When the music police arrive with their yellow tape, what will they say? Will they have the courage to tell the police what they had seen? Would they even know what they had seen?

"I didn't like the way he played Beethoven, officer" one witness might say, "but, God! that new piece was downright awful!"

And then more of them would weigh in, complaining "it deserved to die!"

They might even have been applauding the performer – what difference was there between 'perp' and 'perf,' I wondered – condoning the violence. Perhaps there were several witnesses who felt the composer got what he deserved.

Did the woman mean to warn me I was the one in danger? Had she seen I'd become the prime suspect?

*-*

Not the first time I'd been asked how a composer finds his voice, it was one of those more interesting moments when I was sitting on a discussion panel of, unfortunately, only two composers. A student, probably a sophomore in college, had piped up with considerable concern as if it'd been dogging him for years. On the one hand, he looked hopeful as if our answer would mean his own success was just around the corner. On the other, he saw hope was futile, his life already a failure.

My fellow composer on the panel was fresh out of his master's program, a young man who was half my age, whose works I'd found so far full of promise, if a little uneven. Past fifty at the time, I was cautious about thinking I was probably already on the downward slide of my career.

I suspect I liked my colleague's works that were imitating composers I liked and for which he had an evident understanding, considering other works I found less striking because this 'knack' was less evident. At the moment, he seemed to be interested in a frenzied, tonal minimalism while the darker, atonal piece's angst seemed superficial.

There were two works of mine on these programs, written fifteen years apart and to me they were quite different pieces. I could imagine, though, to the casual listener they might seem quite similar.

My colleague (whose name, I add parenthetically, was Stewart Klein) laughed and said, "I don't know, I'm still looking for mine. Some day, maybe I'll find it if I'm lucky – don't worry about it. It wouldn't be a conscious effort but a process like distillation where things you don't like evaporate, leaving things you do."

"Your job as a student," I added, "is to absorb absolutely everything you hear, imitate this, figure out how that's done."

"Right – eventually what hasn't been discarded becomes the basis for your own fingerprints."

"In fact, even at fifty, I'd say I'm still looking for mine because it's an on-going process as you continue growing." I explained how my two works were really miles apart in their thinking. "The more recent one is simply a more refined approach to older ideas. Every new piece searches for its own solution."

Looking at my sparse audience at this ill-starred pre-concert talk, only dimly interested, even paler under the room's feeble fluorescent lighting, I quickly explained how it worked for Beethoven or Stravinsky, their 'three periods.' Their early works were derivative, imitations of their elders, until something unexpected happened which others deemed 'original,' their first mature works.

"It wasn't that it suddenly happened: it was a gradual process of elimination. Beethoven – and Schubert, too – went in a more right-brained direction, away from classicism; Stravinsky went completely left-brained, and became a neo-classicist."

It reminded me of how Merlynski would talk about the music's core as opposed to the surface language we could hear. There were guiding principles underneath a composer's 'fluid surface' that never changed, regardless. It was this that made Late-Beethoven still sound like Beethoven, or how Serial Stravinsky still had his roots in Le Sacre.

"That doesn't mean," I tried to explain, "it gets any easier, just as that young student I mentioned was bummed out, discovering that there was no easy solution, that finding his voice took time.

"Every note we struggle to put down on paper or in the computer is part of finding – and maintaining – that voice."

Even as our own speaking voice changes over the years – mine's becoming raspier in recent years – it is still recognizably ours.

The same thing happens with our musical voice – "if," I added, "we're lucky."

*-*

First on tonight's program was Beethoven's Op. 2, No. 3, the C Major Sonata that opens with those wicked parallel thirds, an exposed little figure in the right hand difficult to play as written but, I'm told, much easier to play on a keyboard from the 1790s than on one of today's massive modern grands. It's one of a set of three dedicated to his teacher Haydn more out of politics and marketing than sheer devotion – Beethoven was 24 when he wrote it and fairly new to the business.

Speaking of a great composer finding his voice – and Beethoven was about the age my fellow-panelist Stewart Klein was back then – it's interesting to hear the teacher's heavy thumb-print evident in the student's music. But in 1795, it was probably enough for the old-fashioned periwigs to wonder what was happening to the music they loved.

As Ericson-Torres walked confidently out from the wings, not a very great distance since the stage was neither wide nor deep, you could tell he was a no-nonsense kind of guy from the beginning. Only barely acknowledging the audience's welcome, itself not so confident, even somewhat hesitant, he barged immediately into the sonata's opening measures.

That might have been a suitable gesture for a more dramatic beginning (thinking of the last sonata, the great Op. 111). But this delicate opening with its filigree turn needed a more tender hand.

Though written under Haydn's "supervision," one assumes, this is not your grandfather's sonata: once beyond the opening, Beethoven's dynamics and especially all those unexpected, off-beat accents quickly prove this is no namby-pamby C Major. Even as it's written, it must've blown Haydn's wig right off his skull. There's a great deal of thunder and lightening.

Usually, these dynamics are taken down a notch, otherwise they'd sound too exaggerated on a modern instrument compared to Haydn's fortepiano. We should realize they must be translated for an early-21st Century grand piano.

Unfortunately, it seemed Ericson-Torres took the approach that, if Beethoven had set out to demolish the poor fortepiano he was playing, he must work much harder to bring a seven-foot grand to its knees.

By the end of the development with its endless measures of modulating arpeggios, I was ready to raise the white flag.

The audience broke into cheers as the first movement crashed to a close, shell-shocked perhaps but thrilled for surviving the onslaught. And yet it was one way of interpreting what Beethoven had written down. Faster, louder and above all over-the-top translated into sheer visceral excitement for a generation of listeners entertained by "American Ninja Warrior."

The slow movement, comparatively, was a long slog, all very tedious and dry, too soft or, when called for, too loud. The audience, often fidgeting, was as bored as the pianist seemed to be.

If everything in the second movement was flat-lining with miles of meandering passagework, the last two were all chaos and exaggeration. The scherzo was full of rhythmic inaccuracies any teacher should've nailed him for. The last movement's tempo was determined by how fast he could manage different passages which meant the speed was constantly fluctuating.

From my limited vantage point – somewhere in the middle of the right side – I couldn't see very much of the audience. Without turning around, I couldn't see anyone who'd been at the pre-concert talk. I was curious to see what the know-it-all would make of all this but nobody I saw apparently knew the piece.

Despite the crunching discord in the final cadence – he miscalculated and hit a G-flat instead of a G in the bass – the audience rose and cheered: God help me, but my piece was next...

*-*

It was a dull, dark, soundless Autumn afternoon when I managed to arrive at the place the sign called "Escher House," my heart like a suspended lute, skittishly resonating to even the slightest touch. Clouds hung low behind the house whose three stories rose ominously before me, shrouded in insufferable gloom, the eye-like windows vacant. I was glad that I was staying here only for this one night, everything arranged as a guest of the Foundation's. Not knowing what it might be like inside, I couldn't imagine staying longer.

A large clump of birch trees by the sidewalk had fallen into decay, sparse white trunks needing to be cut down. A line of gnarly yews, ancient and unkempt, nearly blocked the downstairs windows. The house, built from granite blocks with steep slate roofs on several gables, appeared to still be damp from recent rains.

Walking up from the campus, I noticed the house stretched back not as far as one would think, viewing the façade. It seemed rather truncated, like an old-fashioned model of a square turreted castle. Curiously, the front of the house stood on higher ground than the back which appeared to open out onto an embankment.

A flagstone path led to the front door, winding through a landscaped garden of large overgrown shrubs and mostly dead plants. A similar path ventured around the house and disappeared into some woods beyond.

The front door was made of heavy, dark-stained wood with an iron knocker, ornate iron hinge-plates and doorknob plus matching kick-plate. On either side of a raised central rib were six deeply carved panels. They reminded me initially of Ghiberti's 'Gates to Paradise' (despite looking more like the entrance to Hell) until I'd looked closer.

That's when I realized they were deeply three-dimensional woodcuts in the style of M. C. Escher and his famous optical illusions. One by the doorknob consisted of people ascending and descending an endless loop.

Unable to see the rest clearly in the gloom, I approached the door, trying not to think I was being watched after I noticed a quick movement at the one window to my left.

I stuck my shoulders back, sighed heavily, and went to ring the bell. What's the worst that could happen to me?

= = = = = = = = = = = = =

to be continued... (link becomes active at 8am EDT, 6-13-2016)

* * ** *** ***** ******** ***** *** ** * *
The usual disclaimer: The Labyrinth of Klavdia Klangfarben, which you've no doubt figured out by now, is a work of fiction and as such all the characters (especially their names) and incidents of its story are more or less the product of the author's imagination, sometimes inspired by elements of parody, occasionally by personal experience. Many of the places are real (or real-ish) but not always "realistically used." The town of Marple in Pennsylvania (or rather, Marple Township) does exist though I've never been there and my use of it - aside from being a logical locale for a mystery inspired solely by the association of its name with a character created by Agatha Christie - is entirely fictional. Any similarity between people and places, living or dead, is entirely coincidental, but then, as Klavdia Klangfarben keeps quoting a former professor of hers, "Perception is everything." Yadda yadda yadda.

©2016 by Richard Alan Strawser for Thoughts on a Train