Kyra Read online

  Daylight was evaporating as we left Cambridge and crossed the river. He put his arm around my shoulder. “Tell me what you thought after last night,” he said, rearranging his legs in the tight space. Spurts of indecipherable speech blurted out of the taxi’s two-way radio. “I kept thinking about Irina, that she had done this for you, and you, having to leave without her. And then that night with Simon coming back. I don’t know if it’s worse to see it or to imagine it—the terror, someone you love. The shock, it never goes away.”

  I leaned back against his arm and looked out the window. He put his hand on my shoulder, the feelings strange after so long. The thought occurred to me: We are both exiles, strangers in this city, the desperation of Europe in our blood. I’d lived here now for a number of years, and Boston was said by some to be the most European of American cities. It didn’t feel European to me. I liked the wooden clapboard houses, but they were American. I stared at the deserted streets, the rows of nondescript shops, and felt happy to be in this taxi with him. Run-down brownstones signaled that we had reached the South End.

  Suddenly I sat up. It was obvious that this cabbie was lost. The address had seemed simple enough, a number and a street, but he lacked “the knowledge” unlike London cabdrivers, he hadn’t internalized the map.

  Andreas drew out the paper with the address from his wallet, as if looking at it would produce the place by magic. And it did. After circling around what had seemed a hopeless maze of streets, we stopped next to a church, a Gothic building rising airily from the midst of tenements.

  “This must be it,” the cabbie said, barely concealing his astonishment at having found the place against all odds. Like a winning lottery ticket, the number he had been given matched those on the iron gate beside us. Andreas paid him, and we walked through the gate into the sweet evening smell of box hedges. The light, reflected off the surfaces of the stained-glass windows, rallied against the darkening sky. I could just make out the jagged edges of holly leaves and the softer shape of the ivy that trailed up the stone walls. A single yellow bulb shone over a wooden door at the end of the diagonal arm of the path. Andreas bent his head as we walked through, his hand on my elbow.

  The door opened into a large room, linoleum on the floor. This was America. Pillars held up the ceiling in a frank, palms-up manner. Peter came out—long, lean in his brown corduroy pants, his glasses reflecting the light, his straight hair falling over his face. The impresario, this was his theater.

  “Kyra,” he said, kissing both cheeks, “you’re an angel to come.”

  He led us into the theater and disappeared to turn on more lights. The emptiness was palpable, creating a feeling of suspension. We stood together in the semidarkness, neither of us speaking, the air ionizing between us, the molecules taking on an electric charge, as if registering the new closeness and physical ease between us. This time, I reminded myself, he wasn’t leaving town.

  I walked away, crossed the center aisle, and headed to the back, to sit in the last row and get the feel of the space. Andreas came and sat beside me. Seats faced the stage on three sides, a gallery running around the back, columns measuring the space underneath the balcony. I turned to him. “You know, it’s odd but I have the same feeling here as I do in Rome. It’s claustrophobic.”

  I felt him watching me quietly, listening.

  “In Tosca,” he said, “everyone feels trapped. You are the one to do this.”

  The lights came up, and we moved to the stage.

  “Here’s the challenge,” Andreas said. “The first act is set in a church, the second in the Farnese Palace, the third on the battlements of the Castel Sant Angelo. Each place contributes to a sense of the monolithic, the alliance of church and state. We’re in a reign of terror, the police chief joins in the singing of Te Deum. Nothing is sacred, humanity is crushed. And we’re in it with two artists, a painter and a singer, both passionate, sensitive souls.”

  His mother was a painter, his wife a singer. It was the story of his life.

  “Conventional sets won’t work,” he said. “I’m looking for something spare and suggestive to convey the intensity of the situation, both the emotional drama and the political—the gravity of what the lovers are up against.”

  An opera meant musicians and singers. I looked at the stage: it was small. The whole project was quixotic, impractical.

  But Andreas deflected the concerns I raised. Everything would be scaled down, only a handful of singer/actors, no choruses, a small chamber orchestra and a piano.

  Peter, the producer, took over.

  “I realize this is not exactly what you had in mind, Kyra, when you gave that talk, but I’m convinced from what you said about the relation of the seen and felt presence that you can help us arrive at an approach to design that will convey the atmosphere of Rome at that time, and of the story itself, which is timeless.”

  “What we are hoping,” Andreas said simply, “is that you will say yes.”

  Our eyes met briefly. I said, “Look, I haven’t worked in the theater. I know nothing about set design. I don’t know opera.”

  They wanted a fresh eye, they said.

  I would want to bring in Sarah. She knew how to improvise. In South Africa, they had taken plays into the townships.

  Andreas and Peter agreed.

  I had completed the drawings for the first phase of the project on Nashawena. Now that winter had set in, construction there had stopped. The university term was ending. I was going on leave but I wouldn’t actually be leaving Cambridge until March. I had thought of taking a watercolor class. I wanted to do something different. Why not this?

  Why not work with this man?

  “Then you’ll do it?” Andreas said, reading something in my face.

  “Good,” Peter said, and went to turn out the lights.

  “I’ll make some sketches, and you can see what you think,” I said. Andreas raised his eyebrows, thick as hedgerows, as if to say, why would there be a question? He had trained as a conductor, he was working as a director. His impulse was to move forward, not wait and see.

  Outside, the night was surprisingly cold. The breeze, gentle earlier, had picked up. Branches swayed across the streetlights, making shadows on the sidewalk. Andreas took my hand. Peter suggested getting dinner at a new place that had opened on Columbus Avenue, but Andreas needed to get back to Brookline, where he and Jesse and Abe were staying with Abe’s sister, Edith, and I wanted to go home and have a bath. He said he had promised Jesse he would read to him before he went to bed. While we were standing on the steps outside the Design School, he had shown me the book he had bought for Jesse at the Coop, the illustrations striking—an arctic landscape, the snow red in the late afternoon sun. In the story, a boy sets out to hunt the wolf who killed his dog, but by the end, he realizes that killing the wolf would not bring his dog back. Profoundly simple, the logic impeccable. How does this clarity get lost? We had walked to Peter’s car. The alarm release made its three beeping sounds. All clear.

  2

  DAVID’S DOOR WAS OPEN THE NEXT MORNING WHEN I CAME INTO school. He was sitting at his desk, hunched over, typing.

  “What are you writing?” I asked, sinking into the relic of an armchair he had rescued from Goodwill.

  He swiveled around.

  “It’s a fellowship application,” he said, his fingers tapping the edge of the chair. “It’s for the American Academy in Rome. It has to be mailed by midnight tonight.”

  Even when he was frazzled, there was a solidity to David. As a landscape architect, he worked with the earth and had a yeoman’s body, I thought, looking at his arms. Extending from the pushed-up sleeves of his charcoal-gray sweater, they exuded strength.

  It was David I sought out when I got stuck, when I needed to discover where I was going with my island project. We talked mostly about work, but there also were times when we talked about our lives, when one of us needed an outside ear. I knew about Sarah, he knew about Simon. When Sarah was talking last wint
er about moving back to Cape Town, he had asked me what he should do. Listen, I said.

  “I don’t want to interrupt you,” I said, thinking of leaving. To be in his presence was to expose myself to his eye, and I wasn’t sure I was up for that. David was someone who said what he saw. And on those days when he told me I looked tired or upset, I resented it, even when it was true.

  “Just give me a minute to finish this paragraph,” he said, “or I’ll forget what I was going to say.”

  I stared at the photographs of plants lining the wall over his desk, a birthday gift from Sarah. The marsh grasses from the Fen-way were my favorites.

  “Okay,” David said, typing a few more words, “I could use a break.”

  He turned to face me and pulled down the sleeves of his sweater.

  “Guess what?” I said.

  He took off his glasses and studied my face. “I give up.”

  “I’ve been asked to design sets for Tosca.”

  “You’re kidding,” he said. “I thought you were building Carthage. So now you’re going to build Rome too?”

  I took off my coat. “It’s for the theater. This man…Do you know Felicia Blumenthal?” David shook his head. “Well, her cousin, Andreas, is directing Tosca in the Counterpoint Theater, the one Peter Maas started in the South End. They’ve asked me to design the sets—or the not-sets. The problem is the space is small.”

  “Sounds like a good project for students,” David said, swiveling back to his desk, “the never-say-never crowd.” He turned back. “Why would you do it?”

  Suddenly it didn’t seem like a good idea.

  “Kyra, we’re friends,” David said quietly.

  My eyes teared unexpectedly.

  Outside, the steady beeps of a truck backing up.

  Was it the conversation in the restaurant, Andreas’s wife disappearing? Or was it simply David’s offer of friendship? Friends can tell each other anything. Yet something held me back.

  David shifted his body in the chair, his glasses reflected the light coming in through the window, the gray, December sky. He waited.

  “It’s the director,” I said finally. “He intrigues me.”

  David’s face lightened. “That’s lovely, Kyra,” he said. “It doesn’t happen often.” I brushed away the tears.

  “There’s really not much more to say at this point,” I said. Still I lingered. Something wasn’t finished, something more I wanted to say, or hear.

  He typed a few words and bent down to lace up his boots. “Let’s get out of here, get coffee, go for a walk. I’ve been here an hour and I already have a headache. This is what the Dutch call a sick building. No fresh air. We have our predecessors to thank for that.”

  I had a million things to do. Anna was leaving that night for London to spend the holiday with our aunt and uncle. It would be a large family gathering. I had decided not to go, but I wanted to send gifts with her. “Let’s go to the Square,” I said.

  David took his coat from the hook behind the door and switched off the light. The definitiveness of the gesture reminded me of Martin, our English uncle. The difference between Europeans and Americans, Martin would say, is that Europeans turn off the lights when they leave a room and put on a sweater when they’re cold. I noticed a postcard on the wall, tacked up near the door, a photograph of red and gold grasses. “That’s new,” I said.

  “It’s from Anglesey Abbey,” David said. “After Kew Gardens, my favorite place.”

  I told him that Martin had taken us to the abbey the first winter Anna and I were in London. He wanted us to see the winter garden. “I remember those grasses, the small trees standing among them, their bark stark white, the deep red stems of the plants. When we came to the grove of white birches planted in lines, I burst into tears. It was like entering a city of ghosts.”

  And then I was sorry I had said that.

  We were standing by the door, the room dim.

  “How long are you going to live among ghosts?” he asked.

  We walked out into the corridor, David’s arm around me, firm.

  I spent the holiday break on Nashawena, grateful for the quiet, the presence of the sea. David had given me a book with photographs of Rome, and I leafed through the pages, stopping to study the Farnese Palace, the Castel Sant Angelo, the church of Sant Andrea della Valle, places where the scenes in Tosca take place. I got ideas for the sets, did a few drawings. Then one afternoon I went for a long walk on the beach and thought, This is not what I want to do. I was involved in building something new, first it had been the house, now it was the island project. It was a relief to be here on Nashawena, by myself.

  When I got back to the house, the message light on the phone was flashing. The call was from Andreas, the number he left was in Vermont. I brought in more logs for the woodstove and heated up the sorrel soup I had made. It was a childhood favorite, and I’d finally figured out my mother’s secret, adding the yolk of an egg. I’d call him after supper. On the message, he said he was with Jesse and Peter, staying in a friend’s cabin, teaching Jesse to ski.

  When I called, he answered the phone on the first ring. “I was hoping it was you,” he said. He was calling to invite me to dinner at Felicia’s. She was giving a dinner for the cast, right after the new year. “I’d love it if you could come,” he said. I surprised myself by saying I would.

  It was a perfect Italian supper, good salami in the antipasto, hand-made pasta. Andreas met me at the door. He looked happy, a little distracted. “Come, I want to introduce you to the singers.” He led me over to the Israeli soprano, the one whose voice he had raved about. She was tall, sensual, dark hair cascading around her shoulders. I wasn’t prepared for her, her easy physicality. My body stiffened. They were musicians, but still…I turned to the tenor standing beside her. His name was Dan, the corner of his mouth flickered, a gesture I would find riveting through the long days of rehearsals. He wore a black Abbey Road T-shirt.

  Felicia came up. “Kyra, darling, how was your break?” She placed her arm around my shoulder. I noticed Dan, the tenor, watching us closely. The soprano was talking to Andreas. I felt drab by comparison. “This cold,” Felicia said, “it does something to the body. You should try the beets in the antipasto—root vegetables store the energy the body needs in winter.” I saw Andreas move to greet a new arrival, a small, dark-haired man who turned out to be another of the tenors. Because the opera was to run every night like a play, the principal roles had been triple-cast.

  Supper was followed by introductions, starting with the lead singers. In addition to the Israeli soprano, whose name was Tali, there was Alice, an Asian soprano, and a redhead named Karen who had grown up on a farm in Iowa. They would all play Tosca. Dan, who was blond and stocky, would play Cavaradossi, Tosca’s lover, as would the small, dark-haired tenor, and Paul, tall and black. I tried to imagine the pairings. Tali and Dan, for sure. They had the same energy. The three Scarpias, the villain, were all heavyset. To play the chief of police in a reign of terror clearly required heft.

  Afterward, Peter, as the artistic director of the theater, spoke briefly, thanking the benefactors who were there. They commanded the sofa and chairs. The singers and actors chose the rug in front of the fire, the tech crew leaned against the walls. Andreas, standing beside the mantel, welcomed us, his face alive with expectation. “We are embarking together on an experiment, to do Tosca not as a spectacle but as intimate theater.” He had a vision; my shoulders released. I had confidence in art, he would find the form.

  I remembered the night on the beach, his body lithe as he bent down to draw the words amor and Roma in the sand, the smell of the sea, the tide coming in.

  I scanned the faces of the singers. Whatever apprehension they may have felt seemed assuaged by Andreas’s assurance, his promise to accompany them. We will find our way together, he said, there will be ample time to prepare. Rehearsals would start at ten the next morning. He wished everyone a good night’s sleep.

  He came across the
room to join me.

  “Can I give you a lift?” he asked.

  I looked around, delighted to be singled out.

  “How do you think it went?” he asked, as we waited for the engine to warm up.

  “It went beautifully, I could feel the group drawing together as you spoke.”

  He told me he was grateful to these young singers, their willingness to work for practically nothing. Otherwise, it would be impossible to have three casts.

  I told him that Dan had said it was a great opportunity for them to work with him.

  Andreas smiled and shifted into gear.

  “Let’s go out for a glass of wine to celebrate. I’m so glad, so happy you’re doing this with me.”

  Happy…a major key. I smiled in the dark car, noticing that music was creeping into my vocabulary. C major. Keep it simple. No flats or sharps.

  The Harvest was closing, so we went to the Charles Hotel, the bar dim, plush chairs circling small tables. We chose a corner and sat looking out into the courtyard, trees strung with white lights.

  I asked about the ski trip, and he said that Jesse had been apprehensive at first, but once he caught on, he insisted on going to the top. “There was a cart road down, an easy trail, but it was long and Jesse was cold. I skied him down between my legs,” Andreas said. “I can still feel it in my shoulders.” He reached back under his collar and massaged his shoulder blades, elbows bent, like the wings of a bird. “Jesse’s really growing up now,” he said. He shook the tension out of his neck. “And you?”