Copyright © 1998 by Shane
Tourtellotte
First published in Analog Science Fiction
and Fact, February 1998
Tadeusz Nikisch watched through the front window as his last
pupil got into the car with her mother. "I said I would call
you if my schedule opened," he remonstrated.
John Button jerked himself to his feet, nearly bumping his
bow case off the coffeetable. "I didn't have any more time. My
audition with the New York Philharmonic's tomorrow afternoon.
If I waited for you ...."
"John, please. An hour or two more will make little
difference." Tadeusz kept calm with his natural ease. John
Button wasn't half his age, but already his forehead was as
lined as his own. "You know the advice I've given you, and I
accept that you haven't taken it."
"Why should I? You tell me to live with my limitations.
Translated, that means give up."
'Live within,' Tadeusz recalled saying, but he left it. "It
means nothing like that. Please, John, sit."
John resisted scornfully, only for a moment. Tadeusz sat by
him, taking a second to nudge the cases away from the table
edge.
"I've told you my evaluation before. You have a love of
music, and there is no greater gift in the world. Your gift
for playing is not as great. The violin is so dependent on a
good ear for precise playing. Technical mastery can take you
far, but only so far. With other instruments, it matters much
less. I wish you would take up piano, as I have suggested."
"I don't want to play piano."
Plain and unassailable, as always. "And so, I suggest
taking smaller steps. The state orchestra is within your
reach." John winced. "This upsets you?"
"'Our state orchestra,'" John recited, "'is a natural
repository for the broad ranks of mediocrity in today's string
players.'"
Tadeusz couldn't deny his words: John probably had that
magazine article framed somewhere. "Mediocrity is relative,"
he maintained. "A mediocre ... er ... Yankees player still has
greater talent than most. Is it shameful to be among the
lesser of the best?"
"Doctor Nikisch, please." John kept his eyes averted for a
long moment. "I came for your help," he said softly. "I wanted
one last edge, one refinement or insight that might make the
difference tomorrow."
"One day out of a dozen years will mean this much?"
"Maybe. Would I have come this far without all that work?
Can I expect to get any farther without more?"
Tadeusz looked aside. Music didn't exist to 'get far,' but
perhaps his was a minority opinion. "I can't give you
instruction tonight." He turned his eyes back, sharp and firm,
before John could protest. "If you insist on a practice
session, come early tomorrow, say six-thirty. I can give you
two hours before my Saturday pupils."
John smiled, but the tension stayed. "Thank you. You know
how much this means to me." He reached for his cases. "I need
to brush up my vibrato. I can't play an auditorium any
other way." The sad gaze struck him, and he held his violin
protectively close. "Let's not argue that again. It's standard
technique."
"Yes. So it is." Large, modern audiences demanded the
fullest projection from the players, whatever the cost to the
subtleties of the music. "Some people insist that birds fly on
steel-feathered wings."
John absorbed this without a flinch. "Thank you, Doctor
Nikisch," he said at the door. "I wouldn't be where I am
without you. I'll try not to let you down," he said in
parting, oblivious to the irony.
The practice hall was thick with people and tune-up sounds
when John arrived. He squeezed himself to his chair without a
word, sat down, and took out his violin. He muttered 'Sorry'
as he jogged someone while opening his bow case.
"I said, how did your audition go?"
"Oh, Sara. Fine, it was fine," he said, even as his stomach
began twisting anew. "How are you?"
"All right." Sara Weber leaned in closer. "Are you?"
"I said I was fine." He flushed. "Sorry, jitters. I'll be
hearing if they'll call me back soon."
"Well, good luck." John's mouth twisted: too late. "I know
how important this is to you."
The arrival of their conductor saved him from another hasty
reply. The Caledon Symphony Orchestra began its summer concert
season in a month, and rehearsals were up to thrice a week. He
led them straight into the first suite of Prokofiev's Romeo
and Juliet ballet.
The knots inside John pulled tighter from the first note.
The CSO was a stepping-stone, the 'to present' line on his
résumé. He shared concertmaster status with Sara, something he
couldn't resent personally the way he might professionally.
His advances left him the conviction that he could go farther.
Yet he hadn't.
His thoughts started to fade beneath the second language he
was playing. The turmoil briefly colored, then submerged
beneath, the music. Prokofiev now outvoiced Button, even as
Button gave him that voice. It was the great consummation, the
two artists silent without each other, together made briefly
immortal.
The conductor stopped the music to instruct the basses, and
the slender bond snapped. John was alone again with his
thoughts, and when the music began again, he could not slip
away from them. The bliss was so rare, and always so transient
when he found it, while others grasped the gift effortlessly.
John's ear for pitch was average, meaning poor for a
violinist. The correct intonation natural to some was a
struggle for him. That fault was the drag on his ambitions --
and the shut door between him and the rapture he could but
touch.
To know every note, recognize it for itself, not as a
string or a key ... and then have their structure and harmony
course over you, an open book, a secret joyously given ... the
daydreams John had of such a passionate rapport thrilled him,
crushed him. If he could work a little harder, rise a little
higher, play with those who understood ...
The unbreakable cycle thwarted him. Professional success
and the true knowledge of music: each needed the other, the
way Prokofiev needed Button ... or any other musician.
John worked the rest of the rehearsal with a hard-set
frown, which most took for a sign of his dedication. It
remained as he put away his violin and bow, only wavering when
he saw Sara regarding it with something like condolence. He
wiped it away, much too late.
"It wasn't good," she said, not even making it a question.
"I'm sorry."
John squirmed, started to turn, but couldn't make himself
leave. "My fault," he muttered. "Berg's Violin Concerto isn't
my best piece."
Berg's requiem was a serial composition, without specific
key. He chose it in a moment of cowardice, playing away from
his weaknesses, but finding no strengths in the notoriously
difficult cadenza he performed. The music didn't reach him in
even the limited way that traditional pieces did ... and it
showed.
Sara walked past him, bringing him along with a touch on
the shoulder. "I guess you keep practicing. Nothing comes
easily in this work." His shoulder dropped away from her hand.
"Did I say something wrong?"
"No, no."
Sara broke away momentarily to intercept the conductor,
saying something about the next rehearsal and no guarantees.
"What was that about?" he asked when she returned.
"I'm going to Philadelphia, for my sister. I told you this,
didn't I?"
"I don't ... wait. Is this an operation?"
"Yes, it's the operation. She's getting the implants
tomorrow. I'll be there Wednesday morning, and cross your
fingers, she'll finally get to hear me say 'hello'."
"Really?" John knew Sara's sister was deaf, but she
definitely had not told him of this operation. They were
'friends,' and maybe she assumed she'd tell a friend. "Uh,
listen, I'm very sorry if I didn't remember your saying all
this. Can I make it up to you, by driving you to Philly and
back?"
"Don't you have work, John?"
"Nothing I can't reschedule." The few students he took were
young, and would likely be glad to miss a session. "Please. I
haven't even met your sister, and what better time?"
They stepped outside, into a cool night breeze. "Sure, it'd
be fine if you came." She sounded less than gleeful. "I just
don't want you getting the wrong idea, John."
"I'm not, Sara. Promise." He got a time for them to leave,
and then they split. John sat for a long time behind the wheel
of his car, asking himself what idea he did have.
The doctors kept them waiting long enough to finish a test
series, then made a dramatic presentation of Sara's entrance.
John watched from the door as Sara and Mara embraced. Mara's
hug was slightly impeded by wires running from behind her ears
to a softball-sized box strapped between her shoulders. Sara
began speaking sign language, but Mara stopped her with a
touch to the lips. She devoured Sara's spoken words with the
unique enthusiasm attendant to a joy lost and regained.
Mara pointed his way. Sara waved him over and introduced
him, and he offered his hand. "Pleased to finally meet you."
Her attention was momentarily disconcerting, eyes focusing
on his lips. Mara still had to read his words to understand
them, but she was already connecting them to the sounds,
reteaching herself this language lost since early childhood.
Sara signed something to her sister, something she didn't want
John intercepting.
"Good to meet you, too." Mara grimaced with frustration,
hearing her own blurry words beside their clear speech.
"Sara's told me a lot about you."
"Oh, I'm sure she has."
One of the doctors began giving Sara a progress report.
Mara was testing superbly, outscoring most unimpaired people
on sensitivity and range. He began outlining the workings of
the system, but Sara said she had heard it all before.
"Actually, this is pretty new to me."
The doctor gladly began explaining it on John's behalf. The
box on Mara's back received the sounds, transmitting them to
chip clusters implanted within each ear. Microcircuits
measured intensity and pitch, passing the data to a stimulator
that converted the signals to electrical impulses. The
impulses went to an electrode array in her auditory cortex,
bypassing the auditory nerves atrophied by long inactivity --
and Mara heard.
John remained on the fringe of the sisters' happy moment
until the doctor stepped outside. Telling Sara he was going to
find a bathroom, he followed seconds later.
"Doctor ... Hippert." John spied the nametag as the doctor
turned. "Don't mean to bother you. I was wondering ... you
said the implants measure the pitches of sounds. That's pretty
advanced."
"True. If we'd had the implant technology five years
earlier, our first experimental patients would have been
tone-deaf."
"So she has perfect pitch. Not all normal -- er, reg-- not
everybody has that."
"No, I understand it's somewhat uncommon." Hippert shifted
his feet. "Take a deep breath, and come to your point."
John wasn't sure what his point was, until he heard himself
blurt it out. "Could you do that with normal-hearing people,
who just don't have full pitch awareness?"
Hippert let his face go blank, then waved John into a side
room. "If you're talking about a voluntary procedure, remember
that this operation is still classified experimental."
"For how long?"
He let the question pass. "There's no reason for such a
procedure, no everyday benefit that outweighs the cost or the
risks."
"I'm not an everyday person," John declared. "I'm a
musician. A violinist. Doesn't that suggest some benefits?"
Hippert's snap answer died unspoken. He pulled over a
chair, and sat to think. John watched his face, and thought he
saw the moment when it shifted from hazard to opportunity. "It
isn't how the procedure was conceived."
"But it's possible. If it weren't, you would have said
already."
Hippert smiled quietly. "It should be easier than full
restoration. The circuits only have to measure pitch; the
electrodes can hook into healthy ganglia. You wouldn't need
the external equipment. The worst problem would be synching
the artificial input to what you get naturally."
"Sounds like a worthy challenge."
The smile hardened. "First, Mister Button, this procedure
may not be approved beyond experimental applications. Second,
insurance companies may have to cover experimental surgery,
and correction of profound impairments. They won't fund
voluntary surgery, and you won't get anyone to think that
average hearing is impaired."
"The money doesn't matter. I have it." His parents had
provided well for him, or he could never have pursued the
violin so fastidiously.
"You really do?" Hippert named a sum. Blood started
pounding in John's ears, but he nodded. "You really should
think this over carefully, but if you do, and you're still
interested, I'll handle it."
He rose, but paused at the threshold. "You are right. It
would be a challenge. Now, maybe you should get back to your
friend."
John stood there a second before reacting, and then almost
passed Mara's room before remembering why he was walking that
way.
"Broad approval is coming, no more than two weeks from
now." Hippert's call came a week later, just as John had begun
dismissing the episode as a deluded fancy. "I need to conduct
some scans and tests first. You can come in now if you like,
so we can start immediately once they grant formal approval. I
don't know whether you've thought it over ...."
"More than you know, Doctor." With the moment upon him, he
still wasn't certain what he was about to say. "Friday
morning's the best time for me."
"Fine. How about I expect you at nine? See you then."
John hung up, and began staring blankly around his living
room. That lurking notion, that one brief moment of courage
... curiosity? ... the momentum had carried him to this
bizarre pass. He wondered at his presumption, wondered what
could have compelled him.
Then he remembered, and felt his heart find its rhythm
again.
He went to pick up the violin, restart his practice. He
almost put his instrument back down. Should he make himself
listen to a shadow of the music, when the full form of it was
so near at hand? Would it someday soon seem a pitiful use of
his time, to clutch at this shadow?
The bow lowered to the strings without his will, ending his
equivocation. Such a beautiful shadow. How much more rapturous
the full body would be.
John made it back to Caledon with time to spare for his
afternoon pupils. He took dinner alone as usual, spent a while
honing his vibrato, then drove to the practice hall. He
casually greeted the tympanist on the way in, and didn't
notice the look.
The room sounded odd before John even entered, filled more
with hushed voices than tuning instruments. Passing the
threshold seemed to turn a switch, quieting the talk nearly to
nothing. John intuitively kept his eyes low, but still the
stares crowded in.
Once in his chair, John cleared his head. His anticipation
was making him imagine things. Sure enough, the players were
tuning up. He took a long breath, and started adjusting his
own violin.
Sara arrived with a rustle. He turned to smile at her, but
she was looking the other way. Before he could ask how her
sister was faring, the conductor called for their attention,
and they went straight into 'The Montagues and Capulets.'
The evening went swiftly, despite the occasional look John
worked not to misinterpret again. The orchestra finally had a
handle on Prokofiev's opus, and the next three weeks would
smooth their rough edges. When the composer called it a night,
John was still ready to play for hours.
He closed up his cases, and started after Sara. "Great
night's work, I think."
Sara's head twitched but didn't turn. "Could you walk me to
my car, John?"
John followed obediently, not comprehending her queer mood.
Halfway across the parking lot, an unhappy idea presented
itself. "Has something gone wrong with Mara? Is she all
right?"
Sara wheeled. "You mean is the implant all right, don't
you?"
"Wh-- well, yes, of course."
Her hand snapped back a few inches. If she hadn't been
carrying her bow case in it, John was certain she would have
slapped him. "You couldn't care less about my sister, only the
hardware in her skull! You fooled me pretty well, but it's the
last time."
She stomped away, but John wasn't too dazed to pursue.
"What are you saying? What gave you that idea?"
"Doctor Hippert, on the evening news. Didn't you see?" She
set her cases on the car roof, and rummaged for keys. "No
matter. You can catch it at eleven."
"I never gave him --" His indignation swerved back to the
primary problem. "Sara, I didn't know what the operation could
do until I spoke to Hippert. I wasn't -- Sara, please --"
She responded to the touch on her shoulder with a wheeling
swing. John fell hard to the asphalt, a red handprint already
burning on his cheek. He stayed down until her car was out of
the lot. He opened his cases, and sighed. He'd protected them
satisfactorily, at the cost of a nasty sting in the small of
his back.
He spent his drive home searching for some way he could
have said something to make her understand. The idea hadn't
blossomed in his head until Hippert's impromptu lecture on the
technology. Until then, he had only suspected, hoped … and
probably used Sara to explore that hope.
Great. He was a jerk, a jerk who could now forget kindling
anything with Sara Weber. No, she was a musician, too. She
could understand. She would, when he got the chance.
Probably.
He didn't recognize the car parked in front of his house,
but the man standing by the door was unmistakable. What, had
he heard too? He left his auto parked outside the garage.
"What can I do for you, Doctor Nikisch?"
"Let me in, I suppose. Oh, I sent away some journalist who
was skulking about. Did she find you at rehearsal? No? You
don't seem disappointed."
"I'm not." John lit up the living room, unsuccessfully
offered Tadeusz a drink, and sat heavily on the sofa, violin
and bow in his lap. "I know what you're going to talk about,
so go ahead. Apparently I'm the only person who didn't watch
the news tonight."
"Fine. I will go ahead and apologize, for wounding your
feelings so badly two weekends ago. I belittled your
frustration, and impelled you on a desperate path which I hope
you will now let me lead you off."
John held still and quiet for a long time. "I believe I'm
honored, Doctor Nikisch, but ... can you help these?" Shaking
hands bracketed his ears. "Your conclusion hasn't changed, and
shouldn't. I don't have the ear for violin, but maybe I will
soon. If you do understand my frustration, you know how much
this would mean."
"John, John, to run such a risk with your body, for so
modest a gain, is not right."
"Would you say that if you had the flat ear? If you didn't
have the natural aptitude to match your dedication and love?
You're so accustomed to your gift, you don't see the chasm it
opens between us."
"But I do, John. I have for a long time." Tadeusz clasped
his hands. "Tell me, particularly, what this operation will
give you."
"Simple. Better hearing. Perfect pitch, keener volume
discernment, every improvement technology can provide."
"Ah. An artificial approach to a natural phenomenon. It
misses the point."
"No it doesn't. There's no barrier between the two. We
stretch gut and nylon strings over an open wooden box, but
somehow that's natural while silicon circuits aren't."
Tadeusz let out a short breath. "I should know by now how
firmly you make up your mind." He stood and walked slowly
toward the door. "I just think you should ask yourself what
you may lose from this, against what you might gain. Consider
whether you should hold onto the gifts you have, rather than
grasping at 'might-be' and 'want-to-be'."
"Doctor ...." John followed, never closer than two paces.
"I'm sorry that we always have to disagree. I admire you, and
respect your advice ... but I cannot take it."
"Not even to reflect? Then I would also be sorry." Tadeusz
left, walking into the night.
John watched him until his car disappeared around the
corner. He walked without caring where his feet carried him,
but they knew to bring him to his study. He dedicated this
room to music, both for application and contemplation. He
picked a Beethoven CD off one shelf, programmed the stereo to
play the 'Pathetique,' and dropped into the soft chair.
Music itself was artificial, he thought, in any form beyond
the banging of rocks and sticks, or the blowing through hollow
reeds. It was the rising sophistication of artificiality that
gave music its growing richness. Without it, what would there
be worth hearing, by anybody's ears?
That premise granted, artificial hearing was the next
reasonable step. Who would begrudge a music lover a hearing
aid, after all? Without a discerning ear, no music could work
its magical effect, just as notes on a page said nothing
without an instrument to voice them. Composition and
performer.
With him, the chips would become both. They would perform
for him, making the music new as the first day on Earth. He
would pour the insights that flowed thence into his
performances, his proficiency redoubled, reborn. He would play
as the instrument of his brilliant new perceptions.
He dimly perceived the music entering its second section
through a bone-deep chill. Was that Tadeusz's dread? Might the
implants hold him in thrall, enslaved to his new senses, his
individuality drowned in technical perfection? He shuddered to
imagine a machine guiding his fingers ... guiding a piece of
his soul.
John willed the fears away, rebuking his own egotism. If he
began producing great music, wouldn't that addition to the
world's joy be enough itself? He couldn't claim exclusive
credit for what he played now. Not with a Lupot violin and a
Tourte bow, instruments that won their own justified praise,
independent of any musician.
Could he be content as an instrument? No, he wouldn't need
to. Concert violinists were more than ears: they were
repositories of practice and study, knowledge and love. No
implant could make a musician, any more than the fretsaw made
the violin. The will and the skill would remain his own. He
needn't fear that.
Still, he feared. His brain laid open, fragile nerves
prodded, mutilated, destroyed. Or if Hippert didn't err ...
what if the gain weren't all he hoped? He was staking the bulk
of his worldly goods, on the wish that music could lift him
beyond worldly concerns.
The known and the unknown. Conventional man that he was,
Doctor Nikisch held to the known. It was their musical common
ground, the old esteemed above the modern, Bach over Bartok,
Schubert over Stravinsky. John was the more adventurous of the
two ... but would he be if he could never go back to the
'Pathetique' after hearing 'The Rite of Spring'?
The last low chords of Beethoven reverberated, and faded.
John sat in silence, as the stereo shut itself off. He longed
for bed, for sleep swept clean of the tumult of a decision yet
unmade. It would haunt him for years if he said 'no,' tempt
him in his darkest moments. Too great a decision, for anyone.
John remembered his violin and bow, still on the living
room sofa. He trudged downstairs for them, but a small red
blink turned his eye. Had he missed the message on his machine
earlier, or had Beethoven and his own turmoil blanked out the
phone? Thinking of Sara, he lunged for the 'play' button.
The voice that replied was professional and measured, and
so polite. It sounded almost sorry that they didn't require a
second audition from him, almost sincere in its good wishes
for his future career. It hung up, and the following silence
was that much more articulate.
John swallowed hard against the clog in his throat. He'd
imagined the wound healed before they opened it. He stood
motionless, quietly bleeding pride until the pain broke
through. When that paroxysm passed, something new remained in
its place. With a slow calm covering all else, he retrieved
his possessions and walked upstairs. He could sleep now,
having chosen which phantasms would bedevil him in the night.
"Do you hear me, Mister Button?"
John wanted only to sleep more, sleep eternally, but the
urge ebbed along with the anesthetic. He turned his head,
discovering an ache beneath that ear. Turning the other way
brought a twin throb, so he gathered all his strength and sat
up.
"Easy." Doctor Hippert slipped a hand behind John's back.
"Are you all right?" After waiting an uneasy second, he
snapped his fingers, turning John's head. "You gave me a
scare."
"Sorry." John strained. "I hear you ... normally." There
was some elusive difference. Was it the fog still rolling
through his head?
"Do you feel up to some tests?"
John didn't, but he took the request as an order. He placed
the bulky headphones over his ears, surprised at the feel.
He'd forgotten they had shaved there; hopefully there wasn't a
mirror in the room. He plodded through the tests, nodding,
raising left and right hands, identifying tones as higher or
lower. He performed with half-conscious confidence, still not
awake enough to be anxious.
Hippert lifted the headphones away, smiling. John didn't
return the smile. "It's a success, John, all around."
"Really?" He still felt no different, except for the haze
slowly parting.
"Really. Your intensity discernment has improved twelve
decibels. I could go into the corner and whisper, and you'd
still hear me. Your range is about half an octave broader on
either side. As for pitch discernment, you tested perfect."
"I did? I did." The corners of his mouth curled. "What was
that tone, the first?"
"The control? Middle C."
John looked to the ceiling, concentrating, and reproduced
the note. He sung, hummed, whistled. Hippert put one headphone
on his ear, pressed a button on the console, and nodded, but
John saw none of this. He was climbing up the diatonic scale,
committing each note to memory.
"Where's my violin? No! My CD player."
Hippert changed course, and got John his portable machine.
He had a disc already inside, a selection made for the drama
he anticipated this moment would hold. He went under the
headphones, started the player, and began softly humming four
notes over the first few seconds of faint static. Three G's
and an E flat. Dah dah dah duuuuum ...
He galvanized with the violin crash, unwittingly shouting.
His smile radiated with joy, but slowly began to change. Bit
by bit, his mouth fell open, nearly as wide as his eyes. "Oh
my ...."
Few things enchanted like a waltz. That hadn't changed in
ten years, since his first operation. His bow skipped across
the strings, while his mind soared, twining in and out of the
melody. He could sometimes forget the concert hall, the other
musicians ... but never for long.
The conductor of the state orchestra was finally content
with their tempo, and called it a night. John scrunched in his
seat to let the lead violinist past before heading for the
exit himself. He found his car, next to the sign proclaiming
the upcoming 'Mostly Mozart' night, and started home.
The drive to his apartment was a long one, full of time for
somber ruminations. His career stood at its natural plateau,
to rise no farther. Old hopes were a quiet torment, now and
again rising to become waking nightmares. He felt it coming
again tonight, felt powerless to halt the cataract of pain.
The worst of it was, Doctor Nikisch had been wrong. The
implants had worked; not as he had expected, not better or
worse, just different. New doors of perception swung open, and
through them he had blazed into the top stratum of his art.
Tadeusz had lived long enough to see the glorious rise ... and
the fall.
Not a fall so much as too feeble an ascent. Musicians
thronged to Doctor Hippert's operating room, and those of
other doctors who accepted the overflow. Traditionalists like
Nikisch either changed their attitudes or fell into
mediocrity, grumbling about the unhappy state of modern
performance.
Had John been alone, he would have been the virtuoso of his
age. He was instead the first, and those who followed gained
the benefit of their doctors' experience. John, his resources
never wholly replenished by his brief supremacy, found an
upgrade slightly beyond his means, then somewhat more so, then
more so. By the time he considered selling his Lupot to raise
money, it was no longer enough. By the time he nerved himself
to sell the house, all it did was halt the slide.
He didn't bother imagining that another operation could
rescue him. He'd learned his lesson; each day he spent around
ambitious young violinists, all straining to move up a chair,
reinforced it. He feared the next surge, the tide that would
wash away his ability to earn a living playing his music.
He longed for home, where he might spend the hour or two
before bed listening to something. He despised the earphones,
but his neighbors had no patience for his hobby. If only they
understood; if only it could reach them as it did him ...
... occasionally, whenever the evanescent gift of rapture
surmounted recollection of the price.
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