A Song for Summer

Lieselotte took not the slightest notice. She had taken up a knife and begun to slice the rolls. "We need more of the salami ones-- Chomsky's eaten three already."

"Lieselotte, I am your supervisor and

I order you to go back and dance," said Ellen. Lieselotte put down her knife.

"Yes, you are my supervisor, but also, I think ... you are my friend? And I want to be with you tonight."

But this was a mistake. Ellen's defences crumbled; tears gathered in her eyes--and nothing could be sillier, for she had known--everybody knew --that Marek was leaving the following day, that his boat sailed in a week--and that Brigitta Seefeld, the mightiest and most redoubtable of the uninvited "Aunts", had come to fetch him.

Marek's abrupt departure from Vienna had infuriated Benny and Staub, puzzled the musical establishment, and caused Brigitta to erupt into a series of violent scenes.

"How dare he treat me like that?"' she raged. "He begs to spend the night with me and then goes off as if I was a plaything!"

Then, about a week after his disappearance and shortly before he was due to sail, Benny called at Brigitta's apartment in an obvious state of excitement.

"Do you know where he is?"' he asked her, shooing away the masseuse.

"Where?"'

"In Hallendorf. Where they all swore they'd never heard of him. And do you know what he's doing?"'

"What?"'

"Writing music for a local pageant. For some obscure saint called Anabella or something."

"I don't believe it."

"It's true. I had it from Ferdie Notar at the Central who heard it from the clarinettist of the Philharmonic who heard it from the director of the Klagenfurt Academy."

"But that's ridiculous. Marcus hates all that sort of thing--villagers with fat legs and mud and everything going wrong." Brigitta's mind was racing. Was he writing her music for some female yokel with blonde plaits and cow's eyes?

"I checked with the Klagenfurt tourist board."

"I'm going back, Benny," said Brigitta imperiously.

"Me too," said Benny. "I smell gold."

Unfortunately he was not the only one. There were too many rivals brought by rumours of Altenburg's involvement in the proceedings. The director of the Festspielhaus, sitting across the table, had a nasty glitter in his eyes.

But with Brigitta to help him, with her influence over Marcus, he was bound to succeed. Staub wasn't much use--he'd insisted on coming but he thought of nothing except his libretto. It was Brigitta who would carry the day.

"I tell you, Marcus, the piece is made for the States," he said now. "They'd gobble it up. A music theatre piece with a message ... You might think they'd object to God and peasants and so on, but I promise it's not so. People always turn to religion when they think there might be a war."

Marek smiled at him lazily. "That's very

kind of them--but I'm afraid what they think about God or peasants has nothing to do with anything. The music for the pageant stays here. It was written for these people at this moment of time. They can use it again or not, but it's theirs."

Benny put down his glass. "For heaven's sake, Marcus, be reasonable. Don't you see how you'd be helping them here if your piece became known all over the world? Think of Oberammergau. You've only got to score that theme you wrote for the saint for Brigitta and it would be a sensation."

"Possibly," Marek agreed, but he did not seem disposed to continue the conversation, and the director of the Festspielhaus now leant across the table to put in his own bid.

"I'd be prepared to put it on with all the actors--everyone from here who took part in it. That way it would stay in Europe."

Brigitta glared at him and put her hand on Marek's arm. It was time to assert her personal dominion over the composer.

"Darling, you can't just keep your work hidden away, you know that really. It belongs to the world. You've no right to keep it to yourself."

"I shan't be doing that. The population of Hallendorf is considerable."

"Well then, at least rescore that incredible theme--it would work marvellously on its own."

"I've done that already," said Marek. "But that too stays here."

Brigitta's eyes narrowed. For whom had he written that amazing tune? Who was behind the whole escapade? She had seen Lieselotte come out of her house at the beginning of the pageant with a certain relief--the girl was hardly more than a child, a peasant through and through. Brigitta had watched her like a hawk afterwards, but she'd made no attempt to come up to Marek--it was her own family she sought out.

But if not Lieselotte, then who? Not that ridiculous Russian woman drifting about in a shroud, not the pretty Norwegian, she was sure of it. No, there could be no one; not in that crazy school, nor in the village. She was silly even to think of it.

"You wrote that melody for me, didn't you? I know you did. It falls exactly for my voice."