Poor Butterfly (4 page)

“I see it.”

“Keel was obsessive. He created the busts with flaws. Every cherub, every figure, every design in this labyrinthine structure was carefully, lovingly designed to make it look European, but his sense of Europe knew no century. Unfortunately, Keel was eclectic.”

“Eclectic,” I repeated as we approached a set of wooden doors at the end of the corridor.

“Yes, he …” Lundeen began.

“Took his ideas from a lot of different places,” I said.

“I apologize.”

“What for?” I asked.

“Condescension,” he said. “Can you forgive me?”

We had stopped. His hands were clasped in front of him. His head was tilted to one side. His smile was apologetic. A little of John Lundeen went a long way. I felt like blessing him before I gave him forgiveness.

“What’s the job?”

“Ah, the job,” Lundeen said, ushering me to one of the doors. “Millions have been invested in this structure. Millions. Including all of my own meager savings. Our investors wish less to realize a profit than to bring back the resplendence of grand opera in this noble edifice, to show the world that in these trying times, life, culture, and tradition can rise from the ashes and go on. We have the blessing of Mayor Rossi, Admiral King, many others, but we struggle, Mr. Peters. Ah, but we struggle. It is difficult to get skilled workmen during a war. Look around. You’ll see women and old men with tools and paint brushes. This has proven to be a task far greater than we anticipated. And we must open in three days.”

“The job,” I repeated as he opened the door.

“Since you are the Maestro’s idea, albeit a welcome one,” he said, “I prefer that he explain.”

I stepped into a theater that did more than hold its own with the rest of the building. The theater wasn’t lit, but the stage to our left was. The light from the stage was enough to show a thousand or more seats and a balcony. There were even box seats set back above us. And one massive glass chandelier, catching what it could of the light, hung high above the seats.

On the stage were two people. One was a white-haired man about sixty in gray slacks and a long-sleeved gray pullover shirt. The sleeves were rolled up. He was talking to the second person, a woman who, for a second or two, looked like Anne. The body was similar—full, dark. The hair, too, was dark and full with—at this distance—a touch of red from the lights. She was wearing a blue dress with a big shiny black leather belt.

The man’s fingers were dancing and the woman’s head was nodding, her eyes fixed on him. An orchestra sat silently in the pit in front of the stage.

Lundeen moved ahead of me toward the front row. The white-haired man paid no attention to us. The woman glanced in our direction. The similarity to Anne was still there, but there were differences. This woman was probably still in her twenties. Her eyes were blue and her face smooth and childlike.

“Vulnerability,” the white-haired man was saying. Actually, he said “vool-newr-abiliry.” “If you fail to project vulnerability with determination and underlying strength,” he told the woman, “you will give the character no depth. Your voice is an instrument like a fine violin. That you know. But you must coax more from it than perfect notes. This is opera. Performance. You comprehend?”

“Yes,” she said, glancing at Lundeen and me as we sat. The seats were covered with some soft stuffed material.

Stokowski stepped back from the woman and looked at us for the first time. He was about six feet tall and stood erect, his eyes unblinking, finding my face. I smiled at him. He didn’t smile back.

“I have a rehearsal this afternoon,” he said over his shoulder to the young woman. “You work with Giancarlo and the tenor …”

“Martin Passacaglia,” she muttered softly.

“… if he arrives for rehearsal this afternoon,” Stokowski concluded.

“Yes,” she said dutifully.

“It’s getting better,” he said, his eyes still on me.

“Thank you,” she said. She didn’t seem sure whether she should stand there and wait for an escort or make her exit. A woman suddenly appeared from stage left, where she had probably been waiting, and beckoned to her. The woman was thin, dressed in a black suit, and of no clear age. She held a small white dog in her arms. I tagged her for Lorna Bartholomew and the mutt for Miguelito. I watched the two women exit.

Stokowski moved to the front of the stage, looked down at the orchestra for a moment, and pointed at a violinist.

“You,” he said. “Do you have another instrument?”

“No,” said the man.

“Leave,” said Stokowski, walking to the end of the stage and coming down the stairs. “An inferior instrument cuts through my heart like the knife of a Prague butcher.”

The violinist got up. He was about fifty and wore rimless glasses. He made his way out with as much dignity as he could muster while his fellow musicians looked at their own instruments, hoping they would not prove inferior, too.

“Overture,” Stokowski said, stepping to the podium a few feet in front of where Lundeen and I were sitting. The Maestro raised his hands and began to conduct He didn’t use a baton. He didn’t need one. His hands flowed. His fingers pointed. His lips moved.

There was no music in front of him. We sat silently and listened. It sounded great but I needed a coffee. I was afraid I’d fall asleep and he’d point his finger at me and tell me to take my inferior instrument home.

The overture ended. Stokowski sighed, shook his head, and said, “Oboe. You, oboe.”

The oboe player, a very old man, looked up, ready to accept the ax.

“When I coax you with my hand like this,” said Stokowski, demonstrating the hand movement “I want you to play, to help. The flutes were lost. They have improved in quality in the last ten minutes but lost in volume.”

“But,” said the bewildered oboe player, his instrument cradled lovingly in his arms, “there was no music when you pointed at me to play.”

“I am the conductor,” said Stokowski. “If I point at you, coax you, it is because I need you, and you will play even if there is no part for you.”

“You want me to improvise on Puccini?” asked the stunned old man, looking in the general direction of the string section.

“Yes,” said Stokowski. “Yes. Yes if I need it.”

“You want me to play … jazz?”

“I don’t care what you call it,” said Stokowski. “Just do it. Can you do it?”

“Yes,” said the old man.

“Good,” said Stokowski. “Practice.”

“Practice what?” asked the old man.

“Creative flexibility.”

With that Stokowski turned to us and looked at me. He was about three inches taller than me. He held out his hand and I took it. His grip was a lot firmer than Lundeen’s. He waved for us to follow him as he left the podium and moved back toward the stage. The orchestra launched into a mess of sound.

“Opera is not my forte,” Stokowski said loudly. “Nor is ballet or oratorio, though I have conducted them all. I have done them. My
Parsifal
was more than competent. It has been said that my
Wozzeck
was a triumph. What did Deems Taylor say of my
Wozzeck?
”

“He said it was a triumph of your career,” Lundeen supplied cheerfully over the instruments as we reached the stage.

“Normally, I leave opera to Toscanini, and I hope that Toscanini will leave the symphony to me,” Stokowski said, looking into the darkness at the rear of the theater as if expecting Toscanini himself to appear suddenly. “Are you familiar with my work, Mr. Peters?”

“I saw
100 Men and a Girl
once and
Fantasia
twice,” I said. “Once with my nephews Nat and Dave. Nat liked the dinosaurs. The other time was with Carmen the cashier from Levy’s Deli in Los Angeles. She liked the dancing hippos.”

Stokowski smiled.

“Stravinsky lends himself to extravagance. Do you know why you are here, Mr. Peters?” he asked. “Did Giancarlo tell you?”

“I thought you should do that, Maestro,” Lundeen said nervously.

“Good,” said Stokowski. “We’ll talk on the way to my car. I’m expected at the presentation of the Congressional Medal of Honor this morning on the cruiser
San Francisco
to a young naval commander named McCandless, who is credited with taking over the task force during the Battle of Savo Island last month after his commander and his captain were killed and he himself injured. Commander McCandless, I understand, is thirty-one years old. Now if we add a waiting girl, we have the material for a modern patriotic opera. The car is waiting, Giancarlo?”

“I’ll …” Lundeen stood up.

“Big black limo with teeth,” I said. “It’s waiting.”

Stokowski strode to the end of the stage and went down the steps. We followed him and I wondered what the hell we had gone up onto the stage for.

“You come recommended by a mutual friend,” Stokowski said as he walked up the aisle and out the door into the corridor. “Basil Rathborie. He and I recently did Prokofiev’s
Peter and the Wolf
with the All-American Orchestra for Columbia Records. Basil said you could be trusted.”

Stokowski walked briskly. I kept up. Lundeen had to work at it.

“The situation is this,” he said. “Assuming this building can be made presentable, an opening performance of
Madame Butterfly
will take place in two days. I am skeptical. The young lady you saw me talking to, Vera …”

“… Tenatti,” Lundeen panted.

“… will make her debut,” said Stokowski. “Giancarlo and his board wanted Bidu Sayao, but she is doing another Puccini,
Manon
, at the Metropolitan in New York. This girl is passable. Promising. I will conduct on opening night only. I must get back to New York. I have a contract with NBC, but I have agreed to lend my support, advice, and name to this project In exchange for this support, Giancarlo has graciously agreed not only to pay me a reasonable fee but to donate 50 percent of all profits during his first season to relief for refugee children in my name.”

We were at the front door. Lundeen moved ahead of us to open it Sunlight blinded us. I was looking at Stokowski. He didn’t blink.

“Sounds great” I said. “And you want me to play Pinkerton?”

Stokowski laughed.

“You are already playing a Pinkerton and we have an operatic Pinkerton,” he said. “A tenor named …”

“… Passacaglia,” Lundeen supplied.

“Tenors exist to be killed at the end of Act Two,” sighed Stokowski. “In any case, he has done the role many times. He fancies himself more skilled than he is. You know opera?”

“Not really,” I admitted as we stepped outside. “Knew a guy named Snick Farkas who worked in a gas station where I rode shotgun nights in Encino. Snick learned to love opera in prison. I also had a wife once who knew opera.
Butterfly
was her favorite.”

“Unfortunately,” said Stokowski, walking down the stone steps past the busy workmen, “there are some who find it an odious work. There are those who believe an opera which sympathetically depicts the plight of a Japanese woman abandoned by an American naval officer is unpatriotic. There are those who believe the opera should not be performed. There have been newspaper editorials … and these pickets.”

We were approaching the limo now. The chauffeur had pocketed his novel and put his hat back on. He held the door open for Stokowski, who put his hand on the open door and turned to me. The temperature was about 60 degrees but Lundeen was sweating from the quick pace and the weight he was carrying.

The trio of ancient picketers was approaching us.

“Are you American?” the old man bellowed at Stokowski.

Stokowski sighed and met the old man’s glaring eyes.

“I was born in Poland,” he informed the man. “Spent my early years in England and have been a resident and citizen of the United States for a good many years. I am here by choice and not by an accident of birth. I am, as a good American, applying my talent and efforts to the winning of this war. I would think that you and these charming ladies would better serve the nation by collecting scrap paper or cans of fat, wrapping bandages, or selling Defense bonds and stamps instead of interfering with esthetic issues about which you clearly know nothing.”

With that, Stokowski turned his back on the old man, whose eyes were darting back and forth in a delayed attempt to understand what had just been said to him.

“Show Mr. Peters the note, Giancarlo,” Stokowski went on, looking over at my battered khaki Crosley.

The ignored picketers spotted a paint truck pulling up about twenty feet away and turned their attention to the two women in overalls and caps who were climbing out of the truck.

Lundeen stepped forward and reached into the pocket of his jacket. He had some trouble fishing out the envelope. It was slightly moist when he handed it to me. I opened it and pulled out a rough, thick sheet of paper. The note was handwritten in ink with fine curlicues. It was worthy of the guy named Keel, who had designed the monster we were standing in front of. I read it:

Be advised. Be warned. Heed. This is a time of tempest and heat. Gods are watching. We are watching. Japan must not be glorified, its people idealized. We are at war. To present this opera is to be a traitor. In war, traitors are executed. All who participate in this abomination are traitors subject to execution
.

Erik

“Where did you find this?” I asked.

“Nailed to the door last Wednesday,” said Lundeen, looking up at the door.

“You don’t think it’s a crackpot, a joke, a …” I said, but stopped when Lundeen shook his head.

“A man is dead, Mister Peters,” Stokowski said.

“The day after the note was found,” said Lundeen. “We were rehearsing. There was a scream. We hurried into the foyer and found a plasterer. He had fallen from the scaffolding.”

“Fallen?”

Stokowski touched his high brow with his long fingers. They came away dry. “The man’s name was Wyler. He was forty years old, sober, experienced. The scaffolding was secure. Giancarlo, Lorna, and another person saw someone wearing a cape climbing the scaffolding before Wyler fell. They paid no attention, thought it was someone going up to help with the plastering. We have checked with the plasterers. None of them climbed up to help Wyler that morning. The police are not interested. They believe it was an accident. They think I took advantage of a coincidence to build publicity.”