A Note Yet Unsung Read online

  “Ya done Pa’s song mighty proud, Rebekah.” Opal touched the neck of the fiddle as she passed, Rufus on her heels.

  “Thought I’s hearin’ angels playin’,” he said softly.

  “Thank you,” Rebekah whispered to each as they passed.

  Cattabelle wiped her eyes. “Think I’ll just set here’a spell with him, just the two of us, if ya hain’t mindin’.”

  “No, ma’am.” Tate spoke up. “We don’t mind. Rebekah and I . . . we’re going for a walk. We’ll be back directly.”

  Cattabelle nodded, and then her eyes narrowed. “Worries me somethin’ fierce, Witty. Them aches in your head.”

  “I’ll be fine,” he whispered, hugging his mother tight. “We’ll be back in a while.”

  Hearing his decisive tone, Rebekah surrendered the fiddle, and he returned it to the case atop the chest of drawers. She followed him outside and down the front steps, the sunshine so bright after being indoors that she had to shield her eyes for a moment, yet she drank in the uncustomary warmth for March.

  Tate turned to her. “It was you. That night. At Mrs. Cheatham’s dinner party.” His blue eyes were bright with emotion. But what emotion, Rebekah couldn’t tell.

  “Yes.” She nodded.

  “Yet you never said anything. Even when you knew I was trying to find out who it was.”

  “I was going to tell you earlier, before Emil came out. And the reason I didn’t before now is because I made a promise to Mrs. Cheatham the night of the party that I wouldn’t. We agreed not to tell anyone.”

  “But why?”

  She looked at him. “You know why. A woman playing the violin? In public? At Adelicia Cheatham’s party? We both know it’s not to be borne.” She shook her head. “I never should have done it. The main reason I did”—the truth stuck fast in her throat—“was to spite you.”

  His expression darkened, and she rushed to explain.

  “You had said no to me after my audition, and I wanted to do something that would rankle you like you’d rankled me. And . . . I also wanted to know what it was like to play in front of an audience. A real audience. What I didn’t plan on, however, was you coming upstairs afterward.”

  “You saw me?”

  She briefly looked away. “I was hiding in the shadows in the children’s bedroom.”

  For a moment he said nothing, and she finally looked back to find him staring. Then a tiny smile tipped one side of his mouth.

  “Rebekah Carrington . . . you truly are a most unconventional woman. And . . . a masterful violinist.”

  She hesitated. “You’re . . . not angry with me?”

  “Angry? I might have been, if I’d found out earlier. But now . . .” His gaze softened. “Recent discoveries have caused me to view life in a slightly different light.”

  He reached for her hand and drew her into his arms. She went without hesitation.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, head against his chest. “For not telling you, and . . . for what’s happening to you.”

  He pulled her closer. She felt so at home in his arms, safe and cared for. And she tried not to think about what her life would be like without him in it.

  “Thank you for playing for my father. There are times, like what just happened a while ago, when a ringing starts in my ears. It’s almost overwhelming and makes playing all but impossible.”

  She drew back slightly. “But the ringing isn’t there all the time.”

  “No. Not yet anyway. It’s unpredictable. Right now, I can hear without any reverberation. But earlier . . . It feels like the sounds are traveling down a tunnel. Then, typically, once the pain leaves, everything is muffled for a while. Like I’m hearing through a wall. But it’s considerably better now.”

  They walked a path that led around the cabin and down the hill, neither of them speaking. Beside them, filling the comfortable silence, a stream trickled and tumbled over a rocky bed, its melody ancient but never old.

  “You’re certain the doctor who examined you is the best in his field?”

  “I’m certain.” Tate pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and handed it to her. “It’s the letter from Dr. Hamilton. He explains what he believes is happening to me.”

  The letter looked well read for one so recently received, its edges crinkled, a corner torn. Rebekah paused and silently read the doctor’s findings, scarcely starting the second paragraph before her hopes for Tate’s healing were dealt a heavy blow.

  It is my conclusion that you suffer from an aggressive and degenerative malady of which my colleagues and I have witnessed only a handful of times, and never before in a person of such youth and vitality. There is an abnormal, microscopic growth of bone in the walls of your inner ear that is causing the stapes bone to become fixed in place. In a normal ear, the stapes vibrates freely to allow transmission of sound into the inner ear. But when it becomes fixed to the surrounding bone, as in your case, it prevents sound waves from reaching the inner ear fluids and hearing becomes increasingly impaired.

  I told you I’d seek consultation from a colleague in Boston, and I did. But burdened by the nature of your illness—and you being so gifted by the Almighty—I took the liberty of seeking additional counsel as well, while keeping your identity concealed. You must know, Maestro Whitcomb, I have never been more eager to have my findings proven false.

  Rebekah found herself not wanting to continue. She wanted to rewrite this doctor’s conclusion. Give it a different ending.

  While we have made enormous strides in medicine in recent decades, there is yet so much we do not know. So it is with the greatest regret I inform you that there is no known treatment or cure for your condition. And while the time frame I’m about to share can vary, you should expect to suffer full hearing loss over the course of the next year. Perhaps a few months less, perhaps more. I am earnestly praying for more.

  Rebekah couldn’t blink back the tears fast enough, and the stationery trembled in her grip. The words on the page ran together, and she could no longer read them. Tate slipped an arm around her shoulders and took the letter.

  She pointed to where she’d left off.

  “‘My deepest regrets to you, Maestro’”—he read softly—“‘for the diagnosis I have had to deliver. Know that you have my continued prayers as well as an open door to my practice—and to my home—whenever you are in Knoxville. If you require anything additional from me, all you need do is ask. My best to you and yours always. Sincerely, Dr. Ronald T. Hamilton. P.S. I have already secured tickets to the grand opening for the new Nashville Opera House, and have never anticipated an event more.’”

  He refolded the letter and returned it to his pocket. “Walk with me?”

  Rebekah looked at his outstretched hand and knew he was offering it as a friend. And she accepted, still wanting so much more.

  Dappled sunshine sneaked through the trees overhead and cast lacy shadows on the path. The twitter of birds in the branches and the sweet smell of fresh pine in the breeze made her wonder if there was any more beautiful place on earth. Or anyone else she’d rather be with right now.

  Tate pulled something from his shirt pocket. It was about the size of a hickory nut, wrapped in paper, then twisted on both ends. He unwrapped it and held it to her lips. “Bite off half.”

  She eyed it. “Tell me what it is first.”

  He smiled. “It’s not made with moonshine. Or squirrel.”

  Smiling, she did as he asked and the chewy, buttery sweetness on her tongue made her instantly glad she had. “It’s like a caramel, only . . . different.”

  “It’s Mama’s molasses taffy. I thought you’d like it.” He popped the other half into his mouth. “Come on. I want to show you something.”

  Farther down, the path opened into a meadow. And there, nestled among prairie grass and winter wheat, sat a little church building, its white steeple stretching tall and proud. Rebekah paused to take it in.

  “Idyllic,” she said with a sigh.

  The door t
o the church was open, the inside orderly and swept clean. Wooden pews, six on each side, were arranged neatly in rows. A simple pulpit adorned a raised dais at the front, and to its right, a piano.

  “Men on that side.” Tate gestured. “Women on this side.”

  She looked over at him. “You are joking.”

  “I am not. It’s the rule of the highlanders. But not to worry . . . There are plenty of barns and wagons around here where a boy and girl can spark mischief.”

  She gave him a little push, not liking the idea of him sparking mischief with anyone else but her. He walked to the piano bench and sat down, leaving room for her beside him.

  “This is where I first learned to play.”

  “Here? On this piano?”

  He nodded, and began playing. She was pleased to discover the piano in tune, except for middle C, which was slightly flat.

  She smiled at the song he played. “Brahms’s ‘Wiegenlied: Guten Abend, Gute Nacht.’ Translated,” she continued, “Brahms’s ‘Lullaby: Good Evening, Good Night.’ I actually had the honor of hearing Johannes Brahms perform this in Vienna.”

  Tate looked at her and shook his head. “Pitiful little thing.”

  Smiling, she gave him a nudge. “He and Maestro Heilig were colleagues, and Brahms would visit him often. Maestro Heilig once said that Brahms had acquired the reputation for being a grump, and not without reason. But he also said that few could ever be as lovable as he.”

  Tate paused in his playing. “What was it like? To live there.”

  “Quite lonely, at first,” she answered honestly. A little too honestly, judging from the uncertainty in his expression. “I was scarcely thirteen when I moved there with my maid, Sally.”

  “That was . . . after your father had passed.” His voice held a hint of question. “And shortly after your mother remarried.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Do you see her often? Your mother?”

  Wondering how they’d wandered into this part of her life, she gave a small shrug. “I try to. She and I don’t share the same kind of affection you have with your family, Tate.”

  She looked down at the keys, determined to change the subject. She continued the lullaby where he’d left off, the sweetness of the music a helpful transition. “Living in Vienna was also exciting.” Scenes rose in her mind. “To walk the streets where Mozart and Beethoven walked. To sit in the same cafes and symphony halls. I’ve walked by Mozart’s home countless times, and by the Schönbrunn Palace where he gave his first performance for the Hapsburg family. At the age of six, which is so amazing when you think of it.”

  “I envy you having lived there. In the City of Music.”

  “I’m grateful for my years there. But I’m also grateful”—her hands paused on the keys—“for being back here.”

  “As am I. Far more than you know.”

  He held her gaze, and she would’ve sworn—not that she was an expert at such things—that he wanted to kiss her. And she wished he would! But . . .

  He finished the Brahms instead. And before the last chord faded, he began the opening measures of the fourth movement from his symphony. Only, he continued past where they’d written. The music was beyond splendid, and different than what he’d composed in the first two movements, and from what they’d written together in the third. She heard traces of the European masters they both loved, but she could also detect the faintest influence of . . . mountain music?

  The discovery brought a smile.

  “This would be the violin solo,” he said. “Or the start of it.”

  The chords and rhythm of the piece slowly transitioned, his fingers expert on the keys—no trouble for him hearing at the moment, she noticed—and she could perfectly imagine the music being played on a violin. Oh, she wished she could be the one to play it. But that was impossible, she knew. Darrow Fulton would play it. And with his talent and practiced skill—minus his meanness—the solo would be superb, the perfect climax and finish to a symphony that was, in her estimation, brilliant.

  “Where did that come from?” she asked once Tate finally paused.

  He shrugged. “I have no idea. I was awake last night, composing in my head, and then again on the path with you on the way here, but I couldn’t get anything to make sense.”

  “Quite the contrary, I’d say.” Yet she understood what he meant by composing in his mind. Melodies would come to her at the oddest times.

  He smiled. “Let me play it again. And perhaps, between the two of us, we’ll remember most of it.”

  Wishing she had pencil and paper, she worked to commit the chords and tempo to memory. Tate played it again and again, then they hurried back to the cabin, laughing and humming as they went.

  They quickly gathered pencil and paper, and with Tate playing his father’s fiddle, they sat on the front porch steps, so as not to bother Angus, and worked to re-create the chords. Rebekah transcribed them as hurriedly and accurately as she could, making suggestions and comments as they went. Then they played the measures from the page and made yet more notations.

  As dusk crept in, they finished their task and were pleased to have a solid beginning to both the opening of the fourth movement and also the violin solo. They ate a bite of dinner, then Tate asked to sit with his father for a while. Angus’s breathing, a labored chore, hurt them all to hear.

  In the family’s faces, Rebekah saw both love for their father and a desire that he stay with them. Yet a love that hated to see him hurt, to struggle for every breath, the rattle in his chest sounding even more pronounced than when they first arrived.

  She stood in the doorway of the bedroom and watched Tate as he sat by his father’s bedside, elbows on his knees, head bowed, and she imagined what he must be praying. She knew he wanted his father to stay alive long enough to hear the symphony he’d written for him. The son longed to honor the father.

  And yet Tate had already honored him in the life he’d lived—and would continue to live.

  And though now wasn’t the time to tell him this, she believed—no matter what happened—that Angus would hear that symphony Tate had written for him, the symphony that would be played that first night in the new hall, whether Angus was still here with them to attend . . . or not.

  Later, cuddled beside Opal in bed, Rebekah awakened to the soft shuffle of steps on the plank floor. She peered up, recognizing Tate in the soft glow of lamplight coming from the bedroom, and also Cattabelle, who’d been asleep on the sofa.

  “Bless you, Witty, for lettin’ me get some rest,” Cattabelle whispered, patting his arm as she passed.

  Tate nodded, heading toward the sofa, then glanced back. “If it’s all right with you, Mama,” he said softly, “I might stay on a few days. Until . . .”

  He didn’t finish the sentence. Didn’t need to.

  “I’s hopin’ you would, son.” A deep sigh left her. “I’s hopin’ you would.”

  The door to the bedroom closed, and darkness enveloped the room again. Tate added another log to the fire, and the wood crackled and sparked as the flames renewed their vigor.

  Soft snores from Tate’s brothers combined with Opal’s gentle breaths to crowd out the silence. Rebekah lay still, knowing Tate had to be exhausted and needed rest. She didn’t know what time it was, but it was still dark out, so she closed her eyes again and soon drifted off.

  But she awakened again some time later, not by a noise, but . . . by a feeling. She looked over at the sofa. Tate was lying down.

  And yet she knew he was awake.

  Not bothering to whisper his name, she rose, slipped her arms into her robe, wrapped a blanket around her shoulders, and padded softly across the floor. Wordlessly, he sat up and made room for her beside him. She was chilled after leaving the warmth of the bed and pulled the blanket close about herself.

  “Can’t sleep?” she whispered.

  He shook his head. “The quiet is deafening.”

  It took a moment for his meaning to become clear. But
as she listened—beyond the soft breathing of his siblings, beyond the muted sounds of his father’s struggle—there was absolute stillness. As though the night around them were a vacuum absorbing every speck of sound. Not an owl hooted, not a breath of wind stirred. Even the rhythmic tick-tick-tick of the clock atop the mantel was silent, the routine effort of winding the mechanism forgotten in the shadow of death.

  Sensing he needed to talk, she waited. And prayed.

  “I know I should say I’m not scared,” he whispered. “That I haven’t . . . lain awake at night wondering if I have weeks or months, or another year. Or if it will happen before the grand opening. But I can’t. Because, the truth is, Rebekah . . . I can taste the fear. I can feel it pulsing inside me. As steady and strong as my own heartbeat. I begin thinking of all the things I’ll never hear again. And then I wonder if, over time . . . I’ll forget them all.”

  The muscles in his jaw went rigid, and the honesty in his confession wrapped itself around her throat, making it difficult for her to speak.

  “Tate, it’s only right that you should be afraid. Anyone would be. I certainly would be.”

  He looked toward the window where darkness lay beyond, the night skies black and star studded. “I’ve been lying here trying to imagine what the rest of my life is going to be like. Will I be able to remember what Beethoven’s Fifth sounds like? Or his Ninth? Or Mozart’s Oboe Concerto in C Major? Or . . . ‘Rondo alla turca’ played by a lovely ghost on a second-floor landing.”

  Tenderness softened his voice, along with uncertainty, and she reached for his hand and held it tight. What to say that would give him hope?

  “Right now, if you concentrate,” she said after a moment, lowering her voice, “can you hear the way the rain sounds as it falls on a tin roof? Or the cry of an eagle as it soars high above in the cloudless blue?”

  He looked over at her.

  “Even after so many years,” she continued, “I can still hear my father telling me he loves me when he used to tuck me in at night. I can hear the singing drifting up over the hill from the slave cabins behind my childhood home. And Demetrius, a slave in my father’s house and . . . actually, the man who first taught me to play the fiddle”—she sensed Tate’s surprise—“was very special to me. There are moments when I close my eyes, and I promise you”—her voice caught—“I can hear his rich baritone and the way he could make his fiddle sing. And will, I think, for as long as I live.”