The Golden Peaks (12 page)

Suddenly, without any warning, he broke off abruptly, and she hear
d
the piano bench pushed impatiently back.

“Where the devil is that Roberto?” she heard i
n a voice that was also impatient
, and next moment, Kurt had stormed on to the b
al
cony, and, in making for the stairs, had almost knocked her over.

“
Herrgott,” he said, steadying her, “what
are you
doing here, Celia?”

“I couldn’t find Roberto—I think he must have gone to bed. I haven’t really been so long—I was listening to your music.”

“While I starve,” he said, relieving her of the tray and carrying it into the room. She followed him, standing inside the long window, and looking round the large living room. She saw the grand piano at once and longed to get at it. She saw the thick fur rugs lying on the polished floor, and the heavy carved furniture, and the im
m
ense, tiled stove which would keep the place so warm in winter. She watched as Kurt sat down at the table and prepared to eat his meal. Without her knowing it, her eyes were shining and on her face a delighted smile still lingered. Kurt looked at her curiously. Then he said:

“Will you have some coffee,
Celia
?”

“Yes,” she said, “I should like some.” She came into the room slowly. She had, at that moment, completely forgotten that she was a waitress in his hot
el
;
she
wanted to discuss the music with him, wanted to share ideas, wanted to illustrate for him, on his piano, where she differed from him. She stood by the table.

“Get a cup from the kitchen,” said Kurt.

“Where is the kitchen?”

He i
n
dicated
one of the doors and she went into one of the most ingeniously fitted kitchens she had ever seen, small but so well planned that it would be a joy to work in it. She stood gazing in admiration, and at last took down a big blue cup and saucer and carried them back into the living room. She poured out two cups, and took hers over to the piano.

“What a beauty this is,” she said.

“You like it?”

“It sounds heavenly—when you play it. I would love to try it myself.”

“Why don’t you?”

“May I?" She put down the coffee cup, and took her seat on the bench. She began to play one of t
h
e variations he had just played. Then she turned towards him with a
smile.

“Yes, it’s lovely to play,” she said, “but I can
’
t play it as you do. This variation, for instance. I play it much quicker than you.” She played enough of it for him to recognize and see the difference. “Why do you play it slowly?”

“Why do
you
play it fast?”

“I heard Schnabel play it like that; and thought he must know better than I.”

Kurt came to the piano and tried it her way. Then he
shook his head.

“
Schnabel
or no
Schnabel,
”
he said,
“
I
like it slow.
”

He rose and went back to the table. “Go on,” he said, “play something more.
”

She played to him while he ate his supper. Perhaps because it was late at night, she played the
quieter
things she knew, a delicate Mozart sonata, a quiet Schubert impromptu. At last, his hand on her shoulder made her
start.

“Come,
Celia
, time for you to go,
”
he said.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She jumped up at once, and stood
facing him.

“You have a very nice touch, Celia,” he said, and his eyes lingered on her face, quietly, reflectively. “Very delicate, very feminine.”

“And you,” she said, caught in some irresistible spell, “have a very virile and stirring touch. Very masculine.” Suddenly there was an odd tension between them. What had caused it? Was it the quite unconscious use of the two words feminine and masculine? Was it the fact that in this still and perfumed night, only the two of them were awake? Was it their isolation in this soft darkness that made them aware of each other? For a few moments they continued to look at each other. It was Kurt who suddenly broke the spell.

“Come,” he said. “You have to be up early in the morning.”

She went to the long window.

“Shall I take the tray?” she asked.

“No. Roberto can take it in the morning.”

“Then goodnight, Mr. St. Pierre.”

“Goodnight, Celia.”

Suddenly, on the balcony, she paused.

“Oh,” she said.

“What is the matter? Shall I go back with you? Does the darkness frighten you?”

“No. I suddenly remembered.”

“What?”

“Have I—I mean—I’m so sorry if I haven't—quite—remembered my place. Perhaps I oughtn’t to—have talked music to you. It rather took me by surprise, you see.
”

He stood at her side in the darkness.

“Your place, Celia? You forgot your place? What is your place, I wonder?” He took her hand and kissed the back of it, formally, politely, perhaps impersonally. “You don't need to apologize for anything. Goodnight.”

She went down the outside staircase and was thankful for the cool air of the mountains on her flushed cheeks, as she made her way along the darkness of the path. She pressed the back of her hand, where his kiss lingered, to her lips.

She went up to her room, but although she was so tired, she could not sleep. Her mind was over-stimulated, and her imagination at work. She had never seen the inside of the chalet before—now she knew it was friendly, charming, comfortable—a home. The beautiful
kitchen went through her mind, the spaciousness of the living room, the wide balcony, gay and perfumed with flowers, the superb Bluthner piano. She sighed a long, trembling
pi
c
turing,
for a brief moment, herself as mistress of it all, and then came a far more realistic picture of Anneliese as mistress of it all. Celia pulled herself up with a jerk. How foolish and schoolgirlish she was allowing herself to be. Keep your
mind,
she warned herself, on your job and on Dorothy and on returning to England when she is better. Goodness knows you’ll have something to think about then—
f
inding a new job and a place to live and a way of looking after Dorothy. Stop living in the clouds and come down to
earth.

Yet, in spite of her exhortations, she at last fell asleep with the memory of Kurt’s kiss on her hand; and awoke to a wonderful, clear summer morning.

They went for Dorothy immediately after breakfast. Dr. Sturm saw them for a few minutes first, to warn them against allowing her to overtax herself. Then they set off in the car, Kurt in front, Celia and Dorothy behind. Down the mountain they went, and along the road to the village, and then turned off in the direction of Lauterbrunnen and the Trummelbach Falls.

Dorothy was alert and fresh then, so she was allowed to walk the distance to the lift, and from that moment, when the lift left them half-way up the falls, until the moment when she was safely down at the bottom again, Dorothy was amazed, thrilled and excited at the grandeur of these under-glacier falls that roared and thundered their
way
through the
chasms
of the mountain. Through small, dark caverns she went, one hand in Kurt’s, the other in Celia s, to emerge on to yet another platform of rock, and behold yet another leaping part of the waterfall. Spray flew round them, great cauldrons of seething foam whirled beneath the great torrent of water shot with the noise of a
thousand cannon from ledge to ledge of the mountain, forcing its way through small chasms, hollowing great smooth circular holes in the rock, emerging at last into open air, falling into the river. As a benediction on the birthday treat, the sun shone at the right moment on the right stretch of the waterfall, and produced an almost circular rainbow in the spray, to Dorothy’s enchantment and rapture.

“Never, in the whole of my life," she announced, as they made their way back to the car, slowly and carefully, “have I seen anything so wonderful.”

“In all your ten years?” teased Kurt
.

“Eleven,” she corrected, her head in the air, her eyes sparkling. “I am eleven today.”

“I think,” said Celia, “a little rest is indicated. There
’
s too much excitement in the air for my liking.”

They
rested for a while, and then went on, in the car, to a place that Kurt had chosen for a midday picnic. He had chosen it because he could drive for a considerable distance up the mountain; and when they left the car to find the particular spot that he wanted to see, Celia carried the hamper and Kurt carried the child.

“We have to treat you with the utmost care,” he told her, “or Dr. Sturm won’t let you come again.”

“Oh, yes, he will,” said Dorothy confidently. “I’m ever so much bett
e
r now.”

“We all know that but we all know, too, what Dr. Sturm will do if he is angry. So you have to be carried, Liebchen.”

Celia wondered if all the tenderness in Kurt were reserved for children, or if it was the fact that Dorothy was a sick child that brought it out of him.

He had chosen a sheltered, grass-covered ledge on the side of the mountain, overlooking the whole valley with the river
r
unning
like a silver ribbon along it. Behind them, a herd of cows was grazing, and with every breath of wind, came a peal from the cow-bells—so many bells and so varied in tone that they sounded like a carillon from a far-off cathedral tower. Another enchantment for Dorothy, who solemnly declared that she would probably never again have such a day.

After luncheon, Celia said she would like to climb higher, and Kurt told her to go along, since he and Dorothy were going to tell each other stories. He put an arm round Dorothy and she leaned confidingly against him. Celia looked at them, grateful to Kurt for his kindness to the child, and thinking that Dorothy looked about eight years old, small and frail as she was. Without schooling, too, she would drop behind the average in that direction. Celia felt a sharp worry, as she turned away from them, for what would happen to Dorothy in the future; and for some time,
this
worry clouded the beauty of the day and her delight in the birthday treat. Once or twice, as she came on to ledges of the mountain,
she
looked down and saw them. Dorothy blew kisses to her, and Kurt sketched the briefest of salutes.

Later in the afternoon, they drove to one of the towns on the homeward route, for Dorothy’s birthday present from Kurt, and she chose a beautifully carved musical box to keep her handkerchiefs in, and spent most of the homeward drive opening it to hear the tune. When they left her with
I
rmgard, her nurse, she was weary but happy, and had already begun to recount the adventures of this day.

“I can never thank you enough,” said Celia, as she and Kurt swept into the cou
r
tyard of the Hotel
Rotihorn
.

The car came to a standstill. Kurt turned towards her.

“If it has given the child a happy birthday,” he
said, “that is enough for me.”

He opened the car door for her, and together they walked to the front entrance of the hotel. Celia was
thin
k
ing
that he made it very plain that everything he had
done,
he had done for Dorothy. He needn’t be afraid, she thought with a tinge of bitterness, that I shall begin to get ideas in my head about him.

She
g
lanced
up at the windows of the hotel. Her eyes fell on the office window, and she
was astonished to see Anneliese standing there, looking at the two of them, for there could be
no possible doubt that Anneliese was furiously angry. Celia had never seen her beautiful face
transfigured with rage before, and the smile disappeared from her own face, as she stared
ba
ck.

Anneliese turned her back. Celia said dully:

“Anneliese is back.”

“Anneliese!” Kurt looked about him, and it seemed to Celia that he was eager, pleased, renewed with life. “Where?”

“In the office.”

“Come, we must greet her.” Kurt hurried
i
nto the hotel, and Celia, following, saw that Anneliese had come out of the office and was hurrying too, to greet him. Her face was beautiful again, her smile warming and candid. She came with both hands outstretched, ignoring Celia completely.

“So you are back,” said Kurt. “And Mutti is better?
”

“Oh, it
’
s so good to be here,” she said. “It seemed age
s
and ages away.”

They walked together towards the office, and Celia stood still and watched them go. So, she thought; so it is finished. Kaput
.
No more working in the office with him, no more treats. Back to waiting at table
...
Ah, well, perhaps it was time something happened to bring you down to earth.

She went up to her room, her pleasure in the day suddenly gone. Her heart was as heavy as lead, and constantly in her mind was the picture of their meeting; cordial in the extreme, Anneliese smiling with both hands outstretched, Kurt taking them in his own,
smiling
down at her as Celia had rarely seen him smile.