XIII
A HOUSE IN THE FOREST
Now, Monsignor, will you please explain to me, in simple words if you wish, what you meant by “some staying”, when you spoke of people of other nationalities?’
That’s right, Roger,’ said Ruth; ‘be firm.’
‘Of course, my dear fellow. There’s no mystery. What I meant was that it is sometimes the case that people dwell in certain realms here, when, by virtue of spiritual progression, they are entitled to live in a higher one.’
‘Then why do they stay here?’
‘Because, Roger, there may be very sound reasons for their staying. Some may elect to abide here for purely private reasons, reasons of affection between two individuals. It may transpire that two people, between whom there is a strong bond, might belong to different planes of progression, and therefore inhabit different realms. In such cases it is not uncommon for the one entitled to live in the higher realm to remain with the one who has not yet advanced, until such time as the latter has progressed, and then, together, the two mount to their new realm, and so continue unseparated. That’s one instance
‘ There’s another, and I believe more common one, and that is where a certain occupation keeps people so absorbed they prefer to work in the less high realm. Our friend Radiant Wing is such a case. They are working for humanity still incarnate, Roger, and although they spend a great deal of time here in these regions, yet they constantly travel to their own homes in the higher realms, and so they are residents of both realms. They’re leading double lives!’
‘Doesn’t that sound too awful for words,’ exclaimed Ruth.
‘Doesn’t it! And thousands of folk on earth are leading double lives too, if it comes to that. Their waking time spent on earth, and their sleeping time spent in the spirit world. There’s a grand meeting of friends and relatives that way, Roger. But that’s another story.’
We had already covered some distance when we reached a part of the country that was well-wooded, and we entered a very pleasant pine forest. At length we came upon a clearing, and before us was a most attractive house, of no great height, but broad, as though several bungalows had been placed together to form the one structure. There were several large masses of banked flowers to be seen, but no attempt had been made to lay out the grounds surrounding the house into anything like formal gardens. There was an element of wildness about the place, without, however, any suggestion of disorderliness. To the beholder it seemed to betoken a haven of rest and quiet, though this was not in any sense exceptional, since it is possible to attain absolute rest and quiet even in the heart of the city without the slightest difficulty.
Ruth and I had visited this house upon many occasions, but it was new to Roger, and so, in respect thereof, our host was waiting for us at his house-door.
‘Well, my dear Monsignor, and Ruth, too,’ said he; ‘you’ve come at the right moment, for I’ve something for you—at least, for Ruth.’
We introduced Roger, and briefly explained our proceedings and mission. There was an exchange of warm greeting between our friend and Roger, and we were at once invited within doors.
‘Call our friend Peter Ilyitch,’ I whispered to Roger, ‘and look for surprises.’
One of them was not long in presenting itself. We were shown into a spacious apartment that was both sitting-room and work-room. Close to a wide window there was a large table upon which were disposed many sheets of music-manuscript, some of which had already been written upon, while a further quantity of unused paper was ready waiting, and it was evident that actual work was in progress.
Along one wall was a commodious couch upon which an old friend of ours was seated, and who rose upon our entrance. He was presented to Roger as Franz Joseph, and then resumed his seat.
What instantly attracted the attention of our young lad was Franz’s companions. For upon the couch there was our undoubted old acquaintance, the puma, with whom Franz Joseph was now playing, while upon the arm of the couch was to be seen the little gray sparrow, who was industriously employed exercising his lungs in a vast deal of twittering.
You’ve met before, it’s plain to see,’ said Peter Ilyitch, for the bird had at once flown to perch upon Roger’s outstretched finger.
We asked Peter what the pair were doing here in his house. ‘Why,’ said he, ‘I was at their home one day, and witnessed their amusing capers. While I was doing so, some music ran through my head that exactly fitted their antics. I thought it was rather too good to miss, and so I borrowed the pair of them from Radiant Wing, so that I could have them on the premises here, and watch them at my leisure. He has very kindly given me a sort of indefinite lease upon them. Their performances are never exactly the same. I expect you know, Roger, that Radiant Wing is Curator-in-Chief and Friend-at Large to them, acting by special commission for his two friends on earth, who between them are the particular friends of these two “imps of mischief”. I was at work on that music when you arrived.’
‘Does that mean that we’ve seriously interrupted you?’ asked Ruth.
‘By no means, dear lady,’ answered Peter. ‘When I said I had something for you, I was referring to this very piece of music. The piano version is already completed. I thought perhaps you would like to have it. What I’m working on now is the orchestral arrangement, which I believe will be decidedly effective. It will differ only slightly from the piano version. Fuller, and with a few more frills and so on. Is Roger interested in this sort of thing?’
‘Yes, very. I played the scherzo you wrote for me, on the organ—the sphere, you know, and he was full of delight, and questions. That’s one of the reasons for our present call, apart from wishing him to meet you. He doesn’t suspect—at least I don’t think he does—who you are, though Monsignor did caution him to look for surprises. He’s had one already with the two pets. I’m sure he doesn’t know who Franz is either.’
‘Well, you know, my dear, we have changed a little since we came here.’
Roger was amusing himself with Franz, the puma, and the bird, and was oblivious to our conversation.
Presently Ruth called to him. ‘Roger, dear,’ said she, ‘you remember the piece I played for you at the church? Peter has written another for me.’ Roger joined us at the table, and was now gazing very earnestly from Peter Ilyitch to a bust standing upon a side table. It was of a man in middle age, and wearing a neatly trimmed beard. Peter was amused at Roger’s obvious attempt to match the two.
‘You feel you can trace some relationship, Roger?’ queried Peter. ‘You’re perfectly correct. That was how I looked when I was on earth. It’s not vanity that leads me to keep that bust here, but solely the beauty of the workmanship.’
It was an exquisitely wrought piece of sculpture.
‘It was done by someone who knew me as I was, and preferred to model it on those lines,’ Peter continued. ‘Do you think I’ve improved, Roger?’
‘My goodness, sir,’ answered Roger, ‘that’s an awkward question. If I say yes, it would imply there was room for improvement. If I say no, you haven’t improved—oh, heavens!’
The boy was lost in confusion, and there was a burst of laughter from the rest of us, not the least from Peter himself. He was, of course, now in his prime of life, in precisely the same way as Franz had reverted to a similar period of external youthfulness.
Roger was very apologetic for his seeming curiosity, but he could not resist asking Peter what was contained in the many large volumes that were to be seen upon the shelves. To those unacquainted with the manuscript of orchestral scores, the volumes might have an unusual appearance in their size. It was explained that they constituted the works of our present host.
Roger was astounded at their enormous quantity.
‘There is nothing remarkable about that, my dear friend,’ said Peter. ‘You see, it’s some considerable time since I first came here to live, and I’ve not exactly been idle in the meantime. It amuses us greatly when we hear the announcement made on earth before a broadcast performance, that “this is the last work composed by so-and-so”. The last work. Naturally, one knows what is meant, but it sounds so funny to us, especially when one glances at those shelves. Is it positively believed, I wonder, that once we’ve left the earth, we’ve stopped composing?’
I hastened to assure him it was so.
‘That is why they put up statues and monuments to us, my dear friend,’ said Franz Joseph. ‘They think we are finished and done for; not a note left in us. And now they are perfectly certain they know what was in our minds when we wrote any piece, large or small. If any of us had given the plain reason: to keep off starvation, they wouldn’t have approved of that. Not nearly mystic enough. Ah, well. This is the life. What do you say, my friends?’
There was no need to affirm our complete agreement!
‘Now, Peter,’ Franz added, ‘play your new piece. I should like to hear it again myself.’
Peter went across to a grand piano standing in a corner—a handsome instrument—and commenced to play. I will not essay the impossible by attempting to describe what our friend played. To give a description of any piece of music in mere words is a useless and fruitless task, as it conveys to the reader precisely nothing. The most that can be done is to give a series of musical technicalities and details which in the end indicate precious little. Suffice it that the music that was played followed in broad outline the physical movements of the two pets, the bird and the puma, in the amusing performance we witnessed when we called upon Radiant Wing. The music rose and fell, as it were, in imitation, or emulation, of what was taking place between the two, together with the many sudden twists and turns, first this way, then that way. Beyond this, it is not feasible to go, in words, except that the piece was in every respect a scherzo, as might be rightly supposed from the nature of its ‘programme’.
At the end of the playing Ruth expressed her delight, as did we all, especially Franz, who paid its composer the very sincere tribute of a brother artist.
‘Now about the orchestral arrangement,’ said Ruth; ‘when shall we be able to hear that?’
‘Very shortly, I hope,’ Peter replied. ‘It will be included in a programme of other works, of course. Shall I let you know?’
‘Most certainly, please.’ Roger had been standing with his back to the bookshelves while the music was being played; now he turned, and was to be observed reading the titles upon the volumes. Ruth and I joined him, feeling that at any moment he would make an interesting discovery.
The works were arranged in orderly manner according to their nature, with all the compositions written while Peter was on earth grouped together. He ran his forefinger along the titles, naming them over to himself. Suite in G, he read; Symphony No. 6, when Peter said: ‘That work is always announced as ‘‘the last work the composer wrote." That is the line of demarcation, Roger, between what I wrote on earth and what I have done since.’
It was plain to see that the latter heavily outweighed the former by innumerable volumes.
‘Yet this is nothing,’ he continued; ‘it is the same with all of us. Take Franz Joseph, there, he has written volumes and volumes of music. Opus numbers run into four figures here, Roger, and if we hadn’t wonderful memories, we should be at a loss to know how much we had actually composed.’
‘Is it easier to compose music here or on earth?’ asked Roger. ‘Oh, here, without a shadow of doubt. Consider how free we are from everything that might be—and so often was—a hindrance. Franz mentioned starvation, for instance. Call it plain hunger in this case, and all that it means. In other words, caring for the necessary bodily wants. We’re entirely free of that. Public apathy—there’s something else that’s thankfully missing here. Difficulty of getting one’s works heard or acknowledged. No trouble about that either—here. Somewhere pleasant to live: this little place is an example. Franz lives in a delightful house where he is as happy “as the day is long”—and it’s a very long day here, Roger, as I expect you’ve noticed. Now what else is there?’
‘No music critics,’ said Franz with a chuckle, ‘though fortunately for me I did not suffer much from those peculiar people. Not, I would have you understand, that my music was so perfect, but because I lived at a period when musical criticism was not the subject for every ignoramus who thinks he knows something about music, as I believe is the custom now on earth. Your native land was very kind to me, my friends, and still is,’ he said, addressing the three of us by the bookshelves.
‘And to me, too,’ said Peter, ‘though they will look on us as dead. Only think what a sensation we should cause, my dear Franz, if we could collect the rest, and go marching upon some concert platform on earth, other after the other, or arm-in-arm. There would be a riot. Think of the money we should make, or somebody would make out of us.’
‘The second is more likely,’ exclaimed Franz.
‘Then the critics would begin operations. They would cut our symphonies and things into small pieces, and put them under the musical microscope; show us exactly where we went wrong, what we ought to have done, and what we were thinking about when we wrote them. And nobody would be able to understand a word any of them said, least of all themselves. But they would all be completely satisfied, and fancy themselves to be vastly superior people. No; I don’t think it would be so amusing after all. It’s safer here. We’re among friends, we are free of all troubles and cares, especially that awful bugbear, the fear of writing ourselves out. We can always have a hearing whenever we wish, without going hat-in-hand to some objectionable fellow who wants to exploit us. And it’s nice to be among ourselves as composers and musicians, and be pleasantly rude to each other with the greatest good will in the world, and knowing that no unpleasant intent is involved. It’s a pity there are no composers to speak of, on earth, at present.’
‘Are there any at all?’ asked Franz.
‘It seems a good many years since any came to join us here,’ replied Peter; ‘what do you say, Monsignor?’
‘Well—’ I began, but Ruth stepped in.
‘You know, Peter,’ she said, ‘that given half a chance, Monsignor will let fly. Ever since he first became acquainted with all of you, and came under your combined tuition for practical purposes, some of the practical purposes have taken the form of outspoken words about the earth’s present composers.’
‘It’s this way,’ I explained amid the laughter that Ruth caused, ‘if I am to give a true picture of this world, I must speak the truth. Obvious and elementary, but so it is. The fact is that there are no master-composers at this moment on earth. I say that advisedly and without qualification. The composers at present there living are not worthy of the name. You truly observed, Peter, that it’s a good many years since any real composers came to join us here. Composers have undoubtedly come here, but they were compelled to leave their music monstrosities behind them. And there are others yet to come—and the same thing will happen to them.
‘You know they say on earth that all spiritual revelation has ceased. The same folk would be speaking the truth if they said that the composing of pure music has ceased.’
‘We have heard about it,’ said Peter, ‘but is it really as bad as all that? The music, I mean.’
‘It is indeed. I’ve not exaggerated. Ruth will bear me out; she’s heard some of it. And Roger has only recently left the earth. Did you ever listen to any of what the earth people call “modern” music, Roger?’
‘I did—but not for long. It was more than I could stand.’
‘We have heard about it from time to time,’ Peter remarked, ‘but never suspected that it was as terrible as you say. What do the beloved critics say about it?’
‘Beautiful things: they hail it as the work of great geniuses, and bamboozle the public into thinking that the particular piece they’re reviewing is full of lovely melodies, when it would take more than a searchlight—if you know what that is, my dear friend—and a microscope to find even the slightest trace of one. It’s impossible to discover what isn’t there. It is the same with art. You’ve no possible notion of the appalling daubs that are bought at the most fantastic prices for public exhibition. To say that they are nightmarish is to put it mildly.’
‘But how do you account for their acceptance?’
‘Perhaps upon two grounds: either a form of insanity, or a huge hoax. But the same acceptance is given for the revolting pictures as for the revolting music. That is the way of the earth at the moment—the cult of the hideous, the monstrous, the gigantically ugly. The poison has seeped its way into all the fine arts.
‘Dear me,’ said Franz, ‘I am glad we are out of it, and none too soon by what you say, Monsignor!’
We were amused by Franz’s remarks, since he has been many years in the spirit world, long before the present decadence began to assail the arts. Peter Ilyitch has also been some considerable time here.
Peter came and stood beside Roger, who had resumed reading the titles of the music scores.
‘May I take one down?’
‘By all means my dear fellow. Do what you like here,' Peter replied. 'No formalities here, you know.'
I know, sir; Monsignor and Ruth are always telling me, but I’ve not got altogether into the way of it yet. It will come with practice, Roger,’smiled Peter. 'Begin now.'
It is pretty marvellous, I mean. You know they have been showing me round, and everybody’s so awfully decent. Kind, I mean. You get the feeling that you’re the most important person when you’re being shown anything. And Ruth and Monsignor seem to have wasted a terrible lot of time on me.’
‘Not wasted, Roger; not wasted,’ said Peter. ‘Never that. Nobody ever wasted time here, because there’s no time to waste! That sounds ambiguous, doesn’t it? Might mean anything.’
‘Here is something you must know, Roger,’ I said, taking one of the scores from the shelf. ‘Do you read music at all?’
‘Not very well, I’m afraid.’
‘Well, then, see if you recognize this tune.’
I hummed an air known the world over, much to the amusement of Peter.
‘Good gracious,’ cried Roger, ‘that’s from—’
‘From the book Monsignor is holding,’ said Peter.
I passed the volume to Roger, who looked from the music to Peter, then turned to the first page where he read the title and composer’s name, and appeared rather breathless.
Franz, from his seat on the couch, watched what was going forward. ‘So, Roger,’ said he, ‘you have discovered his awful secret at last. Does he, do you think, come up to expectation? Or did you expect someone far handsomer—like myself, for instance?’
‘The point is, can one be handsome and clever?’ asked Peter. ‘Oh, yes, there’s no doubt of that,’ returned Franz. ‘I need not tell you where to look. Just use your own judgment. I shan’t blush.’
‘Well, Roger. We said you would have some surprises, and we’ve kept our word. Now, I think we must be off. Word has come that someone is on his way to see me. So we’ll make for the house.’
We thanked Peter warmly for his ‘hospitality’, and Ruth reminded him of the new scherzo. He promised to let us know when it was to be performed orchestral, and said that he would call for us, when we might all go together to hear and see the first public performance.
As we walked through the woods, Roger expressed his delight and amazement that it should be so simple a matter to be able to talk and joke with a man whose name is a household word in the realm of music, in both worlds.
‘Franz Joseph is equally well known, Roger,’ said Ruth. ‘He’s an amazing man. He wrote more than a hundred symphonies when he was on earth.’