The Trill Is Gone
A Blanchard House Mystery
by Cynthia Morrow
“Swans
sing before they die; ‘twer no bad thing
Should certain people die before
they sing.”
Samuel
Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834)
“That’s it! I’m going
down to Market Street Middle School tomorrow to confront that incompetent
moron.” My month-long simmer had just boiled over. I plunked myself down at the
kitchen table and glowered at no one in particular.
“And which moron would
that be?” my best friend Grace asked me. She was setting the kitchen table for
a late supper after a full day of teaching young cellists the basics. “Anyone I
know?”
“No, I don’t think
you’ve met her. I certainly haven’t yet, but I’m going to change all that
tomorrow. Her name is Ms. Kassar, at least that’s what the kids call her, and
she’s singlehandedly ruining the music program in the Kirkland middle schools,
one string player at a time.”
“Ah. And you think
you’re the only one who’s had it with that woman? Think again. So far I’ve had
two promising young cello students quit the school orchestra because of her.”
“Really? You never
mentioned it.”
“Yeah? Well, I was too
busy grinding my teeth.”
“Did you know that she
forces those poor kids to tune their instruments almost a half step lower than
the real 440 A? It drives anyone with perfect pitch, or even relatively good
pitch, completely nuts.”
“Of course I know about
it! One of my students, in complete desperation, brought in a tuning fork. Ms.
Kassar threw it on the floor and insisted that he tune down to whatever pitch
she gave him. That’s when he quit the school orchestra. His father is livid and
so am I.”
“Well,” I said, “it has
to stop. Little Tracy Ingelmeyer came to her lesson in tears just now. She
holds her instrument up nicely, and slightly out to the left, with a beautiful
hand and bow position. She told me that Ms. Kassar made fun of her in front of
the entire middle school orchestra today and told her the left hand should be
collapsed, you know, like a country fiddler. Then she accused this poor little
girl of being ‘prideful.’ I’d like to strangle her.”
“I’ll help.” Grace is
always willing to lend a hand in a good cause, which merely adds luster to her
best friend status, but in this case I wanted to do the strangling all by
myself. My name is Althea Stewart, a forty-something violist who not only gave
up her former life as a successful Hollywood studio musician and moved to
Kirkland, Washington to teach violin and viola, but who encouraged her best pal
Grace Sullivan to follow her up here to teach cello and voice in our own music studio.
We’d both been through painful divorces, and I thought that a change might do
us a world of good. Grace agreed. We’d pooled our resources and purchased a
run-down mansion called Blanchard House overlooking Lake Washington, installing
pianos and setting up our private teaching rooms on the ground floor. Now that
it was up and running with a full roster of paying students, I wasn’t about to
let an incompetent public school music teacher discourage our prize students
and destroy what we’d been working so hard to create.
“You know,” Grace said,
“we might be better off talking to Delilah Cantwell about the situation.” Our
mutual friend Delilah Cantwell, a choral instructor at one of the local high
schools, had just accepted a traditionally thankless position as head of the
Kirkland School District’s Music Program. That meant that she was Ms. Kassar’s
boss. Delilah’s a real glutton for punishment, so she’s also the contractor and
music librarian for the St. Timmons Episcopal Chamber Orchestra and Choir,
which explains why we’d be seeing her Thursday night. The group was performing
Handel’s rarely heard oratorio Hercules.
She’d hired both Grace and me to play for it. Thursday night was the first
scheduled rehearsal.
“Won’t we feel too
guilty cornering poor Delilah at St. Timmons, especially when she’ll be running
around handing out music to the chorus and the orchestra, and probably even
singing the alto solo?” I said. “Maybe we can hit her up at the end of the
evening as soon as everything’s settled down.”
“Do you think you can
you restrain yourself that long?” Grace kept her eyes on my hands, which were involuntarily
clenching and unclenching. Her more moderate approach, I admitted to myself,
was probably better, so I temporarily, albeit reluctantly, relinquished the
satisfying daydream of wrapping my fingers around Ms. Kassar’s deserving
throat. I shook out my hands and took a deep breath.
“I’ll manage,” I said.
“Chewing on a nice rare steak might help. I’ll pretend it’s Ms. Kassar.” I
threw two seasoned NY steaks that had been coming to room temperature into a
pan of sizzling garlic butter, tossed some of my homemade balsamic dressing
into a bowl of torn romaine leaves, and microwaved two yams. It wasn’t fancy,
but the robust Washington State cabernet Grace poured into our glasses washed
it all down nicely. I almost forgot about bad music teachers by the end of the
first glass. Wine-induced mellowness never lasts, though, does it? I was pretty
sure that, come tomorrow morning, I’d still be plenty aggravated.
Grace and I had been
looking forward to Thursday night’s rehearsal at St. Timmons for reasons other
than talking with Delilah Cantwell about our mutual nemesis. I mean, who
doesn’t love Handel, right? Grace’s enthusiasm for the whole enterprise was
even greater than mine because the recent love of her life, Emile Girard, a handsome
bassist with the Seattle Symphony, would be performing with us as a member of
the small chamber group. She’d already spent most of the morning selecting her
wardrobe for both the rehearsals and the performance, trying on a small
mountain of low-cut silk blouses and a half-dozen pairs of ridiculously
high-heeled Manolo Blahnik knockoffs. I gathered she was going in for the kill,
so to speak. Emile was definitely a goner.
I’d recently been
seeing someone myself, Detective Harry Demetrious, Kirkland PD. We’d met during
a murder investigation last Christmas, not exactly listed under the “Top 10 Best
Ways To Get A Date” on the cover of Cosmo,
but I wasn’t complaining. I thought he was fairly brilliant and wildly sexy,
even though we’d only gotten to the kissing and heavy breathing stage up until
this point. There were definite indications that he thought I was pretty swell
too. We’d seen a couple of movies together, and had cleaned our plates at some
of the best restaurants in Kirkland, which is saying something. Kirkland is
known for its restaurants and art galleries, its picturesque setting on the
shores of Lake Washington, and its quaint village atmosphere. Demetrious and I
had been soaking up that atmosphere pretty regularly every weekend since March,
and it was already May. I was finally feeling secure enough in the relationship
to take the next step. Something told me he’d been born ready.
Did that mean that I’d
chance dragging the poor guy to an obscure Handel Oratorio at St. Timmons any
time soon? Probably not, but I thought it wouldn’t hurt to ask him what he
thought of arcane choral music just in case he was an aficionado. A girl can
dream, can’t she?
