The Great Conductor

Chapter 6

Sebastian woke up at his usual time, five-thirty in the morning, and, at first, couldn’t remember what day it was. This happened to him sometimes. He attributed these memory gaps to exhaustion from over-practicing and overworking, and had meant to see someone about them, but never found the time. For a musician, having trouble with memory was not ideal, but he wasn’t too worried about it because it seemed his brain took special care of the music he played. The music scores seemed set in stone in his mind.

He tried his best to remember every detail of the latest conversation with the Great Conductor. Although the meeting was a blur—he definitely should have rested more—he knew exactly what he needed to do. He just needed to figure out how to do it.

But first things first. As usual, a cup of coffee and a couple of quick-boiled eggs for Lydia. Sebastian wondered how her made-up meeting had gone. Did she fall asleep in her chair in front of the TV again?

After cooking the eggs, he would be busy practicing his concerto for a few hours. After that, he had to plan his approach to what the Great Conductor called “the great transformation”—the transition from a good musician to a great composer. He would build an environment for music creation without distractions. This was a complex process that was not easy for many talented people to achieve.

How many contemporary composers could one name off the top of one’s head? Sebastian had every intention of becoming the name that no one would forget. His name was going to be on par with Scarlatti, Debussy, Handel, Ravel, Tchaikovsky, Scriabin, and, of course, Shostakovich. But to get there he had to make some sacrifices.

“The great composers are not of this world,” the Great Conductor had told him during their second meeting. “They aren’t normal people. They are portals for God’s work. The ability to create music that touches and changes people is an honor that is bestowed only on a few chosen ones. You have to be ready to be selected. Anything else is of no importance.”

Sebastian understood the logic. To become a great musician, playing something technically correct was not enough. You needed to add depth to your performance, and that depth came from your personal experiences and the emotions they evoked. One of those was suffering. It was an invaluable state to be in, as it brought a range of emotions that could be expressed through music. You were not just a creator of music; you were a re-creator, bringing new aspects to the piece that people had never heard before. However, to become a great composer required a significant step up in the game. It required certain sacrifices.

“What do I need to do to get rid of . . . distractions?” Sebastian couldn’t bring himself to mention his mother; in his heart, though, he had agreed with the Great Conductor that she was a major obstacle to creating the required environment. He just couldn’t get over the idea of Lydia not being around—it was a weird version of Stockholm syndrome where the aggressor was his own mother. She had been a constant presence in his life, not always a positive one, but she was an integral part of who he was, the fabric of his existence.

When it came to being a mother, Lydia Hasselbach was never the kind of caring person who showered her own son with love and attention. Sebastian couldn’t speak for his brother, Paul, but the constant stream of criticism, irritation for whatever small reason she decided to make important at any given time, and her overall absence from making any important decisions in Sebastian’s life that weren’t related to music made it difficult for him to think of her as a mother, as someone who loved him no matter what. As a child, he was closer to his father. After his father died, there were two things that Sebastian cared about the most—music and his brother. In that order.

Sebastian knew that his mother was trying to project all of her dreams onto him, but she had not done it in a supportive way. It felt like she was always angry with the whole world and never failed to remind Sebastian about it. When he was younger, he couldn’t understand why. But Paul, who never felt shy about looking through Lydia’s things when she was away—mostly looking for money—told Sebastian a few family secrets.

In her early twenties, Lydia was a promising harpist, but she had one major flaw for a classical musician at the time—she was a woman. The world of classical music was notorious for its patriarchy, with hardly any room for women onstage. At best, she could only hope for a position in chamber ensembles, but Lydia refused to be a pushover and was determined to change history alongside other outstanding women who were making their way into the man’s world of classical music.

Without having too many options, in order to get a position in an orchestra, she not only used her musical skills but also her physical charms to entice a maestro who happened to be married to a wealthy woman at the time and whose family was one of the main donors to the orchestra. Thanks to some “friends” in the orchestra, the wife soon found out about Lydia’s affair with the maestro. In order to keep the scandal from spreading, the couple decided to keep it quiet and within the “family.”

The maestro’s reputation was untainted. Lydia had to leave. She did so, but not without a struggle, because she truly believed that the man had feelings for her. She tried to prove this. The conductor sent some passionate letters, which did not work and made the situation worse.

Lydia was accused of faking the letters in a “desperate and pathetic” attempt to keep her position in the orchestra. In the end, the conductor kept his job because he was a genius, and Lydia ended up jobless with no prospects—no one wanted to hire a “disgraced and rebellious woman.” To keep the truth from her father, Lydia faked an accident in which she “hurt” her wrist, thus rendering her unable to pursue any serious musical career, except for some tutoring.

Her father was happy that the accident had inadvertently knocked some sense into his daughter’s crazy head. Not that he was against her music career; he just did not see much future for her in it. To divert Nathan’s attention and distance herself from anyone who could possibly know about her “professional affair,” Lydia found some young students, managed to get a couple of gigs that led nowhere, and started dating the guy from next door, Stephen Copeland, whom she had been ignoring all her life. The young man had a good job and soon proposed to Lydia when they found out that she was pregnant. That was how Sebastian’s parents came to be together.

Paul suspected that there might have been other men, but he could never find any proof. Either he was wrong or Lydia was good at covering her tracks.

Nathan never particularly liked Stephen, but since the young man made “an honest woman” out of Lydia and had a house of his own, he accepted him as his son-in-law. When Stephen began to make some decent money, he rose a few positions in Nathan’s esteem. Lydia, however, never really seemed to love her husband and, some years later, started to blame him for her problems. Only God knows what their marriage would have become had Stephen not died one day from a stroke, leaving the house to his wife.

Paul blamed Lydia for his father’s death, never to her face, but he would always vent his feelings to Sebastian, who, though devastated, had accepted his father’s demise with a “God works in mysterious ways” type of attitude. Sebastian didn’t blame Lydia, but he didn’t love the way she had treated their father, either. It was actually similar to the way she treated Sebastian, except, perhaps, when he played music well at some competitions. He accepted her as a necessary evil because he did not have any other choice when he was a kid and didn’t know better when he became an adult. She was his only mother.

Now it was time for her to leave. The Great Conductor was right about it, but Sebastian would need some help with that.

Sebastian started practicing. Today he would play a movement from the most difficult Bach suite—Suite no. 6 in D major—and play his concerto from beginning to end to get in the right mood. This day was going to be special. The beginning of the rest of his life.

Chapter 7

“Good work on the Brown case, Christine,” said Lieutenant Douglas Whitehead, Christine’s supervisor.

He was in a good mood. He was a strong man—an ex-marine—in his mid-fifties with a balding head and inquisitive eyes. Word had it that one of his (and his wife’s) passions was breeding dogs, and there was nothing wrong with a hobby like that, except he liked . . . miniature poodles. You would not want to make any jokes about miniature poodles when Douglas was around unless you wanted to be on his blacklist. He could not wait to get to his retirement and “take the breeding business to the next level.” Someone could have said that they were trying to compensate for the children they never had, but that person would most likely want to be in a different city to say something like that.

Lieutenant Whitehead was going on vacation in a couple of days, and Christine knew that he didn’t like to see loose ends and unsolved cases on his desk before his annual fishing trips. The case he was referring to was the domestic homicide of a young woman, Tabitha Brown, twenty-seven years old, who was shot by her boyfriend’s shady debt collectors. They came to scare her into giving her boyfriend a message, but she apparently put up a fight and was mortally wounded. The boyfriend, whom Christine had arrested and interviewed, turned out to be a decent person if you didn’t count his criminal activity that led to his girlfriend’s death, and he testified against the gang involved in the case. The case was solved relatively quickly, and it helped to increase the clearance rate for the department.

“Keep up the good work while I’m away,” the lieutenant said and threw a new file on her desk, adding to the considerable pile of folders. “Take a look at this case. Hit-and-run.”

Christine’s special interest in such cases was known around the office, and it wasn’t treated as a form of favoritism. She knew that the lieutenant had a rather stoic way of thinking when it came to any type of mental obstacle. In his mind, the obstacle, whatever it was, was the way to solve the problem. Since Christine’s parents’ case remained unsolved, there was always a tiny chance that the same car might turn up one day. Christine thought the same way.

“Looks like it was intentional. The detective who was on it had to take a personal leave,” he added. Christine looked at Douglas—taking a leave during a case was quite unusual.

“Yeah, I know,” Douglas said as if reading her thoughts. “It was some family tragedy and, to be honest, he didn’t make much headway with it. Just . . . take a look at this, and there should be a list of people you should talk to first right in the case file.” Lieutenant Whitehead looked around the office and added, louder: “Listen up, everyone. I expect all your reports on my desk by nineteen hundred tonight, no exceptions.”

There was some unenthusiastic, agreeing group murmur, and all the detectives went back to their never-ending piles of cases. Douglas smiled and looked back at Christine: “How are the shrink’s sessions going?”

“I have one this afternoon,” she said, not answering the question.

“Listen, we all go through some tough times. You know, people here”—he pointed at the detectives in the office—“they get burned out and can’t wait to get back to patrol or get a desk job so they don’t have to deal with cold cases that are piling up.”

Christine kept silent. Whatever Lieutenant Whitehead had to say, it was better not to interrupt his train of thought.

“What I’m saying is . . . get your stuff sorted up here . . .” He pointed to his own temple. “Get it right, because there’s so much crazy shit on the streets that can’t wait to mess with your mind and drive you crazy. You get my point?”

“Yes, sir,” Christine said.

“All right. Keep your eyes on the prize and don’t get distracted by trivial stuff. Shrink’s appointment—be on time,” he said and slowly went toward his office, stopping at different detectives’ desks to check on the progress.

***

Today, Dr. Korpacheff wore a beige silk dress, a nice pair of golden earrings, and matching bracelets. Her engagement ring, with a big diamond, sparkled over her white-gold wedding band as she was taking notes in her leather-bound notebook. Kids?

“Do you want to tell me about this date?” she asked Christine right after the detective had shared a few updates in her life.

“Well, his name is Victor and he’s in the real estate business with his father. He’s forty-five, Caucasian, tall, healthy, and has blue eyes.”

“That’s an interesting description, don’t you think?”

“Why?”

“It sounds like you’re describing a suspect.” Dr. Korpacheff smiled.

Christine pondered for a second and nodded. It did sound like a police description. “Occupational hazard?” she asked.

“Perhaps,” Dr. Korpacheff agreed. “How did going on this date make you feel?”

“I was . . . a bit nervous if I’m completely honest, but he seemed . . . nice and clean.”

“Clean?” Another note went down in the notebook.

“Is it a strange way to describe one’s date?”

“If that’s what comes to your mind, then . . . clean is good.”

“Anyway, he told me about his life. He’s single. He had girlfriends but it didn’t work out, obviously. He travels a lot . . . for his work, which is . . .” Christine was thinking about the correct way to finish the sentence. “I guess it’s fine, but . . .”

“Could be a problem if . . . ?”

“Well, yeah. I mean, I’m also busy . . . with my work here.”

“So you’re thinking about the possibility of developing this relationship?” It sounded as if it was more of a question than an affirmative statement.

Christine shrugged.

Dr. Korpacheff took her glasses off and put them on her notebook. “What did you tell him about yourself?”

“He knows about my parents, if that’s what you mean. Like I said before, his parents are friends with my grandparents, so he might’ve heard some things about me . . . might’ve asked something before going on the date.”

“I see.”

Christine waited for another question and when none came, continued: “Anyway, we had a nice chat, he insisted on paying for dinner, and saw me off to my cab.”

“Are you going to see him again?”

Christine gave it a thought and nodded. “I think I might.”

Dr. Korpacheff put her glasses back on and took another note. “How are things at work?”

“Busy. New cases come every other day.”

“Relationship with coworkers?”

“No screaming this week.”

Dr. Korpacheff nodded. “Things at home?”

“Well, apart from the blind date, nothing to write home about.”

“How are your hobbies going?”

During their first session, Christine had told Dr. Korpacheff about her obsession with stones and shooting, which helped her to relax and get her mind off some of the gruesome details of her job.

Christine believed that stones had energy that could cleanse her mind and protect her from negative energy from the outside world. Her mother, Connie, used to wear some beautiful beads, and little Christine used to like to touch them on her mother’s wrist. One day Connie showed her how to make a bracelet, and it slowly transitioned to amateur lapidary after finding some interesting stones—turquoise, agate, mother-of-pearl, tiger’s eye, and black onyx—that belonged to her mother. Back in the day, it was the only thing Christine liked to do whenever she had a break from her music.

The other hobby that helped Christine forget about the criminal world, to her grandparents’ surprise, was target shooting. “Don’t you get enough of that at your work?” her grandma would ask her every time Christine returned from practice. It was a sport that did not allow distractions from outside the shooting range, requiring total focus and calmness if one wanted to be good at it. If Christine was thinking about other things, it would show in her performance, and she would receive a quick reprimand from her coach. She was almost expecting Dr. Korpacheff to talk about the sensual aspect of shooting—Dr. Sigmund Freud definitely had something to say on that subject.

“Well, I don’t know what to say.” Christine shrugged. “I still make gemstone bead bracelets and target shoot regularly.”

“What do you do with the bracelets?” Dr. Korpacheff asked.

Christine showed her the beads she was wearing today—turquoise stones with a couple of silver beads. “I wear them, give them to people I care about, and sell them online sometimes.”

“Is there good money in it?”

“Not really. It’s just, they give people energy. I like to think that someone is wearing something I made.”

“What kind of energy would that be?”

“I don’t know. They promote healing and protection from negative energies, I guess.”

“Is that why you wear them?”

“I don’t know.” Christine looked at and played with her bracelet. “I think they’re pretty. I enjoy making them and . . . they remind me of my mother.”