Chapter VI: The First Tragedy

I was very naive during those days. Why had Erik given me that key? Why was Christine suddenly so elated? If I had decided to look more closely for answers, I would probably have found them. Then again, if I had been more inquisitive, it might have been me in the ambulance that early Wednesday morning, being rushed to hospital unconscious with severe internal injuries.

Christine and I both arrived in school after it had happened. Little Jammes, who always took a pride in being well informed, filled us in on all the details.

"There has been an accident", she said, slightly out of breath. "In the basement. The institution secretary, Mme Martin, went down to one of the spare rooms to get some papers, you know they keep a lot of documents down there, apparently it was some former student from thirty years ago who had called, because he absolutely had to have a copy of an essay of his. Anyway, she went down there to look for it, and crash! One of the bookshelves fell down on top of her. She is very badly hurt, they say. I can't believe it, it's so horrible!"

She stared at us, waiting for us to react. I could hear the buzz from the students and teachers around us - everyone was talking about the same thing. It took quite some time before the crowd dispersed. Little Jammes, Christine and I reluctantly left for one of the large classrooms on the ground floor. Choir rehearsals should have started fifteen minutes ago.

M. Reyer did his best to gain the attention of his students. It was quite a large choir, made up mostly of music education majors, singers and church musicians. Now, most of us were whispering about the dramatic events of the morning, and it seemed impossible for poor M. Reyer to make us sing the opening chord of Schubert's Deutsche Messe. I could see him playing the notes over and over on the piano and raising his arms tentatively, only to lower them again with a deep sigh when nothing happened. It was painful to watch.

After a while I think more people noticed what M. Reyer was trying to do, because the whispering discussions gradually stopped. The choirmaster looked at us gratefully and gave us the beginning chord one final time. At last, we could start singing.

We had only completed eight measures before there was a knock on the door. Without waiting for a reply, the headmaster's assistant entered. He was quite pale and composed.

"Mme Martin is dead", he said. "She died before they could reach the hospital."

There was complete silence. Even though I don't think any of us knew the institution secretary personally, we were all moved by the tragic circumstances of her death. I remembered how helpful she had been when Christine and I arrived on our first day in school, and how I had not known her name at the time, but only labeled her "the horse woman" in my mind. I felt slightly guilty about that now.

Due to the tragic news, and possibly the fact that M. Reyer realized that nobody in the choir would be interested in what he was doing after this piece of information had been dropped, the rest of the rehearsal was cancelled. An improvised memorial service was to be held in the afternoon. Christine, Little Jammes and I all decided to attend.

"I am as shocked and grieved as all of you", said the headmaster as he began his speech from the stage in the concert hall. The auditorium was nearly full with students, professors and staff. Some had probably come out of genuine respect for the dead woman, others, I suspected, out of curiosity or maybe even as an excuse for skipping a lesson.

"We will remember Anne Martin as a kind and generous woman", the headmaster continued. "She had worked here at the college for ten years and always did an excellent job. Her skill and helpfulness made her a valued colleague, and her cheerful smile will indeed be missed. Mme Martin loved working here. But she was also a beloved wife and mother of two small children."

There was a sniffle and a cough. Someone in the auditorium was crying.

"She lead an active life", the headmaster continued. "Among her greatest interests was horseback riding and she had several horses of her own."

In the midst of all this tragedy, I found the headmaster's last remark singularly funny. It was just such a hilarious image, picturing the secretary, with her equine face, on a horse. I threw a glance at Little Jammes, and saw the corner of her mouth twitch. She had obviously had the same idea. As our eyes met, it took every fiber of strength in me not to laugh. I felt terrible. Here I was, at the memorial service of a mother who had been killed in an accident, desperately trying to suppress a giggle. And the more I tried, the harder it became. I dared not turn and look at Little Jammes, knowing that would only make it worse. In the end I had to simulate a coughing fit to conceal my laughter. Christine, who was sitting next to me, noticed what I was doing and was completely appalled. She herself was near tears.

At the end of the memorial service, Carlotta Piangi sang an aria by Händel, Lascia ch'io pianga. It was the first time I had heard her perform, and her voice was exactly as Christine had described it. It was a good voice, but it lacked the warmth and emotion needed for the piece. Instead, the da capo section of the aria was filled with rather tasteless ornamentations which were completely unjustified, musically speaking, but showed off Carlotta's high range. After she had finished, she stood on the stage with a smug expression and nodded at the audience, even though there was no applause due to the sad occasion. I instantly disliked the singer.

"After this day, I could do with a cup of hot tea and a piece of strawberry pie!" I exclaimed after the service was over. "Christine, are you coming?"

There was a small café near the college, and since our first visit there on the day school started, Christine and I had become regulars. I was particularly fond of their strawberry pie, which had white chocolate in it.

"No, I think I will go straight home", Christine said, a little thoughtful and, perhaps, slightly upset with me after my apparent lack of respect for poor Mme Martin. She left the school without another word.

"Jammes?" I asked.

Little Jammes replied that she had to go too, since she was already late for a yoga class. I was left standing outside the concert hall, watching other students slowly leaving it, on their way home or to a practice room. Then, I was struck by what I can only describe as a feeling of morbid curiosity. I found myself wandering around the college, slowly getting closer to the basement corridor where the tragedy had occurred. Looking around me with a vague feeling of doing something forbidden, I descended the stairs and went to the room where the accident had taken place. All the doors in the corridor were locked, but the room was easy enough to distinguish due to a small bouquet of flowers which someone had placed outside the door. I turned around - the key I had given Christine went to the room directly opposite this one. A vague fear crept upon me. It was as if the whole corridor was cursed, with its darkness and silence, its absence of windows or fresh air, its locked rooms which were not meant to be opened and, at the far end of it, Erik. Try as I might to brush this feeling aside as childish superstition, I could not bring myself to stand there any longer. I found myself running along the corridor towards the stairs. When I finally reached the ground floor once again, my heart was pounding wildly, as if I had just had a narrow escape from danger. From that moment on, I dreaded the basement corridor, for reasons I would not become conscious of until much later.