Body & Soul Read Online Free PDF Page B

asked, peering.
    "Parts to a string quartet I'm copying out for a customer."
    "The notes are awfully small." Claude put the
Blue Book
on the counter.
    "I owe you an apology," Weisfeld said, and stroked his mustache with thumb and middle finger. "I'm very surprised you could do that by yourself, and even more surprised you could do it so quickly. You must have worked hard."
    "Oh, it was fun. I like it." Claude opened the
Blue Book
and flipped to the end of the first lesson. "You said I did it right."
    "That's correct. You did."
    "You see here at the end of every lesson there's a place where the teacher is supposed to sign it."
    "Yes."
    "I don't have a teacher, but you could sign, maybe."
    "I'd be delighted." Weisfeld reached for his fountain pen.
    "And there's a place for a star. It says you can get a blue star, a silver star, or a gold star. Have you got those? Then everything would be filled in, I mean it would all be finished and filled in." He looked up, and once again Weisfeld felt a slight frisson at the intensity of the brown eyes. "I know I made a mistake on the last one," Claude said.
    Weisfeld paused for a moment. He pulled out a couple of drawers until he found the little boxes of paste-on stars, which he placed on the counter. A box each of blue, silver, and gold. "All right," he said, taking the book and signing the first lesson. He carefully pasted in a gold star where indicated. While Claude watched, he turned the pages and signed, reaching for a gold star each time. At the last lesson he signed and looked at the box. "You mentioned the mistake."
    "It was hard to do it that slow."
    "I understand." Weisfeld's hand hovered over the boxes. "Ordinarily it would be a silver star, but I'm making an exception because you did it without a teacher. You definitely deserve a gold star." He removed one from the box and pasted it in. He closed the book and handed it over. "Good work."

    "Thank you," Claude said.
    From his side of the counter Weisfeld reached down for a wooden stool, passed it high in the air to the boy, and motioned for him to be seated. Late afternoon light streamed through the front windows, amber shafts over the gleaming instruments. The entire shop trembled infinitesimally from the el train rushing past overhead. Weisfeld folded his hands on the counter.
    "Tell me all about yourself," he said, his voice calm and even. "Take your time and tell me all about yourself."
    And Claude did.

3
    I T WAS WINTER and Claude was halfway through the John Thompson piano method. He emerged from the back room one morning and was surprised to find his mother sitting in the big chair, drinking a cup of coffee.

    "What are you doing here?" He rubbed his eyes. There was something wrong with the light—a weak paleness in the room, an underwater feeling—and he glanced at the front window. A translucent, pearly gray effect, as if someone had painted it during the night.
    "Two feet of snow, that's what I'm doing here," she said. "Have to dig out the cab Eat something and let's get going."
    He fixed a bowl of cornflakes moving slowly. In general he slept very deeply, and was slow to wake up. The mild sense of unreality he felt this morning was no more than a variation on what he usually felt anyway. Midway through the cornflakes he spoke up.
    "Why not just leave it?"
    "That's what everybody else is doing. I put the chains on yesterday. Make money today."
    He heard the low murmur of voices from the cathedral radio on the table beside her. He could tell from the position or the dial that it was tuned to WEAF.
    "The rich are usually stingy," she said. "I don't know why, since they live off other people's labor." She sniffed and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. The chair creaked as she put down her coffee cup. "But when cabs are scarce they,ll wave dollar bills in the air. Ha!"
    "We don't have a shovel," he said.

    "I got a couple from the boiler room." She put her hands on the armrests and pushed herself up. She