Paris in May. D. Grey
the arts, especially music. When the boys had different preferences, Mrs. Carle was always there to make sure they each had the opportunity to exercise those preferences. “Okay boys, to keep each of you happy, let’s split up. William, you and your father may go do the things you like, and Kenneth and I will make a separate agenda. That should make everyone happy. Do you agree, Jason?”
So Ken and his mother would have musical adventures built mostly around Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center (especially the opera and the symphony), and Broadway. When it came to theater, their taste ran toward musicals. Mother always met friends when they went out, and they always had great seats and dined well. Like his mother, Ken had a love affair with New York, and the two returned as often as they could. In time, Ken could not hide the fact he one day wanted to be a great New York musician.
Now, as evening approached and shadows from the buildings surrounding the harbor moved across the water, light reflecting from nearby commercial establishments danced and glistened like the western sky at night. Watching the harbor lights change from the heights of his parents’ penthouse apartment, Ken was inspired, so he turned to face the eighty-eight keys of the Steinway grand and laid his hands on the keys, first a single finger and then a chord, as the music that defined his adult life broke through. In his hands, the melodies of Berlin, Rogers, Carmichael, Mercer, Ellington, and others filtered through a jazz idiom that spilled out onto the keyboard effortlessly and transformed Ken’s early evening through the magic of the Great American Songbook.
This piano is a wonderful instrument, he thought, and with that, his musing changed to a different scene. A distant and cherished memory from long ago.
A flashback, the early ’50s
“What kind of music are you whistling?” An eleven-year-old Ken asked the man repairing the bit and replacing the reins used to guide a favored pony. The man, Bootsy, was concentrating on his work and failed to process this question from a boy he saw only once in a while. Apparently the boy had no affection for horses and did not like to ride. The stableman rarely saw him and consequently felt no affection for him. The man saw the boy asking questions as just another silver-spooned ofay kid annoying him. The kid was the younger brother of William, who he liked, and the second son belonging to his cracker boss, who underpaid him and assumed the only reason he existed was to serve the boss’ needs. He also knew only some of that was true. It was just a reflexive response to the poison he’d been injected with throughout most of his life, poison brewed by pervasive racial discrimination that broke his heart and shattered his dreams. The boy had done nothing to him and did not deserve his gruffness. At his job on the Carle farm, he was treated almost like a person worthy of at least a little passing respect. Even so, he was like an invisible cog in the machinery that supported Mr. Carle’s belief that wealth justified fealty, even if you don’t show it.
Mr. Jason Carle, purchased the land in the late 1930’s from William Ogden, whose family had owned the land since the 1860s, and in the spirit of the times and the politics of the south, treated people of color as things to be lauded over and handled. On the other hand, Mr. Carle did not sympathize with Southern politics, but neither did he stand against them in reaching the heights of society’s privileged few. The only time he interacted with the help was to have a worker satisfy a want he thought he needed. Otherwise, he knew nothing of people dissimilar from him. Regardless, most of the time, he had the humanity and good judgment to treat them fairly.
As Ken passed the dimly lit stables on this day, he noticed not much had changed since last he’d passed. Some stalls were clean; others needed attention. The sound of horses bumping against stall walls and the smell of urine-soaked hay and manure filled the air, mixed with periodic neighing. Past the stalls, through to the other end of the stable, the afternoon sun illuminated a great willow oak tree under which the stableman sat at his work.
“What kind of music were you whistling?” Ken asked again.
“It’s just a tune. What difference does it make? Right now, I’ve got to fix this rig.”
“I would really like to know,” Ken replied. “I liked it.”
Impatiently, the stableman said, “It’s ‘Honeysuckle Rose.’” He looked up at this lanky kid standing rigidly upright, with penetrating eyes and long fingers, and said “You like music kid?”
“I like all kinds of music,” said Ken. “Classical music and American show music are my favorites.”
“Is that all you like?” the man asked.
“I do enjoy other things, like puzzles and mysteries. I like math and I’m way ahead of my class and I’ve read almost all of Agatha Christie.”
“You good at those things?”
“Yes, but what I like the best is music.”
“Why?” the man asked.
“Because I’ve always liked it. I can remember it, and it stays with me. I love to listen, and when I play, I lose track of time and I can concentrate. Most of all, it makes me feel good.”
“That’s good. Can you play an instrument?” asked the stableman.
“I’ve been taking piano lessons since I was seven years old, and I’m eleven now,” answered Ken with some pride.
“Can you play European classical music? You know, people like Chopin, Stravinsky, and Debussy.”
“I’ve played those and others,” answered Ken. “You’re just a stableman. How do you know those composers, and why do you ask me if I can play their music?”
“You ever heard of Art Tatum, Oscar Peterson, Fats Waller, Nat Cole, or Bud Powell?”
“I never heard of those. You made them up, didn’t you?”
“You ever heard of jazz? If not, boy, you’ve missed the great American piano players. If you want, someday I’ll show you what they can do and how they sound.”
At that moment, another worker came calling for Kenneth to tell him he was wanted at home. The boy picked up the stick he was carrying and, without another word, ran across the meadow through the knee-high grasses and wildflowers in the direction of the Carle family house.
One afternoon, while Bootsy was currycombing one of the horses, which had been ridden pretty hard by a visitor, Mr. Carle stopped the stableman to ask him about the conversation he had with his son Kenneth.
“Kenneth tells me you and he were having a talk about music.”
“Yeah, the boy told me he was good at math and liked puzzles. Those two things will carry him far,” said Bootsy in an effort to tilt the conversation in a direction away from music.
“He is good at those things,” said Mr. Carle, “but he was very interested in why you’d asked him about music.”
“I didn’t ask him. He asked me about a tune I was humming.” Jason Carle was an astute reader of men, and he knew instantly that Bootsy had tightened and become defensive.
“Maybe. But there was something in the conversation about music that caught his attention. Something about American piano players. He’s asked me three times to find out what you were talking about. I know little about music except what my wife and son tell me. The only people he has to talk to are his teacher and his mother, who doesn’t play an instrument. So I’m here to find out about what you said to him and why he found it so interesting.”
“Mr. Carle, I had no intention of getting into your family’s business and disturbing that boy of yours. I only wanted to talk to the boy. The last thing I wanted to do was upset him. I like my job working for you and I don’t want to lose it.”
“I think you misunderstand, Bootsy. Talking about my son and his love of music is all I wanted. Are you willing to sit and have a chat with me?”
Bootsy hung the curry brush back on the nail inside the barn and walked the horse back to its stall, all the while trying to still his thumping heart and relax and ready himself for a talk with the boss. He had been here before. Most black