Aarons Rod | Page 7

water in the boiler hissed faintly. And in front of him, beneath him as he leaned forward shaving, a drop of water fell with strange, incalculable rhythm from the bright brass tap into the white enamelled bowl, which was now half full of pure, quivering water. The war was over, and everything just the same. The acute familiarity of this house, which he had built for his marriage twelve years ago, the changeless pleasantness of it all seemed unthinkable. It prevented his thinking.
When he went into the middle room to comb his hair he found the Christmas tree sparkling, his wife was making pastry at the table, the baby was sitting up propped in cushions.
"Father," said Millicent, approaching him with a flat blue-and-white angel of cotton-wool, and two ends of cotton--"tie the angel at the top."
"Tie it at the top?" he said, looking down.
"Yes. At the very top--because it's just come down from the sky."
"Ay my word!" he laughed. And he tied the angel.
Coming downstairs after changing he went into the icy cold parlour, and took his music and a small handbag. With this he retreated again to the back kitchen. He was still in trousers and shirt and slippers: but now it was a clean white shirt, and his best black trousers, and new pink and white braces. He sat under the gas-jet of the back kitchen, looking through his music. Then he opened the bag, in which were sections of a flute and a piccolo. He took out the flute, and adjusted it. As he sat he was physically aware of the sounds of the night: the bubbling of water in the boiler, the faint sound of the gas, the sudden crying of the baby in the next room, then noises outside, distant boys shouting, distant rags of carols, fragments of voices of men. The whole country was roused and excited.
The little room was hot. Aaron rose and opened a square ventilator over the copper, letting in a stream of cold air, which was grateful to him. Then he cocked his eye over the sheet of music spread out on the table before him. He tried his flute. And then at last, with the odd gesture of a diver taking a plunge, he swung his head and began to play. A stream of music, soft and rich and fluid, came out of the flute. He played beautifully. He moved his head and his raised bare arms with slight, intense movements, as the delicate music poured out. It was sixteenth-century Christmas melody, very limpid and delicate.
The pure, mindless, exquisite motion and fluidity of the music delighted him with a strange exasperation. There was something tense, exasperated to the point of intolerable anger, in his good-humored breast, as he played the finely-spun peace-music. The more exquisite the music, the more perfectly he produced it, in sheer bliss; and at the same time, the more intense was the maddened exasperation within him.
Millicent appeared in the room. She fidgetted at the sink. The music was a bugbear to her, because it prevented her from saying what was on her own mind. At length it ended, her father was turning over the various books and sheets. She looked at him quickly, seizing her opportunity.
"Are you going out, Father?" she said.
"Eh?"
"Are you going out?" She twisted nervously.
"What do you want to know for?"
He made no other answer, and turned again to the music. His eye went down a sheet--then over it again--then more closely over it again.
"Are you?" persisted the child, balancing on one foot.
He looked at her, and his eyes were angry under knitted brows.
"What are you bothering about?" he said.
"I'm not bothering--I only wanted to know if you were going out," she pouted, quivering to cry.
"I expect I am," he said quietly.
She recovered at once, but still with timidity asked:
"We haven't got any candles for the Christmas tree--shall you buy some, because mother isn't going out?"
"Candles!" he repeated, settling his music and taking up the piccolo.
"Yes--shall you buy us some, Father? Shall you?"
"Candles!" he repeated, putting the piccolo to his mouth and blowing a few piercing, preparatory notes.
"Yes, little Christmas-tree candles--blue ones and red ones, in boxes --Shall you, Father?"
"We'll see--if I see any--"
"But SHALL you?" she insisted desperately. She wisely mistrusted his vagueness.
But he was looking unheeding at the music. Then suddenly the piccolo broke forth, wild, shrill, brilliant. He was playing Mozart. The child's face went pale with anger at the sound. She turned, and went out, closing both doors behind her to shut out the noise.
The shrill, rapid movement of the piccolo music seemed to possess the air, it was useless to try to shut it out. The man went on playing to himself, measured and insistent. In the frosty evening the sound carried. People passing down the street