TIME AND THE ORPHEUS
by chiles samaniego
copyright © 2008 / May not be reproduced without permission
(from Weird Tales #351, Sep/Oct 2008)
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Playing trumpet at the Orpheus was practically the only life John Bastion ever knew.
Certainly it was little different from any other life he’d ever led. The Orpheus had no band, no singer, no piano; not even a turntable or jukebox. All it had was a small dais for John Bastion to stand on when he played, a mic stand with no microphone, and, of course, John Bastion and his trumpet.
“The reason you’re so essential to the Orpheus, Johnny boy, is you provide wossname, ambience. The Orpheus never used to have one before you came along, and these days, you’ve got to have it to keep what we management types call a competitive edge.”
That was Barney, a one-armed, one-legged ex-pirate with at least one glass eye, who was both bartender and owner of the Orpheus.
“All a them new spots on the strip, like, say, the Blue Oyster Wagon and the Sylvian Digs, they charge an arm and a leg off their customers for the dull wall-furnishings they laughably call their ambience; but you Johnny boy, you give our customers something special at no extra cost. We got our arrangement, and thas definitely somethin’ of itself worth a jawin’ or two, an’ it isn’t anything these folk have seen ‘afore.”
Barney had first come across John playing on a sidewalk corner, all the way across the City, a battered old hat lying with the wrong side up in front of him. Barney, being congenitally tone deaf, and therefore unable to tell good music from bad, had first noticed the remarkable number and variety of people that had gathered around him; positively magnetized by the gawky, dark, inexplicably odd young lad with the horn, they watched and listened with slack jaws and glazed eyes. The on-lookers would frequently reach into their pockets and flick their wrists with quick, sleight of hand motions, each time drawing a significant clinking sound from the depths of the battered old hat on the ground. This ritual was done, Barney assumed, each time John reached a particularly good bit in his playing.
That was the second thing Barney noticed: how John Bastion’s old hat managed to draw more coinage than any other street performers’ particular beat-up head gear. And that, more than the third and final thing Barney noticed watching John Bastion play for the first time in his life, was what made him decide that John Bastion was a gifted chap, and belonged inside the Orpheus.
“I haven’t got nothing to pay you, other than to let you ply your trade as you know it (at just the merest percentage out of your hat, so to speak, for overhead and some such); and if you fancy a good drink, an occasional free meal, and a good solid roof over your head to keep the rain off while you play, you’ll leave your spot on that corner there and come work for me at my place.”
John Bastion had given him a look that told Barney nothing, and Barney thought maybe this bloke was special in other ways as well.
“’S called the Orpheus,” he added helpfully.
John looked at him some more. Barney was starting to shift uncomfortably under his gaze, and was considering whether the addition of a bowl of nuts with each drink to his offer was worth the trouble, when John put his trumpet away, poured the change from his hat into an old brown sack, and shoved the hat onto his head, right side up this time. He sealed the sack with fray-ended drawstrings, and threw it over his shoulder, and stood there, trumpet case in one hand, sack in the other, coat on his back, hat on his head. There was something definitely odd about the lad, but when he nodded, Barney forgot all about it and led the way enthusiastically back to the Orpheus.
Barney was nothing if not true to his word, and he never paid John a single quid or tuppence, but gave him an occasional free meal, and kept a good solid roof over his head that kept the rain off while he played, although it turned out the only drink John would ever have out of the bar was chilled, undiluted tonic water (Barney insisted on this, in lieu of the rain water John initially asked for, with certain vividly portrayed admonitions concerning employee health regulations).
He even threw in a bowl of nuts.
John sat at the bar between sets and drank his tonic water, popping the occasional dry roasted peanut into his mouth. He only ate a little when he had to play. Bits would get stuck in his teeth, and, though it’s never happened before, he was afraid a particularly capricious crumb would choose a good bit in his playing to dislodge and fly into his mouthpiece. Although John was never someone anybody would have called temperamental, he suspected that any interruption to his playing would displease him immensely.
It was at those times, as John sat quiescent at the bar, when Barney would speak to him, giving him what Barney referred to as his ‘pep talk’.
“You take ‘em places they’ve never been, John, and could never be; you give ‘em a piece o’ the street they never woulda seen for themselves. The Artists’ Quarter, lovely neighborhood that it is, ’s no place for a Citizen Aristocrat to be seen gallivanting about.
“And your music, John, I’ve never had an ear for the like, you understand, but it doesn’t take half a glass eye to see it moves them. The customers never spend a mite less time than they intend to, and, more often than not, they spend more.”
He would remember the first time he saw John then, and the third and last thing he noticed about the lad and his audience, and he tried to put good words to what he thought was happening.
“Your music keeps them, toys with their imaginings of time, I reckon, and while you play, they stay and drink and flirt as though all the time in the world was theirs for the takin’.”
He would ruminate over those words, pausing to chew on his lip for a moment, but, apparently satisfied with what he’d said, would say no more and walk away and return to work, or to flirting with Constance, the Orpheus’ only waitress, and a pretty young thing herself.
John Bastion never thought about any of it. He just played when he was supposed to, collecting his hat and his coins at the end, usually long past time for the Orpheus to call it a night.
Then, he’d step out onto the sidewalk, standing beneath the sign of the Orpheus, put his hat in the customary position in front of him, and play some more.
One night, John ended a set the way he always did: hardly noticing the applause, the ovation, Barney called it, of the audience. He blinked the way he always does after having played an entire set, clearing his vision as though having just woken-up from a long, rather pleasant and restful sleep, then stepped-off the dais and moved to the bar.
He waited for Barney to come over with his tonic water. He didn’t usually have to wait too long, but tonight, it seemed Barney was held-up for some reason or another, talking to one of the customers down the other end of the bar. John did the John Bastion equivalent of shrugging his shoulders, which involved no movement at all, and decided to look around.
He’d never actually seen the Orpheus. Night after night he would come, a quarter of an hour before opening, and a quarter of an hour after closing, and the whole time he would stand on his dais and play, eyes turned inward, lids closed, just him and his trumpet and the music, dancing a slow waltz in a wild, ancient place John could neither remember nor describe when he stopped, but which never failed to fill him with a sense of inviolable peace. He stopped between sets for his glass of tonic water and Barney’s pep talk, the occasional peanut and nothing more.
Barney, as the ex-pirate himself liked to put it, could fill a hole to the center of the earth, through to the other side with talk.
At first John had trouble making out what he saw. It was like picking out stalking tigers in a dense jungle, if you’ve never heard of either tigers or jungles; when the tigers did jump at him he was filled not with dread, as you might expect from a surprise tiger attack, but with an inexplicable, indescribable, near-insufferable delight.
He saw the gentlemen in their suits and tuxedos, trench coats and jerseys and vests and leather jackets. The ladies were even more pleasing to watch, in their gowns and petticoats, their shawls and feather boas, their sweaters and cardigans. A few of them wore trench coats and leather jackets like the gentlemen (and there were some gentlemen in gowns and petticoats, as well), but he found it pleasing how different they all were, regardless of gender. He watched them gesture and gesticulate, hunching forward for a lewd whisper, or leaning back for a hearty laugh. There were little groups of silent people as well, and they sipped at their various beverages sulkily, but John found them no less pleasing to watch.
Most of all, he listened to them, all of them, their laughter, their weeping, their shouts, their whispers, their silence.
He was not playing, but somehow, he was back at that ancient place of wildness and peace.
And Constance! Watching Constance was best of all. John had always known Constance was pretty, the way a book might know a character in the story printed on its pages was pretty. But now, he actually saw it: she made her way through the tables like a dancer, dodging glances and lusty grabs with equal ease, never losing her poise or that joyful gleam in her eye, laughing at something unheard from a customer, returning gamely with a witty remark that could bring either laughs or blushes but never animosity or rancor (which, John realized with delight, were two very different words for the same sort of thing).
For the first time in his life, John Bastion was aware, and awareness, astonishingly, brought him joy and delight (two more words that were different, but were both very good at saying pretty much the same thing: which was, to be plain, what he felt at that particular moment).
There was something unusual about Barney, when he finally brought John his tonic water. Barney always hobbled over with the air of someone quite comfortable in the grotesquerie of himself, and would speak in a booming voice that belittled whatever the world could possibly think of a one-armed, one-legged ex-pirate with at least one glass eye.
It was not obvious to John, but it would have been to anyone else: Barney was shaken, and when he spoke, he spoke soberly, without the affected slur he imagined ex-pirates always spoke with, and, most of all, he spoke in a whisper.
“Drink up, John. Here, why don’t you let me add a little something to your drink, give it a little kick?” Barney gestured with the bottle of gin in his hand. John blinked back at him with that look that never told Barney anything.
“I like it fine the way it is, thank you.”
John never called anyone by their name, if he spoke at all, and tonight he was surprised by his own voice, as though he’d never heard himself before, and, quite possibly, never really knew he had the knack for it. He thought about it, and decided it wasn’t quite so bad, saying things, and decided to try saying some more.
“The place is jumping tonight.”
He didn’t know what that meant, but he’d heard it often, from customers who seemed more than passing familiar with Barney, and he thought it had a rather pleasing sound to it. Friendly, he thought, was just how the line sounded.
“I wouldn’t doubt it. Listen, John, there’s something you should know.” Barney again gestured with the bottle of gin, letting the open bottle hang poised over the lip of John’s glass.
“I like it fine,” John said again.
Barney turned over a glass from behind the counter, and poured himself a straight. Double. Make that a triple. Hell, he filled the glass, would probably have filled two the way he held the bottle upturned like it was. This was something new as well; John had never seen Barney drink anything more than tap water when he was working.
He knocked it back, taking one large swallow to empty the glass.
“See that stiff over there? The cocky-looking one in the slick grey suit?” John looked but didn’t seem to get what Barney was saying. “Talking to the giddy young blonde in the red dress.”
John had to squint a bit for the tigers to come out. The blonde certainly did look “giddy.” He wasn’t quite sure he knew what the word meant, but he thought it was a good word for the way she looked and moved and laughed, like somehow she wasn’t quite herself; “beside herself” was the phrase that followed “giddy” in John’s mind.
The “stiff” was a bit harder to pick out of the jungle. Most of the gentlemen wore grey suits anyway, but it finally became clear only one of them was actually paying the blonde the kind of attention that could be called “talking to her,” though a lot of the other gentlemen, and quite a few ladies, were looking as well, albeit from a distance.
When he finally did notice the gentleman, he wondered why he hadn’t picked him out sooner. There was something about the fellow that certainly made him stand out quite conspicuously from the rest, even when he was just leaning over the blonde in the red dress, whispering in her ear as she giddied. Something about him made the word “confidence” pop into John’s head.
He continued to be delighted at his newfound awareness, but when he looked back at Barney, he felt something else he didn’t quite have the word for, though it was definitely less pleasant than anything he’d experienced before that night.
He thought about getting back to playing then, the sensation was making him so uncomfortable (he realized just then how much he didn’t like that―being uncomfortable), but something inside him insisted that he stay and listen to what Barney had to say, though he could think of no reason at all why he should. Perhaps it would give Barney pleasure, he thought, and make the discomfort go away.
Barney had poured himself another glassful (John wasn’t sure it was only the second since he’d looked away) and knocked it back with no less alacrity than the previous one.
“I’ve been ‘negotiating’ with that ‘gentleman’ for over a month now. District Attorney for the City Planning and Development Office.” Visions of Unstoppable Power swam in John’s head at the title, though he’d never heard it spoken before. “Seems there was a bit of an oversight when the deed to the Orpheus passed into my hands. Says it was never meant to be owned privately, that the Orpheus rightfully belongs to City Administration, and the public for which they stand.”
He knocked back yet another drink, saluting his own irony.
“Apparently, it’s been decided that a new public throughway is much more essential to the City than the Orpheus, and that shithead is telling us they’re tearing us down, and want us out of here by tomorrow.”
John recognized one of the words from Barney’s pep talk, and a bright smile played on John’s lips.
“Essential. That would be a good thing then.” But Barney’s response made him a little less certain of his statement, and he added, “To the City.”
Barney kept knocking back drinks. The bottle was almost empty.
“Suppose you could say that.” Something in his voice sounded very much like the word “grudging” was meant for it, and John felt another twinge of delight at the realization that he was getting quite good at that, the meaning of things, but was brought down by Barney’s next words: “And maybe you should go work for them then.”
John frowned at that. He took a gander at all the astonishing things he’d become aware of that night. Looked around at the Orpheus.
“I like it fine the way it is, thank you.”
Barney’s look was pitying, though the effect was lost on John, to whom it was just another “look,” a particular configuration of features that, while unique to other such configurations, remain the general size and shape, being inevitably made of the same composite parts, as Barney’s face.
“Listen, John, I know this is difficult, but the negotiations were just fluff while the Office waited for the plans to come through the pipeline. They were never gonna give us anything. Far as they’re concerned, the Orpheus is theirs, and they don’t owe us anything.
“Tonight, the Orpheus closes for the last time.”
John thought that over, looking around at the Orpheus one more time. The displeasure he had assumed was emanating from Barney alone had taken root somewhere inside of him, and he felt it filling him and shoving out all the delightful things he’d been feeling up to that point.
“Come back tomorrow, then.”
“The City’s made its decision, John, they aren’t giving us an extension. I didn’t tell you sooner because, well, there was never really a lot you could do about it, and I didn’t want it getting in the way of your work. We only have the rest of the night.”
John’s face fell with all the weight and sturdiness of a porcelain jug, filled to the brim with curdled milk, and hit the floor with the exact same effect, assuming porcelain jugs could shatter without actually breaking, without, in fact, exhibiting any formal change at all.
“Well, look, John, it can’t be so bad for you. I mean, you still work the street; you’ve practically never left it. You can always go back to your old corner, playin’ the crowds the way you always have. Sure, you’d have to do without the free meals, or the roof, or the tonic water. . .”
John looked at his glass, which he hadn’t yet touched, and was still full of tonic water, though slightly less chilled than it had been.
“Or me.” Barney knocked back one last drink, tried to pour himself another, but found the bottle, at last, empty.
“Constance,” John said, though he wasn’t quite sure why.
“She’ll have it worse than either of us, I expect. Me, I’m a wrinkled hand up the withered arse, if you know what I mean.” (Which John didn’t.) “I’ll find my way, old fart that I am. But Constance? Young as she is, she’s never known another life, and never wanted any other. I’ve always said: if there’s anything stands a good chance of outliving me, it will be the Orpheus, with Constance waiting at the tables.”
Barney shrugged his one remaining shoulder, shaking off the sobering effect the alcohol seemed to have on him. “But, I s’pose, ’s the way of the world, and I’ve been wrong afore.”
John didn’t want it to be “worse” for Constance. And he didn’t care if Barney’s been wrong before; he wasn’t even quite sure what Barney was wrong about then and what he could be wrong about now, but he knew he didn’t want to take any chances with Constance, or with the Orpheus. In one night, he’d fallen hard, harder than any human being has ever been known to fall (and human beings, well, they can fall pretty damned hard), and he knew he had to do something, would never be able to go on if he didn’t.
“John? Wake up boy, time for you to play.”
Yes. That was it. It was time for him to play.
* * *
John stood on the dais like he always did, trumpet in both hands, head bowed slightly. He closed his eyes, turning them inwards, and thought of all the things he’d seen, become aware of, that night. The feel of the tonic water sliding down his throat. Barney’s grotesque but endearingly familiar one-legged hobble. The gentlemen. The ladies. The giddy blonde and the District Attorney for the City Planning and Development Office. Constance waiting tables. The Orpheus and all its noise, its own sweet music; he’d never realized it before, but he knew it then; he never played alone: the Orpheus played with him.
All the delight and comfort and joy and sadness and numbness and drunkenness and sobriety: he thought them all in his head, balled them up tight and put them in the pit of his stomach.
He opened his eyes. Constance was standing at the back of the room, watching him.
When he seemed to hesitate, he saw her jaw tremble slightly, as though she’d said something. He imagined he heard her whisper one word: “Play,” she might have said.
“Play.”
He brought the trumpet to his lips, letting it linger there, as though savoring his first kiss; which, in the way of things that night, it may as well have been. Keeping his eyes on Constance, on all the ladies and all the gentlemen, on the giddy blonde and the District Attorney and the ex-pirate behind the bar, on everyone and everything that was the Orpheus that night, he played.
Your music keeps them, toys with their imaginings of time, I reckon, and while you play, they stay and drink and flirt as though all the time in the world was theirs for the takin’.
The first note started softly, and grew. It was long and mournful, and seemed to fill the Orpheus with its sorrow. Several hearts broke that night, but no one dared even breathe to interrupt that note.
You give our customers something special. You take ‘em places they’ve never been, and could never be; you give ‘em a piece o’ the street they never woulda seen for themselves.
The bar grew quieter with each passing second, and all at once became silent. All eyes were on John as he started his last set. How many were there? Fifty? A hundred? All of them were listening intently, as though incapable of anything else: jaws were slack; eyes glazed. Everyone stopped to hear the last mournful song to ever be heard from the trumpet of John Bastion.
The customers never spend a mite less time than they intend to, and, more often than not, they spend more.
John just kept right on playing, through the night, straight up through dawn; standing right there at the heart of the Orpheus, he just kept right on going like nothing in this world could ever stop him.
And everyone in the Orpheus, they just kept right on listening.
And City Administration, they went right on and built that throughway.
Now no one ever gets to go to the Orpheus; but that’s OK, John Bastion thinks as he plays, because now, no one ever has to leave.
* * *
If you ever find yourself happening across that particular throughway, take a moment to listen; it’s a quiet place for all the cars driving by, but if you listen, and listen hard, you just might hear John Bastion playing.
They say it’s lovely stuff. Me, well . . . I’ve never had an ear for the like, you understand.
When asked to write about himself, chiles samaniego enjoys using lowercase letters and the third person: “Easier to make things up that way,” he says. As a writer of fictions, he wonders if everything he writes might be true, and therefore not to be trusted. He is originally from the Philippines but is currently living in Singapore.
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