The Last Lesson – Part 1: First Position

"You are holding it," said Karl, "like a dead fish."

Margit looked at the bow in her hand. It was thin and elegant and entirely beyond her. She was sixty-one, a retired schoolteacher, newly widowed and badly in need of a challenge, and for some reason she had chosen the violin.

"I'm doing my best."

"Your best is a very sad fish." But his mouth quirked. He was sixty-five, retired from the Vienna Philharmonic, silver-haired and bony, with a face like a clever bird and music stands piled up in every corner of his flat. "Again. Thumb here. Fingers curved. Imagine you are holding a tiny bird."

"I thought it was a fish."

"The bird is alive."

She laughed, a short surprised sound, and the bow squeaked horribly across the string. Karl winced. Then he began to laugh too, a wheezing, delighted laugh she would learn to love.

For two months she came every Tuesday. He taught her scales, bowing, the smallest etudes. She practised in the evenings in her silent flat, producing noises like cats in a sack. Gradually the noises became notes. The notes became a line.

"Today," said Karl, in the eleventh week, "you will play something."

"I can't."

"You can. Twinkle, twinkle."

She played it. It was slow, wobbly and entirely correct. When she finished, there was a quiet in the room, and Karl's eyes were suspiciously bright.

"That was lovely," he said.

"It was Twinkle Twinkle."

"It was yours."

"Can I ask you something?" said Margit.

"Yes."

"Why are you so kind to a terrible student?"

"Because you are never afraid to be terrible," said Karl. "That is the rarest thing in music."

"Green?" she said, softly.

"Green," said Karl, warmly. "I don't know what it means, but yes. Very green."

Continue the story: Part 2 – Recital.