Page Turner Pa by David Leavitt Page A

other after the Chopin, I suppose because the whole thing embarrassed us. It thrust us into an unnatural intimacy."
    "What else can you tell me?"
    "Well, you know she's from Texas, right?"
    "I heard that."
    "Novotna's the name some impresario gave her in the forties, I guess because he thought you had to have an Eastern European name to have a career. And then she did have something of a career, until she met Kessler." He looked across the bed at Paul. "You are aware that she was Kessler's lover, aren't you?"
    "Of course. I've even asked her about it. She gave up her career for love of someone greater."
    "As if she had any choice in the matter."
    "What do you mean?"
    "Kessler had a huge ego. He couldn't bear anyone horning in on his glory. The only people he allowed around him were either muses or toadies. You know two of his children killed themselves," Kennington added.
    "No, I didn't."
    "It's true. So Olga quit playing and became his mistress full-time. Twenty, twenty-five years they were together. Mostly in Paris, though they traveled all the time. And during this whole period he never divorced his wife, and even went back to her periodically, all of which Olga put up with. Then when he died—you know he died quite suddenly—it turned out he hadn't made a single provision for her in his will. Everything went to the wife, who, as you can imagine, wasn't particularly inclined to make a little allowance for Olga." Kennington sighed. "After that it was too late for her to go back to playing. So she moved to San Francisco and started making her living teaching brats like you." He mussed Paul's hair.
    "God," Paul said. "Where did you learn all of this?"
    "Common knowledge." Kennington switched the television to the BBC. A long sheet of waxy paper was now worming its way under the door: a fax, no doubt from Joseph, who was nothing if not persistent. Already Kennington's bureau drawer was stuffed with faxes and little pink message slips, all of them urging him, he was sure, to call so that he could be chastised for having failed to show up at Signore Batisti's dinner.
    Getting up off the bed, he picked up the fax and stuffed it, as well, into the bureau drawer.
    "Aren't you going to read it?" Paul asked.
    Kennington shook his head. "I'll read it later. What say we take a walk? It's beautiful out."
    Reluctantly, Paul got up and put on his shoes. Out of the hotel they strode, up the Via Veneto and into the gardens of the Villa Borghese. "Mr. Mansourian must be a wonderful manager," Paul said.
    "The best in the business."
    "You must be very grateful. He's done a wonderful job by you."
    "Has he? I thought I'd done the wonderful job."
    "I didn't mean you hadn't. I only meant—" Paul grimaced. "Damn. I didn't..."
    "It's okay." And he wondered, not for the first time, whether Paul's real purpose in this affair might not have been to obtain some sort of official introduction to Joseph. Kennington was famous, after all, and as Joseph was forever warning him, people always tried to take advantage of the famous, a cynical pronouncement against which, in the early days of their relationship, he had protested. Yet time and experience, instead of proving him wrong, had proved Joseph right, even about Joseph, whose own motives in souring a teenage boy against the advances of humankind could hardly be called altruistic. Above all else, he'd wanted to keep Kennington from leaving him.
    They crossed a playground and entered into the forested region of the park. After nearly a week, Paul remained a muddle to Kennington. Even as he pestered, he intoxicated. Even as he annoyed, he beguiled. He could drink in sensation and pleasure with the gusto of a Pater, then suddenly lapse into a crabbed, almost clerical meticulousness. Nonetheless it was difficult for Kennington to resent his interruptions, which were frequent, or his insensitivities, which were slashing, because they reminded him so much of himself at the same age; also because he