§ 6
That evening the man came to fetch the cheval glass. He gave her five sovereigns and two half-crowns. Though she knew that the glass was worth double and treble what she was receiving for it, she was immensely pleased by that five shillings which she had extracted solely by her own bargaining.... The rent-man called that night and nearly all the five guineas vanished in the month’s rent.... And by the late evening post came a demand note from Jackson’s, the photographers, printed on legal-looking blue paper, and informing her that if the bill of seven pounds ten and six were not paid within three days, legal proceedings would be instituted.... And it was Jackson’s in the old days where she had always met with such unfailing courtesy and consideration, Jackson’s where her photograph as an Eisteddfod prize-winner had been taken and exhibited in the front window free of charge....
She called at Trussall’s the next morning.
“About that piano,” she began.
The man was immediately all attention.
“You wish to sell it, ma’am? ... Well, my offer’s still open.”
“Yes, but I want a smaller piano as part exchange. I can’t do without a piano of some sort.... I want an upright, not such a good one as the other, of course.”
“Come into the showrooms,” he said, beckoning her to follow.
They wandered up and down long lanes of upright pianos.
“This,” he said, striking the chord of A major (always the chord of A major) on one of them—“Beautiful little instrument ... rich tone ... upright grand ... good German make—Strohmenger, Dresden ... worth forty pounds if it’s worth a penny, sell it to you for thirty-five guineas....”
“Can’t afford that,” she said. “Show me something for about twenty.”
“There’s this one,” he said, rather contemptuously. “Good English make ... eighteen guineas ... cheapest we have in the shop. But, of course, you wouldn’t want one like that.”
She struck a few chords.
“I’ll take that ... and you can send it up and take the other away as soon as you like.”
“Very good, ma’am.”
When she returned she had a sudden fit of sentimentality as she looked at the Steinway grand. It was a beautiful instrument, black and glossy and wonderfully sleek, like a well-groomed horse. Its raised sound-board reflected her face like a mirror. She sat down on the stool in front of it and tried to play. But her right hand was woefully disorganized. She started a simple minuet of Beethoven, one that she had played as an encore to a Cambridge audience, but the pain in her right hand and arm was so great that she did not go further than the first few bars. Then she tried trick playing with her left hand alone, and when that became uninteresting there was nothing for her to do but to cry. So she cried....
When the furniture van had arrived and a couple of men had carried the beautiful piano into a dark cavity of straw and sackcloth, leaving behind them in exchange a mocking little upstart in streaky imitation fumed oak, not even the presence in her bureau drawer of sixty pounds in notes and gold could compensate her adequately. The new piano looked so cheap and tawdry amongst the surrounding furniture, and the space where the old one had been was drearily vacant and ever remindful of her loss.
The same day she wrote cheques to half a dozen tradesmen, and as she went out to post them, put fifty pounds into her cheque account at the bank. She felt that slowly, at any rate, she was winning in her contest with fortune.