Echoes

There were echoes in the room. At least that’s what I’d decided they were. Normally I wouldn’t have said I was the type to hear things but this wasn’t quite hearing things either. You know when you get the feeling that someone is watching you? It was a bit like that…just, well.. echoes. Soft, sibilant, rustling, reverberating in an ancient round chamber.
I wasn’t there for me which is why the rather unusual audio vibes were so disconcerting. Mum loves classical music but since she and Dad moved to Cornwall the opportunities to hear live music have been a bit thin. So when I saw the advert for concert at the castle I bought them tickets. Trouble was Dad didn’t fancy a ‘medieval banjo’. Mum was disappointed, so I said I’d drive her to the fortress on the headland. So there I was. Hearing echoes in the Mess Room.
The soloist was a lutenist- young, stylish and with a deft dexterity that made the music seem effortless. I’d never seen this Tudor instrument before though the last historical novel I’d read mentioned a lute being played at the court of Elizabeth I. In the setting of a sixteenth century castle on the sea-shore it was magical.
The two-tone honey coloured curve of the pear shaped instrument, long necked with heaven only knows how many strings, lay in the lap of the musician. His left hand caressed the frets, his right made the lute sing. Perfect harmonies and complex counterpoint through a dozen exquisite melodies that made you hold your breath with their beauty.
I think I’d been holding my breath and that’s why I heard it-the whisper of the echo. It was probably lack of oxygen. But I would swear when the musician trilled the last lingering arpeggio a whisper of approval, applause, a phantom farthingale or footfall just anticipated the live appreciation, leaving me with the urge to throw a glance, swift and surreptitious, across my shoulder.
Was that a shadow or something more? The spectral swirl of a cloak, a slashed sleeve or souls sighing as the animated echoes died away?
A split second passed after the concluding note then the tangible audience reacted with enthusiastic and substantial signs of approval. The clapping shattered my fanciful notions. My bruised palms were reassuringly real.
The crowd dispersed. I shook myself, stood up, half listening to Mum’s contented commentary as a family jostled past on their way up the spiral staircase to the exit.
Then a sleepy young voice made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end;
“ Mummy, I liked it but why weren’t the people wearing the costumes on the stage too?”.
I wasn’t there for me which is why the rather unusual audio vibes were so disconcerting. Mum loves classical music but since she and Dad moved to Cornwall the opportunities to hear live music have been a bit thin. So when I saw the advert for concert at the castle I bought them tickets. Trouble was Dad didn’t fancy a ‘medieval banjo’. Mum was disappointed, so I said I’d drive her to the fortress on the headland. So there I was. Hearing echoes in the Mess Room.
The soloist was a lutenist- young, stylish and with a deft dexterity that made the music seem effortless. I’d never seen this Tudor instrument before though the last historical novel I’d read mentioned a lute being played at the court of Elizabeth I. In the setting of a sixteenth century castle on the sea-shore it was magical.
The two-tone honey coloured curve of the pear shaped instrument, long necked with heaven only knows how many strings, lay in the lap of the musician. His left hand caressed the frets, his right made the lute sing. Perfect harmonies and complex counterpoint through a dozen exquisite melodies that made you hold your breath with their beauty.
I think I’d been holding my breath and that’s why I heard it-the whisper of the echo. It was probably lack of oxygen. But I would swear when the musician trilled the last lingering arpeggio a whisper of approval, applause, a phantom farthingale or footfall just anticipated the live appreciation, leaving me with the urge to throw a glance, swift and surreptitious, across my shoulder.
Was that a shadow or something more? The spectral swirl of a cloak, a slashed sleeve or souls sighing as the animated echoes died away?
A split second passed after the concluding note then the tangible audience reacted with enthusiastic and substantial signs of approval. The clapping shattered my fanciful notions. My bruised palms were reassuringly real.
The crowd dispersed. I shook myself, stood up, half listening to Mum’s contented commentary as a family jostled past on their way up the spiral staircase to the exit.
Then a sleepy young voice made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end;
“ Mummy, I liked it but why weren’t the people wearing the costumes on the stage too?”.