Mortal Instruments

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Tadeusz Nikisch watched through the front window as his last pupil got into the car with her mother. “I said I would call you if my schedule opened,” he remonstrated.

John Button jerked himself to his feet, nearly bumping his bow case off the coffee table. “I didn’t have any more time. My audition with the New York Philharmonic’s tomorrow afternoon. If I waited for you—”

“John, please. An hour or two more will make little difference.” Tadeusz kept calm with his natural ease. John Button wasn’t half his age, but already his forehead was as lined as his own. “You know the advice I’ve given you, and I accept that you haven’t taken it.”

“Why should I? You tell me to live with my limitations. Translated, that means give up.”

Live within, Tadeusz recalled saying, but he left it. “It means nothing like that. Please, John, sit.”

John resisted scornfully, only for a moment. Tadeusz sat by him, taking a second to nudge the cases away from the table edge.

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