Casebook 4: A Score Settled - 4.10[index]

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Hallgató nodded.

“Very well. After lunch, we returned to our rooms together. He seemed most happy. He shared a joke with me about an Austrian woman and a trombone player. It is too obscene to repeat. We each entered our rooms. I lay on the bed to take a nap. I could hear Meklàr begin to play. It was an odd little tune.” He hummed vaguely. “The strangest thing was: it was the simplest tune and yet he played it over and over. It began to lull me into a doze. But then, the music stopped abruptly and he began to scream. I leapt off the bed and stood listening. I heard sobbing and then a scream of terrible pain. 'No. No. No!' Then at the top of his voice. 'No! No! No!' He repeated it over and over so very loudly that I rushed out of my room and tried to open his door. But it was locked. I rapped frantically a number of times – I was calling out: 'Meklàr, Meklàr. Open the door.' But there was no answer.

“I pressed my ear to the door, but I heard nothing, so I peered into the keyhole. I saw him sitting at the desk. He was writing. His face was still, but very sad. The expression sent me cold. I knew something terrible was happening. I banged on the door again and shouted, 'for God's sake, Meklàr, open the door!' But he was in another world.