Music

The Fine Arts Library is the best library. It has paintings, it has sculptures, it has windows - the main library doesn’t, because they want to kill our souls - and it’s in the art museum, which is a grand staircase and three stories of empty space, with galleries at the sides.

I had just climbed to the library mezzanine when I heard the music: an eerie surge of sound in the silence. The library windows overlook the stair, and I went to them and looked down - and on the landing, beneath the skylights in the vaulted ceiling, one woman played on a grand piano and another on violin. Beethoven.

I went down again. The music faded as I went into the library proper, and grew again as I went into the library foyer: and when I entered the museum, the sound filled all three stories: the air seemed to vibrate with it.

The chairs were already full. So I leaned against the stair rail, and listened.