...a deathly serenade...

puzzles and games that seem to have no end
conclusion, even when you think you have him
sussed.
The Steinway Piano was purchased by Ellis
after she had moved into Franz' apartment. A
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
AA
trained pianist in her youth, Ellis' Father, George
Szell Gould was a conductor widely considered
one of the twentieth century's greatest conductors
(George Szell Gould, A Life of Music, University
of Illnois Press). She decided against such a career
to become an administrator, of course, but still
asked Franz to purchase the Steinway, as a mantel
piece for soirees she had intended to orchestrate.
As she admitted this and that she never touched
the piano herself - which I noticed in the soiree's
I would attend, instead she would often have
other pianists play. After one of these
performances by the famous Jools Holland, she
once commented to me, one night, that she had
never told Franz that she could even play it or
about her father, who had died when she was in
her teens. Why Ellis did this, is not at all clear to
me, but they were known to have an impassioned
relationship full of teasing and psychological
games, as described forensically in the epigraph's
words that illuminated knowledge of their "cold
war". Their relationship clearly went a bit Picasso,
and is completely opposed to their wedding day,
where, with all in attendance, after Yashu had
finished his rather drunken best's man's speech: -
that seemed wholly devoid of anything other than
tipsy anecdotes of himself, Franz and Leila, (who
was not in attendance, but at the Convent) - Franz
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