Chapter 4

The musician turned slowly to the piano.

The child's eyes followed him. She shivered a little.

He swung back with a swift gesture, feeling absently in his pockets.

"A piece of tissue-paper," he murmured. He had extracted a small comb from one of his pockets. He regarded it thoughtfully. "If I had one little piece of paper--" He looked about him helplessly.

"There is some in the music-rack, Marie. Find it for him," said the count.

The girl found it and laid it in his hand.

He turned back to the piano, adjusting and smoothing it. His broad back was an effective screen. The group waited, a look of interest on their faces.

Suddenly he wheeled about, his hands raised to his mouth, the comb, thinly covered with tissue-paper, at his lips, and his fat cheeks distended. His eyes behind the big spectacles glowed portentously.

They gazed at him in astonishment.

He drew a full breath and drove it forth, a lugubrious note. With scowling brows and set face he darted the instrument back and forth across his puckered lips. It wailed and shrieked, and out of the noise and discord emerged, at a galloping trot, "Der Erlkönig!"

The child, who had been regarding him intently, threw back her head, and a little laugh broke from her lips. Her face danced. She came and stood by the player, her hand resting on his knee.

Herr Schubert puffed and blew, and "The Erlking" pranced and thumped. Now and then he stumbled and fell, and the fugitives flew fast ahead.

The player's face was grave beyond belief, filled with a kind of fat melancholy, and tinged with tragic intent.

The faces watching it passed from question to amusement, and from amusement to protest.

"Nein, nein, mein Herr!" said the countess, as she wiped her mild blue eyes and shook her blond curls. "Nicht mehr! nicht mehr!"

With a deep, snorting sob the sound ceased. The comb dropped from his lips, and the player sat regarding them solemnly. A smile curved his big lips.

"Ja," he said simply, "that was great music. I have made it myself, that music."

With laughter and light words the party broke up. At a touch from the count the musician lingered. The others had left the room.

The count walked to the open window and stood for a moment staring into the darkness. Then he wheeled about.

"What was it you played?" he said swiftly.

"A Hungarian air," replied Schubert briefly.

The count looked incredulous.

"It was your own," he said.

"Partly," admitted the musician.

The count nodded.

"I thought so." He glanced toward the piano. "It is not too late----"

Schubert shrugged his shoulders.

"I told the child--you heard--I cannot play it again, that music."

The count laughed lightly.

"As you like." He held out a hand. "Good night, my friend," he said cordially. "You are a strange man."

The grotesque, sensitive face opposite him quivered. The big lips trembled a little as they opened.

"I am _not_ a strange man," said Schubert vehemently. "That music--it was--the devil!"

The count laughed again lightly. He held out his hand.

"Good night," he said.

IV

A soft haze hung over Zelitz. The moonlight, filtering through it, touched the paths and shrubs with shifting radiance and lifted them out of shadow. Under the big trees the darkness lay black, but in the open spaces it had given way to a gray, elusive whiteness that came and went like a still breathing of the quiet night.

A young girl, coming down one of the winding paths, paused a moment in the open space to listen. The hand that held her trailing, shimmering skirts away from the gravel was strong and supple, and the face thrown back to the moonlight wore a tense, earnest look; but the dark eyes in their curving lids were like a child's eyes. They seemed to laugh subtly. It may have been that the moonlight shifted across them.

A young man, standing in the shadow of the trees, smiled to himself as he watched her. He stepped from beneath the trees and crossed the open space between them.

The girl watched him come without surprise.

"It is a beautiful night, Herr Schubert," she said quietly as he stood beside her.

"A wonderful night, my lady," he answered softly.

She looked down at him.

"Why are you not in the castle, playing?" she demanded archly.

"The night called me," he said.

She half turned away.

He started forward.

"Do not go," he breathed.

She paused, looking at him doubtfully.

"I came to walk," she said. She moved away a few steps and paused again, looking back over her shoulder. "You can come----"

He sprang to her side, and they paced on in silence.

She glanced at him from under her lids.

His big face wore a radiant, absent-minded look. The full lips moved softly.

"What are you thinking of?" she said swiftly.

He flushed and came back to her.

"Only a little song; it runs in my head."

"Hum it to me," she commanded.

He flushed again and stammered:

"Nein, nein; it is not yet born."

Her eyes were on the shifting light.

"Will you play it to me when it is done?" she asked softly.

"You know that I will."

She waited a moment.

"You have never dedicated a song to me," she said slowly. "There are the four to my father--but he is the count; and the one last year for Marie--why to Marie?--and one for them all. But not one least little song for me!" The words had dropped under her breath. Her dark eyes were veiled. No one could say whether they laughed now.

He looked up with a swift, brusque gesture.

"They are all yours; you know it." The low voice rebuked her gently. "For six years they are yours--all that I have done." The face was turned toward her. It was filled with pleading and a kind of gentle beauty, clumsy and sweet.

She did not look at it.

"There is one that I should like to hear," she said musingly. "You played it once, years ago, on a comb. I have not heard it since." She laughed sweetly.

Schubert smiled. The hurt look stole from his eyes.

"You will hear it--my 'Erlkönig'?" he demanded.

She nodded.

"I will play it to you when I come back," he said contentedly.

She stopped short in the path.

"When you come back!" The subtle eyes were wide. They were not laughing.

"Ja, I shall----"

"Where are you going?"

He rubbed his great nose in the moonlight.

"Nein, I know not. I know I must go----"

She stopped him impatiently.

"You will not go!" she said. He turned his eyes and looked at her. After a moment her own fell. "Why will you go?" she asked.

The face with its dumb look was turned toward her.

"That little song--it calls me," he said softly. "When it is done I will come back again--to you."

She smiled under the lids.

"That little song--is it for me?" she asked sweetly.

"Ja, for you." He looked pleadingly at the downcast face. "The song--it is very sweet; it teases me."

The lids quivered.

"It comes to me so close, so close!" He was silent, a rapt look of listening in his face. It broke with a swift sigh. "Ach! it is gone!"

She glanced at him swiftly.

"I thought the songs came quickly."

He shook his head.

"The others, yes; but not this one. It is not like the others. It is so sweet and gentle--far away--and pure like the snow.... It calls me--" He broke off, gazing earnestly at the beautiful, high-bred face, with its downcast eyes.

"Nein! I cannot speak it," he said softly. "But the song it will speak it for me--when I come."

She lifted her head, and held out her hand with a gesture half shy and very sweet.

The moonlight veiled her. "I shall wait," she said gently--"for the song."

He held the slender hand for a moment in his own; then it was laid lightly against his lips, and turning, he had disappeared among the shadows.

V

"Hallo, Franz! Hallo--there!"

Two young men, walking rapidly along the low hedge that shuts in the Zum Biersack from the highway, lifted heated faces and glanced toward the enclosure, where a youth seated at one of the tables had half risen from his place, and was gesticulating with the open book in his hand to vacant seats beside him.

"It is Tieze," said Schubert, with a smile. "Come in."

His companion nodded. The next instant a swift waiter had served them, and three round, smiling faces surveyed one another above the foaming mugs.

"Ach!" said Tieze, looking more critically at the shorter man, "but you have grown thin, my friend. You are not so great."

Schubert smiled complacently. He glanced down at his rotund figure.

"Nein, I am little," he assented affably.

His companions broke into a roar of laughter.

"Drink her down, Franz! drink her down!" said Tieze, lifting the heavy stein.

Schubert wiped the foam from his lips.

"Ja, that is good!" He drew a deep sigh.

He reached out his hand for the open volume that lay by his companion's hand. It was given over in silence, and he dipped into it as he sipped the beer, smiling and scowling and humming softly. Now and then he lifted his head and listened. His eyes looked across the noisy garden into space.

His companions ignored him. They laughed and chatted and sang. Other young men joined the group, and the talk grew loud. It was the Sunday festival of Warseck.

Schubert smiled absently across the babel.

"A pencil--quick!" he said in a low tone to Tieze. His hand holding the open book trembled, and the big eyes glowed with fire.

Tieze fumbled in his pockets and shook his head.

Schubert glared at the careless group.

"A pencil, I tell you!" he said fiercely.

There was a moment's lull. Nobody laughed. Some one thrust a stub of pencil across the table. A fat young man sitting at Schubert's side seized it and, drawing a few music-bars on the back of a programme, pushed it on to him.

"Ach!" said Schubert, with a grateful sigh, "Goot--goot!" In another moment he was lost.

The talk grew louder. Hurried waiters rushed back and forth behind his chair with foaming mugs and slices of black bread, and gray and brown. Fiddles squeaked, and skittle-players shouted. Now and then the noise broke off and changed to the national air, which the band across the garden played loudly. But through it all Schubert's big head wagged absently, and his short-sighted eyes glared at the barred lines and flying pencil.

Suddenly he raised his head with a snort. His spectacles flew to his forehead, and his round face smiled genially at the laughing group.

"Done?" asked the fat young man with a smile. He reached out his hand for the scrawled page.

Schubert drew it jealously back.

"Nein," he said quickly.

Tieze, who had come around the table, stood behind them, scanning the barred lines and the scattered shower of notes. He raised a quick hand to the group about the table.

"Gott im Himmel!" he said excitedly. "Listen, you dunderheads!"

Silence fell on the group. Every glance was turned to him. He hummed softly a few bars of sweetest melody--under the garden's din.... The notes stopped in a choking gasp, Schubert's hand on his throat.

"Stop that!" he said hoarsely. The paper had been thrust loosely into his coat pocket. His face worked fiercely.

Tieze drew back, half laughing, half alarmed.

"Franz! Franz!" he said.

The other brushed his hand across his forehead and drew a deep breath.

"Ja," he said slowly, "I might have killed you."

Tieze nodded. A look of curiosity held his face.

"It is schön!" he said softly. "Schön!"

Schubert turned abruptly.

"It is not for you.... For years I search that song, over mountains, in the storm, in the sunshine; but it has never come--till here." His eye swept the crowded place. "Now I have it"--he patted the rough coat pocket--"now I have it, I go away."

VI

The girl sitting on a rough bench by the low building stirred slightly. She glanced behind her. Deep blackness in the wood, shifting moonshine about her. She breathed a quick sigh. It was like that other night. Ah, he would not come!

Her face fell forward into her slender fingers. She sat immovable. The shadow trembled a little, but the girl by the low house was blind and deaf. Melodies of the past were about her. The shadow moved, but she had no eyes to see; slowly it travelled across the short-cropped grass, mystically green and white in the waning moon. Noiselessly it came; it sank noiselessly into the shadow of the low house. A sound clicked and was still. But the girl had not moved--memory music held her. It moved upon her spirit, low and sweet, and stirred the pulse, and breathed itself away.

She stirred a little, and laid her cheek upon her palm. Her opened eyes rested carelessly on the ground; her look flashed wide and leaped to the lattice window beside her, and back again to the ground. A block of light lay there, clear and defined. It was not moonlight or dream-light. She sprang to her feet and moved a step nearer the window. Then she stopped, her hand at her side, her breath coming quickly. The high, sweet notes were calling from the night. Swiftly she moved. The door gave lightly beneath her touch. She crossed the smooth floor. She was by his side. The music was around them, above them, shimmering. It held them close. Slowly he turned his big, homely face and looked at her, but the music did not cease. It hovered in the air above, high and pure and sweet. The face of the young countess bent lower; a look of tenderness waited in her subtle eyes.

He sprang to his feet, his hands outstretched to ward it off.

"Nein. It is not I. It is the music. You shall not be bewitched!" His hands made swift passes, as if he would banish a spell.

She caught them to her and waited.

"Am I bewitched--Franz?" she said at last. The voice was very low. The laughing eyes were looking into his.

"Ja, you are bewitched," he returned stoutly.

"And you?"

"I have only love for you."

"And I have only love for you," she repeated softly. She hummed a bit of the melody and stopped, looking at him sweetly. "It is my song," she questioned--"the song you went to seek for me?"

He lifted his head proudly.

"It came for you."

She nodded with brimming eyes. Her hands stole softly up to the big face. They framed it in, with its look of pride, and touched it gently. "Dear face!" she breathed, "dear ugly face--my music face!"

They moved swiftly apart. The figure of the count was in the open doorway.

She moved forward serenely and slipped her hand in his.

"I am here, Father Johann," she said quietly.

His fingers closed about the white ones.

"Go outside, Cara. Wait there till I come."

Her dark, troubled eyes looked into his. They were not laughing now.

"Nay, father," she said gently, "it is you who will wait outside--while we say farewell."

The count regarded her for a long moment, then he turned toward the young musician, his face full of compassion and a kind of envy.

"My friend," he said slowly, "for five minutes I shall leave her with you. You will go away--forever."

Schubert bowed proudly. His eyes were on the girl's face.

As the door closed, she turned to him, holding out her hands.

He took them in his, and they stood silent, looking into each other's eyes.

She drew a long breath.

"What do people say when they are dying?" she asked.

"Nein, I know not." His voice trembled.

"There is so much, and it is nothing," said the girl dreamily. She moved a step toward the piano, his hands locked fast in hers. "Tell me again you love me!" she whispered.

He took off the great spectacles, and laid them beside the scrawled page.

"Look in my eyes," he said gently. A kind of grandeur had touched the homely features. The soul behind them looked out.

She bent toward him. A little sob broke from her lips. She lifted the hands and moved them swiftly toward the keys.

"Tell me!" she said.

With a smile of sadness, he obeyed the gesture.

Melody filled the room. It flooded the moonlight. The count, pacing back and forth, halted, a look of bewilderment in his face. He stepped swiftly toward the door.

The lights on the piano flared uncertainly. They fell on the figure at the piano. It loomed grotesque and grim, and melted away in flickering shadow. Music played about it. Strains of sadness swept over it in the gloom and drifted by, and the sweet, high notes rose clear. A little distance away the figure of the young countess stood in the shifting light. Her clasped hands hung before her. She swayed and lifted them, groping, and turned. Her father sprang to her. Side by side they passed into the night. The music sounded about them far and sweet.

* * * * *

Franz Schubert, with his youth and his wreaths of fame, his homely face and soul of fire, is dead these many years; but the soul of fire is not dead.... The Countess Esterhazy, framed for love, is dust and ashes in her marble house. The night music plays over her tomb.

The night music plays wherever night is.

FREDERIC CHOPIN--A RECORD

PARIS, October 6, 1837.

It has rained all day. No one has been in. No fantasies have crept to my soul. Nothing to break the ceaseless, monotonous drip, drip, drip on my heart. No one but a _garçon_ from the florist's bringing violets--the great swelling bunch of English violets--Jane Stirling's violets! Heavens, what a woman! I am like her now, in the little mirror on my desk. Merely thinking of her has made me so! The great aquiline nose--the shrewd, canny Scotch look--and the big mouth--alas, that mouth! When it smiles I am enraged. Oh, Jane! Why dost thou haunt me, night and day, with thy devotion and thy violets--and thy nose! Let women be gentle, with soft glances that thrill--soft, dark flames. Constantia's glance? Constantia? Nay, fickle. Fickle moon of yesternight that drips--drips--drips. Will it never cease! I cannot play the pain away. It eats into my heart. Yet life was made for joy and love--love--love--sweet as dream-light--sweet as music--sad and sweet and gay--love! The weariness rests upon me. The silver clock ticks. It chimes the pain. One--two--three--nine--ten. The night wears slowly. I must break the burden. I will look into a woman's face, and rest.

PARIS, October 10, 1837.

It was a thought of inspiration. I threw off the ugly loose coat and my _ennui_ together. I plunged into the fragrant bath. Little tunes hummed to me as I rose from it. I put on clean, fresh linen--fine as silk--and evening dress. My blood coursed freely, and the scent of violets came to me sweetly. It followed through the wet, dripping streets, and clung to me as I ascended the softly carpeted stair to the salon of the Countess Czosnowska. I was merry in my soul. Then a shadow crossed me. It fell upon my shoulder, and I turned in fear to look. No one--except a naked Venus on the wall. My good angel drew me on. I have seen her thrice since then. It seems a day. She came and looked into my eyes, while I played. It was fairy-music, witching and sweet--a little sad--the fairies of the Danube. My heart danced with them in the fatherland. Her eyes looked into mine. Sombre eyes--strange eyes. What did they say? She leaned forward on the piano, gazing at me passionately. My soul leaped back and stood at bay. The strange eyes smiled. It was a man's face--breadth and depth and coarseness--and the strange, sad eyes. I longed for them and shrank upon myself. She moved away. Later we spoke together--commonplaces. Liszt brought her to me, where I was sitting alone. Camellias framed us in. A sweet shadow rested on my heart. She praised my playing--gently. She understood. But the strong, sad, ugly face! I have seen her twice since then. In her own _salon_, with the noblest minds of France about her--and once alone. Beautiful face--haunting sadness! Aurora--sweetest name! She loves me! Day-spring--loved-one! The night lags----

PARIS, November 5, 1838.

We are to go away together--to the South. There is a strange pain at my chest, a haunting cough. It will not let me go. I shall escape it--in the South. She cares for me, day and night. Her sweet breath! My mother's face is sad in my dreams. I shall not dream when the sun shines warm upon me--in the South----

MAJORCA, November 16, 1838.

We are alone--two souls--in this island of the sea. The surf beats at night. I lie and listen. Jane Stirling came to see us off. She brought violets--great, swelling English violets. I smell them in the mouldy cloister cells, night and day. This monks' home is cold and bleak. The wind rattles through it, and at night it moans. A chill is on me. When I cough it echoes through my heart. I love the light. Sweet music waits the light. I will not die. The shadow haunts. But life is strong. Jane's violets on my grave! I will not die.

PARIS, March 14, 1839.

Paris--gay, live Paris! The cabs rattle sweetly on the stones. I can breathe now. The funeral dirge will wait. In Marseilles we came upon Nourrit--dead. Poor Adolphe! He could not bear the weight. A crash into eternity! I knew it all. The solemn mass ascended for his soul--and high above it all, I spoke in swelling chords--mystery--pain--justice--the fatherland. A requiem for his soul--for Chopin's soul? And Heine smiles. Brave Heine! With death upon his heart--inch by inch he fights it--with laughs. I saw him yestermorn. His great eyes winked. They made a bet at me. He will outlast us yet, he swore, ten years. Brave fight! Shall I live to see it stop--gasp--the last quip fail on sunny lips? I peer into the years between. They hang among the mists. Aurora comes. It is a week. Sweet day-spring!

NOHANT, October 11, 1839.

They tell me I am well. The cough has ceased and the pain. But deep below, it beats. Aurora's eyes are veiled. Only when I play will they glow. They fill the world with light. I sit and play softly--her pen moves fast. She can write with music--music--over her--around--Chopin's music, whispered low--but clear as love. They said once George Sand was clever. It is Chopin's touch that makes her great. It eats the soul. For thee, Aurora, I could crawl upon the earth. I would not mind. I give thee all. I ask a glance--a touch--a smile when thou art weary--leave to love thee and to make sweet music. Thou wilt not be too cruel, love--with thy veiled eyes?

NOHANT, May 3, 1847.

I must have money. I am a burden--sick--a cough that racks the soul. Aurora comes but seldom. The cough hurts her. She is busy. I do not look into her eyes. I lie and gaze across the field. It stretches from my window--sunny, French field! Miles away, beneath a Polish sky, I see my mother's eyes. Unshed tears are heavy. "Fritz, little Fritz," she calls to me, "thou wilt be a great musician. Poland will be proud of thee!" Poland--dear land--proud of Frederic Chopin! My heart is empty. It aches.

NOHANT, June 1, 1847.

It is over. Life has stopped. A few years more or less, perhaps. But never life again. I do not write the words. They hammer at my brain. She spoke so sharply--and my soul was sick. I did not think she could. If she had waited--I would not have tarried long, not too long, Aurora. Hadst thou waited--weary of the burden, the sick burden of my complaint! Money--I shall work--Waltzes that the public loves--and pays for. Mazurkas from a torn heart! I shall work--a little while--20,000 francs to set me free! I will die free!

PARIS, June 10, 1847.

Strange fortune that besets a man! The 20,000 franc paper is in my hand. I turn it. I look at it. Jane Stirling and her goodness haunt my gloom. She only asks to give. Strange, uncouth, Scotch lady! With thy heart of gold, thy face of iron, and thy foot of lead! Thy francs lie heavy in my hand. "Master," she writes my name. She only asks to give. But women should be gentle, with soft, dark eyes that thrill. The day has closed. I shall die free!

STIRLING CASTLE, SCOTLAND, June 16, 1848.