During the whole five years which had elapsed since his departure, no
one had known anything about him. All rumours concerning him had died
out, exactly as though he had vanished from the face of the earth. When
Fabio met his friend on one of the streets in Ferrara he came near
crying out aloud, first from fright, then from joy, and immediately
invited him to his villa. There, in the garden, was a spacious, detached
pavilion; he suggested that his friend should settle down in that
pavilion. Muzio gladly accepted, and that same day removed thither with
his servant, a dumb Malay--dumb but not deaf, and even, judging from the
vivacity of his glance, a very intelligent man.... His tongue had been
cut out. Muzio had brought with him scores of chests filled with divers
precious things which he had collected during his prolonged wanderings.
Valeria was delighted at Muzio's return; and he greeted her in a
cheerfully-friendly but composed manner. From everything it was obvious
that he had kept the promise made to Fabio. In the course of the day he
succeeded in installing himself in his pavilion; with the aid of his
Malay he set out the rarities he had brought--rugs, silken tissues,
garments of velvet and brocade, weapons, cups, dishes, and beakers
adorned with enamel, articles of gold and silver set with pearls and
turquoises, carved caskets of amber and ivory, faceted flasks, spices,
perfumes, pelts of wild beasts, the feathers of unknown birds, and a
multitude of other objects, the very use of which seemed mysterious and
incomprehensible. Among the number of all these precious things there
was one rich pearl necklace which Muzio had received from the Shah of
Persia for a certain great and mysterious service; he asked Valeria's
permission to place this necklace on her neck with his own hand; it
seemed to her heavy, and as though endowed with a strange sort of warmth
... it fairly adhered to the skin. Toward evening, after dinner, as they
sat on the terrace of the villa, in the shade of oleanders and laurels,
Muzio began to narrate his adventures. He told of the distant lands
which he had seen, of mountains higher than the clouds, of rivers like
unto seas; he told of vast buildings and temples, of trees thousands of
years old, of rainbow-hued flowers and birds; he enumerated the cities
and peoples he had visited.... (their very names exhaled something
magical). All the Orient was familiar to Muzio: he had traversed Persia
and Arabia, where the horses are more noble and beautiful than all other
living creatures; he had penetrated the depths of India, where is a race
of people resembling magnificent plants; he had attained to the confines
of China and Tibet, where a living god, the Dalai Lama by name, dwells
upon earth in the form of a speechless man with narrow eyes. Marvellous
were his tales! Fabio and Valeria listened to him as though enchanted.
In point of fact, Muzio's features had undergone but little change:
swarthy from childhood, his face had grown still darker,--had been
burned beneath the rays of a more brilliant sun,--his eyes seemed more
deeply set than of yore, that was all; but the expression of that face
had become different: concentrated, grave, it did not grow animated even
when he alluded to the dangers to which he had been subjected by night
in the forests, deafened by the roar of tigers, by day on deserted roads
where fanatics lie in wait for travellers and strangle them in honour of
an iron goddess who demands human blood. And Muzio's voice had grown
more quiet and even; the movements of his hands, of his whole body, had
lost the flourishing ease which is peculiar to the Italian race.
With the aid of his servant, the obsequiously-alert Malay, he showed his
host and hostess several tricks which he had been taught by the Brahmins
of India. Thus, for example, having preliminarily concealed himself
behind a curtain, he suddenly appeared sitting in the air, with his legs
doubled up beneath him, resting the tips of his fingers lightly on a
bamboo rod set upright, which not a little amazed and even alarmed Fabio
and Valeria.... "Can it be that he is a magician?" the thought occurred
to her.--But when he set to calling out tame snakes from a covered
basket by whistling on a small flute,--when, wiggling their fangs, their
dark, flat heads made their appearance from beneath the motley stuff,
Valeria became frightened and begged Muzio to hide away those horrors as
quickly as possible.
At supper Muzio regaled his friends with wine of Shiraz from a round
flask with a long neck; extremely fragrant and thick, of a golden hue,
with greenish lights, it sparkled mysteriously when poured into the tiny
jasper cups. In taste it did not resemble European wines: it was very
sweet and spicy; and, quaffed slowly, in small sips, it produced in all
the limbs a sensation of agreeable drowsiness. Muzio made Fabio and
Valeria drink a cup apiece, and drank one himself. Bending over her cup,
he whispered something and shook his fingers. Valeria noticed this; but
as there was something strange and unprecedented in all Muzio's ways in
general, and in all his habits, she merely thought: "I wonder if he has
not accepted in India some new faith, or whether they have such customs
there?"--Then, after a brief pause, she asked him: "Had he continued to
occupy himself with music during the time of his journeys?"--In reply
Muzio ordered the Malay to bring him his Indian violin. It resembled
those of the present day, only, instead of four strings it had three; a
bluish snake-skin was stretched across its top, and the slender bow of
reed was semi-circular in form, and on its very tip glittered a pointed
diamond.
Muzio first played several melancholy airs,--which were, according to
his assertion, popular ballads,--strange and even savage to the Italian
ear; the sound of the metallic strings was plaintive and feeble. But
when Muzio began the last song, that same sound suddenly strengthened,
quivered powerfully and resonantly; the passionate melody poured forth
from beneath the broadly-handled bow,--poured forth with beautiful
undulations, like the snake which had covered the top of the violin with
its skin; and with so much fire, with so much triumphant joy did this
song beam and blaze that both Fabio and Valeria felt a tremor at their
heart, and the tears started to their eyes ... while Muzio, with his
head bent down and pressed against his violin, with pallid cheeks, and
brows contracted into one line, seemed still more concentrated and
serious than ever, and the diamond at the tip of the bow scattered
ray-like sparks in its flight, as though it also were kindled with the
fire of that wondrous song. And when Muzio had finished and, still
holding the violin tightly pressed between his chin and his shoulder,
dropped his hand which held the bow--"What is that? What hast thou been
playing to us?" Fabio exclaimed.--Valeria uttered not a word, but her
whole being seemed to repeat her husband's question. Muzio laid the
violin on the table, and lightly shaking back his hair, said, with a
courteous smile: "That? That melody ... that song I heard once on the
island of Ceylon. That song is known there, among the people, as the
song of happy, satisfied love."
"Repeat it," whispered Fabio.
"No; it is impossible to repeat it," replied Muzio. "And it is late now.
Signora Valeria ought to rest; and it is high time for me also.... I am
weary."
All day long Muzio had treated Valeria in a respectfully-simple manner,
like a friend of long standing; but as he took leave he pressed her hand
very hard, jamming his fingers into her palm, staring so intently into
her face the while that she, although she did not raise her eyelids,
felt conscious of that glance on her suddenly-flushing cheeks. She said
nothing to Muzio, but drew away her hand, and when he was gone she
stared at the door through which he had made his exit. She recalled how,
in former years also, she had been afraid of him ... and now she was
perplexed. Muzio went off to his pavilion; the husband and wife withdrew
to their bed-chamber.