M. Gaston Delileo was the stranger's name, but in the Rue Ravestein
they never called him anything but "the sad gentleman,"--the "droevige
Herr." He might have been between forty and fifty years old, had a
yellow face that reminded one of a carving in old ivory, wore a full
beard, and long straight black hair parted in the middle of his
forehead. Except in the hottest summer weather he never went on the
street otherwise than wrapped in an old dark blue, red-lined Carbonari
cloak.
About seven months before, he had moved into the Rue Ravestein, stroked
the children's heads, greeted the women in passing, was generally liked
and associated with no one.
Before Margaretha's flight she had secretly placed a letter in the
otherwise empty letter-box before his door, begging that he would adopt
the boy, thereby showing some shrewd knowledge of character in trusting
to his benevolence. His wife was dead: his only child, a little
daughter, at that time hardly seven years old, was being brought up by
relatives in France, as his bachelor housekeeping would have made it
difficult for him to give the child proper care. Thus widowed and
solitary, afflicted moreover with a great heart that needed love, and
had never all his life long been satisfied, he took the boy to himself
without any overnice reasoning upon the subject.
"Come to breakfast," he said quite simply, took the orphan by the hand
and led him into his own dwelling.
When the meal was over, and while M. Delileo, with that rage for
systematizing which often distinguishes especially unpractical people,
was bending over his writing table, making out a plan of education, a
division of hours, and finally a long list of things which Gesa might
possibly need within the next ten years, the boy slipped curiously
around in the little room, and examined its arrangement. The furniture
was a decayed mixture of stiff, military Empire, and pretentious,
crooked Louis-Philippe. On the walls hung a few sketches by once
celebrated masters, with dedications "a mon chere ami, etc.," a few
poet's autographs in little black frames, and besides these the rapidly
executed portrait of a very beautiful woman, in a white satin dress
with a great many strings of pearls around her neck, and a little crown
on her head. "Is that the queen?" asked Gesa of his new protector.
Whereupon the "droevige Herr," rising up from his occupation, answered,
not without a certain solemnity, "That, my child, that was the
Gualtieri!"
"Ah!" said Gesa, and was exactly as wise as before. How indeed was he
to know that the Gualtieri in her time had been one of the most famous,
and alas! one of the most infamous artistes in the world?
"She was a queen too,--a queen of song," added Delileo after a pause.
"And did you know her?" asked Gesa, still absorbed in staring at the
romantically costumed lady.
"She was my wife," answered Delileo with emphasis, and an eloquent
gesture.
"Ah! then she must have loved you very much," observed Gesa, seriously,
wishing to say something pleasant. But Delileo shrank and turned away
his head.
Beneath this portrait, day after day, on a shabby black marble-top
table, stood fresh flowers in a crumbling blue delft pitcher.
V
Immediately upon the beginning of their life together, Delileo made a
correct estimate of his protege's musical gifts, and thanks to some
artist connections that still remained to him, he procured instruction
for Gesa from one of the most famous violinists at that time
established in the Brussels Conservatory. He cared for the rest of
Gesa's education himself. A curious education, truly! "Correct spelling
and an extensive knowledge of literature," he would assert, "are two
absolute necessities of a gentleman's culture, further than that he
needs nothing." Gesa's orthography, in spite of his instructor's
praiseworthy efforts, remained somewhat uncertain, his knowledge of
literature on the contrary made astonishing progress, and soon reached
from the "Essais de Montaigne," Delileo's first hobby, to Delileo's own
romance--his second hobby.
This romance, which was called "The Twilight of the Gods," and had been
waiting ten years in vain for a publisher, formed a striking
counterpart to Delileo's Carbonari cloak. Like that romantic article of
apparel it smelled of mould, and the breath of superannuated
philanthropic theories hovered about it. It began with a legend and
ended with an ode. Many an evening the elder spent in reading this
nondescript production to his protege, Gesa always attending with the
devout fervor which believing natures bring to mysteries they do not
understand.
An odd couple they made, the broken man with his nervous restlessness,
the restlessness of one who has accomplished nothing, and who sees the
grave before him--and the vigorous young fellow, with his healthy
laziness, the self-confident laziness of one who feels a great talent
within him and to whom life seems as if it could never end. The weary
spirit of one strayed constantly back, from the hopeless insipidity of
his present, to an Utopia of the year thirty: the other's imagination,
meanwhile, crippled by no sort of experience, galloped confidently out
into the future, behind a double team of fresh young chimeras!
Enthusiasts were they both,--Delileo the more unpractical of the two.
Poor Gaston Delileo! He belonged in the category of universal geniuses;
for which reason he had brought his genius to the attainment of
absolutely nothing in the universe! Music, painting, literature,
political economy,--he had pursued them all, one after the other or
simultaneously, just as it happened, and all with the greatest zeal. He
had believed with devout idealism in the capacity of society for
improvement. He had adopted the theories of St. Simon, and had worn
with enthusiasm the vest laced up behind of that brotherhood, and a
headband on which his name was embroidered. History relates that the
St. Simonian Brotherhood, with their practical division of labor,
limited his activity in the beginning to the contribution of money and
the brushing of boots! Later they enrolled him the memorable "Three
hundred," who set forth to seek the mother of the sect in foreign
lands, after Madame de Stael had declined that post of honor.
His money was gone, his illusion had changed to disgust. He had
withdrawn in melancholy from the world, seeking to hide himself and his
disappointment. He wished nothing but to forget and be forgotten:--that
is in the present; from the future, a far-off, misty future, he still
hoped something--for his romance. Meanwhile he supported existence by
copying notes,--like Rousseau. Two, three years passed by, Gesa became
as handsome as a youth in a picture. At Delileo's side he could not
fail to gain cultivation of mind and heart, but associated with the
eccentric St. Simonian he remained a stranger to all discipline of
character. More and more there was revealed a want of concentration,
and a vague dreaminess in his nature which to a practiced observer,
would have boded no good for his future. He could never maintain a
medium between relaxed indolence and exhausting ardor: in tough,
persistent capacity for work he failed altogether, and whatever did not
come to him by inspiration, he acquired with greater difficulty than
did the most commonplace pupil of the conservatory.
Upon all this, however, his violin-professor made no reflections. Gesa
not only played his instrument with a skill unheard of for his years,
but he also improvised with wonderful originality, at least, so said
the professor--who marked nothing but the gigantic strides of the boy's
progress, was proud of his pupil and presented him to one amateur after
another.
The phlegmatic Brusselers were enchanted by his musical extravagances,
because he was named Gesa, had a handsome brunette face, and was said
to have sprung from Hungarian origin. Their enthusiasm at his
performance always culminated in the same words--"how gipsy-like!
_Comme c'est tsigane!_"
At last came a day when Gesa was to play for the first time at a public
concert. With the colossal conceit of youth, he rejoiced at the thought
of his debut The apprehensive Gaston Delileo on the contrary, lost
appetite and sleep.
Anxiously anticipating a disappointment for the boy, he spent most of
his time in exhorting Gesa not to care much for a fiasco; an
exhortation which the young musician took very impatiently, and ran
away from it. With his hat dragged down self-assertingly over his ears,
he stamped fuming up and down the Rue Ravestein, while the sad elder
crept back and forth in his chamber above, and foreboded.
On the concert evening, Delileo could not be moved to enter the music
hall. Breathless and panting, he stood before the performer's entrance,
and held his fingers in his ears. Suddenly, in spite of his efforts to
exclude every sound, he heard a strange tumult. He let his hands fall.
Was it a fire alarm? No, it was clapping from hundreds of hands and
shouting from hundreds of throats. The next moment he had burst sobbing
into the green-room, and held his nurseling in his arms.
All the other performers pressed the young fellow's hands, praised him,
and promised him a brilliant future. With that naive arrogance
which one so easily pardons in young gods, even while it provokes a
pitying smile, he received all these compliments as if they were his
proper tribute; but even his unabashed self-possession gave way when
the door opened and an elegant young man entered holding out both
hands--Alphonse de Sterny.
"My dear young friend," he cried, "I could not let the evening pass
without knowing you--without congratulating you." Then the young
violinist's head sank, he trembled from head to foot, and his hands
grew ice cold in those of the great virtuoso.