The violinist read this note twice, then he looked around with a dull,
stupefied gaze, stretched his arms on high as those do who are shot
through the heart, and sank senseless to the floor.
* * * * *
A lingering nervous fever broke his constitution, and destroyed the
little energy he had still possessed. When he began to creep about his
chamber, a weary convalescent, with thinned hair, he sought at once for
pen and ink. Every day he wrote a letter to de Sterny, and tore it in
pieces. When Delileo, who had nursed him through the sickness like a
mother, begged him not to excite himself, he only answered, "I must
have it off my heart!" and wrote a fresh letter,--but never sent any.
One day he said to himself that it did not become him to write, that he
must demand satisfaction from de Sterny face to face. But before that
could happen he must recover his health. From that time he wrote no
more. He lived his brooding life, idle, and melancholy. His grief was
mingled with a burning shame. He constantly feared that he should meet
some one who would ask him about his bride, or his friend. At the
thought the blood rushed into his cheek, and even when he was quite
alone he turned his face to the wall. He trembled in every limb, a wild
rage possessed him when he thought of the betrayer. Then--then he
remembered the thousand kindnesses to which the virtuoso had accustomed
him, his amiability, the cordial tone of his voice. He pressed his
hands to his temples and groaned.
He could not understand.
And the days went by, and he did not seek de Sterny. A wild fear of men
mastered him. By day he almost never left Delileo's dwelling, but, as
his health improved, he gradually accustomed himself to go out at
night. He was still young. He felt a vehement desire to deaden the
power of feeling. In the midst of the wildest orgies, he sat pale and
dumb, with fixed expressionless face. This joyless dissipation he soon
gave up, but his wound still craved relief--and slowly, gradually, he
gave himself to drink. Music he neglected altogether. Every note awoke
a memory. If he had been obliged to earn his bread by his profession,
he would probably not have gone so utterly to ruin, but the money which
he had brought back from America permitted him to live.
When old Delileo, whom it cut to the heart to see his dear one's
hopeless suffering, and his splendid talents so sadly wasted, asked him
questions in regard to the future, Gesa answered, "I will work again,
but leave me alone now for a while--it is too hard yet." And his fear
of mankind more and more sought concealment in Rue Ravestein. In all
large cities there are alleys like the Rue Ravestein. Paris has many of
them. A man flies thither when he has suffered a fiasco, or a great
sorrow, hides himself there from the derision of enemies and the pity
of friends ... pity which at the best seems to him but a sentimental
form of contempt! He has no intention of passing his whole life in that
unwholesome obscurity, he will only give his wounds time to heal.
Meanwhile he forges many plans in this voluntary exile; and dreams how
he will go back to the world sometime and retrieve all by a grand
success. The dreams never see fulfilment. For such streets are graves,
and whoever after long years seeks to flee from that solitude, wanders
among men like a risen corpse. Superannuated ideas surround and cling
to him like the mouldy air of the sepulchre. He speaks a dead language.