This is a true story. Unless you promise to believe me, it is not much
good my going on.... You promise? Very well.
Years ago I bought a pianola. I went into the shop to buy a gramophone
record, and I came out with a pianola--so golden-tongued was the
manager. You would think that one could then retire into private life
for a little, but it is only the beginning. There is the music-stool
to be purchased, the library subscription, the tuner's fee (four
visits a year, if you please), the cabinet for the rolls, the man to
oil the pedals, the----however, one gets out of the shop at last. Nor
do I regret my venture. It is common talk that my pianola was the
chief thing about me which attracted Celia. "I _must_ marry a man with
a pianola," she said ... and there was I ... and here, in fact, we
are. My blessings, then, on the golden tongue of the manager.
Now there is something very charming in a proper modesty about
one's attainments, but it is necessary that the attainments should
be generally recognized first. It was admirable in STEPHENSON to
have said (as I am sure he did), when they congratulated him on
his first steam-engine, "Tut-tut, it's nothing;" but he could
only say this so long as the others were in a position to offer
the congratulations. In order to place you in that position I
must let you know how extraordinarily well I played the pianola.
I brought to my interpretation of different Ops an _elan_, a
_verve_, a _je ne sais quoi_--and several other French words--which
were the astonishment of all who listened to me. But chiefly I
was famous for my playing of one piece: "The Charge of the Uhlans,"
by KARL BOHM. Others may have seen Venice by moonlight, or heard
the Vicar's daughter recite _Little Jim_, but the favoured few
who have been present when BOHM and I were collaborating are the
ones who have really lived. Indeed, even the coldest professional
critic would have spoken of it as "a noteworthy rendition."
"The Charge of the Uhlans." If you came to see me, you had to hear it.
As arranged for the pianola, it was marked to be played throughout at
a lightning pace and with the loudest pedal on. So one would play it
if one wished to annoy the man in the flat below; but a true musician
has, I take it, a higher aim. I disregarded the "FF.'s" and the other
sign-posts on the way, and gave it my own interpretation. As played by
me, "The Charge of the Uhlans" became a whole battle scene. Indeed, it
was necessary, before I began, that I should turn to my audience and
describe the scene to them--in the manner, but not in the words, of a
Queen's Hall programme:--
"Er--first of all you hear the cavalry galloping past, and then
there's a short hymn before action while they form up, and then comes
the charge, and then there's a slow bit while they--er--pick up the
wounded, and then they trot slowly back again. And if you listen
carefully to the last bit you'll actually hear the horses limping."
Something like that I would say; and it might happen that an
insufferable guest (who never got asked again) would object that the
hymn part was unusual in real warfare.
"They sang it in this piece anyhow," I would say stiffly, and turn my
back on him and begin.
But the war put a stop to music as to many other things. For three
months the pianola has not been played by either of us. There are two
reasons for this: first, that we simply haven't the time now; and
secondly, that we are getting all the music we want from the flat
below. The flat below is learning "Tipperary" on one finger. He gets
as far as the farewell to Leicester Square, and then he breaks down;
the parting is too much for him.
I was not, then, surprised at the beginning of this month to find
Celia looking darkly at the pianola.
"It's very ugly," she began.
"We can't help our looks," I said in my grandmother's voice.
"A bookcase would be much prettier there."
"But not so tuneful."
"A pianola isn't tuneful if you never play it."
"True," I said.
Celia then became very alluring, and suggested that I might find
somebody who would like to be lent a delightful pianola for a year or
so by somebody whose delightful wife had her eye on a delightful
bookcase.
"I might," I said.
"Somebody," said Celia, "who isn't supplied with music from below."
I found John. He was quite pleased about it, and promised to return
the pianola when the war was over.
So on Wednesday it went. I was not sorry, because in its silence it
was far from beautiful, and we wanted another bookcase badly. But on
Tuesday evening--its last hours with us--I had to confess to a certain
melancholy. It is sad to part with an old and well-tried friend,
particularly when that friend is almost entirely responsible for your
marriage. I looked at the pianola and then I said to Celia, "I must
play it once again."
"Please," said Celia.
"The old masterpiece, I suppose?" I said, as I got it out.
"Do you think you ought to--now? I don't think I want to hear a charge
of the Uhlans--beasts; I want a charge of our own men."
"Art," I said grandly, "knows no frontiers." I suppose this has been
said by several people several times already, but for the moment both
Celia and I thought it was rather clever.
So I placed the roll in the pianola, sat down and began to play....
Ah, the dear old tune....
Dash it all!
"What's happened?" said Celia, breaking a silence which had become
alarming.
"I must have put it in wrong," I said.
I wound the roll off, put it in again, and tried a second time,
pedalling vigorously.
Dead silence....
Hush! A note ... another silence ... and then another note....