The days passed, unmarked, eventless, like the uniform pages of a dull

book. When the solitude grew unbearable, Maurice went to visit Frau

Furst, and had his supper with the family. He was a welcome guest, for

he not only paid for all the beer that was drunk, but also brought such

a generous portion of sausage for his own supper, that it supplied one

or other of the little girls as well. Afterwards, they sat round the

kitchen-table, listening, the children with the old-fashioned solemnity

that characterised them, to Frau Furst's reminiscences. Otherwise, he

hardly exchanged a word with anyone, but sat at his piano the livelong

day. Of late, Schwarz had been somewhat cool and off-hand in manner

with him; the master had also not displayed the same detailed interest

in his plans for the summer, as in those of the rest of the class. This

was one reason why he had not gone away like every one else; the other,

that he had been unwilling to write home for an increase of allowance.

Sometimes, when the day was hot, he envied his friends refreshing

themselves by wood, mountain or sea; but, in the main, he worked

briskly at Czerny's FINGERFERTIGKEIT, and with such perseverance that

ultimately his fingers stumbled from fatigue.

With the beginning of August, the heat grew oppressive; all day long,

the sun beat, fierce and unremittent, on this city of the plains, and

the baked pavements were warm to the feet. Business slackened, and the

midday rest in shops and offices was extended beyond its usual limit.

Conservatorium and Gewandhaus, at first given over to relays of

charwomen, their brooms and buckets, soon lay dead and deserted, too;

and if, in the evening, Maurice passed the former building, he would

see the janitor sitting at leisure in the middle of the pavement,

smoking his long black cigar. The old trees in the PROMENADE, and the

young striplings that followed the river in the LAMPESTRASSE, drooped

their brown leaves thick with dust; the familiar smell of roasting

coffee, which haunted most house- and stair-ways, was intensified; and

out of drains and rivers rose nauseous and penetrating odours, from

which there was no escape. Every three or four days, when the

atmosphere of the town had reached a pitch of unsavouriness which it

seemed impossible to surpass, sudden storms swept up, tropical in their

violence: blasts of thunder cracked like splitting beams; lightning

darted along the narrow streets; rain fell in white, sizzling sheets.

But the morning after, it was as hot as ever.

Maurice grew so accustomed to meet no one he knew, that one afternoon

towards the middle of August, he was pulled up by a jerk of surprise in

front of the PLEISSENBURG, on stumbling across Heinrich Krafft. He had

stopped and impulsively greeted the young man, before he recalled his

previous antipathy to him.

Krafft was sauntering along with his hands in his pockets, and, on

being accosted, he looked vaguely and somewhat moodily at Maurice. The

next moment, however, he laid a hand on the lappel of Maurice's coat,

and, without preamble, burst into a witty and obscene anecdote, which

had evidently been in his mind when they met. This story, and the fact

that, by the North Sea, he had stood before breakers twenty feet high,

were the only particulars Maurice bore away from their interview. His

previous impatience with such eccentricity returned, but none the less,

he looked grudgingly after the other's vanishing form.

A day or two later, towards evening, he saw Krafft again. As he was

going through an outlying street, he came upon a group of children, who

were amusing themselves by teasing a cat; the animal had been hit in

the eye by a stone, and cowered, terrified and blinded, against the

wall of a house. The children formed a half circle round it, and two of

the biggest boys held a young and lively dog by the collar, inciting it

and restraining it, and revelling in the cat's convulsive starts at

each capering bark.

While Maurice was considering how to expostulate with them, Krafft came

swiftly up behind, jerked two of the children apart, and, with a deft

and perfectly noiseless movement, caught up the cat and hid its head

under his coat. Then, cuffing the biggest boy, he kicked the dog, and

ordered the rest to disperse. The children did so lingeringly; and once

out of his reach, stood and mocked him.

He begged Maurice to accompany him to his lodgings, and there Maurice

held the animal, a large, half-starved street-cat, while Krafft, on his

knees before it, examined the wound. As he did this, he crooned in a

wordless language, and the cat was quiet, in spite of the pain he

caused it. But directly he took his hands off it, it jumped from the

table, and fled under the furthest corner of the sofa.

Krafft next fetched milk and a saucer, from a cupboard in the wall, and

went down on his knees again: while Maurice sat and watched and

wondered at his tireless endeavours to induce the animal to advance. He

explained his proceedings in a whisper.

"If I put the saucer down and leave it," he said, "it won't help at

all. A cat's confidence must be won straight away."

He was still in this position, making persuasive little noises, when

the door opened, and Avery Hill, his companion of a previous occasion,

entered. At the sight of Krafft crouching on the floor, she paused with

her hand on the door, and looked from him to Maurice.

"Heinz?" she said interrogatively. Then she saw the saucer of milk, and

understood. "Heinz!" she said again; and this time the word was a

reprimand.

"Ssh!--be quiet," said Krafft peevishly, without looking up.

The girl took no notice of Maurice's attempt to greet her. Letting fall

on the grand piano, some volumes of music she was carrying, she

continued sternly: "Another cat!--oh, it is abominable of you! This is

the third he has picked up this year," she said explanatorily, yet not

more to Maurice than to herself. "And the last was so dirty and

destructive that Frau Schulz threatened to turn him out, if he did not

get rid of it. He knows as well as I do that he cannot keep a cat here."

Her placidly tragic face had grown hard; and altogether, the anger she

displayed seemed out of proportion to the trival offence.

Krafft remained undisturbed. "It's not the least use scolding. Go and

make it right with the old crow.--Come, puss, come."

The girl checked the words that rose to her lips, gave a slight shrug,

and went out of the room. They heard her, in the passage, disputing

with the landlady, who was justly indignant.

"If it weren't for you, Fraulein, I wouldn't keep him another day," she

declared.

Meanwhile the cat, which, in the girl's presence, had shrunk still

further into its hiding-place, began to make advances. It crept a step

forward, retreated again, stretched out its nose to sniff at the milk,

and, all of a sudden, emerged and drank greedily.

Krafft touched its head, and the animal paused in its hungry gulping to

rub its back against the caressing hand. When the last drop of milk was

finished, it withdrew to its corner, but less suspiciously.

Krafft rose to his feet and stretched himself, and when Avery returned,

he smiled at her.

"Now then, is it all right?"

She did not reply, but went to the piano, to search for something among

the scattered music. Krafft clasped his hands behind his head, and

leaning against the table, watched her with an ironical curl of the lip.

"O LENE! LENE! O MAGDALENE!" he sang under his breath; and, for the

second time, Maurice received the impression that a by-play was being

carried on between these two.

"Look at this," said Krafft after a pause. "Here, ladies and gentlemen,

is one of those rare persons who have a jot of talent in them, and off

she goes--I don't mean at this moment, but tomorrow, the day after,

every day--to waste it in teaching children finger-exercises. If you

ask her why she does it, she will tell you it is necessary to live.

Necessary to live!--who has ever proved that it is?"

For an instant, it seemed as if the girl were going to flash out a

bitter retort that might have betrayed her. Then she showed the same

self-control as before, and went, without a word, into the next room.

She was absent for a few minutes, and when she reappeared, carried what

was unmistakably a bundle of soiled linen, going away with this on one

arm, the volumes of music she had picked out on the other. She did not

wish the young men good-night, but, in passing Maurice, she said in an

unfriendly tone: "Do you know what time it is?" and to Krafft: "It is

late, Heiriz, you are not to play."

The door had barely closed behind her, when Krafft broke into the loud,

repellent laugh that had so jarred on Maurice at their former meeting.

He had risen at once, and now said he must go. But Krafft would not

hear of it; he pressed him into his seat again, with an effusive warmth

of manner.

"Don't mind her. Stay, like a good fellow. Of course, I am going to

play to you."

He flicked the keys of the piano with his handkerchief, adjusted the

distance of his seat, threw back his head, and half closing his eyes,

began to play. Except for the unsteady flickerings cast on the wall by

a street-lamp, the room was soon in darkness.

Maurice resumed his seat reluctantly. He had been dragged upstairs

against his will; and throughout the foregoing scene, had sat an

uncomfortable spectator. He had as little desire for the girl to return

and find him there, as for Krafft to play to him. But no excuse for

leaving offered itself, and each moment made it harder to interrupt the

player, who had promptly forgotten the fact of his presence.

After he had listened for a time, however, Maurice ceased to think of

escaping. Madeleine had once alluded to Krafft's skill as an

interpreter of Chopin, but, all the same, he had not expected anything

like what he now heard, and at first he could not make anything of it.

He had hitherto only known Chopin's music as played in the sentimental

fashion of the English drawing-room. Here, now, came some one who made

it clear that, no matter how pessimistic it appeared on the surface,

this music was, at its core an essentially masculine music; it kicked

desperately against the pricks of existence; what failed it was only

the last philosophic calm. He could not, of course, know that various

small things had combined to throw the player into one of his most

prodigal moods: the rescue and taming of the cat, the passage-at-arms

with Avery, her stimulating forbiddal, and, last and best, the one

silent listener in the dark--this stranger, picked up at random in the

streets, who had never yet heard him play, and to whom he might reveal

himself with an indecency that friendship precluded.

When at length, Frau Schulz entered, in her bed-jacket, to say that it

was long past ten o'clock, Krafft wakened as if out of a trance, and

hid his eyes from the light. Frau Schulz, a robust person, disregarded

his protests, and herself locked the piano and took the key.

"She makes me promise to," she whispered to Maurice, pointing over her

shoulder at an imaginary person. "If I didn't, he'd go on all night.

He's no more fit to look after himself than a baby--and he gets it

again with his boots in the morning.--Yes, yes, call me names if it

pleases you. Names don't kill. And if I am a hag, you're a rascal,

that's what you are! The way you treat that poor, good creature makes

one's blood boil."

Krafft waved her away, and opening the window, leaned out on the sill:

a wave of warm air filled the room. Maurice rose with renewed decision,

and sought his hat. But Krafft also took his down from a peg. "Yes, let

us go out."

It was a breathless August night, laden with intensified scents and

smells, and the moonlight lay thick and white on the ground: a night to

provoke to extravagant follies. In the utter stillness of the woods,

the young men passed from places of inky blackness into bluish white

patches, dropped through the trees like monstrous silver thalers. The

town lay behind them in a glorifying haze; the river stretched

silver-scaled in the moonlight, like a gigantic fish-back.

Krafft walked in front of his companion, in preoccupied silence. His

slender hands, dangling loosely, still twitched from their recent

exertions, and from time to time, he turned the palms outward, with an

impatient gesture. Maurice wished himself alone. He was not at ease

under this new companionship that had thrust itself upon him; indeed, a

strong mental antagonism was still uppermost in him, towards the moody

creature at whose heels he followed; and if, at this moment, he had

been asked to give voice to his feelings, the term "crazy idiot" would

have been the first to rise to his lips.

Suddenly, without turning, or slackening his pace, Krafft commenced to

speak: at first in a low voice, as if he were thinking aloud. But one

word gave another, his thoughts came rapidly, he began to gesticulate,

and finally, wrought on by the beauty of the night, by this choice

moment for speech, still excited by his own playing, and in an infinite

need of expression, he swept the silence before him with the force of a

flood set free. If he thought Maurice were about to interrupt him, he

made an imploring gesture, and left what he was saying unfinished, to

spring over to the next theme ready in his brain. Names jostled one

another on his tongue: he passed from Beethoven and Chopin to Berlioz

and Wagner, to Liszt and Richard Strauss--and his words were to Maurice

like the unrolling of a great scroll. In the same breath, he was with

Nietzsche, and Apollonic and Dionysian; and from here he went on to

Richard Dehmel, to ANATOL, and the gentle "Loris" of the early verses;

to Max Klinger, and the propriety of coloured sculpture; to PAPA HAMLET

and the future of the LIED. Maurice, listening intently, had fleeting

glimpses into a land of which he knew nothing. He kept as still as a

mouse, in order not to betray his ignorance; for Krafft was not

didactic, and talked as if the subjects he touched on were as familiar

to Maurice as to himself. On the other hand, Maurice believed it was a

matter of indifference to him whether he was understood or not; he

spoke for the pure joy of talking, out of the motley profusion of his

knowledge.

Meanwhile, he had grown personal. And while he was still speaking with

fervour of Vienna--which was his home--of gay, melancholy Wien, he

flung round and put a question to his companion.

"Do you ever think of death?"

Maurice had been the listener for so long that he started.

"Death?" he echoed, and was as much embarrassed as though asked whether

he believed in God. "I don't know. No, I don't think I do. Why should

one think of death when one is alive and well?"

Krafft laughed at this, with a pitying irony. "Happy you!" he said.

"Happy you!" His voice sank, and he continued almost fearfully: "I have

the vision of it before me, always wherever I go. Listen; I will tell

you; it is like this." He laid his hand on Maurice's arm, and drew him

nearer. "I know--no matter how strong and sound I may be at this

moment; no matter how I laugh, or weep, or play the fool; no matter how

little thought I give it, or whether I think about it all day long--I

know the hour will come, at last, when I shall gasp, choke, grow black

in the face, in the vain struggle for another single mouthful of that

air which has always been mine at will. And no one will be able to help

me; there is no escape from that hour; no power on earth can keep it

from me. And it is all a matter of chance when it happens--a great

lottery: one draws to-day, one to-morrow; but my turn will surely come,

and each day that passes brings me twenty-four hours nearer the end."

He drew still closer to Maurice. "Tell me, have you never stood before

a doorway--the doorway of some strange house that you have perhaps

never consciously gone past before--and waited, with the atrocious

curiosity that death and its hideous paraphernalia waken in one, for a

coffin to be carried out?--the coffin of an utter stranger, who is of

interest to you now, for the first and the last time. And have you not

thought to yourself, with a shudder, that some day, in this selfsame

way, under the same indifferent sky, among a group of loiterers as idly

curious as these, you yourself will be carried out, feet foremost, like

a bale of goods, like useless lumber, all will and dignity gone from

you, never to enter there again?--there, where all the little human

things you have loved, and used, and lived amongst, are lying just as

you left them--the book you laid down, the coat you wore--now all of a

greater worth than you. You are mere dead flesh, and behind the horrid

lid lie stark and cold, with rigid fingers and half-closed eyes, and

the chief desire of every one, even of those you have loved most, is to

be rid of you, to be out of reach of sight and smell of you. And so,

after being carted, and jolted, and unloaded, you will be thrown into a

hole, and your body, ice-cold, and as yielding as meat to the

touch--oh, that awful icy softness!--your flesh will begin to rot, to

be such that not your nearest friend would touch you. God, it is

unbearable!"

He wiped his forehead, and Maurice was silent, not knowing what to say;

he felt that such rational arguments as he might be able to offer,

would have little value in the face of this intensely personal view,

which was stammered forth with the bitterness of an accusation. But as

they crossed the suspension bridge, Krafft stopped, and stood looking

at the water, which glistened in the moonlight like a living thing.

"No, it is impossible for me to put death out of my mind," he went on.

"And yet, a spring into this silver fire down here would end all that,

and satisfy one's curiosity as well. Why is one not readier to make the

spring?--and what would one's sensations be? The mad rush through the

air--the crash--the sinking in the awful blackness ..."

"Those of fear and cold. You would wish yourself out again," answered

Maurice; and as Krafft nodded, without seeming to resent his tone, he

ventured to put forward a few points for the other side of the

question. He suggested that always to be brooding over death unfitted

you for life. Every one had to die when his time came; it was foolish

to look upon your own death as an exception to the rule. Besides, when

sensation had left you--the soul, the spirit, whatever you liked to

call it--what did it matter what afterwards became of your body? It

was, then, in reality, nothing but lumber, fresh nourishment for the

soil; and it was morbid to care so much how it was treated, just

because it had once been your tenement, when it was now as worthless as

the crab's empty shell.

He stuttered this out piece-wise, in his halting German; then paused,

not sure how his companion would take the didactic tone he had fallen

into. But Krafft had turned, and was gazing at him, considering him

attentively for the first time. When Maurice ceased to speak, he nodded

a hasty assent: "Yes, yes, it is quite true. Go on." And as the former,

having nothing more to say, was mute, he added: "You are like some one

I once knew. He was a great musician. I saw him die; he died by inches;

it lasted for months; he could neither die nor live."

"Why do you brood over these things, if you find them so awful? Are you

not afraid your nerves will go through with you, and make you do

something foolish?" asked Maurice, and was himself astonished at his

boldness.

"Of course I am. My life is a perpetual struggle against suicide,"

answered Krafft.

In the distance, a church-clock struck a quarter to twelve, and it was

on Maurice's tongue to suggest that they should move homewards, when,

with one of his unexpected transitions, Krafft turned to him and said

in a low voice: "What do you say? Shall you and I be friends?"

Maurice hesitated, in some embarrassment. "Why yes, I should be very

glad."

"And you will let me say 'DU' to you?"

"Certainly. If you are sure you won't regret it in the morning."

Krafft stretched out his hand. As Maurice held in his the fine, slim

fingers, which seemed mere skin and muscle, a hitherto unknown feeling

of kindliness came over him for the young man at his side. At this

moment, he had the lively sensation that he was the stronger and wiser

of the two, and that it was even a little beneath him to take the other

too seriously.

"You think so poorly of me then? You think no good thing can come out

of me?" asked Krafft, and there was an appealing note in his voice,

which, but a short time back, had been so overbearing.

Had Maurice known him better, he would have promptly retorted: "Don't

be a fool." As it was, he laughed. "Who am I to sit in judgment? The

only thing I do know is, that if I had your talent--no, a quarter of

it--I should pull myself together and astonish the world."

"It sounds so easy; but I have too many doubts of myself," said Krafft,

and laid his hand on Maurice's shoulder. "And I have never had anyone

to keep me up to the mark--till now. I have always needed some one like

you. You are strong and sympathetic; and one has the feeling that you

understand."

Maurice was far from certain that he did. However, he answered in a

frank way, doing his best to keep down the sentimental tone that had

invaded the conversation. At heart he was little moved by this new

friendship, which hail begun with the word itself; he told himself that

it was only a whim of Krafft's, which would be forgotten in the

morning. But, as they stood thus on the bridge, shoulder to shoulder,

he did not understand how he could ever have taken anything this frail

creature did, amiss. At the moment, there was a clinging helplessness

about Krafft, which instinctively roused his manlier feelings. He said

to himself that he had done wrong in lightly condemning his companion;

and, impelled by this sudden burst of protectiveness, he seized the

moment, and spoke earnestly to Krafft of earnest things, of duty, not

only to one's fellows, but to oneself and one's abilities, of the

inspiring gain of unremitted endeavour.

Afterwards, they sauntered home--first to Maurice's lodging, then to

Krafft's, and once again to Maurice's. At this stage, Krafft was

frankness itself; Maurice learnt to his surprise that the slim, boyish

lad at his side was over twenty-seven years of age; that, for several

semesters, Krafft had studied medicine in Vienna, then had thrown up

this "disgusting occupation," to become a clerk in a wealthy uncle's

counting-house. From this, he had drifted into journalism, and finally,

at the instigation of Hans von Bullow, to music; he had been for two

and a half years with Bullow, on travel, and in Hamburg, and was at

present in Leipzig solely to have his "fingers put in order." His plans

for the future were many, and widely divergent. At one time, a musical

career tempted him irresistibly; every one but Schwarz--this

finger-machine, this generator of living metronomes--believed that he

could make a name for himself as a player of Chopin. At other times,

and more often, he contemplated retiring from the world and entering a

monastery. He spoke with a morbid horror--yet as if the idea of it

fascinated him--of the publicity of the concert-platform, and painted

in glowing colours a monastery he knew of, standing on a wooded hill,

not far from Vienna. He had once spent several weeks there, recovering

from an illness, and the gardens, the trimly bedded flowers, the

glancing sunlight in the utter silence of the corridors, were things he

could not forget. He had lain day for day on a garden-bench, reading

Novalis, and it still seemed to him that the wishless happiness of

those days was the greatest he had known.

Beside this, Maurice's account of himself sounded tame and unimportant;

he felt, too, that the circumstances of English life were too far

removed from his companion's sphere, for the latter to be able to

understand them.

On waking next morning, Maurice recalled the incidents of the evening

with a smile; felt a touch of warmth at the remembrance of the moment

when he had held Krafft's hand in his; then classed the whole episode

as strained, and dismissed it from his mind. He had just shut the

piano, after a busy forenoon, when Krafft burst in, his cheeks pink

with haste and excitement. He had discovered a room to let, in the

house he lived in, and nothing would satisfy him but that Maurice

should come instantly to see it. Laughing at his eagerness, Maurice put

forward his reasons for preferring to remain where he was. But Krafft

would take no denial, and not wishing to hurt his feelings, Maurice

gave way, and agreed at least to look at the room.

It was larger and more cheerful than his own, and had also, a

convenient alcove for the bedstead; and after inspecting it, Maurice

felt willing to expend the extra marks it cost. They withdrew to

Krafft's room to come to a decision. There, however, they found Avery

Hill, who, as soon as she heard what they contemplated, put a veto on

it. Growing pale, as she always did where others would have flushed,

she said: "It is an absurd idea--sheer nonsense! I won't have it,

understand that! Pray, excuse me," she continued to Maurice, speaking

in a more friendly tone than she had yet used to him, "but you must not

listen to him. It is just one of his whims--nothing more. In less than

a week, you would wish yourself away again. You have no idea how

changeable he is--how impossible to live with."

Maurice hastened to reassure her. Krafft did not speak; he stood at the

window, with his back to them, his forehead pressed against the glass.

So Maurice continued to live in the BRAUSTRASSE, under the despotic

rule of Frau Krause, who took every advantage of his good-nature. But

after this, not a day passed without his seeing Krafft; the latter

sought him out on trivial pretexts. Maurice hardly recognised him: he

was gentle, amiable, and amenable to reason; he subordinated himself

entirely to Maurice, and laid an ever-increasing weight on his opinion.

Maurice became able to wind him round his finger; and the hint of a

reproof from him served to throw Krafft into a state of nervous

depression. Without difficulty, Maurice found himself to rights in his

role of mentor, and began to flatter himself that he would ultimately

make of Krafft a decent member of society. As it was, he soon induced

his friend to study in a more methodical way; they practised for the

same number of hours in the forenoon, and met in the afternoon; and

Krafft only sometimes broke through this arrangement, by appearing in

the BRAUSTRASSE early in the morning, and, despite remonstrance,

throwing himself on the sofa, and remaining there, while Maurice

practised. The latter ended by growing accustomed to this whim as to

several other things that had jarred on him--such as Krafft's love for

a dirty jest--and overlooked or forgave them. At first embarrassed by

the mushroom growth of a friendship he had not invited, he soon grew

genuinely attached to Krafft, and missed him when he was absent from

him.

Avery Hill could hardly be termed third in the alliance; Maurice's

advent had thrust her into the background, where she kept watch over

their doings with her cold, disdainful eye. Maurice was not clear how

she regarded his intrusion. Sometimes, particularly when she saw the

improvement in Heinrich's way of life, she seemed to tolerate his

presence gladly; at others again, her jealous aversion to him was too

open to be overlooked. The jealousy was natural; he was an interloper,

and Heinz neglected her shamefully for him; but there was something

else behind it, another feeling, which Maurice could not make out. He

by no means understood the relationship that existed between his friend

and this girl of the stone-grey eyes and stern, red lips. The two lived

almost door by door, went in and out of each other's rooms at all

hours, and yet, he had never heard them exchange an affectionate word,

or seen a mark of endearment pass between them. Avery's attachment--if

such it could be called--was noticeable only in the many small ways in

which she cared for Krafft's comfort; her manner with him was

invariably severe and distant, with the exception of those occasions

when a seeming trifle raised in her a burst of the dull, passionate

anger, beneath which Krafft shrank. Maurice believed that his friend

would be happier away from her; in spite of her fresh colouring, he,

Maurice, found her wanting in attraction, nothing that a woman ought to

be. But her name was rarely mentioned between them; Krafft was, as a

rule, reticent concerning her, and when he did speak of her, it was in

a tone of such contempt that Maurice was glad to shirk the subject.

"It's all she wants," Krafft had replied, when his companion ventured

to take her part. "She wouldn't thank you to be treated differently.

Believe me, women are all alike; they are made to be trodden on.

Ill-usage brings out their good points--just as kneading makes dough

light. Let them alone, or pamper them, and they spread like a weed, and

choke you"--and he quoted a saying about going to women and not

forgetting the whip, at which Maurice stood aghast.

"But why, if you despise a person like that--why have her always about

you?" he cried, at the end of a flaming plea for woman's dignity and

worth.

Krafft shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose the truth is we are dependent

on them--yes, dependent, from the moment we are laid in the cradle.

It's a woman who puts on our first clothes and a woman who puts on our

last. But why talk about these things?"--he slipped his arm through

Maurice's. "Tell me about yourself; and when you are tired of talking,

I will play."

It usually ended in his playing. They ranged through the highways and

byways of music.

One afternoon--it was a warm, wet, grey day towards the end of

August--Maurice found Krafft in a strangely apathetic mood. The

weather, this moist warmth, had got on his nerves, he said; he had been

unable to settle to anything; was weighed down by a lassitude heavier

than iron. When Maurice entered, he was stretched on the sofa, with

closed eyes; on his chest slept Wotan, the one-eyed cat, now growing

sleek and fat. While Maurice was trying to rally him, Krafft sprang up.

With a precipitance that was the extreme opposite of his previous

sloth, he lowered both window-blinds, and, lighting two candles, set

them on the piano, where they dispersed the immediate darkness, but no

more.

"I am going to play TRISTAN to you."

Maurice had learnt by this time that it was useless to try to thwart

Krafft. He laughed and nodded, and having nothing in particular to do,

lay down in the latter's place on the sofa.

Krafft shook his hair back, and began the prelude to the opera in a

rapt, ecstatic way, finding in the music an outlet for all his

nervousness. At first, he played from memory; when this gave out, he

set the piano-score up before him, then forgot it again, and went on

playing by heart. Sometimes he sang the different parts, in a light,

sweet tenor; sometimes recited them, with dramatic fervour. Only he

never ceased to play, never gave his hearer a moment in which to

recover himself.

Frau Schulz's entry with the lamp, and her grumblings at the

"UNVERSCHAMTE SPEKTAKEL" passed unheeded. A strength that was more than

human seemed to take possession of the frail youth at the piano.

Evening crept on afternoon, night on evening, and still he continued,

drunk with the most emotional music conceived by a human brain.

Even when hands and fingers could do no more, the frenzy that was in

him would not let him rest: he paced the room, and talked--talked for

hours, his eyes ablaze. A church-clock struck ten, then half-past, then

eleven, and not for a moment was he still; his speech seemed, indeed,

to gather impetus as it advanced like a mountain torrent.

Then, all of a sudden, in the middle of a vehement defence of

anti-Semitism, to which he had been led by the misdeeds of those

"arch-charlatans," Mendelssohn and Meyerbeer, he stopped short, like a

run-down clock, and, falling into a chair before the table, buried his

face in his arms. There was silence, the more intense for all that had

preceded it. Wotan wakened from sleep, and was heard to stretch his

limbs, with a yawn and a sigh. The spell was broken; Maurice, his head

in a whirl, rose stiff and cramped from his uncomfortable position on

the sofa.

"You rascal, you make one lose all sense of time. And I am starving. I

must snatch something at Canitz's as I go by."

Krafft started, and raised a haggard face with twitching lips. "You are

not going to leave me?--like this?"

Maurice was both hungry and tired--worn out, in fact.

"We will go somewhere in the town," said Krafft. "And then for a walk.

The rain has stopped--look!"

He drew up one of the blinds, and they saw that the stars were shining.

"Yes, but what about to-morrow?--and to-morrow's work?"

"To-morrow may never come. And to-night is."

"Those are only words. Do you know the time?"

Krafft turned quickly from the window. "And if I make it a test of the

friendship you have professed for me, that you stay here with me

to-night?--You can sleep on the sofa."

"Why on earth get personal?" said Maurice; he could not find his hat,

which had fallen in a dark corner. "Heinz, dear boy, be reasonable.

Come, give me the house-key--like a good fellow."

"It's the first--the only thing, I have asked of you."

"Nonsense. You have asked dozens."

Krafft took a few steps towards him, and threw the key on the floor at

his feet. Wotan, who was at the door, mewing to be let out, sprang

back, in affright.

"Go, go, go!" Krafft cried. "I never want to see you again."

Earlier than usual the next morning, Maurice returned to set things

right, and to laugh with Heinz at their extravagance the night before.

But Krafft was not to be seen. From Frau Schulz, who flounced past him

in the passage, first with hot water, then with black coffee, Maurice

learned that Krafft had been brought home early that morning, in a

disgraceful state of intoxication. Frau Schulz still boiled at the

remembrance.

"SO 'N SCHWEIN, SO 'N SCHWEIN!" she cried. "But this time he goes. I

have said it before and, fool that I am, have always let them persuade

me. But this is the end. Not a day after the fifteenth will I have him

in the house."

Maurice slipped away.

Two days passed before he saw his friend again. He found him pale and

dejected, with reddish, heavy eyes and a sneering smile. He was wholly

changed; his words were tainted with the perverse irony, which, at the

beginning of their acquaintance, had made his manner so repellent. But

now, Maurice was not, at once, frightened away by it; he could not

believe Heinrich's pique was serious, and gave himself trouble to win

his friend back. He chid, laughed, rallied, was earnest and apologetic,

and all this without being conscious of having done wrong.

"I think you had better leave him alone," said Avery, after watching

his fruitless efforts. "He doesn't want you."

It was true; now Krafft had no thought for anyone but Avery. It was

Avery here, and Avery there. He called her by a pet name, was anxious

for her comfort, and hung affectionately on her arm.--The worst of it

was, that he did not seem in the least ashamed of his fickleness.

Maurice made one further attempt to move him, then, hurt and angry,

intruded no more. At first, he was chiefly angry. But, gradually, the

hurt deepened, and became a sense of injury, which made him avoid the

street Krafft lived in, and shun him when they met. He missed him,

after the close companionship of the past weeks, and felt as if he had

been suddenly deprived of a part of himself. And he would no doubt have

missed him more keenly still, if, just at this juncture, his attention

had not been engrossed by another and more important matter.

XIII.

The commencement of the new term had just assembled the incoming

students to sign their names in the venerable rollbook, when the report

spread that Schilsky was willing to play his symphonic poem,

ZARATHUSTRA, to those of his friends who cared to hear it. Curiosity

swelled the number, and Furst lent his house for the occasion.

"You'll come, of course," said the latter to Maurice, as they left

Schwarz's room after their lesson; and Madeleine said the same thing

while driving home from the railway-station, where Maurice had met her.

She was no more a friend of Schilsky's than he was, but she certainly

intended to be present, to hear what kind of stuff he had turned out.

On the evening of the performance, Maurice and she walked together to

the BRANDVORWERKSTRASSE. Madeleine had still much to say. She had

returned from her holiday in the best of health and spirits, liberally

rewarded for her trouble, and possessed of four new friends, who, no

doubt, would all be of use to her when she settled in England again.

This was to be her last winter in Leipzig, and she was drawing up

detailed plans of work. From now on, she intended to take private

lessons from Schwarz, in addition to those she received in the class.

"Even though they do cost ten marks each, it makes him ever so much

better disposed towards you."

She also told him that she had found a letter from Louise waiting for

her, in which the latter announced her return for the following week.

Louise wrote from England, and all her cry was to be back in Leipzig.

"Of course--now he is here," commented Madeleine. "You know, I suppose,

that he has been travelling with Zeppelin? He has the luck of I don't

know what."

The Cayhills would be absent till the middle of the month; Maurice had

received from Ephie one widely written note, loud in praise of a family

of "perfectly sweet Americans," whom they had learnt to know in

Interlaken, but also expressing eagerness to be at home again in "dear

old Leipzig." Dove had arrived a couple of days ago--and here Madeleine

laughed.

"He is absolutely shiny with resolution," she declared. "Mind, Maurice,

if he takes you into confidence--as he probably will--you are not on

any account to dissuade him from proposing. A snub will do him worlds

of good."

They were not the first to climb the ill-lighted stair that wound up to

the Fursts' dwelling. The entry-door on the fourth storey stood open,

and a hum of voices came from the sitting-room. The circular hat-stand

in the passage was crowded with motley headgear.

As they passed the kitchen, the door of which was ajar, Frau Furst

peeped through the slit, and seeing Maurice, called him in. The

coffee-pot was still on the stove; he must sit down and drink a cup of

coffee.

"There is plenty of time. Schilsky has not come yet, and I have only

this moment sent Adolfchen for the beer."

Maurice asked her if she were not coming in to hear the music. She

laughed good-naturedly at the idea.

"Bless your heart, what should I do in there, among all you young

people? No, no, I can hear just as well where I am. When my good

husband had his evenings, it was always from the kitchen that I

listened."

Pausing, with a saucepan in one hand, a cloth in the other, she said:

"You will hear something good to-night, Herr Guest. Oh, he has talent,

great talent, has young Schilsky! This is not the usual work of a

pupil. It has form, and it has ideas, and it is new and daring. I know

one of the motives from hearing Franz play it," and she hummed a theme

as she replaced on the shelf, the scrupulously cleaned pot. "For such a

young man, it is wonderful; but he will do better still, depend upon

it, he will."

Here she threw a hasty glance round the tiny kitchen, at three of the

children sitting as still as mice in the corner, laid a finger on her

lips, and, bursting with mystery, leaned over the table and asked

Maurice if he could keep a secret.

"He is going away," she whispered.

Maurice stared at her. "Going away? Who is? What do you mean?" he

asked, and was so struck by her peculiar manner that he set his cup

down untouched.

"Why Schilsky, of course." She thought his astonishment was disbelief,

and nodded confirmingly. "Yes, yes, he is going away. And soon, too."

"How do you know?" cried Maurice. Sitting back in his chair, he stemmed

his hands against the edge of the table, and looked challengingly at

Frau Furst.

"Ssh--not so loud," said the latter. "It's a secret, a dead

secret--though I'm sure I don't know why. Franz----"

At this very moment, Franz himself came into the kitchen. He looked

distrustfully at his whispering mother.

"Now then, mother, haven't you got that beer yet?" he demanded. His

genial bonhomie disappeared, as if by magic, when he entered his home

circle, and he was particularly gruff with this adoring woman.

"GLEICH, FRANZCHEN, GLEICH," she answered soothingly, and whisked about

her work again, with the air of one caught napping.

Maurice followed Furst's invitation to join the rest of the party.

The folding-doors between the "best room" and the adjoining bedroom had

been opened wide, and the guests were distributed over the two rooms.

The former was brilliantly lighted by three lamps and two candles, and

all the sitting-accommodation the house contained was ranged in a

semicircle round the grand piano. Here, not a place was vacant; those

who had come late were in the bedroom, making shift with whatever

offered. Two girls and a young man, having pushed back the feather-bed,

sat on the edge of the low wooden bedstead, with their arms interlaced

to give them a better balance. Maurice found Madeleine on a rickety

little sofa that stood at the foot of the bed. Dove sat on a chest of

drawers next the sofa, his long legs dangling in the air. Beside

Madeleine, with his head on her shoulder, was Krafft.

"Oh, there you are," cried Madeleine. "Well, I did my best to keep the

place for you; but it was of no use, as you see. Just sit down,

however. Between us, we'll squeeze him properly."

Maurice was glad that the room, which was lighted only by one small

lamp, was in semi-darkness; for, at the sound of his own voice, it

suddenly became clear to him that the piece of gossip Frau Furst had

volunteered, had been of the nature of a blow. Schilsky's departure

threatened, in a way he postponed for the present thinking out, to

disturb his life; and, in an abrupt need of sympathy, he laid his hand

on Krafft's knee.

"Is it you, old man? What have you been doing with yourself?"

Krafft gave him one of those looks which, in the early days of their

acquaintance, had proved so disconcerting--a look of struggling

recollection.

"Oh, nothing in particular," he replied, without hostility, but also

without warmth. His mind was not with his words, and Maurice withdrew

his hand.

Madeleine leaned forward, dislodging Krafft's head from its

resting-place.

"How long have you two been 'DU' to each other?" she asked, and at

Maurice's curt reply, she pushed Krafft from her. "Sit up and behave

yourself. One would think you had an evil spirit in you to-night."

Krafft was nervously excited: bright red spots burnt on his cheeks, his

hands twitched, and he jerked forward in his seat and threw himself

back again, incessantly.

"No, you are worse than a mosquito," cried Madeleine, losing patience.

"Anyone would think you were going to play yourself. And he will be as

cool as an iceberg. The sofa won't stand it, Heinz. If you can't stop

fidgeting, get up."

He had gone, before she finished speaking; for a slight stir in the

next room made them suppose for a moment that Schilsky was arriving.

Afterwards, Krafft was to be seen straying about, with his hands in his

pockets; and, on observing his rose-pink cheeks and tumbled curly hair,

Madeleine could not refrain from remarking: "He ought to have been a

girl."

The air was already hot, by reason of the lamps, and the many breaths,

and the firmly shut double-windows. The clamour for beer had become

universal by the time Adolfchen arrived with his arms full of bottles.

As there were not enough glasses to go round, every two or three

persons shared one between them--a proceeding that was carried out with

much noisy mirth. Above all other voices was to be heard that of Miss

Jensen, who, in a speckled yellow dress, with a large feather fan in

her hand, sat in the middle of the front row of seats. It was she who

directed how the beer should be apportioned; she advised a few

late-comers where they would still find room, and engaged Furst to

place the lights on the piano to better advantage. Next her, a Mrs.

Lautenschlager, a plump little American lady, with straight yellow hair

which hung down on her shoulders, was relating to her neighbour on the

other side, in a tone that could be clearly heard in both rooms, how

she had "discovered" her voice.

"I come to Schwarz, last fall," she said shaking back her hair, and

making effective use of her babyish mouth; "and he thinks no end of me.

But the other week I was sick, and as I lay in bed, I sung some--just

for fun. And my landlady--she's a regular singer herself--who was

fixing up the room, she claps her hands together and says: 'My goodness

me! Why YOU have a voice!' That's what put it in my head, and I went to

Sperling to hear what he'd got to say. He was just tickled to death, I

guess he was, and he's going to make something dandy of it, so I stop

long enough. I don't know what my husband'll say though. When I wrote

him I was sick, he says: 'Come home and be sick at home'--that's what

he says."

Miss Jensen could not let pass the opportunity of breaking a lance for

her own master, the Swede, and of cutting up Sperling's method, which

she denounced as antiquated. She made quite a little speech, in the

course of which she now and then interrupted herself to remind

Furst--who, was as soft as a pudding before her--of something he had

forgotten to do, such as snuffing the candles or closing the door.

"Just let me hear your scale, will you?" she said patronisingly to Mrs.

Lautenschlager. The latter, nothing loath, stuck out her chin, opened

her mouth, and, for a short time, all other noises were drowned in a

fine, full volume of voice.

On their sofa, Madeleine and Maurlee sat in silence, pretending to

listen to Dove, who was narrating his journey. Madeleine was out of

humour; she tapped the floor, and had a crease in her forehead. As for

Maurice, he was in such poor spirits that she could not but observe it.

"Why are you so quiet? Is anything the matter?"

He shook his head, without speaking. His vague sense of impending

misfortune had crystallised into a definite thought; he knew now what

it signified. If Schilsky went away from Leipzig, Louise would probably

go, too, and that would be the end of everything.

"I represented to him," he heard Dove saying, "that I had seen the

luggage with my own eyes at Flushing. What do you think he answered? He

looked me up and down, and said: 'ICH WERDE TELEGRAPHIEREN UND

ERKUNDIGUNGEN EINZIEHEN.' Now, do you think if you said to an English

station-master: 'Sir, I saw the luggage with my own eyes,' he would not

believe you? No, in my opinion, the whole German railway-system needs

revision. Would you believe it, we did not make fifty kilometers in the

hour, and yet our engine broke down before Magdeburg?"

So this would be the end; the end of foolish dreams and weak hopes,

which he had never put into words even to himself, which had never

properly existed, and yet had been there, nevertheless, a mass of

gloriously vague perhapses. The end was at hand--an end before there

had been any beginning.

"... the annoyance of the perpetual interruptions," went on the voice

on the other side. "A lady who was travelling in the same

compartment--a very pleasant person, who was coming over to be a

teacher in a school in Dresden--I have promised to show her our lions

when she visits Leipzig: well, as I was saying, she was quite alarmed

the first time he entered in that way, and it took me some time, I

assure you, to make her believe that this was the German method of

revising tickets."

The break occasioned by the arrival of the beer had been of short

duration, and the audience was growing impatient; at the back of the

room, some one began to stamp his feet; others took it up. Furst

perspired with anxiety, and made repeated journeys to the stair-head,

to see if Schilsky were not coming. The latter was almost an hour late

by now, and jests, bald and witty, were made at his expense. Some one

offered to take a bet that he had fallen asleep and forgotten the

appointment, and at this, one of the girls on the bed, a handsome

creature with bold, prominent eyes, related an anecdote to her

neighbours, concerning Schilsky's powers of sleep. All three exploded

with laughter. In a growing desire to be asked to play, Boehmer had for

some time hung about the piano, and was now just about to drop, as if

by accident, upon the stool, when the cry of: "No Bach!" was

raised--Bach was Boehmer's specialty--and re-echoed, and he retired red

and discomfited to his Place in a corner of the room, where his

companion, a statuesque little English widow, made biting observations

on the company's behaviour. The general rowdyism was at its height,

when some one had the happy idea that Krafft should sing them his

newest song. At this, there was a unanimous shriek of approval, and

several hands dragged Krafft to the piano. But himself the wildest of

them all, he needed no forcing. Flinging himself down on the seat, he

preluded wildly in imitation of Rubinstein. His hearers sat with their

mouths open, a fixed smile on their faces, laughter ready in their

throats, and only Madeleine was coolly contemptuous.

"Tom-fool!" she said in a low voice.

Krafft was confidently expected to burst into one of those songs for

which he was renowned. Few of his friends were able to sing them, and

no one but himself could both sing and play them simultaneously: they

were a monstrous, standing joke. Instead of this, however, he turned,

winked at his audience, and began a slow, melancholy ditty, with a

recurring refrain. He was not allowed to finish the first verse; a howl

of disapproval went up; his hearers hooted, jeered and stamped.

"Sick cats!"

"Damn your 'WENIG SONNE!'"--this was the refrain.

"Put your head in a bag!"

"Pity he drinks!"

"Give us one of the rousers--the rou ... sers!"

Krafft himself laughed unbridledly. "DAS ICH SPRICHT!"--he announced.

"In C sharp major."

There was a hush of anticipation, in which Dove, stopping his BRETZEL

half-way to his mouth, was heard to say in his tone of measured

surprise: "C sharp major! Why, that is----"

The rest was drowned in the wild chromatic passages that Krafft sent up

and down the piano with his right hand, while his left followed with

full-bodied chords, each of which exceeded the octave. Before, however,

there was time to laugh, this riot ceased, and became a mournful

cadence, to the slowly passing harmonies of which, Krafft sang:

I am weary of everything that is, under the sun.

I sicken at the long lines of rain, which are black against the sky;

They drip, for a restless heart, with the drip of despair:

For me, winds must rage, trees bend, and clouds sail stormily.

The whirlwind of the prelude commenced anew; the chords became still

vaster; the player swayed from side to side, like a stripling-tree in a

storm. Madeleine said, "Tch!" in disgust, but the rest of the company,

who had only waited for this, burst into peals of laughter; some bent

double in their seats, some leant back with their chins in the air.

Even Dove smiled. Just, however, as those whose sense of humour was

most highly developed, mopped their faces with gestures of exhaustion,

and assured their neighbours that they "could not, really could not

laugh any more," Furst entered and flapped his hands.

"Here he comes!"

A sudden silence fell, broken only by a few hysterical giggles from the

ladies, and by a frivolous American, who cried: "Now for ALSO SCHRIE

ZENOPHOBIA!" Krafft stopped playing, but remained sitting at the piano,

wiping down the keys with his handkerchief.

Schilsky came in, somewhat embarrassed by the lull which had succeeded

the hubbub heard in the passage, but wholly unconcerned at the lateness

of the hour: except in matters of practical advancement, time did not

exist for him. As soon as he appeared, the two ladies in the front row

began to clap their hands; the rest of the company followed their

example, then, in spite of Furst's efforts to prevent it, rose and

crowded round him. Miss Jensen and her friend made themselves

particularly conspicuous. Mrs Lauterischlager had an infatuation for

the young man, of which she made no secret; she laid her hand

caressingly on his coat-sleeve, and put her face as near his as

propriety admitted.

"Disgusting, the way those women go on with him!" said Madeleine. "And

what is worse, he likes it."

Schilsky listened to the babble of compliments with that mixture of

boyish deference and unequivocal superiority, which made him so

attractive to women. He was too good-natured to interrupt them and free

himself, and would have stood as long as they liked, if Furst had not

come to the rescue and led him to the piano. Schilsky laid his hand

affectionately on Krafft's shoulder, and Krafft sprang up in

exaggerated surprise. The audience took its seats again; the thick

manuscript-score was set up on the music-rack, and the three young men

at the piano had a brief disagreement with one another about turning

the leaves: Krafft was bent on doing it, and Schilsky objected, for

Krafft had a way of forgetting what he was at in the middle of a page.

Krafft flushed, cast an angry look at his friend, and withdrew, in high

dudgeon, to a corner.

Standing beside the piano, so turned to those about him that the two on

the sofa in the next room only saw him sideways, and ill at that,

Schilsky gave a short description of his work. He was nervous, which

aggravated his lisp, and he spoke so rapidly and in such a low voice

that no one but those immediately in front of him, could understand

what he said. But it did not matter in the least; all present had come

only to hear the music; they knew and cared nothing about Zarathustra

and his spiritual development; and one and all waited impatiently for

Schilsky to stop speaking. The listeners in the bedroom----merely

caught disjointed words--WERDEGANG, NOTSCHREI, TARANTELN--but not one

was curious enough even to lean forward in his seat. Madeleine made

sarcastic inward comments on the behaviour of the party.

"It's perfectly clear to you, I suppose," she could not refrain from

observing as, at the finish, Dove sagely wagged his head in agreement.

It transpired that there was an ode to be sung before the last section

of the composition, and a debate ensued who, should sing it. The two

ladies in the front had quite a little quarrel--without knowing

anything about the song--as to which of their voices would best suit

it. Schilsky was silent for a moment, tapping his fingers, then said

suddenly: "Come on, Heinz," and looked at Krafft. But the latter, who

was standing morose, with folded arms, did not move. He had a dozen

reasons why he should not sing; he had a cold, was hoarse, was out of

practice, could not read the music from sight.

"Good Heavens, what a fool Heinz is making of himself tonight!" said

Madeleine.

But Schilsky thumped his fist on the lid, and said, if Krafft did not

sing it, no one should; and that was the end of the matter. Krafft was

pulled to the piano.

Schilsky took his seat, and, losing his nervousness as soon as he

touched the keys, preluded firmly and easily, with his large, white

hands. Now, every one leaned forward to see him better; especially the

ladies threw themselves into positions from which they could watch hair

and hands, and the slender, swaying figure.

"Isn't he divine?" said the bold-eyed girl on the bed, in a loud

whisper, and hung upon her companion's neck in an ecstatic attitude.

After the diversity of noises which had hitherto interfered with his

thinking connectedly, Maurice welcomed the continuous sound of the

music, which went on without a break. He sat in a listening attitude,

shading his eyes with his hand. Through his fingers, he surreptitiously

watched the player. He had never before had an opportunity of observing

Schilsky so closely, and, with a kind of blatant generosity, he now

pointed out to himself each physical detail that he found prepossessing

in the other, every feature that was likely to attract--in the next

breath, only to struggle with his honest opinion that the composer was

a slippery, loose-jointed, caddish fellow, who could never be proved to

be worthy of Louise. But he was too down-hearted at what he had learnt

in the course of the evening, to rise to any active feeling of dislike.

Intermittently he heard, in spite of himself, something of Schilsky's

music; but he was not in a frame of mind to understand or to retain any

impression of it. He was more effectively jerked out of his

preoccupation by single spoken words, which, from time to time, struck

his ear: this was Furst, who, in the absence of a programme, announced

from his seat beside Schilsky, the headings of the different sections

of the work: WERDEGANG; SEILTANZER--here Maurice saw Dove conducting

with head and hand--NOTSCHREI; SCHWERMUT; TARANTELN--and here again,

but vaguely, as if at a distance, he heard suppressed laughter. But he

was thoroughly roused when Krafft, picking up a sheet of music and

coming round to the front of the piano, began to sing DAS TRUNKENE

LIED. By way of introduction, the low F in the bass of F minor sounded

persistently, at syncopated intervals; Schilsky inclined his head, and

Krafft sang, in his sweet, flute-like voice:

Oh, Mensch! Gieb Acht!

Was spricht die tiefe Mitternacht?

"Ich schlief, ich schlief,

Aus tiefem Schlaf bin ich erwacht:

Die Welt ist tief,

Und tiefer als der Tag gedacht."

--the last phrase of which was repeated by the accompaniment, a

semitone higher.

Tief ist ihr Weh,

Lust--tiefer noch als Herzeleid:

As far as this, the voice had been supported by simple, full-sounding

harmonies. Now, from out the depths, still of F minor, rose a

hesitating theme, which seemed to grope its way: in imagination, one

heard it given out by the bass strings; then the violas reiterated it,

and dyed it purple; voice and violins sang it together; the high little

flutes carried it up and beyond, out of reach, to a half close.

Weh spricht: vergeh!

Suddenly and unexpectedly, there entered a light yet mournful phrase in

F major, which was almost a dance-rhythm, and seemed to be a small,

frail pleading for something not rightly understood.

Doch alle Lust will Ewigkeit,

Will tiefe, tiefe Ewigkeit.

The innocent little theme passed away, and the words were sung again to

a stern and fateful close in D flat major.

The concluding section of the work returned to these motives, developed

them, gathered them together, grouped them and interchanged them, in

complicated thermatic counterpoint. Schilsky was barely able to cope

with the difficulties of the score; he exerted himself desperately,

laboured with his head and his whole body, and surmounted sheerly

unplayable parts with the genial slitheriness that is the privilege of

composers.

When, at last, he crashed to a close and wiped his face in exhaustion,

there was a deafening uproar of applause. Loud cries were uttered and

exclamations of enthusiasm; people rose from their seats and crowded

round the piano to congratulate the player. Mrs. Lautenschlager could

not desist from kissing his hand. A tall, thin Russian girl in

spectacles, who had assiduously taken notes throughout, asked in a loud

voice, and her peculiar, hoppy German, for information about the

orchestration. What use had he made of the cymbals? She trusted a

purely Wagnerian one. Schilsky hastened to reopen the score, and sat

himself to answer the question earnestly and at length.

"Come, Maurice, let us go," said Madeleine, rising and shaking the

creases from her skirt. "There will be congratulations enough. He won't

miss ours."

Maurice had had an idea of lingering till everybody else had gone, on

the chance of picking up fresh facts. But he was never good at excuses.

So they slipped out into the passage, followed by Dove; but while the

latter was looking for his hat, Madeleine pulled Maurice down the

stairs.

"Quick, let us go!" she whispered; and, as they heard him coming after

them, she drew her companion down still further, to the cellar flight,

where they remained hidden until Dove had passed them, and his steps

had died away in the street.

"We should have had nothing but his impressions and opinions all the

way home," she said, as they emerged. "He was bottled up from having to

keep quiet so long--I saw it in his face. And I couldn't stand it

to-night. I'm in a bad temper, as you may have observed--or perhaps you

haven't."

No, he had not noticed it.

"Well, you would have, if you hadn't been so taken up with yourself.

What on earth is the matter with you?"

He feigned surprise: and they walked in silence down one street and

into the next. Then she spoke again. "Do you know--but you're sure not

to know that either--you gave me a nasty turn to-night?"

"I?" His surprise was genuine this time.

"Yes, you--when I heard you say 'DU' to Heinz."

He looked at her in astonishment; but she was not in a hurry to

continue. They walked another street-length, and all she said was: "How

refreshing the air is after those stuffy rooms!"

As they turned a corner however, she made a fresh start.

"I think it's rather hard on me," she said, and laughed as she spoke.

"Here am I again, having to lecture you! The fact is, I suppose, one's

METIER clings to one, in spite of oneself. But there must be something

about you, too, Maurice Guest, that makes one want to do it--want to

look after you, so to speak--as if you couldn't be trusted to take care

of yourself. Well, it disturbed me to-night, to see how intimate you

and Heinz have got."

"Is that all? Why on earth should that trouble you? And anyhow," he

added, "the whole affair came about without any wish of mine."

"How?" she demanded; and when he had told her: "And since then?"

He went into detail, coolly, without the resentment he had previously

felt towards Krafft.

"And that's all?"

"Isn't it enough--for a fellow to go on in that way?"

"And you feel aggrieved?"

"No, not now. At first I was rather sore, though, for Heinz is an

interesting fellow, and we were very thick for a time."

"Yes, of course--until Schilsky comes back. As soon as he appears on

the scene, Master Heinz gives you the cold shoulder. Or perhaps you

didn't know that Heinz is the attendant spirit of that heaven-born

genius?"

Maurice did not reply, and when she spoke again, it was with renewed

seriousness. "Believe me, Maurice, he is no friend for you. It's not

only that you ought to be above letting yourself be treated in this

way, but Heinz's friendship won't do you any good. He belongs to a bad

set here--and Schilsky, too. If you were long with Heinz, you would be

bound to get drawn into it, and then it would be good-bye to anything

you might have done--to work and success. No, take my advice--it's

sincerely meant--and steer clear of Heinz."

Maurice smiled to himself at her womanly idea of Krafft leading him to

perdition. "But you're fond of him yourself, Madeleine," he said. "You

can't help liking him either."

"I daresay I can't. But that is quite a different matter--quite;" and

as if more than enough had now been said, she abruptly left the subject.

Before going home that night, Maurice made the old round by way of the

BRUDERSTRASSE, and stood and looked up at the closed windows behind

which Louise lived. The house was dark, and as still as was the

deserted street. Only the Venetian blinds seemed to be faintly alive;

the outer windows, removed for the summer, had not yet been replaced,

and a mild wind flapped the blinds, just as it swayed the tops of the

trees in the opposite garden. There was a breath of autumn in the air.

He told himself aloud, in the nightly silence, that she was going

away--as if by repeating the words, he might ultimately grow used to

their meaning. The best that could be hoped for was that she would not

go immediately, but would remain in Leipzig for a few weeks longer.

Then a new fear beset him. What if she never came back again?--if she

had left the place quietly, of set purpose?--if these windows were

closed for good and all? A dryness invaded his throat at the

possibility, and on the top of this evening of almost apathetic

resignation to the inevitable, the knowledge surged up in him that all

he asked was to be allowed to see her just once more. Afterwards, let

come what might. Once again, he must stand face to face with her--must

stamp a picture of her on his brain, to carry with him for ever.

For ever!--And through his feverish sleep ran, like a thread, the words

he had heard Krafft sing, of an eternity that was deep and dreamless, a

joy without beginning or end.

Madeleine had waved her umbrella at him. He crossed the road to where

she was standing in rain-cloak and galoshes. She wished to tell him

that the date of her playing in the ABENDUNTERHALTUNG had been

definitely fixed. About to go, she said:

"Louise is back--did you know?"

Of course he knew, though he did not tell her so--knew almost the exact

hour at which the blinds had been drawn up, the windows opened, and a

flower-pot, in a gaudy pink paper, put out on the sill.

Not many days after this, he came upon Louise herself. She was standing

talking, at a street-corner, to the shabby little Englishman, Eggis,

with whom she had walked the FOYER of the theatre. Maurice was about to

bow and pass by, but she smiled and held out her hand.

"You are back, too, then? To-day I am meeting all my friends."

She had fur about her neck, although the weather was not really cold,

and her face rose out of this setting like a flower from its cup.

This meeting, and the few cordial words she had spoken, helped him over

the days that followed. Sometimes, while he waited for the blow to

fall, his daily life grew very unimportant; things that had hitherto

interested him, now went past like shadows; he himself was a mere

automaton. But sometimes, too, and especially after he had seen Louise,

and touched her living hand, he wondered whether he were not perhaps

tormenting himself unnecessarily. Nothing more had come to light; no

one had hinted by a word at Schilsky's departure; it might yet prove to

be all a mistake.

Then, however, he received a postcard from Madeleine, saying that she

had something interesting to tell him. He went too early, and spent a

quarter of an hour pacing her room. When she entered, she threw him a

look, and, before she had finished taking off her wraps, said:

"Maurice, I have a piece of news for you. Schilsky is going away."

He nodded; his throat was dry.

"Why, you don't mean to say you knew?" she cried, and paused half-way

out of her jacket.

Maurice went to the window, and stood with his back to her. In one of

the houses opposite, at a window on the same level, a girl was

practising the violin; his eyes followed the mechanical movements of

the bow.

He cleared his throat. "Do you--Is it likely--I mean, do you think?----"

Madeleine understood him. "Yes, I do. Louise won't stay here a day

longer than he does; I'm sure of that."

But otherwise she knew no more than Maurice; and she did not offer to

detain him, when, a few minutes later, he alleged a pressing

appointment. Madeleine was annoyed, and showed it; she had come in with

the intention of being kind to him, of encouraging him, and discussing

the matter sympathetically, and it now turned out that not only had he

known it all the time, but had also kept it a secret from her. She did

not like underhand ways, especially in people whom she believed she

knew inside out.

Now that the pledge of secrecy had been removed from him, Maurice felt

that he wanted facts; and, without thinking more about it than if he

had been there the day before, he climbed the stairs that led to

Krafft's lodging.

He found him at supper; Avery was present, too, and on the table sat

Wotan, who was being regaled with strips of skin off the sausage.

Krafft greeted Maurice with a touch of his former effusiveness; for he

was in a talkative mood, and needed an audience. At his order, Avery

put an extra plate on the table, and Maurice had to share their meal.

It was not hard for him to lead Krafft round to the desired subject. It

seemed that one of the masters in the Conservatorium had expressed a

very unequivocal opinion of Schilsky's talents as a composer, and

Krafft was now sarcastic, now merry, at this critic's expense. Maurice

laid down his knife, and, in the first break, asked abruptly: "When

does he go?"

"Go?--who?" said Krafft indifferently, tickling Wotan's nose with a

piece of skin which he held out of reach.

"Who?--why, Schilsky, of course."

It sounded as if another than he had said the words: they were so short

and harsh. The plate Avery was holding fell to the floor. Krafft sat

back in his chair, and stared at Maurice, with a face that was all eyes.

"You knew he was going away?--or didn't you?" asked Maurice in a rough

voice. "Every one knows. The whole place knows."

Krafft laughed. "The whole place knows: every one knows," he repeated.

"Every one, yes--every one but me. Every one but me, who had most right

to know. Yes, I alone had the right; for no one has loved him as I

have."

He rose from the table, knocking over his chair. "Or else it is not

true?"

"Yes, it is true. Then you didn't know?" said Maurice, bewildered by

the outburst he had evoked.

"No, we didn't know." It was Avery who spoke. She was on her knees,

picking up the pieces of the plate with slow, methodical fingers.

Krafft stood hesitating. Then he went to the piano, opened it, adjusted

the seat, and made all preparations for playing. But with his fingers

ready on the keys, he changed his mind and, instead, laid his arms on

the folded rack and his head on his arms. He did not stir again, and a

long silence followed. The only sound that was to be heard came from

Wotan, who, sitting on his haunches on a corner of the table, washed

the white fur of his belly with an audible swish.

XIV.

Whistling to him to stop, Furst ran the length of a street-block after

Maurice, as the latter left the Conservatorium.

"I say, Guest," he said breathlessly, on catching up with him. "Look

here, I just wanted to tell you, you must be sure and join us to-night.

We are going to give Schilsky a jolly send-off."

They stood at the corner of the WACHTERSTRASSE; it was a blowy day.

Maurice replied evasively, with his eyes on the unbound volume of

Beethoven that Furst was carrying; its tattered edges moved in the wind.

"When does he go?" he asked, without any show of concern.

Furst looked warily round him, and dropped his voice. "Well, look here,

Guest, I don't mind telling you," he said; he was perspiring from his

run, and dried his neck and face. "I don't mind telling you; you won't

pass it on; for he has his reasons--family or domestic reasons, if one

may say so, tra-la-la!"--he winked, and nudged Maurice with his

elbow--"for not wanting it to get about. It's deuced hard on him that

it should have leaked out at all. I don't know how it happened; for I

was mum, 'pon my honour, I was."

"Yes. And when does he go?" repeated his hearer with the same want of

interest.

"To-morrow morning early, by the first train."

Now to be rid of him! But it was never easy to get away from Furst, and

since Maurice had declared his intention of continuing to take lessons

from him, as good as impossible. Furst was overpowering in his

friendliness, and on this particular occasion, there was no escape for

Maurice before he had promised to make one of the party that was to

meet that night, at a restaurant in the town. Then he bluffly alleged

an errand in the PLAGWITZERSTRASSE, and went off in an opposite

direction to that which his companion had to take.

As soon as Furst was out of sight, he turned into the path that led to

the woods. Overhead, the sky was a monotonous grey expanse, and a soft,

moist wind drove in gusts, before which, on the open meadow-land, he

bent his head. It was a wind that seemed heavy with unfallen rain; a

melancholy wind, as the day itself was melancholy, in its faded

colours, and cloying mildness. With his music under his arm, Maurice

walked to the shelter of the trees. Now that he had learnt the worst, a

kind of numbness came over him; he had felt so intensely in the course

of the past week that, now the crisis was there, he seemed destitute of

feeling.

His feet bore him mechanically to his favourite seat, and here he

remained, with his head in his hands, his eyes fixed on the trodden

gravel of the path. He had to learn, once and for all, that, by

tomorrow, everything would be over; for, notwithstanding the

wretchedness of the past days, he was as far off as ever from

understanding. But he was loath to begin; he sat in a kind of torpor,

conscious only of the objects his eyes rested on: some children had

built a make-believe house of pebbles, with a path leading up to the

doorway, and at this he gazed, estimating the crude architectural ideas

that had occurred to the childish builders. He felt the wind in his

hair, and listened to the soothing noise it made, high above his head.

But gradually overcoming this physical dullness, his mind began to work

again. With a sudden vividness, he saw himself as he had walked these

very woods, seven months before; he remembered the brilliant colouring

of the April day, and the abundance of energy that had possessed him.

Then, on looking into the future, all his thoughts had been of

strenuous endeavour and success. Now, success was a word like any

other, and left him cold.

For a long time, in place of passing on to his real preoccupation, he

considered this, brooding over the change that had come about in him.

Was it, he asked himself, because he had so little whole-hearted

endurance, that when once a thing was within his grasp, that grasp

slackened? Was it that he was able to make the effort required for a

leap, then, the leap over, could not right himself again? He believed

that the slackening interest, the inability to fix his attention, which

he had had to fight against of late, must have some such deeper

significance; for his whole nature--the inherited common sense of

generations--rebelled against tracing it back to the day on which he

had seen a certain face for the first time. It was too absurd to be

credible that because a slender, dark-eyed girl had suddenly come

within his range of vision, his life should thus lose form and

purpose--incredible and unnatural as well--and, in his present mood, he

would have laughed at the suggestion that this was love. To his mind,

love was something frank and beautiful, made for daylight and the sun;

whereas his condition was a source of mortification to him. To love,

without any possible hope of return; to love, knowing that the person

you loved regarded you with less than indifference, and, what was

worse, that this person was passionately attached to another man--no,

there was something indelicate about it, at which his blood revolted.

It was the kind of thing that it suited poets to make tragedies of, but

it did not--should not--happen in sober, daily life. And if, as it

seemed in this case, it was beyond mortal's power to prevent it, then

the only fitting thing to do was promptly to make an end. And because,

over the approach of this end, he suffered, he now called himself hard

names. What had he expected? Had he really believed that matters could

always dally on, in this pleasant, torturous way? Would he always have

been content to be third party, and miserable outsider? No; the best

that could happen to him was now happening; let the coming day once be

past, let a very few weeks have run their course, and the parting would

have lost its sting; he would be able to look back, regretfully no

doubt, but as on something done with, irrecoverable. Then he would

apply himself to his work with all his heart; and it would be possible

to think of her, and remember her, calmly. If once an end were put to

these daily chances of seeing her, which perpetually fanned his unrest,

all would go well.

And yet ... did he close his eyes and let her face rise up before

him--her sweet, white face, with the unfathomable eyes, and pale,

sensuous mouth--he was shaken by an emotion that knocked his

resolutions as flat as a breath knocks a house of cards. It was not

love, nor anything to do with love, this he could have sworn to: it was

merely the strange physical effect her presence, or the remembrance of

her presence, had had upon him, from the first day on: a tightening of

all centres, a heightening of all faculties, an intense hope, and as

intense a despair. And in this moment, he confessed to himself that he

would have been over-happy to live on just as he had been doing, if

only sometimes he might see her. He needed her, as he had never felt

the need of anyone before; his nature clamoured for her, imperiously,

as it clamoured for light and air. He had no concern with anyone but

her--her only--and he could not let her go. It was not love; it was a

bodily weakness, a pitiable infirmity: he even felt it degrading that

another person should be able to exercise such an influence over him,

that there should be a part of himself over which he had no control.

Not to see her, not to be able to gather fresh strength from each

chance meeting, meant that the grip life had of him would relax--he

grew sick even at the thought of how, in some unknown place, in the

midst of strangers, she would go on living, and giving her hand and her

smile to other people, while he would never see her again. And he said

her name aloud to himself, as if he were in bodily pain, or as if the

sound of it might somehow bring him aid: he inwardly implored whatever

fate was above him to give him the one small chance he asked--the

chance of fair play.

The morning passed, without his knowing it. When, considerably after

his usual dinner-hour, he was back in his room, he looked at familiar

objects with unseeing eyes. He was not conscious of hunger, but going

into the kitchen begged for a cup of the coffee that could be smelt

brewing on Frau Krause's stove. When he had drunk this, a veil seemed

to lift from his brain; he opened and read a letter from home, and was

pricked by compunction at the thought that, except for a few scales run

hastily that morning, he had done no work. But while he still stood,

with his arm on the lid of the piano, an exclamation rose to his lips;

and taking up his hat, he went down the stairs again, and out into the

street. What was he thinking of? If he wished to see Louise once more,

his place was under her windows, or in those streets she would be

likely to pass through.

He walked up and down before the house in the BRUDERSTRASSE, sometimes

including a side street, in order to avoid making himself conspicuous;

putting on a hurried air, if anyone looked curiously at him; lingering

for a quarter of an hour on end, in the shadow of a neighbouring

doorway. Gradually, yet too quickly, the grey afternoon wore to a

close. He had paced to and fro for an hour now, but not a trace of her

had he seen; nor did even a light burn in her room when darkness fell.

A fear lest she should have already gone away, beset him again, and got

the upper hand of him; and wild schemes flitted through his mind. He

would mount the stairs, and ring the door-bell, on some pretext or

other, to learn whether she was still there; and his foot was on the

lowest stair, when his courage failed him, and he turned back. But the

idea had taken root; he could not bear much longer the uncertainty he

was in; and so, towards seven o'clock, when he had hung about for three

hours, and there was still no sign of life in her room, he went boldly

up the broad, winding stair and rang the bell. When the door was

opened, he would find something to say.

The bell, which he had pulled hard, pealed through the house, jangled

on, and, in a series of after-tinkles, died away. There was no

immediate answering sound; the silence persisted, and having waited for

some time, he rang again. Then, in the distance, he heard a door creak;

soft, cautious footsteps crept along the passage; a light moved; the

glass window in the upper half of the door was opened, and a little old

woman peered out, holding a candle above her head. On seeing the pale

face close before her, she drew back, and made as if to shut the

window; for, as a result of poring over newspapers, she lived in

continual expectation of robbery and murder.

"She is not at home," she said with tremulous bravado, in answer to the

young man's question, and again was about to close the window. But

Maurice thrust in his hand, and she could not shut without crushing it.

"Then she is still here? Has she gone out? When will she be back?" he

queried.

"How should I know? And look here, young man, if you don't take away

your hand and leave the house at once, I shall call from the window for

a policeman."

He went slowly down the stairs and across the street, and took up anew

his position in the dark doorway--a proceeding which did not reassure

Fraulein Grunhut, who, regarding his inquiries as a feint, was watching

his movements from between the slats of a window-blind. But Maurice had

not stood again for more than a quarter of an hour, when a feeling of

nausea seized him, and this reminded him that he had practically eaten

nothing since the morning. If he meant to hold out, he must snatch a

bite of food somewhere; afterwards, he would return and wait, if he had

to wait all night.

In front of the PANORAMA on the ROSSPLATZ, he ran into the arms of

Furst, and the latter, when he heard where Maurice was going, had

nothing better to do than to accompany him, and drink a SCHNITT. Furst,

who was in capital spirits at the prospect of the evening, laughed

heartily, told witty anecdotes, and slapped his fat thigh, the type of

rubicund good-humour; and as he was not of an observant turn of mind,

he did not notice his companion's abstraction. Hardly troubling to

dissemble, Maurice paid scant attention to Furst's talk; he ate avidly,

and as soon as he had finished, pushed back his chair and called to the

waiter for his bill.

"I must go," he said, and rose. "I have something important to do this

evening, and can't join you."

Furst, cut short in the middle of a sentence, let his double chin fall

on his collar, and gazed open-mouthed at his companion.

"But I say, Guest, look here!..." Maurice heard him expostulate as the

outer door slammed behind him.

He made haste to retrace his steps. The wind had dropped; a fine rain

was beginning to fall; it promised to be a wet night, of empty streets

and glistening pavements. There was no visible change in the windows of

the BRUDERSTRASSE; they were as blankly dark as before. Turning up his

coat-collar, Maurice resumed his patrollings, but more languidly; he

was drowsy from having eaten, and the air was chill. A weakness

overcame him at the thought of the night-watch he had set himself; it

seemed impossible to endure the crawling past of still more hours. He

was tired to exhaustion, and a sudden, strong desire arose in him,

somehow, anyhow, to be taken out of himself, to have his thoughts

diverted into other channels. And this feeling grew upon him with such

force, the idea of remaining where he was, for another hour, became so

intolerable, that he forgot everything else, and turned and ran back

towards the PANORAMA, only afraid lest Furst should have gone without

him.

The latter was, in fact, just coming out of the door. He stared in

astonishment at Maurice.

"I've changed my mind," said Maurice, without apology. "Shall we go?

Where's the place?"

Furst mumbled something inaudible; he was grumpy at the other's

behaviour. Scanning him furtively, and noting his odd, excited manner,

he concluded that Maurice had been drinking.

They walked without speaking; Furst hummed to himself. In the

thick-sown, business thoroughfare, the BRUHL, they entered a dingy cafe

and while Furst chattered with the landlord and BUFFETDAME, with both

of whom he was on very friendly terms, Maurice went into the side-room,

where the KNEIPE was to be held, and sat down before a long, narrow

table, spread with a soiled red and blue-checked tablecloth. He felt

cold and sick again, and when the wan PICCOLO set a beer-mat before

him, he sent the lad to the devil for a cognac. The waiter came with

the liqueur-bottle; Maurice drank the contents of one and then another

of the tiny glasses. A genial warmth ran through him and his nausea

ceased. He leaned his head on his hands, closed his eyes, and, soothed

by the heat of the room, had a few moments' pleasant lapse of

consciousness.

He was roused by the entrance of a noisy party of three. These were

strangers to him, and when they had mentioned their names and learned

his, they sat down at the other end of the table and talked among

themselves. They were followed by a couple of men known to Maurice by

sight. One, an Italian, a stout, animated man, with prominent jet-black

eyes and huge white teeth, was a fellow-pupil of Schilsky's, and a

violinist of repute, notwithstanding the size and fleshiness of his

hands, which were out of all proportion to the delicate build of his

instrument. The other was a slender youth of fantastic appearance. He

wore a long, old-fashioned overcoat, which reached to his heels, and

was moulded to a shapely waist; on his fingers were numerous rings; his

bushy hair was scented and thickly curled, his face painted and

pencilled like a woman's. He did not sit down, but, returning to the

public room, leaned over the counter and talked to the BUFFETDAME, in a

tone which had nothing in common with Furst's hearty familiarity.

Next came a couple of Americans, loud, self-assertive, careless of

dress and convention; close behind them still another group, and at its

heels, Dove. The latter entered the room with an apologetic air, and on

sitting down at the head of the table, next Maurice, mentioned at once

that, at heart, he was not partial to this kind of thing, and was only

there because he believed the present to be an exceptional occasion:

who knew but what, in after years, he might not be proud to claim

having, made one of the party on this particular evening?--the plain

truth being that Schilsky was little popular with his own sex, and, in

consequence of the difficulty of beating up a round dozen of men, Furst

had been forced to be very pressing in his invitations, to have

recourse to bribes and promises, or, as in the case of Dove, to

stimulating the imagination. The majority of the guests present were

not particular who paid for their drink, provided they got it.

At Krafft's entry, a stifled laugh went round. To judge from his

appearance, he had not been in bed the previous night: sleep seemed to

hang on his red and sunken eyelids; his hands and face were dirty, and

when he took off his coat, which he had worn turned up at the neck, it

was seen that he had either lost or forgotten his collar. Shirt and

waistcoat were insufficiently buttoned. His walk was steady, but his

eyes had a glassy stare, and did not seem to see what they rested on. A

strong odour of brandy went out from him; but he had not been many

minutes in the room before a stronger and more penetrating smell made

itself felt. The rest of the company began to sniff and ejaculate, and

Furst, having tracked it to the corner where the overcoats hung, drew

out of one of Krafft's pockets a greasy newspaper parcel, evidently

some days old, containing bones, scraps of decaying meat, and rancid

fish. The PICCOLO, summoned by a general shout, was bade to dispose of

the garbage instantly, and to hang the coat in a draughty place to air.

Various epithets were hurled at Krafft, who, however, sat picking his

teeth with unconcern, as if what went on around him had nothing to do

with him.

They were now all collected but Schilsky, and much beer had been drunk.

Furst was in his usual state of agitation lest his friend should forget

to keep the appointment; and the spirits of those--there were several

such present--who suffered almost physical pain from seeing another

than themselves the centre of interest, went up by leaps and bounds.

But at this juncture, Schilsky's voice was heard in the next room. It

was raised and angry; it snarled at a waiter. Significant glances flew

round the table: for the young man's outbursts of temper were well

known to all. He entered, making no response to the greetings that were

offered him, displaying his anger with genial indifference to what

others thought of him. To the PICCOLO he tossed coat and hat, and swore

at the boy for not catching them. Then he let his loose-limbed body

down on the vacant chair, and drank off the glass of PILSENER that was

set before him.

There was a pause of embarrassment. The next moment, however, several

men spoke at once: Furst continued a story he was telling, some one

else capped it, and the mirth these anecdotes provoked was more than

ordinarily uproarious. Schilsky sat silent, letting his sullen mouth

hang, and tapping the table with his fingers. Meanwhile, he emptied one

glass of beer after another. The PICCOLO could hardly cope with the

demands that were made on him, and staggered about, top-heavy, with his

load of glasses.

But it was impossible to let the evening pass as flatly as this;

besides, as the general hilarity increased, it made those present less

sensitive to the mood of the guest of honour. Furst was a born speaker,

and his heart was full. So, presently, he rose to his feet, struck his

glass, and, in spite of Schilsky's deepening scowl, held a flowery

speech about his departing friend. The only answer Schilsky gave was a

muttered request to cease making an idiot of himself.

This was going rather too far; but no one protested, except Ford, the

pianist, who said in English: "Speesch? Call that a speesch?"

Furst, inclined in the first moment of rebuff to be touchy, allowed his

natural goodness of heart to prevail. He leaned forward, and said, not

without pathos: "Old man, we are all your friends here. Something's the

matter. Tell us what it is."

Before Schilsky could reply, Krafft awakened from his apparent stupor

to say with extreme distinctness: "I'll tell you. There's been the

devil to pay."

"Now, chuck it, Krafft!" cried one or two, not without alarm at the

turn things might take.

But Schilsky, whose anger had begun to subside under the influence of

the two litres he had drunk, said slowly and thickly: "Let him be. What

he says is the truth--gospel truth."

"Oh, say, that's to' bad!" cried one of the Americans--a lean man, with

the mouth and chin of a Methodist.

All kept silence now, in the hope that Schilsky would continue. As he

did not, but sat brooding, Furst, in his role of peacemaker, clapped

him on the back. "Well, forget it for to-night, old man! What does it

matter? To-morrow you'll be miles away."

This struck a reminiscence in Ford, who forthwith tried to sing:

I'm off by the morning train,

Across the raging main----

"That's easily said!" Schilsky threw a dark look round the table. "By

those who haven't been through it. I have. And I'd rather have lost a

hand."

Krafft laughed--that is to say, a cackle of laughter issued from his

mouth, while his glazed eyes stared idiotically. "He shall tell us

about it. Waiter, a round of SCHNAPS!"

"Shut up, Krafft!" said Furst uneasily.

"Damn you, Heinz!" cried Schilsky, striking the table. He swallowed his

brandy at a gulp, and held out the glass to be refilled. His anger fell

still more; he began to commiserate himself. "By Hell, I wish a plague

would sweep every woman off the earth!"

"The deuce, why don't you keep clear of them?"

Schilsky laughed, without raising his heavy eyes. "If they'd only give

one the chance. Damn them all!--old and young----I say. If it weren't

for them, a man could lead a quiet life."

"It'll all come out in the wash," consoled the American.

Maurice heard everything that passed, distinctly; but the words seemed

to be bandied at an immeasurable distance from him. He remained quite

undisturbed, and would have felt like a god looking on at the doings of

an infinitesimal world, had it not been for a wheel which revolved in

his head, and hindered him from thinking connectedly. So far, drinking

had brought him no pleasure; and he had sense enough to find the

proximity of Ford disagreeable; for the latter spilt half the liquor he

tried to swallow over himself, and half over his neighbour.

A fresh imprecation of Schilsky's called forth more laughter. On its

subsidence, Krafft awoke to his surroundings again. "What has the old

woman given you?" he asked, with his strange precision of speech and

his drunken eyes.

Schilsky struck the table with his fist. "Look at him!--shamming drunk,

the bitch!" he cried.

"Never mind him; he don't count. How much did she give you?"

"Oh, gee, go on!"

But Schilsky, turned sullen again, refused to answer.

"Out with it then, Krafft!--you know, you scoundrel, you!"

Krafft put his hand to the side of his mouth. "She gave him three

thousand marks."

On all sides the exclamations flew.

"Oh, gee-henna!"

"Golly for her!"

"DREI TAUSEND MARK!--ALLE EHRE!"

Again Krafft leaned forward with a maudlin laugh.

"JAWOHL--but on what condition?"

"Heinz, you ferret out things like a pig's snout," said Furst with an

exaggerated, tipsy disgust.

"What, the old louse made conditions, did she?"

"Is she jealous?"

There was another roar at this. Schilsky looked as black as thunder.

Again Furst strove to intercede. "Jealous?--in seven devils' name, why

jealous? The old scarecrow! She hasn't an ounce of flesh to her bones."

Schilsky laughed. "Much you know about it, you fool! Flesh or no flesh,

she's as troublesome as the plumpest. I wouldn't go through the last

month again for all you could offer me. Month?--no, nor the last six

months either! It's been a hell of a life. Three of 'em, whole damned

three, at my heels, and each ready to tear the others' eyes out."

"Three! Hullo!"

"Three? Bah!--what's three?" sneered the painted youth.

Schilsky turned on him. "What's three? Go and try it, if you want to

know, you pap-sodden suckling! Three, I said, and they've ended by

making the place too hot to hold me. But I'm done now. No more for

me!--if my name's what it is."

Having once broken through his reserve, he talked on, with heated

fluency; and the longer he spoke, the more he was carried away by his

grievances. For, all he had asked for, he assured his hearers, had been

peace and quiet--the peace necessary to important work. "Jesus and

Mary! Are a fellow's chief obligations not his obligations to himself?"

At the same time, it was not his intention to put any of the blame on

Lulu's shoulders: she couldn't help herself. "Lulu is Lulu. I'm damned

fond of Lulu, boys, and I've always done my best by her--is there

anyone here who wants to say I haven't?"

There was none; a chorus of sympathetic ayes went up from the party

that was drinking at his expense.

Mollified, he proceeded, asserting vehemently that he would have gone

miles out of his way to avoid causing Lulu pain. "I'm a soft-hearted

fool--I admit it!--where a woman is concerned." But he had yielded to

her often enough--too often--as it was; the time had come for him to

make a stand. Let those present remember what he had sacrificed only

that summer for Lulu's sake. Would anyone else have done as much for

his girl? He made bold to doubt it. For a man like Zeppelin to come to

him, and to declare, with tears in his eyes, that he could teach him no

more--could he afford to treat a matter like that with indifference?

Had he really been free to make a choice?

Again he looked round the table with emphasis, and those who had their

muscles sufficiently under control, hastened to lay their faces in

seemly folds.

Then, however, Schilsky's mood changed; he struck the table so that the

glasses danced. "And shall I tell you what my reward has been for not

going? Do you want to know how Lulu has treated me for staying on here?

'You are a quarter of an hour late: where have you been? You've only

written two bars since I saw you this morning: what have you been

doing? A letter has come in a strange writing: who is it from? You've

put on another tie: who have you been to see?' HIMMELSAKRAMENT!" He

drained his glass. "I've had the life of a dog, I tell you--of a dog!

There's not been a moment in the day when she hasn't spied on me, and

followed me, and made me ridiculous. Over every trifle she has got up a

fresh scene. She's even gone so far as to come to my room and search my

pockets, when she knew I wasn't at home."

"Yes, yes," sneered Krafft. "Exactly! And so, gentlemen he was now for

slinking off without a word to her."

"Oh, PFUI!" spat the American.

"Call him a liar!" said a voice.

"Liar?" repeated Schilsky dramatically. "Why liar? I don't deny it. I

would have done it gladly if I could--isn't that just what I've been

saying? Lulu would have got over it all the quicker alone. And then,

why shouldn't I confess it? You're all my friends here." He dropped his

voice. "I'm afraid of Lulu, boys. I was afraid she'd get round me, and

then my chance was gone. She might have shot me, but she wouldn't have

let me go. You never know how a woman of that type'll break out--never!"

"But she didn't!" said Krafft. "You live."

Schilsky understood him.

"Some brute," he cried savagely, "some dirty brute had nothing better

to do than to tell her."

"Ha, ha, ha!" laughed the painted boy.

Furst blew his nose. "It wasn't me. I was mum. 'Pon my honour, I was."

"My God!" said Schilsky, and fell to remembering it. "What a time I've

been through with her this afternoon!" He threatened to be overcome by

the recollection, and supported his head on his hands. "A woman has no

gratitude," he murmured, and drew his handkerchief from his pocket. "It

is a weak, childish sex--with no inkling of higher things." Here,

however, he suddenly drew himself up. "Life is very hard!" he cried, in

a loud voice. "The perpetual struggle between duty and inclination for

a man of genius ...!"

He grew franker, and gave gratuitous details of the scene that had

taken place in his room that afternoon. Most of those present were in

ecstasies at this divulging of his private life, which went forward to

the accompaniment of snores from Ford, and the voice of Dove, who, with

portentous gravity, sang over and over again, the first strophe of THE

LAST ROSE OF SUMMER.

"A fury!" said Schilsky. "A ... a what do you call it?--a ... Meg ... a

Meg--" He gave it up and went on: "By God, but Lulu knows how! Keep

clear of her nails, boys--I'd advise you!" At this point, he pulled

back his collar, and exhibited a long, dark scratch on the side of his

neck. "A little remembrance she gave me to take away with me!" While he

displayed it, he seemed to be rather proud of it; but immediately

afterwards, his mood veered round again to one of bitter resentment. To

illustrate the injustice she had been guilty of, and his own

long-suffering, he related, at length, the story of his flirtation with

Ephie, and the infinite pains he had been at to keep Louise in

ignorance of what was happening. He grew very tender with himself as he

told it. For, according to him, the whole affair had come about without

any assistance of his. "What the deuce was I to do? Chucked herself

full at my head, did the little one. No invitation necessary--a ripe

plum, boys! Touch the plum--and off it tumbles! As pretty a little

thing, too, as ever was made! Had everything arranged by the second

meeting. Papa to set us up; house in New York; money IN HULLE UND

FULLE!"

At the mention of New York, the lean American looked grave. "Look here,

you, don't think you're the whole shoot because you've got a wave in

your hair!" he murmured in English.

But Schilsky did not hear him; his voice droned on, giving the full

particulars of this particular case. He grew momentarily opener.

"One no sooner out of the door than the other was in," he asserted, and

laughed long to himself.

For some time past, Maurice had been possessed by the idea that what

was happening concerned him very nearly, and that he ought to interfere

and put his foot down. His hands had grown cold, and he sat vainly

trying to speak: nothing, however, came, but little drunken gulps and

hiccups. But the first mention of Ephie's name seemed to put new

strength into him; he made a violent effort, and rose to his feet,

holding on to the table with both hands. He could not, however, manage

to attract attention; no one took any notice of him; and besides this,

he had himself no notion what it was that he really wanted to say.

"And drowns his sorrows in the convivial glass!" he suddenly shouted in

English, at the top of his voice, which he had found. He had a vague

belief that he was quoting a well-known line of poetry, and, though he

did not in the least understand how it applied to the situation, he

continued to repeat it, with varying shades of fervour, till some one

called out: "Oh, stop your blasted rot!"

He laughed hoarsely at this, could not check himself, and was so

exhausted when he had finished that it took him some time to remember

why he was on his feet. Schilsky was still relating: his face was

darkly red, his voice husky, and he flapped his arms with meaningless

gestures. A passionate rebellion, a kind of primitive hatred, gripped

Maurice, and when Schilsky paused for breath, he could contain himself

no longer. He felt the burning need of contradicting the speaker, even

though he could not catch the drift of what was said.

"It's a lie!" he cried fiercely, with such emphasis that every face was

turned to him. "A damned lie!"

"A lie? What the devil do you mean?" responded not one but many

voices--the whole table seemed to be asking him, with the exception of

Dove, who sang on in an ever decreasing tempo.

"Get out!--Let him alone; he's drunk. He doesn't know what he's

saying--He's got rats in his head!" he heard voices asserting.

Forthwith he began a lengthy defence of himself, broken only by gaps in

which his brain refused to work. Conscious that no one was listening to

him, he bawled more and more loudly.

"Oh, quit it, you double-barrelled ass!" said the American.

Schilsky, persuaded by those next him to let the incident pass

unnoticed, contented himself with a: "VERFLUCHTE SCHWEINEREI!" spat,

after Furst's gurgled account of Maurice's previous insobriety, across

the floor behind him, to express his contempt, and proceeded as

dominatingly as before with the narration of his love-affairs.

The blood rushed to Maurice's head at the sound of this voice which he

could neither curb nor understand. Rage mastered him--a vehement desire

to be quits. He kicked back his chair, and rocked to and fro.

"It's a lie--a dirty lie!" he cried. "You make her unhappy--God, how

unhappy you make her! You illtreat her. You've never given her a day's

happiness. S ... said so ... herself. I heard her ... I swear ... I----"

His voice turned to a whine; his words came thick and incoherent.

Schilsky sprang to his feet and aimed the contents of a half-emptied

glass at Maurice's face. "Take that, you blasted spy!--you Englishman!"

he spluttered. "I'll teach you to mix your dirty self in my affairs!"

Every one jumped up; there was noise and confusion; simultaneously two

waiters entered the room, as if they had not been unprepared for

something of this kind. Furst and another man restrained Schilsky by

the arms, reasoning with him with more force than coherence. Maurice,

the beer dripping from chin, collar and shirt-front, struggled

furiously with some one who held him back.

"Let me get at him--let me get at him!" he cried. "I'll teach him to

treat a woman as he does. The sneak--the cur--the filthy cad! He's not

fit to touch her hand--her beautiful hand--her beau ... ti ... ful----"

Here, overpowered by his feelings, as much as by superior strength, he

sank on a chair and wept.

"I'll break his bones!" raved Schilsky. "What the hell does he mean by

it?--the INFAME SCHUFT, the AAS, the dirty ENGLANDER! Thinks he'll

sneak after her himself, does he?--What in Jesus' name is it to him how

I treat her? I'll take a stick to her if I like--it's none of his

blasted business! Look here, do you see that?" He freed one hand,

fumbled in his pocket, and, almost inarticulate with rage and liquor,

brandished a key across the table. "Do you see that? That's a key,

isn't it, you drunken hog? Well, with that key, I can let myself into

Lulu's room at any hour I want to; I can go there now, this very

minute, if I like--do you think she'll turn me out, you infernal spy?

Turn me out?--she'd go down on her knees here before you all to get me

back to her!"

Unwilling to be involved in the brawl, the more sober of the party had

begun to seek out their hats and to slink away. A little group round

Schilsky blarneyed and expostulated. Why should the whole sport of the

evening be spoilt in this fashion? What did it matter what the damned

cranky Englishman said? Let him be left to his swilling. They would

clear out, and wind up the night at the BAUER; and at four, when that

shut, they would go on to the BAYRISCHE BAHNHOF, where they could not

only get coffee, but could also see Schilsky off by a train soon after

five. These persuasions prevailed, and, still swearing, and

threatening, and promising, by all that was holy, to bring Lulu there,

by the hair of her head if necessary, to show whether or no he had the

power over her he boasted of, Schilsky finally allowed himself to be

dragged off, and those who were left lurched out in his wake.

With their exit an abrupt silence fell, and Maurice sank into a heavy

sleep, in which he saw flowery meadows and heard a gently trickling

brook....

"Now then, up with you!--get along!" some one was shouting in his ear,

and, bit by bit, a pasty-faced waiter entered his field of view. "It's

past time, anyhow," and yawning loudly, the waiter turned out all the

gas-jets but one. "Don't yer hear? Up with you! You'll have to look

after the other--now, damn me, if there isn't another of you as well!"

and, from under the table, he drew out a recumbent body.

Maurice then saw that he was still in the company of Dove, who sat

staring into space--like a dead man. Krafft, propped on a chair, hung

his head far back, and the collarless shirt exposed the whole of his

white throat.

The waiter hustled them about. Maurice was comparatively steady on his

legs; and it was found that Dove could walk. But over Krafft, the man

scratched his head and called a comrade. At the mention of a droschke,

however, Maurice all but wept anew with ire and emotion: this was his

dearest friend, the friend of his bosom; he was ready at any time to

stake his life for him, and now he was not to be allowed even to see

him home.

A difficulty arose about Maurice's hat: he was convinced that the one

the waiter jammed so rudely on his head did not belong to him; and it

seemed as if nothing in the world had ever mattered so much to him as

now getting back his own hat. But he had not sufficient fluency to

explain all he meant; before he had finished, the man lost patience;

and suddenly, without any transition, the three of them were in the

street. The raw night air gave them a shock; they gasped and choked a

little. Then the wall of a house rose appositely and met them. They

leaned against it, and Maurice threw the hat from him and trampled on

it, chuckling at the idea that he was revenging himself on the waiter.

It was a journey of difficulties; not only was he unclear what locality

they were in, but innumerable lifeless things confronted them and

formed obstacles to their progress; they had to charge an

advertisement-column two or three times before they could get round it.

Maurice grew excessively angry, especially with Dove. For while Heinz

let himself be lugged this way and that, Dove, grown loud and wilful,

had ideas of his own, and, in addition to this, sang the whole time

with drunken gravity:

Sez the ragman, to the bagman,

I'll do yees no harm.

"Stop it, you oaf!" cried Maurice, goaded to desperation. "You beastly,

blathering, drunken idiot!"

Then, for a street-length, he himself lapsed into semi-consciousness,

and when he wakened, Dove was gone. He chuckled anew at the thought

that somehow or other they had managed to outwit him.

His intention had been to make for home, but the door before which they

ultimately found themselves was Krafft's. Maurice propped his companion

against the wall, and searched his own pockets for a key. When he had

found one, he could not find the door, and when this was secured, the

key would not fit. The perspiration stood out on his forehead; he tried

again and again, thought the keyhole was dodging him, and asserted the

fact so violently that a window in the first storey was opened and a

head thrust out.

"What in the name of Heaven are you doing down there?" it cried. "You

drunken SCHWEIN, can't you see the door's open?"

In the sitting-room, both fell heavily over a chair; after that, with

infinite labour, he got Heinz on the sofa. He did not attempt to make a

light; enough came in from a street-lamp for him to see what he was

doing.

Lying on his face, Krafft groaned a little, and Maurice suddenly

grasped that he was taken ill. Heinz was ill, Heinz, his best friend,

and he was doing nothing to help him! Shedding tears, he poured out a

glass of water. He believed he was putting the carafe safely back on

the table, but it dropped with a crash to the floor. He was afraid Frau

Schulz would come in, and said in a loud voice: "It's that fellow

there, he's dead drunk, beastly drunk!" Krafft would not drink the

water, and in the attempt to force him, it was spilled over him. He

stirred uneasily, put up his arms and dragged Maurice down, so that the

latter fell on his knees beside the sofa. He made a few ineffectual

efforts to free himself; but one arm held him like a vice; and in this

uncomfortable position, he went to sleep.