"Nothing more to-night, thank you, Robert; I shall require nothing
more, except to be left alone."
"Very well, sir."
The old servitor withdrew, and Arthur Dalziel threw himself into his
lounging chair with a weary look in his eyes. For a long time he gazed
into the fire, muttering now and then between his teeth: "If--yet, no,
it is impossible, impossible! Yes, Arthur, my boy, you'd have to give
it all up, lands, position, prospect of a title--that London life you
love so much--and go back to dreary Scotch law. But you're a fool to
think of such things, a confounded fool!"
He rose, and going to a side table poured out a glass of wine, which he
drained hastily.
The wine seemed to relieve him of his disturbing thoughts. He glanced
more cheerfully round his luxurious sanctum--half library, half
music-room--and strolled up to the piano, where he stood carelessly
fingering the keys.
One or two chance chords evidently awoke some old memories of
half-forgotten melody, for he turned to a canterbury and searched among
the heterogeneous mass of music it contained. Music is somehow always
hard to find, but at length Dalziel drew out a single leaf of faded
manuscript, which he set on the stand and, seating himself, began to
play.
It was a wonderful melody, so simple, yet so full and thrilling in its
harmonies. The player's face grew softer as he touched the keys, and he
looked almost youthful again in spite of his worn appearance. It was
not age, however, that had grizzled Arthur Dalziel's hair. He was but
two-and-thirty, though he looked like forty-five. Again and again he
played the melody, and an unwonted moisture gathered in his cold grey
eyes. The music seemed to affect him strangely. Pausing for a little,
while his fingers rested caressingly on the keys, he sighed: "Poor
Jack! Poor Jack! Would that I knew--would that I knew! Still, would it
make me any happier to know? And then--perhaps it might mean ruin--it's
better as it is."
Once more he played over the fragment, scarcely glancing now at the
music, for what we have once known is easily learned again. The wind
howled in strange unison with the plaintive air, but was it merely the
wind that made the musician start and drop his hands nervelessly on his
knees?
"No, no," he exclaimed, "you are an imaginative, nervous fool!
That air is known to yourself alone of living men--it is
impossible--impossible--"
Some sort of fascination seemed to chain him to the instrument.
Mechanically his fingers sought the keys, and the self-same air came
trembling from the strings. He seemed scarcely to believe, however,
that his former fancy (whatever it was) had been all imagination,
for he struck the opening chords softly, and with the air of one who
listens for a response he is but half certain of receiving. Clear above
the notes of the piano, above the wild piping of the wintry gale, rose
the wail of a violin. Very gently and tenderly Dalziel continued to
play, but his face was ashen pale, for the mysterious performer out
there in the storm answered him note for note.
"Strange," he muttered, as the strain ended; "but, ghost or no ghost,
I'll test him with the unwritten part." He sprang up and turned out
the gas. Then flinging open the window, heedless how the gusts of
night-wind scattered his papers about the room, he seated himself once
more at the instrument, and dashed into a variation on the same theme.
Curiosity had taken the place of fear, and his playing was bold and
clear.
Again the violin rang out, and in perfect accord the intricate
variation was rendered. Dalziel suddenly abandoned the air and dropped
into an accompaniment, but the player held on undismayed to the end. It
was a weird but exquisite performance.
"Marvellous! Correct to the minutest particular!" Dalziel cried. "I
shall fathom this, come what may."
He went to the window and peered into the square, where the gas lamps
shivered in the blast and threw an uncertain glimmer, that was not
light, on the deserted pavement.
[Illustration: "DALZIEL STOOPED OVER THE PITIFUL LITTLE BUNDLE."]
No living soul was to be seen, but a voice came out of the darkness: a
child's pleading voice:--
"Please, sir, don't be angry; but _do_, please, play that accompaniment
again. From the beginning this time, please: I'd like to remember it
all. Just once, please, sir, and then I'll go away."
"Who are you?"
"Giovanni."
"Some clever Italian brat. Heard me once or twice, I suppose, and
picked up the air," Dalziel thought; "but then, that variation! I must
sift this, as I said, whatever is the upshot."
"Would you like to come in, Giovanni?" he said presently, as he began
to make out the dim outline of a form huddling against the railings;
"you must be cold out there."
"Come in _there_, to the firelight and the piano? Oh, it would be like
Heaven!"
"I don't know about that," Dalziel muttered, adding, however, in cheery
tones, "Yes, Giovanni, come in here--go up the steps and I'll open
the door for you. He's got a pretty dash of an Italian accent, this
mysterious little Giovanni," he continued, as he stepped into the hall,
"I'd like to see him, at any rate."
He opened the hall door and the warm light streamed out upon the steps,
out upon a pallid little face and a heap of shabby clothes lying there
motionless. Dalziel stooped over the pitiful little bundle, and gently
disengaged a violin from the nerveless hands. Swiftly laying the
instrument on the hall table, he returned and bore the child to the
sofa in the study. He re-lighted the gas and rang the bell.
Robert appeared. Accustomed as he was to "master's fads," he seemed to
receive a severe shock at the sight which presented itself; but none of
Arthur Dalziel's servants, even the oldest and trustiest, dared ask any
questions, so Robert awaited orders in silence.
"Send Mrs. Johnson here, Robert."
The ancient butler obeyed.
"Mrs. Johnson, here's a little street-musician that's been taken ill
just outside. Help me to restore him."
"Bless him, he's a bonny little man," was all the worthy housekeeper
dared to say. "We'll soon bring him to, sir. Some brandy, sir, so. Now
you're better, aren't you, you poor little dear? You're nigh frozen;
and hungry, too, I believe. You're hungry, aren't you, now?" she cried,
as the child's eyes quivered wonderingly open.
"_So_ hungry!"
"Well, you'll have some supper soon," interposed Dalziel. "Get him
something hot, Mrs. Johnson. You just lie still, young man, till it
comes, and don't talk. I'll play to you till your supper's ready, if
you promise to hold your tongue."
He resumed his place at the instrument and played anything and
everything that occurred to him, while Giovanni lay back on the sofa
in quiet enjoyment of the music. His eyes grew very large and bright
as the player proceeded, and once or twice his lips moved as though he
would say something, but remembering the injunction to keep silent, he
invariably checked himself.
So the two new friends passed the time until the supper appeared. The
child ate eagerly, but with evident self-restraint, and Dalziel noted
with the instinctive satisfaction of a gentleman that Giovanni was not
at all ill-bred.
When the supper had at length disappeared Giovanni said: "May I speak
now?"
"Certainly."
"Please, where is my violin?"
"All safe and sound, my man; I'll fetch it for you."
Dalziel stepped out and returned with the instrument. The child clasped
it eagerly, ran his thumb lightly over the strings, and glancing up at
Dalziel, said, mechanically, "'A,' please."
His companion, thoroughly determined to humour and observe the strange
child, struck the required note. In a second or two Giovanni had
brought his instrument to perfect tune. Then he looked up and hesitated.
"Well, my man, what is it?" queried Dalziel.
"That tune again--do, please, play it, sir: the one I heard out in the
square before I grew so dizzy."
Dalziel at first seemed reluctant to comply, but the child's pleading
eyes overcame him, so he turned round to the piano and struck the
opening chords.
Giovanni crept over to his side and began to play, hesitatingly at
first, but gradually gaining strength as the spell of the music
possessed him. Dalziel looked from time to time at the boy's pathetic
face with a questioning, almost frightened glance, but played steadily
to the end.
"Thank you so much, sir," said Giovanni, when they had finished.
"You are a wonderful player, child. Who taught you?"
"Mother," he replied; then he burst into tears, crying, "Oh! I must
go--I must go; poor mother will be wearied to death for me. I am
selfish to stay, but I was so happy with the lovely music that I'd
forgotten her. I must go; poor mother is so ill."
He moved towards the door.
"Come back, Giovanni; you can't go out in the rain. Tell me where
mother lives and I'll go to see her at once, and let her know you're
safe."
With difficulty he persuaded the child to stay indoors, and taking
the address Giovanni gave him he left the house, first directing Mrs.
Johnson to put his _protégé_ to bed.
Ere he had gone half way on his mission the worn-out little brain had
for a season forgotten its troubles in sleep.