chapter 13

I DON’. know how many hours afterward I awoke. Gradually, as consciousness asserted itself, I realized that somebody was playing a violin in the adjacent room: and at length it struck me that it must be Merivale practicing. I pricked up my ears and hearkened. Oh, yes; he was running over his part of the last new composition we had studied. The clock-like tick-tack of his metronome marked the rhythm. I lay still and listened till he had repeated the same phrase some twenty times. Finally I got up and crossed the threshold that divided us.

Merivale kept on playing for a minute or two, unaware of my intrusion. Not till it behooved him to turn the page did he lift his eyes. Then, encountering my night-robed figure,they lighted up with merriment. Their owner lowered his instrument, remained silent for a moment, in the end gave vent to an uproarious peal of laughter.

“What are you laughing at?” I stammered.

When he had got his hilarity somewhat under control he replied: “At you. Come and gaze upon yourself.” And conducting me to a mirror he said, pointing, “There, isn’t that a funny sight?”

I looked sleepy, that was all. My hair was awry, and my eyes were heavy, and my costume was a trifle wrinkled. Still, I suppose, my general appearance was sufficiently ludicrous. Be that as it may, I could not help joining in Merivale’s laughter: and, thus put into good humor at the outset, I cheerfully complied with his request to hasten through my toilet and “come and fiddle with him.”

“Let’s start here,” he said, opening the book.

We read for a while in concert. As usual my arm seemed to swing of its separate will, I myself becoming all but comatose. By and by I perceived that Merivale had discontinued and was seated at one side with his instrument upon his knees. Then I perceived that I was no longer following the book. I closed my eyes and listened. As usual I heard the voice of my violin very much as though some other person had been the performer.

I found that I was playing a lot of bits from memory. I heard the light, quick tread of a gavotte which I had learned as a boy and meantime almost forgotten; I heard snatches from the chants the Chazzan sings in the synagogue; I heard the Flower Song from Faust mixing itself up with a recitative from Lohengrin. Then I heard the passionate wail of Chopin become predominant: the exquisite melody of the Berceuse, motives from Les Polonaises, and at length the impromptu in C-sharp minor—that to which I have alluded in the early part of this narrative, as descriptive of Veronika. Following it, came the songs that Veronika herself had been most prone to sing, Bizet, Pergolese, Schumann, morsels of German folk liede, old French romances. And ever and anon that phrase from the impromptu kept recurring. Every thing else seemed to lead up to it. It terminated a brilliant passage by Liszt. It cropped out in the middle of a theme from the Meistersinger. And with its every new recurrence, the picture of Veronika which it pre sented to my imagination grew more life-like and palpable, until ere long it was almost as though I saw her standing near me in substantial objective form. As I have said, I scarcely realized that it was I who played. Except for the sensation along my wrist as the bow bit the catgut, I believe I should have quite forgotten it. But now abruptly, without the least volition upon my part, my arm acquired a fresh vigor. The voice of my violin increased in volume. The character of the music underwent a change. From a medley of fragments it turned to a coherent, continuous whole. Note succeeded note in natural and inevitable sequence. I tried to recognize the composition. I could not. It was quite unfamiliar to me. Odd, because of course at some time I must have practiced it again and again. Otherwise how had I been able to play it now? It flowed from the strings without hitch or hesitancy. Yet my best efforts to place it were ineffectual. Doubly odd, because it was no ordinary composition. It had a striking individuality of its own.

It began with laughter-provoking scherzo, as dainty as the pattering of April rain-drops, as riotous as the frolicking of children let loose from school; which, by degrees tempering to a quieter allegro, presently modulated into the minor, and necessarily, therefore, became plaintive and sentimental. For a while bar succeeded bar, fitful and undetermined, as if groping blindly for a climax. Next, a quick, fluttering crescendo, and an exultant major chord. This completed the first movement. The second began pianissimo upon the A and E strings, an allegretto full of placid contentment; again, a minor modulation; again, blind groping for a climax, this time more strenuous than before, tinged by a passion, impelled by an insatiable desire; adagio on G and D, still minor; then a swift return to major, a leap of the bow and fingers back to A and E, and on these latter strings a rhapsody expressive of the utmost possible human joy. Third movement andante, sober but still joyous; the music, which hitherto had been restless and destitute of an apparent aim, seemed to have caught a purpose, to have gained substance and confidence in itself.

It proceeded in this wise for several periods, when sharply, without the faintest warning, it broke into a discordant shriek of laughter, the laughter of a demon whose evil designs had triumphed.

Though I had not recognized the composition, up to this point I had understood it perfectly. Its intrinsic lucidity carried the intelligence along. But henceforward I was mystified. The reason for the violent change of theme, time, and quality, I could not divine; nor could I appreciate, either, how the subsequent effects were produced or what they were meant to signify. My impression was, as I have said, that the laughter which my violin seemed to be echoing was demoniac laughter, the outburst of a Satan over his success, of a Succubus fastening upon his prey. Yet the next instant I was doubtful whether it was indeed laughter at all? Was it not perhaps the hysterical sobbing of a human being frenzied by grief? And again the next instant neither of these conceptions appeared to be the correct one. Was it not rather a chorus?—a chorus of witches?—plotting some fiendish atrocity?—chuckling over a vicious pleasantry?—now, whispering amicably together, now wrangling ferociously, now uniting in blood-curdling screams of delight? Whatever it might be, I could not penetrate its sense. I listened with deepening perplexity. I wished it would come to an end. But it did not occur to me to stop my arm and lay aside my bow. The music went on and on—until Merivale caught me by the shoulder and snatched my violin from my grasp. He was speaking.

The descent back to earth was too abrupt. It took me some time to gather myself together. “Eh—what were you saying?” I asked at last.

“I was saying, stop! Consider a fellow’s nervous system. Where in the name of Lucifer did you learn that infernal music? Whom is it by?”

“Oh,” I answered, “oh, I don’t know whom it is by.”

“It out-Berliozes Berlioz,” he added. “Is it his?”

“Perhaps. I don’t remember. I am tired. Let me rest a moment without talking.”

“Well,” he continued, “it was a terrible strain to listen to it. I am quite played out—feel as if—forgive the comparison—as if I had spent the last hour in a dentist’s chair. However, for relief’s sake, let’s go to dinner. Are you aware that we haven’t eaten any thing since early morning?”

After dinner Merivale insisted that we should take a long walk “to shake out the kinks,” and after the long walk we were tired enough to return to our pillows.

I went straight to sleep; but my sleep was troubled. As soon as Merivale had said goodnight and extinguished the gas, memory began to repeat the music I had played. I heard it throughout my sleep. Every little while I would wake up and try to banish it by fixing my attention on other matters. But it kept thrumming away in my brain despite myself. I could not silence it. Merivale’s reference to a dentist’s chair was, if inelegant, at least a graphic one. I got as hopelessly irritated as I could have done with a score of dentists simultaneously grinding at my teeth. My very arteries seemed to be beating to its rhythm.

In one fit of wakefulness, that lasted longer than its predecessors had done, I found myself unconsciously tattooing it upon the wall at my bed’s head.

“Is that you?” Merivale’s voice demanded from out of the darkness.

“Yes,” I replied. “Aren’t you asleep?”

“Mercy, no. That music you played—or rather, stray fragments of it, keep running through my brain. I haven’t been able to sleep for a long while.”

“That’s singular. It affects me the same way. I was just drumming it on the wall. I’ve been trying to get rid of it all night.”

“It has wonderful staying powers, for a fact. I’m glad you’re awake, though. Companionship in misery is sweet.”

“Yes, I also feel rather more comfortable now that you have spoken. Do you know, it’s an immense puzzle to me, that music? I can’t imagine where or when I ever learned it. And yet it is not the sort of thing one would be apt to forget. I can’t recognize the style even, can’t get a clew to the composer.”

“The style is emphatically that of Berlioz.”

“Perhaps so. But it can’t be by Berlioz, because I never learned any thing by Berlioz at all.”

“Hum!” A pause. Then, “Say, Lexow—”

“Well?”

“It isn’t possible that it’s original, is it?”

“Original? How do you mean?”

“Why, an improvisation—a little thing of your own.”

“Oh, no; oh, no, I never improvise—at least an entire composition, like that. Nobody does. It bears all the marks of careful workmanship. It must be something well-known that has temporarily slipped from my memory. It’s too striking not to be well-known. Tomorrow I’ll go through my music and find it; and I’ll wager it will turn out to be quite familiar. Only, it’s extremely odd that I can’t place it.”

“Why wait till to-morrow?”

“Why, we can’t begin to-night, can we?”

“Why not? I say, let’s begin right off. The cursed thing is keeping us awake, and there doesn’t seem to be any escape from it. We may as well utilize our wakefulness, as lie here doing nothing but toss about. I say, let’s light the gas and go to work.”

“Oh, well, I’m agreeable. The sooner the better as far as I’m concerned.”

“Good,” cried Merivale.

He sprang out of bed and lighted the gas.

“Shall Mahomet go to the mountain or shall the mountain come to Mahomet?” he inquired, blinking his eyes.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean shall we dress and adjourn to the other room? Or shall I bring your musical library in here, so that we can conduct our investigation without getting up?”

“Just as you please,” I answered.

“Well, we’ll move the mountain, then,” he said, and left the room.

He made two or three trips, back and forth, bearing an armful of music as the fruit of each. The last folios deposited on the floor, “Now, as to method,” he inquired, “how shall we start? It will occupy us till doom’s-day if we undertake to go through the whole of this. I suppose there are some composers we can eliminate 脿 priori, eh?”

“Oh, yes; Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Wagner, Liszt, in particular, we needn’t trouble with. I’d keep an especially sharp eye out for Ruben-stein and Dvorak and Winiauski. It’s fortunate that I’ve preserved all the music I’ve ever owned. We can’t miss it if we’re only patient enough.”

“Well, here goes,” he cried, thrusting a thick pile of music into my hands, and apportioning an equal amount to himself.

We were industrious. It is needless that I should tarry with the incidents of our search. At daybreak we had not yet quite finished, and we had not yet struck any thing that bore the slightest resemblance to the composition in question.

“But little remains,” said Merivale. “In another five minutes we will have found it; or my first hypothesis was true.”

“Your first hypothesis?” I inquired.

“Yes—that it was original—a lucubration of your own.”

“Oh, that, I tell you, isn’t possible. I’m not vain enough to imagine that I could improvise in such style, thank you.”

“Well, we won’t enter into a dispute, at any rate not till our present line of investigation is exhausted. Back to the saddle!”

For a space we were silent.

“Eh bien, mon brave!” cried Merivale at length. “There goes the last of my half,” and he sent a sheet of music fluttering through the air.

“And here is the last of mine,” I responded, laying down Schumann’s Warum.

“And we are still in the dark.”

“Still in the dark.”

“It isn’t possible that we have overlooked it?”

“I’m sure I haven’t. I took pains with each separate page.”

“Likewise, I! Therefore. I congratulate you. I’ll order a laurel wreath at the florist’s, the first thing after breakfast.”

“Nonsense! How many times need I tell you that I could not by hook or crook have made it up as I went along? The mere notion is ridiculous. It must have got lost, that’s all.”

“On the contrary, the notion that you once learned it, then forgot it, then played it off without a fault from beginning to end, is trebly ridiculous. It was ridiculous of us to waste our time hunting for it, also. I am entirely convinced that it is yours. Why not? Ideas have come to other people—why not to you? Yesterday while you played, you were excited and wrought up, and the result was that you had an inspiration. By Jove, you’re lucky! It’s enough to make you famous.”

“But, Merivale, fancy the absurdities you are uttering. Do you seriously suppose anybody—even a regular composer—could take up his fiddle and reel off a complicated thing like that without once halting? Why, man, there are four or five distinct movements. You might as well pretend that a mere elocutionist could write an intricate epic poem without once pausing to make an erasure or find a rhyme, as that I, a simple instrumentalist, could have done this.”

“Well, there’s only oneway of settling the matter. We’ll refer it to an authority. You jot down a few specimen bars on paper, and I’ll submit it to your friend, Dr. Rodolph. Of course he will identify it at once, if it isn’t yours.”

“If that will satisfy you, well and good,” I assented.

In the course of the forenoon, Merivale, having procured a stock of music-paper at a shop in the neighborhood, said, “I don’t know how rapidly a man can write music, but if it isn’t too slow work, I’d seriously counsel you to put down the whole thing, while you’re about it. In fact I’d counsel you to do so any how. If by hazard it is original, you know, you’d better make a memorandum of it while it’s still fresh in your mind. Otherwise you might forget it. That often happens to me. A bright idea, a felicitous turn of phraseology, occurs to me when I’m away somewhere—in the horse-cars, at the theater, paying a call, or what-not—and if I don’t make an instant minute of it in my note-book, it’s sure to fly off and never be heard from again.”

“We’ll see,” I returned. “I haven’t written a bar of music for such a long while that I don’t know how hard I shall find it. But I used to make a daily practice of writing from memory, because it increases one’s facility for sight-reading.”

I hummed the first two or three phrases softly to myself, beating time with my fingers; then drew up to the writing-table and commenced to set them down. At the outset I had considerable difficulty, was obliged, so to speak, to spell my way along note by note, and committed several blunders which I had to go back to and correct. But gradually my path grew smoother and smoother, until I was no longer conscious of effort; and at last I became so much absorbed and so much interested by what I was doing, that my hand sped across the paper like a machine performing the regular function for which it was contrived. I suppose mental activity always begets mental exhilaration; and that mental exhilaration in turn, when allowed to attain too high a pitch, always approaches the borderland of its antipode, on the principle that extremes meet. At any rate such was my experience in the present instance. At first, both mind and fingers were sluggish and moved laboriously. Then mind got into running order, and fingers lagged behind; then fingers caught up with mind, and for a while the two kept pace; then, finally, fingers spurted ahead and it was mind’s turn to acknowledge itself left in the rear. Mental exhilaration gave place to bewilderment, as I saw that my hand was forging along faster than my thought could dictate, in apparent obedience to an independent will of its own—which bewilderment ripened into thoroughgoing mystification, as the hand dashed forward and back like a shuttle in a loom, with a velocity that seemed ever to be increasing. I had precisely the sensation of a man who has started to run down a hill, and whose legs have acquired such a momentum that he can not stop them: on and on he must submit to be borne until some outside obstacle interferes, even though a yawning chasm await him at the bottom. Toward the end I scarcely saw the paper on which I was writing; I am sure I saw nothing of the matter that I wrote. I said to myself, “Of course you will find that all this stuff is incoherent and meaningless when you get through.” But I waited passively till my hand should get through of its own accord, I made no endeavor to draw the rein upon it. Eventually it came to a standstill with a round turn. I was quite winded. I needed leisure in which to recover my equilibrium.

Merivale—of whose presence I had become oblivious—crossed over and began gathering the scattered sheets of paper from the table. The sight of him helped to bring me to myself.

“Well,” I said, “there it is. I don’t suppose you can read it. I got so excited I hardly knew what I was about.”

“That’s all right,” he answered reassuringly. “I’m much obliged to you for the trouble you’ve taken. But what,” he added abruptly, “but what is all this that you have written?”

“Why, what do you fancy? The music, of course, that you asked me to.”

“No, no; I mean this writing, this text, with which you have wound up?”

“Writing? Text? What are you driving at?”

“Why, here—this,” he said handing me the paper.

“Mercy upon me!” I exclaimed, thoroughly amazed. “I was not aware that I had written any thing.”

The last half dozen pages were covered with written words—blotted, scrawling, scarcely decipherable, but unmistakably written words.

“Well, certainly, this is most astonishing. Whatever it is, I have written it unawares.”

I dropped the manuscript and leaned back in my chair, dumbfounded by this latest development.

“Here,” said Merivale, “is the point where the music ends and the words begin.”

The music ended, the words began, just at that point where last night the shriek of malevolent laughter had interfered with the current of melody. From that point to the bottom of the last page not another bar of music was discernible—not a note of the incomprehensible witches’ chorus—simply words, words that I dared not read.

“This is magic, this is ghost-work,” I said. “It appalls me. Look at it, Merivale. Does it make sense? Or is it simply a mass of scribbling without rhyme or reason?”

“Ye-es,” rejoined Merivale slowly, “it seems to make sense. The penmanship is pretty blind, but the words appear to hang together. It begins, ‘I walked re—re—reluctantly’—next word very bad—’I walked reluctantly—reluctantly—away’—oh yes, that’s it—’away—from the house. By Jove, this is singular! Shall I go on?”

“Yes, go on,” I said faintly. There was panic in my heart.

Merivale continued, picking his way laboriously. The following is what he read.