"Exactly; you shall therefore have sufficient time to think about us. As you have not control enough to fasten your mind on your own affairs, we must indulge your weakness by giving it plenty of room."
Then he pointed to my page with his bow, and we went on quietly. I need not say we were alone. After my lesson, just before he proceeded to the next violin, he spoke again.
"You do not know, perhaps, what test you are about to endure. We shall have a concert next month, and you will play a first violin with me."
"Sir!" I gasped, "I cannot—I never will!"
"Perhaps you will change your note when you are aware who appointed you. It is no affair of mine."
"If you mean, sir, that it is the Chevalier who appointed me, I don't believe it, unless you gave your sanction."
He turned upon me with a short smile,—just the end of one,—and raised his delicate eyebrows. "Be that as it may, to-night we rehearse first, in the lesser hall; there will be nobody present but the band. The Chevalier will hold his own rehearsal the week after next, for there is a work of his on this occasion,—therefore we shall prepare, and, I trust, successfully; so that the polishing only will remain for him."
"Bravo, sir!"
"I hope it will be bravo; but it is no bravo at present," said he, in dismissing me.
I had never heard Anastase play yet, and was very curious,—I mean, I had never heard him play consecutively; his exhibitions to us being confined to short passages we could not surmount,—bar upon bar, phrase upon phrase, here a little, and there a very little. But now he must needs bring himself before me, to play out his own inner nature.