XIII.
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.