Despite the plans of Nicholas Rubinstein, his departure for Moscow, and, by consequence, that of the under-teacher, was delayed for some weeks; and it was only on the evening of October 2d that Ivan, with all his earthly belongings in the two valises beside him, and his whole fortune—forty roubles—in his pocket, stood by his companion in front of the Petersburg station in Moscow, waiting for a droschky and looking once more upon the lights and many-colored domes of his native city.
Three hours later, in a comfortable little room on the third floor of a dingy house of the Brionsovskaia, three men, who had been lingering over a hearty supper, rose to their feet, glasses in hand, to repeat the toast just suggested by the youngest of the trio:
"To the Conservatoire of Moscow—and her director: the friend and benefactor of all Russian musicians,—Nicholas Rubinstein!"
The first six words rang out from three voices; but before the rest the oldest man put down his glass, laughing as he said:
"You prevent my drinking, Ivan Mikhailovitch. No. Let the rest of the toast be: 'to the friendship of the three who inhabit this apartment: thou Boris, and thou Ivan,—star of the future, and finally my old, plain self!'"
Boris Shrâdik, the young violinist who formed the third inmate of the Rubinstein apartment, quickly seized the speaker by the right hand, while Ivan grasped his left; and then the younger men, setting down their glasses, clasped hands across the small table.
There was an instant's silence. Then the glasses were drained, and Ivan, to whom the evening had brought many a throb of sentiment, walked away to the window for a moment, while even Rubinstein loudly cleared his throat.—They are an emotional people, these musicians; and, despite the pettiness which success seems to raise in them, they are, in private life, genial and generous, and intensely loyal to their kind.
It was not wonderful that the youngest professor of the Conservatoire speedily made himself at home in his new abode. Moscow might hold many sad memories for him; but it was the place which must always be his home, after all. For where the first years of childhood are spent, there, however humble the place, are rooted deep some of the soul's loveliest plants: there rest associations of love and of joy far more powerful, more unforgettable, than any that can be made in after life: and these make a consecration recognized by the most careless, the most unsentimental of us all. Ivan, indeed, rejoiced daily that he had not to begin life again in a strange city. But he soon perceived that he had formed an astonishingly mistaken notion of what that life was to be. He had believed it would bear a strong resemblance to the existence he had been leading for the past years: so many afternoon hours among students—this time as teacher, instead of pupil; so many for rest, meals, exercise; the rest of the time spent in quiet solitude, at his own beloved work.
Two thirds of this programme he did, indeed, carry out; though not without constant difficulties in escaping those friendly spirits who would have kept him for hours at a time over a meal, out of sheer conviviality. And it was three weeks or more before the absent-minded dreamer became convinced of the hopelessness of attempting his own work in that particular atmosphere. For Ivan was of a type, fortunately rare, which demands a large amount of daily solitude. Loneliness he might dread—and bear. But isolation during his working hours he must have, at whatever price. And to expect isolation in Nicholas Rubinstein's apartment, was, truly, to cry for the moon. Regularly, all day, the little living-room overflowed with visitors; nor did any of these hesitate to comply with any requested musical exhibition, despite the fact that, during eight hours of the working day, the apartment resounded with violin exercises emitted from the bedroom of young Shrâdik. Even this was not all; for the house was in the heart of the musicians' quarter. And all day, from apartments below, from rooms above, came an endless banging, shrieking and caterwauling from embryonic tenori and virtuosi, such as, within a month, would have cured all but the most persistent music-lovers of any further desire for the expression of that abstract art.